Community

The Forum of Young Global Leaders is a community of innovators from diverse backgrounds and experiences. Search current members and alumni by year awarded, sector or region.

Dr Celine Herweijer

Group Chief Sustainability Officer, HSBC, United Kingdom

Dr Celine Herweijer joined HSBC as Group Chief Sustainability Officer in July 2021. She is responsible for the ongoing development and implementation of the Group’s sustainability strategy. She is also co-chair of the HSBC Holdings ESG Committee and the Sustainability Execution Committee.

Previously, Dr Herweijer worked as a Partner at PwC, where she held global leadership roles including acting as PwC’s Global Innovation and Sustainability Leader. Dr Herweijer was at the forefront of PwC’s work on sustainability and climate change, advising corporate boards, investors, governments and regulators on climate transition, technology and innovation, ESG and wider sustainability and development issues. Prior to joining PwC in 2009, where she went on to become one of the firm’s youngest partners, Dr Herweijer worked for Risk Management Solutions (RMS), a leading fintech firm focused on risk modelling in insurance and banking, acting as Director of Climate Change and Consulting.

Dr Herweijer is a World Economic Forum (WEF) Young Global Leader. She has held numerous international advisory board and committee roles on climate change, sustainable finance, biodiversity, resilience, and technology and innovation for the UN, WEF, G20, World Bank, EU and a number of governments. A climate scientist and NASA Fellow, Dr Herweijer holds a PhD, MPhil and Masters in Climate Modelling and Policy from Columbia University, New York, and is a Visiting Senior Fellow at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change at the London School of Economics. She also serves as Co-Chair of the We Mean Business Coalition, that brings together seven of the leading international sustainability NGOs focused on business and climate change, and is a trustee of BLUE Marine, a leading conservation NGO.

He Zhengyu

Chief Technology Officer, Ant Group, People's Republic of China

Dr. Zhengyu He is the CTO at Ant Group and leads the Group’s technical infrastructure. His current focus of work is on building a financial-grade cloud-native computing platform for Ant. Dr. He strongly believes security and reliability, more now than ever, have to be the core of the technical infrastructure for financial institutions to ensure business continuity, while continuously improving user experience and satisfaction. Under his leadership, Ant has evolved to the fifth generation of its technical infrastructure, serving ~1.3 billion users of Ant and its global partners worldwide. Dr. He holds a Ph.D. from the School of Electrical & Computer Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Dr. He also received master's and bachelor's degrees respectively from the Beijing Institute of Technology.

Sheri Hickok

CEO, Climate Impact Partners, United Kingdom

Sheri Hickok currently serves as Vice President & CEO - Onshore Wind International where she is responsible for the current execution and future growth of GE Onshore wind across APAC, MENAT, LATAM, EU and SSA.

Prior to this role, Sheri served as CEO for Onshore Wind, Asia Pacific & China. Sheri joined GE in 2017 as General Manager – Global Product Development at GE Renewable Energy where she was responsible for the development and execution of an industry leading platform strategy and product portfolio for GE's onshore wind turbine business. She also oversaw the launch of GE Renewable Energy’s industry-leading Cypress onshore wind turbine platform, as well as the launch of the best-selling 2.5-116 turbine. Sheri also had the pleasure of serving as an independent director on the board for Newmont Corp, the world's leading gold mining company, from 2017 to 2020.

Prior to joining GE, Sheri served as Executive Chief Engineer – Autonomous Partnerships and Fleets at General Motors where she led the program strategy and execution of GM’s first autonomous vehicle fleet. During her 22-year tenure at General Motors, Ms. Hickok held various positions including Chief Engineer - Next Generation Full-Size Trucks, and Executive Director - Global Supplier Quality & Development. She also led operations at GM’s Global Noise and Vibration Center and served as Chief Engineer on the Buick LaCrosse and Cadillac XTS. Sheri joined GM in 1995 as a co-op, and progressed through a number of roles within the company, with a strong focus on leadership, technology, program execution, supply chain, quality and strategic program
development.

Sheri holds a Bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering from Kettering University, Master’s degree in Engineering from Purdue University, and Master’s degree in Business Administration from the University of Michigan. She has also attended executive education programs at Stanford, Oxford, and Harvard.

In both 2015 and 2016, she was named to the Motor Trend Top 50 Influencers in the Auto Industry list. In addition, in 2015, Sheri was also named within the Automotive News Top 100 Women in the Auto Industry and has been recognized by Fortune Magazine, Kettering University, and the Detroit Free Press. Externally, Sheri is a member of the World Economic Forum Young Global Leaders and is a three-time DAVOS Panelist on Urban Mobility, The Future of Production, and Women in Tech.

Sheri currently resides in Elmhurst, Illinois, a suburb of Chicago, with her husband, Loren and her two daughters, Ellena and Kendall. She is passionate about her faith, family, health, and making a difference in the lives of others.

