Suzanne Smith

Founder/CEO

Suzanne Smith is pioneering Grassroots FinTech—extending financial inclusion beyond individuals to organizations.

After nearly 30 years in international development, from Niger to Mozambique and Bangladesh to Afghanistan, Suzanne recognized a critical gap: grassroots organizations were being excluded from funding not due to lack of capacity, but due to lack of financial infrastructure.

She founded Accountable Partners to solve organizational financial exclusion.

EARLY CAREER: POVERTY ALLEVIATION & MICROFINANCE

At 24, Suzanne joined the Peace Corps in Niger, designing nutrition and immunization education for village women and children. By the late 1990s, poverty alleviation became her focus when she began consulting to microcredit organizations in Bangladesh, including PLAN International, the South Asian Network of Microfinance Initiatives, and NORAD, evaluating methodology effectiveness and client responsiveness. She also monitored the Bangladesh Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) Flood Rehabilitation Project through the European Community’s Humanitarian Organization (ECHO).

THE INSIGHT: INFRASTRUCTURE, NOT CAPACITY

During the next decade in Sub-Saharan Africa, Suzanne led Save the Children’s microcredit program in Mozambique, designing policies for HIV-affected families managing loans. She then focused on health-related training and curriculum design for organizations including US Peace Corps, Health Alliance International, International Relief & Development, and the Academy for Education Development.

This work revealed the critical barrier: community-based organizations had the capacity to do excellent work but lacked the financial infrastructure to prove it to donors. Over four years, Suzanne and her colleague piloted a simplified accounting system for CBOs—one that was sustainable, transparent, and accessible.

The problem wasn’t training. It was infrastructure.

AFGHANISTAN: EDUCATION & SYSTEMS THINKING

Before returning to the US, Suzanne moved to Afghanistan, implementing gender-based training and development projects in Kandahar and Kabul. She co-developed curricula and learning materials that would eventually be mainstreamed as electives in Afghan high schools through the Ministry of Education. She co-authored the Royesh curriculum for USAID.

FOUNDING LYCHEE: FINANCIAL INCLUSION FOR ORGANIZATIONS

Suzanne founded Accountable Partners with a vision: just as mobile money solved financial inclusion for unbanked individuals, Grassroots FinTech would solve it for unfunded organizations.

She created Lychee—the first Grassroots FinTech platform—to automate financial transparency for community-based organizations in developing countries. Free for CBOs, Lychee enables international donors to scale localized funding by providing real-time visibility into sub-grantee finances.

Suzanne is establishing the standards, building the Alliance, and creating the certification program that will make Grassroots FinTech the infrastructure layer international development has needed for decades.

THE MISSION

Organizational size shouldn’t determine access to funding. Transparency should be automatic, not arduous. Billions in development funding should flow directly to the communities doing the work.

We solved financial inclusion for individuals. Now we’re solving it for organizations.