The Avanz Capital Team

Haydee Celaya

Ms. Celaya is a co-founder of Avanz Capital where she is CEO and CIO. She is an accomplished investment manager with 35 years of emerging markets expertise, including as the head of the International Finance Corporation’s (IFC’s) Private Equity and Investment Funds Group and Chairperson of the IFC Global Funds Investment Committee for six years. She is a former Regional Director for the IFC in Sub-Saharan Africa and headed the Latin America Financial Institutions Group. During her tenure at the IFC, Ms. Celaya was responsible for numerous direct investment transactions. She served on several advisory committees for IFCʼs portfolio funds.

Ms. Celaya helped establish the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association (EMPEA) and served on its Advisory Committee from 2004-2010. She was also responsible for cementing IFC’s reputation as a leading global emerging markets fund investor and promoter of the asset class through its premier annual conference (www.globalpeconference.com). Prior to joining IFC in 1991, she worked in international banking for ten years.

Hany Assaad

Mr. Assaad is a co-founder of Avanz Capital where he is Chief Portfolio and Risk Officer and Chief Compliance Officer. He is a respected senior investment and finance professional with over 30 years of experience, including serving as CIO in IFC’s Private Equity Funds Group and as investment manager for IFC’s sector-specific funds, such as clean energy, extractive industries, infrastructure and healthcare. He held various positions across IFC with regional responsibilities in companies, financial institutions and funds covering the Middle East and North Africa, South and Southeast Asia and Emerging Europe, with transactional experience in Latin America and Africa. Mr. Assaad was responsible for a number of initiatives at IFC including the mainstreaming of environmental and social finance through financial intermediaries and funds across emerging and frontier markets; the development of commercially-focused investments in microfinance, small business finance and carbon finance.

Jamie Foran

Jamie Foran is a Director focused primarily on portfolio management for Portfolio Investments. She participates in the sourcing, assessment, recommendation and negotiation of Fund Investment and Direct Co-Investment opportunities across all regions. Previously, Ms. Foran was a Senior Associate with SVB Capital’s fund of funds group. From 2007 to 2010, she led screening, selection and investment recommendations for venture and growth capital funds from SVB Capital’s San Francisco and London offices. From 2003 to 2007, Ms. Foran was an Analyst with Probitas Partners on the project management team interacting with senior management of several private equity funds, creating marketing and due diligence materials for investors, and coordinating road shows for the fund managers.