Hamilton Lane appoints GC successor

Private markets investor Hamilton Lane has appointed Lydia Gavalis as deputy general counsel. Gavalis, who joins the firm having held a number of senior legal positions at SEI, is being lined up to take over from the firm’s current general counsel, Robert Cleveland, who is due to retire during 2017 after 16 years at the firm.

Gavalis has spent the last 10 years as general counsel of SEI’s “institutional investors” business and previously filled the GC role for a number of the firm’s different businesses, including SEI Private Trust Company and London-based SEI Investments (Europe).

Philadelphia-headquartered Hamilton Lane advises institutional investors on their private markets allocation, as well as running discretionary fund management programmes. It has a staff of more than 250 around the world and has more than $315 billion in total assets under management and “supervision”.

Commenting on Cleveland’s retirement, Mario Giannini, chief executive officer of Hamilton Lane, said: “Bob joined Hamilton Lane when we were only 49 employees, and the firm has benefited immensely from his unwavering, sound guidance as we've navigated the many stages of our evolution to become the industry-leading, global organization we are today.”