Alexander Kalis
Mr Alexander Kalis is the Managing Partner of Milltrust International LLP in the United Kingdom. He is a seasoned investment and business professional with an award-winning track record managing institutional capital. Prior to co-founding Milltrust, he was most recently Founder &amp; Managing Partner at Think Alternative Advisors LLP, an Emerging Markets research and advisory firm.
Alexander Kalis

MANAGING PARTNER

MILLTRUST INTERNATIONAL LLP

Alexander Kalis is the Managing Partner of Milltrust International LLP in the United Kingdom, which he co-founded in December 2010. At Milltrust, Mr Kalis is Group Head of Investments, Head of Sustainability & Impact.

As a passionate leader in the fight against climate change and in channelling private sector capital into profitable impact-driven investment solutions, Mr Kalis led Milltrust’s focus towards sustainable impact investments which the firm has fully embraced under its mantra of ‘Sustainable Prosperity’.

Mr Kalis serves as Portfolio Adviser and Chairman of the Investment Advisory Committee for The Climate Impact Asia Fund, a pioneering long-only environmental ESG impact equity fund which he initiated and launched in exclusive partnership with WWF-Hong Kong. Annualising over 24% since inception, the fund was nominated as a finalist for Best Impact Equity Fund by Investment Week Sustainable & ESG Investment Awards 2021 and was awarded the Environmental Finance Impact Awards for Impact Initiative of the Year 2020 as well as a nominated finalist for the Pension & Investments Brightest Idea Award 2020.

Mr Kalis is also the Co-Portfolio Manager of the top-performing Milltrust Global Emerging Markets Fund (ESG) and strategy, launched in 2012. The fund has won numerous awards including #2 Best Emerging Markets Fund for the year 2019 by Barclayhedge and has annualised over 10% since the inception of the strategy, delivering over 5% annualised alpha over the MSCI Emerging Markets Index.

Mr Kalis also serves on the investment committee of Milltrust’s Climate Impact, Agri Capital Markets and Future Health co-investor platforms and on the Future Health SPV, a venture capital fund seeking to tap into the secular growth trends in healthcare by investing in high potential companies with a focus on the science of ageing and technology that enables early detection and management of illness, leading to better outcomes in the key areas of immunisation, diagnostics, telehealth, medical devices, mental health, artificial intelligence and sustainable food & proteins.

Leveraging his multi-disciplinary experience, Mr Kalis was appointed an Independent Expert at EIT Climate-KIC in November 2019, Europe’s largest public-private partnership and supported by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT), with responsibilities for addressing climate change mitigation and adaptation, evaluating innovation and entrepreneurship project proposals and monitoring the progress, outcome and impact of these programmes.

Until the successful acquisition in November 2021 of Milltrust’s subsidiary and Agtech and Science-Focused adviser, Milltrust Agricultural Investments and associated investment funds, Mr Kalis served as the Portfolio Manager of The British Innovation Fund, an impact-driven venture capital fund investing in UK-wide university science and technology spin-outs and start-ups that have commercialised pioneering and protected IP emanating from world-class university research in the fields of healthcare, medical technology, life sciences, biotech, food-tech, sustainable protein, and agri-tech, offering real-world impactful solutions to some of the world’s biggest challenges. Mr Kalis was also the Portfolio Manager of the Milltrust Australia and New Zealand Buy & Lease Sustainable Agriculture Funds that focused on purchasing Australian and New Zealand farmland (real assets) and leasing these farms to regional and international operators, sustainably generating a range of agricultural produce across various crops, dairy and livestock.

Mr Kalis is a seasoned investment and business professional with a long track record managing institutional capital including two decades at top-tier asset management firms. Between 2007 and 2009, Mr Kalis was Portfolio Manager of the Optimal Asian Opportunities (Ireland) Fund (US$ 300m AUM). The Optimal Asian Opportunities (Ireland) Fund ranked one of the top 10 Asia Pacific funds during the Global Financial Crisis. Mr Kalis was previously overseeing Asia research at Edmond de Rothschild Asset Management in London between 2002-2007, exclusively dedicated to the Asian Capital Holdings Fund which grew from USD 200 million to USD 1.3 billion during his tenure. The fund achieved strong performance as one of the best performing Asia Pacific funds in the industry and won the award for Best Asian Fund by Eurekahedge in 2004. Immediately prior to co-founding Milltrust, he was Managing Partner at Think Alternative Advisors LLP, an Emerging Markets research and advisory firm he founded which was acquired by Milltrust International Group in 2010.

He is a frequent commentator at industry conferences and in the financial media. He speaks fluent English, French and Dutch, and holds a Master’s in Management from the Université Catholique de Louvain in Belgium.