Operis, a leading advisor in project and infrastructure finance, has appointed Hilary Smart as an Associate Director in the Project Finance Team, focusing on Modelling.
Hilary has re-joined Operis, having spent several years as the Portfolio Analysis Manager at Bioenergy Infrastructure Group (BIG). She had responsibility for monitoring and valuing the long-term performance of its biomass and waste to energy plants.
Hilary said: “I am delighted to be back with the Operis team. Their combination of numerical agility, commitment to the task at hand and refusal to take themselves too seriously has always made them a pleasure to work with.”
During her time at BIG, Hilary developed expertise in using operational and monitoring models for projects with a longer lifespan than an on-time transaction. It made her determined to put the need of the long-term users of such models, who often do not have any significant modelling background, at the centre of model design.
Hilary added: “I’m excited to get stuck back into model audits which are still my first love on the modelling side. I hope to bring what I’ve learnt in my time away to our operational and monitoring model builds. I also look forward to helping to train the recruits that will join us later in the year. The mentoring and collaborative approach make Operis a great place to be part of.”
David Colver, founder and chairman of Operis, said: “It may come as a surprise to some that financial modelling now attracts enough interest to have become a spectator sport, with an annual world championship competition in the subject. The Operis team has been consistently ranked at or near the top of these tournaments, and its employees have taken individual first prizes on two occasions, second and third prizes on another. It was Hilary who gave Operis its first taste of success in these events when she won the 2013 competition, and I take great pleasure in welcoming her back to the Company.”
