MEET THE TEAM

We are a lean, entrepreneurial and motivated team of thinkers and doers.

DIRECTOR

Sharon has over 15 years of experience in the field of research and international development. As the Executive Director of IFMR LEAD, Sharon leads the strategic direction of the organization and provides oversight to research, policy and capacity building engagements.

PRINCIPAL INNOVATION OFFICER

Trained in physics and economics, Badal loves to tinker with big ideas. He is passionate about disruptive innovation and large-scale change, which is reflected in his professional trajectory.

LEAD, CUSTOMER CENTRICITY

Jayshree is an experienced professional with a demonstrated history of working in the international development finance industry.

LEAD, SOCIAL & BEHAVIORAL INSIGHTS

Varinder has over 14 years of experience in brand strategy and social issues across India and UK.

LEAD, LAB PROJECTS

Preethi holds a Master’s in Business Administration (MBA) from IFMR Business School, with a focus on finance and marketing. In her free time, Preethi likes to write poetry, read fiction and watch movies.

LEAD, INCUBATOR PROJECTS

John manages the accelerator’s operations at Catalyst and also oversees the organization’s MSME and Entrepreneurship research.

LEAD, POLICY

A policy wonk and a lawyer (in that order), Mandar Kagade is focussed on development of regulatory policy in connection with the payments ecosystem. He is passionate about exploring intersections of finance and policy.

MONITORING & EVALUATION SPECIALIST

Passionate about designing solutions that address the needs of the underserved sections of society, Vaisnavi’s journey in the development sector started through volunteer opportunities.

SHARON BUTEAU

DIRECTOR

Sharon has extensive experience in building important partnerships between academia, donor agencies, policymakers and practitioners to promote evidence-based policy making and practice at scale. She has hands-on experience in research and analytics, and is a Principal Investigator on several IFMR LEAD studies as well. Prior to joining IFMR LEAD, Sharon was an Economist with the Analysis Group in Montreal, Canada.

Sharon holds a Master’s Degree in Social Research Methods from the London School of Economics & Political Science, and a Master’s Degree in Economics from the Université du Québec à Montréal.

JAYSHREE VENKATESAN

LEAD, CUSTOMER CENTRICITY

Previously, she has worked with CGAP and Accion on customer centric business models for low-income segments. As the CEO of IFMR Mezzanine Finance, Jayshree managed an investment portfolio of USD 2 million with zero default. A graduate from MDI Gurgaon, Jayshree is a Chevening Fellow from King’s College, London.

VARINDER KAUR

LEAD, SOCIAL & BEHAVIORAL INSIGHTS

Previously, she has worked with BBC Media Action in India to lead their research on an HIV/AIDS project funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Varinder also has significant experience in strategy design and impact evaluations of corporate social responsibility projects, with organizations such as Unilever, Marico and Reliance.

JOHN VICTOR ARUN KUMAR

LEAD, INCUBATOR PROJECTS

His core areas of work are project design, implementation and monitoring & evaluation. John has 10 years of experience in the Development Sector and has worked at Tata Consultancy Services on an Entrepreneurship Development program. John holds a Master’s degree from the Madras School of Social Work and a Bachelor’s in Computer Science from the Madras university.

BADAL MALICK

PRINCIPAL INNOVATION OFFICER

Badal has a deep industry background in financial services, digital payments and online commerce. Previously, he was a Vice President at Snapdeal where he built an Omnichannel business from ground up; a Group Product Head at Intuit’s Quickbooks business unit where he crafted new fintech products; an Engagement Manager at McKinsey’s financial services and payments practice where he advised Fortune 50 companies on innovation strategies; and an Economist at the World Bank’s Water and Sanitation Program where he led a ground breaking a new initiative focused on public accountability in urban service delivery.

He is a technology enthusiast, an active angel investor, and once played for a NYC based rock band. He has an MBA from the Yale School of Management.

