Lord Ara Darzi
Lord Ara Darzi of Denham is Director of the Institute of Global Health Innovation at Imperial College London and holds the Paul Hamlyn Chair of Surgery. Named in TIME100 Health 2025, he is an internationally recognised academic, surgeon, and leader in global health policy. He is also a former UK Health Minister (2007-09). In his role as Executive Chair of […]
Joe Studwell
Joe Studwell worked as a journalist and author in east Asia for 25 years. He was the founding editor of the China Economic Quarterly and co-founder of the Asian research firm Dragonomics, now GaveKal Dragonomics. Joe is the author of three books about East Asia, two of which were long-listed for the Financial Times Business Book of the Year. One […]
Wawira Njiru
Wawira Njiru is a social innovator and enterprise leader who has spent more than a decade structuring, financing, and operating large-scale public food systems. As the founder and CEO of Food4Education, she is redefining how governments, investors, and philanthropists invest in the world’s largest reserve of human capital: African children. Food4Education works alongside families, schools, smallholder farmers, and governments to […]
Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu
Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu is the 15th Governor of Lagos State, Nigeria. He began his career in the private sector, spending more than a decade in banking before moving into public service. His public-service record includes helping establish the Lagos State Security Trust Fund Board, analysing government revenues to inform policy, and contributing to the development of Lagos State’s economic development […]
Jad Abumrad
Jad Abumrad is a composer, artist, and journalist. He is the creator of Radiolab, Dolly Parton’s America, Fela Kuti: Fear No Man, and many other podcasts, which collectively have been downloaded over a billion times. He has been called a “master of the radio craft” for his unique ability to combine cutting-edge sound design, cinematic storytelling, and a personal approach […]
Jamal Eltaeb
Dr. Jamal Eltaeb is an orthopaedic surgeon, head of traumatology, and General Director of Al Nao Hospital in Omdurman, Sudan. Amid Sudan’s devastating civil war and the near-total collapse of the country’s health system, Dr. Eltaeb has kept Al Nao Hospital operating as one of the last functioning referral hospitals in Greater Khartoum—a testament to his resilience and leadership under […]
Bobi Wine
Robert Kyagulanyi Ssentamu – known by his stage name as Bobi Wine – was born and raised in Kamwokya, one of Kampala’s most vibrant and challenging urban neighbourhoods. He rose to fame in Uganda as a musician, with music that spoke to some of the frustrations of ordinary Ugandans living under the increasingly authoritarian, four-decade-long rule of President Yoweri Museveni. […]
Janet Echelman
Janet Echelman sculpts at the scale of buildings and city blocks. Her work defies categorisation, as it intersects disciplinary boundaries, from sculpture, architecture, and urban design, to material science, structural and aeronautical engineering, computer science, and performance. Using unlikely materials, from atomised water particles to engineered fibre fifteen times stronger than steel, Echelman combines ancient craft with computational design software […]
Dixon Chibanda
Dixon Chibanda is a Zimbabwean psychiatrist and the founder of Friendship Bench, a community mental health programme that has reshaped how the world thinks about closing the treatment gap in low-resource settings. He is a practising medical doctor and professor of psychiatry and Global Mental Health at the University of Zimbabwe and the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine, […]
Gayle Smith
Gayle E. Smith is the former President and CEO of the ONE Campaign and former Administrator of USAID. She served as a top advisor on development issues for two American presidents and is one of the world’s leading experts on global development. She brings unparalleled expertise on development and democracy issues, and an extraordinary network of relationships across the African […]
Edgar Pieterse
Edgar Pieterse is founding director of the African Centre for Cities (ACC) at the University of Cape Town. He publishes different kinds of text, curates exhibitions, as well as difficult conversations about pressing urban problems. He is co-founder of CS Studios with Tau Tavengwa, and his latest publication is the co-authored book Cities Rethought: A New Urban Disposition (Polity, 2025). […]
Houda Ghozzi
Houda Ghozzi is the founder and CEO of Open Startup International (OST), an NGO that fosters innovation ecosystems with a focus on building linkages with academia. OST works with Columbia University and MIT to grow and connect ecosystems in Africa with the US, Europe and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region. After a decade operating in Africa and supporting more […]