Born and initially raised in Riga, Latvia, Alina became a refugee upon the collapse of the Soviet Union when her family fled to Australia. Her childhood "helped inform a career path that took her from corporate media to the World Bank before she decided to take a plunge into the world of startups, culminating in the co-founding of FFA." Her resilience in the face of adversity allowed her to move from corporate media to entrepreneurship before finally becoming the influential founder of Founders Factory Africa.