Crash Course: Corporate Social Investing

Christophe has been Director of Solidarity Investments in the Sustainable Development Department of Schneider Electric since 2009.

After having created Schneider Electric's Solidarity Employee Savings Scheme in France, he is now in charge of managing the solidarity component. This fund invests on the one hand in France and Europe in solidarity companies contributing to the fight against energy poverty, and on the other hand in Sub-Saharan Africa. In Africa, the fund targets social enterprises providing safe and reliable access to renewable electricity in rural and peri-urban areas. He has also piloted the creation of a €75M impact fund dedicated to rural electrification in East Africa in partnership with major European development banks.

To do so, he can rely on his previous experience as International Financial Controller, in charge of the balance sheet structure of Schneider Electric subsidiaries in Europe and Asia. He also participated in the design of the Schneider Electric Group Management Control System, implementing new concepts replacing the annual budget process to improve the responsiveness and flexibility of management decision making.

Christophe holds a law degree from ESSEC.

Called by Trafigura to establish the Trafigura Foundation in 2008, Vincent still spearheads it today, guided by and putting into practice those same values which always drove his engagement in international and development issues.

A geophysicist engineer by background, Vincent Faber started his career in the oil industry and management consulting. In 1990, on the occasion of a sabbatical year, he gave a new orientation to his professional life and followed a humanitarian and development path, which took him to a countless number of countries, job positions and international organisations. Thanks to this experience that brought him to work both in the field and in headquarters, he acquired the conviction that fruitful and powerful synergies can be found when the non-profit and business worlds join forces.

Sophie leads Impact Europe's corporate impact market development in Europe, supporting Corporate and Financial institutions in shaping their social investment strategies, benchmarking their initiatives, facilitating peer learning, enabling the co-funding or co-creation of projects through strategic collaboration. 

She is part of the National Advisory Board for Impact Investing in France and various local networks. She sits on the Board of a few non-profit organisations like PhiTrust Incubator, Article 1 (Education), Simplon (Coding school) and is part of the Expert Committee of Sanofi Espoir Foundation.

Prior joining Impact Europe in 2016, she occupied several senior positions at BNP Paribas: in charge of the Wealth Management strategy for Philanthropy, Impact investing & Social Responsible Investment and as an Investment banker for more than 15 years structuring fund raising for strategic Corporate & Institutional clients in Europe, Brazil and Asia (Shanghai).

Sara is Impact Europe's Training Manager. She joined EVPA in 2017 to structure and to further develop the Training Academy activities, after more than ten years working as a project and impact manager, and as a trainer in the social impact field.

Before, Sara provided secretariat support to the Italian Advisory Board to the Social Impact Investment Taskforce established under the UK's Presidency of the G8. She is today the Secretary General of Social Impact Agenda per l'Italia, the Italian network for impact investing. She is a graduate in political philosophy and holds a master's degree in management of social enterprises from Bocconi Business School.