Catalyst’s Core Team

Managing Director

Dan has 20+ years experience working in over 30 African countries. Prior to founding Catalyst, he co-founded Côte d'Ivoire’s first PAYGo solar company, and spent 15 years at the World Bank in a variety of operational roles.

Principal

Ian has 15+ years of diverse energy-sector experience with tech and business-model expertise across off-grid solar, mini-grids, and clean cooking. In addition to Catalyst, he has worked for the World Bank, EarthSpark International, and PFC Energy (now S&P Global).

Senior Advisor

Christine has 25+ years of experience in decentralized energy enterprise development and finance, strategy, and partnerships. She previously served as Senior Advisor to Sustainable Energy for All, co-founder and CEO of E+Co, and a Director of SELCO India.

Senior Advisor

Willem is an economist with over 20 years of experience in establishing and managing high-impact microfinance and renewable energy businesses in Asia and Africa. Most recently, he was the co-founder and CEO of SolarNow based in Uganda and Kenya.

Senior Associate

Annette is a finance and operations professional with over 10 years of experience in the energy access and corporate sectors. This includes operational roles with Equatorial Power and SolarNow. Previously she held corporate finance roles at Unilever.

Senior Associate

Rachel spent 7 years as a practitioner with EarthSpark International, leading its spin-off Haitian social enterprise, Enèji Pwòp. She is an operations specialist with experience developing training programs and leading business processes in the nonprofit and social entrepreneurship sector.

Senior Associate

Xan is energy access and decentralized rural energy distribution practitioner, having worked in senior roles with leading PAYGo companies (Mobisol, Bboxx, SolarWorks).

Maria has 9+ years of experience working in energy access and development in East and West Africa and in the financial sector. Prior to joining Catalyst, she worked for Dalberg Advisors in Dakar and Energy 4 Impact in Nairobi as a project manager. Her expertise lies in mini-grids, productive use of energy, financial modeling, data and M&E.

Alexandre Galicier

Senior Associate

Alexandre is an EDS professional with over 12 years experience in the energy sector in West and Central Africa. He previously served as Group Head of Credit Risk and Strategy at d.light in Côte d’Ivoire where he was responsible for a portfolio of $130+ million in consumer financing for 1+ million people.

Alvin Ng

Data Engineer

Alvin is a Data Engineer that helps with backend data infrastructures and ensures the integrity of the data. He supports the development of an in-house credit risk management solution, the PAYGo Lab.

Justin Sankara

Graduate Associate

Justin is a data strategy professional with over 10 years of experience, including leading quality control strategy for Teach For America’s admissions process. With previous experience in the education field, he is currently pursuing a Masters in International Affairs at Columbia University SIPA.

Kurt Eulau

Data Scientist

Kurt helps make data actionable. He has developed algorithms and dashboards to analyze and track credit risk management metrics, and developed a data visualization platform related to energy access.

Affiliated Consultants

DIMA REDA

Dima has 20 years of experience in natural resource management, climate change, gender, and monitoring and evaluation (M&E). She is the President and Founder of Nataij Group. Prior to launching Nataij Group, she served as the Results Based Management Coordinator at the Global Environment Facility (GEF).

ESMERALDA SINDOU

Esmeralda is an energy engineer and economist with over 10 years of experience managing and developing energy projects in Sub-Saharan Africa including market analysis, financial modelling for the design of the reverse auction mechanism, evaluation of proposals and due diligence for two RBF programmes totalling €148m (Modern Cooking Fund for Africa and Beyond the Grid Fund).

EVAN COLTON

Evan is a business strategist with broad experience in emerging markets, clean energy, and the technology industry. He co-founded energy efficiency startup Incenergy and helped launch Asha, a Nairobi-based software startup company.