Michael Hokenson is a Managing Director and Co-Founder of Minlam Asset Management. Mr. Hokenson has been involved with emerging market entrepreneurial ventures and the microfinance industry since 1997. He has been published on the profitability of microfinance institutions in The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid by C.K. Prahalad. Mr. Hokenson graduated from the Erb Institute of Global Sustainable Enterprise at the University of Michigan, earning an M.B.A. at the Stephen M. Ross School of Business and an M.S. in Environmental Science at the School of Natural Resources and Environment. He received his B.A. in Mathematics and Philosophy from St. John's College in Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Neelam Chhiber - the co- Founder of Industree , which has launched Mother Earth & Managing Trustee of Industree Crafts Foundation. She is an Industrial Design Graduate from National Institute of Design, Ahmedabad, 1986, who has 24 years of hands on experience providing design, technical and marketing solutions in natural fibre products of India, wood inlay, stone craft, Kashmiri willow craft and papier mache, Chennapatna painting, Madhubani hand painting, Tibetan carpets, sheet metal beaten products, wax metal casting among others. Neelam has been instrumental in bringing traditional, rural skills to mainstream lifestyle markets by using design to reinterpret skills and materials, by providing a strong marketing platform in Mother Earth. She believes that the growth of Industree through mainstream retailers and global markets can be replicated for other social and Fair Trade brands through Mother Earth. She encourages the growth of multiple social brands under the umbrella of Mother Earth. She is of the firm view that Design education has been key to 360 degree thinking. Neelam believes Industree's biggest challenge and reward has been to facilitate and enable producers to manage themselves in changing scenarios. neelam@motherearth.co.in

Casey is the Co-Founder and CEO of Wokai, China's first person-to-person mirofinance platform. Casey serves on Wokai's Board of Directors and leads business strategy and development, Field Partner due-diligence evaluation, and public outreach. She graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Wesleyan University with a BA in Economics. While at Wesleyan, Casey focused on economic development and its applications in the Chinese context. After graduation, Casey completed a course of study at Tsinghua University and the University of California at Berkeley's Inter-University Program (IUP) for advanced Chinese. Prior to studying at Tsinghua, Casey spent two summers studying Chinese at the Middlebury College Intensive Chinese School in Vermont.

Brinda Ganguly is an Associate Director at the Rockefeller Foundation. There, she manages the Foundation’s Program Related Investments (PRI) portfolio and works on the Initiative to Harness Impact Investing, which seeks to catalyze an efficient industry that can deploy investment capital to complement philanthropy in solving social challenges at scale. Prior to joining Rockefeller, Ms. Ganguly was a Vice President in Citigroup’s Corporate Bank, where she addressed corporate finance issues for healthcare clients. Earlier in her career, Ms. Ganguly worked at the Soros Foundation, originating and executing PRIs on behalf of the Soros Economic Development Fund, and at Charles River Associates as an economic consultant. Ms. Ganguly serves on the board of Neighbors Together, an anti-poverty, anti-hunger organization based in Brooklyn, New York, as well as on the President’s Advisory Council for Bryn Mawr College. She holds a BA, in Economics and Spanish, from Bryn Mawr and an MBA from Columbia Business School.

April Rinne is the Director of WaterCredit at Water.org. WaterCredit is an innovative initiative that puts microfinance tools to use in the water and sanitation (watsan) sector, and catalyzes more efficient use of philanthropic and commercial capital to meet the watsan needs of the developing world. Previously April has worked at Unitus, Women’s World Banking and global law firms where she focused primarily on international microfinance-related transactions for both non-profit and for-profit entities. She is also a trainer for the International Development Law Organization (IDLO) and its microfinance courses and frequently advises microfinance organizations. April is a graduate of Harvard Law School, The Fletcher School and Emory University, and has traveled to 78 countries at last count.

Until March 2008, April Rinne was the Director of Venture Development at Unitus, a global microfinance accelerator and provider of innovative solutions to global poverty. In this capacity she provided legal and strategic advice to the Unitus family, including the new commercially-oriented strategic affiliates Unitus Capital and Unitus Investment Group.

