2010 Think-tank Members


Clarisse Bamazi Clarisse Bamazi is a member of the new generation of African female leaders born after the independences. She is currently the executive director of BRVM local offices, the West-African stock exchange.
As the BRVM Togolese market supervisor, her mission is to organize the securities market, to disseminate market information and to promote the market. The Bourse Régionale des Valeurs Mobilières SA, or BRVM, is a regional stock exchange serving several West African countries: Benin, Burkina Faso, Guinea Bissau, Côte d'Ivoire, Mali, Niger, Senegal and Togo. Market offices are maintained in each country.
Clarisse is professor in four West African universities including the University of Lomé and the West African Catholic University.
She has also a consultancy assignment with the National Agro-Industrial Sector Restructuring Program, led by UNIDO and West African Economic and Monetary Union.
Prior working experience include several years human resources management in banking and insurance, both in Togo and in the USA.
Clarisse holds a Doctorate degree in Human Resources Management from the University of Poitiers.


Dr. Barak Ben-Avinoam joined Maayan Ventures’ management staff and serves as CEO of Iris Ventures Technology Incubator. He has excellent entrepreneurial, sales and business development skills. He is responsible for reviewing of the new projects, advancement and development of the existing portfolio companies.
Prior to joining Maayan Ventures Barak held several C-level executive positions with technology companies and accumulated vast international business developmentan d sales experience with leading Global 2000 companies. His previous positions include: COO of Lab-One Innovations - an early-stage investor and privatized technology incubator, focusing on the Information & Communications Technology (ICT) investments. Co-Founder & CEO of Prolify, Co-Founder & CEO of Flash Networks, General Manager (Europe) at Business Layers.
Barak holds an MBA and a DBA, both at the International School of Management in Paris, and holds a B.Sc. in Information Systems from Drexel University in Philadelphia. Barak is also a visiting professor for international business and entrepreneurship at several MBA programs in Paris.


Marcela Benitez, a geographer and sociologist by training, spent seven years traveling throughout Argentina as part of her work as an academic researcher for the National Research Council for Science and Technology (CONICET). During this time, she observed first-hand the economic and social problems that were arising in the small, isolated rural villages outside of Buenos Aires and other parts of the country.
On 1999, putting her research on small rural villages into action, she established RESPONDE, which has galvanized people to become involved in generating new opportunities for these villages. RESPONDE designs and implements strategies aimed at improving social and economic opportunities of rural communities at risk of disappearing due to depopulation.
Working with interested companies, universities, private citizens and local government, RESPONDE builds the capacity of townspeople to engage successfully in new avenues for generating livelihoods and economic and social projects. The organization creates social recovery models that can be replicated in other villages in Argentina and other countries.
Benitez was named in 2002 by Diario La Nación as one of 100 True Argentine Leaders of Today.


Gabor Bojar was one of the very few entrepreneurs of Central-Eastern Europe to succeed in global business already in the years of state-socialism. He founded his own firm in 1982. Bojar and his partner started in business with a programmable HP calculator with 2K of memory. They were trying to win a bid to write software for a contract with a Hungarian engineering company.
Graphisoft, a software development company focusing on 3D architectural design, grew rapidly and in a decade became one of the top three software vendors of the sector internationally. Along the way, Bojar founded, built and sold Apple's distribution business in Hungary, under the name of Graphisoft Trading, but the software business remains his major concern.
Graphisoft relies on its network of independent distributors to meet current and future business goals. The multinational software corporation works with dedicated distributors in 80 countries and hundreds of Value-Added Resellers (VARs) and Systems Integrators who ensure that customers receive support and personal attention wherever they are.
In 1998 The Wall Street Journal named him as one of the ten most successful entrepreneurs in Central Europe


Bruno Bonnell is one of the founders of Infogrames Entertainment SA. A qualified chemical engineer, Bonnell received a degree in economics at the Université Paris IX.
He began his long career on the Thomson TO7, one of the earliest French-produced home computers, before founding Infogrames in June 1983 at the age of 25 with Christophe Sapet and Thomas Schmider. He has been chairman and chief creative officer of the company from 1983 to 2007. He was also chief executive officer of the company between 1983 and 2004.
Bonnell is known for spearheading many of the takeovers of many smaller (and a few larger) development studios over the 1980s and 1990s, most notably British development house Ocean Software and Atari, as well as GT Interactive, Accolade, Gremlin Graphics and Hasbro Interactive.
In 1995, Bonnell was elected president of the Syndicat des Editeurs de Logiciels de Loisirs (SELL), a French games developers' association. He has worked together with French broadcaster Canal Plus to create the television channel Game One, which was specifically aimed at a gaming audience.
In 2007, Bonnell resigned from his positions at Atari and Infogrames.
In 2008, Bonnell joined zSlide, a company based near Paris.


