SPEAKERS
AUSTRALIAN TECHNOLOGY PARK, SYDNEY
11 - 12 OCTOBER 2017
KEYNOTE SPEAKERS AND PANELLISTS
MINISTERIAL OPENING ADDRESS
The Hon. (Matt) Matthew John KEAN
MP, Minister for Innovation and Better Regulation, NSW
MASTER OF CEREMONIES
Mark Pesce
The Register
In 1994 Mark co-invented VRML, a 3D interface to the World Wide Web. Mark has written six books, including VRML: Browsing and Building Cyberspace and The Playful World: How Technology is Transforming Our Imagination, which used toys such as Furby and Sony’s PlayStation to explore our interactive future.
As an educator, Mark founded graduate programs in interactive media at both the University of Southern California’s world-famous Cinema School and the Australian Film, Radio and Television School.
Mark currently holds an appointment as Honorary Associate in the University of Sydney’s Digital Cultures Program.
In 2012 Mark founded MooresCloud, a startup developing connected lighting products for the home.
OPENING & CLOSING REMARKS
Eitan Bienstock
Founder and CEO, Everything IoT
Passionate about innovation, Eitan founded Everything IoT in 2015 to provide focus and global perspective for the Internet of Things in Australia. With the mission to propel IoT innovation, Everything IoT quickly became a global platform for IoT innovation connecting corporates with startups.
Before founding Everything IoT, Eitan spent over 20 years working for fortune 100 companies, venture capital firms, incubators as well as founding couple of startups in Israel, the US and Australia. Ex Intel Capital, Eitan is highly involved in the Australian startup ecosystem as an investor, mentor and startup builder.
A recipient of the “Intel Achievement Award”, Eitan was responsible for the development and management of Intel Israel’s incubator program in the late 90’s that resulted in 100’s Million dollars of economic value to the participating companies and a successful NASDQ IPO ((NVMI).
SPEAKER KEYNOTES AND PANELISTS
PARTIAL LIST
Professor Hugh Bradlow
Chief Scientist, Telstra Corporation
President, Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering (ATSE)
Hugh S. Bradlow is President of the Australian Academy of Technology and Engineering, and Chief Scientist at Telstra Corporation. In the latter role he acts as a “forward scout” looking at the longer term technology directions and technology disruption that will impact Telstra and its customers. Prior to becoming Chief Scientist he was Chief Technology Officer and Head of Innovation at Telstra,responsible for the introduction of new technologies into Telstra’s business. Before joining Telstra in September 1995, Professor Bradlow was Professor of Computer Engineering at the University of Wollongong in Australia and Professor of Electrical Engineering (Digital Systems) at the University of Cape Town. Professor Bradlow is a graduate in electrical engineering from the University of Cape Town in 1973 and received the D.Phil. degree for research in experimental nuclear physics from the University of Oxford. He is an Emeritus Professor of the University of Wollongong, a Professorial Fellow of the University of Melbourne, and a recipient of a Centenary Medal from the Commonwealth of Australia.He is globally recognised as a thought leader in telecommunications and was elected as the joint 2009 Australian Telecommunications Ambassador of the Year, named by Global Telecom Business as one of the most 100 most influential telecommunications executives in the world and Smart Company designated him as one of the 12 most influential people in Australian ICT.
Professor Genevieve Bell
Sr. Fellow and vice president of the Corporate Strategy Office, Intel Corporation
An accomplished anthropologist and researcher, Bell joined Intel in 1998. She has been granted a number of patents for consumer electronics innovations throughout her career, with additional patents in the user experience space pending, and is the author of numerous journal papers and articles. She was named an Intel Fellow in 2016. In addition to her position at Intel, Bell is a highly regarded industry expert and frequent commentator on the intersection of culture and technology. She has been featured in publications such as Wired, Forbes, The Atlantic, Fast Company, the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. She is also a sought-after public speaker and panelist at technology conferences worldwide for the insights she has gained from extensive international field work and research. Her industry recognition includes being listed among the "100 Most Creative People in Business" by Fast Company in 2010, induction in the Women in Technology International Hall of Fame in 2012, and being honored as the 2013 Woman of Vision for Leadership by the Anita Borg Institute. Bell's book, "Divining a Digital Future: Mess and Mythology in Ubiquitous Computing," written in collaboration with Paul Dourish, was published by MIT Press in 2011. Bell holds a combined bachelor's and master's degree in anthropology from Bryn Mawr College and a master's degree and Ph.D. in cultural anthropology from Stanford University, where she was a lecturer in the anthropology department from 1996 to 1998.
