Marilia Bezerra

Marilia leads the development and implementation of the IKEA Foundation’s global strategy. She is responsible for the end-to-end grant-making process, setting up the foundation’s vision and providing strategic guidance for the organisation.

Before IKEA Foundation, she was co-Executive Director at Synergos, leading the organisation’s strategy and managing a global community of leading philanthropic families and social investors. Prior to Synergos, she was the founding Managing Partner of CARE Enterprises Inc., a for-profit subsidiary of CARE focused on creating gender justice through impact investment. And before CARE, she founded and led Aldeia Works, a boutique consulting firm focused on supporting philanthropists, corporations and nonprofits in creating positive social impact.

One of her earlier career highlights was her time at the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI), where she is proud of having helped build the organisation from its start-up phase to the successful catalyst for action and global convening body it later became.

Marilia received a Master of Science (with distinction) in global affairs from New York University in 2007 and a B.A. in Law from the Federal University of Ceará (Brazil) in 1996.