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The Team

We are a huge collection of passionate climate volunteers from around the world that have come together to help solve this issue.

Experience comes from: NASA, Facebook, Whatsapp, Sky, Airbus, IBM, the NHS, rapid-scale start-ups, climate scientists with PHDs and degrees from psychology to science.

If you would like to join the team, get in touch!

Samuel Naef

CEO/Founder

Sam has been an entrepreneur for the last ten years, most notably creating 8billionminds, a free live-learning platform. Sam taught sciences and maths while travelling the world, holds a physics degree and space studies masters, and has worked at NASA and Airbus. He has earned several entrepreneurial awards, including for a new propulsion system for spacecraft. His current focus is ensuring the success of The Climate App.

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Matt Sawyer

Climate Scientist

Matt is a GP by day but also runs his own sustainability consultancy (seesustainability.co.uk) helping SMEs improve their triple bottom line - providing information and practical knowledge to overcome barriers to sustainability. His current work includes carbon footprinting and carbon literacy for primary care and providing bespoke, practical and workable solutions to reduce carbon to Net Zero. BSc (First) in Environmental Science, Msc (Distinction) in Corporate Sustainability and environmental Management.

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Nayomi Illansinhage Don

Community Builder

Nayomi is an enthusiastic researcher working on genetically modifying the main vector for malaria in Sub-Saharan Africa, the Anopheles gambiae mosquito. Passionate about global health and environmental and social justice issues, Nayomi has experience in outreach and fundraising for NGOs (such as Doctors Without Borders), volunteering in her local community, especially with Extinction Rebellion. She hopes to be part of the change that our planet so desperately needs, and she sees in The Climate App the opportunity to bring widespread positive change.

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Vanessa Sangiorgio

UI/UX Designer

Vanessa is a friendly, creative and enthusiastic UI/UX Designer with a great eye to details and great ability to develop wireframes and task flows based on user needs. She loves collaborating in a team of designers and developers to create usable and accessible products. She has two rescue dogs from Italy and she has been a vegetarian for more than 5 years. Her main concern at the moment is the urgency to help to save our planet before it’s too late. 

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Zhonghao (Sergio) Lin

Developer

Sergio is a software engineer currently working at IBM as Cloud Microservices Engineer. Previously, he completed a master's degree in Computer Science and worked for Saber Interactive as a backend programmer for AAA video games. He has also been participating in multiple tech startups. In order for The Climate App to be a success, he is mainly developing the App for Android devices.

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Xingjian Ye

Developer

Xingjian is a software engineer with many years of experience in building android apps. She has completed a CS bachelor degree at the University of Minnesota Duluth, and has worked on an IoT platform as an intern. She is helping to develop The Climate App.

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Tim Coombe

Development Lead

Tim has been a software engineer for thirty years. Working in a diverse range of industries such as Finance, Insurance, Publishing, News, Broadcast Media and Entertainment has given him a deep understanding of the application of technology. His most recent experience has been at Sky helping to architect and design leading edge solutions. He has followed the climate change ‘debate’ for almost as long as he has been writing software and hopes to help The Climate App become a huge success.

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Becky Wong

Community Builder

Becky is a Freelance Operations, Projects & Digital Content Manager with over ten years’ experience working across various sectors ranging from charities, FinTech start-ups, social enterprises, technology associations and professional coaches. She also has experience within events, marketing and PR. She is currently supporting digital content, social media and community building for The Climate App.

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Tim Kachko

UX Designer

Tim is a UX Designer with strengths in research & testing, thinking through complex problems and achieving the most with the least. Currently he's teaching UX at a design school while volunteering for mission-driven projects like The Climate App. Multi-passionate, buys more books than he can read and is quite a nerd but with an adventurous side.

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Nikhila (Nikki) Chaudhari

Software Engineer

Nikhila is an experienced software engineer (for 6+ years) and will be helping take forward our Android App! She's from the outskirts of Mumbai (Dombivli) and currently lives in New York - working for Meridian Link (on a loan origination project connecting dealers and financial institutions). She also loves origami and hiking (having hiked most of the nearby mountains in NY). She hopes to help resolve the climate crisis and leave this world in a better place!

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Daniel Luo

iOS Developer

Daniel is an iOS developer and Doctor of Occupational Therapy specializing in hand rehabilitation who has been absolutely passionate about the environment ever since learning about ozone holes as a child. In his spare time, he loves rock climbing, snowboarding, and going on backpacking trips to experience all that our wonderful Planet has to offer. He is also a huge fan of baseball, cars (especially electric ones), and dogs.

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Katy Wrench

Community Builder

Katy is a digital marketing consultant and a climate advocate! She’s been working in digital marketing for 10 years focusing on digital strategy for start ups and small businesses, particularly the undervalued power of Search Engine Marketing. She is passionate about greener marketing and hopes to help businesses support and enable climate action. She is looking forward to helping The Climate App grow and empower local communities to do their bit in the fight against climate change!⁠

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Sophie Wisburn

Advisory Board

Positive Change Catalyst - Regenerative Entrepreneur - empowering CEOs, Founders & their teams to accelerate sustainable transformations and activate Purpose leaving a positive legacy creating a regenerative future!