Professor Jacob Rosen
Bionics Lab Director, Dept. of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, School of Engineering, UCLA
Jacob Rosen is a professor of medical robotics at the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering with joint appointments with the Department Surgery and the Department of Bioengineering, University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). His research interests focus on medical robotics, biorobotics, human centered robotics, surgical robotics, wearable robotics, rehabilitation robotics, neural control, and human-machine interface. Dr. Rosen received his B.Sc. degree in Mechanical Engineering, M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Biomedical Engineering from Tel-Aviv University in 1987, 1993 and 1997 respectively.
Dr. Rosen developed several key systems in the field of medical robotics such as the Blue and the Red Dragon for minimally invasive surgical skill evaluation that is commercialized by Simulab as the “Edge”, Raven – a surgical robotic system for telesurgery that is commercialized by Applied Dexterity as an open source research platform, several generations of upper and lower limb exoskeletons and most recently the Exo-UL7 – a dual arm wearable robotic system. He is a co-author of 100 manuscripts in the field of medical robotics and a co-author and co-editor of two books entitled “Surgical Robotics – Systems, Applications, and Visions” and "Redundancy in Robot Manipulators and Multi-robot systems" published by Springer.
Kaye Ceille
Managing Director International, Avis Budget Group
Kaye is Managing Director, International at Avis Budget Group. Based in Sydney, she has overall responsibility for the company’s operations in Australia and New Zealand. Kaye has spent more than 20 years working for multiple Avis Budget Group brands and companies. Prior to her current role, she served as President of Zipcar, the world’s leading car sharing company. Before joining Zipcar, she served as Managing Director, United Kingdom, where she oversaw all aspects of the Avis Budget Group's UK operations. Before that Kaye was Senior Vice President of International Sales and Marketing for North America.
Kaye holds a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from St. Norbert College in De Pere, Wisconsin, and a Masters degree in Business Administration from Loyola University in Chicago, Illinois.
Lee Hickin
IOT Business Development Lead - APAC, Amazon Web Services
As the Business lead for IOT across Amazon's APAC region; Lee is responsible for the execution, delivery and success of the AWS IOT Platform and associated services such as AWS Greengrass. Lee is focused on the success of our customers in leveraging AWS Cloud platform to drive innovation, automation and savings in their core business through IOT solutions.
With over 23 years’ experience in the IT industry, prior to Joining Amazon, Lee was with Microsoft for 11 years (most recently as the Product marketing manager for IOT) and prior to that spent 5 years at RSA Security as a Senior Consultant on Identity management and Authentication Services and 8 years in a variety of roles at IBM, Tivoli and a couple of Start-ups.
Lee holds a Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP) certification and is an active participant in the IOT community.”
Dr Maria Milosavljevic
Chief Information Security Officer for NSW Government (GCISO)
Dr Maria Milosavljevic is the newly appointed Chief Information Security Officer for NSW Government (GCISO) and an Adjunct Professor at the University of Canberra. In her new role, Dr Milosavljevic will work across the NSW government and consult with industry leaders and research groups, as well as Commonwealth, state and overseas governments to ensure a collaborative approach to cyber security. She will develop standards with NSW government agencies to streamline their approach to cyber security.
