OakNorth taps Coconut founder Sam O’Connor to lead business banking unit
Sam O’Connor, former CEO and founder of the accounting and tax app-based solution Coconut, has announced his “new chapter” leading business banking for OakNorth Bank.
Sam O’Connor to lead business banking at OakNorth
Announced earlier this week, the UK-based challenger’s business banking offering will assign a business partner to mid-sized businesses generating revenues between £1 million and £100 million.
The partner with work with the bank’s clients to understand the full scope of their business needs and strategic objectives before directing them with “tailored information on OakNorth’s products and services”.
Targeting financially underserved founders, CFOs, CEOs and directors – or who CEO and founder Rishi Khosla describes as “the missing middle” – the offering is currently engaged in a phased beta, with prospective clients being encouraged to join a waiting list.
O’Connor joined the bank as a contracted advisor in May, before ascending to his current position of general manager of transaction banking in August.
“I’ve been working with the team for five months and have spoken to hundreds of mid-sized companies about their banking pain points, and future growth ambitions,” his LinkedIn statement reads, adding that the decision to take on the full-time role with the bank was “an easy one”.
Prior to OakNorth, O’Connor served as CEO of Coconut, an app-based offering formerly known as Monizo primarily built to help self-employed people manage their taxes, which he founded with his long-time business partner Adam Goodall in 2016.
The venture was ultimately acquired through an equity deal with GoSimpleTax in June.
O’Connor and Goodall also previously joined hands to launch the electronic audit confirmation solution ProConfirm in 2012. However, both exited when the solution was acquired by Confirmation, a US-based provider of online audit confirmation services, in July 2014.