ALOK GUPTA

DIRECTOR, INCUBATION

Alok has 22 years of global experience in fintech solutions. He was COO, India, at World Resources Institute where he set up global work in urban innovation and tools. Before that he was member of the startup team at UIDAI driving program strategy and implementation of Aadhaar – the world’s largest biometric-based online identity platform for 1.2 billion Indians — enabling roll out of the Aadhaar-based payment platform and effective delivery of welfare services. Prior to UIDAI, he took two fintech ventures to the Indian market as a founding team member. Earlier, he worked in the U.S. for 10 years with Trend Micro, managing global IT strategy, and DiamondCluster, developing and executing digital strategies for Fortune 50 companies.

He has an Electronic Commerce management degree from Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University and Bachelors in Electrical Engineering from Delhi College of Engineering.

SUDHIR KUMAR

ECOSYSTEM OPERATIONS LEADER

Previously, while with the Small Industries Development Bank of India (SIDBI), Sudhir headed its Financial Inclusion initiative (Poorest States Inclusive Growth program) in Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh, focusing on increasing access to financial services among poor households. As an entrepreneur, Sudhir initiated his own Urban Microfinance Company called MITRA in Rajasthan, providing financial services to urban poor. He has also worked closely with industry associations on policy and advocacy issues and with client-beneficiaries in urban and rural Rajasthan to generate linkages with livelihoods.

He is a postgraduate from the Indian Institute of Forest Management (IIFM).

PARVINDER SINGH

ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR, LEARNING & COMMUNICATIONS

Passionate about evidence-based conversations and storytelling, he has co-created community media initiatives and digital platforms for public engagement for inclusion and social change. Parvinder has worked with some of the leading development organizations like ActionAid, Oxfam, Christian Aid International, Plan International and Landesa among others. He loves contributing to the on-going public discourses through his writings and has been published in academic journals and international news media.

SAPNA BHARATH

MANAGER, PARTNERSHIPS & IMPLEMENTATION

Sapna has been a pilot team member at global investment banks such as Goldman Sachs, Lehman Brothers and Nomura, and their set up and start up story in India. With over 11 years of experience across transition, operations and execution of large-scale business transformation programs, her noteworthy engagements involved the roll out of new bank branch set ups for equity and fixed income businesses in Mauritius, Singapore, Indonesia and China. In her last stint at Nomura, she was instrumental in front-to-back program management, business analysis and user-acceptance testing for projects such as delivery of India FII Proprietary Trading business roll-out. Prior to Nomura, Sapna was a business analyst at Goldman Sachs and established a center of excellence reconciliation platform for Lehman’s global businesses.

Sapna holds a Bachelor in Commerce Degree, an MBA from the Symbiosis University, Pune and is Six Sigma Green Belt certified.

STRATEGY AND PRODUCT ARCHITECT

An Engineer and a Post-Graduate in management, Aditya is passionate about startups and has spent a large portion of his professional journey in the ecosystem.

BUSINESS ANALYST

Passionate about fintech and use of blockchain to improve regulation tech, Gaurav loves designing the efficient ways to streamline processes. prior catalyst he was a co-founder at Authentic – An India stack based E-KYC and authentication startup.

SENIOR PROGRAM ASSOCIATE

Sunil is an engineer turned management student. He has worked in the areas of brand alliance in ecommerce and as a Business Intelligence consultant for several domains.

OPERATIONS ASSOCIATE

Tunisha is passionate about policy and regulatory research and has had professional exposure in a diverse set of sectors including business responsibility, insurance and energy.

MANDAR KAGADE

POLICY CONSULTANT

Before Catalyst, Mandar worked with the Finance Research Group at IGIDR (Mumbai) on a Paypal-funded assignment authoring and disseminating policy research, op-ed pieces and curating round tables towards policy advocacy. Earlier, he was at the Bharti Institute Of Public Policy (Indian School Of Business) where he published financial regulatory research in banking, payments and fintech. A graduate of Columbia Law School and Govt. Law College (Mumbai) he practiced Transaction Law in an earlier life, before the policy bug bit him. When he is not thinking about pushing payments, you would find him watching Ken Burns’ documentaries or Quentin Tarantino creations.

