Shemara Wikramanayake

Shemara Wikramanayake has been Macquarie Group’s Managing Director and CEO since late 2018. She joined Macquarie in 1987 in Macquarie Capital in Sydney. In her time at Macquarie, she has worked in six countries and across several business lines, establishing and leading Macquarie’s corporate advisory offices in New Zealand, Hong Kong and Malaysia, and the infrastructure funds management business in the US and Canada. Wikramanayake has also served as Chair of the Macquarie Group Foundation.

As Head of Macquarie Asset Management for 10 years before her appointment as CEO, Wikramanayake led a team of 1,600 staff in 24 markets. Macquarie Asset Management grew to become a world-leading manager of infrastructure and real assets and a top 50 global public securities manager.

Wikramanayake sits on the World Bank’s Global Commission on Adaptation and Private Sector Investment Lab and was a founding CEO of the United Nations Climate Finance Leadership Initiative (CFLI). She currently leads emerging markets workstreams for CFLI and the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero (GFANZ), is a member of the Monetary Authority of Singapore’s International Advisory Panel and Global Investors for Sustainable Development (GISD) Alliance and was a member of the Australian Universities Accord Panel of Eminent Australians which conducted the Australian Universities Accord Review.