Steve Archer
- Business Development Manager, 30MHz
Steve is a Business development manager at 30MHz, a Dutch Agri-tech company. They help businesses in the agri-food chain drive productivity with data. From seed companies through cultivators to food retailers, they provide cloud-based software to access real-time data generated by their own scalable wireless sensing technology. Steve works closely with growers on a daily basis to understand their problems, to learn how we can use our system to solve them and to understand how to drive strong ROI for customers as well as passing feedback for 30MHz product development team enabling a rapid customer driven approach to product development.
Fred Barrigar
- Sr. Director of Devices and Connectivity, Livongo
As Sr. Director of Devices and Connectivity at Livongo Health, Fred leads the company’s remote product monitoring activities and partnerships. Livongo has led in commercializing cellular connected remote monitoring products starting with a cellular connected blood glucose meter. Prior to joining Livongo, Fred lead the hardware partnerships group with Verily Life Sciences (formerly Google Life Science), and held leadership roles in medical device companies such as Guidant, Boston Scientific, Acclarent and Johnson and Johnson. His work has focused on bringing tools to improve lives in cardiac surgery, rhinology, laryngology, and people with diabetes until joining Livongo and focusing across multiple chronic conditions. Fred completed his Bachelor of Science and Master of Science in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan.
Paul Beastall
Paul works as an independent advisor and non-executive director for companies that are deploying cutting-edge technology to deliver a market beating advantage. He works across the deep tech ecosystem, from connected products and services to synthetic biology.
As a consultant, Paul’s work has provided strategic insight on the impact of new technology on users, business models and regulation. Until recently he was Strategy Director for Cambridge Consultants and brings more than 25 years’ experience in networking and connected systems. He has led a wide range of projects for users of communications services, operators, product development organisations and government departments.
Paul graduated from the University of York with an MEng degree in electronics systems engineering and is a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of the IET. In 2018 Paul was appointed to the Advisory Board for UK5G.
Dan Byles
- Chief Commercial Officer, Living PlanIT
Dan is a leading figure in the Smart Infrastructure and Internet of Things sector where he Chairs SmarterUK - the UK smart infrastructure initiative within techUK - and heads global Corporate Development at the award winning software, data and AI technology company Living PlanIT. Dan also chairs the British Standards Institute (BSI) Standards Policy & Strategy Committee.
A former British Army officer, Dan stepped down from Parliament in 2015 where he served on the Energy & Climate Change Select Committee and the Science & Technology Committee, in addition to chairing a number of influential All Party Parliamentary Groups including the All Party Environment Group.
Dan was founding Chair of the All Party Smart Cities Group and has a strong reputation as a thought leader with regard to Smart Cities, the Internet of Things (IoT) and digital transformation. As an MP he was a Parliamentary Adviser to the Green Alliance and a President of the Young Persons Trust for the Environment.
Kevin is head of the technology and life sciences sector at Mills & Reeve. He specialises in providing commercial and procurement advice to clients including plcs, government departments and industry regulators. Kevin supports customers on major outsourcing projects, typically with a technology focus, and works with suppliers to protect and exploit their intellectual property internationally.
Peter Clemons
- Founder, Quixoticity
Peter Clemons has been involved in the global critical communications industry for over 20 years. He has promoted TETRA and other complementary radio technology standards in Latin America, North America, UK & Europe, Asia-Pacific region & Middle East. He is a former Director & Board Member of TCCA & remains an active member of TCCA Marketing Group, Transport Group & Critical Communications Broadband Group (CCBG).
Peter is Founder & Managing Director of consulting firm, Quixoticity, founded in 2012 - a member of ETSI, 3GPP, TCCA, Cambridge Wireless & eLTE Industry Alliance. As member of 3GPP & ETSI, he now spends much of his time studying critical communications requirements & solutions for future 5G standards. Peter launched the first edition of the ambitious, groundbreaking Quixoticity Index in late 2017, which lays out a future roadmap for the global critical communications industry and community until 2030 based on the three pillars of mission-critical, 5G and United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
Ben Crowther
- Co-Founder and Engineering Lead, Lettusgrow
Ben Crowther is the CTO and one of three founding members of LettUs Grow, a Bristol-based indoor farming technology company. He's been deploying his systems engineering background to the development of highly efficient irrigation systems in order to build the farms of the future for the past 3 years. LettUs Grow has been expanding rapidly. Ben has been recognised by the Royal Academy of Engineering for his role and recently has been awarded an Industrial Fellowship with the SWCTN to explore automation within vertical farming.