ADITYA DESHPANDE

STRATEGY AND PRODUCT ARCHITECT

For over 10 years, Aditya has handled a wide range of roles including consulting, academics and entrepreneurship. Previously, he was working with GREX as Associate Vice President and handled the ground-up development of debt products for the company. He was responsible for many key partnerships for GREX and also handled various special initiatives, as part of the PMO team earlier. After a brief stint with Satyam as WRAP consultant, he moved to academics and subsequently became part of the entrepreneurship ecosystem while working with a Pune based VC firm and later his own startup in the incubation space.

He is an Electronics Engineer and also has a PG Diploma in Management from IMT, Nagpur. He loves working on product ideas and building strong partnerships for organizational growth. Aditya enjoys reading and conquering difficult terrain with his prized 4×4 in his free time. He also enjoys traveling, photography and horse riding.

ARBIND KUMAR

OPERATIONS ASSOCIATE

Arbind has a post graduate degree in E-Governance from IIM Indore, and has an experience of over 6 years in business consulting and ICT Solutions for various Government Ministries and Departments. At his last held designation as a Consultant for Business Process & IT and an Advisory Consultant, he has been a key driver of business strategy, transformation and operational improvement. He has also been associated with National Institute for Smart Government, Bluefrog mobile technologies Pvt. Ltd and IIM Indore. Prior to joining Catalyst, he has been a part of

Prior to his association with Catalyst, he was a part of the National Institute for Smart Government (NISG) New Delhi, where he was associated with various Ministries and Govt. departments, which included Controller General of Defence (MoD), Department of Finance (Govt. of Bihar), Election Commission of India, Ministry of Labour and Employment, Punjab Governance Reforms and others. During his free time, Arbind enjoys cooking, designing, watching movies and trying new cuisines.

His involvement with various Ministries and Govt. Departments are in the area of Rural Development, Health and Treasury Management. As a consultant, Arbind was involved in designing workflow-based business processes for the Government to create transparency, and as a Management Consultant, he was a part of conceptualizing, designing, and monitoring the E- Governance Project.

APARAJITA BHARTI

COMMUNICATIONS AND MEDIA CONSULTANT

Aparajita was one of the four Indians selected for the Faiths Act Fellowship by the Tony Blair Faith Foundation. Prior to that, she was a LAMP Fellow and worked as a Legislative Assistant to Mr. N.K. Singh, Member of Parliament, Rajya Sabha. Most recently, she was Manager, Corporate Affairs and Communications at Snapdeal where she was responsible for media messaging and engagement, in addition to providing inputs on policy and legislative issues concerning the digital commerce sector. She also developed and managed partnerships with many state governments for Snapdeal.

A street theatre artist in her undergraduate years, Aparajita was instrumental in seeding ‘Manthan’ – an annual congregation of street theatre student groups to spread social awareness across India. Manthan has now expanded to 15+ towns and cities.

She is an alumnus of Oxford University and College of Business Studies at Delhi University.

ROHIT KUMAR

POLICY CONSULTANT

Rohit served as the Head of Policy and Research at the office of Mr. Baijayant ‘Jay’ Panda, Member of Parliament (MP) in Lok Sabha. Prior to that, he has worked for several years with PRS Legislative Research, the Indian think-tank that supports MPs across party lines with research on legislative and policy issues. At PRS, Rohit also developed ‘MP Track’, a tool that is widely used by civil society to track engagement of MPs in Parliament. Before shifting to policy, he was a strategy consultant with the Boston Consulting Group (BCG).Rohit is an alumnus of the Harvard Kennedy School of Government and Indian Institute of Technology-Bombay.

VAISNAVI GNANASEKARAN

MONITORING & EVALUATION SPECIALIST

Vaisnavi has worked with various international organizations on research projects focused on the development sector while undertaking her Masters degree. She worked at the United Nations Population Fund Headquarters in New York where she was involved in designing and coordinating evaluation studies of global projects. During this time, she worked with UNICEF and UN Women on evaluation of a jointly operated project to address female genital mutilation in Sub-Saharan Africa. Prior to this, she worked with faculty at the University of Alberta on projects ranging from safe needle exchange programs for addicts to special after-school programs for at-risk children. As a volunteer, Vaisnavi worked with sex workers’ union and human rights activist groups. She specializes on solutions that have a strong data analytical backbone in the development sector.

