Speakers

Dean A. Connor was appointed President & Chief Executive Officer, Sun Life Financial on December 1, 2011, and is a member of the company’s Board of Directors.

Dean joined Sun Life in 2006 and held a series of roles prior to his current appointment, including head of Sun Life’s Canadian Operations, and Chief Operating Officer. Dean joined Sun Life following 28 years at Mercer Human Resource Consulting, where he rose to be President for the Americas.

On December 2, 2020, Dean announced his intention to retire in August 2021. On February 15, 2021, Dean relinquished his role as President. He will remain Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Directors until his retirement.

Dean serves on the Board of the Business Council of Canada, as a Trustee for the University Health Network in Toronto, and as a member of the Ivey Advisory Board and the Asia Business Leaders Advisory Council. He also Chaired the 2017 United Way campaign for Toronto and York Region, and Toronto Rehabilitation Institute’s ‘Making Incredible Happen’ campaign.

Dean is a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries and the Canadian Institute of Actuaries. He holds an Honours Business Administration (HBA) from the Ivey School of Business at Western University. Dean was named Canada’s Outstanding CEO of the Year for 2017® and Ivey’s Business Leader of the Year for 2018.

Kevin D. Strain is currently President and Chief Financial Officer of Sun Life. Kevin assumed the role of President on February 15, 2021 and is a member of the company’s Board of Directors. He will be appointed Chief Executive Officer in August 2021, upon current CEO Dean Connor’s retirement.

Kevin joined Sun Life in 2002 and has since held several senior roles, including Vice-President of Investor Relations for Sun Life’s Corporate Office, and Senior Vice-President of Sun Life’s Individual Insurance and Investments division in Canada.

In 2012, Kevin assumed the role of President, Sun Life Asia where he was responsible for Sun Life’s interests in Asia, including identifying opportunities for growth in the region and managing the company’s relationships with its partners.

In 2017, Kevin was appointed Chief Financial Officer and is responsible for Sun Life’s worldwide Finance, Taxation, Capital and Investor Relations, Enterprise Services and Corporate Development business groups.

Kevin is a Chartered Accountant and holds a Master of Accounting degree from the University of Waterloo in Canada.

Steve Peacher is President of SLC Management, Sun Life’s institutional investment management business, which counts the General Account of Sun Life among its clients. Steve is a member of the Sun Life Executive Team.

Steve joined Sun Life in 2009 and has more than three decades of investment management and credit experience in North American and international markets. This includes extensive experience managing teams, portfolios and research across a wide range of assets and strategies, including public and private asset classes, derivative markets and liability-driven investing.

Steve’s portfolio of work includes Head of Fixed Income and Liquidity Strategies at Columbia Management and over 15 years at Putnam Investments where he rose to Managing Director and Chief Investment Officer of the Credit Team. Earlier in his career, Steve spent time in the investment banking division at Dean Witter Reynolds (now part of Morgan Stanley).

Steve holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Virginia. He is a CFA Charterholder and a member of the Boston CFA society.

Sonny Kalsi is the CEO of BentallGreenOak (BGO) and is based in New York City. BGO is a global real estate investment and management platform with approximately $50 billion of assets under management. BGO has 24 offices worldwide (North America, Europe, and Asia) and over 1,300 employees. The firm manages investment strategies and properties in various asset and risk classes.

Sonny previously was a Founder of GreenOak Real Estate in 2010 and together with the team built the business organically to $12 billion of assets under management in 10 countries with over 100 employees. Before GreenOak, Sonny was Global Co-Head of Morgan Stanley’s Real Estate Investing (MSREI) business and President of the Morgan Stanley Real Estate Funds until 2009. At its peak, the platform had approximately $100 billion of assets under management in 33 countries. During his 18-year career at Morgan Stanley, Sonny spent almost 10 years in Asia and has lived and worked in six different locations around the world.

Sonny is a graduate of Georgetown University and continues to be very involved with the school. He has been cited by Private Equity Real Estate magazine as one of the “30 Most Influential” people in private equity real estate globally. Sonny is on the board of several charitable organizations including Teaching Matters, Room to Read, SparkYouth NYC, Asia Society, and the Hirshhorn Museum. He is a Trustee of the Spence School, board member of Oberoi Realty, and Georgetown University. He is also an Adjunct Professor at Columbia University in the Master of Real Estate Program.

John Carrafiell is a major shareholder and member of the Management Committee of BentallGreenOak, a leading, global investment management and advisory firm with over $50 billion in AUM and 24 offices in 12 countries. John was a Founder of GreenOak Real Estate in 2010 and together with the team built the business organically to $12 billion (USD) of assets under management in 10 countries with over 100 employees prior to its 2019 merger with Bentall Kennedy (owned by Canada headquartered leading financial institution, Sun Life). Based in London, John is the Firm’s Senior Managing Partner having oversight responsibility for BentallGreenOak’s European and UK businesses and is a member of the firm’s Investment Committees globally.

