Born in Ethiopia and raised in Kenya and the United States, Mimi Alemayehou is a development and finance professional. She attended St. Austins Academy, then moved to St. Austins Academy secondary school, Nairobi, Kenya, and Drew College Preparatory School, San Francisco, California, USA. She obtained her bachelor’s degree from West Texas A & M University, Texas, in the USA, and a Masters degree in International Business and International Law & Development from Tufts University Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Medford, Massachusetts, USA
Alemayehou is currently the Managing Director of Black Rhino Group, an investment consulting firm focused on promoting greater efficiencies in African infrastructure development. She is also the Executive Advisor and Chair of Blackstone, one of the world’s leading investment and advisory firms. In 2010, Alemayehou was nominated Executive Vice President of OPIC by President Barack Obama and unanimously confirmed by a full US Senate. As Vice President of OPIC, Alemayehou managed a portfolio of approximately $16 billion invested in over 100 countries. During her tenure, OPIC partnered with President Obama’s Power Africa Initiative.
Prior to OPIC, Alemayehou was Executive Director of the African Development Bank (AfDB). She is a global leader in the field of investment and finance and one of the most powerful female executives in America.
Appointed by President Obama in 2010, she currently serves as Executive Vice President of the Overseas Private Investment Corporation (OPIC), a United States government entity that provides credit and insurance products designed to encourage American investment in developing economies. She is excited about pending projects that OPIC anticipates being able to support in Ethiopia. President Obama also appointed Mimi as a Member of the Board of Directors of the African Development Foundation, where again she is the only woman board member.
Mimi has been active in her community in addition to her work. She became the co-publisher of the African Yellow Pages, the first phone directory targeting the large African immigrant community in the US. She served on the board of directors of the Tahirih Justice Center, the leading advocacy group providing pro-bono legal service to women immigrants and refugees and combating the scourge of Female Genital Mutilation in Africa and sat on the board of the Citizens League of Ethiopian Americans. She has been a committed supporter and fundraiser for the Fistula Foundation and hopes that the organization will be able to close down during her lifetime because women will no longer suffer from this horrendous condition.
A mentor to several young women colleagues during her career, she believes strongly in the importance of mentoring for young women. She credits her own success to strong mentoring she has received, to the powerful examples of her strong mother and grandmother who encouraged her to believe she could do anything she chose to, and to her stubborn perseverance in pursuing opportunities she was interested in.
Mimi Alemayehou is a mother of two, a global power player with an adorable sense of fashion. Mimi is the second most powerful person at the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, [OPIC], the US government’s development finance institution headquartered in the nation’s capital, Washington D.C.