Vaisnavi recently completed her Master degree in Public Health from University of Alberta, Canada.

OPERATIONS ASSOCIATE

Passionate about developing and improving e- Governance systems across multiple levels of society, Arbind loves to design user friendly workflow-based business processes for the Government to create transparency.

OPERATIONS ASSOCIATE

Prior to Darshan’s association with Catalyst, he was associated with Indian Institute of Management (Indore), for entrepreneurship and enterprise development programs.

PROGRAM ASSOCIATE

Siddharth enjoys mathematics and all things data. He joins Catalyst from the partnerships & strategic initiatives team at Snapdeal. He loves swimming, squash and anything that gets him outdoors.

ADMIN MANAGER

With flawless administrative skills, Preeti is passionate about her work; conducting events is her strength. She feels good to provide support to her teammates.

ARINDAM JANA

DATA SCIENTIST

Arindam has developed analytical frameworks for problems ranging from performance and strategy evaluation in Twenty20 cricket, to identifying possible locations for the new capital of the bifurcated state of Andhra Pradesh, to assessing credit risk in data-poor lending networks, to proving cartel and monopolistic behaviour in markets. Arindam also has a keen interest in developing data pipelines, with a specific interest in data quality and value add – in his time with Indian Institute for Human Settlements, he was instrumental in developing a spatiotemporal database panning sources from Census of India to remote sensing imagery from NASA and ISRO. In his free time, Arindam loves following long form cricket from across the globe, cooking, and analysing films.

PREETI BAWA

ADMINISTRATIVE OFFICER

Preeti previously worked with FHI360 where she gained exposure to the development sector. Earlier, at Jayanita Exports, she was exposed to work with global buyers for handicraft export and import. Before that, at Alar Impex Pvt. Ltd., she was working with the Belgian government on importing dredging machines from Belgium. Her first experience was interesting: she started her career with SSC as an invigilator for initial paper checks.

She has an Economics degree from Delhi University, and an Office Management and Secretarial Diploma from YMCA as well as an Operational Management diploma from MIT.

SUNIL GURUBHAGWATLA

SENIOR PROGRAM ASSOCIATE

Sunil has worked with Snapdeal in the capacity of Brand Alliances Manager. He has also worked to pilot the Omni channel form of retail in the e-commerce space. Prior to that, he has worked with Cognizant as a Business Intelligence consultant for clients ranging from the publications to banks to telecom sectors.

He is an alumnus of Mudra Institute of Communications (MICA), Ahmedabad and National Institute of Technology, Raipur.

TUNISHA KAPOOR

OPERATIONS ASSOCIATE

Tunisha has valuable work experience in both the corporate as well as the development sector. She worked as a Senior Research Associate with Consumer Unity and Trust Society for two years handling policy and regulatory research. Prior to that she worked with IMRB International for three years and was responsible for end-to-end project management. She handled both quantitative as well as qualitative studies in the areas of brand health checks as well as communication evaluations.

Tunisha has a management degree from Mudra Institute of Communications, Ahmedabad (MICA).

DARSHAN SINGH

OPERATIONS ASSOCIATE

During Darshan’s tenure at DA, he played a leadership role in the creation of ecosystem development for fly ash brick industry, enterprise development, creation of market linkages and integrated village development with HUL and Bharat Oman Refineries Limited. His business proposal on Rural Home Stays in Madhya Pradesh “Homes of India” was selected by IIM- Calcutta as a semi-finalist entry to TATA Social Enterprise Challenge and he was offered the Entrepreneurship Development Program at IIM-Calcutta on incubation. As an independent consultant, he has helped non-profit organizations with fundraising and marketing strategies. He has also independently conducted marketing activation campaigns for various corporates.

Darshan’s education background is in economics and international business management.