Prior to Unitus April was a private lawyer focusing primarily on international microfinance-related transactions for several years, both in the United States and abroad. In this capacity she advised numerous non-profit and for-profit microfinance clients and worked on various microfinance transactions, including the Blue Orchard Loans for Development (BOLD) 2006 securitization which won international legal awards. In addition to her work at Unitus, April is a trainer for the International Development Law Organization (IDLO) and its microfinance courses throughout the developing world, and she frequently serves as a panellist and speaker on microfinance-related topics.

April is a graduate of Harvard Law School (J.D.) and the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy (M.A. in International Finance and Development Economics). She is fluent in Italian, has a very advanced command of Spanish, and is proficient in French.

Andrew is Managing Partner of DeRisk Advisory Services, a specialist advisor on risk mitigation for investors, fund managers and project developers in frontier and developing markets. Andrew’s background is in insurance and management consulting, having worked with clients in over 25 countries. Prior to starting DeRisk in 2006, Andrew worked in the insurance division of Credit Suisse in Switzerland and with insurance clients at Accenture in the United Kingdom. Andrew holds an MBA from HEC Paris and a BA in Sociology summa cum laude from Pepperdine University, California.

DeRisk Advisory Services (UK) is a risk mitigation specialist for investors in frontier and developing markets; advising on, developing and providing unique access to a wide spectrum of risk strategies, products and services. DeRisk works with debt, equity, corporate, philanthropic, and other innovative investors as they deploy capital beyond the security – and limitations – of more mature and liquid financial markets. DeRisk also assists fund managers and project developers in attracting both traditional and new sources of capital to investment opportunities. DeRisk is an authorized marketing agent of the Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency, the World Bank Group’s political risk insurance arm. DeRisk partners with MIGA and other insurers and risk mitigation partners to develop and market new risk products. DeRisk also focuses on markets and asset classes that have traditionally been underserved – among others, post-conflict countries and smaller or early stage investments.

Mr. Avedisian led the development and launch of Cygma while at Chatham Financial Corp. and currently serves as Cygma’s President. Cygma provides the microfinance industry with the unique ability to hedge foreign exchange risk in illiquid emerging markets currencies. Cygma also advises its clients in the analysis and mitigation of foreign exchange risk and provides education services to the microfinance industry. Over the last five years, Mr. Avedisian and his team have advised many of the leading microfinance investment funds, networks and MFIs in the structuring and execution of foreign exchange risk management solutions.

Prior to focusing full time on Cygma, Mr. Avedisian advised some of the largest private equity firms and real estate investment funds in foreign currency and interest rate risk management, and U.S. based regional and community financial institutions in the practice of asset and liability management. Mr. Avedisian has held leadership positions in several industries over the past twenty years. He spent the early part of his career in product development where he and his teams hold several patents and awards for their work designing innovative diagnostic medical solutions. He served as President of Cowley and Associates, a multimedia advertising firm for several years before co-founding LifeLink Monitoring Corporation, where he served for five years as its President and CEO, overseeing the development and application of a ground-breaking telemedicine platform for the healthcare industry. Mr. Avedisian earned a BS in electrical and computer engineering with honors, from Clarkson University, and completed his MBA studies at Syracuse University.

Mr. Mahmood, Managing Director of the Global Social Investment Funds at Deutsche Bank, is responsible for an over $500 million loan and investment portfolio which seeks both a financial and social return. He is also responsible for Deutsche Bank Microfinance efforts globally which comprise more than 85 relationships in 41 countries. Mr. Mahmood was the central force in creating a pioneering $80 million commercial microfinance fund which has raised most of its money from 13 large institutional investors in the world. . He has partnered with Ashoka and International Association for the Prevention of Blindness (IAPB) to create Eye Fund 1, a revolutionary fund that will lend to hospitals providing ophthalmology services to the poor. Mr. Mahmood is positioning Deutsche Bank to be an investment bank for social capital and is looking to be a catalytic leader and innovator in the growth of finance able social ventures by bringing together differently motivated capital from development agencies, foundations and socially motivated commercial investors.

