Quantum Global Group, an investment firm focusing on Africa, has announced the newest appointments to its Advisory Board, Dr. Cheick Diarra and Dr. Thomas Ladner. 

The Quantum Global Advisory Board are a distinguished body of international experts tasked with helping the Group build strategic alliances with key African stakeholders including governance institutions, research and specialist establishments. 

The Advisory Board contributes expert advice which greatly shapes the Group’s overall strategy and the new appointments will further strengthen recent developments of the Group’s Private Equity operations in Africa, including laying the groundwork for the Group’s African expansion plans. 

Diarra is the Chairman of the Africa Legal Network. 

A dignified astrophysicist, businessman, politician and previously serving as acting Prime Minister of Mali from April to December 2012, he served as the Chairman of Microsoft Africa from 2006 until 2011 and is also a goodwill ambassador for UNESCO. 

Diarra joined the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California (a division of NASA), where he participated in various missions that included Magellan to Venus, Ulysses to the Sun’s poles, Galileo to Jupiter and the Mars Observer and Mars Pathfinder. 

He later headed NASA’s Mars Outreach Program.

Ladner, who has been involved with Quantum Global since 2007, is now deputy chair alongside Quantum Global’s Founder and Advisory Board Chairman, Jean – Claude Bastos de Morais. 

Rated amongst Switzerland’s most influential business lawyers, he has enjoyed a long and distinguished career supervising assorted high level mergers, acquisitions and private equity deals. 

An Attorney at Law with a Master's degree and a Doctorate in law (Dr. iur.) from University of St. Gallen, Switzerland, Ladner is a member of the Swiss Bar Association and a counsel with Meyerlustenberger Lachenal, a pre-eminent Swiss law firm. 

A corporate governance expert, Ladner is now an investor and strategic adviser with seats on a variety of Boards.

“Quantum Global Group values the perspectives of its Advisory Board Members to shape policy discussions that may impact the direction of our firm as the Group aims to expand across the African continent. I am delighted to welcome both Dr. Diarra and Dr. Ladner to our advisory panel, and I am certain that their skills and diverse experience will complement the core competence of the Group,” said de Morais.