DESIGN AND BRANDING MANAGER

A professional visual artist, Allan has dedicated over a decade to art and design. He is a graduate in Visual Communication and is passionate about creating and exploring the latest trends in visual art.

DESIGN AND BRANDING MANAGER

A professional visual artist, Allan has dedicated over a decade to art and design. He is a graduate in Visual Communication and is passionate about creating and exploring the latest trends in visual art.

PROGRAM ASSOCIATE

Siddharth enjoys mathematics and all things data. He joins Catalyst from the partnerships & strategic initiatives team at Snapdeal. He loves swimming, squash and anything that gets him outdoors.

DESIGN AND BRANDING MANAGER

A professional visual artist, Allan has dedicated over a decade to art and design. He is a graduate in Visual Communication and is passionate about creating and exploring the latest trends in visual art.

SHAGUN NAGPAL

SENIOR COMMUNICATIONS MANAGER

An Advertising & Public Relations major from Indian Institute of Mass Communication; Shagun believes that effective communication leads to a positive change. Over the course of last 7 years she has worked in diverse work environments starting from Advertising agencies such as Ogilvy & Mather to Humanitarian organisations such as Medecins Sans Frontieres/Doctors Without Borders. Her extensive experience, during which she has managed Press Relations as well as designed Experiential Marketing campaigns, has provided her with an opportunity to explore communication through varied lenses.

She has planned & executed marketing campaigns for various audience profiles in India and South Asia. This background has given Shagun interesting insights into different cultures, along with teaching her skills like people’s management, customer engagement and crisis management.

ANUP KUMAR ROY

OPERATIONS LEADER, IFMR LEAD

Anup joined IFMR Research in October 2005 as Research Associate and has worked in several research studies. Prior to IFMR, he worked with University of Delhi for four years, as well as the World Bank as Short Term Consultant for more than a year. At present, as COO, he is involved in IFMR’s international expansion, partnership and training, HR and administration, grant management, financial functions, effective data collection, data management and ethical compliance.

Anup holds a Master degree in Social Work from the University of Delhi.

PREETHI RAO

LEAD, LAB PROJECTS

In addition to her role at Catalyst, Preethi heads the Innovation Vertical at IFMR LEAD. As an Innovation Champion, she drives new initiatives and is responsible for conceptualizing new areas of interest for the organization. A significant part of her role at IFMR LEAD is to identify improvements to existing processes, drive new research opportunities and develop capabilities for the same. She is also involved in developing and leading research studies and short term projects in open data, MSMEs, finance and healthcare. Her past roles include overseeing field data collection and digitization of operations.

Preethi’s journey at IFMR began in 2006 as a researcher where she worked in the small enterprise finance and development space until 2012. During this time, she managed a pan India study on ROSCAs and their role in MSME financing, funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The study was presented to and acknowledged by the then Hon. Finance Minister, Mr. Pranab Mukherjee.

VIVEKDEEP GUPTA

ASSOCIATE DIRECTOR, STRATEGIC INNOVATIONS

Vivekdeep Gupta graduated in 2014 with an MBA in Finance and Economics. Vivek has significant public policy experience, having worked at the Office of the Advisor to Prime Minister of India where he designed parts of the National Skill Development Policy and approved loans for skill development programs. He also worked with Mr. N Chandrababu Naidu, through the AP Economic Development Board, during his current tenure as Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh. Vivek spent 4 years with the Tata Group as part of the Tata Administrative Services (TAS) in Africa, Israel and India. At TAS, he helped the Group set up multiple businesses including India’s first private sector military aerospace unit and micro-finance fund in South Africa.

AKANKSHA MITTAL

OPERATIONS ASSOCIATE

Akanksha has worked with Accenture Strategy as a Business Consultant for close to years, in large scale implementation and strategy projects in areas of process efficiency and process integration with technological systems.

She completed her MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore and BSc (H) Mathematics from Lady Shri Ram College. She is passionate about the causes of Financial Inclusion, education for the blind and economic development and has contributed to these areas in her own small yet significant ways.

She likes watching plays more than movies and philosophy more than romance. Her height doesn’t justify her love and skill at basketball and she takes the job of restaurant critiquing quite seriously! Her bucket list includes travelling solo to Latin America and teaching kids there.

