Global Team
Meena Palaniappan
An award-winning entrepreneur and social impact leader, Meena Palaniappan founded Atma Connect, a tech non-profit to build the infrastructure for impact at scale, developing technology and engagement solutions that empower people and organizations for social good.
With over 25 years as an Environmental Engineer and technologist, Meena is also an Ashoka Fellow, Fulbright Fellow, an awardee of the Million Lives Club, winner of multiple international Resilience Awards, and named in publications such as Ideas that are Changing the World and Stanford Social Innovation Review. Meena has led technology projects in Africa, Asia and North America, including a $1.3 million USAID project to build a WATER SMS mobile to web crowd-sourced mapping system to improve water services in Indonesia. She has worked with the Pacific Institute and the Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) on sustainable community development, pollution prevention, and environmental justice. Meena received an M.S. in Energy and Resources from UC Berkeley and an Engineering degree from Northwestern University.
Since 2014, Meena has led Atma to become a globally recognized non-profit with teams in 3 countries and programs reaching 300 cities across three continents, focused on helping people connect, neighbor-to-neighbor, by sharing actionable information and solutions, taking collective action, and building community resilience.
Karen Risa Robbins
Extensive track-record negotiating multi-sector partnerships and building communities of purpose. Previously, Partnership Director for $18 Billion infrastructure redesign programManaged $500M of public funding and IP rights for cutting-edge tech dev projects. Ren also played key role in introducing drones to the marketplace. Expert, entrepreneur, and advisor on using digital platforms to build networks to drive social and institutional transformation and scale social impact. Incubated precursor to ReliefWeb. Ren focuses on social impact and building networks supported by digital platforms, with special interest in community-first businesses, entrepreneurial communities, and systems-level Changemakers.
Aisyah Gunung
Defining the organization’s product vision and strategy, she works closely with our executive team to ensure that the strategy is aligned with impact goals, business objectives, customer needs, market trends, and technical feasibility. Previously led product teams in startups with experiences in marketing, education, online retail and e-commerce sectors (Zenius, Blibli, Ogilvy, REA Group Asia-Australia). She was a part of senior management teams, providing directions for management, development, innovations, and business strategies. Aisyah is passionate about products sustainability, economic resilience, discrepancy, and information literacy. She holds BA in Electrical Engineering from Bandung Institute of Technology and is an alumni of XL Axiata Future Leaders programme.
Dave Turner
David was the CTO at a series of technology startups in Online Advertising, Search Engine Marketing in Australia. Upon successfully exiting those companies David was founder and CTO of biNu, a company delivering phone technology solutions to the least connected in Africa through specialised apps, low data technologies and the reverse billing of mobile data cost. The focus was on efficiency, simplicity and easy adoption with the objective of extending the reach of mobile technology to the most disadvantaged and increasing the positive impact of mobile solutions. David joined Atma Connect in 2018 as an advisor on technology and product direction.
Technology Team
Ef
Ef loves to design system architecture, to solve complex problems, to deliver solutions that meet specific business objectives. He takes the lead on the development processes and provide solutions to help businesses to be successful.
Eka Jayani Ayuningtyas
Eka is a self-taught front-end developer who is passionate about user experience, progressive enhancement, and accessibility. Previously, she has worked as a media and admin staff, language instructor, interpreter and translator in local and international organizations as well as independently. Her interests include food, music, digital art, subcultures, and interdisciplinary creative communities.
Dian Manullang
Dian is responsible for the quality and assessments of the Atma platforms. She translates requirements into the design of comprehensive functional and automated tests. Dian graduated from Del Institute of Technology in Sumatera and is continuing her studies in information technology.
Rahma Batari
Rahma is passionate about product and business management, especially about digital businesses. Rahma has some experience in the startup industry for marketplace, property, and EduTech. Rahma got a Bachelor’s Degree in Computer Science at Padjadjaran University, majoring in Information Systems.
David Wibisono
David is responsible for the design of the Atma Connect platforms and websites. He started his career as an operations officer in a commercial company before shifting his career to UI/UX. He seeks to learn new things throughout his career and is happy to be able to help people through what he does. He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Humanities from the University of Indonesia.
