Bernhard Kowatsch

Bernhard Kowatsch is the Head of the Innovation Accelerator at the United Nations World Food Programme (WFP) which he started in 2015. The WFP Innovation Accelerator was named by Fast Company as Best Workplace for Innovators and Innovative Team of the Year 2020 for its work in identifying, nurturing and scaling disruptive startups and innovations to end global hunger. In 2019, innovations supported by the Accelerator positively impacted the lives of 1.4 million people directly and many more indirectly across the globe. Most recently, the Accelerator also runs programmes for external partners such as the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation in primary healthcare, Humanitarian Grand Challenge and others.

Prior to starting the Accelerator, Bernhard co-founded the award-winning ShareTheMeal fundraising app and built-up WFP’s Business Innovation team. Bernhard was previously a Project Leader at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) for global tech and industrial goods companies, and holds three Masters degrees from HEC Paris and Vienna University of Business.