RYAN TERRIBILINI

FELLOW

Ryan has worked on numerous projects at the intersection of technology, policy, and operations. He spent four years at Google developing the Android hardware and software ecosystems by managing direct-to-consumer device support operations and creating policies for the world’s biggest mobile app marketplace. At Ripple, Ryan served as Head of Developer Relations and Platform Partnerships. Through this role he engaged with numerous financial institutions and FinTech entrepreneurs building the payment systems of the future.

Ryan is a magna cum laude graduate of the University of California, Berkeley with a degree in Classical Civilizations. He is expected to graduate from the University of Oxford’s Master of Public Policy program in Fall 2017. When he’s not studying or playing with tech, you can find Ryan relaxing by watching and playing baseball.

BHARADWAJ ADIRAJU

ASSOCIATE

Bharadwaj is pursuing an M.A. in Economics from the University of Hyderabad. Driven by his desire to solve socio-economic injustices, he was part of a team that conducted a study on the reasons for the drop-out of differently-abled students from Delhi University. He intends to combine his interests in teaching and economics to pursue a career in teaching Currently, he is interested in investigating benefits of financial inclusion at the grass-roots and its impact on macroeconomic policies and indicators. In his free time, he enjoys relaxing and plays the Carnatic Classical violin and lawn tennis.

RAGHAV KATYAL

ASSOCIATE

Raghav studies Political Science and Economics at Ashoka University. He believes policy enables markets to drive socio-economic development. An aspiring public policy professional, Raghav also enjoys writing opinion pieces on contemporary issues. Apart from his academic pursuits, he also steers the Consulting vertical of the Ashoka Business Club.
Born and brought up in New Delhi, he takes an avid interest in reading up on the city’s history, monuments, as well as the politics that is woven into its fabric. At Catalyst, he hopes to help create government regulation for payments which can unlock financial inclusion for India’s masses.

SAMRUDHI KHANNA

ASSOCIATE

With an undergraduate degree in financial markets and over two years of experience in investment banking research, Samrudhi has now decided to dive into a more impactful role within the space. She aims to contribute her time and skills towards helping Catalyst build a digitized national economy and promote financial inclusion at various levels. A firm believer in the bottom up theory of development, she has also worked on a number of field as well as analytical projects in behavioural finance, child labour, improving the scope of primary education in India etc.

NITHYA SRINIVASAN

ASSOCIATE

Nithya recently graduated in Economics from Miranda House, University of Delhi and is passionate about international development and economic research. Her academic interests include social entrepreneurship, women empowerment, and behavioural aspects of public policy formulation. In the past, Nithya has worked with research organisations, NGOs and the Delhi Government on women entrepreneurship, public health, education and law. She recently represented India at the South Asian Economics Students Meet, Bangladesh and was awarded ‘best paper’ for her research work on healthcare financing. Besides research, Nithya loves debating, travelling and meeting new people. She is a passionate singer and currently teaches with an organisation called Music Basti in Delhi.

MYLA SWALLOW

ASSOCIATE

Myla is interested in the intersection of normative philosophy and the realities of global economic development. She bridges a fascination for the theoretical with a desire to implement effective on-the-ground change, realising that these pursuits can often lead in divergent directions. She is now working on her undergraduate thesis investigating and evaluating the execution of financial services in low-income communities. Myla is originally from Sydney, Australia, but has spent the last 3 years as a Robertson Scholar at Duke University. She will be graduating from Duke in May 2019 with a double major in economics and philosophy.

ANUPAMA MENON

ASSOCIATE

Anupama is an undergraduate student of Electronics and Communication Engineering at the National Institute of Technology, Trichy, and was named a Cargill Global Scholar in 2017. She is driven by a desire to integrate technology with the development sector in India. She is interested in digitization and its impact on the Indian economy and is keen on using her technical and behavioral insights to fast-track this process.

