Jonathan Kestenbaum
Jonathan Kestenbaum is Chief Executive of NESTA, The National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts.
With assets under management of £350million, NESTA is the largest endowment in the UK exclusively dedicated to fostering innovation. Jonathan previously worked as Chief of Staff to Sir Ronald Cohen, the Chairman of Apax Partners. Together with Sir Ronald, he built The Portland Trust which developed a $500 million fund for small and medium sized businesses in the Middle East.
Raised in Japan by his American parents, Jonathan moved to the UK graduating from the LSE and Cambridge. He pursued further studies achieving an MA in Education and an MBA with distinction from the Cass Business School.
Early in his career, he built a large family commodity trading business which was a ring dealing member of the London Metal Exchange. The company was successfully sold in a management buy-out. Jonathan then moved to public service, becoming Chief Executive of the Office of the Chief Rabbi, Professor Jonathan Sacks. Together, they worked on a number of prize-winning publications, including the 1990 BBC Reith Lectures, The Persistence of Faith. In 1996 he was appointed Chief Executive of the UJIA, one of the largest voluntary organisations in the UK.
Jonathan is a trustee of a number of foundations and a Board member of the Design Council; the UK's Technology Strategy Board; the Royal Shakespeare Company and Profero, a digital marketing company. He is a graduate of the Cabinet Office Top Management programme and the Strategic Agility programme at Harvard Business School. He has been an adviser to BAE Systems and was until recently Non-Executive Chairman of Quest, a large financial services firm.