GAWA Microfinance Fund Investment Committee
• Mr. Lench has spent most of his career working with financial institutions in developing countries. He invested in, rated, and structured numerous transactions in Asia, Africa, Latin America, Eastern Europe, and the Middle East.
• Prior to forming Treetops Capital, Mr. Lench was a managing director at Credit Suisse where he headed global syndicate and primary trading in the structured finance group.
• He was also a managing director in the Structured Securities Group at Bank of America in New York and London where he had several roles including head of global syndicate.
• Mr. Lench was the head of the emerging markets structured finance team at Fitch Ratings in London and had responsibility for Eastern and Central Europe, Middle East, and Africa. At Fitch he rated financial institutions and various types of structured finance transactions in a wide array of countries. He managed a team of 17 credit analysts, led rating committees, and developed rating criteria.
• He is also the co-founder of RPF Development, a property development company that focuses on developing affordable residential housing in Romania. • He started his financial career at the Federal Reserve focusing on the Latin American banking sector. He holds a Masters from the School of International Affairs at Columbia University and a B.A. from Binghamton University.
Mr. Vitórica has worked in investments and asset management for the last ten years. His interest in microfinance comes from his academic side, being currently a doctoral researcher on the impact of new technology on microfinance institutions.
• Before forming Ambers&Co Capital Microfinanzas, Mr. Vitórica was the head of Dalbergia, a large family office in Spain which has been very active in direct venture capital and private equity investments in SMEs. He was responsible for the whole investment process, including deal flow origination, negotiation and closing of the entry transaction, monitoring of the investee company and negotiation and execution of the exit transaction. In his investor role, he has served as Board Member of 8 SMEs from various sectors.
• Since 2004 and while he was heading Dalbergia, Mr. Vitórica was also the managing director of the New Business Division at Grupo Zeta, one of the largest media groups in Spain, owned by the family that owns Dalbergia. Under his responsibilities he headed the Audiovisual, Internet and Mobile operations, being responsible for the start-up of four businesses. He was also in charge of Corporate Development, heading the strategy, M&A and investments activities in the group.
• Before working in Dalbergia and Grupo Zeta, Mr. Vitórica spent most of his career in financial institutions, both as a consultant and as an auditor for the largest financial institutions of Spain, at the international firms Accenture and Deloitte. He was also a financial consultant at Global Business and Finance, a small consulting boutique focusing on financial advisory.
• Mr. Vitórica is currently a candidate for the doctor’s degree at the University of Manchester. He holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) from the Kellogg School of Management (Northwestern University) and a degree in Business Administration from Centro Universitario Villanueva (ascribed to Universidad Complutense Madrid).
• Mr. Diez-Hochleitner holds more than 30 years of experience holding top general management and finance positions. He is a partner at Ambers Capital and has played a key role in the founding of the asset management and microfinance activities atAmbers&Co.
• He is currently the Vice Chairman of Mas-Movil (Mobile Virtual Network Operator), Chairman of Canalmail (e-mail marketing leader in Spain), of Bodaclick (Internet company) and Vice Chairman of 20 Minutos España (publisher of Spain’s leading free newspaper). He is also an Advisor to Schibsted International (the leading Scandinavian media group) and to Veronis Suhler Stevenson (a leading private equity firm).
• He has been a Partner at Apax Partners, where he was head of Spain’s Media group. Before Apax Partners, Mr. Diez-Hochleitner was the COO and CFO for the largest media group in Spain, Grupo Prisa, where among other responsibilities he led the expansion of the group in Latin America and the group’s IPO process.
• Mr. Diez-Hochleitner started his career in banking, where he held various responsibilities at the Dresdner Bank and BNP Paribas group, including heading Banexi in Spain.
• He holds a Master of Business Administration (MBA) degree from IESE (Universidad de Navarra) and a BA from Universidad Autónoma de Madrid.
Mr. Jiménez-Blanco has 23 years of investment banking experience at top global institutions in London and Madrid. He has advised the largest Spanish and Portuguese companies in their most important strategic and financial transactions, including Telefonica, Endesa, Banco Santander, Repsol, ACS, Ferrovial, EDP, Portugal Telecom.
• He is currently a Senior Advisor to Credit Suisse in Spain, a position he holds since November 2009.
• Mr. Jiménez-Blanco was since 2006 Chairman and CEO of Merrill Lynch in Spain and Portugal, a position he left in January 2009. He immediately became involved in Ambers Capital, due to his high interest in microfinance.
• Before joining Merrill Lynch in 2006, David served as Head of the European Industrials Group at Goldman Sachs' London Office. Prior to that he had been Co-Head of the Spanish Investment Banking Team in Madrid. He worked for Goldman Sachs from 1995 until 2006.
• Before Goldman Sachs, Mr. Jiménez-Blanco was a Director of Investment Banking at Salomon Brothers in London, where he worked from 1989 until 1995.
• Mr. Jiménez-Blanco holds a Business Administration degree from CUNEF (ascribed to Universidad Complutense Madrid).
• Mr. Torre spent most of his career working in microfinance, SMEs and financial institutions.
• Prior to forming Ambers&Co Capital Microfinanzas, he previously worked in Investment Banking in the Financial Institutions Group at Credit Suisse on a variety of transactions, including the Initial Public Offering of Banco Compartamos and Financiera Independencia. Mr. Torre also spearheaded a commercial microfinance initiative to increase Credit Suisse's market share in the sector.
• Prior to Credit Suisse, Mr. Torre worked in India for Annapurna, a cooperative microfinance bank located in Pune, performing a turnaround of the organization to support financial sustainability.
• Mr. Torre also worked in Cambodia with the International Finance Corporation to support local Social Entrepreneurship.
• He started his career as a management consultant at The Boston Consulting Group focusing on the Financial Services sector and worked extensively with the largest Italian banking group in better serving the Small and Medium Enterprise segment.
• Mr. Torre received a First Class BSc from University of Brighton and a MBA from The Kellogg School of Management where he was awarded the Siebel scholarship for leadership and academic achievements.
• Mr. Torre is the Chairman of the Credit Committee of the Lower East Side People Credit Union in New York City.
• Mr. Vranceanu has spent his entire career working and investing in the emerging markets with an emphasis on SME finance.
• Co-founder of RPF Development, a property development company that focuses on developing affordable residential housing and mixed use buildings in Eastern Europe.
• Founder and president of 11 DNA, Inc., which invested in small and medium sized Eastern European companies.
• Founder of Carpathian Clothing in Romania; a clothing manufacturing wholesale and retail company. Carpathian Clothing had over 100 employees in Romania.
• Masters degree in Economics from the University of Bucharest, BS from University of Massachusetts Amherst.