Team Members.
The GIF team across London, Washington D.C., Nairobi and Singapore is comprised of investors, economists, and development experts who are committed to harnessing the power of innovative and market-driven approaches to tackling the greatest challenges facing the developing world.
Executive
Avinash Mishra
Chief Investment Officer and Head of GIF Growth
Avinash leads GIF's risk capital investment team and heads GIF Growth, GIF's new returnable capital investment vehicle. He shares oversight of the GIF's finance function with our CEO, ensuring...
Cillian Moynihan
General Counsel
Cillian Moynihan oversees the legal and ESG teams and functions at GIF. He is responsible for structuring and negotiating all GIF’s investments around the globe, managing all existing investments, fundraisings...
Joseph Ssentongo
Acting CEO
Joseph Ssentongo has overarching responsibility for GIF’s mission: finding and funding innovations with the potential to transform the lives of people living on less than $5 a day. He oversees...
Rachna Nag Chowdhuri
Senior Vice President, Impact
Rachna Nag Chowdhuri oversees the work of GIF's Grants and Analytics functions. She has extensive experience in research, evaluation and evidence-based policy making across South Asia, South East Asia, Southern...
Full Team
Alessandra Buonfino
Senior Advisor
Alessandra is a Senior Advisor at GIF and responsible for GIF’s strategy on climate. She has been working at the nexus of government, investment and not-for-profits for over 15 years...
Alix Peterson Zwane
Senior Advisor
Alix Peterson Zwane served as GIF’s CEO for eight years, shaping our organisation from its inception as a flagship UK-US project mobilising aid funding into high impact innovations and guiding...
Avinash Mishra
Chief Investment Officer and Head of GIF Growth
Avinash leads GIF's risk capital investment team and heads GIF Growth, GIF's new returnable capital investment vehicle. He shares oversight of the GIF's finance function with our CEO, ensuring...
Ben Potgieter
Junior Legal Counsel
Ben Potgieter supports the legal team on governance matters relating to GIF and our portfolio, as well as general commercial matters, and legal issues arising in relation to portfolio companies...
Christina Holzmüller
Operations Manager
Christina is the operations manager at GIF. Previously she carried out the role of policy adviser, as part of the team supporting the CEO. Before joining the team, Christina worked...
Cillian Moynihan
General Counsel
Cillian Moynihan oversees the legal and ESG teams and functions at GIF. He is responsible for structuring and negotiating all GIF’s investments around the globe, managing all existing investments, fundraisings...
Eugene Gikonyo
Investment Associate
Eugene Gikonyo is an investment associate in the Risk Capital team at GIF. Previously, he worked at Global Partnerships’ Social Venture Fund as an investment analyst. His duties included portfolio...
Francesco Valente
Investment Director, Risk Capital
Francesco is an Investment Director on the Risk Capital team at GIF. Prior to joining the team, Francesco was an advisor at Volta Capital (prior D.Capital, Dalberg Group) where he...
Garry Mulgrew
HR Business Partner
Garry is a Chartered Member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development and has worked in HR across Europe, the Middle East and Africa; Asia Pacific; and North America...
Georgiana-Maria Groza
Office Manager & Executive Assistant
Georgi is the Office Manager and Executive Assistant at our GIF London office. She has considerable experience as an Office Manager and Executive Assistant within different industries. Georgi moved to...
Grace Kapustianyk
Analytics Associate
Grace is an Associate in the Analytics team with experience in public health, clinical research, and project management. Her work at GIF includes providing analytics support on pipeline and portfolio...
Joseph Ssentongo
Acting CEO
Joseph Ssentongo has overarching responsibility for GIF’s mission: finding and funding innovations with the potential to transform the lives of people living on less than $5 a day. He oversees...
Karyna Greenidge
Business Integrity Analyst
Karyna holds the position of Business Integrity Analyst, supporting the Environmental, Social and Corporate Governance Executive in performing ‘Know Your Customer’ operations across GIF's portfolio and pipeline deals. Before joining...
Kate Sturla
Analytics Director
Kate Sturla brings experience in research, evaluation and right-sizing M&E frameworks. She previously worked at IDinsight, where she was a Director on the Innovation Team and led projects in education...
Kathi Hanifnia
Investment Director
Kathi Hanifnia is an Investment Director. She joins GIF from Beam, a social enterprise that helps homeless people into high-quality training and jobs, where she worked on a government commissioned...
Katie Carrasco
Head of Environment, Social Responsibility & Governance and Gender Co-Lead
Katie leads GIF's Environmental, Social responsibility and Governance (ESG) function, conducting ESG diligence across our portfolio. Katie also leads our Indo-Pacific office and relocated to Singapore in 2022. Katie is...
Ken Chomitz
Chief Economist
Ken Chomitz comes to GIF after a distinguished career in research and evaluation at the World Bank. An innovator in applied economics, he has published pioneering work in the economics...
Kippy Joseph
Senior Advisor
As Senior Advisor, Gender, Kippy Joseph brings 20 years professional experience to strengthen GIF’s commitment to supporting innovations that benefit women and girls, and aim to address gender inequality. Concurrently...
Lily Steele
Investment Director
Lily is an Investment Director at GIF. Previously Lily worked with early stage social ventures based in Kenya and Madagascar, providing advisory and business development services, as well as capital...
Liz Agase
Environment, Social Responsibility & Governance Director
Liz holds the position of Environment, Social Responsibility, and Governance Director at GIF. She is responsible for conducting ESG diligence across GIF's investment pipeline and portfolio. Before arriving at GIF...
Our board of directors
GIF is governed by a Board of Directors that brings together world-leading academics, impact investors, thought leaders, and development experts from across the public and private sectors. The GIF Board is responsible for oversight of our strategy and performance, and holds us accountable for how we work.