Lise Birikundavyi

Lise Birikundavyi is the co-founder and managing partner of BKR Capital, the first institutionally backed, Black-led venture capital fund in Canada. Lise is an innovative finance specialist who has worked with several international institutions, most notably the Jacobs Foundation for whom she managed an edtech impact investment strategy. Lise also mentors and supports highly promising and impactful startups in emerging markets. Lise is a CFA charter holder; she also holds a master of business administration from the Shanghai Advanced Institute of Finance, where she wrote her thesis on impact investing, and a trilingual BBA from HEC Montréal. Lise is fluent in French, English and Spanish, and has a conversational level of Mandarin. She is a firm believer in using the forces of capital markets as a basis for more inclusive wealth creation and sustainable poverty alleviation.