Ije Ikoku Okeke
Co-founder & Managing Partner, Griot International Partners
Ije Ikoku Okeke brings over 20 years of leadership experience in private equity investments, infrastructure finance and turnaround management in the energy sector. She is a Co-founder and Managing Partner of Griot International Partners (“GIP”) a Pan African growth focused private equity fund investing in infrastructure and industrials sector with key impact themes of climate and energy access. She previously was a founding member of CEC Africa Investments (“CECA”), a multi-country energy investment platform (with approximately $1bn in assets under management) established to develop, finance and operate power projects across Sub Saharan Africa, with a particular focus on renewable energy. Ms Okeke has also served as the Chief Financial Officer and Head of Strategy of Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC), one of CECA’s portfolio companies, overseeing financial operations, product innovation and strategy. At AEDC she launched their distributed energy services platform to finance and develop complementary solar powered off grid projects to improve service reliability in underserved clusters in the franchise area.
Previously, she was a Senior Investment Officer and Infrastructure Team Lead at the International Finance Corporation where she spent 7 years. In this role she was responsible for deal origination, structuring, negotiating, and financing of energy, telecoms and infrastructure transactions and Public Private Partnerships. At IFC she worked in Washington, DC and Lagos, Nigeria covering investments in Latin America and Africa, and successfully structured project finance, private equity, and structured finance deals in excess of US$2.5 billion. Ms. Okeke also has expertise in energy sector turnarounds - she served as portfolio lead for IFC’s US$135 million debt investment in Cameroun’s power sector, which included Cameroun’s privatized utility (AES Sonel, now ENEO); she was also transaction lead for IFC’s US$85 million equity investment in one of the largest utilities in Brazil (Equatorial Energia).
Before joining IFC, she was the Finance Director at Geometric Power, an integrated power project in Nigeria and previously spent her professional career (primarily in finance) supporting entrepreneurial ventures in the US, Ghana, Nigeria, Namibia, and South Africa, and has worked at Charles Schwab, Emerging Capital Partners, to name a few.
Ms. Okeke has held a number of independent board roles and advisory board positions. She is a Tutu Fellow and was recently appointed to Rockefeller Foundation’s Global Commission to End Energy Poverty. She’s holds a BSc in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University, and an MBA in Finance & Entrepreneurial Management from the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania.
