Africa Business Conference
2101 HBS Student Mail Center
Boston, MA 02163

© 2008 ICG Link, Inc.

Social Enterprise in Africa: Attracting Private Sector Investment

Moderator: Michael Chu
Coordinators: Taiwo Ajayi, Neha Patel, Yaw Agyenim-Boateng

	Nvalaye Kourouma CEO, Afric Xpress (AX) Services, Inc Nvalaye Kourouma is the CEO of Afric Xpress (AX) Service Inc, a mobile payment services provider in Ghana. The company leverages the wireless network to offer mobile payment services in partnership with banks and telecoms. TXTNPAY®, AX’s mobile wallet, offers customers and merchants the ability to make and accept payments anywhere, anytime using their mobile phones. Prior to founding AX, Nvalaye spent several years in marketing and operation with The Coca-Cola Company, Africa Online and Colgate Palmolive in West and central Africa. In 2005, He joined Citigroup Global Leadership Program in New York. Nvalaye holds an MBA from Harvard Business School, a Master in Marketing and Strategy from Poitiers University (France) and a Degree from the Ecole Superieure de Commerce D’Abidjan (Cote d’Ivoire).

	Iggy Bassi Co-Founder, GADCO Mr Bassi is co-founder & Board member of GADCO Coöperatief U.A where he provides overall leadership with a focus on business strategy and sustainability policy. He leads GADCO’s market-based programs for local farming communities in conjunction with development partners and foundations. He has over 14 years experience in the corporate and advisory sectors, as well as in entrepreneurship (in fields of investments, science, technology and sustainability in emerged and emerging markets). He co-founded Argopolo Management Company to focus on technology and sustainability work in Europe. Prior to this he worked at the Monitor Group advising Fortune 500 companies on issues of competitive strategy, operational efficiency, innovation and corporate venturing. Earlier in his career, he headed European business development for a US software company and also worked in investment banking focusing on mergers and acquisitions in the TMT sectors. He has authored and edited book on private equity focused on fund structures, regulation and social ventures (‘Structuring European Private Equity’ – Euromoney Books 2006) and holds a Masters degree from Cambridge University, where he was awarded the Economic and Social Research Scholarship. He also holds a first class honours degree. He is married and has two children.

	Michael Chu - Moderator Senior Lecturer of Business Administration, Harvard Business School Michael Chu was appointed a Senior Lecturer in the Initiative on Social Enterprise of the General Management Group of the Harvard Business School in July 2003. He is also Managing Director of the IGNIA Fund, an investment firm based in Monterrey, Mexico, dedicated to investing in commercial enterprises serving low-income populations in developing countries, which he co-founded in 2007. He continues to serve as Senior Advisor and a founding partner of Pegasus Capital, a firm in Buenos Aires dedicated to deploying equity capital in Latin America, with a portfolio which includes major companies in Argentina. Chu teaches the second year elective course Business and the Base of the Pyramid, developed and taught together with Professor V. Kasturi Rangan. He is Faculty Co-Chair of the Executive Education program Strategic Leadership for Microfinance. In the past, he has taught the course Investing and Managing in Emerging Markets. and Effective Leadership of Social Enterprises. Chu is co-head of Project Antares, a collaboration between HBS and the Harvard School of Public Health focusing on commercial approaches to delivering high-impact primary health care to low-income populations in developing nations. Project Antares is part of the Social Enterprise program on Global Health and Low Income Populations. Before Pegasus, as President & CEO of ACCION International, a nonprofit corporation dedicated to microfinance, Chu worked to develop financial services for the working poor as a new segment of banking capable of outstanding returns. He participated in the founding of several microcredit financial institutions and regulated banks throughout Latin America, including Banco Solidario which under his chairmanship has been the most profitable bank in Bolivia, Mibanco in Peru and Banco Compartamos, which following its IPO in the Mexican Stock Exchange in April 2007 has been incorporated as part of the exchange's index. From 1989 to 1993, as an executive and limited partner in the New York office of Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co, Chu was one of sixteen professionals deploying KKR’s $5.7 billion private equity fund and managing an investment portfolio with aggregate annual revenues in excess of $60 billion. He joined the private equity firm from PACE Industries, a KKR-sponsored leveraged buyout, where he served as Senior Vice President & CFO. Previously, he held senior management positions in U.S. corporations and was a management consultant with the Boston Consulting Group. Chu currently serves on the boards of Sealed Air Corporation (NYSE), ACCION International (Emeritus) and is a Trustee of Dartmouth College. Chu graduated with an A.B.(Honors) from Dartmouth College and received a M.B.A. with highest distinction (Baker Scholar) from Harvard Business School. Chu was born in Kunming, China and grew up in Montevideo, Uruguay. He and his wife Victoria Cowling Chu reside in West Newton, MA.