Business & Technology
Unity Advisory appoints Marc Lien as Chief AI Officer
Unity Advisory has appointed Marc Lien as chief AI officer as the firm reaches 100 employees.
Lien will also join the board and founding leadership team. He will work with chief executive Marissa Thomas, chair Steve Varley and the wider leadership group on the technology and delivery set-up behind the firm’s AI-focused advisory model for chief financial officers.
The appointment brings a senior financial services and consulting executive to a young advisory firm building its offering around artificial intelligence. The hire coincides with the headcount milestone, signalling growth in a market where finance leaders are under pressure to improve efficiency, reporting and deal execution.
Lien was most recently a senior advisor at Warburg Pincus, where he advised deal teams and portfolio companies on AI-led value creation. Before that, he spent 11 years at Lloyds Banking Group, where he led the UK’s largest credit-card franchise and served as chief executive of MBNA.
Earlier in his career, he spent 12 years at McKinsey & Company and holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Unity Advisory describes itself as a CFO advisory firm focused on mid-market organisations. It combines finance, tax and deals work in a single model and operates without an audit practice, which it says removes conflicts that can affect larger professional services firms.
The company is backed by Warburg Pincus, where Lien most recently held an advisory role. That connection gives the appointment added significance, linking the firm’s investor base with an executive brought in to shape how AI is used across the business.
Thomas linked the appointment to the company’s growth. “It’s a pleasure to welcome Marc at such an important moment for the business. He brings experience that aligns closely with how we are building, combining strong advisory thinking with the ability to deliver and scale practical solutions,” she said.
She also highlighted the workforce expansion. “We’re also reaching an important milestone as we welcome our 100th colleague. In a short space of time, we’ve built a high-quality team and strong momentum, driven by the work underway and the demand we’re seeing from clients,” Thomas said.
Career background
Lien’s background spans consulting, banking and private equity, areas that increasingly overlap as firms assess how AI could reshape operations and advisory work. His experience in consumer finance at Lloyds and MBNA may also be relevant for a business advising finance chiefs balancing investment demands with pressure on costs and controls.
Professional services firms have been racing to define AI strategies, but approaches vary widely. Some have focused on internal tools to improve staff productivity, while others are trying to redesign client work and delivery processes around automation and data models.
Unity Advisory is positioning itself in the latter camp. In comments released alongside the appointment, Lien drew a distinction between adding AI tools to established workflows and building an advisory firm around the technology from the outset.
“Most AI in professional services today is cosmetic, with a model dropped on top of the old way of working. Unity has been designed so AI is the runtime of the firm, not a layer bolted on. Across banking, consulting, and PE, it’s the first firm I’ve seen designing the right way from the ground up,” Lien said.
The hire suggests Unity Advisory wants AI leadership represented at the top of the organisation rather than treated as a support function. By placing Lien on the board and in the founding leadership team, the firm is tying technology design directly to its operating model and client delivery.
That approach stands out in a sector where many firms still place AI responsibility within innovation teams or technology departments. At Unity Advisory, the role appears embedded in the core management structure as the company expands its workforce and builds out its offer to the Office of the CFO.
Lien will help shape the technology and delivery architecture behind that model. As he put it, the firm was “designed so AI is the runtime of the firm, not a layer bolted on”.
The British supermarket chain Iceland closed its high street shop in Sheep Street, Bicester, in 2024.
Since the company’s Food Warehouse stores opened in the nearby Launton Road Retail Park, the site has remained vacant.
Now, Allen Planning Limited, acting on behalf of an applicant, wants to alter the front of the ground floor shop front to attract a new commercial tenant.
It submitted plans to Cherwell District Council, the planning authority seeking what it called the creation of ‘minor external alterations’ which would ‘not adversely impact the design of the building or the wider visual amenities of the area’.
READ MORE:
Amendments include a white render band in place of signage, slimline aluminium windows, a glazed fanlight, a new aluminium double door with fanlight, and a separate aluminium entrance door to the first floor, as previously approved under plans.
Changes to the two upper floors have already been approved, including installing replacement windows and five new infill panels.
The site sits within the Bicester Conservation Area, which is also within the newly pedestrianised ‘Sheep Street’ character area, which is characterised by predominantly three-storey buildings facing onto the main shopping street.
Comments are due until July 2 and the planning authority is set to make a decision by July 24.
SOFIAH NICHOLE SALIVIO
News Editor
CyberCube has partnered with Affinity Marketplace to integrate cyber insurance quoting into a single broker workflow, targeting the SME cyber insurance market.
The partnership combines Affinity Marketplace’s quoting process with CyberCube’s Broking Manager software, which provides information on a client’s cyber risk profile. The integrated setup is designed to help brokers discuss financial exposure and compare risk transfer options without leaving the same system.
