CDC, the UK’s development finance institution that will soon be renamed British International Investment (BII), has appointed four new managing directors, it said in a statement.
The company has elevated Abhinav Sinha, the current Director and Head of Technology and Telecoms, Equity, to become the Managing Director and Head of Technology and Telecoms.
The three others elevated as MDs within the firm are Amal-Lee Amin - MD and Head of Climate; Chris Chijiutomi - MD and Head of Infrastructure Equity, Africa and Pakistan; and Yasemin Saltuk Lamy becomes MD and Head of Asset Allocation and Capital Solutions.
Amin has led cross-firm initiatives to align investment strategies with the goals of the Paris Agreement as CDC’s Climate Change Director.
Chijiutomi was Director, Head of Infrastructure Equity while Lamy was Deputy CIO, Head of Asset Allocation and Capital Solutions.
The appointments have been made as CDC/BII enters its new five year strategy announced in November in which it will prioritise investment in clean infrastructure and climate finance projects.
While Sinha and Lamy have been with the company since 2018, Chijiutomi joined CDC as Investment Director in January 2017 and Amin joined in 2020.
An IIM Calcutta alumnus, Sinha has formerly worked with Eight Roads and joined CDC in 2018 based in London. As Director and Head of Technology and Telecoms, Equity he has been looking at impact investments in Africa/South Asia in areas such as telecoms, technology, pharmaceuticals, light engineering and others.
Some of the key investments handled by Sinha are Africa’s Liquid Telecom, the mobile partnership with Vodacom in Ethiopia and setting up Kelix bio, the cross-border pharmaceutical manufacturing platform.
Chijiutomi has been responsible for some of the company’s most important relationships and transactions and sits on the boards of Globeleq and Gridworks, CDC’s key investments in Africa power.
“Under Lamy’s leadership since 2018, CDC’s Catalyst portfolio has doubled in size, reaching $1 billion of commitments and helping more than 40 million people. In 2020, she stewarded CDC’s COVID-19 response, which was awarded Real World Impact Initiative of the Year by the UN Principles for Responsible Investment,” the company said.
CDC, which will be called BII beginning April 2022, has added South East Asia and the broader Indo-Pacific region as its new focus area for business expansion.
In November, it has also appointed former Google executive Diana Layfield as its new chairperson, first female to head CDC.