Victor Williams

Managing Partner at Lions Range Group

Panellist

Victor Williams is a distinguished global business leader with over twenty-five years of achievements driving transformative business growth across the U.S. and Africa.

Williams is the Founder and Managing Partner of Lions Range Group, a firm that invests in compelling sports, technology and creative economy opportunities globally with a particular focus on Africa.

From 2020 to 2023, as Executive Vice President of the National Basketball Association (NBA), and CEO of NBA Africa, Williams led all the league’s basketball and business development initiatives in Africa, significantly enhancing the growth and popularity of the NBA brand on the continent. He oversaw the formation and capitalization of NBA Africa as a standalone entity with external investment, to conduct the league’s business in Africa. Williams also led the launch and growth of the Basketball Africa League (BAL), the NBA’s first professional league outside North America; the establishment of new NBA offices in Nigeria, Egypt and Kenya; the launch of the first NBA Stores in Africa, and scaled up marketing and fan engagement initiatives, grassroots and talent development programs including NBA Academy Africa, media and corporate partnerships, and merchandising and licensing.

Prior to joining the NBA, Williams had more than two decades’ experience as a banking industry leader. As the Executive Head of Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB), Africa Regions for Standard Bank Group, he oversaw the strategy, execution and financial performance of Standard Bank’s business with corporate, sovereign and institutional investor clients in 19 countries across sub-Saharan Africa. In this pan-continental role, Williams was responsible for the growth of global markets, investment banking and transactional services businesses across Africa, and helped lead Standard Bank’s expansion into Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia and South Sudan.

Previously, as a Managing Director of mergers and acquisitions (M&A) in the US with Wells Fargo Securities, Williams led the IT and Business Services M&A practice and executed several multi-billion dollar transactions, providing strategic insights to senior executives and boards of directors of Fortune 500 companies on complex merger and financing transactions. Williams started his investment banking career in mergers and acquisitions at Goldman Sachs in New York where he rose to Vice President.

A dual citizen of Sierra Leone and the U.S., Williams holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and two undergraduate degrees, with academic honors, from Brown University. He was named among the 100 Most Influential Africans of 2021 by New African Magazine. He serves on the Board of the Smithsonian Museum of African Art in Washington, DC, and Harvard Business School’s Africa Advisory Board. He has also served on the boards of public companies and non-profit organizations in the U.S., Nigeria and Kenya.