The Team

Local experts and mentors. International advisers and organisations. Designers, investors, peer entrepreneurs, and future alumni.

IT’S ALL ABOUT THE NETWORK.

Team

Emily Waters

Monitoring & Evaluation

Emily is part of the SPRING Monitoring & Evaluation Team, helping to capture and interpret the results of our work. She has over 10 years of experience in research and M&E for development programs in the US and Africa, running the gamut from designing performance monitoring systems and qualitative research to managing randomized controlled trials. She enjoys working with businesses to conceptualize and demonstrate impact, adapting tools and methods to be relevant and practical given the topic and level of rigor required. Emily holds a BA in Anthropology from the University of Colorado and an MPH from UNC Chapel Hill.  She has been with SPRING since its inception, first as part of the Nairobi team now as a consultant based in Kyiv, Ukraine.

Andy Annett

Myanmar Country Manager

Andy is from a private sector and entrepreneurship background specifically in advertising, digital and communications agencies in the UK, Asia and elsewhere. He has founded and subsequently sold his own business, and has also been a Director of social enterprises and a CIC in the UK as well as being a Government Growth Accelerator coach. He moved to Myanmar to run a large multinational advertising agency in Yangon and is now an Entrepreneur, Marketing Consultant, Board Director and Coach and Mentor to several SMEs and social enterprises in Myanmar. He is passionate about the potential of the country and about providing opportunities to all parts of society.

Fahad Ifaz

Bangladesh Country Manager

After spending a few years at Katalyst; a pro-poor Market Systems Development program and at the World Bank, Fahad co-founded EDGE Consulting. EDGE specializes in economic, business and innovation at the bottom of the pyramid and works with major international development organizations, private sector and government clients. Fahad spent the last 2 years in Myanmar, supporting a large scale market systems development program. Fahad also co-founded Misfit Technologies, a company that has human centered design at its core and works on agritech, artificial intelligence and IoT solutions for complex problem solving.

Luna Shrestha Thakur

Nepal Country Manager

Luna is the Founding Director of ChangeFusion Nepal, a non-governmental organisation that nurtures aspiring change makers in diverse fields within social entrepreneurship. As an author of travelogue ‘A Journey to Self’, her book is an inspiration for young women who seek to pursue their dreams. She was the leader of Youth Action Fund Nepal for three consecutive years from 2011 and has been working closely with the youth and social change makers of Nepal. She has previously consulted with the British Council, and has worked with Save the Children and the Asia Foundation. She was named as one of five finalists for ‘Women Leader in the World’ by World Pulse magazine.

YVES BÉHAR

Designer

Yves is the Founder of fuseproject and an award-winning industrial designer and entrepreneur. He has extensive experience in developing innovative product solutions and taking them to scale in emerging markets. Yves is a powerful advocate for design as an agent of change. Yves was the Chief Industrial Designer of the One Laptop Per Child XO laptop, which works to make educational devices that are affordable for those living in developing and emerging economies. His works are included in the permanent collections of museums worldwide, and he is a frequent speaker on design, sustainability, and business topics.

DR. REBECCA CALDER

Technical Director

Rebecca is a thought leader and world-class expert in the sphere of economic empowerment of adolescent girls. She has more than 20 years of experience as a gender and social exclusion adviser and has produced a significant body of research that has informed policy for national governments and multilateral sponsors. Rebecca is an international authority and her on-going research into the inclusion and empowerment of adolescent girls continues to be on the cutting edge of gender-based development research.

SUZANNE BIEGEL

Investment Director

Suzanne has more than 30 years of experience in entrepreneurship, training and communications, and investing for social impact. Over the course of her career she has occupied executive, manager, board member, and team leader roles for multidisciplinary programmes, as well as a number of short-term consultancies on socially responsible business and social impact investing. Suzanne has trained hundreds of entrepreneurs on methods for raising capital and has designed and implemented investment programmes, networks, and partnerships in the US, UK, and Europe. She has been working to raise capital and the profile of impact investing for positive change for girls and women for more than five years.

RAMONA LIBEROFF

CEO

Ramona has experience in her 20+ year career as a tech for good entrepreneur and long-time angel and social investor, committed to innovation and gender equity and access to finance. She previously led the global business between Unilever and Nielsen Innovation, where she also led Nielsen Europe’s CSR strategy and activities.

REBECCA SPOHRER

Knowledge & Policy

Rebecca has 6+ years of experience in development program design, management and learning. Previously at the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN), Rebecca provided technical and managerial support to a range of programs focusing on improving nutrition through market-based solutions across Africa and Asia. Rebecca has authored numerous publications on best practices and lessons learned, and is passionate about capturing what works, what doesn’t, why, and how. Rebecca holds a BA in Political Science from the University of Notre Dame and an MBA in management of international organisations from the University of Geneva.

CHARLOTTE BLUNDY

Operations

Charlotte is responsible for supporting the operational and financial management of SPRING. She has over five years of experience in the operational management of social and economic empowerment and governance programmes, with a focus on Southern Africa, North Africa and the Middle East. Charlotte has worked on a broad range of projects run by institutional donors, NGOs, INGOs and media networks, including Triple Line Consulting, WarChild UK and Al Jazeera. She holds an M.SC. in Violence, Conflict and Development, from the School of Oriental and African Studies and a BA Honours in Arabic Studies from the University of Manchester.