NLINE - Key Persons
Job Titles:
- Team Leader
- Ghana Team Leader
Agnes Okyne is a Team Leader for nLine's work in Ghana. She is tasked with leading the day-to-day operations in the field. She has been working in the field of research for close to eight years. Agnes has a passion for collecting and analyzing data to provide meaningful insights for informed decision-making and translation into actionable policies.
She is pursuing a Master's degree in Research and Public Policy at the University of Ghana, Legon.
Job Titles:
- Director of Strategic Operations and Impact
Alexandra helps lead nLine's operations, business development, implementation of in-country sensor deployments, and global partnership engagement. Prior to nLine, she worked in research and program implementation roles spanning financial inclusion, economic empowerment, community development, and wildlife conservation. She is passionate about human development and the application of technology and data science for advancing global development, reducing poverty, and protecting, maintaining and restoring our natural resources and wildlife. Alexandra holds a Master of Development Practice (MDP) from the University of California, Berkeley and a BA in Economics and International Studies from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Job Titles:
- Data Analyst
- Data Scientist
Joyce is a data scientist with a background in electrical engineering, embedded systems and IoT. She is passionate about improving the energy reliability challenges faced in most sub-Saharan African countries. Joyce dreams about a developed Africa and she believes accessible and reliable energy systems will contribute to making this a reality.
Job Titles:
- Team Leader
- Ghana Team Leader
Daniel Agyei is a Team Leader for nLine's work in Ghana. He is tasked with leading day-to-day operations in the field. Before nLine, he worked as a Territory Sales Supervisor at Blu Telecommunications in Ghana.
He holds a BA in Economic and Sociology from the University of Cape Coast, Ghana. He is passionate about research, football and listening to good music.
Emily is passionate about increasing data accessibility and conducting analyses that allow for more informed decision making. She joined the nLine team near its start and worked to develop power outage detection algorithms and methods of outage evaluation. Emily completed her undergraduate degree in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research at the University of California, Berkeley.
Genevieve mobilizes data to support the development of critical infrastructure. Decision-making should be informed by measurement; however, monitoring infrastructure is infamously difficult. Starting with the world's electrical grids, she designs data pipelines that produce robust estimates of power outages and grid losses that can be used to target grid improvement. Genevieve received her PhD in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT, with a joint degree in Applied Ocean Engineering from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute. Her PhD examined how to balance exploration and exploitation in decision making problems. Throughout her PhD, she collaborated with environmental scientists, developing to algorithms for localizing coral colonies, finding for rare plant species, and monitoring hydrothermal plumes. Genevieve loves birds and all of the side roads she goes down to find them. Her six years of research in exploration versus exploitation have not helped her find an optimal balance in life: she favors exploration in food, books, running, and most things.
Jackson is fascinated by the intersection of technology, humanism, and social justice and works to support the interaction and architecture of nLine's backend systems. His background is spread over computer science, media interaction, HCI, music, and cognitive science. Beyond nLine, Jackson enjoys playing guitar, drinking coffee, making collages, and reading critical theory. He holds a master's degree in Music, Communication, and Technology from the University of Oslo.
Josh is passionate about architecting systems that make data and the sensors that collect that data more accessible to non-experts. He joined Noah three years ago to help build early versions of what are now nLine's core technologies, and has since focused on ensuring nLine's technology and technical culture will lead to on-the-ground improvements for everyday users of the critical infrastructure we monitor. He completed his PhD in Electrical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley, has been instrumental in the publishing of six conference papers on sensor systems, and is the recipient of an NSF GRFP fellowship and a departmental teaching award.
Job Titles:
- Field Supervisor
- Ghana Field Supervisor
Kelvin Albert Dogbe is the Field Supervisor for nLine's work in Ghana. He coordinates the day-to-day field activities in Ghana. He is passionate about data driven solutions to improving the economic situation in Africa. Before joining nLine, he worked with Innovations for Poverty Action Ghana (IPA) and Institute of Statistical Social and Economic Research (ISSER) as a Team Leader and Field Supervisor, respectively.
He holds a MPhil in Economics from University of Ghana Legon.
Job Titles:
- Project Manager
- Ghana Project Manager
Kwame Abrokwah is the Project Manager for nLine's work in Ghana. He is responsible for managing the deployment of the power monitoring sensors, recruiting and managing field teams, and managing local stakeholders. He has deployed over 1,300 sensors across Accra, the capital city of Ghana. He is passionate about research in general, and loves imparting knowledge and building the capacity of field officers.
