Sylvia Brune

CEO at pawaPass

Presenter

Sylvia Brune, CEO at pawaPass, is an entrepreneur with more than 10 years of experience. She has a dynamic career trajectory that spans various sectors and industries, showing a unique blend of problem-solving, connecting the dots, and a drive to create great experiences for customers.

Having seen the challenge for African consumers to access online services, while online businesses in these markets often struggle with fraud and abuse, Sylvia started pawaPass, an inclusive verification platform. It enables access to services using biometrics that can be captured on any smartphone, for when businesses want unique users, to keep their accounts secure, and don’t need to collect a government ID.

pawaPass builds bespoke compliance solutions for enterprises, using a unique combination of low-touch data points, non-ID-based user verification, and anti-duplication technology, to ensure online security for users, while tackling fraud and abuse of services for businesses.

Sylvia was part of the management team starting and running Africa’s first accelerator program, 88mph, investing in 45 companies from 2011-2015 across Nairobi and Cape Town, and in Lagos as 440NG, a JV with L5 Labs.

From 2015 - 2021, Sylvia co-founded and ran AHOY, a concierge flight booking app that empowered frequent travellers with DIY tools and 24/7 support for flight management, serving the expansion teams from companies like Uber, MEST, Buzzfeed, and betPawa.

Sylvia has a Bachelor's degree in International Business Administration & Chinese and a Master's in Organisational Innovation and Entrepreneurship from Copenhagen Business School, as well as Philosophy, Linguistics & Chinese Studies from the University of Oslo, including a 6 month period at Fudan University in Shanghai.