Sriganesh Lokanathan

Sriganesh currently leads LIRNEasia‘s research on Big Data for Development. He is responsible for developing partnerships as well as the big data analytics needed to harness mobile network big data to answer broad questions related to human development. Currently this work involves the development of actionable insights for transportation and urban development in Sri Lanka. He is also a part of the team lead by Rohan Samarajiva, developing a privacy framework in a Big Data context.

He also leads LIRNEasia’s research on the role of ICTs in rural development. He ran a sustainable not-for-profit market price information service that is currently the main source for agricultural commodity prices in Sri Lanka. He has co-authored reports on the state of play of ICTs in rural development, the role of ICTs in reducing information and knowledge asymmetry, as well as on regulatory and policy factors for facilitating a conducive environment for the development and uptake of relevant rural focused applications and services. He has been invited to speak on the subject in multiple international fora.

Sriganesh also has expertise in broader telecommunications and ICT policy and regulation, having initiated LIRNEasia’s research on supply side indicators, conducting telecommunication sector performance reviews of Afghanistan, as well being as involved in the drafting of Bangladesh’s new International Long Distance Telecommunication Service (ILDTS)

He has previously worked as a consultant and as a software architect in technology companies in Sri Lanka and the US.

He is well versed in designing and conducting large multi-country quantitative surveys, in-depth qualitative research including focus groups, stakeholder interviews and socio-anthropological ethnographies, as well action research. He holds a Bachelors degree in Computer Science, from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a Master’s degree in Public Policy from the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy of the National University of Singapore.