John is a member of the board (as Observer) of privately-held Lineage, the world’s largest Cold Storage company. From 2011, John was the sole advisor to the New York State Common Retirement Fund on their 51% stake in Shugard (Europe’s largest self storage company) and served as their appointed board director and Audit Committee member from its IPO until February 2019. From 2004-2010 John was a member of the board, Chairman of the Audit Committee and Chairman of the Operating Committee of Canary Wharf, the leading developer and owner of the London office district. John was a member of the board of several other publicly listed European companies including Netherlands-based pan-European REIT Corio and Germany-based DIC. He is also a former director of the Executive Board of the European Public Real Estate Association (EPRA, the equivalent of NAREIT). John currently serves as a member of the Board and Chairman of the Audit Committee of Klepierre, one of Europe’s largest REITs with a €22 billion portfolio of retail assets.

John is a 34-year Private Equity, Corporate Finance and Real Estate veteran (32 years based in London and Europe). He became Head of European Real Estate for Morgan Stanley in 1994 (at the age of 29) and rose during a 22-year career to be Head of Global Real Estate (both principal investing with $100 billion of AUM, and Investment Banking) and to serve as a member of the Morgan Stanley Investment Banking Division’s six-person Global Operating Committee in 2005. Among many notable transactions, the IPO, take-private, and re-IPO of Canary Wharf, which John led, was, at $10 billion of gross assets, the largest-ever transaction of its type in Europe and resulted in exceptional returns for its investors over a decade of stewardship, including navigating the Great Financial Crisis.

John is a former Trustee of the Urban Land Institute (ULI) and member of its Finance and Endowment Committee. John is the co-Chairman of the Yale School of Architecture Dean’s Council. John is the Chairman of the Chelsea & Westminster Hospital Foundation Trust Development Board. He is a member of the Board of Overseers of the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Design & Architecture and the Tate Modern Acquisitions Committee in London. John graduated Yale University with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Philosophy.

Werner is the Chief Executive Officer of InfraRed Capital Partners. He is focused on strategy and driving the evolution and growth of the business. He has been closely involved in selecting and monitoring infrastructure and real estate investments for over 20 years as a member of InfraRed’s Investment Committees.

Before joining the business in 1995, then known as Charterhouse Bank, he held roles in real estate investment, corporate finance and private equity in the USA and Germany. As Joint Chief Executive of Charterhouse Bank Werner, together with some of the current senior InfraRed team members, restructured the Bank into a private equity investment business focused on infrastructure and real estate. Werner led the business following its acquisition by the HSBC Group in 2000 and, in 2011, was principally responsible for its spin-out to form InfraRed as an independent, management-owned investment platform. In 2019 he led the initiative that resulted in InfraRed being acquired by Sun Life and becoming its infrastructure equity investment arm.

Werner holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration and Economics from the University of St. Gallen.

Chris joined InfraRed in 2008 as Deputy Chief Executive. In this role he is responsible for the day-to-day management of the business, including oversight of the Finance and Tax, Risk and Compliance functions. Chris is a member of InfraRed’s Investment Committees across the business.

Chris originally joined Midland Bank (later acquired by the HSBC Group) in 1981. Initially focused on project finance, Chris has had extensive involvement with a variety of leverage, structured and cash flow-based financings in multiple international jurisdictions. Between 1991 and 2002, he held a series of credit roles, including Head of Credit Risk Management for the HSBC Group in London. He also sat on the board and investment committee of HSBC Private Equity Europe (now Montagu Private Equity). From December 2003 to August 2008, Chris was responsible for HSBC’s global private equity investment activities and sat on the boards and investment committees of HSBC’s private equity businesses in Asia, the Middle East, USA and Canada and a number of third-party funds. Jointly with Werner, Chris had a key role in the spin-out of the business from HSBC in 2011.

Chris has a bachelor’s and a master’s degree in Finance from the University of Loughborough.

Mark Attanasio is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Crescent Capital Group LP supervising the firm’s public and private market activities. He is also Chairman and Principal Owner of the Milwaukee Brewers Baseball Club.

Crescent is a thirty-year old alternative asset manager with approximately $30.7 billion in assets under management and 200 employees. Prior to co-founding Crescent, Mr. Attanasio worked in the High Yield Bond Department at Drexel Burnham Lambert during the formative stages of the public high yield market.

Mr. Attanasio holds positions on several not-for-profit boards, including Heal the Bay, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), LA2028, and Harvard-Westlake School (“H-W”). In addition, Mr. Attanasio served on the President’s Leadership Council at Brown University for a decade and is a member of the Student Life Visiting Committee at MIT. He is currently Chairman of the Investment Committee for Major League Baseball (MLB), as well as a member of the Executive Council. He is also the co-Chairman of the Investment Committee for LACMA and H-W.

Mr. Attanasio received an A.B. from Brown University and a J.D. from Columbia University School of Law.

Mr. Chapus is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Crescent supervising the firm’s public and private credit market activities. As co-founder, he helped develop Crescent’s guiding investment philosophies in mezzanine, high yield, senior loans, European lending, special situations and other credit strategies, and as a result, Crescent has become a globally recognized leader in offering credit solutions to growth industries and the private equity community. Additionally, Mr. Chapus has been instrumental in establishing the firm’s private market investment activities as one of the largest and longest-standing platforms investing in private-equity led acquisitions worldwide.

