Advisory Board PDF Print E-mail
Hubertus van der Vaart Hubertus van der Vaart co-founded Small Enterprise Assistance Funds (SEAF) in 1989, when it was known as the CARE Small Business Assistance Corporation (CARESBAC). Today, he is SEAF’s Executive Chairman and oversees equity capital of more than $450 million invested in emerging market SMEs through a network of 19 offices in Latin America, Central Europe, and Asia. In 1992, Mr. van der Vaart negotiated the establishment of CARESBAC/SEAF’s first fund in Poland, which grew to $16.8 million total capital under management under his leadership as the fund’s Director General. In 1997, Mr. van der Vaart was appointed CEO and President of SEAF, where he has since been involved with the establishment and supervision of each of SEAF’s 19 funds globally, including in Sichuan, China, Vietnam, India, Central Asia and Eastern Europe. He sits on every SEAF fund’s Investment Committee and has been involved in managing each exit.

Mr. van der Vaart holds a J.D. from Yale Law School, where he also studied finance at Yale School of Management. Mr. van der Vaart’s other academic achievements include a B.A. in Politics and Economics and an M.Phil in Economics from Oxford University, where he was a Rhodes Scholar, and a B.A. from the University of North Carolina, where he was a Morehead Scholar.

Iqbal Z. Quadir Iqbal Z. Quadir is the founder and director of the Legatum Center for Development and Entrepreneurship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), which promotes bottom-up entrepreneurship in developing countries. In the 1990s, Mr. Quadir founded GrameenPhone, which provides effective telephone access throughout Bangladesh and which became Bangladesh’s largest telephone company, with net income of $250 million in 2006. His childhood exposure to the conditions in rural Bangladesh combined with his later venture capital experience in New York led Mr. Quadir to recognize that the ensuing digital revolution could facilitate the introduction of telephony to 100 million people living in rural Bangladesh.

For four years, Mr. Quadir taught at the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, focusing on the impact of technologies in the politics and economics of developing countries. In 2005, he moved to MIT. His particular research interest is in the democratizing effects of technologies in developing countries. Mr. Quadir has appeared on CBC, CNN and PBS and has been profiled in feature articles in The Economist, Boston Globe, Financial Times and The New York Times, as well as several books. The World Economic Forum, based in Geneva, Switzerland, selected him as a “Global Leader for Tomorrow.” 

Dave Chen Dave Chen is the founder & CEO of Equilibrium Capital Group, an investment firm focused on building a portfolio of asset management companies, each executing a unique investment strategy in the area of sustainability. Mr. Chen was a General Partner at OVP Venture Partners, which focused on early stage tech venture investing from 2000 to 2007. Prior to OVP, Dave founded GeoTrust (acquired by VeriSign 2006), founded The Ascent Group, was Vice President Marketing at Mentor Graphics, an associate at McKinsey & Company, and was an early team member in 1978 at Solectron.

Currently Mr. Chen serves as Chairman of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco’s Portland Branch, Governor-Appointed Chairman of the Oregon Innovation Council, Board member of National Collegiate Inventors & Innovators Alliance (NCIIA), Board member of The Freshwater Trust, Board member of B Corp, Faculty at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University & former Chairman of the Oregon Nanoscience and Microtechnologies Institute (ONAMI). Mr. Chen is also a founder of Patton Valley Vineyards.

Mark Minevich Mark D. Minevich is the founder and President of Going Global Ventures, a New York based private investment and strategic advisory firm that prepares companies to deal with the complexities of the 21st century global economy. Mr. Minevich’s background includes 20 years’ experience in strategy and consulting for the global technology markets. He currently focuses on sustainability analytics, green IT initiatives, green investing, Smart Cities, Smart Buildings, Smart Grids, energy management, efficiency and automation issues. Mr. Minevich is also an influential authority on technology and particularly the role of the CIO/CTO in private wealth, social networking, impact investing and innovation.

Previously, Mr. Minevich was CTO and Strategy Executive at IBM and has held various management, technology and strategy roles at BTM Corporation, Deutsche Bank, Qwest Communications, Geotek, Comcast, and USWEB/CKS. From 2006 to 2010, he was a founder, chairman and director of the Billion Minds Foundation and Club, a global sustainability and knowledge foundation think tank and private wealth club. He is a recipient of the prestigious Albert Einstein Award for Outstanding Achievement and World Trade Leadership Award by World Trade Centers and WTCA. Mr. Minevich holds a B.S. from Montclair State University and an MBA from Stevens Institute of Technology.

