FIRESIDE CHAT

Nicole Van Der Tuin ,
CEO, First Access

Nicole is the CEO of First Access, a software platform that allows lenders to digitize loan origination and analysis. Lenders have saved borrowers over 300 years of wait time by fast-tracking loans on First Access. Ranked among the 100 Most Creative People in Business by Fast Company, Nicole has helped advance financial inclusion in Africa, Asia and Latin America. First Access has been selected by Unreasonable Goals 2018 for SDG #1 – Poverty, by Entrepreneur for the Brilliant 100, by MIT for the Zambezi Prize, by PopTech for Social Innovation, and featured in over 70 events and publications, including The Financial Times, The Economist, and Forbes.

Iyinoluwa Aboyeji
General Partner and Co-founder, Future Africa

Iyinoluwa Aboyeji is the General Partner and Co-founder of Future Africa, a platform that provides capital, coaching and community for mission-driven innovators building an African Future where purpose and prosperity is within everyone’s reach.

Prior to co-founding Future Africa, he served as the Deputy Director-General for the Madam Oby Ezekwesili 2019 Presidential Campaign. He also helped to build Andela and Flutterwave, two of Africa’s largest and fastest-growing technology companies backed by global investors.

Iyinoluwa, more popularly known as “E”, holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Legal Studies from the University of Waterloo and is a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader. He also sits on the board of a number of corporate and non-profit organizations and advises a number of national and sub-national governments across Africa on how to support high growth innovation-driven enterprises in their domains.

FIRESIDE CHAT

PANEL

Semhar Araia

HEAD, DIASPORA POLICY, AFRICA, MIDDLE EAST AND TURKEY PUBLIC POLICY TEAM FACEBOOK

MODERATOR

A trained lawyer, practitioner, and thought leader, Ms. Araia serves as head of Diaspora Public Policy for the Facebook Africa, Middle East and Turkey (AMET) Public Policy team, where she provides guidance on the company’s policy priorities and opportunities for engagement with AMET diaspora stakeholders outside of the region.

 

Semhar has provided technical expertise, capacity building and research support over 85 African, Asian, European and Arab diaspora communities, as well as to governments and organizations, focused on the role of diasporas in international development.

 

Previously, she served as the lead for Diaspora Partnerships at UNICEF USA and as a diaspora technical advisor to USAID, the African Union, the United Nations. She began as an attorney for the implementation of the 2000 Eritrea-Ethiopia peace agreement and later served as a policy advisor at Oxfam International, The Elders and the US House of Representatives.

Francine Dove

PROJECT MANAGER DMA GLOBAL (DMAG)

SPEAKER

Francine Dove is a Project Manager who works for DMA Global (DMAG), a UK based development consultancy that specialises in remittances, payments, financial inclusion and diaspora related affairs. DMAG deliver projects for a range of stakeholders including governments, international donors and the private sector.

 

Francine started working with DMA Global in 2018, following a career in banking and project management. Francine has been heavily involved in work with the African Development Bank to create a systematic approach to supporting diaspora investment, remittance market studies across the ECOWAS region, assessing compliance with the remittance general principles in the MEFMI region and strengthening and harmonising ECOWAS remittance data collection.

Kojo Boakye

DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC POLICY, FACEBOOK, AFRICA

SPEAKER

Kojo Boakye is Facebook’s Director of Public Policy for Africa. He’s an experienced ICT for Development Practitioner, with 15+ years’ experience working with governments, fixed-line and mobile operators, development partners, online service providers, content developers and civil society organisations. Before joining Facebook, he was the Deputy Director of the Alliance for Affordable Internet (A4AI), and the Head Research and Consultancy at the Commonwealth Telecommunications Organisation (CTO) prior to that.

 

In addition to an MSc in Development Studies, Kojo holds a BA in African History and Development Studies from the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London. In recent years, his work has focused on: broadband affordability; the use of mobile infrastructure and devices for the delivery of services; strategic planning for Universal Service Funds and ICT regulators; increasing internet access; and understanding ICT users’ demand for services, their usage of those services and perceptions of satisfaction

Yemiru Chanyalew

CEO, MONETA TECHNOLOGIES

SPEAKER

Yemiru Chanyalew is CEO of Moneta Technologies. Moneta Technologies S.C. is a Fintech company, fully-owned subsidiary of Fettan Holdings, Limited of Kenya. The company is headquartered in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Moneta Payment solution “Amole”​ is a secure and efficient payment platform that links consumers, banks, merchants, mobile content aggregator and service providers into an electronic payment ecosystem. Yemiru a dynamic, results-oriented six-sigma master black belt senior executive with over 27 years of successful management experience in information systems, sales, software engineering and IT management; highly effective leader with proven abilities to meet or exceed operational, growth and profit objectives.

Omosalewa “O” Adeyemi

GLOBAL PARTNERSHIPS & EXPANSION, FLUTTERWAVE, INC

SPEAKER

Omosalewa “O” leads the Partnership and Expansion team at Flutterwave. Flutterwave is a global payments technology company building digital payments infrastructure, with a focus on the African market. We enable digital transactions across Africa, between Africa and other regions. Products include: 1. Flutterwave for Business; an online merchant acquiring and disbursement platform that works across Africa, US, Europe. It is 3DS enabled, has an inbuilt fraud management system and is PCIDSS Level 1 certified. 2. Barter; a consumer lifestyle application, launched in partnership with Visa. Since launching in 2016, Flutterwave has processed $6B across 100M+ transactions for clients such as Uber, Booking.com, Facebook, Flywire, Transferwise among others.