Solveigh Hieronimus

Senior Partner, McKinsey & Company, Germany

Solveigh Hieronimus is a Senior Partner at McKinsey & Company, based in Germany. She serves clients across heavily regulated industries such as energy, infrastructure, healthcare and finance on topics covering digital and data strategies, sustainability, and innovation/growth. Solveigh is also a member of both McKinsey's Sustainability and People & Organizational Performance Practices and serves on the council of the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI), where she focuses her work on the competitiveness and long-term prosperity of Europe.

Solveigh is a Young Global Leader (YGL) at the World Economic Forum, a member of the Trilateral Commission and the European Commission's high-level expert panel for the Future of Work. She is also a regular panelist and speaker at international fora such as the OECD, DLD and the Chatham House Conference.

Prior to joining McKinsey, she held various positions at the United Nations, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan. Solveigh studied in Oxford, Madrid and Paris and has a M.Sc. in Economics and a Diplôme de Grande Ecole from ESCP-EAP European School of Management. In addition, she holds a Master in Public Administration (MPA) with focus on Public Finance, Development Economics and Security Policy from Columbia University in New York.

Katie Hill

Partner and Associate Director, Climate, Boston Consulting Group, Kenya

Katie Hill is an Expert Partner at Boston Consulting Group, based in Nairobi, Kenya. She is a core member of the Green Ventures team, building and scaling climate-smart companies across Africa. She has spent over 15 years as an investor and operator in high-impact climate and technology companies. Katie specializes in decarbonization strategy and implementation for global companies; renewable energy economics and transactions; sustainable and impact investing; and digital economy and infrastructure.

Prior to joining BCG, Katie launched and led Apple’s Clean Energy Program to decarbonize Apple’s product manufacturing worldwide. Her team enabled 3GW of new clean energy contracted for Apple production in less than 2 years. She also co-led Apple’s issuance of a $1.5 billion green bond. Most recently, Katie was the Global Director for Business Operations at Liquid Intelligent Technologies (formerly Liquid Telecom), a pan-Africa digital infrastructure company. She started her career as a venture investor in emerging markets companies with Acumen, where she launched the energy investing portfolio and made some of the world's first investments in off-grid energy companies. Katie is on the Board of BioLite, an energy technology company, and an angel investor with Chalo Ventures. Katie received her MBA and an MS in Environmental Engineering from Stanford University. She is a TED Fellow and World Economic Forum "Young Global Leader. Katie has spent over ten years living and working in East Africa and South Asia.

Shaurya Veer Himatsingka

Deputy Managing Director, India Carbon Limited, India

Shaurya is an Entrepreneur and currently serves as the CEO & Deputy Managing Director for India Carbon Limited. At the group level he is responsible for New Projects, Corporate Finance, Strategy, Mergers-Acquisitions & Joint Ventures.

He has been engaged with domestic acquisitions and establsihment of Greenfield Projects, in addition to diversifying into the Mobile Commerce, Real Estate and Infrastructure space.

He is currently leading his team to develop and establish North East India’s first Special Economic Zone in Guwahati, Assam.

Shaurya’s latest entreprenueurial venture is his setting up a Venture Builder under the brand iExponential, to build high value corpprations based on disruptive ideas and a mobile first strategy. He is currently involved in growing businesses in sectors ranging from Fitness & Healthcare and the ‘Internet of Things’ to Education and Last Mile Passenger Conn ectivity.

He has obtained his Master's in Business Administration (2005) and also his B.Sc from Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh.

Shaurya is the National Chairman for CII–Young Indians (13,000 Members) based on Nation Building and Youth & Thought Leadership.

Lars Hinrichs

Chief Executive Officer, Cinco Capital GmbH, Germany

Lars Hinrichs is a serial entrepreneur, investor and tech geek. One of his first efforts, politik-digital.de was a platform for politics and new media, which he launched when he was 22. His next venture, a new media consulting firm, failed but not without first paying rich dividends in learning. Hinrichs applied these lessons learned to his third major effort XING, the world's first Web 2.0 company to go public. He also became active in investing in and helping secure funding for a wide range of tech start-ups. His most recent start-up, HackFwd, is an innovative pre-seed venture capital company investing in technical talent across Europe. Hinrichs and HackFwd have been profiled in Wired, the Financial Times and TechCrunch. He is an Honorary Member of the German Committee of UNICEF.

