Managing Director and Founder
Azita founded Eat Your Cake in January 2007. She developed the idea while doing her MBA at INSEAD in 2001. Her career path has given her a very sound understanding of the technology sector, having worked at some of the most successful companies in the space. She spent fours years at eBay UK, growing and nurturing the small business segment. She also built up relations with independent retailers and brought them on board to help them sell their excess stock on the site to improve their cash flow.
Prior to eBay Azita worked for two years at Dell Computers. At Dell she worked with the Southern European sales operations on reinforcing the classic Dell sales model. Before that, she spent a year at two tech start-ups in the heady dotcom era. Her first job was in strategy consulting at Braxton Associates.
But no one knows better than Azita that it’s not all about work. In 2002 she spent three months volunteering for a microfinance organisation in Costa Rica. In London she volunteers for an aspiring opera singer. Her favourite part of the world is the Andes, which she has explored with her Kenyan husband.
Azita studied Economics, French & German at Clare College, Cambridge. She speaks Urdu, Spanish, French and German and a touch of Dutch. Her family originates from Kashmir in the Himalayas.
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Associate Director
Olivia has over twenty years’ experience in communications, employer branding, recruiting and people development gained at global blue chip companies in the mining, engineering and reinsurance sectors. A consultant and trainer, she is passionate about finding creative and pragmatic solutions that enable individuals and organisations to tap into their strengths and derive maximum benefits from their working relationship.
Born and raised in the US, Olivia studied History at Yale. She did her MBA at the Helsinki School of Economics and has spent her working life in Finland, Switzerland and the UK. She speaks fluent Finnish. She is pursuing her dream of developing a portfolio of work projects so that she can devote time to writing and exploring other cultures.
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Advisory Board
Amer Vohora is Vice President at First Capital. The firm provides venture capital fundraising and corporate finance advice to high growth technology firms. Amer currently holds two roles in both First Capital and FirstVentures, the fund management arm of First Capital. FirstVentures advises FNI Venture Capital (Nixdorf family), an early stage fund investing into UK technology companies exploiting advanced materials.
Amer studied Manufacturing and Management at Cambridge University as a post-graduate and studied Manufacturing Engineering with Commerce at Birmingham University, including a year spent in Osaka, Japan.
He is a keen photographer and fly fisherman.
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Advisory Board
The first part of John’s career was spent in international marketing with a major oil company. Then, after a spell working for the Prince’s Trust Business he decided to set up his own business, John Goodhead Associates. He’s now been a business adviser and trainer for over 14 years. John believes he has assisted over 400 people into business (including Eat Your Cake) and given advice to around 1000 people.
The key activities involved in John’s business involve advising start-up and microbusinesses and giving training courses in business planning, marketing and the preparation of a market plan, record keeping and other areas of capacity building. Mentoring and advising social enterprises have recently been added to the list of activities. Recent experiences also include working and living in Albania, Kosovo and Zambia as a business adviser and trainer.
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