Field Teams
Silvia Yulianti
Silvia has been working for almost 20 years both in the profit and non-profit sectors, with various roles related to community development, program management, environmental consulting, and sustainability. As the Program Director at Atma Connect, Silvia is leading the organization’s program and activities in Indonesia for community development through IT utilization. Her role is also to increase women’s participations and to build partnerships with women’s organizations throughout Indonesia. She received her bachelor’s degree in Engineering from the Universitas Indonesia and Master of Science degree in Environmental Science and Technology from the UNESCO-IHE Delft, The Netherlands.
Alfan Rodhi
Alfan has been working on education, good governance, and community development projects for over ten years. He has held various positions throughout his career, including Project Officer for Malteser International and Founder of Komunitas CareShare. Alfan’s extensive experience working in urban poor communities throughout Indonesia includes managing the Community-Based Disaster Risk Reduction Project in the Special Province of Aceh, advocating for gender-responsive budgeting in West Java, and many other projects in areas such as Malang and Makassar. As the Field Director, Alfan builds and manages teams of people for user acquisition and onboarding, conducts user interface studies and gathers extensive user feedback, and manages a team of community moderators on AtmaGo and provide feedback on features needed directly from the communities.
Erika Marrero
Erika is in charge of community outreach, growing AtmaGo presence, and project design. Having lived Hurricane María and its aftermath, Erika was interested in learning what others did to overcome the disaster and enjoyed sharing her ingenuity in fighting crisis. She advocates the uplifting of voices concerning social justice, human rights, and heritage. She has worked with the National Park Service and Fundación Dr. Francisco López Cruz, and has been a lecturer in Ghana and St. Croix. Erika holds an MA in Linguistics and an BA in Audiovisual Communications, from the University of Puerto Rico. Her hobbies include agriculture, reading comics, and playing video games.
Indra Alfonso
Indra Alfonso is Finance and Operational manager with experience in finance, accounting, and operational field for more than ten years in commercial & development fields. An experienced leader with a history of development in Business Planning and Development, Data Management, Project Coordination, Talent Acquisition, Account Reconciliation, Due-Diligence, and Financial Reporting. Over the past ten years, he has been involved in the World Bank Project (PNPM Mandiri), FHI 360, Mercy Corps, GGGI, Embassy of Netherland, and Oxford Policy Management project.
David Khoirul
David is a translator, graphic designer, and community outreach specialist. He speaks English, Indonesian and Javanese. David has worked for HBO Asia, Google, Uber, and Motorola. He was a member of the English Student Association of the University of Ronggolwre from 2005 to 2008, and the FKPPG Youth Communication Forum in Lamongan from 2006 to 2009. David graduated from the University of Ronggolawe with a degree in language education.
Jimmy Welles
Jimmy is on our Indonesian team working to understand, measure, and evaluate AtmaGo’s social impact and outreach. He has extensive experience as a market researcher, translator and teacher. He was an AusAID/ADS Scholarship awardee 2010-2012 and holds a Master’s in Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages from Australia’s La Trobe University.
Communications
Laurie Kretchmar
Laurie Kretchmar, communications lead, is a communications strategist and former business journalist (FORTUNE, The Wall Street Journal and founding editor in chief of Women.com Networks, the first major U.S. for women). She works with great companies and causes to amplify their brands and reach their target audiences. Laurie is the author of the business book, “Tweet This! How to Amplify Your Brand on Twitter.” She can be found on Twitter as @LKhere.
Daniel Morton
Grants Consultant
Daniel Morton is a fundraising professional from Canada, currently living in South America. After graduating in Journalism in 2008, Daniel’s career took him from newspapers to television and finally to international development, where he specializes in raising funds to in support of the good. He’s thrilled to be with Atma, and believes in the power of neighbors helping neighbors to achieve a better world.
I am delighted to be the Board Chair of Atma Connect, now an award-winning technology non-profit in the San Francisco Bay Area, and take part in Atma Connect’s exciting future.
Board
Lisa Diaz Nash
Kush Amerasinghe
Nicholas Cain
Sergio Paluch
Bapon Fakhruddin, PhD