Tom is a Director at Market Gravity – a Proposition Design consultancy with offices in London, Edinburgh, New York, Oslo, Singapore, Hong Kong, Amsterdam, Toronto and Sydney. We are part of the wider Deloitte family. We work with the world’s best companies to design, prototype and deliver new products and services. He has a passion for innovation and bringing new and challenging projects from concept to reality, with a particular focus on innovation labs, digital/physical spaces and programmes.
James Dean
- CEO, SenSat
James is a technology entrepreneur fascinated by the way the world works. He founded SenSat in 2015 to enable the greatest step change since the internet; the digitisation of the physical world. SenSat allows computers to interact with the real world in their own language, making important information accessible to everyone.
James received a BSc from King’s College London in Geography and a minor in Astrophysics from The University of California, Irvine. His speciality lies in Satellite Sensing and Earth monitoring where he worked with NASA’s LandSAT and MODIS satellites. In addition he worked collaboratively with professors from NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Dr Lavindra de Silva is a Senior Research Associate at the Cambridge University Engineering Department. Lavindra joined the Distributed Information and Automation Laboratory (DIAL) in February 2019 as project leader on the Digital Manufacturing on a Shoestring project. Prior to joining DIAL, Lavindra worked in the Engineering Department of the University of Nottingham, where, in collaboration with the Agents Lab, he developed algorithms and a tool for determining whether and how a factory of manufacturing cells can ‘reconfigure’ in order to manufacture a product. This enabled factories in a manufacturing cloud to automatically ‘bid’ for products requested by customers. Before coming to the UK, Lavindra worked on two projects as a research scientist at the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS-LAAS).
Richard Fairchild
- Operations Director, Aurrigo
After completing a PhD on the feasibility of autonomous navigation in 2009, Richard worked in research developing V2V and V2I technologies and improving access to transport for vulnerable and elderly passengers through technology.
In 2011, Richard moved to industry, where he worked to set up and manage an automotive telematics division at RDM Group in Coventry.
In March 2017, the Aurrigo division of RDM Group was formed and Richard has taken up the challenge of developing connected mobility solutions utilising autonomous vehicles to improve transport choices and accessibility for all travellers.
Simon joined Real Wireless in January 2016 as Chief Technology Officer, taking overall technical and innovation strategy responsibility across the company. He is a member of the UK5G AB, co-chair of the International WG, and member of the Climate WG. His long-standing association with the UK innovation eco-system through roles such as Director of mVCE and the Innovate-UK ICT-KTN brings a wealth of practical knowledge on open innovation to accelerate product and services delivery. Simon spent his formative years in telecoms infrastructure systems and product development. In NEC Corporation he played a key role in the formation of Joint Ventures for development of 3G and 4G products and established a core team that developed the first-generation of technology for 4G systems culminating in a Steering Board position in the LTE SAE Trials Initiative (LSTI). In recent times he has directed projects on future cities, the application 5G and IoT in industry verticals with an event horizon towards 2030. His long participation in Common Public Radio Interface (CPRI) and then directing Real Wireless engagement in H2020 and the 2016 NIC study on Future Comms infrastructure brings great foresight on a range of architectural evolutions underway in 5G architectures, in particular for Open RAN and Diversification. He is a CW Small Cell SIG Champion, and in February 2022 the Small Cell Forum (SCF) appointed Simon as their Chief Strategy Officer, drawing on 25 years direct industry experience and work as an advisor to governments, regulators and big business.
Matt Flook
- Product Owner, PowerShift, EDF Energy
Passionate about sustainability, Matt has worked in the energy industry for over 6 years in a multitude of areas including environmental management consultancy, energy trading, flexibility and the smart metering rollout.
