Swiss Impact with Banerjis

Hosts: Sveta and Ben Banerjee
Topic: How to accelerate the energy transition in mobility 10 times
Guests: Frank Kroon, Founder & CEO of BeMup
              Dirck Gevers, Co-founder & COO of BeMup

Frank Kroon, founder & CEO
Frank developed his startup capabilities in developing Telco organizations across Europe in the late 90s and early 00s. His first project was Telfort in the Netherlands, which started with a team of 60 people and grew to 1600 staff and a €400 million annual turnover. Later he delivered similar results at Viag Interkom, AuraServ, O2 Genie, Sonera Zed, and Completel. Besides building startups, he delivered projects at WestPac, BT, Evry, Tinn Energi, and the Tax Office in the Netherlands.

Frank delivered successful consulting engagements across the globe before starting BeMup in 2018. The vision of BeMup to deliver the most comfortable and efficient mobility service available is on target. With BeMup, Frank leverages his acquired skills in IT Technology, Financial Modelling, Organisational Development, and Business Development.

Frank is father of Lex (27), Elvera (26), and Tessa (23) whom he got with Ageeth (d.2012). He is married to Jet since 9-11-2021. They live in Leiden and Slijkenburg.

Dirck Gevers, co-founder & COO
Dirck's career in Mechanical Engineering started at the South African Power Utility, was broadened in a Unilever Margarine Factory, and honed in 21 years of working for BMW in various factories, central planning, and the R&D centre in Munich. At BMW he managed the department that is responsible for the complete Body Quality of all global Product Launches.

His solid operational experience and his passion for innovation - especially in data analytics - helped to continuously raise the bar of efficiency and quality. Dirck brings internationally proven organizational skills, modern leadership values, and a drive to build something new for the team.

He loves to do sports, play the trombone, and learn new skills, currently in cryptocurrencies. He lives outside of Munich with his wife Martina, their children Anouk, Luc, and Henri, and their young golden retriever Thembi.

Hosts: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: The role of faith-based investors in building a better world
Guest: Martin Palmer Faith Invest

Our guest for today's show is Martin Palmer, the founding president and CEO of Faith Invest. Martin has been an international specialist in major religions and cultures for over 45 years and has written more than 20 books on religious and environmental topics. He has been a regular contributor to the BBC and has worked with the Faith Invest program since 2001.

Martin Palmer discussed his new multi-faith just transition fund. He has been the Secretary General of the Alliance of Religions and Conservation (ARC) and has worked with HRH Prince Philip on environmental issues since 1985. Martin's approach to being an expert in various religions has been to ask a vaguely intelligent question and listen to people tell him about their faith.

Join Martin Palmer and the hosts of the TV Show as they discuss the role of faith-based investors in building a better world. Martin's unique perspective and expertise in both religion and environmental issues make for a fascinating conversation on the importance of impact investments in these challenging times.

Hosts: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: Russia beyond the war with Ukraine
Guest: Sergei Ponomarev, Expert in social entrepreneurship

Sergei Ponomarev is a PhD in Political Science, co-founder of IIIC Galileo, certified expert in the field of social entrepreneurship and impact measurement with more than 20 years of experience. Sergei is specialised in social engineering, education and consulting for impact startups.

He has been teaching 14 years at the universities, worked with corporations, social enterprises and NGOs. Sergei managed more than 100 international social projects and worked in 25 different projects in 15 countries.

The show on how Impactful investments and businesses are helping to implement the 17 UN SDG’s worldwide to preserve the world for future generations.

Banerjis have enlightening and in-depth conversations with newsmakers, celebrities, thought leaders, entrepreneurs, project owners, investors, politicians and business leaders and encourage them to act now.

Hosts: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: Restitution: Returning stolen assets
Guest: Katherine Mulhern CEO of Restitution

Katherine is a senior lawyer with significant experience on transparency, accountability, governance and anti-bribery and anti-corruption. A former investigator for an African TRC, Katherine was a senior law firm partner in private practice, the Chief Executive Officer of three leading development organizations based in West Africa, the UK and the United States, and a consultant for sovereign governments (including donor governments) on transparency, anti-bribery and anti-corruption and governance.

