FOUNDER

Mike is the founder of MLIW. Having spent the past 25 years working in London & Dubai trading in financial markets and consulting, he founded Highland Whisky Clan in 2023 and MLIW in 2025. Mike's family heritage is a combination of Scottish (Edinburgh) and Irish (Donegal), so has a deep-rooted connection with both countries that produce the best quality of whiskey in the world.

A happily married family man with two beautiful children, his wife and kids give him the enthusiasm and motivation to drive MLIW to be a global success — delivering a trustworthy, transparent experience to all MLIW clients.

SENIOR PARTNER

Vijay is a globally renowned professor of international business, and his involvement as a business mentr and advisor spans several decades. One of the top publishing scholars in business and management, his work appears in the Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Management Review and he has featured several times in Forbes, as an expert.

He has been involved in helping several startups including in the liquor and beverages industry, technology industry and consumer goods industry. He is a strategist and consultant and part of HWC family as a partner.

JUNIOR PARTNER

Vinny has extensive experience in the financial industry, before joining Mike at Highland Whisky Clan three years ago to work alongside the family-run team to build the brand and develop MLIW whiskey in Ireland.

Vinny was an active day trader, managing high-net-worth funds on behalf of his client base on both Forex & Cryptocurrency Exchange and Tangible assets.

GLOBAL COMMERCIAL DIRECTOR

Gora has proven expertise in brand development, sales force transformation, multi-state P&L leadership, and consumer-led product innovation. He is a visionary CXO-level leader with 30+ years of excellence in India’s alcohol beverage industry, driving transformation across premium, mass, and country liquor segments. Renowned for building high-performing organizations, launching categorydefining brands, and steering exponential growth across regulated and diverse markets. His key strengths are transforming traditional markets into branded ecosystems, launching award-winning innovations like Shuddh – India’s first “natural” country liquor, and consistently surpassing volume, profitability, and market share targets.

GLOBAL MARKETING DIRECTOR

Mikey Hoban is a seasoned marketing expert with 20 years of experience across both direct-to-consumer and business-to-business marketing, advertising, PR, brand strategy, global market entry and expansion. He has held senior leadership roles within Australia’s largest D2C eCommerce group, contributing to the rapid growth of leading online wine marketplace Vinomofo. In the UK, Mikey served as Global Head of Marketing for blur Group, a £580m market-cap SaaS platform, where he led global brand expansion and user acquisition initiatives. Today, he specialises in digital advertising, brand development, content, and social media strategy for MLIW & HWC.