Spac advisory partners team

Lewis Silberman

Managing Director

Lew is the Managing Director of the SPAC Advisory Partners Team. He is also the Co-CEO and Director at GSR II Meteora Acquisition Corp, which successfully completed a business combination with Bitcoin Depot (BTM) in June 2023. Prior to joining the team, Lew served as the Co-President & Director at Graf Acquisition Corp. IV,  and was the Head of SPAC Equity Capital Markets at Oppenheimer. In that job, he led financings for Oppenheimer's  SPAC IPOs and business combination clients, managed all SPAC IPO clients (including a number of sponsor formation processes) and acted in an advisory or placement agent role for transactions, including Starton Therapeutics’ combination with Healthwell, Zapp’s combination with CIIG II, Rodgers Silicon Valley’s combination with Enovix, Alpha Healthcare’s combination with Humacyte, Switchback’s combination with ChargePoint, and Roth CH’s combination with PureCycle.

Lew has a Bachelor of Science degree with a dual major in finance and marketing and an MBA with a dual focus in financial markets and management from the Leonard N. Stern School of Business at New York University. He has also completed three New York City Marathons as a Member of Fred's Team to raise money for the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center. 

Gus Garcia

Managing Director

Gus is a Managing Director of the SPAC Advisory Partners Team. He is also the Co-CEO and Director at GSR II Meteora Acquisition Corp, which successfully completed a business combination with Bitcoin Depot (BTM) in June 2023. Prior to joining the team, Gus served as the Head of SPAC M&A at Bank of America Merrill Lynch, where he had a 19+-year investment banking career advising companies and SPACs on all aspects of merger transactions. He has advised on 14 closed SPAC transactions with approximately $20 Billion in negotiated equity since September, 2020. Additionally, he has worked on and overseen transactions with an excess of $150 billion across pipes, corporate separations and other mergers & acquisistions.

Prior to being the head of SPAC M&A, he led the separations practice for Bank of America, focusing on complex corporate transactions, such as spin-offs (including one of the top five largest spin-offs in corporate history), split-offs, reverse Morris trusts, carve-out IPOs and structured private capital raises. Prior to the merger with Bank of America, Gus worked at Merrill Lynch in the corporate finance group, focusing on complex corporate transactions as well as structured investments held on the bank's balance sheet in partnership with Merrill Lynch's Global Principal Investment Group.

Gus graduated Magna Cum Laude from Georgetown University with both a Bachelor of Science degree in business administration and a Masters of Science degree in international commerce & finance. He sits on the Board of Directors for New York Cares. 

Anantha Ramamurti

Managing Director

Anantha is a Managing Director of the SPAC Advisory Partners Team. He is also the President and Director at GSR II Meteora Acquisition Corp, which successfully completed a business combination with Bitcoin Depot (BTM) in June 2023. Prior to joining the team, Anantha served as the CFO at Graf Acquisition Corp IV. Prior to that, he was the head of the Global Mobility Group at Bank of America, where he covered clients in AutoTech and other emerging technologies. Anantha advised on several SPAC mergers, including the sale of Starton Therapeutics’ to Healthwell, the sale of Zapp to CIIG II, the sale of Spire Global to NavSight, acquisition of Lucid by Churchill IV, sale of Xos to NextGen, acquisition of EVgo by Climate Change Crisis I, sale of Proterra to ArcLight, sale of Lightning eMotors to GigCapital3, sale of ChargePoint to Switchback, sale of Canoo to Hennessy IV, and sale of Velodyne Lidar to Graf Industrial. He has led execution on over 65 transactions totaling over $80 billion in transaction value across all product areas, including equity offerings, debt issuances, SPAC mergers and other M&A advisory, over the banking career.

Prior to his careers in banking and finance, Anantha spent almost 12 years in various engineering roles at Rockwell Semiconductor Systems, Texas Instruments and several other technology firms, working on the design and development of semiconductor processor chips. He  holds four patents in the areas of design and development.

Anantha graduated with Honors from BITS, Pilani, India with a Bachelor of Engineering, received a Masters of Science with Honors in electrical engineering from the University of Pittsburgh, and received an MBA with Honors in finance from the UCLA Anderson School of Management. 

Yuya Orime

Senior Vice President

Yuya is the Senior Vice President of the SPAC Advisory Partners Team. He is also the Senior Vice President and Director at GSR II Meteora Acquisition Corp, which successfully completed a business combination with Bitcoin Depot (BTM) in June 2023. Prior to joining the team, Yuya served as a Director on the Bank of America Technology Investment Banking Team, where he covered clients in Industrials, TMT and Financials in the Tokyo office and AutoTech and Enterprise Software in the Palo Alto Office

Across his career, Yuya has led executions on over $50 billion in deal value across all products areas, including equity offerings, debt issuances and M&A advisory. He has also advised on several SPAC mergers, including the sale of Spire Global to NavSight, acquisition of Lucid by Churchill IV, sale of Xos to NextGen, acquisition of EVgo by Climate Change Crisis I, sale of Proterra to ArcLight, sale of Lightning eMotors to GigCapital3, sale of ChargePoint to Switchback, sale of Canoo to Hennessy IV, and sale of Velodyne Lidar to Graf Industrial. He has advised on several M&A transactions, including acquisition of Mulesoft and Tableau by Salesforce, among others, and has advised on several equity transactions, including Lucid Motor’s Convertible Note, ChargePoint’s Follow-on, Alteryx’s Convertible Note, Avalara’s Follow-on, Cardlytics’ IPO, Skylark’s IPO, and Japan Airline’s IPO.

Yuya graduated from the University of Southern California with a Bachelors of Science in business administration.