In her role as Chief Executive Officer and as a consultant, Katherine has provided legal advice and support to emerging democratic governments (including Iraq, Afghanistan, Zimbabwe, The Gambia, Kenya and others) on a variety of technical legal issues, including in relation to anti-bribery and anti-corruption.

Restitution is a first-in-market global litigation impact fund which works with emerging, transparency-focused governments in the Global South in the recovery of assets stolen through kleptocracy and corruption.

Billions of dollars of assets are stolen annually from the Global South through bribery, corruption, fraud and theft. Often these flows come to rest in identifiable and recoverable assets that include securities, real estate and cash. These assets and claims relating to misappropriation, corruption, fraud, tort and breach of contract, as well as non-performing loans and related judgments are an asset class that can be identified, valued and realized. Restitution is an impact litigation fund which, in partnership with government partners, donors and investors, identifies, quantifies, develops and realizes these portfolios for the benefit of the governments (and the people) who are victims of corruption.

Restitution realizes claims portfolios relating through kleptocracy and corruption side-by-side with victim governments, donors and investors (many of whom wish to invest in a “G” (governance)-focused ESG investment). Restitution ensures that the country receives the majority of the returned assets in a way that is transparent and accountable, while also ensuring that investors receive a strong return.

Hosts: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: The world’s oldest lake's dark secret
Guests: Mikhail Granin, Vice President of NEM.io foundation; Ilya Aslamov, The Head of the Laboratory of Hydrology and Hydrophysics, Limnological Institute, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

The show on how Impactful investments and businesses are helping to implement the 17 UN SDG’s worldwide to preserve the world for future generations.

Banerjis have enlightening and in-depth conversations with newsmakers, celebrities, thought leaders, entrepreneurs, project owners, investors, politicians and business leaders and encourage them to act now.

Hosts: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: Swiss Impact for Ukraine
Guest: Natasha Korotkina, Professional Dance Artist, Choreographer, International Master Teacher

The show on how Impactful investments and businesses are helping to implement the 17 UN SDG’s worldwide to preserve the world for future generations.

Banerjis have enlightening and in-depth conversations with newsmakers, celebrities, thought leaders, entrepreneurs, project owners, investors, politicians and business leaders and encourage them to act now.

Hosts: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: How to Build faster, safer and greener homes
Guests: Sanna Silfverberg, CEO of Block Solution
             Markus Silfverberg, Founder of Block Solution

Sanna is the CEO of the Block solutions Oy who wants to promote the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals in everyday life. Especially gender equality and reduced inequalities are on top of her list of important things to achieve in business.

Sanna has en extensive background in Human Resources but she knows almost every detail of Block solutions technology including injection moldingand she is even a great builder when it comes to building with the Blocks.

Sanna´s vision is to disrupt the entire construction industry with our innovative solution and material. We are creating a better tomorrow by creating sustainable communities around the world.

Markus is an international serial entrepreneur with an extensive background in the production technology sector of large scale.

He is the founder and inventor of Block solutions. Markus has a passion for sustainability and environmental actions and fighting the climate change.

Due to the wide expertise in different positions, Markus has a thorough understanding about business culture and knows how to bring up successful businesses around the world.

Block solutions is an affordable, sustainable, environmentally friendly and easy way of building homes.

Host: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: Zero Emission, safe fun Mobility
Guests: Pekka Ketola, CEO of Scouter Mobility Oy
             Jaakko Pitkäjärvi, COB of Scouter Mobility Oy

Pekka is a practitioner for human innovation, bringing together user experience, innovation, co-creation and business development.

From 1995 to 2011 he worked for Nokia in multiple innovation management roles developing communicators, smartphones and mobile services. At Nokia he was a strong advocate for open innovation and collaborative development. His doctoral thesis (2002) explored how usability engineering can be integrated in complex concurrent development processes.

In 2012 Pekka co-founded innovation company Ideascout to bring the power of collaborative development and user innovation to SMEs and industries. This led him to the path of exploring the biggest opportunities in the society and translating those into new businesses.

Scouter Mobility Oy was born in 2014 from translating urban development megatrends and emerging problems into an industrial scalable solution, a disruptive light electric vehicle.

Pekka is CEO of Scouter Mobility. Pekka is well connected with global innovation networks. He brings value to all areas of development by inspiring people for collaboration, by translating ideas to insights, and by developing tangible business possibilities.

