Heldhand works with a wide variety of experts from accountants, legal advisors, software specialists, hardware engineers and PR and marketing professionals.  Key members of the team include:

Harry Holmwood - Managing Director

A degree in Computer Science and a series of IT consulting contracts led Harry to a join a start-up software developer in 1992, where he worked on a number of successful computer games for major clients such as Electronic Arts and Mindscape.

In 1994, he was approached by Sony to work on their forthcoming PlayStation games console. At Sony he worked with games publishers, developers and retailers across Europe to evangelise and support launch of PlayStation, the most successful games console of all time.

In 1996 Harry founded a games software development company with major clients such as Mattel, Sony and Eidos, taking it to profitability within 12 months on the back of a small private round of funding. In 1999, the company was listed on AIM with a valuation of around £20million, and went on to launch a well-known online gaming service which was sold in early 2001.

Shortly after this, Harry founded Heldhand as a strategic, financial and management consultancy focussed on the technology and media space.  Clients have included games developers and publishers, retailers, law and accounting firms, venture capital providers, turnaround specialists, animation houses, marketing and PR agencies and other companies needing support and advice to grow and prosper.

An expert in the video games and online sectors, he has appeared regularly on television and radio as well as in print across Europe and the USA, and periodically gives lectures on technology and business at industry and academic seminars.

He was also a director of the innovative peripherals manufacturer and games publisher In2Games.  Harry was brought into this 2-man startup to consult on business planning and financing in 2002, and was quickly offered a board position.  Harry was instrumental in taking the company through various financing rounds, heading up development and marketing, setting up and negotiating global distribution and launching successful products worldwide.  The company was sold to US group PDP in 2008, and Harry continues to advise PDP on development and commercial issues.

Laura Smith - Associate

After some years in Asia, including a period in Indonesia managing a language school, Laura returned to the UK to gain an M.Sc. in Computer Science.

This led to the field of project management, working on the design and implementation of top-end project management software, before joining Sony in 1995 where she was responsible for PlayStation development community communications.  In addition to this, she established PlayStation's web presence, running both developer and consumer-side online presence across all European territories. In the process, as well as becoming a Unix administrator, online marketing pioneer and project management expert, she gained valuable experience in the creative, technical and cultural challenges of managing complex global software projects across multiple teams, platforms and countries.

This global approach led her to online gaming site freeloader.com, where she was responsible for 16 staff covering customer support, web interface, content, statistic reporting, sales/marketing and Internet integration, server administration and security.

More recently, she was Chief Technical Officer at Infogrames, one of the world's largest videogames publishers, and reported to senior management on company profiles at technical, strategic and commercial levels. Current clients include Disney Interactive.