In his current role, Matt is a Product Owner on EDF Energy's flexibility platform, PowerShift, where he is responsible for the Internet of Things (IoT) and asset controls capability. PowerShift is an EDF Energy innovation enabling customers who have ‘flexibility’ through generation, storage or demand to balance the grid, increase revenue and decarbonise their operations.
Esther is dedicated to accelerating technology, and is expert in the global IP system. Her career has encompassed energy sourcing and conversion, consumer products, semiconductors devices and telecommunications. She is committed to bringing such diverse sectors together, to build a sustainable future for all.
Her career began early with an engineering apprenticeship, before university studies and advanced research within a global technology company. Leveraging her lab-based R&D background, she has since gained 20 years experience of protecting cutting edge inventions internationally through the patent system.
Esther was awarded a PhD in Microelectronics from the University of Cambridge, following her engineering studies at the Technische Hochschule Darmstadt (Germany) and the University of Kent. She has been awarded an Engineering Prize from the Royal Academy of Engineering, and was invited to present the Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET) Faraday Lecture "The Digital World".
Raj has over 20 years of experience in short range and wireless communications technology R&D, business development and marketing. Raj was part of initial IEEE 802.11 team to define first WLAN standard in 1996 – a technology which has now shipped over 5bn units. Raj also helped pioneer the first 3G data transmissions working with Motorola and others to demonstrate one of the first video calls at the 3GSM show in 1998 – many years before 3G licences were awarded. He has also been awarded a number of patents including short range wireless technologies. Raj was a founder member of startup UbiNetics (1999), which successfully exited in 2005 for over $120m USD. As part of that deal, Raj joined CSR and ultimately took the role of VP Marketing where he was part of the team that acquired SiRF Technologies for $136m (2009) to add GPS technology to CSR portfolio. More recently in 2012, he helped sell CSR’s handset business to Samsung in a deal worth $310m for 310 staff to form the SCSC division. As part of that deal, Raj took up the role of VP Marketing responsible for defining future wireless products. In 2014, Raj was promoted to head up the SCSC division leading the silicon and software development for Samsung’s connectivity solutions.
Melissa Giordano joined the Civil Service in 2004, starting her career as a fast streamer in the Department for Business.
Since then, she has worked in several Departments within Whitehall, from two years on secondment to the FCO (UKREP Brussels) working on state aid cases, postal services and telecoms, to HMRC where she led a team specialising in international personal taxes. She was also Private Secretary to two Secretaries of State - Rt Hon John Hutton and Lord Mandelson.
Prior to her appointment as Deputy Director for Mobile Infrastructure and Spectrum, Melissa held several roles at HM Treasury, working on subjects as diverse as Public Service Pension Reform, Eurozone Economic Governance, and the creation of the new Lifetime ISA.
Melissa took over her current role at DCMS in January 2018, and is responsible for Mobile coverage, Spectrum Policy, Road and Rail connectivity and 5G policy.
Mansoor Hanif
- CTO, Ofcom, UK5G Advisory Board Member, UK5G
Mansoor has 25 years experience of planning, building, optimising and operating mobile networks around the world. In 2011 Mansoor joined EE and was accountable for the technical launch of 4G as well as the Integration of the 2G/3G Orange and T-Mobile networks. Mansoor was Director of RAN and a board member of MBNL (the joint venture of EE with H3G) until 2016. At BT Mansoor was Director of the Converged Networks Research Lab from 2016 to 2018, and led collaboration with UK Universities, innovators, and government bodies. Mansoor was closely involved in the foundation of several cross-industry initiatives to accelerate innovation with disruptive technologies: in the UK, he co-founded the Scottish Innovation Partnership, and internationally participated in the Telecom Infra Project (TIP). From September 2018 Mansoor is the CTO of Ofcom, the UK telecoms and media regulator. As CTO he is head of the technology profession across the organisation, ensuring that the technology aspects of all Ofcom’s policy work are informed and robust, and is a member of the Policy and Management Board (the decision-making body at executive level). He also leads Ofcom’s activities in network security & resilience as well as engagement with CTOs at our stakeholders, industry bodies and with Government. Outside of Ofcom, Mansoor is also a member of the Advisory Boards of the UK5G Innovation Network, the Satellite Applications Catapult and UCL Electrical and Electronic Engineering Dept.