Jaakko Pitkäjärvi is an investor focused on start-ups related to sustainability and energy saving. He holds a medical doctor degree from the University of Tampere and has worked in various healthcare companies for over 20 years. Moreover, his stages of keen activity span from aviation to maritime and automotive fields, both in form of professional certificates and personal interests in aforementioned areas. The investments he has done are spread in different technology sectors mainly outside medicine.

Mr. Pitkäjärvi has been involved with Scouter since 2013 and seen the project progress from basically zero to the current status. The main driver to invest and chair the company has been the revolutionary change the company can offer. Scouter has already proven how different city traffic can be instead of current solutions. And there is an enormous potential in bringing this to global awareness.

Host: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: Why empowering girls can change the world?
Guest: Dr. Vibeke Riemer and Lars Kolind, Founders of World Guide Foundation

Dr. Vibeke Riemer (a Danish citizen), is a medical doctor, entrepreneur, board chair and philanthropist, has over 30 years of experience from public and private sector management and philanthropy. Specialized in Public Health with additional business education from Copenhagen Business School and the Wharton School, Dr. Riemer joined the National Board of Health (Ministry of Health) where she was engaged in developing and designing future structure and standards for the Danish public health service. Later she joined the Ministry of Finance, to work with similar challenges in other sectors. Realizing the importance of the human factor Dr. Riemer co-founded PeopleTools A/S, a management consultancy providing psychological assessment tools for public and private corporations, with the scope of improving leadership and social skills.

Dr. Riemer has been a volunteer Scout/Guide leader throughout her career. She has held numerous positions at local, regional, national and world levels. She has served as President of the Olave Baden-Powell Society, supporting the World Association of Girl Guides and Girl Scouts (WAGGGS). Dr. Riemer’s passion is to develop tomorrow’s leaders with focus on girls and young women. She is a major contributor to this work, and she has been engaged in leadership development projects and social entrepreneurship around the world. She has received awards for her work including the Princess Benedikte Award and the Regal Circle Award from the World Scout Foundation, and she is a Knight of the Order of the Dannebrog. Dr. Riemer attended the Clinton Global Initiative in 2012.

Lars Kolind (a Danish citizen) is a mathematician, serial entrepreneur, bestselling author and philanthropist. He has started more than 25 businesses and he is a thought leader on leadership and strategy. He has written five books about leadership and strategy that have been published in nine languages.

Kolind has been a pioneer in organizational design. He created one of the world’s first paperless and truly knowledge-based organizations in 1991 where he demonstrated how an organization can simultaneously become more innovative, more flexible, more responsive, more efficient and more meaningful to employees.

Kolind’s philanthropic work focuses on enabling young people throughout the world to be active citizens leading positive change in their communities. This is the vision of the World Scout Movement where Kolind has been engaged for four decades. He has received numerous awards including Denmark’s Man of the Year, the Bronze Wolf, The BSA Silver World Award, The Silver Fox, the Princess Benedikte Award, the Regal Circle Award, and he is a Knight of the Order of the Dannebrog. He currently serves as chairman of the World Scout Foundation.

Host: Ben Banerjee & Sveta Banerjee
Topic: Tackling Food Insecurity
Guest: Eero Pisilä MD Perunamestarit Oy, MD Tanzanice Agrofoods Ltd, Chairman Luonnosta Finland Ltd.

Eero Pisilä
- Enterpreneur and founder of Perunamestarit Oy since 1987. Company has built on 90's seedpotato production and marketing model from finnish farms to global market, volumes over 10milj kg of certified seedpotatoes before business was sold to Dutch company HZPC.
- Chairman of Luonnosta trading company since 2005, building efficient international trading model for potatoes, fruits and vegetables. Network to over 20 countries.
- Founder and MD of Tanzanice Agrofoods Ltd since 2017.
- Investor and chairman of Pohjolan Peruna Oy, Finland biggest potato processing factory 2007- 2021,when shares were sold.
- Chairman of Seed Traders association of Finland on 2000's.
- Studies of Agrotechnology 1974-1978 in Helsinki University.
- Potato farm enterpreneur in Finland 1976 - 2014.