Prior to moving to NSW Government, Dr Milosavljevic was the CIO and CISO of AUSTRAC where she led the creation of leading-edge data analytics / AI technology and an Innovation Hub for the Fintel Alliance, a world-first public-private partnership between AUSTRAC and its public and private sector partners. As the CIO and CISO at the Australian Crime Commission she was the key driver in the establishment of the National Criminal Intelligence Fusion Capability which won several awards including an iAward and an Australian Computer Society (ACS) Digital Disrupter Award.
Dr Milosavljevic completed a PhD in Artificial Intelligence on a prestigious scholarship from the Microsoft Research Institute, graduated from ANU with an Executive Masters of Public Administration from the Australia and New Zealand School of Government (ANZSOG), and is a graduate from the Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD). As a data scientist, Dr Milosavljevic has developed several world-first and award-winning solutions to difficult problems in the private and public sector throughout her 25 year career. She has also published widely and has been a keynote speaker for a range of conferences globally.
Gordon Archibald
National partner, Cyber Security practice, KPMG Australia
Gordon is the national partner of KPMG’s Australia’s Cyber Security practice. Gordon leads a highly experience team supporting all sectors - Commercial, Defence and Federal. Gordon recently joined KPMG, bringing a wealth of industry and consulting experience. As Global Portfolio Executive, Gordon supports numerous International and National organisations
covering all industry sectors, such as Financial Services, Telecommunication & Media, Oil & Gas, Retail and Government and is considered as one of the leaders in his field.
As Cyber Chief Technology Officer, Gordon is responsible for working with clients to develop Cyber strategies to enable desired business outcomes, develop and approve vendor agreements, industry evangelist. Gordon has worked with many Australian boards and business executives around Cyber education and strategy. He led the development of the ASX100 Cyber Health Check and has assisted board in understanding their role in leading Cyber in business. Gordon has worked with major Australian companies to develop enterprise governance, compliance & risk programs cover security, vendor/supply, project management, and business resilience risk and helped develop a program for continuous security monitoring.
Dr Elizabeth Eastland
Director, Strategy, Market Vision and Innovation, CSIRO
Dr. Elizabeth Eastland is currently Director, Strategy, Market Vision and Innovation at CSIRO and is currently guiding CSIRO’s strategic direction, understanding and defining CSIRO’s national and global market roadmaps, together with leading CSIRO’s Innovation and Entrepreneurial Program, which is aimed at developing a pipeline of new investable ventures.
Elizabeth has thirty years international experience in high tech research and development, innovation management, business development, M&A, and strategy, with senior executive roles in CSIRO, UOW, Alcatel, Optus, Optus Vision, GEC, NorTel, and BNR.
Elizabeth has a a BA, BFA, EMBA and PhD across disciplines of computer science, creative writing and filmmaking.
Matt Furse
Digital Transformation Specialist - IoT, Microsoft
Matt Furse is a Digital Transformation Specialist at Microsoft focused on the Internet of Things, working with organisation’s to understand the value of emerging technologies to help them transform. Matt works with a range of large and small Businesses, Government Departments and Education Establishments across Australia and New Zealand, assisting them in the development of their future thinking and ultimately proving out the use of IoT, Big Data, Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence as accelerators and disruptors for change.
Matt has a varied experience in technology across different industries, having previously worked in the UK for a couple of start-ups, IBM e-Business hosting and Microsoft as a Global Technology Advisor to the retailer, Tesco. 5-years ago Matt relocated in Australia and has worked in a range of roles at Microsoft, always with an eye on the future, working on everything from mobility and helping to launch Surface in Australia to working in the hybrid cloud business.
Sandra McCullagh
Head of Environment, Social, Governance Research, Australia Equities, CREDIT SUISSE
Sandra McCullagh is the Head of Environment, Social & Governance Research at Credit Suisse in Australia. She has spent 35+ years working in the energy and utilities industry at senior executive level for companies such as Energex, AGL and Santos. She has been a selection committee member and mentor for startup programs such as EnergyLab and is on the Advisory Board of a fintech startup. Sandra has recently been appointed to the Queensland Government’s Climate Advisory Council.
