Team
Greg Casagrande
Founder, CEO
Greg is the Founder and CEO of Transformative Ventures LLC. He also handles key accounts including SPBD Microfinance Network where he serves as the President, WaterHealth International where he serves as the Executive Chairman, and Cumulo9 where he serves as a director.
Greg is a serial Social Entrepreneur. In addition to the leadership roles in the aforementioned impact organizations, Greg has served as a director on several impact-industry boards including: the International Association of Microfinance Investors (of NY), Microfinance Pasifika (of Papua New Guinea), Planet Finance (of Paris), and Plebys (of Irvine, CA) a “Base of the Pyramid” investment fund.
Greg was named “Person of the Year” in the Pacific Island nation of Samoa for his work in empowering poor families in that country; was honored to be a United Nations Global Advisor for its International Year of Microfinance; was awarded the “Singapore Global Social Entrepreneur” Prize and was awarded the first ever “Colgate Impact Award” by his alma mater Colgate University.
Greg speaks extensively at conference and universities around the world on the topics of microfinance, social entrepreneurship, financial inclusion, and impact investing. Five business case studies have been written about the work of SPBD (Harvard Business School, Kennedy School of Government and Kelley School of Business at Indiana University).
Greg also promotes hi-tech entrepreneurship and was a founding director of the Ice Angels, Australasia’s largest angel investor group and serves as Chairman/Director of three New Zealand software firms: Biomatters Ltd, Cumulo9 Ltd and English-To-Go Ltd. In 2019 Biomatters achieved a much-heralded exit to life sciences powerhouse Insightful Science of San Diego, CA.
Prior to these ventures, Greg recorded significant achievement with Ford Motor Company and Mazda Motor Company in product development, manufacturing, and financial management positions. He led teams in the U.S., Japan and Europe and while with Mazda was honored to be the youngest-ever Buchou (Division General Manager) of any major Japanese company. Greg began his professional career as an external public auditor with Coopers and Lybrand in New York City.
Greg has an MBA with concentrations in Finance and Marketing from the Kellogg School at Northwestern University, an MS in Accounting from NYU Stern, and a BA with Honors in Economics from Colgate University. Greg is also a CPA and a member of MENSA.
Sandeep K Lohani
Vice President
Sandeep serves as a Vice President of Transformative Ventures LLC. His principal account is with SPBD Microfinance where he is assigned the role of CFO of the SPBD Microfinance Network.
Sandeep has more than 16 years of experience in financial inclusion, impact investing, general management, business planning and corporate strategy. He developed and managed several innovative businesses, designed and rolled out new products, and developed distribution channels across diverse geographies with robust system, processes and controls.
Prior to joining Transformative Ventures, Sandeep served as General Manager for SPBD Microfinance Solomon Islands wherein he was instrumental in launching the operations. He also served as a member of the National Financial Inclusion Taskforce of the Central Bank of Solomon Islands.
Prior to SPBD, Sandeep served as Chief Strategy Officer and Chief Operating Officer for two large microfinance institutions in India, apart from serving as Vice President with an impact investing fund. Sandeep has served on the board and management committees of microfinance institutions in India, and held strategic positions with AIG, ITC and L&T in the early years of his career.
Sandeep has a MBA from Mumbai University, India and has further pursued an executive leadership program in microfinance from Harvard Business School and an executive program in financial inclusion from Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
Polly Kelekis
Vice President
Polly serves as a Vice President of Transformative Ventures LLC. Her principal accounts are with MicroDreams Foundation where she is assigned the role of CEO and SPBD Microfinance Network where she is the assigned the role of COO.
As the CEO of the MicroDreams Foundation, Polly is charged with further developing the organization and growing its resource base with the ultimate goal of empowering poor micro-entrepreneurs by providing them with meaningful economic opportunity so they can work their way permanently out of poverty. Polly is responsible for the day-to-day operations of MicroDreams, including new business development, stakeholder relationship management, marketing, outreach and fundraising.
As the COO of the SPBD Microfinance Network, Polly oversees network-wide policy development, implementation and compliance, new product development and new partnership development. She also serves as a director of SPBD Microfinance Tonga Ltd.
Prior to Transformative Ventures, Polly worked at FINCA International and consulted for the Financial Inclusion Practice Area (FIPA) of the United Nations Capital Development Fund (UNCDF). In 2003-04, she managed the Volunteer Team for the Opening and Closing Ceremonies at the 2004 Olympic Games in Athens, Greece.
Previously, Polly held posts at Accenture and Booz Allen Hamilton and also worked at the Office of Dr. Henry A. Kissinger, the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), and the Corporate Executive Board.
Polly has an MBA from The Wharton School of Business, an MA in International Economics and International Relations from the School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of The Johns Hopkins University, and a BA from Yale University.
Jonathan Reyes
Associate
Jonathan serves as an Associate of Transformative Ventures LLC. In this role he serves as the Finance Manager for Transformative. He is also assigned to accounts including the SPBD Microfinance Network, MicroDreams Foundation and Biomatters Inc. For each of these accounts Jonathan provides a range of financial budgeting, reporting, control, forecasting and tax services as well as other back office administrative services.
Prior to joining Transformative Ventures, Jonathan served seven years with Programs for Parents, a non-profit organization which promotes quality childcare services in Essex County, NJ. His efforts in reporting their financial positions, management of the organization’s benefits programs, and assistance in obtaining state grant funding helped PfP become a leader in the childcare service industry in Essex County.
Jonathan is a graduate of William Paterson University with a BS in Accounting.