J. Alex Hartzler

J. Alex Hartzler is Chairman of the Board of both MEDA Investments, Inc. and Sarona Asset Management. Mr. Hartzler was Executive Vice President and a partner of Webclients.net from 2000 until the company's sale to ValueClick, Inc. in June 2005. Prior to that, Mr. Hartzler was a corporate attorney with Buchanan Ingersoll, P.C. Mr. Hartzler is a graduate of Penn State University (BA, Econ), The George Washington University Law School (JD), and was a Fulbright Scholar in Cologne Germany. Mr. Hartzler is currently the managing partner of WCI Partners, LP, a real estate development company which he founded in 2005, along with his former partners at Webclients.net and also advises several companies in the internet marketing sector. Mr. Hartzler currently serves as Chairman of the Board of Ten Thousand Villages, an international handicraft distributor and retailer, and Director of the Board of MEDA. He has been active in the impact investment arena for many years with MEDA and is a founding investor of MicroVest, Inc.

Michael Strong Michael Strong is the co-founder (with John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market) and Chief Visionary Officer of Conscious Capitalism, Inc., a non-profit organization that promotes Conscious Capitalist solutions to world problems. He frequently speaks and writes on issues related to entrepreneurial and capitalist solutions to world problems. Mr. Strong’s work is featured in academic journals (The Journal of Business Ethics, Economic Affairs, Critical Review, etc.), specialty publications (Microfinance Insights, Policy Innovations, Carnegie Ethics, etc.) and in media reaching popular audiences (The New York Times, Bloomberg, The Huffington Post, RealClearPolitics, etc.) Mr. Strong is also the lead author, along with Muhammad Yunus, 2006 Nobel Peace Prize laureate, Hernando de Soto, Co-chair of the U.N. Commission on the Legal Empowerment of the Poor, John Mackey, CEO of Whole Foods Market, and others of Be the Solution: How Entrepreneurs and Conscious Capitalists Can Solve All the World's Problems.

Prior to founding FLOW (the predecessor organization to Conscious Capitalism, Inc.), Mr. Strong spent fifteen years in K-12 education, where he founded a charter high school ranked the 36th best public high school in the U.S. He is the author of The Habit of Thought: From Socratic Seminars to Socratic Practice and has consulted for hundreds of schools and universities around the world. He was educated at Harvard, St. John's College, and the University of Chicago.

Magatte Wade

Magatte Wade is a serial entrepreneur who was raised in Senegal, educated in Germany and France, and began her entrepreneurial career in the U.S. She is the founder of Adina World Beverages, a beverage company based originally on a Senegalese hibiscus recipe. Today Adina beverages are sold at major grocery chains across the U.S., including Whole Foods Market, Wegmans, and Safeway. Some speculate that Adina is the most prominent U.S. consumer brand founded by an African entrepreneur. Her current project is The Tiossano Tribe, Inc., a high-end skin care products line based on indigenous Senegalese recipes.  

Ms. Wade writes and speaks for many audiences, including presentations at MIT, Columbia, Furman, Babson, and articles for The Huffington Post. She is on the boards of several non-profits that support African causes, including Afropop Worldwide, the SEEDS Academy, AllforAfrica.com, and ASNAPP. She is fluent in, and conducts business in, Wolof, French, and English.

Richard E. Smith, III Richard E. Smith, III retired from his position of President and Chief Executive Officer for Reich & Tang Capital Management Group in New York – a firm that managed $4 billion of equities and global fixed income investments for institutional, high net worth and retail investors. Reich & Tang Capital Management Group was an affiliate of IXIS Asset Management  North America, LP, which is a subsidiary of IXIS Asset Management, Paris. Mr. Smith was with the firm from 1994 to 2008.

Prior to joining Reich & Tang, Mr. Smith held executive positions with notable firms along the East Coast including Rhode Island Hospital Trust, Review Management Corp., Rockefeller & Co., Inc., and The Chase Manhattan Bank. He holds an MBA in Finance from the University of Connecticut and a B.A. in History from Gettysburg College. Mr. Smith also holds professional designations including Chartered Financial Analyst and Series 6, 7, 24, and 63 FINRA registrations.

Francis J. Calcagno Francis J. Calcagno has an extensive background in providing financial advisory services to middle market private and public companies, including mergers & acquisitions, financing and strategic joint venturing. Currently, Mr. Calcagno serves as a Managing Director of Pickwick Capital Partners, an investment banking boutique specializing in providing financial services to middle market companies and third party marketing services to the investment management community. Prior to becoming a principal at Pickwick Capital Partners in 2009, he held Managing Director positions at Dominick & Dominick and Deloitte & Touche LLP, as well as senior positions at C.J. Lawrence/Morgan Grenfell and Bankers Trust Co.

Mr. Calcagno has also held board positions with several private and public companies, both domestic and international. He holds an MBA in Finance from Washington University (St. Louis) and a BS in Electrical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.