Meet the Principal Voices

Principal Voices gathers together a series of the world's foremost thinkers in their respective areas. For 2007 this is in social entrepreneurship, technology and innovation, and alternative energy.

As well as contributing their thoughts on their subject, including written White Papers to be published on this Web site in the coming months, they will take part in Principal Voices round table events around the world over the course of the year.

The Principal Voices for social entrepreneurship are featured below. Our experts on technology and innovation and alternative energy will be announced in the months to come.

Social entrepreneurs
Rick Aubry is one of the world's leading social entrepreneurs. For over 21 years he has lead Rubicon Programs, a social enterprise in the San Francisco Bay Area that helps people - most of whom are homeless or living in poverty - get jobs, housing, legal support, and the skills they need to create better lives for themselves. Rubicon's two businesses, Rubicon Landscape Services and Rubicon Bakery, offer high quality services and products while providing job training opportunities.

Rubicon Programs has been recognized for four years by Fast Company Magazine as "one of the 25 organizations changing the world." Aubry is also a lecturer in Management at the Stanford Graduate School of Business where he is a fellow of Stanford's Center for Social Innovation.
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Rory Stear is the co-founder of Freeplay Energy, renowned for its wind-up technology and work advancing the use of sustainable energy. The not-for-profit Freeplay Foundation seeks to redress the energy poverty of poor rural areas, particularly in Africa, where the low level of electricity and high cost of batteries keep many from access to basic information and communications.

Since it's first product was released in 1996, the Freeplay Foundation and aid agencies have distributed more than 400,000 self-powered radios in less developed countries, as well as selling over 4.5 million products worldwide. He is also a member of the executive committee of the council of the Schwab Foundation for Outstanding Social Entrepreneurs.
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Kailash Satyarthi is India's foremost leader in abolishing bonded labor. Through his work as co-founder and director of the Bachpan Bachao Andolan (BBA) he has freed thousands of bonded and child laborers. He continues to campaign against unsafe and overcrowded factories despite receiving death threats and has organized several mass marches across India and the global march against child labor in 1998 to raise awareness of the issues.

Recognizing that no matter how many children were liberated, others would be forced to take their places at the looms he was instrumental in the formation of the RugMark Foundation, formally established by a coalition of NGOs, businesses, government bodies, and UNICEF. To date, more than four million carpets bearing the RugMark label have been sold in Europe and North America.
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Technology and innovation

Neil Gershenfeld is the Director of MIT's Center for Bits and Atoms. His unique laboratory investigates the relationship between the content of information and its physical representation. He is an integral part of the pioneering "Fab Labs" program that is allowing people to create, not just consume technology and empowering local people to solve local problems. Technology from his lab has been seen in places are diverse as the New York's Museum of Modern Art, rural Indian villages, the White House and Sami herds. He is the author of numerous technical publications, patents, and books including "Fab," and "When Things Start to Think," and he has been selected as one of the top 100 public intellectuals. Dr. Gershenfeld has a BA in Physics with High Honors and an honorary Doctor of Science from Swarthmore College, a Ph.D. from Cornell University, was a Junior Fellow of the Harvard University Society of Fellows, and a member of the research staff at Bell Labs.
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Jimmy Wales is the revolutionary luminary who founded Wikipedia in 2001- a peer reviewed encyclopaedia that is open-source, meaning anyone can add, delete or edit entries. Controversial at first because of questions about the reliability of the information, it is now closely monitored and there are rules for editors. It is one of the most used repositories of knowledge on the planet, with more than one million articles in English and hundreds of thousands in other languages, all freely available. As well as Wikipedia, Wales set up the charitable organization, the Wikimedia Foundation that aims to keep open-source content wiki-projects free and accessible for all. Wales has a Masters degree in finance and was listed as No.1 in the Scientists & Thinkers section of Time Magazine's 100 Most Influential People edition in May 2006.
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Kristin Peterson is the co-founder of Inveneo, a not-for-profit social enterprise that was set up to bring the advantages of information and communications technology to rural areas in the developing world. Addressing the issues that affect these areas, such as a high price of energy or lack of specialist know-how, Inveneo builds and sells tailor made computing hardware and develop open source software. Kristin has over 18 years of experience working in business development and marketing in the communications industry, having held high-profile positions at a number of technology start-up companies and AT&T. She grew up in New Mexico, USA, and has a B.S. in Civil Engineering from NMSU and a M.B.A in International Marketing from Pepperdine University.
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Amy Smith will now be taking part in the Principal Voices debates for 2008.

Alternative Energy
Vijay V. Vaitheeswaran is an award- winning journalist for The Economist and environmental commentator. The New York-based journalist joined The Economist as the Latin America correspondent in 1992, going on to open its first office in that region in Mexico City, before serving as bureau chief until 1997. As the newspaper's Global Environment & Energy Correspondent, he covered the politics, economics, business and technology involved in those topics from 1998 to 2006. His portfolio now includes global health, pharmaceuticals and innovation.

Vijay is a term member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and serves on the selection committee for CFR's annual Arthur Ross Book Award. He teaches at NYU's Stern Business School, and is a regular commentator on Marketplace radio, in the Wall Street Journal and at other media outlets. He is also the head of the Clinton Global Initiative for energy in NY and author of a book on the future of energy, "Power to the People."
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Jeremy Leggett has been described by Time Magazine as "one of the key players in putting the climate issue on the world agenda." An award-winning scientist and oil-industry consultant, he switched sides to campaign for Greenpeace before setting up Solarcentury, now the UK's largest provider of solar photovoltaic solutions ,where he is CEO. His first book, The Carbon War, has been described by the Sunday Times as "the best book yet on the politics of global warming," and his second book, Half Gone, previews the looming global energy crises, while signposting a safe exit opportunity. He is a director of the world's first private equity renewable energy fund, and serves on the UK Government's Renewables Advisory Board. The 21st century, he says, must be the solar century.
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Juliet Davenport is the CEO of Good Energy, and part of the original team to set up the UK company. Recognising that climate change is a threat, that carbon dioxide is the primary gas responsible for climate change and that individuals can make a real difference, Good Energy was established in late 1999 to help empower people to make this change. All the electricity supplied comes from wind, small-scale hydro and solar power generators from all over Britain. They are either small or medium sized sites and many of them are the result of diversification from areas such as farming and other family businesses. She is a physics graduate from Oxford University and an economics graduate of Birkbeck College, London.
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