Meet our Co-founder, Joel Perlman

Meet our Co-founder and Senior Managing Director, Joel Perlman and find out how his experience as an entrepreneur helped drive his mission to support underfunded businesses across the UK.

Empowering Britain's ambition

Joel Perlman is the Co-founder and Senior Managing Partner of OakNorth, the leading fintech business focused on powering the commercial economy of the future. He started his first business, Copal Partners, a financial research company, in 2002 with just $60k. Over 12 years, he and his Co-founder, Rishi Khosla, scaled it to a 3,000-employee organization across 13 markets, before selling it to Moody’s Corporation (NYSE: MCO) in 2014. They then set out to build their second business – OakNorth, a leading fintech bank.

Joel grew up in Bogota, Colombia. He began his career as a Consultant at McKinsey & Company and has degrees from the London School of Economics and Georgetown University.