Former Baillie Gifford and Scottish Mortgage fund manager James Anderson has joined an investment management firm backed by the Agnelli Italian industrial dynasty.
Anderson has joined Lingotto Investment Management, an FCA-regulated firm managing £2.4 billion, owned by Exor N.V., a Dutch company owned by the Agnelli family.
Anderson recently left Edinburgh-based investment giant Baillie Gifford to become chairman of Swedish investment company Kinnevik AB.
Lingotto said in a statement Anderson will focus on his own specialist experience of investing in companies with innovation potential.
Edinburgh-based Anderson, 63, said he was “excited” to be joining Lingotto.
“The opportunity to be part of an entrepreneurial project that aligns with my own view of what investing should be was difficult to resist,” said Anderson.
“Lingotto brings together a highly attractive combination of autonomy and structured support, as well as colleagues of great calibre, and I look forward to playing my part in achieving their purpose.”
London-based Lingotto has also appointed former UK finance minister George Osborne as non-executive chair.
Lingotto CEO Enrico Vellano said: “It is a pleasure to welcome James and George to the team.
“To be able to attract leaders of their quality and experience is a testament to the ambition of Lingotto and our determination to build a great investment management company.”
In December, Anderson and his wife Morag made a gift of $100 million to Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies’ Europe campus in Bologna, Italy.
Johns Hopkins said the gift will allow the university to expand its SAIS Europe campus in Bologna “into an international hub for research and collaboration, bringing together leading academics and practitioners around the world to train the next generation of international experts, offer multidisciplinary solutions to global problems, facilitate scientific and technological research on public policies, and work towards peace and democratic development.”
Anderson is a 1981 SAIS Europe alumnus and longtime supporter of the school.
The $100 million gift was the largest-ever private contribution to a university in Italy.