Mr. Dipal C. Barua Founder & Chairman, Bright Green Energy Foundation (BGEF), has more than 35 years experience in finding sustainable market based solutions to the social and economical problems faced by the rural people. As the Founding Managing Director of Grameen Shakti, he is world renowned for his innovation which include installment based payment which reduced the cost of a solar system to monthly kerosene cost, coupled with a strong effective after sales, repair, maintenance network, involving local technicians and especially women technicians cum entrepreneurs who repair, assemble solar accessories in their communities. He has shown that Solar PV technology can be successfully implemented on a mass scale to provide rural people with climate friendly energy, light, income and health. He won the First Zayed Future Energy Prize 2009 for his innovation and commitment to alternative energy. Under his vision and leadership, Grameen Shakti has received many national and international awards including Right Livelihood Award in 2007 and Ashden Outstanding Achievement Award in 2008.

He is one of the co-founders of Grameen Bank, and occupied the number two position as the Deputy Managing Director of this Nobel Prize Winning organization up to December 2009.

He is a Member of Strategic Advisory Board of IRENA (International Renewable Energy Agency). He is also a member of the advisory board of the International Climate Initiative, Germany. He is also the Board member of A Solar World For All, a new initiative to expand solar energy to the rural people. He is also the Jury member of the Design Contest, initiated by Fraunhofer Insititute of Solar Energy (ISE), Germany and Canopus Foundation. Recently he visited France and SriLanka to give advice on formulating strategy to increase access to solar energy. He was invited by the TOTAL group, France and the Government of Sri Lanka.

Hazem is a Partner in PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), the Leader for the Global Cities and Local Government Network and is also a member of PwC’s Global Leadership team for the Public Sector. With over 22 years of consulting experience, Hazem has expertise in local government strategy formulation, capacity development and public sector reform. He led several multi-million dollar projects for both public and private sector. Since 2008, Hazem has been leading PwC’s Thought Leadership around the world for cities and local governments. He led the core group which developed a comprehensive framework for city management and assessment tools to assist cities in charting their path to become a “City of the Future” starting from a clear vision. He also led and contributed to other global research efforts and reports on cities including the “Impact of the Financial Crisis on Cities” Survey and “Cities of Opportunity”, comparing and benchmarking 21 global cities on several dimensions including intellectual, ICT, infrastructure, social and environmental.

Hazem worked on several projects in the Middle East, United States, Latin America and South East Asia, which gives him an edge of expertise with the Public Sector in both developed and developing markets conditions. He supported PwC’s efforts to work with cities and local governments around the world in Brazil, China, Russia and Saudi Arabia. In Abu Dhabi, he led the strategy formulation and implementation support for several government clients such as the Abu Dhabi Department of Municipal Affairs, Abu Dhabi Municipality, Al Ain Municipality and the Western Region Municipality, the Abu Dhabi Education Council and Al Ain Wild Life Park & Resorts. In 2006, he led the strategic plan formulation for the infrastructure, land and environment for a leading GCC city. Most recently he led the strategy formulation for the Economic Cities Authority in Saudi Arabia, responsible for overseeing six new economic cities.

Laina Raveendran Greene, is CEO and Lead Consultant GET-IT, Inc, a strategic marketing and business planning consulting company based in Silicon Valley (www.getit.org). She started her career in 1986 working with the International Telecommunications Union in Geneva, INTELSAT in DC, and Singapore Telecom in Singapore. She then started her consulting career in 1996 working with clients including Pacific Internet, Cisco Systems, Juniper Networks, Verisign, International Telecommunication Union, United Nations, Asia Pacific Network Information Centre, and International Development Research Centre in Canada. She also served as the first Secretary General of the Asia Pacific Internet Association, Board Director of Globetel Communications Corp, founded, ran and sold an interactive digital media company in Singapore and is currently Entrepreneur in Residence at Stanford University where she also teaches a class at the Global Entrepreneurial Marketing program and Board member of emota.net. Over the last 3 years, she has become very involved in bridging the energy divide as much as she had been with bridging the digital divide. This has included her being invited to be a part of the UN delegation to the Copenhagen Climate Conference to speak about Green ICT, co-producing a mini-series “Green Planet” with TelecomTV, keynoting at the Clean Tech Open Business Accelerator Conference in California, keynoting in Brunei for the Institute for Engineering and Technology Conference on Renewable Energy, working on projects to explore ways to help bridge the energy divide for the bottom of the pyramid marketplace, just to name a few. Her passion for “green” technologies is mirrored by her living in a solar powered home.