Rolake Akinkugbe-Filane, Advisory Board Member, African Energy Chamber
An award-winning and versatile energy and infrastructure sector executive, Rolake has more than 15 years track-record of helping to finance and scale businesses across Africa. With a solid reputation as one of Africa’ leading female voices in the energy and infrastructure sector, and expert commentator, Rolake can expertly distil complex topics on global energy, infrastructure, economy, markets, and others, to a wide audience, including senior business leaders, policy makers and decision makers. She is a regular feature on platforms like CNBC, BBC and CNN and has published scores of articles on African energy, infrastructure, and markets.
She is currently the Chief Commercial Officer of a leading infrastructure developer, helping the group craft and execute its commercial, market-expansion, revenue optimisation and growth strategies across subsidiary operations in Nigeria, Senegal, Morocco, Tunisia, and Cote d’Ivoire. As a member of the Energy Transition and Investment Committees of the African Energy Chamber, she is helping to support the Chamber in creating a business environment for companies in Africa’s energy sector to optimise their reach, impact, and networks through public and private sector collaboration.
She was also the Senior Advisor to IFU, the Danish Investment Fund and sat on the global advisory board of Canadian Private Equity firm, Stonechair Capital advising on its renewables and gas sector Energy Africa fund. From 2014 – 2019 she was head of energy for FBN Capital and FBNQuest Merchant Bank (investment banking arm of Nigeria’s largest and oldest financial services group), raising debt and equity capital for local energy companies, and during which time she was also member from 2017-2019, of the private sector economic advisory group advising the Office of the Vice President on a range of national development policy issues. Prior to FBNQuest Merchant Bank, she was head of the award-winning energy research team at pan-African Ecobank Group covering 33 African markets out of London. In her early career, she worked as a political risk analyst with Control Risks Group and Eurasia Group and worked in international affairs and development with the Development Directorate Générale of the European Commission in Brussels and the International Crisis Group in Dakar, Senegal.
She was recognised as a top 275 Global Female Influencer Executives (2020) in Energy by the UK’s Energy Council, and in 2015, won the Best Africa Oil and Gas analyst award from Energy Africa US, and was in 2016 recognised as One to Watch in African Energy by Centurion LLP. She was also recognised as a Young Economic leader in Africa, by the Choiseul Institute (2018, 2019 & 2020) and was listed in the Most Influential People of African Descent (MIPAD) 100 Under 40 in the 2018 Business and Entrepreneurship Category.
She has a BSc & an MSc degree from the London School of Economics (LSE) and a joint MBA degree from the London School of Economics, HEC School of Management Paris and NYU’s Leonard Stern School of Business (TRIUM). Rolake also sits on the global advisory board of Persistent Energy, Africa’s Climate Venture Builder, and was an Executive Council member (2021) of WIMBIZ, Nigeria’s leading women’s network and NGO, where as Chair of the Private Sector Advocacy Committee, she led the development of the first-ever private sector gender equity and equality scorecard. She is also a founding member of the Women In Energy Network (WIEN).