Mr. Mahmood sits on the Board of the Microfinance Information Exchange (MIX), the Editorial Board of The Microbanking Bulletin, as well as being on the Advisory Board of The Rockdale Foundation / Gray Ghost Fund. He sits on the steering committee for Private/Public Partnerships for the World Economic Forum. He was recently also brought on to the leadership committee of the “2% Commitment”. This effort includes Executive Directors of some of the leading foundations in the US and encourages them to use 2% of their endowment to make social investments. Mr. Mahmood is also the founder of the Microfinance Club of New York, which brings microfinance leaders to present their work and hold discussions on salient issues. The Club is also now active in Paris, Frankfurt and London.

Sweta Mangal was born in a small town Beawar in Rajasthan in 1976. She was sent boarding school when she was 4 years old because of lack of good English Medium School in Beawar.

She completed her schooling from Mayo College Girls School in 1994 and then went to Delhi to pursue her Bachelors. She was a very good athlete and has won several medals at the school, district and state levels. While she was growing up she missed her family a lot and decided that when she grows up she would build a world class school in Beawar so that the other children of Beawar do not have to stay away from family while growing up.

She did her Bachelors in commerce (Hons) from Jesus & Mary College, Delhi and post her graduation she went to Rochester Institute of Technology, Rochester USA for her Masters in Business Administration.

While she was in the US, she missed India a lot and felt very passionately about doing some good work in India and making a difference in India rather than living a materialistic life in the US. While doing her Masters she worked with Fortune 500 company United Technologies for sometime, which gave her the exposure of the American style of working. Once she finished her Masters she decided to return back to India so that she could make some difference.

Post her MBA she worked as a professional for 7 years with a few top companies in India like Zee, Tata AIG Life Insurance and Marico.

While she was in Tata AIG Life, her friend Shaffi Mather approached her with an idea which would result in saving lives in Mumbai .The idea was to start an Ambulance Service in Mumbai modeled around 911 of US and 999 of UK.

She found the idea very interesting and decided to be a part of it. With limited resources she along with 4 other friends founded the Dial 1298 for Ambulance service in Mumbai. The service started with 10 ambulances in May 2005 and today it has 70 ambulances operating in Mumbai and Kerala. In 2007 she quit her professional commitment and joined the ambulance project as a CEO so that she could scale up the same service across all the metros in India.

Besides running the ambulance service, she also kept her dream alive to start a world class school in Beawar, so when her brother was ready to take over the family business she convinced him to work with her to open a quality school in Beawar.

The school i.e. Mangal Newton School (MNS) was started in July 2007 with 163 students and just one year later has 350 students. The school has a official tie-up with Canadian based Maple Bear program which is taught in kindergarten. To ensure that the students of MNS get exposure to the world outside India, Sweta has done a cultural tie up with one of the best school in London, St. Christopher School, where in teachers and students from the St. Chris school visited MNS in Feb2008 and teachers from MNS visited St. Chris in June 2008. She is also the recipient of one of the most prestigious scholarships called the Gurukul Chevening Scholarship at the London School of Economics in 2007.

Tom Brunner, a partner with Wiley Rein LLP, chairs the firm’s 40 lawyer insurance practice and sits on its Administrative, Management and Diversity Committees. He has represented insurers and insurance industry organizations in a variety of disputes, transactions and regulatory matters throughout the United States and overseas. He just concluded service as Co-Chair of the Washington Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and Urban Affairs. For the Lawyers’ Committee, he was lead counsel in Disability Rights Council v. WMATA, challenging Metro’s paratransit service for severely disabled riders that settled after certification of a 16,000 member class, and other civil rights cases.

Tom currently serves as general counsel for LeapFrog Investments Ltd., the world’s first social investment fund for microinsurance, which is investing in South Africa, India and other developing countries. LeapFrog Investments closed on the first wave of its investment in early May 2009.

