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Maja is interested in the potential of entrepreneurship and human ingenuity to contribute to economic, environmental and social development. She has spent over 12 years connecting these fields, including as product manager in a web-technology startup, lead researcher at the International Institute for Sustainable Development, and counselor for Canada for the World Bank Group. Since 2009, she has worked to expand infoDev’s mobile innovation program, including by extending our offering to better serve women founders of tech startups in emerging and frontier markets. Maja is pursuing a doctorate at the University of Oxford under Professor Bill Dutton, with a focus on innovation ecosystems and with support from Oxford University Press. She can be reached at mandjelkovic@worldbank.org

Yehia Eldozdar joins infoDev as the Monitoring and Evaluation Specialist and is tasked to design, implement and evaluate results frameworks for our programs, which entails working with our team, clients and end beneficiaries.

Prior to joining infoDev, Yehia was part of IFC’s Investment Climate team in the MENA region where he spent seven years working on a number of business regulatory reform projects in Egypt, Lebanon and West Bank and Gaza. He also worked on developing a number of impact estimation models for IFC advisory products including business regulation, business edge and credit bureaus. Yehia also worked with the global Jobs team on executing two impact estimation studies for Financial institutions and Agri business for IFC investments in Lebanon and Egypt respectively. Before joining the World Bank group, Yehia worked for seven years as an SME Policy Development Specialist in the Office of the Ministries of Economy, Foreign Trade & Finance in Egypt. His work included consultations with the private sector on issues related to SME definition, legal and regulatory matters facing enterprises from start-up to operations to exit and the drafting of policy papers related to those issues.

Yehia holds an MSc in Economic Development & International Trade from the University of Reading in the UK and a BA in Economics from the American University in Cairo. 

Karlene Francis joins the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Unit as an Operations Officer in the World Bank's Jamaica Country Office. She is responsible for coordinating activities in the Caribbean with primary focus on the Entrepreneurship Program for Innovation in the Caribbean (EPIC).

Karlene, a Jamaican national, has extensive experience working in the private sector, public sector, and international financial institutions. Her core areas of expertise are in ICT and entrepreneurship. Prior to joining the World Bank, she managed complex regional projects and programs funded by the World Bank, IDB, Canada, and CDB in fifteen Caribbean countries. While at the Inter-American Development Bank, she was the Technical Lead for the design of four ICT projects and supervised several projects in the Jamaica portfolio. As a Senior Director in the Government of Jamaica, she was responsible for the ICT portfolio and led the development of national and Caribbean policies and strategies.

Karlene holds a MSc in Computer Based Management Information System and a BSc in Computer Studies (Computer Science and Management) from the University of the West Indies. She is a Project Management Professional and has a Post Graduate Diploma in Public Sector Management.

Samiksha Nair is Program Officer for the Climate Technology Program (CTP), supporting the expansion of the network of Climate Innovation Centers and lead engagement with external stakeholders.

With nearly a decade of experience, Samiksha specializes in cross-sector projects for sustainable development and environmental finance. Prior to joining infoDev, she worked for both public and private organizations in the energy sector as it relates to climate change, energy security and green growth. Samiksha began her career in Washington, DC focusing on energy regulatory issues for oil and natural gas clients. More recently she has worked at the U.S. Department of Energy, World Economic Forum and a private advisory firm managing projects in emerging markets to support and scale business development in renewable energy, climate smart agriculture, and sustainable supply chains.

Samiksha holds a Master’s degree in International Relations and Economics, concentrating on Energy, Resources and the Environment from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies and an MBA from the University of Geneva. She also has a BA in International Relations from the Johns Hopkins University.