About Us

DevMarkets Team & Associates

Developing Markets Group LLC (DMG) is a consulting firm with extensive experience in ICT projects, including broadband networks, data centers, and digital government. The company's expertise and capabilities include international project management, economic/financial analysis for ICT projects, market demand analysis for ICT investments, legal/regulatory analysis for ICT projects, and feasibility studies. Clients include the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB), and the U.S. Trade and Development Agency (USTDA), as well as corporations and private investors. DMG has carried out projects in the United States, Brazil, Argentina, Colombia, Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras, Algeria, and Nigeria, among other countries.

Flavio Feferman

Flavio Feferman is President of DevMarkets and Adjunct Professor at the University of California, Berkeley, Haas School of Business. During his 25 years of professional experience, Flavio directed several international feasibility studies and sectoral evaluations for private investors and for international organizations such as the World Bank, the Inter-American Development Bank, and the U.S. Trade and Development Agency. He has served as strategic consultant to companies such as eBay, Visa, and Bechtel, as well as to non-profits such as the Goldman Environmental Prize, Global Greengrants, and Technoserve.

Flavio has worked in several countries in Latin America and Africa and recently served as keynote speaker for a conference organized by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development. He is an Adjunct Professor (Lecturer) at the University of California, Berkeley, where he teaches courses on Business, Technology and Economic Development in the MBA program. His teaching and professional interests include economic development, information technology, agriculture/agribusiness, renewable energy, marketing strategy, financial valuation and entrepreneurship in developing regions.

Flavio obtained an MBA from the U.C. Berkeley Haas School of Business, focusing on Finance and Marketing. He holds an MA in Economic Development (FRI program) from Stanford University and a BA in Quantitative Economics also from Stanford. Flavio is originally from Brazil and is fluent in Portuguese, Spanish and French.

Information technology partners

Pacific-Tier Communications, PTS Data Center Solutions, as well as regional partner firms in Brazil.

Team consultants

Regional Economic Development Projects

Alec Hansen

Associated consultant Dr. Alec Hansen, from ECG, specializes in local and regional economic analysis and strategy development. Much of his work focuses on small business development and improving technology transfer mechanisms to promote economic growth, including projects for the development of technology parks and business incubators. He has extensive prior experience in regional impact studies, urban and regional economics, cost/benefit analysis and environmental studies, and applies these skills to cluster analysis and competitiveness studies. He has worked throughout the United States and in several countries, including Brazil, in sectors such as IT, tourism, apparel, aviation, biotechnology, and transportation industries.

Dr. Hansen is also a co-founder and former president of The Competitiveness Institute (TCI), a non-profit network of more than 400 cluster/competitiveness practitioners world-wide. Dr. Hansen holds a B.A. in economics from U.C. Berkeley, and a Ph.D. in economics from Boston University.

Eric R. Hansen

Associated consultant Dr. Eric R. Hansen is the President of the Economic Transformations Group. Dr. Hansen’s areas of expertise are economic competitiveness analysis, strategy development, and managing broad-based economic change and action implementation for regions and industries. He is a specialist in cluster-based economic development and is innovating procedures for stimulating private-sector development and public-private collaboration in a variety of socio-economic and cultural contexts. Dr. Hansen directed major economic strategy projects for South Africa, Texas, Pennsylvania, Panama, Guatemala, Morocco, and the States of Campeche, Chihuahua, and Tabasco in Mexico, as well as projects in Eastern Europe (Slovakia and Slovenia). He has also directed a variety of competitiveness projects in the United States: Long Beach, California (business incubator design, university technology park development), Southern California (biotech research and training institute), Florida (new enterprise development), and Arizona, North Dakota, Iowa (cluster-based economic strategy). He holds a BA in economics from the University of California at Santa Cruz and a Ph.D. in regional economics and planning from M.I.T. He is fluent in English, Spanish, and French, and has working knowledge in Portuguese and Farsi (Persian).

Alexandre Ribenboim

Alexandre Ribenboim is an experienced entrepreneur and business consultant based in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. He was founding partner and executive at MLab, one of the leading Web consulting companies in Brazil, and more recently was founder and Managing Director of Casa do Saber, a highly regarded education and cultural center in Rio de Janeiro.

As a management consultant, Alexandre advises companies in diverse industries such as information technology, culture and arts, environmental technologies, and Web-based businesses. He works with senior management in projects related to corporate strategy, marketing and sales, finance, operations and process improvement. Alexandre is a recognized expert in startup ventures in Brazil, with particular focus on Internet based companies (both web services and online retail).

Alexandre obtained MS and BS degrees in Computer Science from PUC-Rio, and an Executive MBA from a consortium of US universities (Stanford, Wharton, CMU, and Thunderbird).

Julio Feferman

Julio Feferman is founder and President of Unito Systems, an IT and web software company based in Brazil. Julio is responsible for operations and management of the company, as well as for developing web based solutions for diverse clients, such as private companies and NGOs. He participates in feasibility studies for ICT ventures in developing coutries providing expertise on the evaluation of IT markets and technologies.

Julio has 20 years of experience in IT consulting for NGOs such as Ashoka Social Entrepreneurs, Rainforest Action Network, and the Committee for IT Democratization. Julio is a graduate of the Claremont McKenna College where he studied Biology, Economics, and Computer Science.