Piers Hogarth-Scott
National Practice Leader – Internet of Things, KPMG
Piers is the National IoT Practice Leader at KPMG. Piers leads a team of management consultants that are helping clients tap into the multi-trillion dollar economic opportunity that is forecast to be derived from IoT over the next 10 years, underpinned by connecting the digital world with the physical world which helps make better, faster decisions, automate processes and predict future events.With a vertical focus on Smart Cities including connected transport and infrastructure, Smart Food and Fibre and Smart Energy & Natural Resources, KPMGs IoT Practice is working with clients to improve their business processes, optimise asset utilisation, create compelling customer experiences, develop innovative products and services, reduce business risk, increase employee satisfaction and more. Piers is a founding member of the Executive Committee of the IoT Alliance Australia (IoTAA),Chair of the Industry Board of the Australian Smart Communities Association (ASCA), and board advisor to Hypercat an international standard for interoperability of IoT. Piers has also been recognised by Business Age as one of the Top 50 Entrepreneurs in the UK to have made the most significant contribution to the Internet, innovation and wealth creation.
Daniella Traino
Business Leader - Cyber Security (GAICD) CSIRO| Data61
At Data61, Daniella co-developed the cyber security business strategy and is responsible for business development and global innovation partnerships for the cyber security domain. Daniella is a member of the Research Advisory Committee for the Internet Commerce Security Laboratory (ICSL) – a cyber security research unit of Federation University Australia. She was a judge at the 2017 Finnies (Fintech Australia awards), a contributor to 2017 ‘Startup secrets: How Australia can create new businesses with fintech and cyber security industry collaboration’ report and Cyber Track leader for the 2016 Spark Festival (formerly Startup Week Sydney). Prior to Data61, Daniella has held senior management roles including General Manager Security & Risk (Chief Information Security Officer) for a NSW government department, responsible for the effective management of all ICT risk, security & continuity practices; and executive management roles in Banking & Finance and Management Consulting. Daniella holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Accounting, Computer Science) from the University of Sydney, and is a Graduate Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors (GAICD). She is motivated to help industry and government tackle the growing and challenging cybersecurity implications and opportunities of operating in the emerging digital economy.
Ian Gardiner
Head of Startup Ecosystem, Australia and New Zealand | Amazon Web Services
Ian is a technology entrepreneur working to build relationships and business with the startup ecosystem as part of Amazon Web Services across Australia and New Zealand. Based out of AWS's Sydney office, the role covers - startups, venture capitalists, incubators, accelerators, co-working spaces, angel investors, government.
Accomplished leader of high-growth technology businesses. Strong understanding of technology and cloud infrastructure and how it can be used to build competitive advantage.
Johanna Pitman
Program Director, CityConnect, Blue Chili
Johanna directs BlueChilli’s latest accelerator program, CityConnect: an open innovation program to co-create solutions addressing the biggest challenges facing the world’s urban communities. CityConnect brings together government, corporates, academics and investors, to find and fund great smart cities ideas.
Prior to BlueChilli Johanna was the Deputy CEO for the Committee for Sydney, an independent think-tank advocating for global best practice in city-making. Johanna brings a deep understanding of urban issues and economic development, through senior roles in Federal and State agencies, and the UK Government's overseas trade network. Johanna is passionate about connecting the right players to create smart cities that are prosperous, inclusive and liveable for all.
Dr Mark Dunn
Principal Research Engineer, Coal Mining Research Program, CSIRO Energy
During the last several years, Dr Mark Dunn has worked extensively on the commercialisation of CSIRO’s Longwall Automation technology (LASC). This has included comprehensive communication protocol testing and compliance utilities, as well as extensions such as 3D Lidar measurement for longwall positioning. Mark has also been heavily involved with international commercialisation of LASC, with sites now in North America and Europe.
Mark has extensive experience in machine vision applications and automation technology. His current focus is on the application of automation in underground longwall coal mines to increase safety, sustainability and efficiency. This includes working on everything from novel sensors for environmental condition identification, through to architecture roadmaps, and remote control and autonomous navigation of underground machinery.