Before joining nLine, he worked with Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) Ghana for eight years as a Team Manager, Project Manager, and Survey Coordinator. As Survey Coordinator, he supported and coordinated several projects across different sectors such as Education, Finance, SMEs, Health, and Governance. He has also worked with other notable research institutions like Ghana Statistical Service (GSS) and Institute of Statistical Social and Economic Research (ISSER).
He holds an MSc in Applied Statistics and a B.Sc. in Mathematics from Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST). He is a certified Project Management Professional (PMP) from the Project Management Institute (PMI).
Margaret is passionate about using technology for positive impact. She especially loves to use her knowledge and skills in optimizing systems on the African continent. She has a background in Electrical Engineering and Data Science and is continually improving her tech knowledge to be able to solve energy quality and reliability issues. At nLine, she writes and improves data analysis algorithms for revealing and communicating insights into the key performance metrics of power grids. Margaret holds a Master of Science in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.
Marguerite supports day-to-day administration systems and workflows and provides in-country project coordination. She is a mission-driven administrative professional with a background in nonprofit program management. She believes in data-informed, sustainable policy and infrastructure decisions and is passionate about driving nLine's mission forward through organizing systems and relationship building. Marguerite holds a BA in Economics and Environmental Studies from Whitman College in Walla Walla, WA.
Job Titles:
- Energy Research Scientist
Mohini is an energy and electric grid specialist, who is dedicated to helping achieve affordable, clean, high-quality power for all. At nLine, she works on algorithms that reveal energy infrastructure insights from sensor data. She completed her PhD at UC Berkeley, where her dissertation work focused on human-friendly computational tools for grid monitoring. Her technical background spans power systems, computer science, statistics and signal processing. She is enthusiastic to share the challenges and possibilities of energy infrastructure with a broader audience through teaching and writing. Beyond nLine, Mohini enjoys printmaking, pastels, birdwatching, reading and drinking lots of tea, ideally on a breezy balcony.
Molly is a data scientist dedicated to helping decision-makers make the most informed, effective interventions that they can. Her background is in anticipatory intelligence, specifically crowdsourced predictions. She holds a Master's in Computer Science from Virginia Tech, where she studied methods of automated discovery and causal inference, and a BA in Math from the University of Maryland - Baltimore County, with a minor in Modern Languages & Linguistics.
Noah loves tech designed to inform policy decisions, monitor the long-term impact of those decisions, and hold underperforming systems and stakeholders accountable. He started working on the ideas behind nLine 8 years ago during his PhD in Electrical Engineering at the University of California, Berkeley. He has spoken in India, Ghana, Kenya, and the United States on issues related to energy monitoring, and most recently, based on his work developing the technology underpinning nLine, was the recipient of the Sevin Rosen Funds Award for Innovation, given by UC Berkeley EECS based on outstanding technical achievement in Computer Sciences or Electrical Engineering research.
Job Titles:
- Global Partnership and Project Manager
Olufolahan supports nLine's strategy and global partnership engagement. Prior to nLine, she worked as a senior researcher, managing multidisciplinary research teams, facilitating knowledge management, and monitoring evaluation and learning related to disruptive energy technologies and electricity services in the Global South. She is passionate about the application of disruptive, ecological and inclusive technologies to address current human and ecological needs. Olufolahan completed her PhD in Energy and Environmental Policy at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam. She's a recipient of several research grants, has led and co-driven several projects on Low Carbon energy transitions in sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia and Europe.
Job Titles:
- Founder
- Associate Professor in the Electrical Engineering Department at the University of California
Prabal is an associate professor in the Electrical Engineering Department at the University of California, Berkeley. His research interests include design, deployment, and scaling of wireless, embedded, networked, and sensory systems for applications in health, energy, and the environment. He received a PhD in computer science from UC Berkeley, and he is the recipient of an Alfred P. Sloan Research Fellowship, an NSF CAREER Award, a Popular Science Brilliant Ten Award, and an Intel Early Career Award.
Job Titles:
- Business Strategist
- Strategic Policy & Business Development Intern
Purity is a business strategist who is devoted to bringing developmental reforms to improve emerging market economies. She is passionate about using entrepreneurship to effect change in small and medium enterprises. She supported nLine's business development, policy, and operations-oriented goals. Outside nLine she works with small businesses and startups from the brainstorming stage to market penetration.
Sam is pursuing an undergraduate degree in Energy Engineering with an intended minor in Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley. He is passionate about expanding renewable energy use and has developed a recent fascination with electrical grids. His work for nLine involved a comprehensive review of investments into countries' energy sectors with the goal of assessing nLine's future role in these types of investments.