Designated by the Legal Times as one of Washington’s 10 leading insurance lawyers, he attended Yale Law and Columbia undergraduate

Distributed Capital Group is led by Zac Pessin, previously of JPMorgan’s Capital Structure Advisory Solutions (CSAS) group. CSAS was responsible for designing sophisticated bespoke solutions for select clients, predominantly multinational corporations confronting enormous complexity across the global distribution of their operations, tax liabilities, cash flows, capital structures, and the risks that accompany all of these things. Distributed Capital's products and position in frontier markets stand on this ability to synthesize new best practices for areas of finance that are currently underdeveloped.

Earlier, Zac worked for the Global Head of Operational Risk as part of the three-person team managing the firm's $7 billion Operational Risk Capital model, a practice focused on defending the firm from extreme or "fat-tail" risks. At the time, JPM’s model and OpRisk program was the most sophisticated in the world, and the group won numerous awards including RiskMagazine's top award two years in a row. Zac worked closely with senior members of the firm’s Quantitativ Research & Development group during this time, and regularly prepared material for CFOs and other senior executives across the six global businesses of the firm.

Included in external efforts focused on communicating and collaborating with regulators at the Federal Reserve (The Fed), the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), Zac has taken this experience and assembled a strong operating team as well as a Board of Advisors that assists in ensuring that Distributed Capital is in line with global best practices across all risk and regulatory disciplines. Zac has an engineering degree from Stanford University, and a Master’s in Management Strategy for East Asia, from Yale University. He has lived and worked in Japan and is conversationally fluent in Japanese. He is also an Eagle Scout.

Zac sits on the Board of Advisors of Long-Life Clinic Network (LLCN), a global healthcare initiative serving the base of the pyramid; he is also a founder and current Board member of the Wall Street Microfinance Alliance (WSMA).

Ella Silverman is the Executive Director of World of Good Development Organization, a 501(c)3 that aims to improve the economic and social conditions of women living in poverty in the developing world with a focus on workers in global supply chains. Under her leadership, World of Good Development Organization was named a Tech Laureate in 2009 for the Fair Wage Guide, a free online tool that establishes fair wages for contract and piece-rate workers. Before joining the Development Organization, Ella was on the founding team of WorldofGood.com by eBay, opening markets for people & planet positive products. Ella worked at TransFair USA , the fair trade certification agency where she managed the fair trade chocolate and sugar programs. Earlier in her career, Ella co-founded and managed Big City Bread, a bakery and café that focuses on job creation and economic empowerment for low-income & underemployed populations. Ella has an undergraduate degree from the State University of New York at Albany and a Master’s Degree in City & Regional Planning from Cornell University.

Nigel Biggar has over 17 years working with microenterprise and microfinance in developing countries. He began in this field working as a microentrepreneur with a street youth project he established in Quito, Ecuador in the early 1990s. He has worked extensively with MFIs and microentrepreneurs and street youth in Latin America and Asia.

Nigel has been with Grameen Foundation since early 2000. He is currently the Director of the Social Performance Management Center and the principal for the Social Performance/ Progress out of Poverty Index initiative. He previously served as Grameen Foundation’s Regional Director for the Americas where he assisted start-up MFIs in Latin America to build and expand their programs based on the Grameen methodology. He holds a masters degree in Development Studies from the Institute of Development Studies at Sussex University.

