PowerWomen Speak

Margarida is a founding team member and VP of Operations at poolside. Before joining poolside, Margarida spent two years as a venture capitalist at Beacon Capital, primarily investing in early-stage deep tech companies. Prior to that, she served as COO at Lifebit, an AI genomics platform for developers, where she played a key role in growing the company from Day 0 to their $60M Series B round. Margarida's earlier experience includes working at source{d}, applying AI to code and software. In both source{d} and Lifebit, Margarida joined when the companies were Day 0 and only had its founders, while at Beacon Capital she was critical to raising their first fund. Next to her day jobs, Margarida helped raise over $100M in capital for founders she mentored.

Nneka is a Senior Director at Alvarez & Marsal, where she leads the UK’s Wealth Management Performance Improvement practice. She was previously Chief Operating Officer at a wealth management business and prior to this, Nneka spent almost 10 years in Management Consulting at Deloitte and Accenture. A passionate champion of improving social mobility, Nneka is a mentor with the Social Mobility Foundation. She previously mentored with the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women and Amos Bursary, and she is a supporter of Women of Colour Global Network (WOCGN), Women of the Future Future and Inspiring the Future.

Ingvild Næss is the CIO of Schibsted and CEO of E-Tech AB delivering IT services across Schibstead. She is on the Board of Komplett ASA, an electronic consumer goods company, and Neddy AS, an ed-tech startup. Ingvild was named female media leader of the year in Norway 2023. She chairs the board of Feltgis, a startup focused on using data in forestry. Ingvild used to chair the Norwegian Media Businesses Association's data and privacy committee. Furthermore, she was appointed as a member of the Norwegian government's privacy commission. She is also a member of the board on the Polytechnic society. Ingivild is married with two children and loves running.

Sarah Friar, former CEO of Nextdoor, soon to be the CFO of OpenAI, led the company to nearly triple its reach to over 92M Neighbors in 335,000 neighborhoods worldwide. Previously, as CFO at Square, she oversaw its IPO and $30 billion market cap increase. Her prior experience spans Goldman Sachs, McKinsey, and Salesforce. Currently a Board Member of Walmart and Consensys, she's also known for her Board contributions to Slack Technologies and New Relic. A Fellow of the Aspen Institute, and on the Advisory Boards of Operation HOPE, the Blavatnik School of Government at Oxford and Co-Chair of the Stanford Digital Economy Lab. Sarah is committed to mentorship, founding LadiesWhoLaunch.org. Raised in Northern Ireland, she holds degrees from Oxford and Stanford, earning an OBE from Queen Elizabeth II for entrepreneurship.

Joanna Jensen is the founder of the UK’s number one baby and child personal care brand, Childs Farm, having created the brand in 2010 as a result of her own daughter's sensitive and eczema prone skin.  In March 2022, Jensen sold Childs Farm for £40m to PZ Cussons Plc Jensen is a keen supporter of other female entrepreneurs.  She is a mentor to a number of British SMEs through Imperial College’s mentoring programme and is a leading advocate of supporting female founded businesses.  She works on the advisory board of Buy Women Built (BWB) driving awareness of female founded brands to UK consumers and investors.   Joanna is also a Sustainability advisor to The British Beauty Council. Childs Farm is the market leader in sustainability, and recently became a certified B Corp.