Our people
Four practitioners. One team on every engagement.
Polaris is deliberately small. The partner you meet is the partner who does the work.
Zachary Aqua, CFA
Managing Partner · Strategy & Corporate FinanceZachary founded Polaris in 2023 after four years at Accuracy, where he advised corporates and investors on M&A due diligence, valuation and corporate strategy across Canada and Europe. He is also a manager in Rio Tinto's internal strategy consulting team, leading engagements on corporate strategy, capital allocation and post-merger integration, including the integration of a US$1.5B aluminium-recycling joint venture.
At Polaris he has led fundraising, due-diligence and strategy mandates for technology, manufacturing and industrial clients. Zachary holds a B.Comm in Finance (with distinction) from John Molson School of Business and is a CFA charterholder. He works in English and French.
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Lee Shadowitz, CPA
Partner · Transactions & ValuationLee leads Polaris's valuation and due-diligence work. He spent two years in EY-Parthenon's Transactions & Corporate Finance practice and two years in BDO Canada's Financial Advisory Services group, advising institutional and mid-market clients on business valuations, M&A analysis and financial modelling across sectors.
He began his career in accounting and financial analysis in Halifax. Lee is a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA Canada).
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Alexandre Lasry, CFA
Partner · Economics & Market AnalysisAlexandre brings an investor's lens to strategy and capital-allocation questions. He spent two years as an investment analyst at Bison Interests, a value-oriented hedge fund focused on publicly traded energy companies, and began his career in Business Strategy, Transformation & Integration at Cirque du Soleil Entertainment Group. He now runs a multifamily real-estate investment firm in Montréal.
Alexandre holds a B.Com from McGill University's Desautels Faculty of Management, where he was lead case writer for the McGill International Portfolio Challenge, and is a CFA charterholder.
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Samuel Fagen
Partner · Digital & OperationsSamuel is co-founder and CEO of Vome, a volunteer-management software platform, and leads Polaris's work on technology-enabled operating models and digital projects. His background spans product development, project management and systems architecture across start-up and corporate environments.
He focuses on turning strategic decisions into systems and processes teams actually use.
How we work
Four principles we hold ourselves to.
Rigour.
Every analysis is built to withstand scrutiny. A decision is only as good as the work behind it.
Candour.
We tell clients what they need to hear, not what is comfortable. Trust is built on it.
Curiosity.
We interrogate assumptions and chase the answer others overlook.
Commitment.
We measure ourselves by client impact. Every mandate gets senior attention from start to finish.