Dr. Raul Hinojosa is CEO of SF Tech, LLC, which innovates and operates technology platforms for companies in the SF Global Group. He is also co-founder and a managing partner in SF Mexico, LLC, SF Dominican Republic, LLC, and other operating companies in the SF Global Group. As a leading provider of financial services and mobile banking technologies, corporate clients and partners of the SF Global Group include Scotiabank and Telcel.
Dr. Hinojosa has served as a founder and board member various financial and economic development institutions, including the Los Angeles Community Development Bank and the International Community Foundation, and has been appointed to the Economic Strategies Panel of the State of California and the Los Angeles Office of International Trade. While working with President William Jefferson Clinton and Rep. Esteban Torres of California, Dr. Hinojosa Ojeda was the originator of the proposal for the North American Development Bank, a $3 Billion institution that was created by the U.S. and Mexican governments in 1994.
Dr. Hinojosa is currently an Associate Professor in the Division of Social Sciences and the César E. Chávez Center at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. Hinojosa has held various academic and policy research positions in a variety of universities and public institutions, including the World Bank, Inter-American Development Bank, the White House Council of Economic Advisors, the United States Trade Representative, Stanford University, and the University of California Berkeley. Dr. Hinojosa founded the North American Integration and Development (NAID) Center at UCLA in 1995, dedicated to developing innovative research agendas and policy pilot projects concerning globalization and development. Under Dr. Hinojosa’s leadership, the NAID Center has received over $10 million in research and policy grants from a wide range of institutions, including the Inter-American Development Bank, the World Bank, the OECD, the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America, the U.S. Departments of Labor, Commerce and Treasury, and the Ford, Rockefeller and MacArthur Foundations.

Michelle Turner serves as General Counsel of the Michael & Susan Dell Foundation, a private family foundation based in Austin, Texas and dedicated to improving the lives of children living in urban poverty around the world. The Dell family foundation funds programs that foster high-quality public education and childhood health and improve the economic stability of families living in poverty. The Michael & Susan Dell Foundation has committed more than $530 million dollars to global children’s issues to date and has, since 2006, committed more than $20 million dollars to Program Related Investments, primarily in early-stage microfinance institutions in India.
As General Counsel, Ms. Turner is responsible for managing the Foundation’s Legal Team and overseeing the legal aspects of the Foundation’s global operations and activities, including, for example, its US Education portfolio focused on driving student achievement and teacher satisfaction in the country’s largest urban school districts, its similarly-focused India and South Africa Education portfolios, its US and South Africa scholarship programs, its Global Policy Initiatives, and its Global Microfinance Program focused on catalyzing the urban microfinance market in India through qualifying Program Related Investments including private equity and loans.

Antony Bugg-Levine joined the Rockefeller Foundation in New York in January 2007. Among other responsibilities, he leads the Foundation’s Initiative on Harnessing the Power of Impact Investing that seeks to help catalyze an efficient industry that can deploy investment capital to complement philanthropy in solving social challenges at scale. Prior to joining Rockefeller, he served as the Country Director of the international NGO TechnoServe in Nairobi, Kenya where he helped to design and implement business solutions to rural poverty focused on smallholder farmer economic integration and consulting to medium-scale enterprises.
In Kenya he also worked with various capital providers –including micro-finance institutions, commercial banks and private equity managers — to develop profitable mechanisms to extend lending to rural businesses and smallholder farmers.
Earlier in his career, as a consultant with McKinsey, he focused in financial services and healthcare, managed the team that undertook a strategic review for the United Nations' Global Compact and helped to develop new frameworks to incorporate social dynamics into corporate strategy.
A native of South Africa, he served in the late 1990s as the communications director at the South African Human Rights Commission and as a speechwriter and media strategist for the African National Congress's 1999 election campaign.
He is an associate adjunct professor at the Columbia Business School where he teaches ‘Business Innovations in International Development.’
Bugg-Levine is a graduate of Yale College and earned an MPA focused on Economic Development from Princeton's Woodrow Wilson School.

Christine Looney is the Program Investment Officer at the Ford Foundation. In this role, Christine is responsible for managing Ford’s $280 million program-related investment fund, where she originates, structures, underwrites and monitors Ford’s program-related investments. Prior to joining the Ford Foundation, Christine was President of the Urban Business Assistance Council, a nonprofit consulting firm serving the minority business community of New York City. Christine also has served as an Assistant Vice President and Portfolio Manager in Fleet Financial’s Corporate Banking group and as an Associate in Chase Manhattan’s Structured Finance Group. Christine serves on the advisory board of the CDFI Fund Assessment and Ratings System, the steering committee of the PRI Makers Network, and on the credit committee of the Living Cities Catalyst Fund. Christine has an MBA in Finance and Management from NYU’s Stern School of Business and a BA in Economics from Holy Cross.