She has worked extensively in the Public Health sector - having conducted research in Medical Imaging and developed an application for Breast Cancer Thermography. As a volunteer, she has taught English to primary-school goers in rural Trichy. She also takes an active interest in theatre, classical dance and writing.

ALLAN ALFRED

DESIGN AND BRANDING MANAGER

For over a decade, Allan has been dedicated to design and looking into global design trends. His passion for art, design and communication has helped him build a staggering array of visual art and concepts. During the last 13 years, Allan has been recognized as a change enthusiast and a trend setter.

After graduating with a Degree in Visual Communication, Allan has worked in Malaysia and many parts of India. He is a well appreciated Team Leader and spends most of his leisure time interacting with like-minded creative professionals and exploring new realms of design.

SIDDHARTH DHANKHAR

PROGRAM ASSOCIATE

Siddharth has a dual degree from BITS Pilani with bachelor’s degree in electronics engineering and a master’s degree in economics. He’s previously interned at Morgan Stanley, KPMG, among other companies.

Prior to joining Catalyst, he spent about two years at Snapdeal working on partnerships & strategic initiative projects.

In his spare time, he can be found debating, planning detailed vacation itineraries and outdoors. He has spent a summer working in financial crime investigation with Gurgaon Police.

GAURAV SINGHAL

BUSINESS ANALYST

Gaurav has been an active participant in startup ecosphere. He has worked with CIIE, IIM A where he worked on the bi-yearly Blpan competition Power of Ideas; as an intern at Dexter capital – a startup debt advisory and angel fund where he assisted in early due diligence and outreach; and as a Business development associate at CultureAlley, creator of HelloEnglish App where he worked on monetizing the app through multiple channels and upselling. In his free time, he loves to write short stories, follow cricket and prepare for marathon cycling.

SUMMER PROGRAM (BATCH OF 2018)

Every year, we select a few passionately driven individuals with unique skills and interests that complement our current priorities.

ASSOCIATE

Bharadwaj is pursuing an M.A. in Economics from the University of Hyderabad. Driven by his desire to solve socio-economic injustices, he was part of a team that conducted a study on the reasons for the drop-out of differently-abled students from Delhi University.

ASSOCIATE

Raghav studies Political Science and Economics at Ashoka University. He believes policy enables markets to drive socio-economic development.

ASSOCIATE

With an undergraduate degree in financial markets and over two years of experience in investment banking research, Samrudhi has now decided to dive into a more impactful role within the space.

ASSOCIATE

Nithya recently graduated in Economics from Miranda House, University of Delhi and is passionate about international development and economic research.

ASSOCIATE

Myla is interested in the intersection of normative philosophy and the realities of global economic development.

ASSOCIATE

Anupama is an undergraduate student of Electronics and Communication Engineering at the National Institute of Technology, Trichy, and was named a Cargill Global Scholar in 2017.

BHARADWAJ ADIRAJU

ASSOCIATE

Bharadwaj is pursuing an M.A. in Economics from the University of Hyderabad. Driven by his desire to solve socio-economic injustices, he was part of a team that conducted a study on the reasons for the drop-out of differently-abled students from Delhi University. He intends to combine his interests in teaching and economics to pursue a career in teaching Currently, he is interested in investigating benefits of financial inclusion at the grass-roots and its impact on macroeconomic policies and indicators. In his free time, he enjoys relaxing and plays the Carnatic Classical violin and lawn tennis.

ANAND RAMAN

TECHNICAL ADVISOR

Anand enjoys learning and has moved between sectors and domain in his professional life — from IT to telecom to television and lastly financial services. He has written code, managed projects, delivered products, sold and marketed them with stints at companies including Tech Mahindra, Idea Cellular, Star TV, Eko and IDmission Solutions. He wants to remain curious and in hopefully bring some change. He has interests in diverse and often utterly unrelated subjects.

