He’s tackled Argentina’s Mount Aconcagua, the highest peak in South America, and raised money for Argentinian literacy nonprofit Fundación Leer. Now, PayPal’s Francesco Rovetta has set his sights on another peak: Mount Kilimanjaro. Starting on June 2, Rovetta will scale Africa’s highest peak — only this time, he’s not going alone. The engineer is gathering a group of tech thought leaders from Silicon Valley, Europe and Asia to swap ideas, test technology and raise funds for a local nonprofit as they climb.
The seven intrepid hikers of KiliTechTrek, as Rovetta has named his adventure, come from Amazon, Accenture, eBay and various start-ups. They’ll focus on the use of PayPal technology as they scale Kilimanjaro, bringing mobile phones with the PayPal app and a PayPal Here device to collect donations from other travelers and check the status of payments.
“We will climb the highest mountain in Africa for a great charitable cause, while using the greatest technology on the way,” Rovetta said.
The donations benefit Amani Children’s Home, a nonprofit organization in Tanzania that provides street children with a nurturing place to heal, grow and learn. In 2012, Rovetta referred Amani for a grant through the employee-led GIVE Team grant recommendation process. The Bay Area GIVE Team awarded the Amani Home a grant of $3,000 to set up a psycho-social counseling service, to complement its current efforts in social work and education.
Photo: Hikers on Mount Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. Credit: istockphoto