Francesco Silva, the former head of Italian operations at JP Morgan, has joined E Capital Partners, an Italian mergers and acquisitions and asset management advisory firm, as chief executive.

Silva, who has been running his own M&A boutique Sfera Consulting since 2002, will become one of six partners at E Capital. The firm is chaired by Claudio Dematté, who also chairs a number of Italian corporates and banks and is chairman of Italy's private equity association.