In her current role, Dr. Lina Huertas focuses on driving the creation of value in the UK through the digitalisation of UK industry. This includes shaping the UK national strategy and policy, chairing the High Value Manufacturing Catapult strategy team and running the MTC corporate strategy on Digital Manufacturing. In recent years she has formed and led different engineering and technology teams that offer unique capabilities to develop and mature technological solutions for the UK manufacturing sector. Her experience includes a PhD in the application of simulation and informatics solutions to support manufacturing, and 12 years’ experience delivering industrial projects that generated business benefits on the back of digital technologies. Lina is a Fellow of the IMechE and has a first class honours degree and a master’s degree in Mechanical Engineering.
Nigel Jefferies is a senior standards manager with Huawei Technologies and Chairman of the Wireless World Research Forum, a global partnership between industry and academia to develop a research agenda for mobile communications. Previously he was Head of Academic Relationships within Vodafone Group Research & Development and a Principal Mathematician at Racal Research Ltd. In the past he led the European-funded IST project SHAMAN, which studied the security of future mobile systems, and ran the Secure Applications Steering Group for Mobile VCE. Other collaborative research projects on various aspects of security for mobile communications include 3GS3 in the UK-funded LINK programme, and ASPeCT and USECA in the European ACTS programme. His research interests include cryptography, security of systems and applications of mathematics to telecommunications. He received a PhD in functional analysis from Goldsmith's College, London, and an MA in mathematics from the Queen's College, Oxford, and is a visiting professor at Kingston University. He is a Fellow of the Institute of Mathematics and its Applications and a Chartered Mathematician.
Mainda Kiwelu
- Senior Product Manager, Metail
Mainda has a passion for working with people across domains to build things and finding market and growth opportunities. In addition to working as a start-up business mentor, she has held several product management and marketing roles in education, publishing, information technology, shopping television and professional services. She has experience in global product portfolio responsibility and has successfully supported key business development initiatives in the US, South America, Europe and Asia.
In her current role as Senior Product Manager at Metail, Mainda is working with a talented team of innovators to expand opportunities for their cutting-edge technology in the digital visualisation of human bodies and garments for both fashion product development and for e-commerce.
Harald Kröll
- Principal Product Manager, u-blox UK
As Principal Product Manager, Harald currently manages the u-blox cellular chipsets and edge computing platforms, allowing customers to connect their assets to the cloud and process data right on the device where it is created.
He has 10 years of chip design and wireless communication experience in both industrial and academic environments. Previously, he worked as chip design engineer in the cellular industry and obtained a PhD in Electrical Engineering at ETH Zurich, focussing on energy-efficient signal processing and systems-on-chip for wireless communication.
Jack Lomas
- Head of Product, Smart Infrastructure, Mott MacDonald Group
Jack leads product within the Smart Infrastructure startup team at Mott MacDonald Digital Ventures. Tasked with driving digital transformation across the business and within customer organisations, the team adopts lean methodology to design, develop and release new tech products, applying the team's combined experience in technology, startups and infrastructure.
An experienced business leader, Jack co-founded SenSat, identified as Europe’s fasting growing AI startup (Crunchbase) and awarded 'Startup of the Year' (New Civil Engineer) that transformed civil infrastructure projects through using specialised digital twins to convert manual and physical tasks to digital and automated. Having scaled the company from 3 to 25 people, raised several million pounds of venture capital and hit revenue milestones, Jack sits as a shareholder and adviser to the management team. Outside of Mott MacDonald, Jack is a founding board director at Cambridge Wireless and founder at Future Engineering Club, a working group for senior industry thought leaders.
