ALAN HOOPER, MBA, BSc

Alan has an extensive track record in leading sensitive and high-level commercial negotiations in the telecommunications sector. Most recently, when he was the lead negotiator of the advisory team supporting the Kenyan Ministers of Finance and Telecommunications and other senior Kenyan Government officials working on the Privatization of Telkom Kenya Ltd. (TKL). Alan was involved in sensitive high-level negotiations concerning ?unbundling? of TKL?s 60% in Safaricom, with the top management of Vodafone UK. This paved the way for the successful US$390 million privatization of TKL by sale of 51% to France Telecom, and was an essential pre-cursor to the initial public offering (IPO) of 25% of the shares in Safaricom on the Nairobi Stock Exchange, the largest IPO ever in sub Saharan Africa outside of South Africa.

In Africa, Alan has worked in Botswana, Burundi, Ghana, Kenya, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Africa, Tanzania, and Uganda where he has advised on telecommunications regulatory issues with a focus on implementing Universal Service, privatization, and attracting direct foreign investment into the telecommunications sector

Alan has substantial transactional experience in telecommunications. He has led transactions with five different African operators while they were being privatized. Alan was also financial and strategic advisor to the team from Telkom SA that conceptualized and implemented the US$650 million, 28,000km, SAT3-SAFE submarine cable linking Europe and the West coast of Africa to Asia. He has the capacity to identify and evaluate the economic, financial and legal implications of different courses of action available to Government in seeking an agreement. In the course of his career with the International Finance Corporation and subsequently, Mr. Hooper has been responsible for the evaluation of the financial viability of literally hundreds of projects, and for the successful financing of dozens of them. In the field of telecommunications he has been involved in some of the largest transactions on the African continent (see above) and also some of the smallest. In South Africa, together with Mr. Espitia, he has assisted small groups of black entrepreneurs in rural areas of South Africa with the successful development of winning strategies for highly competitive underserviced area licenses.

Alan has an MBA from Harvard University's Business School, a MSc diploma in Management Science from Edinburgh University, UK, and a BSc in Organic Chemistry from Leeds University, UK.  He speaks English, and some French and Spanish.