Bryan leads microfinance coverage as a member of Morgan Stanley’s Environment, Social Finance and Community Reinvestment Group. He has recently worked on a variety of advisory mandates in microfinance, including CARE’s sale of EDYFICAR (Peru MFI) to BCP for a total equity value of $96MM (completed October 2009) and financial analysis for Grameen America (completed September 2009). Bryan has also worked at ACCION International on the transformation of PADME (Benin MFI) and at ACCION New York as a Loan Officer.

Previously, as part of Morgan Stanley’s Latin America Investment Banking Group, Bryan worked on numerous M&A and restructuring transactions including Banco Edwards’ $940MM merger with Banco de Chile, the $4.0Bn debt restructuring of Telecom Argentina and Morgan Stanley Infrastructure / OTPP’s $1.3Bn acquisition of Grupo SAESA in Chile.

Bryan holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, an MPA in international development from the John F. Kennedy School of Government and a BSBA from UNC-Chapel Hill. Bryan is currently Vice Chair of the ACCION USA Microfinance Council, a group of over 200 members he helped co-found in 2007. He speaks Spanish and French, having lived in Chile, Argentina and Benin (West Africa).

Yana is a Manager with Dalberg Global Development Advisors, a strategy consulting firm focused on international development. Yana leads the firm’s work in Microfinance and is active across all areas of emerging markets finance, from small and medium enterprise (SME) finance to innovative financing mechanisms for the development of sectors such as agriculture and renewable energy. Most recently, Yana developed a strategy for sustainably scaling savings for a global Microfinance network. Yana led the team in analyzing savings product and customer segment-specific economics, determining the right mix to optimize cost curves and ensure savings products could be delivered sustainably at scale by institutions across the network.

Prior to joining Dalberg, Yana was part of The Boston Consulting Group’s (BCG) Financial Services practice. At BCG, Yana developed business strategies for clients in retail and investment banking, insurance, private equity and venture capital. Yana’s other professional experience includes work with VISA International, Women’s World Banking, and Arthur D. Little. Yana holds an MBA with honors from The Wharton School and a BA with honors from McGill University in Political Science. While at Wharton, Yana developed and taught a graduate-level course in Microfinance. Yana is a Board member of the 501c3 Microfinance Club of New York. In 2009, Yana authored two cover articles for the journal Microfinance Insights- “From Crisis to Catharsis: How Microfinance Can Make It Through The Global Recession” in the Mar/Apr edition and “Innovation versus Imitation in Microfinance” in the Nov/Dec edition.

Maya Chorengel is a co-Founder and Managing Director of Elevar Equity, one of the leading equity investors in microfinance institutions and companies serving the base of the pyramid. Maya has been involved in microfinance investing since 2005. Prior to co-founding Elevar Equity, she was Managing Director of the Dignity Fund, a private investment fund that provided loans and guarantees to commercially oriented, high-growth microfinance institutions throughout the developing world. Maya serves on the boards of Comat, the Dignity Fund, Silicon Valley Microfinance Network and Wokai. She serves on the advisory board of Water.org and MicroCredit Enterprises. Earlier in her career, Maya was a Vice President of the private equity firm, Warburg Pincus, working in the firm’s New York, Hong Kong and Menlo Park offices. She invested in a variety of companies spanning venture capital to leveraged buyouts to post-Asian crisis balance sheet restructurings. Previously, she was an associate at Morgan Stanley Asia Limited (Hong Kong and Singapore) and an analyst at James D. Wolfensohn, Incorporated. Maya graduated with Honors in Social Studies from Harvard University and has an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.

