Anthony Masozera
CEO, Vanu Rwanda
Anthony is a Senior Business Executive with advanced and versatile experience leading companies in the private sector spanning telecommunications, information technology and finance for over 20 years. He is a noted change agent who is able to transform organizational structure and initiatives into highly profitable enterprises. He currently serves as Chief Executive officer of Vanu Rwanda. Anthony worked as the Chief Executive Officer of Econet Wireless Burundi, a telecommunications company, which is part of the Econet Wireless Group. Prior to joining Econet, he worked for various MTN operations for 10 years in various capacities including Chief Executive Officer in West Africa and Chief Financial Officer in Rwanda. He also worked as Financial Manager for Electronic Data Systems in Plano, Texas and a Senior Auditor with the accounting firm of Deloitte and Touche in Houston, Texas.
Anthony is a Certified Public Accountant with the State of Texas where he obtained his Bachelors and Masters of Business of Administration degrees. He is also a member of the Institute of Certified Public Accountants Rwanda (ICPAR)
Julio Malikane
Project Manager
Julio Malikane is a Rwandan but considers himself as a global citizen. He was born in DR Congo, grew up in Rwanda, worked and managed innovation and technology projects in West Africa, East Africa, Southern Africa and Central Africa. He has traveled to 16 countries in the world and speaks 7 languages. He likes to travel, meet people, discuss and try new innovations.
Julio holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Computer Science and Engineering from the Kigali Institute of Technology and he is pursuing an MBA.
Prior to Vanu Rwanda, he cofounded a digital finance service based company called Digital Oxygen Pty Ltd in Kenya that focuses on building digital finance service and products in Africa. Prior to DO, he worked as an International Consultant Health Deployment Specialist at UNICEF Global Innovation Centre based in Nairobi and reported on a bi monthly basis to HQ in New York. He was advocating and supporting innovation initiatives for vaccination programs in Zambia and Indonesia. Prior to UNICEF, Julio worked in Senegal as a Senior Project Manager, West Africa Region for a non for profit organization called Medic Mobile, Inc where he was overseeing projects, operation and deployments for digital health and development in Senegal, Mali, DR Congo and Liberia. Prior to Medic Mobile, he worked in Mali for the United Nations Peacekeeping Mission in the Demobilization, Disarmament and Reinsertion department as an IT Officer. Prior to the UN in Mali, he worked in Rwanda with various companies and organizations including the Rwanda Social Security Board and Voxiva Inc., a US based company.
Murenzi Safari
Head of Network Planning and Operations
Murenzi Safari holds a Bachelors of Engineering in Telecommunication Engineering. He has over ten years of multi-vendor experience as a telecommunications engineer. His technical are of expertise is mainly in the areas of network projects, operations and planning. He is currently working as the Head of Planning and Deployment at Vanu Rwanda. His previous roles were Project Manager, Ceragon Enterprise Links Point to Multi Point deployment for MTN Rwanda; Chief Engineer Network Services at Econet Burundi; Network Manager at Airtel Rwanda, Senior WiMAX Engineer at Broadband Systems Corporation; Radio Network Planning and Optimization Engineer at Tigo Rwanda; and Radio Network Planning and Optimization Engineer (WCDMA and GSM) at Huawei Technologies International Co.
He has worked with equipment vendors, including Huawei, Ericsson, Samsung, and ZTE.
His wireless technologies experience includes 2G (Including Edge + GPRS), 3G (Including WCDMA + HSPA), WiMAX, and 4G LTE.
Philbert Ukurikiyimana
Core Network Engineer
Philbert Ukurikiyimana was born in Kigali, Rwanda on 1st March 1980. He graduated from Kigali Institute of Science and Technology with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Electronics and Telecommunication, Engineering in December 2005. He also received the Master of Engineering degree in Communication and Information systems from Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan, China, in 2008.
After receiving his first degree, Philbert joined Rwanda Information Technology Authority (RITA) as provincial ICT Coordinator where his primary role was the design and implementation of government ICT projects in rural areas. In 2008 he joined Huawei Technologies as a Data Communication Engineer responsible for Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda projects.
In January 2009, he joined Rwanda development board as infrastructure engineer responsible for design and implementation of Rwanda backbone fiber network project, 2500Km of fiber cable rollout, 30 PoPs and 48 BTS mobile networks. After the implementation of the project, all infrastructure and staff were transferred to Broadband System Corporation (BSC), where he occupied the post of Senior Wimax Engineer responsible for operation and maintenance of the Mobile Wimax Network across the country.
With his past experience in mobile network, in December 2013 he was transferred to Korea Telecom Rwanda Network (KTRN) as Senior Core Network Engineer where he participated in the design, implementation and operation of 4G LTE Core network for 152 RF sites. He is currently working with Vanu Rwanda as Core Network Manager responsible for deployment and operation of both Circuit Switched and Packet Switched core network Nodes.
Philbert Ukurikiyimana has a vast experience with various technology vendors such as Samsung, Solid Technology Cisco, Juniper, Huawei, Nokia and Vanu