As head of telecoms and mobile at Cambridge Consultants, Derek leads the company’s collaboration within the sector. Central to Derek’s role at Cambridge Consultants is helping create breakthrough innovation that transforms the delivery of high-performance communication for their partners; from mobile carriers and ISPs, to vendors and component manufacturers. With over 20 years’ experience in mobile technology, Derek has held a range of multinational senior management roles and has a wealth of expertise across all generations of mobile and broadband technology, including LTE-A and 5G. Derek holds a PhD in telecommunications from the University of Bristol.
Alex Massey
- Innovation Consultant, Innovia Technology
Alex Massey is an innovation consultant with a background in chemistry. He has helped Shell, GE Healthcare, Anglo American, and other companies think through how prospective new technologies should influence their long-term innovation strategy. As one of Innovia Technology’s most experienced project leads, Alex takes on projects that study the deepest interactions between people and technology
Duncan McFarlane
- Head of Distributed Information & Automation Lab, Professor of Industrial Information Engineering, Institute for Manufacturing, Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge
Duncan McFarlane is Professor of Industrial Information Engineering at the University of Cambridge, Head of Distributed Information & Automation Lab, fellow of St John’s College and a visiting Professor at University of Melbourne. He began his career as an engineering cadet with BHP in Melbourne and has worked in the industrial automation area for over 25 years joining Cambridge in 1995. He was Research Director of the Auto ID Centre in 2000-3 and subsequently co-founder and Chairman of RedBite Solutions Ltd - an industrial RFID/IoT based asset management solutions company. He is Founder and Principal Investigator of the Digital Manufacturing on a Shoestring programme. The programme is developing low cost digital solutions for small manufacturers with recent spin-outs into construction, logistics and medical systems. Between March and September 2020 he led a team which won the RAE President's Award for providing Industrial Engineering support to local hospitals managing the Covid-19 Epidemic and from September 2020 to July 2021 was Operations Logistics lead at Cambridge University for its Asymptomatic Covid-19 Student Testing Programme.
Kevin McGivern
- SVP, Kx
Kevin has worked with Kx for nearly 10 years having previously worked in Banking. Early in his career at Kx, the world’s fastest time-series database, he worked primarily Fintech helping to grow revenue across global capital markets clients which resulted in holding roles across North America, Europe and Asia.
Kevin is now helping to drive the company’s strategy that has extended to penetrate new industries and markets that are being challenged by the increasing volume and velocity of sensor and other data. His remit now encompasses working with major clients and partners across Automotive, Utilities, Manufacturing, Smart Cities and Cyber Security. In his role, Kevin also works with many growth and early stage tech companies to enable them to bring solutions to market earlier with Kx.
Bill McKinley
- Automotive/Connected Car Strategic Planner, Keysight Technologies
Bill McKinley has spent 30 years in the Test & Measurement industry starting with Hewlett-Packard, then at Agilent Technologies and most recently with Keysight Technologies after various company splits. He has travelled extensively on business and spent time working abroad to gain valuable international experience. His focus has been primarily on wireless communications.
Bill has held multiple engineering and management positions throughout his career including R&D, Strategic Planning, Marketing and Manufacturing Engineering.
Bill is currently lead strategic Solutions Planner for Keysight’s Automotive/Connected Car business segment and holds a BSc in EE.
Simon Mead
- CEO, N/A
An experienced Commercial Director/CEO with a strong sales and marketing background. Successfully developing and executing sales strategies encompassing all media, partnerships, relationship sales and in field team management in the B2B market place. I have worked in hi-tech, on-line, media sales, broadcast and financial service industries. I have experience of working with Local Government, the Health Services, Public Services and in the Non for Profit sector.
Emma Mee
- Programme Manager, Allia
Emma supports impact entrepreneurs and start-ups looking to make a positive impact on the world, and leads the “Future 20”, a select group of inspiring start-ups addressing global challenges. She is passionate about encouraging and helping people to create solutions to some of the world’s biggest problems through innovation and entrepreneurship. She has 12 years' experience of working with large corporate clients solving sustainability challenges at the University of Cambridge Institute for Sustainability, and a sound understanding of climate change and renewable technologies. She also supports Cambridge Cleantech with business development and making connections to support the growth of both organisations, and is an elected member of the council for the National Trust, guiding long term strategy.
