Prior to founding a boutique advisory firm, he was appointed senior advisor to the Commissioner of the Jobs Creation Commission under the Prime Minister’s Office of Ethiopia. He also served as the Regional Director for Africa of a Silicon Valley based big data analytics venture helping government officials in low- and middle-income countries make evidence-based decisions. At BNP Paribas, 8th largest bank in the world, he was focusing on offshoring and outsourcing strategies as Vice President of the Location Strategy group in San Francisco. He is also the Co-Founder of Arifpay, the first National Bank of Ethiopia licensed Payment System Operator, a L&A portfolio company for which he served as CEO.  Bernard draws from 15 years of global management consulting experience during which he advised fortune 50 clients in the USA as well as multinationals in Europe and the Middle East on corporate strategy formulation, digital transformation, program execution excellence, post-merger integration, process reengineering and organizational change management.   His client portfolio includes renowned companies such as AAA, Avago, Brink’s, Church & Dwight, Cisco, Google, Gilead, HGST, Kroger, Liberty Mutual, LSI, NetApp, New York Life, PG&E, ResMed, Roche, and UAE Ministry of Finance.   Bernard holds a Master of Science in mechanical engineering from ENSTA France, a Master of Science in aerospace engineering as well as a Master in Business Administration from the Georgia Institute of Technology USA. He is fluent in English, French and Amharic, proficient in Spanish and conversational in Japanese.