SME cyber insurance has been held back by a lack of specialist knowledge, the challenge of explaining technical risk to smaller businesses, and the time brokers need to place cover. The integrated process is intended to reduce those points of friction for generalist brokers and their clients.
CyberCube’s Broking Manager generates reports on company-specific financial exposure, along with benchmarking data on policy limits and cover structures. Affinity Marketplace provides the digital environment where brokers can obtain automated quotes.
Nate Brink, Head of Broker Sales & Account Management at CyberCube, said the model addresses both economic and training challenges in the market.
“This strategic relationship between CyberCube and Affinity Marketplace solves the margin and education crunch that has long plagued the SME cyber insurance sector. By automating the quoting process directly alongside actionable exposure data within the same workflow, brokers can instantly demonstrate real risk without using complex technical jargon,” Brink said.
The approach allows brokers to stay within one system from the initial client discussion through to quotation. It also presents cyber risk in business terms that smaller companies can relate to when deciding whether to buy insurance and how much cover to take.
Founded in 2023, Affinity Marketplace focuses on digital distribution for specialty insurance. Its platform connects brokers and agents with managing general agents, carriers, and technology providers across quoting, binding, renewals, and carrier connectivity.
Andrew Suesserman, Co-founder of Affinity Marketplace, said: “Affinity Marketplace is all about giving brokers the tools they need to scale efficiently, and this collaboration with CyberCube does exactly that. We’ve combined rapid, automated cyber quoting with clear risk diagnostics in a single environment. This removes the complex jargon that usually stalls SME sales and gives generalist brokers the confidence to advise on exposures and limits like seasoned cyber specialists. We can’t wait to see our brokers leverage this to unlock new, highly profitable growth.”
Broker response
Wholesure, which uses the combined setup, said the integration has changed how its brokers and retail agents handle SME cyber placements. The brokerage cited a shortage of cyber specialists across the market as a barrier to broader take-up among smaller businesses.
Kevin Merchant, National Cyber Practise Leader at Wholesure, said: “With too few cyber specialists in the market today, closing the critical SME protection gap has felt like an uphill battle. Combining Affinity Marketplace with CyberCube has been an absolute game changer for our brokers, retail agents, and the insureds we protect. By utilizing Affinity Marketplace, our brokers gain instant access to seamless, efficient cyber quotes, eliminating the traditional friction of the placement process. Coupled with CyberCube’s robust financial loss impact and benchmark reports, our retail agents are equipped with the exact data-driven storytelling tools they need to educate insureds. We can present small business owners with clear, quantified evidence of their true financial exposure and show them how their peers are structuring their risk transfer.”
CyberCube was established within Symantec in 2015 and has operated as an independent company since 2018. It provides cyber risk analytics software to insurance institutions and has offices in San Francisco, New York, Chicago, London, and Tallinn.
The partnership is available through the Affinity platform.
David Lincoln who lives in Barton, said delivery problems have been ongoing for around five years.
The 73-year-old said: “You get it, then it goes away, then it starts again. It’s beyond a joke and getting ridiculous.”
Residents receive emails apologising for “resourcing issues” at the Oxford East delivery office.
But, Mr Lincoln claims two staff are still sent out on rounds and “take it in turns” to prioritise parcels one week, with letters left to the following week.
He said he has waited longer than his bank’s specified timeframe for a new card and missed hospital appointments because of delayed letters.
READ MORE: Oxford private school adds compulsory addition to curriculum
With multiple health conditions, he says the uncertainty around when post will turn up is causing “growing anxiety”.
A Royal Mail spokesperson said: “We know how important it is for letters to arrive on time, particularly where they relate to hospital appointments.
“Our latest results show 92 per cent of letters arrive on time and more than 99% arrive within a week. However, some delivery offices can be temporarily affected by local issues such as sick absence.
“We list areas experiencing temporary disruption on our service updates page, which includes Oxford East Delivery Office. We are working to get services back to normal and, where mail is delayed, we aim to deliver it the following day.”
-
Crime & Safety4 weeks agoRyan Bridge speaks of London arrest after Oxford incident
-
Oxford News3 weeks agoOxfordshire families invited to free day of fun in Bicester
-
UK News4 weeks agoRussian threats against Baltics ‘unacceptable’ and danger to ‘our entire union’, EU’s von der Leyen says – Europe live | Europe
-
Crime & Safety3 weeks agoPhotos as 1979 Pontiac Firebird ‘bursts in flames’ at Tesco
-
Business & Technology3 weeks agoNew ‘high-quality’ mushroom business launched in Oxford
-
Crime & Safety4 weeks agoNew video call system to help domestic abuse victims
-
Oxford News4 weeks agoOxfordshire Lib Dems lose another councillor amid ‘serious concerns’
-
Oxford News4 weeks ago80s singing legend backs village bid to save UK pub