SPEAKERS

Over 20 leading practitioners in mobile transactions will speak at MPAY Nigeria on June 2, 2009 at the Muson Centre, Onikan, Lagos.

VALENTINE OBI, Global CEO eTRANZACT
He has an extensive experience in IT and has served in various capacities locally and internationally. Mr. Valentine Obi, a computer scientist, is MD/CEO of eTranzact, an e-payment gateway. He eveloped and designed the 2003 Computerworld Honours award winning eBusiness Platform of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE) and was the Project Director for the World Bank assisted project of Oyo State Valuation Office where he was directly involved in the design and implementation of a property valuation and management information system for the state.

YVES EONNET, CEO, Tagattitude
Yves Eonnet is the co-founder and President of Tagattitude. The company specializes in mobile payment and security solutions. The company was founded in 2005 by Yves Eonnet, Loïc Eonnet and Hervé Manceron. These founders combined their expertise in smart card and telecom industries, as well as telecom infrastructure and signal processing. Tagattitude has developed a highly innovative technology called NSDT (Near Sound Data Transfer). This patented technology enables all existing mobile phones worldwide to be used as payment tools or authentication devices. NSDT uses the mobile phone's audio channel to transmit secure transaction data (e.g. One Time Password, electronic signatures, and certificates).

BARRY COETZEE, CEO, iVeri
Barry is the Chief Executive Officer of iVeri Payment Technologies, the company he founded in 1998. Based in South Africa, Barry has dedicated the last decade to developing IT solutions to improve transactional banking in Africa. Through iVeri, Barry has created technology which is being used to address the transactional requirements in South Africa, Namibia, Rwanda, Nigeria, Kenya and Cote D'Ivoire. Barry is an enthusiastic scuba diver and photographer.

ENGR. ERNEST NDUKWE, EVC, NCC
Engr. Ernest Ndukwe is the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of Industry Regulator, the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC). Under his watch, an unprecedented growth has been recorded in the Telecoms Sector. From a mere half a million lines when he took over at the NCC six years ago, more than 20 million telephone subscribers have been signed up. He had also served in various Committees set up by the Nigerian government to formulate policies for a liberalized telecommunications industry in Nigeria.

Mr Ndukwe is an Alumnus of the Lagos Business School, a Fellow of the Nigerian Society of Engineers (FNSE) and a Fellow of the Nigerian Institute of Management (FNIM). Under his tenure, the NCC has witnessed tremendous growth and transformation, earning a reputation as a transparent and open agency. Engr. Ndukwe was at the helm during Nigeria's first Digital Mobile License Spectrum Auction, which was acknowledged internationally as a resounding success. This auction process and other licensing initiatives that followed have led to a vibrant liberalised market and the rapid network growth that has been associated with the  Nigerian Telecommunications Industry within the last four years.

HERMAN KOJO CHINERY-HESSE, CEO, BSL GLOBAL
Herman is a software engineer by profession. Sixteen years ago, he co-founded the SOFTtribe limited, one of the leading software houses in Ghana and West Africa. The SOFTtribe has won a number of awards amongst which are The Millennium Excellence Awards for IT in 2005 (nominated in 2000). The company has also been featured on BBC, CNN and the IEEE magazine in the USA, amongst others. Herman holds a number of directorships and is an Assessor of the Commercial Court, Ghana.

He has won a number of personal awards including "Outstanding Ghanaian Professional" from the GPA awards, UK plus the "Distinguished Alumnus Award" from the Texas State Alumni Association and Texas State University-San Marcos, USA; the first and currently only African recipient of the award. Herman has also been a resource person/visiting speaker at the Wharton Business School, Harvard Business Schools Cambridge University, the University of Ghana, and the TEDGlobal conference in Arusha, Tanzania, amongst others. The BBC describes Mr. Chinery-Hesse as "Africa's Bill Gates". Herman believes that "If Africa misses the current global IT boat there may never again be an opportunity for rapid wealth creation on the continent.