SOWMYA NANJUNDAIAH

MARKETING, INCITE

Since 2010, Sowmya has driven INCITE’s growth from a small startup into a full-service interactive agency operating out of the U.S., Europe and India. Earlier, she was responsible for corporate fund raising for the United Way in Massachusetts, helping America’s largest non-profit organization raise funds for outreach programs. On her return to India, Sowmya was part of the founding team of Nirvana, a Bengaluru-based BPO that services global clients. Here she defined the strategic vision and built key parts of the organization including product development and sales. As Head of the New York office, she was responsible for Nirvana’s expansion into the North American market. Sowmya then returned to India to co-found a successful wine company, Naka Wines. As CEO of Naka Wines, she was responsible for launching the brand across Karnataka and the USA.

Sowmya has an MBA from the prestigious University of Massachusetts.

ABHINAV VERMA

ASSOCIATE

Abhinav is a second-year undergrad pursuing a B.Sc. (Hons.) in Economics and Finance from Ashoka University. He is interested in social entrepreneurship and the potential of markets to promote economic development. His academic interests lie in financial inclusion and impact investing. Last winter, he organised a panel discussion at the Harvard-US India Conference to discuss the role of financial inclusion in Indian rural development.

Abhinav is a budding entrepreneur. He started a e-commerce company to represent local manufacturers on e-commerce portals. On campus, he also started a food-delivery business. To relax, he enjoys swimming, photography, writing for his university’s newspaper, and trying new kinds of cuisine.

PRIYANKA ROYCHOUDHURY

ASSOCIATE

Priyanka worked with Centre for Policy Research in New Delhi in their project –Accountability Initiative- where she worked in the areas of public finance and public administration. As a Research Associate, she handled both quantitative and qualitative analytical work as well as worked on ground to implement PETS for the project.

Priyanka holds a B.A. (Hons) Economics degree from Lady Shri Ram college for women and a PGD in Liberal Arts from Ashoka University. Apart from nurturing a career goal to step into policy work using her academic qualifications professionally, she continues to juggle her passion for community work through her community initiative- The WordsWorth Project- which engages youth volunteers to assist underprivileged kids with their English language development. She often uses the rest of her time to give life to her thoughts through blogging and doodling.

MAYA DURVASULA

ASSOCIATE

Maya combines academic interests in economic development and poverty alleviation with a wide array of experiences in research and multi-sectoral policy development & implementation. Most recently, she co-led two nationwide behavioral economics experiments on HIV test uptake with a public health and social entrepreneurship laboratory in Guangzhou, China. She is interested in the ways in which microeconomic theory and behavioral insights can be used to design informal and formal social programs and institutions.

Maya studies economics and mathematics as a Robertson Scholar at Duke University and will graduate in May 2018. She was named a 2017 United States Truman Scholar. In her free time, she can usually be found wandering through mountains and canyons in the American Southwest.

ADVISORS

Catalyst’s advisors being deep sector expertise and thought leadership to guide our strategy and implementation.

ALLEN WEINBERG

Partner/Co-Founder

Glenbrook Partners

LEORA KLAPPER

Lead Economist

World Bank

NITIN MANTRI

CEO

Avian Media

PAWAN BAKHSHI

India Lead - Financial Services for the Poor

Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation

PRAVEEN KHANDELWAL

Secretary-General

Confederation of All India Traders

RAJESH BANSAL

Senior Partner

Bankable Frontier Associates

RENANA JHABVALA

National Coordinator

SEWA Bank

SMITA AGGARWAL

Director - Investments

Omidyar Networks

VARAD PANDE

Financial Inclusion Partner

Dalberg Social Advisors

VIVEK WADHWA

Distinguished Fellow

Carnegie Mellon University

STEERING COMMITTEE

Catalyst’s Steering Committee represents current donors and IFMR to provide governance and oversight.

CATHERINE HIGHET

Technical Advisor

mSTAR at FHI 360

MATTHEW HOMER

Senior Policy Advisor, Digital Finance

USAID (Washington, D.C.)

MUKESH SADANA

Project Management Specialist

USAID (New Delhi)

SHARON BUTEAU

Executive Director

IFMR Lead

BADAL MALICK

CEO

Catalyst

MATTHEW HOMER

Senior Policy Advisor, Digital Finance

USAID (Washington, D.C.)

MUKESH SADANA

Project Management Specialist

USAID (New Delhi)

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