Advisory Board

John J. Law

Managing Director & Chief Risk Officer for HSBC in Italy & President of The British Chamber of Commerce for Italy

John was born in Leicester on 7th April 1958 and was educated at Ratcliffe College and the University of Manchester, where he read English Language & Literature.  He joined the Barclays Group in 1980 where he became an Associate of the Chartered Institute of Bankers and, after a broad based training programme, held various management positions in Barclays' Corporate & Investment Banking Division in London. In 1993 he gave in to pressure from his Italian wife, Simonetta, and moved to Rome as part of Barclays de Zoete Wedd's Structured Finance Division. He transferred to Milan in 1996 where he was Risk Director for Barclays Capital in Italy until 2002 when, faced with a return to London or a move to Hong Kong, he decided to prolong his love affair with Italy by changing banks. He has since worked at Deutsche Bank as their Chief Credit Officer and is now Managing Director & Chief Risk Officer for HSBC in Italy. John first joined the British Chamber of Commerce for Italy in 1998 and became a Councillor in 2009. He became President in June 2010.

John has two children - Andrew (aged 22) who recently graduated in English Literature at the University of Loughborough and is currently studying for a Masters in Management at Bath University and Emily (16) who is a pupil at the International School of Milan. His other interests outside work are centered around golf, rugby, literature and his family.

Massimo Cortinovis

Executive director and innovation manager of Connexia

Massimo is an ex-basketball coach who has been able to combine his passion for sports with his professional life. Born in 1965, after quitting his coaching job he decided to increase his own creativity and technical skills in a dynamic and innovative company: Esperia, a web agency founded in the years of the Internet boom. Convinced of the extraordinary power that sports can hold when used as a communication channel, of its universal language and its ability to emotionally involve both real and virtual audiences, Massimo Cortinovis then put together a team of highly specialized professionals, with an expertise in technology and consultancy, to manage customized communication, promotion and Web Streaming projects for major events. That is how Esperia became part of Gruppo Media Partners. Esperia was part of Visiant Group from 2001 to 2007, when it is finally integrated in Connexia.

Marco Frazzica

Partner at Legal firm de Berti Jacchia Franchini Forlani & General Consul (Honorary) of Sweden in Milan

Marco Frazzica was born in Ancona in 1959 and graduated in law (maxima cum laude) at the Bologna University in 1984. He started his professional career in 1985 joining the Milan firm Bergmann e Scamoni which then became, after successive mergers, CMS Adonnino Ascoli & Cavasola Scamoni.

After periods of practice as visiting foreign lawyer at Vinge in Gothenburg and at Baileys Shaw & Gillett in London he became, in 1992, partner of CMS Adonnino Ascoli & Cavasola Scamoni. In 2005 he joined as partner the firm de Berti Jacchia Franchini Forlani were he practices in the field of contractual consultancy, corporate and commercial law, including M&A and private equity.

In these sectors he assists several multinational companies and has also acquired specific competence in the industry sectors where his major clients are engaged, such as the automotive and the steel industries.

As a consultant to legal publisher Ipsoa-Francis Lefebvre, he contributed to the Memento Pratico Ipsoa-Francis Lefebvre, a classical reference book on commercial enterprises.

He was Vice-President of the International Business Law Commission of the International Young Lawyers Association (AIJA) as well as member of the Milan Bar Commission for International Relations.

Fluent in Swedish, he has been for many years member of the Board and then Chairman of the Italian-Swedish Chamber of Commerce-Assosvezia as well as member of the Board of Unionestere, the association of foreign chambers of commerce in Italy.

In 2002 he was appointed General Consul (Honorary) of Sweden in Milan with jurisdiction over Lombardy, Emilia Romagna and the provinces of Verona, Alessandria and Novara. Languages: English, Swedish and French.