IKECHUKWU NNAMANI, CEO, Medallion
Engr. Ikechukwu Nnamani is the President/Chief Executive Officer of Medallion Communications, Nigeria which provides interconnect exchange clearinghouse services. Medallion currently employs 18 full time staff and has 29 telecom operators in Nigeria as it customer including all the major GSM, CDMA, Fixed Line, ISPs, and Value Added Service Providers. Engr. Nnamani is also the Chairman of Demadiur Systems Limited. He played pivotal roles in deploying the telephony networks of Rainbownet Limited in the cities of Enugu, Aba, Owerri, Abakiliki, Onitsha, and Nsukka, all in the eastern region of Nigeria. Demadiur also successfully deployed the networks of Megatech Engineering in Kano and Startech Networks in Abuja.

Prior to founding Demadiur, he worked as an optical systems engineer at Luxcore Networks Inc., in Atlanta Georgia, USA. While at Luxcore, he helped design and manufacture Luxcore's Semiconductor Waveguide Optical Regenerative Device, the world's first integrated photonic wavelength converter chip. It guarantees non-locking of traffic flow in telecommunication networks. Engr. Nnamani also played a key role in the design and manufacture of Luxcore's LambdaXchange, the world's first demonstrated all-optical router, which won the best system award at the 2001 Optical Fiber Conference at Anaheim, California. Ike holds a Master's in Mechanical Engineering degree from Tennessee State University, Nashville Tennessee, USA as  well as a Bachelor in Mechanical Engineering degree from University of Nigeria, Nsukka.

MITCHELL ELEGBE, CEO, InterSwitch
Mitchell Elegbe has been charged with the responsibility of leading a team of dedicated Nigerians as the pioneer management of InterSwitch Limited since December 2002. The team's objective is to build a shared infrastructure in Nigeria that will help shareholders reduce the cost of financial transactions. Before joining InterSwitch, he was the Head, Group Marketing and Business Solutions of TELNET (Nig) Ltd where he conceived the idea of building a nationwide switch in early 2001.

Working with Accenture and Nine (9) leading banks in Nigeria, Mr. Elegbe managed the project from design, proving of the concept, to the eventual setup of the company responsible for managing the shared infrastructure. Mr. Elegbe has had significant exposure to switching software and switching companies both in South Africa and Europe over the past five (5) years. He has an in-depth knowledge of the industry, both local and international; technical knowledge and incomparable passion for business.

MAC ATASIE, CEO, Nextzon Business Service
Mac Atasie is currently the Managing Director/CEO of NEXTZON Business Services Ltd. He has over 20 years experience in business advisory and venturing for several industries. He started his career as an Assistant Manager at Nigerian Breweries Plc. before moving to Accenture where he worked for over a decade and eventually became Head of Venturing/Payment Systems & Senior Manager, Strategy. Macauley led several industry-defining initiatives such as the National Switching Project, ATM Consortium Project, and Application Services Provider Project aimed at small and medium-sized enterprises.

Subsequently, Macauley became the CEO of HEIRS Alliance Limited, which was set up as a holding company for several banks and non banks totaling 10 companies with assets under management of over $1 Billion. Macauley has delivered several papers at several organized conferences and seminars on topical issues including e-Commerce, the future of the Financial Services industry, Customer Relationship Management and logistics and smart cards and ePayment systems.

OGUNTONADE DEJI, FlashMeCash Innovator
Deji Oguntonade, until recently was the Chief Executive Officer of 3Line Card Management Limited Before his joined the company, he was the Group Head, Information Technology, First Inland Bank plc. He also doubled as the Managing Director of the bank's e-payment subsidiary, First Atlantic Online (Nigeria) Limited, and as a director of First Inland Online (Ghana) Limited. Oguntonade birthed the first M-Payment services in Nigeria with the invention of Flash Me Cash solution that enable First Inland Bank customers and non customers to pay and receive money through mobile phone platform.

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