Previously, Mr. Chapus was Group Managing Director of The TCW Group, Inc., co-managing TCW’s Leveraged Finance Group, and prior to TCW was an investment banker and capital markets professional.

Mr. Chapus is a current and former member of the board of numerous companies and institutions. Mr. Chapus received his MBA and AB in Economics from Harvard University.

Tom Murphy drives the global business strategy for SLC Management’s institutional business.

Tom joined SLC Management in 2018 with 20 years of experience at Mercer where he most recently held the position of Senior Partner. In his current role, Tom leads the teams responsible for business development, consultant relations, client service, product development, and marketing for Canadian and U.S. insurance and pension asset management. Tom also oversees the International Investment Centre that manages Sun Life’s relationships with investment managers around the world.

Tom’s portfolio of work includes numerous leadership positions at Mercer including heading the U.S. Wealth Business, U.S. DC and Financial Wellness Business, and U.S. and European OCIO Businesses. During his time with Mercer, he worked in Ireland, the UK and the U.S. and served on their Irish, UK, European, North American and Global Executive Investment Leadership teams.

Tom graduated from University College Dublin with a degree in Economics and Statistics and subsequently qualified as a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries. Tom also has an MBA from the Smurfit School of Business, Dublin Ireland.

Randy is CIO for Sun Life since 2016 and leads SLC Management’s insurance business with $119 billion in assets under management (AUM). Randy is Executive Sponsor of SLC Management’s Sustainable Investment Program, and a member of Sun Life’s International Sustainability Council responsible for implementing the global sustainability plan.

Randy joined Sun Life at the start of 2016 and has more than three decades of investment management expertise at highly-respected global financial firms. Randy has held senior roles at Deutsche Asset & Wealth Management, most recently as Global Head of Insurance and Pension Solutions and as Head of Asset and Wealth Management for the UK region.

Previously, he was Co-Chief Investment Officer of Deutsche Asset Management, responsible for a global investment staff of 750 and total assets of $1.2 trillion. Before the integration of Deutsche’s asset management and wealth management businesses, Randy was the head of its investment business managing money for insurance companies, with more than $200 billion of assets under management.

Randy’s portfolio of work also includes senior roles in trading at BlackRock and Morgan Stanley & Company and Salomon Brothers.

Randy holds Bachelor of Science and Master of Engineering degrees, both in Electrical Engineering, from Cornell University. He also earned an MBA from Cornell University's Johnson Graduate School of Management, where he was a Lester B. Knight Scholar.

Marlene Van den Hoogen is Chief Financial and Operating Officer for SLC Management.

Marlene joined SLC Management in April 2019 and has over 22 years of broad financial experience, primarily in leadership positions. In her current role, Marlene leads the teams responsible for financial management and reporting, the risk and control framework and the middle and back office operations across the firm. She is a strategic partner to the business, supporting the alignment of strategy and financial plans.

Marlene joined Sun Life in 2011 as Vice-President, Actuarial Reporting and Analysis, managing the presentation of actuarial management information for Sun Life globally. Most recently Marlene held the position of Treasurer and Head of Capital Planning for Sun Life, where she led the firm’s global capital planning and management function, capital market actions and treasury operations. She was also responsible for managing bank and rating agency relationships.

Marlene’s portfolio of work also includes Vice-President and Chief Risk Officer for BMO Insurance. Marlene also held senior roles at TD Insurance, and Tillinghast-Towers Perrin.

Marlene has a Bachelor of Commerce with a major in Finance from Queen’s University and has a Post Degree Diploma in Actuarial Science from the University of Waterloo. She is a Fellow of the Canadian Institute of Actuaries as well as a Fellow of the Society of Actuaries. Marlene Van den Hoogen Chief Financial & Operating Officer, SLC Management

Leigh Chalmers is the Senior Vice-President, Head of Investor Relations and Capital Management. In this role, Leigh leads Sun Life’s engagement strategy with investors, analysts, ratings agencies and other key external stakeholders. She is also responsible for the Company’s treasury operations, capital planning and capital optimization strategies.

Leigh joined Sun Life in 2017 as Senior Vice-President & Chief Auditor, where she played an integral role in shaping and enhancing Sun Life’s global audit team and strategy.

Prior to Sun Life, Leigh was an Assurance Partner and Chief Inclusion Officer at PwC. With over 20 years of experience specializing in insurance and banking, Leigh has a broad range of expertise in providing audit and advisory services to the financial service industry.

Engaged in her community, Leigh is a member of the Board of Directors of the Granite Club using her financial expertise on various Committees including the Audit, Insurance and Risk Committee as well as the Pension Committee. In addition, Leigh was a director for 6 years for the Canadian Children’s Book Centre where she was Board Treasurer and a member of the Executive Committee providing support and advice to the management of the charity. She is also a member on the Smith School of Business Advisory Board.

Leigh is a Chartered Professional Accountant. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from Queen’s University.