CEO Roundtable bridging Asia

Today's guest is Henri Nyakarundi, founder and CEO of A.R.E.D in Rwanda 

Henri is a tech startup entrepreneur, author of "My African Dream and Vlogger 

ARED is a deep tech micro-infrastructure company to help bridge the digital gap in developing countries. To Achieve that goal ARED developed 3 pieces of technology.

1. A mini-server solution that can store multiple types of digital applications such as distributed storage solution, android app system, surveys etc.. on the edge and distribute them via WIFI.

2. A solar kiosk platform to power the technology but also provide phone charging solutions to address the energy gaps in low-income areas.

3. A WIFI mobile app for users to interact with the edge applications. This app directly connects with the mini-server and also provides a closer mini-server location if needed.

ARED is a B2B company that currently provides its technology to mostly NGO's, telecom companies, and other social impact enterprises. Our goal is simple, help organizations bridge the digital and social gap across the continent. ARED technology is the recipient of over 10 international awards. Seif.org Award, Energyglobe Award, Ishow Asme Award, Microsoft Affordable Access, Siemens Foundation, Greenchallenge, Fire Africa Award, ICT for social good Award, Africa50 innovation challenge

Today's guest is Suzie Wokabi, the Founder of SuzieBeauty, Kenya' 1st beauty brand, Kenya's beauty mogul, and also podcaster of The Suzie Wokabi Podcast 

Put a dark-skinned woman and the African sun together, throw in some grossly overpriced, often counterfeit make-up brands into the equation and what do you get a recipe for disaster! Multiply that and you have a population of fashion police’s most wanted, not to mention a host of unsightly skin reactions.This was the inspiration that led Suzie Wokabi, International Relations degree holder, to pursue her passion and create her authentic, affordable, high-quality African make-up brand. This revolutionary line is Kenya’s first make-up/ beauty brand and a global trailblazer in creating a bespoke product for the African woman, by an African woman. Soon after graduating from University in the U.5, Suzie dove right into the fashion industry. She was trained by MAC Cosmetics and completed an intensive Media Make-up certificate course at the Award Studio Make-up School in Los Angeles. She worked in New York within the fashion and beauty industries from 2001 until 200 7, when she returned to her hometown of Nairobi, Kenya.

Suzie is now one of the top local make-up artists whose extensive industry experience runs the full gamut from Print Media to Television, Film, Video, Commercials, Runway, and Bridal. She began creating her make-up/ beauty brand in early 2009 and officially launched it in December 2011. The hallmark of SuzieBeauty products is affordable, great quality, tailor•made for the unique needs of women living in theAfrican climate.

Today's guest is Soumobroto Ganguly, CEO of Cars 45, Africa's No 1 used car trading platform. 

Cars45 buys, sells, prices, and rates the condition of pre-owned autos.

The Cars45 brand provides consumers with the opportunity to buy cars online and offline. 

Car dealers and end-users can now have access to a rich variety of cars that have been properly verified and checked, accompanied by a standard inspection report. What Cars 45 is bringing to the market isn't just availability but access to cars with the right information such that consumers can make the right decision.

Today's guest is Khaled Bouchoucha, founder and CEO of Beekeeper Tech and IRIS Technologies LLC, better known as "SmartBee" in TunisiaSmartBee is an Agtech startup developing and integrating cutting edge Hw/Sw solutions to provide beehive' tracking and monitoring technologies for better profitability, efficiency, and security. SmartBee team are simplifying beekeepers' mission, promoting bee’s welfare by revitalizing and preventing them from a variety of risks. SmartBee team are building our Beekeeping Support Decision System to link the beekeeper's behavior and habits, bees internal parameters, weather, and location impact.Using the Smartbee app, beekeepers are notified early of any problems for faster treatment, digital journals, and updates, to monitor hive conditions around the clock, and immediate alerts in case of theft. All in a non-invasive manner. Why are we doing this?First, because beehives management hasn’t changed since 1900!!Second, around 35% of 2 million “Pro” beekeepers (90M hives) worldwide (FAO), are struggling more than ever to: Grow sustainable profits, scale-up, maintain, manage their hives and remain profitable following a number of uncontrollable constraints that have a huge impact on productivity and profitability.And third because, bees are effective pollinators affecting 35% of the global agricultural land, the volume of pollinator-dependent production has increased by 300% over the last 50 years, which makes it an economic, ecological and social challenge.Eventually, we believe in building Beekeeping Prediction Models based on Data Science and machine learning features because higher productivity, profitability, and a healthy colony are the result of limited human intervention and efficient decision making in a real-time process.

Today's guest is Meghan McCormick, Co-Founder & CEO at OZÉ & Dare to Innovate in Ghana, Africa. OZÉ is a platform that equips small business owners in Africa to make data-driven decisions to improve their performance, tap into networks, and access capital.OZÉ’s platform is comprised of two components. On one side is a mobile app for small business owners that aggregates and analyzes transaction data to push context-specific recommendations and reports. On the other side is a portal for financial institutions that combines the app’s crowdsourced data with alternative data sources to assign a credit risk score to each OZÉ user. Through the portal, banks can source and support a small-business loan portfolio.

