Anne Wanjiku Mutahi

Anne Wanjiku Mutahi is a Specialist in SME DEVELOPMENT AND RELATED FINANCIAL SERVICES.Anne has a wealth of experience in the financial services sector, having worked professionally in several regulated financial institutions in senior and high-level capacities. She has worked for Middle East Bank in Nairobi, ABN AMRO Bank and Citibank.

Having held senior management roles as Senior Corporate Banking manager, she made a shift into the SME side of business. As the CEO of a Micro Finance Wholesale House, She was able to interact & finance a range of SME front facing institutions ranging from CBO’s, Sacco’s, non-deposit taking financial institutions and micro finance institutions.
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Kwame Owino

Kwame Owino is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Institute of Economic Affairs, a think tank on public policy that is based in Kenya. He undertakes and oversees research in IEA-Kenya’s key policy areas on public expenditure and revenue analysis, international trade, economic regulation, devolution and the use of futures methodologies to inform public affairs in Kenya.

Carole Karuga

Carole Karuga holds a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Economics and Sociology from the University of Nairobi and a Masters Degree in Public Administration and International Affairs from Bowling Green State University, Ohio, USA. She has also pursued several professional courses on Public-Private Sector Dialogue, Global Leadership and Private Sector Development among others.

Ms. Karuga has a wealth of experience in leadership having worked for Barclays Bank of Kenya, Nairobi Chapel and Sagamore Institute for Public Policy Research, Indianapolis – Indiana, where she acted as a liaison between Kenya Private Sector Alliance (KEPSA) and the institute before formally joining KEPSA. She worked for several years at KEPSA before being appointed KEPSA CEO.
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Juliana Rotich

Juliana Rotich is a tech entrepreneur and strategic advisor based in Nairobi, Kenya. She is a Co-founder of Boya, a Fin Tech company in Nairobi that provides a breakthrough app that reduces use of PDQs and ATM Machines. She is also a venture partner at Atlantica Ventures, a venture capital firm that invests in African startups.

Juliana was previously the Managing Director and Country Cluster Head for BASF East Africa Ltd. She Cofounded BRCK Inc, a hardware and services technology company formed to realize a vision for enabling communication in low infrastructure environments by developing useful, innovative, hardware-centered technologies in Kenya. Juliana co-founded Ushahidi Inc., a non-profit tech company, which specializes in developing free and open-source software for changing how information flows in the world. .
She is a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader, TED Senior Fellow and serves on the boards of Standard Media Group, Safaricom Money Transfer Service Ltd, Mookh Africa, Blue Consulting and Kenya’s Vision 2030.

Prof. Ruth N. Kiraka

Ruth N. Kiraka is Associate Professor, Strategy & Entrepreneurship, Strathmore University. She earned her PhD from Victoria University, Melbourne, Australia; MSc from Wageningen University, the Netherlands; and BSc from Egerton University, Kenya. She has published 2 books, over 25 journal articles and book chapters, 12 case studies and two research reports.

She has received research grants to conduct entrepreneurship research. She has supervised several PhD and masters’ students. Her teaching performance also won her a University teaching excellence award. Her consulting experience includes work for Johnson & Johnson, Commission for University Education Kenya, National Commission for Higher Education, Namibia, Barclays Bank of Kenya, the British Council and the International Finance Corporation. She also conducts entrepreneurship training for small and medium sized enterprises, in which she has trained over 2000 entrepreneurs.
Prof. Kiraka is a journal reviewer for Eastern Africa Social Science Research Review; International Journal of Knowledge, Culture and Change Management; Knowledge and Process Management; International Academy of African Business and Development and Journal of African Business.

Mr. Tirus Mwithiga

Mr. Tirus Mwithiga has over 29 years' experience in Retail Banking across business management, Wealth and Retail products management, sales management, channel management and service delivery digitization..

Tirus has served in an array of leadership roles locally, regionally and internationally, initially with Barclays Bank and lastly with Standard Chartered, where his last appointment was in Singapore where he served as the Global Head of Network Planning and Branch Design. Tirus is a certified banker with professional training from The London Institute of Banking and Finance and is currently pursuing a Chartered Banker MBA from Bangor Business School, Bangor University in Wales UK.

Martin Mbaya

Martin Mbaya is a member of faculty at Strathmore University Business School. He teaches undertakes research and consults in the areas of Public Policy, Digital Learning, Trade and Sustainability.

Martin is a Founding Director of Utawala Applied Research Institute the legacy of a 2013-2014 Ford Foundation grant to support Devolution on Kenya. He is a Trustee of the AHS Endowment Fund Trust, the Adebisi Babatunde Thomas Entrepreneurship Institute (ABTEI). He is a Governing Council Member of the African Centre for Technology Studies (ACTS) and Trustee of its affiliated Endowment Foundation Trust. He is a also 2015 Tutu Fellow. Martin holds a Bachelor's degree in Mechanical Engineering from MIT and a Master's degree in Public Policy from Harvard Kennedy School. He is pursuing a Phd at the Graduate School of Technology Management, University of Pretoria.