Board of Directors

Laurie Olivier

Chairman, Yola

Partner, Veritas Venture Partners

Laurie is a partner of Veritas Venture Partners, Israel's most experienced venture capital firm and manages its Atlanta office. He is a member of technology-related industry forums – serving as vice chairman of the American Israel Chamber of Commerce and sitting on the board of the Atlanta Venture Forum. In South Africa, he currently serves as a technology commercialization advisor to the major government-controlled research organization and the University of Pretoria.

He has been involved in venture capital since 1990. As SVP Private Equity at Anglo American (AA), a leading global mining concern, he represented AA's interests in a number of venture funds, including the AAV fund managed by Veritas. He served on the boards of various AAV portfolio companies. He was also a board member of MCPEPA (an East Asian private equity fund) and MCA (a South African VC fund - Chairman of the Investment Committee).

At Anglo American, he pioneered the establishment of new technology-driven businesses, and served on the boards of a variety of publicly traded and privately held businesses, including Anglo American Industrial Corporation Ltd and some of its joint venture companies with major East Asian corporations, including Mitsubishi, Temasek, and the Daewoo Group.  

Laurie was born and raised in South Africa. He holds a Bachelor of Engineering (Electronics) degree from the University of Pretoria, and a Bachelor of Commerce (Honors) degree with a Diploma in Datametrics from the University of South Africa.

Jason Eaglestone

Chief Financial Officer, Reinet Investment Advisors

Jason is a member of the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants and currently is the Chief Financial Officer of Reinet Investment Advisors and Chief Investment Officer of Columbus Venture Capital.  He serves on the board of several of Richemont and Reinet’s subsidiary and investment companies.  Prior to joining Richemont, Jason worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers in an audit & advisory capacity in various offices around the world including the USA, Middle East and South Africa.  In 2004, he joined Richemont in Geneva, Switzerland as an Operations Manager.  He moved to the UK in 2005 to served as Chief Operating Officer of James Purdey & Sons before assuming his current responsibilities.
 
Jason holds a Bachelor of Accounting degree and a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa and he holds an MBA from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh, Scotland.

Alastair Bainton

Chief Financial Officer, Columbus Venture Capital

Alastair is a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland. Since joining Reinet’s predecessor company, he has been responsible for aspects of internal controlling and reporting, as well as providing strategic input by serving as a Board member and Audit Committee Chairman on various Reinet predecessor investee companies. Prior to joining, he worked for PricewaterhouseCoopers in the UK, Central Europe and Switzerland where he performed, managed and led financial audits, due diligence, internal controls and accounting framework conversion projects. He was also a member of the Global Retail and Consumer Group IFRS Technical Committee. Alastair holds an honors degree in economics and accounting from the University of Strathclyde, Glasgow.

Vinny Lingham

Founder, Chief Executive Officer, Yola

See Executive Team
 

Brent Viljoen

Founder, Chief Technology Officer, Yola

See Executive Team

Trevor Harries-Jones

Chief Operating Officer, Yola

See Executive Team