Today's guest is Jonathan Shaw , Chief Executive Officer and Founder of Nuru, a private utility in the Democratic Republic of Congo.Jonathan says, "We deploy renewable energy to people with 9% electrification in conflict-affected zones next to the world's "second lung" -- the Congo Basin forest. We believe energy technology can help fight climate change, deforestation, and pollution in Congo." Nuru's vision is to become the largest private utility company in Africa. Nuru (Swahili for "light"​) is a company dedicated to enhancing connectivity in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Nuru deployed Congo's first solar-based mini-grid in 2017 and is currently constructing a 1.3MW solar hybrid site in Goma, the largest off-grid mini-grid in sub-Saharan Africa.Nuru was first established under the name Kivu Green Energy in August 2015. We changed our name in September 2019 to reflect our expansion beyond the Kivu regions into other parts of DRC.

Today's guest is Etop Ikpe, founder and CEO of Autochek AfricaEx founder and CEO of Car 45. the #1 leader of African used car trading platformAutochek Africa is an Automotive Technology development company that builds solutions aimed at enabling and enhancing commerce within the automotive sector. We focus on solutions that improve access to Auto loans, quality maintenance / aftersales services, warranty solutions, and transactional marketplaces. We are operational in West and East Africa and we also have developed a partner-led retail footprint with over 150 service centers.

THE CLOTHING BANK GROUP OPERATES FOUR PROGRAMMES: The Clothing Bank's mission is to empower unemployed mothers through enterprise development. It has four projects that support our vision to inspire, skill and support unemployed South Africans to eradicate poverty in their lives.1. THE CLOTHING BANKThe Clothing Bank skills and supports unemployed mothers to start retail trading micro–enterprises. The Clothing Bank uses clothing ‘waste’ from the fast fashion retail supply chain, as the tool to teach unemployed women how to earn an income, manage their finances and make healthy life choices.South Africa’s major retailers donate their excess stock to The Clothing Bank in return for Enterprise Development or Socio-Economic Development points for their Broad-Based Black Economic Empowerment Score Cards.The donated clothing is sold to the women in our programme at greatly discounted prices and they then sell the product on for a profit through their micro-enterprises. This income builds individual wealth through the accumulation of assets, both tangible and intangible, and builds our organisational sustainability. Local township businesses also benefit from the ripple effects of a stimulated local township economy.Our beneficiaries go through a two-year programme where they are nurtured and taught business, financial and life skills. We address the need for more business-focused education and support the women through coaching and mentoring as they grow their sustainable micro-enterprises.2. THE APPLIANCE BANKThe Appliance Bank skills and supports unemployed fathers to repair and sell donated appliances.The Appliance Bank provides an opportunity for unemployed men to establish micro-enterprises, using small home appliances as the catalyst for change. We assist men on their journey towards economic stability by teaching them how to fix broken appliances and develop their business acumen so that they can run a business selling the repaired appliances. We also support the men through a comprehensive life-skills programme.3. GROW EDUCARE CENTRESThe GROW Educare Centres social franchise model invests in, trains and mentors women to run high–quality early learning centres for preschool children aged between 2 and 5 years, that are also sustainable businesses.The GROW Educare Centres project empowers women who are currently running community-based early learning centres in disadvantaged communities. These centres are often under-resourced with unskilled teachers. GROW converts these centres, using a social-franchise-scaling model, into highquality centres that are financially sustainable. Our aim is to change the status quo of education in these communities by offering quality and professionalism that has never been seen before.

Luni is a 25+ year serial entrepreneur, most recently founder of Fledge, a global network of conscious company accelerators; Africa Eats, a pan-African holding company focused on feeding Africa; Realize Impact, a public charity making it easy for anyone to make an impact investment; and investorflow.org, an online network connecting impact investors.Luni is an Entrepreneur in Residence Emeritus at the University of Washington’s CoMotion, the author of The Next Step series of series of guidebooks and podcasts on entrepreneurship, and with The Pinchot Impact Index, he solved the question on how to measure impact across a collection of companies.Africa Eats begins with 27 fledglings from Fledge, wraps them in a holding company, and with that creates a diversified, fast-growing, institutional-scale investment that aim to be public by 2024. A company with aggregate revenues across its 27 subsidiaries of over $7 million in 2019, growing 51% CAGR since 2014, all while growing the revenues of tens of thousands of smallholder African farmers and feeding millions of Africans.

Today's guest is Chibuzo Opara, founder and CEO of DrugStoc in Nigeria.DrugStoc is a secure and interactive procurement platform (Online/Offline) that empowers healthcare providers by giving access to safe and quality pharmaceutical products through our consolidated supply chain system.Drugstoc is changing the way health providers interact with pharmaceutical supply chains at the last mile in Africa for the better! Its cloud based, easy to use and internationally accredited pharmaceutical procurment platform provides access to quality pharmaceutical products for healthcare providers, hospitals,pharmacies, doctors and pharmacists at the touch of a button. They believe no patient or healthcare provider should lack access to good quality pharmaceuticals. Through technology enabled distribution they are leap frogging the infrastructure, access, supply chain fragmentation, financing and counterfeit drug challenges within the Sub-Saharan pharmaceutical space to improve on the quality of healthcare delivery.