Stewart Craine is the Managing Director of Village Infrastructure Angels that was founded in 2012. He previously co-founded the solar LED lighting company Barefoot Power, which built up to a $5 million revenue business that helped 1 million people replace kerosene lamps with solar during 2005-2011. Stewart also has extensive experience in micro and mini hydropower, large wind farm design, hybrid systems, minigrid design and other forms of renewable energy.
Fabio De Pascale
Fabio is the co-founder and CEO of NXT Grid, the co-founder of The EnAccess Foundation, and the co-founder and Chief Energising Officer at Devergy. Before becoming an entrepreneur in the Energy Access sector, Fabio was Project Manager at the European Space Agency, dedicated to Sounding Rocket and Satellite microgravity research projects. There he managed and supported the successful interaction between international government agencies and the private sector, together with their financial and political implications.
Rahul Barua
Rahul Barua is the Director of Climate Finance Innovation at Salesforce, where he designs and supports blended financing initiatives for nature and climate action.
Previously, Rahul spent twelve years working in universal energy access (UN Sustainable Development Goal 7) throughout sub-Saharan Africa. His experience includes designing and supporting the financing of energy access projects and ventures, investment funds and facilities, and large-scale public-private partnerships within mini-grid, PAYGO solar home systems, and clean cooking domains. He has worked with the African Development Bank Group’s Sustainable Energy Fund for Africa, FactorE, and CleanStar Ventures, and has authored SDG 7 finance research published by UN SEforALL and the EU’s GET.invest program.
Claudio Pedretti
Claudio is the Founder & CEO of Green Climate Ventures, which provides expertise and patient capital to the social entrepreneurship ecosystem in the areas of rural electrification, renewable energy, agribusiness, and cooling. He is also Founder and President of the Club of Florence, a think tank that puts Florence at the center of the global debate on Climate Action and Climate Finance. Claudio recently served a two-year mandate as President and Chairman at Alliance for Rural Electrification, the largest worldwide industry association representing 190 companies in the sector. He currently sits on the board of several private companies and non-profits organizations around the world.