Peter Mildon is the COO of Vivacity Labs, a company delivering AI based products to the road infrastructure industry. Peter Co-founded Vivacity in late 2015, and since then has driven the operational growth and delivery of the Vivacity Sensor Platform, a system that makes use of Edge Processing to gather detailed real-time anonymous data on how roads are being used.
Tim Moore
- VP Innovation, ghd Cambridge
Dr Tim Moore is VP Smart Devices at Coty Inc, the third largest beauty company in the world, where he is responsible for innovation and early stage development of devices and systems for beauty, including Internet of Things (IoT). Tim joined Coty through their acquisition of ghd. As the CTO of ghd he lead and built ghd’s world-class laboratory facilities in Cambridge where innovative high performance products are developed based upon a fundamental understanding of the physics of hair. Prior to joining ghd, Dr Moore was CEO of Sagentia SGAI Ltd, a technology consultancy based in Hong Kong and Cambridge focusing on the development of breakthrough consumer products. Dr Moore obtained his PhD in Microelectronics at Cambridge University.
Masakatsu Mori
- General Manager, Hitachi
Joined Hitachi Ltd in 1994. His duties included research into new solutions that utilized advanced ICT, research into production technologies and research strategy formulation. After some time as a visiting researcher at the University of California, San Diego from 2003 to 2004, he went on to be appointed to his current position in 2018. He is currently engaged in coordinating research and development in Europe, developing the Social Innovation Business and research and development of advanced technology. He is a member of the Information Processing Society of Japan (IPSJ) and the Society of Instrument and Control Engineers (SICE).
Abhi Naha
- Digital Accelerator Director, PwC UK
Abhi Naha is the Digital Accelerator Director at PwC. He is creating and leading a new tech division for PwC. The Digital Accelerator solves innovation challenges using the power of scale ups and ecosystems for greater insights, impact and value creation.
Abhi was the CCO of CW Cambridge Wireless and CEO of the Product as a Service Consortium. At CW, Abhi initiated and lead on the 5G private network testbed in Cambridge, corporate digital innovation accelerators and high value collaborations.
Abhi was the CEO and Founder of Zone V a Cambridge start up backed by Qualcomm and ARM focused on empowering people with aging eyes and visually impairment through inclusively designed smartphone software. He held senior roles at Powermat, San Jose based Synaptics and advisory roles for Goldman Sachs and Silver Lake in the area of mobile user interface technologies. Abhi is a senior advisor to an autonomous vehicle mobility scale up Conigital, Industry Partner (Digital Infrastructure) for Arjun Infrastructure Partners with 5 Billion Euros of assets under management and an Ambassador for the United Nations Global Sustainability Index Institute. Abhi studied Electronics and Electrical Engineering, has an MBA in International Marketing and authored a book on Mobile Handset Design when approached by Cambridge University Press. More recently Abhi has created an initiative to help train widows in developing countries learn python programming, gain financial empowerment and become future leaders.
Andrew Pockson
- Engineering Manager, Anglia
An experienced and proven Engineering Manager, Marketing Manager and Applications Engineer for a range of semiconductor partners in both digital, analog and power products along with passive and electro-mechanical components.
Partners include STMicroelectronics, Analog Devices, Cree LED, Toshiba, Rohm, Telit Cinterion, Omron, Littelfuse, Murata, Hirose, TDK and Panasonic.
Andy Rhodes
- Technical Manager, GKD Technologies
Andy has over 30 years of international experience in the development of wireless communications and tracking products and systems. He has sector experience in industrial and consumer electronics, commercial telecoms, high reliability satellite systems and security & defence. At 42 Technology, a technology and product development consultancy, he has recent first-hand experience of delivering an Industrial IoT system deployment with 1000's of devices across UK and Europe, operating in harsh and hazardous environments, to provide quality data that can change the operating business model for the industry.
