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Sophia Bekele

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Website:

link=sophiabekele.com Sophia's Blog   [sophiabekele.com
Sophia's Blog sophiabekele.com
Sophia's Blog]

LinkedIn:    [Sophia Bekele Sophia Bekele]
Twitter:    @sophiabekele

Ms. Sophia Bekele is a businesswoman, entrepreneur, executive, and policy adviser.[1] She is the founder and CEO of CBS International.[2]

ICANN Work[edit | edit source]

Ms. Bekele was nominated to serve on ICANN's GNSO policy board from 2005-2007, under the Chairmanship of Dr. Vinton Cerf.

In this position, Ms. Bekele contributed to global public policies that guide the development of the Internet. During her tenure, Sophia was instrumental in initiating policy dialogue over IDNs as well as the formation of a IDN working group to focus on IDNs within ICANN. She was later credited for championing the inclusion of the global IDN community within this policy dialogue. As a result, Ms. Bekele was also nominated to chair ICANN's IDN Working Group. She was one of the co-authors of ICANN's IDN policy guidelines.

Corporate Experience[edit | edit source]

Sophia began her career working with a number of large banking institutions, such as: PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Bank of America, Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi, and the Union Bank of California. Her corporate career also involved consultant work with multinational firms, technology risk assessment, computer quality assurance, and project management. [3]

CBS International[edit | edit source]

In 1998, Ms. Bekele founded CBS International; a non-profit organization with the goal of supporting technology in organizations working in emerging markets. Their self-described mission is to: "Utilize our experience in consulting services in sales, software training , and provide our clients with a total systems solutions to help lower their cost and maximize efficiency in the delivery of quality products and services". It is based near Silicon Valley, California.[4]

Other Endeavours[edit | edit source]

Additionally, Ms. Bekele has initiated the formation of the African grouping within ICANN; as well as starting and leading the .Africa project through her creation of the non-profit organization DotConnectAfrica (DCA).[5]

She is a board member of the Golden Gate University, The Internet Society of San Francisco, advisory member to various United Nation initiatives, former Board Member of Information Systems and Control Association (ISACA-SF), and advisory member to the World Affairs Council.[6]

Education[edit | edit source]

Ms. Bekele holds an MBA in Management Information Systems (MIS) from Golden Gate University, San Francisco and a Bachelor of Science in Computer and Information Systems from San Francisco State University. She is also a Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA), Certified Control Specialist (CCS), and Certified in the Governance of Enterprise IT (CGEIT).

ICANN References[edit | edit source]

  1. DotConnectAfrica, spoke on way-forward on the contribution of the ".africa" name to an ICT enabled environment, and launched its "Yes to a .africa Campaign", at the AITEC ICT summit held in Nairobi, Kenya.html, Sep 11, 2010
  2. DotConnectAfrica, Ms.Sophia Bekele, provided a Keynote address for AITEC Summit during the opening panel discussions.html, Sep 11,2010
  3. DotConnectAfrica, DotConnectAfrica registered maximum success in East Africa as the voice was echoed globally.html, April 06, 2010
  4. Policy Development,Statement of Interest (SOI) Members of the Vertical Integration Policy Development Process Working Group, April, 01, 2010
  5. Public Forum announcement, African Union endorsment of ".Africa" and urging for ICANN to expedite process for TLDs,Nairobi, March,11,2010
  6. DotConnectAfrica, African Union endorsed the domain name ".Africa" to DotConnectAfrica org, Addis Ababa, February 18, 2010
  7. Policy Development,Statement of Interest (SOI) for the Policy Development Process Steering Committee-Policy Development Team, March 19, 2009
  8. Internet Governance, Internet Governanace & Policy Divide, San Francisco, March 10, 2009
  9. Public Forum announcement, Continuing interest in the work of ICANN, IDNs and DotAfrica, Paris, June 25, 2008
  10. Farewells, ICANN Meeting...and had a lot of respect for, Cary Karp from registries, Mawaki Chango, noncommercial, Ross Rader, registrar, and Sophia Bekele, the NomCom appointee..., ICANN Public Forum, Part 2 Thursday, 1 November 2007
  11. DotAfrica, [http://www.ntia.doc.gov/ntiahome/domainname/jpacomments2007/jpacomment_069.pdf DotAfrica�s position on JPA -National Telecommunications and Information Administration], NITA, Los Angeles, California, Feb 2008
  12. AfriICANN-discuss, A debate on dot.africa, Nov 2007
  13. AfrICANN-discuss, DotConnectAfrica's initiation of DotAfrica), Nov 2007
  14. Aftld-Discuss [AfriICANN-discuss], Who is DotAfrica?, Nov 2007
  15. ICANN IDN, GNSO Final report, Oct 2007
  16. AfriICANN-Discuss, [http://lists.aftld.org/pipermail/aftld-discuss/2007-October/000183.html Dot Africa�s position on fast tracking of IDN ccTLD], Oct 2007
  17. GNSO IDN, Comments in Response to the ccNSO-GAC Issues report on IDN Issues, Aug 2007
  18. GNSO IDN, Outcome Report of the GNSO IDN Working group, Mar 2007
  19. At-Large policy, Policy matters for conference call agenda, Mar 2007
  20. AfriIcann, Going forward with ICANN- The African Region Perspective, Mar 2007
  21. AfriICANN, ICANN - GNSo Policy update - presentation to African Group by Sophia Bekele, Lisbon, Mar 2007
  22. GNSO IDN, Outcome Report of the GNSO IDN WG, Mar 2007
  23. GNSO IDN Regarding IDN Working Group membership issues, Mar 2007
  24. ICANN IDN, IDN Working Group, Jan 2007
  25. GNSO-IDN-WG, IDN Chair Nomination, Oct 2006
  26. ICANNwiki, ICANNWiki Caricature, Wellington New Zealand, Mar 2006
  27. DotConnectAfrica's Website,dotconnectafrica.org - African's Map on Digital Inclusion, Mar 2006
  28. GNSO IDN, On IDN dialog - a debate with John C. Klensin, Mar 2006
  29. ICANN, Nominating Committee | Biographical Information on the ..., Nov 2005
  30. ICANN NomComm ICANN | Nominating Committee Announces Final Selections for Key leadership positions..., Vancouver, Canada Nov 2005
  31. ICANN, Sophia Bekele, Statement of Interest, Nov 2005

External References[edit | edit source]

References[edit | edit source]

Generic Names Supporting Organization. Develops and recommends to the Board substantive policies relating to generic top-level domains and other responsibilities set forth in the Bylaws (ICANN Bylaws).

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