 

Sophie is a positive change catalyst for regeneration, a sustainable business and leadership transformation coach, trainer, facilitator, educator, keynote speaker, purpose expert and board advisor.

She is on a mission to empower people and organizations to activate Purpose, realizing positive impact to accelerate change to a better - more sustainable - regenerative world for all!

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Rob Evans

iOS Developer

Rob is support engineer with Microsoft on the Outlook iOS and Android app and freelances as an iOS developer working in Swift and SwiftUI. Rob resides in South Carolina, US and when not coding he enjoys spending time with his two boys and wife, travelling, & long distance running.

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Johanna Perraudin

Community Builder

Johanna is an editorial assistant for a scientific publishing company. She studied history, linguistics, and literature and got her Master of Arts by Research in English Studies in 2021. She loves to learn and to pass on knowledge. She is the most passionate about the environment and gender equality. When she is not working or volunteering, you can find her at the gym, at the choir singing her heart out, or at the theatre watching musicals. Passionate about writing and creating visual content, she is happy to put her skills at the service of The Climate App. She believes that small gestures from individuals will push companies, universities that shape the workers of tomorrow, and politicians to act. She is very excited to be part of this project!

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Ben Taylor

Community Builder

Ben is a communications professional with a background in sustainability engagement across UK universities. He brings his creative and technical skills to the Community Building team to develop content for the app, website, and social media. Outside work, Ben finds joy in everything from running and photography to languages and AFOL engineering (that's Adult Fan Of Lego!).

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Kriss Bennett

iOS Developer

Kriss is a Senior Contract iOS Developer who has worked with a many different organisations from start-ups to global enterprises. When he's  not working building apps, he will likely be busy with his three kids; or as an amateur astrophotographer and astronomy nerd, be out in the dark with one or more of his telescopes capturing the night sky.  (https://instagram.com/krissbennett)

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Ann Gibson

Community Builder

Ann’s 20 plus year career spans the built environment: commercial real estate sales, and commercializing energy efficiency technologies in buildings with the U.S. Department of Energy. She brings her writing and project management skills to develop social media content and strategy, and assist with partnership development.  Outside of work, you’ll find Ann cooking, hiking with the dogs and traveling.

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Paul Dixon

Animator

Paul is an award-winning freelance motion graphics designer and animator based in and around London. In a career spanning 20 years he has helped develop Brand idents, UI for pioneering Video-on-demand TV channels, TV ads and digital marketing. He is currently involved with designing the crowd-funding video for The Climate App. He feels that helping The Climate App to become a world-wide success will make a very significant contribution to changing our future for the better.

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Arkadiy Matsekh

Physicist

I hold a PhD in physics obtained from the Institute of Thermophysics, Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences with a major in thermal physics and theoretical thermal engineering. I worked as a postdoc research fellow at Kyushu University, Japan studying applied superconductivity for energy applications and later moved to Australia to join a privately-funded project of a large superconducting homopolar generator. I have also completed a Graduate Certificate in Renewable Energy Technology from the Energy Institute of Technology. Currently I design and study electric propulsion systems. I am particularly interested in light electric vehicles in general and electric bicycles in particular, and I see them among the key components of sustainable transport. Also, I love cycling and ride push bikes a lot!

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Deise Sulzbach

Business Strategist

Deise is a nature-lover, a relationship builder, and she is helping The Climate App with business and finances. She has a Bachelor's in Biology with a focus on Environmental Education and is now pursuing a second Bachelor's in Business Administration, focusing on sustainable economics.

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Jessalyn Li

UI & Visual Designer

Jessalyn is the UI/Visual Designer for The Climate App. Coming from a background in marketing and Environmental Science she understands the crisis of global climate change and the challenges of developing practical solutions. She thinks The Climate App is part of that solution, and is eager to see this movement make an even bigger impact. 

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Kristin Murray

Developer

Kristin is an Android developer originally from the USA but currently based in London. She has over 5 years of experience building apps on a variety of mobile platforms. She is passionate about tackling the climate crisis and empowering individuals to make a change. 

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Hayden Postle-Floyd

Clean Energy Specialist

Hayden’s career has been focused around clean energy technology, working on a wide variety of projects across the globe, from microgrids to grid-scale projects that include award-winning developments.  With an academic background in climate change analysis, including published work, Hayden sees no greater problem to solve than that of the impending climate crisis.

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Tiffani Lewsley

Community Builder

Tiffani has worked in live TV broadcasting for the last 17 years and teaches yoga in her spare time. Tiffani is an animal rights activist, keen environmentalist and fosters her strong interest in sustainability by growing her own food in her allotment. She joined Extinction Rebellion last summer after realising that the public have to take action now into our own hands to avert a climate catastrophe. Tiffani believes The Climate App will be a key way for everyone to do their bit and more for our planet going forward.

