Working to deliver impact

With over 10 years of experience in the startup and innovation ecosystems of Europe, Asia and East Africa, I work with organizations and their teams in emerging and developing markets to design and implement solutions that can make an impact to address some of today's biggest challenges. Working across sectors and with a diversity of clients, I work to deliver change on the organizational, industry and sector level.

After completing a MSc in Development Management from London School of Economics, I started my career in 2008 in the public sector, advising the German Ministry of Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) on issues around innovation systems promotion and private sector development, before coming to India in 2010 and managing two projects in the field of Small and Medium Enterprise Development and Innovation Promotion for bilateral development agency GIZ.

In 2014, I joined the private sector as Business Development Lead for Intellecap's Africa expansion. As a pioneering organization in India's impact investing and social entrepreneurship ecosystem, Intellecap offered the opportunity to work with a variety of private sector clients such as large corporate, startups, investors, but also development organizations, family offices, and foundations. As Associate Partner, I led Intellecap's Europe expansion between 2017 and 2018, designing a number of innovative initiatives that connect the European innovation ecosystem with India and East Africa.

In late 2018, I started to work as an independent consultant, where I still am associated with some of Intellecap's projects. I am currently leading the Circular Apparel Innovation Factory, an innovation and co-creation platform for the Indian apparel sector to develop new business model innovations through partnerships with startups. As an independent consultant, I have also advised organizations and leadership teams on innovation and creativity.

I am engaged in a number of ecosystem building networks: As chair of the India Chapter of the Aspen Network of Development Entrepreneurs (ANDE), I am driving topics such as talent development and help the network in business development and network building. As ambassador of the German-Indo-Startup-Exchange Program, I support German enterprises to enter into the Indian market.

As an anthropologist and economist, trained in organizational development, design thinking and innovation management, I apply a systemic and human-centric approach to problem solving and work on solutions on the organizational, industry and ecosystem level. Some of my ideas, I blog on my personal blog, Boardroomanthropologist.com