Bernadette Ikhena

New Markets Venture Partners is a leading early- and growth-stage venture capital firm that invests in and helps build transformative education, information technology and business services companies that drive superior financial returns through high customer ROI. New Markets is led by a veteran investment team with a 25-year track record of outperformance. As one of the leading education venture firms in the U.S., we maintain deep relationships with states, districts, universities, and other centers of workforce innovation that allow us to provide exceptional value to our portfolio companies. New Markets adds value to our portfolio companies before, during and after the investment process.

Altas Partners is a North American private equity firm focused on selectively acquiring significant interests in high-quality businesses with meaningful growth potential. Altas focuses on sub-sectors where it has deep expertise, seeking one or two compelling investment opportunities each year. The Firms patient investment philosophy and engaged approach to ownership distinguish Altas as a buyer of choice for many management teams and founders. The Firm was founded in 2012 and operates from offices in Toronto and New York. Altas manages more than $10 billion on behalf of leading institutional investors from around the world.

Africa50 is a pan-African infrastructure investor and asset manager that contributes to Africas growth by developing and investing in bankable projects, catalyzing public sector capital, and mobilizing private sector funding, with differentiated financial returns and impact. Africa50 currently has 35 shareholders, comprised of 32 African countries, the African Development Bank, the Central Bank of West African States (BCEAO), and Bank Al-Maghrib. Africa50 provides support at every stage of the project cycle. Its operations are carried out through three business lines: Project Development The primary objective of Africa50 Project Development is to increase the number of investment-ready, "bankable" infrastructure projects. In addition to providing financing at earlier stages of projects, Africa50’s staff actively contributes to project development, engaging with stakeholders along the deal cycle, with a particular focus on mobilizing political support. Project Finance Sourcing projects through Africa50 Project Development and other partners, Africa50 Project Finance engages stakeholders post financial close. Following a private equity model, it provides primarily equity and quasi equity with flexible exit options. It typically takes significant minority stakes of over $20 million, focusing on profitability as well as development impact, and playing an active role regardless of the type of investment. Africa50 Infrastructure Acceleration Fund Africa50-IAF is a 12-year closed-ended infrastructure private equity fund established to invest in infrastructure assets that unlock transformative impact, create jobs, and accelerate Africa’s green industrial revolution. Mobilizing large-scale and long-term institutional capital from African and international investors, Africa50-IAF seeks to deliver long-term growth and attractive risk-adjusted returns by investing in diversified and sustainable infrastructure sectors across Africa.

Bain & Company is a global consultancy that helps the world’s most ambitious change makers define the future. Across 65 cities in 40 countries, we work alongside our clients as one team with a shared ambition to achieve extraordinary results, outperform the competition, and redefine industries. We complement our tailored, integrated expertise with a vibrant ecosystem of digital innovators to deliver better, faster, and more enduring outcomes. Our 10-year commitment to invest more than $1 billion in pro bono services brings our talent, expertise, and insight to organizations tackling today’s urgent challenges in education, racial equity, social justice, economic development, and the environment. We earned a platinum rating from EcoVadis, the leading platform for environmental, social, and ethical performance ratings for global supply chains, putting us in the top 1% of all companies. Since our founding in 1973, we have measured our success by the success of our clients.

Ingressive Capital is a $10M VC targeting tech-enabled startups in Nigeria, Kenya, Ghana and Egypt. The fund is Delaware-incorporated and headquartered in Nigeria.  We target 10% ownership in Pre-Seed to Seed tech-enabled companies based in Sub-Saharan Africa with typical check sizes of up to $400k. We provide follow-on funding with our own investor base, who run some of the leading funds in the world. We look for post-launch founders with great products, solving big problems and we work with them on ways to grow and scale through business development, partnerships and financial support.