Who We Are

Bellona Advisors are economic regeneration specialists – solely focused on accelerating the delivery of schemes that deliver high value employment, quality homes and decarbonised energy across the UK. 

Iain Thomson founded Bellona Advisors in 2021 after working for nearly two decades for listed, private, public sector and VCS organisations in a range of leadership and management roles.  We’re named after the Temple of Bellona in Rome, a strategically important part of the Roman Empire that brought together disparate interests to determine key decisions. This reflects our role in convening organisations with wildly differing motives and expectations to work together effectively.

Whilst we principally work with a number of real estate and energy clients, ultimately we’ll work with anyone that is driven by the mission to improve the UK’s productivity, increase the number and quality of its housing supply and reducing energy intensity and emissions from any form of operations. 

Iain’s experience includes promoting and delivering a number of major mixed-use real estate and energy projects across the UK, as well as strategy, funding and media work across the private, public and community sectors. This plurality of experience gives our clients with a unique and authentic perspective in delivering the greatest value from their projects.

Our Values: what clients can expect

  • Quality

    We have an underlying commitment to quality, using the best possible data and evidence available to inform our work.

  • Connection

    We help our clients to ‘join the dots’ in all of our work to help deliver the best possible outcome for them.

  • Honesty

    We are transparent and direct on the approach for all of our work and its cost.

  • Discretion

    We are extremely careful to maintain the hard-won reputations of our clients.

What people say about us

  • "I’ve worked with Iain as a colleague and client. He’s an exceptional operator; strategic, thoughtful, and well regarded by many in the sector for his insight, good counsel, knowledge, and ability to think outside the box. He’s determined, creative and considered with a good dose of humility and humour that makes him and engaging person to have alongside you. He can pitch ideas and have an understanding at all levels, local, regional and to national and across many areas of the property sector. Throw him a challenge and don’t be surprised if he has an answer that can be leftfield but also unique and well thought through."

    Phil Wilson​
    Executive Director ‑ Land, Communities and Homebuilding, Peel L&P
    Chief Executive ‑ Northstone

  • “We have used Bellona’s expert advice for two key workstreams in recent months: the development of our first Net Zero Pathway as part of a wider sustainability framework; and also, in working with industrial partners as we look to decarbonise our developments. Regardless of the job, Iain provides robust challenge, an excellent ability to tie together different interests to work towards major shared challenges and high-quality work, backed by a common-sense based approach in gathering and assessing the available evidence.”

    Peter Henry​, Director of Sustainability, Harworth Group

  • “We engaged with Iain as soon as he became available with his own business. We use Bellona to support our business not just with its communications strategy but also its overall strategy; from advice on the direction of travel in national and local government policy, through to advice around ESG, brand positioning and messaging and in securing public funding. We lean on Iain in lots of ways, including being a critical ear to help us listen and hear more.”

    David Cross, Chief Executive, Sky-House Co

  • “Working with and collaborating with Iain is always interesting and thought-provoking. His experience working with Government at a range of levels has provided us and clients with a greater level of expertise of strategic planning issues and a greater understanding of ESG obligations than most organisations hold internally. We’ll be working with Iain going forward as he helps our teams better understand the UK’s febrile political landscape and how future socio-economic trends will affect ESG requirements and programmes.”

    Asgoo Pirbhai, Managing Director of Reach Marketing Communications

  • “Our work together usually involves Iain charting potential new commercial routes for the AMRC to explore or to accelerate high-value new programmes. His enthusiasm, depth of knowledge and speed of turnaround makes him a trusted partner for the organisation.”

    Simon Collingwood, Head of External Affairs & Communications,
    University of Sheffield Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre

  • "Having worked with Iain for almost a decade I can’t think of anybody better placed to advise on communication strategy relating to political affairs and engagement with government bodies. He has his finger firmly on the political pulse and what he doesn’t know about socio-economic trends and investment in regeneration and infrastructure is probably not worth knowing. Iain is incredibly well-connected across the property and infrastructure sectors, hugely insightful on a multitude of topics, and his ability to identify ideas and opportunities that are ‘outside the box’ ensures that he offers excellent counsel and thought-provoking input on a wide range of subjects. In addition to consistently delivering high-quality input with a high-speed turnaround, Iain also brings great humour and enjoyment to every engagement."

    Jonathan Stott, Group Managing Director, Ardent