Aavishkaar Goodwell India Microfinance Development Company is a business development company, which invests in microfinance institutions in India. Aavishkaar Goodwell was initiated by an Indian-Dutch joint venture and founded in 2006.
Our investment team operates alongside the team that manages Aavishkaar India Micro Venture Capital Fund (www.aavishkaar.org), an innovative and UNDP Award-winning micro-equity fund investing in scaleable SMEs. The financial and microfinance expertise, social sector and business experience and on the ground presence make us uniquely placed to provide hands-on support to the smallest start-ups and the largest growth phase MFIs in India.
Goodwell Investments (www.goodwell.nl) is a Dutch social investment firm focused on high impact, high return investment solutions. The firm's microfinance private equity company, Goodwell Microfinance Development Company, is the launching investor in Aavishkaar Goodwell.
The investment team of AG consists of:
Vineet Rai (1971), founding partner India
Vineet is a serial social entrepreneur and leading microfinance expert. He has been involved
in innovative finance mechanisms for over a decade. He has experience in small business incubation,
SME sector, microfinance and venture capital investments. Vineet co-founded
Rural Innovations Network and Aavishkaar India Micro Venture Capital Fund,
arguably the world's first for-profit
micro-equity fund. He founded Intellecap,
a leading development finance consultancy and innovator
consisting of over 30 professionals and operating out of Mumbai, Hyderabad and Varanasi.
Vineet is an Ashoka Fellow, serves on the advisory board of L-RAMP at IIT Chennai (Lemelson
Foundation India Initiative) and the Joint Task Force of the Government of Uttranchal on
Social Venture Capital.
Wim van der Beek (1960), founding partner The Netherlands
Wim is a social venturer with two decades of experience in financial structuring, investment
funds and cross border direct investments. In 2005 he decided to "walk his talk" and founded
Goodwell Investments, a social investment firm focussed on high impact high return investment
solutions.
Before launching Goodwell, Wim co-founded and managed an institutional fund advisory company.
Prior to that, he was a partner in the financial services international tax practice at
PricewaterhouseCoopers in Amsterdam. Wim is advisor at
Intellecap and
Aavishkaar in India
and advisory board member of Social Fusion
in San Francisco.
Pradeep Pathiyamveetil (1972), COO investment team India
Pradeep is COO of the investment team in India, with extensive experience in project finance, private equity investing and business development in rural India. Pradeep joined Aavishkaar in March 2002 as a Project Manager. Since then he has become a specialist in financial analysis and evaluation of small and medium size enterprises (SME's) and microfinance institutions. Previously he was six years with Rajshree Sugars and Chemicals in Coimbatore as Deputy Manager, Finance. Pradeep holds an MBA degree from the T. A. Pai Management Institute in Manipal, India.
Els Boerhof (1970), partner
Els was six years with FMO before joining Goodwell in 2008. At FMO she was the Manager of the Micro & Small Enterprise Fund MASSIF, which she expanded from €200 mln per end 2005 to over €300 mln per end 2007. She was a non-executive board member of Acción Investments in Microfinance (USA) and member of the Credit Committee of the AfricInvest Financial Sector Fund. Previously she held the positions of Manager Business Development and Investment Officer Asia. Els also worked for MeesPierson and has a Master's Degree in Economics from Tilburg University.
Sophie Vossenaar (1960), partner
A communications expert and social venturer, who ended an 18-year career at KLM, where she was responsible for the Inflight Entertainment & Communications for her last 8 years there. In 2004 Sophie refocused to socially responsible activities and has since then built a portfolio of involvement: as director of welfare foundation 'Stichting De Vondelbrug', as a project account manager for children aid organization Net4kids and as a consultant to a foundation for homeless youngsters. She graduated from the School for Hotel Management in The Hague and has an MBA from the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, USA.
John Duffy (1949), partner
John joined the Goodwell team as a partner to lead Goodwell's activities in the US. John is a social entrepreneur with over 30 years experience in the financial services industry and wireless communications. He co-founded a wireless communications company, was an Executive VP with Drexel Burnham Lambert and started his career with Dean Witter Reynolds. More recently he has been the Executive Director of Net Impact and consulted with Geneva Global. He is a former Peace Corps volunteer and has served on both corporate and philantropic boards.
Thijs van Berckel (1966), senior manager
Thijs joined the team in The Netherlands in September 2007, after a 12-year career with Van Lanschot Bankiers, a leading Dutch private bank. He worked as a manager in the Private and Business divisions, in charge of financial consulting and planning and loan approvals for his client base. As managing director of one of the bank's branches he led a team of 12-15 staff members. After leaving Van Lanschot he went to Kenya to consult with a savings & credit cooperation of dairy farmers, which made him very motivated to continue his career in the social venturing arena. Thijs holds a Master's degree in Business Economics from the Erasmus University in Rotterdam. Within Goodwell he focuses on operations and sales&marketing within The Netherlands.
