Tara Waters

Ashurst Digital Ventures

Ashurst corporate partner Tara Waters started her career as a web developer in New York before jumping into law. After moving to London in 2009 to work as a corporate finance associate at Allen & Overy, she joined Ashurst, where her client base was launching venture arms to inject cash into unicorn companies. From that point, Waters set out on a mission for herself to broaden the scope of innovation within the firm. The result is her new role as co-CEO of Ashurst Digital Ventures, a development and investment arm launched in 2019 that will market technology products to clients.

The business is part of Advance, a global tent-pole pulling together the disparate strands of the firm’s New Law service delivery. Thanks to her team’s efforts, last year it was elevated to practice, meaning it will garner significant investments.

Waters’ ambition stretches to making an impact on traditional legal services, having orchestrated the debut of a venture capital team within the corporate practice to support early-stage companies as they deal with regulatory and hurdles affecting their business trajectory. In this respect, she helped launch a new accelerator programme for up to 30 fintech companies to ensure the firm can secure clients among the big companies of the future. She is currently overseeing the launch of Venture’s first product and filling the ranks of its software development team.