Miku Hirano

Chief Executive Officer, Cinnamon, Japan

Serial Entrepreneur. MSc, in Artificial Intelligence, from Tokyo University. Engaged in research on Recommendation Engine, Complex Network, Clustering. Won the Innovative Software Creation Program (Super Creator Award) under Information-technology Promotion Agency Japan (IPA) in 2005 and 2006. Started her first business to create the middleware which enables to develop iOS / Android / Feature Phone simultaneously, and sold the company to mixi.inc. Founded Cinnamon in Singapore in 2012. She has received various awards, including St. Gallen Symposium Leaders of Tomorrow, Forbes Japan "Entrepreneur Ranking 2020" BEST10, Woman of the Year 2019 Innovative Entrepreneur Award, and Veuve Clicquot Business Woman Award 2019 New Generation Award. She has also been a keynote speaker at AWS Summit 2019, Milken Institute Japan Symposium, 45th Japan-ASEAN Management Conference, Bloomberg The Year Ahead Summit 2019, and etc. She was appointed to a member of the IT Strategy Office, Cabinet Secretariat and a special member of the Tax Commission, Cabinet Office in 2020. She has been an expert member of the Council on Economic and Fiscal Policy, Cabinet Office; a member of the New Economic and Industrial Policy Subcommittee, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry; and an expert member of the Council for Realizing New Capitalism, Cabinet Secretariat in 2021. She is also a member of the Advisory Board of the Faculty of Engineering at the University of Tokyo. She is the mother of three children.

Aroon Hirdaramani

Director, Hirdaramani Group, Sri Lanka

Owner and Director, Hirdaramani Group. Aroon is a leader of the Group's Executive Committee which is responsible for the overall strategy and execution of the Group's global apparel business and excellence in sustainability. Aroon also oversees the Group's Global Trading and Sourcing Operations, and Investment Strategies.
Honorary Counsel to Guatemala for Sri Lanka. Member, Young Presidents' Organization. 2001, Bachelor's in Business Economics, Brown University. 2001-03, Investment Banking Analyst, Credit Suisse, New York.

Kent Ho

Founder and General Partner, S28 Capital, Hong Kong SAR, China

Kent Ho is the Founder and Managing Director of S28 Capital – a multistage technology venture capital fund primarily focused on Enterprise Saas and Enterprise Infrastructure in western markets. Being a venture investor for over a decade, Kent has evaluated thousands of investment opportunities across industries, stages, and geographies, and some of his investments include: Zoom (ZM.NSDQ), Coupang (CPNG.NYSE), Palantir (PLTR.NYSE) and Noom. He is passionate about working closely with founders on go to market strategy and thinking about both domestic and international expansion; and has built an unique and proprietary global network.

Kent is also Co-Founder of Singapore based Wine Portal Holdings Pte. Wine Portal is present across the vertical and horizontal value chain of the wine industry - from boutique vineyards; to negociants and wholesale distribution; to storage; to private client sales and premium wine lounges (Park 90) and e-commerce. We actively seek out opportunities globally to grow our portfolio and coverage of all things wine.

Kent has formerly served as a board member of Hong Kong Science and Technology Park (HKSTP) (2017-2023), and previously served on its investment committee. HKSTP is Hong Kong Government's most well-funded technology and innovation platform (HK$40 billion).

He holds a BA degree from Duke University, an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business and is an Honorary Trustee of Peking University.

Brent Hoberman

Co-Founder & Executive Chairman, Founders Factory, United Kingdom

Brent is Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Founders Factory (corporate-backed venture studio and accelerator), Founders Forum (global community of founders, corporates and tech leaders), and firstminute capital (2017: $100m seed fund with global remit, backed by Atomico, Tencent and over 30 unicorn founders). Previously, Brent co-founded lastminute.com in 1998, was CEO from its inception, and sold it in 2005 to Sabre for $1.1bn.

Technology businesses Brent has co-founded have raised over $800 million and include Karakuri (provider of robotics, AI and automation systems), made.com (leading European direct-from-factory consumer homewares retailer), PROfounders Capital, Founders Intelligence (entrepreneur-powered consultancy), accelerateHER (network taking action to change the underrepresentation of women in technology), Founders Keepers (technology executive search firm), Founders of the Future (network that identifies and supports aspiring entrepreneurs), Founders Pledge (community for entrepreneurs committed to finding and funding solutions to global challenges), Grip (AI powered event networking solution) and most recently Founders Academy (a new type of business school for a changing world).

Dirk Carsten Hoke

Managing Director, D&D Invest Consult GmbH, Germany

Degree in Mechanical Engineering, TU Brunswick, Germany. Formerly, R&D Engineer, Renault, Paris. Since 1994, with Siemens, including: railway divisions in Germany, Argentina, Austria, US with regional responsibilities for North and South America and Western Europe; 2002, General Manager, Transrapid Propulsion and Power Supply Division; 2005-08, President, Transportation Systems Group, China; 2008, Chief Executive Officer, Western and Central Africa and Morocco; 2009, Chief Executive Officer, Africa; 2011, Chief Executive Officer, Customer Services Division; 2014, Chief Executive Officer, Large Drives, Process Industries and Drives Division; 2016, Chief Executive Officer, Airbus Defence and Space. Interests: photography, travelling, languages, sports.