2015 Africa Business Forum
SPEAKERS.
MEET SHASHI BULUSWAR
Shashi is the co-founder and Executive Director of LIGTT. Before founding LIGTT, Shashi was a Partner at Dalberg Global Development Advisors, an organization which gives strategic advice to governments, the UN, NGOs and foundations on issues such as economic development, health, agriculture, climate change, education and post-conflict reconstruction. In recent years, Shashi has worked with the UN's Peacekeeping Department to restructure global operations, with the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to launch development programs in Africa and Asia, with the US government on post-conflict development in Afghanistan, with several multinational corporations to improve their social responsibility agendas, and dozens of NGOs. Shashi also teaches International Development at UC Berkeley, and is currently writing a textbook on the topic.
He holds a Ph.D. in Robotics from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and an MBA from the Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. Before his career in Global Development, Shashi taught at Northwestern University, and was an Associate Partner at the consulting firm, McKinsey. Beyond his professional interests, Shashi spent a decade competing on the Indian national rowing team, and recently made a critically acclaimed documentary film about the India-Pakistan conflict. Shashi was born and raised in India, and has traveled to about 70 countries.
MEET STEPHEN OZOIGBO
Stephen Ozoigbo is the CEO of the African Technology Foundation, a Silicon Valley based organization focused on globalizing African technologies by providing access to resources that effectively address and manage the pressing technological challenges on the continent. He is a serial investor and advisor to multiple startups.
Mr. Ozoigbo holds an MBA from Pepperdine University and a graduate diploma in Behavioral Finance from the Kennedy School at Harvard University. In 2011, he served as a management consultant for the Spanish companies that participated in the Global Access Program at the UCLA Anderson School of Management and in February 2013 he served as a guest lecturer on the current state of Sino-African relations at the Political Science Department of UCLA. A regular speaker at the Global Mobile Internet Conference (GMIC) in Beijing and Silicon Valley, Stephen also supports the efforts of the GSMA and the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
MEET SARAH KUNST
Sarah is a Venture Partner @ Future Perfect Ventures. Prior to this, Sarah was on the investment team at Mohr Davidow Ventures (MDV) performing diligence and sourcing deals in the consumer and SaaS categories.
Before MDV, she was Director of Business Development at Inporia, a mobile ecommerce company backed by Y-Combinator, NEA, and SV Angel, where she forged key partnerships for the company’s flagship mobile app, Kaleidescope. Sarah got her start in on-campus marketing for both Red Bull and Apple and after college she worked at Chanel and later at Guest of a Guest, a digital media company.
A graduate of Michigan State University, Sarah is an Investor Board Member at both Venture for America as well as the New York City Department of Education Business and Finance Industry Commission. She was named by Business Insider as a 30 under 30 in Education and one of the Top African Americans in Technology. She has been a judge for Time Magazine's Innovator Awards & 40 Over 40 Awards and Marie Claire’s Young Gun.
MEET KEVIN SCHUSTER
Kevin is Director of Growth for VOTO Mobile, a Ghana and US based social enterprise with the mission to amplify the voices of under-heard citizens through mobile phones. In his role, he has supported organizations including The World Bank, UNICEF, Facebook and IDEO.org with their "Mobile for Development" projects. Previously, Kevin served as the Founding Fellow at the MEST Seed Fund and Incubator in Ghana. At MEST, Kevin advised a portfolio of 15 Ghanaian software startups and mentored over 70 entrepreneurs. Kevin is part of the World Economic Forum's Global Shapers Initiative. He is a graduate of Boston College.
MEET LESLEY MARINCOLA
Lesley Marincola is the Founder and CEO of Angaza Design. A product designer (B.S.) and mechanical engineer (M.S.) from Stanford University, Lesley has also worked at Amazon (Lab126) with the Amazon Kindle design team, and at Bay Area design consultancy, D2M Inc. with clients including DirecTV, Genentech, Qualcomm, and Volkswagen. Lesley is a recipient of the Santa Clara University Global Social Benefit Incubator (GSBI) scholarship and was named a 2012 Tech Awards Laureate, in recognition of Angaza’s pay-as-you-go technology. She was recognized by Businessweek as one of “America’s Best Young Entrepreneurs”, is a World Economic Forum Young Global Shaper, was named a Forbes “30 Under 30” Entrepreneur, and is a 2013 Echoing Green Fellow. Lesley’s vision is to solve the world’s most widespread problems – like energy access – with market-driven technology innovation developed from a human-centered design approach.
MEET NASHILU
MOUEN
Nashilu is the founder of Dorodrum, an online publication showcasing the brightest young business minds of Sub-Saharan Africa.
A graduate of the University of California, Berkeley, she has worked with microfinance institution Kiva, Oakland-based youth hackathon incubator Qeyno Labs, the U.S. Department international mentorship program Techwomen, and most recently San Francisco developer Lennar Urban. With a background in journalism, she has also written for the San Francisco Chronicle and the Berkeley Political Review.
A Bay Area transplant from the UK with roots spread across Kenya, Cameroon, Nigeria and France, Nashilu is obsessive about the intersection of technology, development and opportunity in local and international contexts.
MEET BEAR DOUGLAS
Bear Douglas is a Developer Advocate at Twitter, where she works with teams of all sizes to make the most of Twitter's platform and get traction. Former @fbplatform, @strobe, and community organizer for @emberjs.