Tim Dieppe retires from sustainable fund firm WHEB to take Christian ministry role

Tim Dieppe, fund manager and partner at the WHEB Listed Equity business and fund manager of the WHEB Sustainability Fund, is retiring in April to take on a role in Christian ministry.

Dieppe was a key member of the SRI team that was made redundant by Henderson Global Investors in late 2011 – along with George Latham and Seb Beloe and others.

The multi-thematic global equity fund he runs is modelled on Henderson’s Industries of the Future fund, which Dieppe ran from 2005-2011. All told, the team has £120m under management as at the end of last year.

Going forward, the fund will be run by Ted Franks, the WHEB partner, who has been co-manager with Dieppe for some time. Franks has been with WHEB since 2009 and was a member of the original team that launched the Sustainability Fund in June that year.

“It’s the logical way to take it forward,” Latham, Managing Partner and Chief Investment Officer, told RI. He said the team has been recruiting recently, taking on Ben Kluftinger, for example, the former Macquarie Equity Research and Citigroup Equity Research analyst.

Dieppe, who has a degree in Mathematics with Computation from Oxford University, has been studying theology and will devote himself to Christian ministry. He sits on the advisory group of the Westminster Theological Centre, an evangelical group whose directors include former Zurich Insurance executive Chris Gillies. He’s also actively involved with the Trinity Church in north London.The team’s external advisory group includes Jamie Arbib, the founder of grant-maker Tellus Mater and Clare Brook, the WHEB co-founder and ex-Henderson SRI head who’s now Finance Director of the Blue Marine Foundation.

Also on the panel are Geoff Hall, the former Allianz Insurance CIO and Nick Robins, the former Head of the Climate Change Centre of Excellence at HSBC who is Co-Director of a UNEP Inquiry into the Design of a Sustainable Financial System. Rounding out the group are Phineas Glover, Senior Advisor at the Investor Forum, and Rachel Crossley, the SRI industry stalwart currently involved with the Global Impact Investing Network and the Access to Nutrition Foundation.

WHEB was co-founded in 2002 by Ben Goldsmith, whose latest venture is the listed energy efficiency trust Menhaden Capital Management.
WHEB runs Menhaden’s listed equities allocation, its first separate account mandate.

Separately, WHEB’s private equity group has been bought out by management and rebranded. WHEB Partners has become Alpina Partners; it has also announced the final closing of its latest fund, a €140m offering.

Alongside existing investors, the European Investment Fund, British Business Bank, Hermes GPE and investors managed by RobecoSAM – new investors include Access Capital, Akina, BMO Global Asset Management, M&G Private Funds Investment and SWEN. Alpina, which has offices in Munich and London, will continue to manage all WHEB Partners’ private equity funds.