Rajesh Sagar
Rajesh advises on all aspects of IP law, and has extensive experience of co-ordinating high value, multi-jurisdictional patent litigations. He has been involved in high profile disputes before the UK and European courts, and has a particular focus on issues of FRAND and the enforceability of standard essential patents. Rajesh has worked on several IP projects funded by organisations such as the European Commission and UK Research Councils, and has keen interest in technologies such as blockchain, AI and machine learning. Rajesh is dual qualified in England & Wales and India.
Mr Roland Schatz is the Senior Advisor to the UN General Director developing and implementing the UN SDG 25+5 Cities Leadership Program. The work is organised through UNGSII Foundation – which is an international, multi-stakeholder, not-for-profit institute supporting the UN and the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals. UNGSII, in cooperation with UNOPS and the UN Office for Partnerships, are uniting 25 frontrunning cities and 5 Indigenous Communities from all continents, to prove that full SDG implementation by 2025 is possible. Mr Schatz is the President of the UNGSII Foundation. The leaders and experts held the first official launch SDG Lab in Davos at the World Economic Forum in January 2019. See www.ungsii.org
Roland Schatz is 5th Generation Journalist and Founder and CEO of Media Tenor Ltd., the Research Institute of InnoVatio Verlags AG, www.mediatenor.com. With offices in Africa, Asia, Europe and the U.S., Media Tenor is the leading provider of ongoing international media content analysis, including in-‐depth analysis of new and traditional global media content.
Gemma is the Programme Manager for the Smart Cambridge programme which was set up to explore how data, innovative technology and better connectivity can be used to transform the way people live, work and travel in the Greater Cambridge area and beyond. Local councils, technology businesses, university researchers and partner organisations are working together to find smart ways to tackle city challenges, such as transport and air quality.
Robert Shaw
- Head of Asset Intelligence, Anglian Water
Having worked for Anglian Water for 17 years, most recently leading the creation of the company Asset and Operations Strategy, Rob now heads up a new and exciting team, Asset Intelligence.
With genuine passion for innovation and delivering tangible and sustained positive change, he will be responsible for enabling asset maintenance excellence through intelligent exploitation of existing and new capabilities in technology, digital, data and information.
Ian Simmons
- Vice President Business Development, Magna International
Ian Simmons has served as Vice President Business Development, Corporate Engineering and R&D since 2012. Simmons is responsible for identifying and developing new business opportunities with start-ups, universities, venture capital companies and entrepreneurs. As a result of his work in the last 12-15 months, Magna has entered into partnerships with more than 15 companies and invested over $90 million.
Simmons joined Magna in 2003 as Executive Director Sales and Program Management for Magna Steyr North America. In 2008 he was promoted to General Manager, Magna Steyr North America and in 2010 this role was expanded to President of Magna Steyr North America.
Simmons, who has worked in the automotive industry for more than 35 years, began his career in 1976 with student training at the Ford Motor Company in the U.K. Upon leaving Ford in 1982 he undertook engineering assignments in Europe with Volkswagen and DAF Trucks.
In 1990 Simmons held the position of Manager of Business Development for Hawtal Whiting Plc. in the U.K., where he was responsible for sales activities throughout Europe. In 1993 he accepted a transfer to the company’s U.S. operation to become Vice President of Sales. In 1995 Simmons became Vice President of Operations for the Hawtal Whiting technical center in Sterling Heights, Michigan.
Simmons returned to the U.K. in 1997 as Director of Business Development for TWR Ltd. supporting TWR Group sales and operational tasks for the technical services division. He subsequently returned to the U.S. in 1999 and joined Porsche Engineering Services as Head of Sales in 2000. Simmons holds dual U.S. / U.K. citizenship.
Simmons has been a member of the Society of Automotive Engineers for over 20 years.
Jay comes from the technology industry and is a University of Michigan Alum. He is very well recognized in the industry in the Middle East region. Jay has been dubbed “Transformer” by Forbes in their special cover issue in July 2018 on Digital Transformation. He has also been named in the Top 50 best executives in the MENA region by Forbes for 3 consecutive years with experience expanding across emerging markets in Southeast Asia, East Europe, Middle East and Africa.