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Sophia Chan

Community Builder

Sophia has spent the last 6 years working in digital marketing and the advertising technology space in London. Alongside this she is passionate about choosing affordable sustainable and ethical lifestyle choices and inspiring others around her to do the same, as well as learning more about wildlife & ocean conservation. ​She is working on the website and content strategy for The Climate App.

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Lua Stee

Graphic Designer and Illustrator

Lua Stee is a graphic designer and illustrator who specializes in packaging and digital design. She has developed marketing and branding for various organizations and helped promote brands using social media and email marketing. She is most passionate when working on projects that give back to the community. When she is not designing, Lua loves travelling, cycling, and petting all the dogs.

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Aditya Verma

Community Builder

Aditya is a final year Undergraduate Physics with Astrophysics and Cosmology Student at King’s College London. Through his time at The Climate App, he wishes to try and play a part in what he believes is the need of the hour. He is enthusiastic about tackling environmental issues and wants to save “the only home we’ve ever known”. He is always ready and eager to learn new things! He loves reading, writing poems, and stargazing too.

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Soufiane Benkhaldoun

iOS Developer

Soufiane is an iOS developer currently working as a freelancer and on some of his own projects. From those things that he enjoys the most there are coding and reading information about environmental science innovations. Based in London but raised in Italy, nature and climate change have always been important points for him. If he’s not working on Swift, you can find him going out in London and taking pictures of the city.

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Alexis Issaharoff

Advisory Board

CEO at Antah Solar | Board Director | Accelerating Clean Energy Transition | Sustainability & Environment Advocate

Alexis is currently CEO of Antah Solar (APAC region), and has been working in the solar & renewable energy sector for the last 14 years: as VP for the Nasdaq US firm Premier Power, VP for the German Holding WSTECH (Wind & Sun Technologies), and 10 years previously as Senior Corporate Executive for HSBC in LATAM.

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Chen-Chen Tung

Sustainability Lead

Chen-Chen is a senior sustainability consultant at Bridge Partners,  a management consulting firm working at the intersection of climate science and business strategy with the world’s largest and most innovative tech companies. She is currently advising Microsoft’s Climate Innovation Fund on impact investing strategy. Previously, Chen-Chen worked at the World Back, think tanks and venture capital. She managed the first carbon fund created in the world to protect natural forests, and participated in the global launch of the World Bank’s Environmental and Social Framework. 

Chen-Chen believes passionately that we have to find economic and business models that place nature at the center of the climate discussion. Outside work, she finds her peace and grounding in yoga, and promotes mind-body-nature connection in her yoga classroom. 

Chen-Chen received an MA in International Economics specialized in Energy, Resources and Environment from Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), and a BA with dual degrees in International Relations and English Literature from National Chengchi University in Taiwan.

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Tom Vartdal

Content Team

Tom works as a Mechanical Engineer at an engineering consultancy in the construction industry, and holds a Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering with Sustainable Energy Systems. During his four years of experience in the construction industry he has consulted on sustainability strategies for buildings, and has delivered building services designs across a variety of sectors including; healthcare, commercial, residential, educational, industrial and more.

Tom joined the The Climate App team to help spread the word of sustainability to hopefully help inspire some positive changes with regards to the climate crisis. To this end, he is currently involved with leading the Content Team.

In his spare time he's trying to learn Norwegian, enjoys playing the piano, as well as playing some tennis!

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Samuel Aristotle Kratsas

Software Engineer, Backend

From Beautiful Cleveland, Ohio; Sam 2 is a software engineer specializing in API and SDK work. He works remotely for Wunderkind and volunteers in various capacities for other nonprofits such as: teaching, grant writing , and being on a board of directors. When he’s not laying on his couch saving the world one line of code at a time he can be found traveling, petting a dog he meets on a street, or holding open a door for a stranger. He will be joining the backend development of TCA.

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Leticia Suarez

UX/UI Designer

Leticia is a UX/UI designer with an industrial design and sustainability background. She has worked in several industries within multi-national and start-up companies where she has been responsible for designing and managing a wide range of projects from concept to market. As an industrial designer, she was exposed to the alarming environmental impact that mass production is having to the planet which inspired her to pursue a career change in sustainability and user experience. Outside work, she likes painting and doodling, playing catch with her dog Tilly, hiking, and volunteering for Incredible Edibles.

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Marina Clowes

Community Builder

Marina is a marketing and comms expert with 15+ years of digital, brand and commercial planning experience based in UK. She is passionate about energising and supporting start-up businesses and believes any problem can be solved with a clear vision, strategy and an inspired community.  Driven by an insatiable curiosity and love for adventure, Marina’s travels have taken her to all four corners of the globe, taking part in volunteering and conservation projects.  She is committed to finding practical solutions to environmental challenges and conserving our planet for the future generations.

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Phil Vigus

Backend Developer

Phil is a backend developer working as a consultant at Devoteam Creative Tech in Stockholm. He has worked with various technologies including PHP/Laravel, JavaScript, and React, and is currently focused on Java, AWS and Terraform. Outside of work, he loves watching films, playing board games, and when he has time he composes his own music.

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