WiTT’s Directors are:
Annette Nabavi
AHV Associates / Anchusa Consulting
Annette has a broad range of public and private board experience and currently holds a number of Directorships. She is a Non-Executive Director on the board of Maintel Group, an AIM listed unified communications services business. She also serves as the Chairman of Maintels’s Remuneration Committee and is a member of the Audit Committee. She is on the Advisory Board of the National Media Museum, part of the Science Museum Group, and a Director of Women in Telecoms and Technology (WiTT) Ltd.
Annette is a Partner with AHV Associates, a firm of corporate finance advisors specializing in Mergers and Acquisitions, Capital Raising, Structured Finance and Derivatives Advisory work for privately owned businesses. She specializes in corporate finance projects for small and medium privately owned enterprises in the IT, technology, telecoms and media sectors.
Annette previously held the position of Head of Telecoms Global Business Development for Corporate Finance at ING Barings where she gained significant experience in M&A, private equity, structured debt and public equity transactions.
She later became the founding director and CEO of XchangePoint Holdings Ltd, a Venture Capital backed Internet Interconnect company providing broadband metro peering services to ISPs and carriers. Annette was responsible for tripling revenues every year for 3 years, and grew the customer base to over 100 customers while expanding the company into Germany. She successfully achieved two rounds of VC financing.
Her early years were spent with the PA Consulting Group where she specialized in strategic partnerships, business planning and marketing strategy. She became a Senior Partner with PA before moving to Barings.
Annette holds an MA from Oxford University and a Doctorate from the University of Dijon.
Michelle Senecal de Fonseca
Area Vice President
Citrix
Michelle Senecal de Fonseca has developed a career of more than 30 years in international telecommunications and technology and currently serves as Area Vice President for Citrix Systems. Prior to joining Citrix, she was the Director of Cloud & Hosting Services, a global line of business for Vodafone Group Enterprise. With operational experience in more than 50 countries on all continents, she has worked with Cable & Wireless Worldwide, Fidelity Data Networks, NextiraOne, Worldport, Global One, Sprint International and US West International. Ms Senecal de Fonseca’s executive positions have ranged from Managing Director and CFO to head of Sales and Marketing, Corporate Development, Strategic Planning, and Corporate Communications.
From 2007-2011, Ms Senecal de Fonseca worked at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) where she managed the Telecom, Media and Technology banking team and its associated €3 billion investment portfolio within the international financial institution.
Michelle also serves as a non-executive Director of the FDM Group – a FTSE listed IT service provider, serves on the Investment Board of MOVe Capital – a first time European fund investing in enterprise services businesses and is a Director of the Women in Telecom and Technology. She holds a dual degree in Business and Political Science from the University of Kansas and Masters in Business from Thunderbird School of Global Management in Phoenix, Arizona where she also serves on the school’s Global Council. She has dual British/American citizenship, has been recognised by Global Telecoms Business magazine as one of the telecommunication industry’s most influential leaders and lives with her husband and three children in London.
Audrey Mandela
WiTT Chair
Co-Founder, Multimap
Independent Consultant /Angel Investor
Audrey is WiTT’s chair and company secretary. She is also director of Mandela Associates, which provides market research and consulting services for select clients in the telecom, internet and geographical information sectors.
Audrey was Co-Founder of Multimap, one of the world’s leading online mapping providers, where she acted as the company’s corporate counsel and marketing director, and was a board director. Multimap was sold to Microsoft in December 2007.
Audrey was formerly Senior Vice President, International, for the Yankee Group, one of the industry’s leading IT research firms. As Senior VP, Audrey was responsible for managing the Yankee Group’s research, consulting and sales activities in Europe, Latin America and Asia. She was a frequent speaker at telecom industry events around the world, and the author of numerous reports and studies on global telecom trends.
Audrey is also a member of the steering committee for the Global Board Ready Women initiative; a board director for Wedu, a charity that mentors and supports young women leaders from underserved communities in Southeast Asia; and an NED for Clear Returns, an award-winning and innovative SaaS company; its returns intelligence platform enables retail clients to boost profits by reducing the costs and impact of returns.
For the past five years Audrey has been an advisor for London Business School’s TEDxLondonBusinessSchool event. She has also judged for the FDM everywoman in Technology Awards since 2012, and is a member of Angel Academe, which offers angel investment to women-led businesses.
Audrey holds a bachelor’s degree from Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts, US.
Helen Kelisky
Managing Director, UKI, Google Cloud
Helen Kelisky is an executive sales leader with a proven track record in general management, sales and marketing, and technology, spanning more than 30 years.
She is Managing Director for UK and Ireland at Google Cloud. She is also a commercial advisor to SaaS start ups, and has been a WiTT board member since 2013.
Before joining Google, Helen was Vice President for B2B Sales across EMEA for OpenText, and prior to this, Senior Vice President at Salesforce, responsible for establishing, setting the strategy, and leading the Cloud Sales organisation for UK and Ireland. Previously in IBM, Helen held a number of leadership roles, latterly heading up IBM’s Cloud business, leading the UK and Ireland organisation’s digital transformation to think and act ‘Cloud First’.
Helen is also an a Non-Executive Director with Calnex Solutions plc (AIM: CLX), a leading provider of test and measurement solutions for the global telecommunications sector.
Given the enormous amount of change the world is experiencing – health, climate, technology and more – Helen believes it’s never been more important to champion diversity and inclusion in all its forms. She has been voted as one of the Most Influential Women in UK Tech for the last five years consecutively 2017-2021 (Computer Weekly), and lives in London with her husband and two children.
Yasmeen Majid
Director, Business Change, Atos OneCloud
ATOS
Yasmeen Majid was invited to join the WiTT Board in 2017, following 10 years as an active member. Her career comprises many years of working with technology-oriented and technology-driven organisations leading global functions and transformations in several industries and geographies while developing a portfolio of NED roles in the Private and Public sectors. She has been a mentor for several years and is a long-term supporter of Diversity, Equality and Inclusion initiatives.
Prior to her role with ATOS, she held leadership roles with Aviva (Global Network Operations), Vodafone (Cloud & Hosting Solutions/Transformation), Direct Line Group, and Multimap/Microsoft – following several years of Management and Consultancy (KPMG) roles in France and Canada.
Yasmeen holds a B.Sc. in Computer Science from McMaster University, Canada, and an MBA from EDHEC-Theseus, France.