Jawad Simon Boulos is a Member of the Parliament of Lebanon since 2005.
His family has been involved in Zgharta Zawie political and public life for many years. His father, Simon Boulos, was an influential, though discreet figure, in both regional and national politics during his lifetime. Jawad is the great-nephew of former Minister and Member of Parliament Jawad Boulos who he is named after.
He studied at the College des Frères at Kfaryachite then going onto the American University of Beirut (1984-1990) obtaining two degrees, Bachelor of Science - Biology and Bachelor of Arts-Business. He then attended in 1991 Saint Joseph University, Beirut when he obtained a Bachelor of Law. This was followed by studies in France at the Sorbonne, Paris where he received a Bachelor of International Law and at the graduate business school INSEAD, Fontainebleau, where he obtained a MBA.
In addition to his political life he is a legal consultant to various international companies in Beirut and the Middle East.


Ms. Brattina serves as President and CEO of AllFacilities, Inc., a facilities management marketing firm that works with manufacturers, service companies and energy providers who offer building services and solutions to commercial, industrial and institutional owners.
Over the last 20 years, Ms. Brattina and her staff have planned, designed and managed hundreds of business services programs for major corporations across the country including Trane Commercial Services, Strategic Energy (now Direct Energy), Eaton Electrical, PowerWare, PPG Industries, CentiMark Roofing, Otis Elevator, Schindler Elevator and others.
With a background of a journalism degree from Duquesne University and seven years experience in corporate marketing, she launched her own business in Pittsburgh and employs people all around the US. She is also the author of "Diary of a Small Business Owner".
AllFacilities Energy Group, LLC offers demand management services to facility owners and managers across the United States. Ms Brattina is a winner of the Business Marketing Association’s Direct Marketer of the year award, the Pennsylvania 50 Best Women in Business award, is an Athena Award recipient and is a member of the Pennsylvania Honor Roll for Women.


The Groupement des chefs d’entreprise du Québec comprises over 1,600 business leaders, including 300 young entrepreneurs. Members belong to one of more than 200 clubs that meet once a month, where they share their “know-how” in order to improve their business practices. The Groupement was founded in 1974 and has its headquarters in Drummondville, which has fifty employees and sales of C$5 million.
From 1988 to 1997, Michel Bundock has been responsible for overseeing the development of the more than 200 clubs in Québec. From 1997 to 2005, he headed a team of 15 Groupement Coaches based throughout the regions, providing service to members. He co-hosted the major provincial meetings, which were attended by more than 500 people. He carried out numerous Groupement mandates, such as public relations, research and development and managing major contracts with partners.
Since 2008, he has been Groupement General Manager and in July 2010, he was appointed Senior Vice-President and General Manager of the organization.


Mariarosy Calleri has a Master’s of Arts in Film and Television from the New School University of New York and a degree in Foreign Languages and Literature from the IULM University of Milan. Since 1995, she has written, directed and produced several short films and documentaries that have won prizes and awards at international film and video festivals both in the U.S, Europe and India.
In New York, from 1994 to 2000, she worked as a director and freelance producer for RAI Television and the Mediaset channel in the USA.
In 2000, she moves to Rome where she initially teaches the course Filmaker’s Tools at the New University of Cinema and Television at Cinecittà.
In 2007, Mariarosy Calleri and Dennis Usher create MARDEN ENTERTAINMENT SRL a film and television production company based in Rome whose mission is to contribute to the new European cinema through international coproductions and films able to combine artistic and entertainment values. MARDEN ENTERTAINMENT SRL also operates as a production service for foreign companies who want to come and shoot films, TV programs, music videos, commercials and advertising campaigns in Italy.