Lisa Hall represents the Calvert Foundation, a leader and pioneer in microfinance investing. She oversees Calvert Foundation’s growing loan portfolio, which totaled $160 million at year end 2008. Over the past three years, under Ms. Hall’s leadership, Calvert Foundation expanded its direct microfinance portfolio lending in almost any region of the world including Africa, Central Asia, and Eastern Europe in addition to Latin America, which Calvert Foundation has invested in since its inception in 1995. Lisa previously served as Chief Credit Officer for the American Communities Fund in the Housing and Community Development Division of Fannie Mae. Prior to that, Lisa worked in the Clinton Administration at the National Economic Council. Lisa has also held positions in real estate and community development finance with the Enterprise Foundation, JP Morgan Chase and Travelers Insurance. She holds a BS in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania and an MBA from Harvard University. In 2003, Lisa participated in the American Marshall Memorial Fellowship, a travel program for emerging leaders from the US and Europe. She lives in Washington, DC with her husband and young daughter.

Roger Frank is one of the pioneers in using the capital markets for social change. He created I3 Advisors LLC to provide funding for enterprises addressing the spectrum of human needs at the “Bottom of the Pyramid”. Prior to I3 he was instrumental in both raising & deploying over $500 million of debt and equity, which provided investors market-rate returns and provided capital to microfinance institutions in the developing world. He has worked with CEOs of major, multi-national corporations and Presidents of Central Banks; he has discussed new models for sustainability with Presidents and Princesses and taught women prisoners and disabled adults.

After starting his own graphic design studio, founding community arts programs, teaching in prisons & schools and an extensive tour behind the iron curtain, he received an MBA in Finance and International Business from New York University Stern School of Business. He holds a BFA, cum laude, from the University of Delaware, speaks conversational German and Spanish and is on the Livelihoods Council for Save the Children. He is a member of the Microfinance Social Performance Task Force, his local community Board, plays in a masters soccer league and coaches youth soccer & baseball.

As a Portfolio Associate with Acumen Fund, Robert Katz conducts portfolio research, stewards Acumen's internal knowledge management and works with investees as part of the performance management team. Before joining the Portfolio team, Rob spent a year and a half on the Knowledge & Communications team, where he managed Acumen's online communications and research work. Prior to Acumen Fund, Rob was an Associate with the Markets and Enterprise Program of the World Resources Institute, where he began his career researching, writing and speaking about "base of the pyramid" business approaches to poverty alleviation. He is the co-founder and co-Managing Editor of www.NextBillion.net, a web site and blog about enterprise and development. As a principal analyst of household survey data and co-author for "The Next 4 Billion: Market Size and Business Strategy at the Base of the Pyramid" report, he has studied BoP market structure and spending patterns extensively. Rob holds a B.A. in Political Economy from Georgetown University.

Geert Peetermans, Chief Investment Officer. He is a microfinance specialist, who joined Incofin Investment Management in 2002. Geert Peetermans designed Incofin’s investment policy and is responsible for the coordination of the investment operations of Incofin’s Pool of Funds and for guiding the team of investment managers. Geert Peetermans is Director of the Rural Impulse Fund, and sits on the Board of Directors of Edpyme Confianza in Peru, Fie Gran Poder in Argentina and Apoyo Integral Inversiones in Panama. Before he joined Incofin, he worked as a consultant for the Belgian Raiffeisen Foundation, an institution supporting microfinance in rural areas, where he published on the topic of “Guarantee systems in microfinance” (with support from ILO). From 1997 until 2000, he was resident Technical Advisor in Ecuador for development organisation ACT entrusted to start microfinance operations of Acción Rural, a greenfield MFI. Geert Peetermans studied economics at the University of Louvain. He is fluent in English, Spanish and Dutch. He has a fair ability to express in German and French.

Guy Stuart is a Lecturer in Public Policy at the Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University. He received his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1994, and then worked for four years in Chicago in the field of community economic development. Since 1998 he has been on the faculty at the Harvard Kennedy School where he teaches courses on management and microfinance – financial services for the poor in developing countries. He uses qualitative methods such as Financial Diaries and Participatory Research to help microfinance organizations find the best way to serve their clients. He is currently conducting research on microfinance in Pakistan, Malawi and Kenya. He is the author of numerous articles and case studies on the management of microfinance organizations.