Prior to joining Ross, Jay Srage launched Qualcomm operations in MEA in 2008 from inception and expanded to SEA and East Europe to become one of the regional top influencers across emerging markets. He also founded a consulting 4.0 practice Dubai-based firm based Centrigent DMCC focused on educating executives across multiple industries in healthcare, retail, and finance on building sustainable transformational strategies. Jay started his career at Fermi National Accelerator Lab in Chicago, Illinois - America's largest particle physics accelerator and nuclear facility.
Jay Srage holds multiple inventions and patents and he has published in multiple publications including but not limited to EE Times - USA, Design Wave Magazine – Japan, Wireless Elektronic Magazine – Germany and Telecom Review – Middle East. In addition, Jay has given keynote speeches and participated as lead panelist across multiple global events such Mobile World Congress, Gitex, Telecom Summit. He is also a member of several professional business organizations like Young Arab Leaders and speaks fluently three languages.
Ben joined Qualcomm in October 2002. He is based in the UK and is responsible for marketing chipsets, other products and software in the UK and elsewhere in Europe. He works with operators, customers and other partners to ensure that Qualcomm helps their customers deliver the best possible devices and services using highly integrated and feature-rich solutions. Previously Ben has worked at O2 plc as VP, Operations Europe; at Cable & Wireless Mobile as Director of Strategy and Marketing, at Mercury Communications and at the LEK Partnership. Ben has an MA in Economics from Queens College Cambridge.
Jonathan Tudor
- Technology & Innovation Strategy Director, Centrica
Jonathan heads up strategy for Centrica Innovations, established in 2017 to invest in new technology and ideas that will transform the way we live, work and move.
Prior to joining, Jonathan served as the global managing director of BP Ventures. He has 20-years of experience in various technology based business development and investment roles. He was the ventures director at QinetiQ in the UK where he helped create and spin-out several high-tech companies in sensors, software, data analysis and materials. In his early career, he had also worked for the Carl Zeiss Group in Germany to help develop their drug screening business.
Ian Wheal
- Co-founder and CEO, Breedr
Ian Wheal is co-founder and CEO of Breedr, a data app for livestock farmers. Ian grew up on a family farm in South Australia and passionately believes that better informed farmers – coupled with an integrated, transparent supply chain – can revolutionise the productivity, quality and sustainability of the entire livestock industry. Breedr recently raised £2M Seed investment to re-think the way we track, measure and trade livestock globally.
Clare Wildfire
- Global Practice Leader for Cities, Mott MacDonald Group
Clare is Global Practice Leader for Cities with global engineering, management and development consultancy, Mott MacDonald, and is working with some of Europe’s highest profile cities. She has a background in the built environment, working as a building services engineer on low impact buildings. Her current role involves using systemic engineering at both building and city scale to facilitate the accommodation of more people in urban areas whilst consuming fewer resources, improving resilience and achieving enhanced quality of life. With a practical understanding of construction and development drivers and processes at both macro and micro level, she has embraced the potential for smart technology to enhance outcomes for citizens. Combining this with engagement in policy she is able to bring insight into the technical, political, financial and behavioural aspects of sustainable development.
Nik Willetts
- President & CEO, TM Forum
An experienced leader in the technology, media, and telecoms (TMT) market, Nik Willetts is the CEO of TM Forum.
He is passionate about the digital revolution and its profound impact on our lives and businesses. As an industry thought leader, he is a frequent writer, speaker and moderator at industry conferences and events. In 2013, Global Telecoms Business named Nik to their Top 40 under 40 as one of the most exciting leaders in the communications industry.
Previously, Nik served as the Deputy CEO of TM Forum where he was responsible for leading the Forum’s strategy, digital transformation and value-delivery for its core communications industry collaboration programs.
Nik has also held a number of executive positions within the Forum, including responsibility for strategy, marketing and communications, global events and IT. Prior to joining TM Forum, Nik ran a successful consulting business working with multi-national companies including BT, WestLB and The Carphone Warehouse.