Nicki Page
National Board Director, Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA)
Having been born in to a tech family, a professional career in IT was encouraged from a young age. Nicki has over 20 years’ experience in the IT industry in both the UK and Australia originally as a Computer Scientist before moving in to Sales and Marketing with companies such as KAZ and Microsoft, before spearheading her own data integration tech start-up called Breeze.
More recently Nicki was the CEO of MOQ, an ASX listed cloud system integrator, which was awarded the 2016 Microsoft Worldwide Country Partner of the Year award for an innovative health and safety Internet of Things solution.
Nicki was awarded in the industry as the 2014 ARN Women in ICT Entrepreneur of the Year and has a key interest in smart innovations using clever analytics, artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things - combined with her passion for storytelling she brings real world customer solutions to life.
Martin Creighan
Managing Director & Sales Centre Vice President, Australia and New Zealand, AT&T
Martin as the Sales Centre Vice President is responsible for leading AT&T’s business in Australia and New Zealand (ANZ). With a career at AT&T that began in 2004, Martin now manages AT&T’s sales and business development for the region supporting business functions including service delivery, after sales support, marketing, finance and human resources.
In Martin’s previous role as Director of Sales for AT&T’s business development team in Australia, he was responsible for leading the team on the development of proposals and contracting offers for AT&T’s multi-national customers. Prior to AT&T, Martin started his career in the US Navy where he spent over 9 years as an Operations Specialist and was responsible for building and project managing simulated warfare environments. Since then he has held Sales, Marketing and Business Management roles with Radware, SecureNet, Baltimore Technologies and Viasoft.
Ros Harvey
Founder and Managing Director, The Yield
Ros Harvey is an experienced entrepreneur and executive in the field of technology – particularly the Internet of Things (IoT) and user-centric design. Ros is committed to creating public good through the innovative use of technology, which is reflected throughout her career.
After founding The Yield in 2014, Ros now leads an experienced team which brings together leading engineers, data scientists, agriculturists and technologists. Each of these skills work together to ensure our solutions offer real outcomes for growers and industry. Ros is passionate about technology playing a role in the sustainable governance of the planet, and is a sought-after speaker on AgTech, IoT, converting data to knowledge and the future of food.
Ros founded the globally-recognised Better Work program, and co-founded the Food Agility Consortium and the Knowledge Economy Institute with Dr Michael Briers. She is also an Adjunct Professor at the QUT Institute for Future Environments in Intellisensing.
Joe Urli
Director of Flight Operations, Airobotics
Joe is Airobotics Director of Flight Operations and has more than 26 years of experience in the aerospace industry having worked in senior management roles in both the private sector (Boeing & General Electric) and public sector (CAA & CASA) as an Airworthiness and Air Transport Safety Inspector. Joe is the President of Australia’s peak commercial drone association (ACUO) and has a degree aeronautics. He also holds chief UAV controller approvals for piloting, maintaining various types of unmanned aircraft, and is also a licensed [manned] pilot and aircraft engineer. Joe is a member of the CASA CEO Directors Advisory Panel (DAP), Government Aviation Industry Strategic Council, UAS Standards Consultative Sub-Committee and is also a non-Executive member of the Board of Directors for the Paris-based International RPAS Coordination Council of UVS International. Joe lives in Brisbane with his young family and enjoys nature-walks, flying, astronomy and reading.
Flavia Tata Nardini
Co-founder and CEO, Fleet.space
Flavia Tata Nardini began her career at the European Space Agency as Propulsion Test Engineer, before she joined TNO to apply her technical knowledge to advanced space propulsion engineering projects. She rapidly became involved in project management and business development within the space and defence domain and after that she was assigned to developed international relations and identified business opportunities in the Middle East. After establishing the business in Qatar, she return to her love of space propulsion systems, and has successfully completed full lifecycle development of satellites and several micro thrusters currently flying on actual space missions (Delfi Program’s CubeSats).
In 2015, Flavia co-founded Fleet to solve the issue facing businesses globally: how to connect the more than 75 billion connected devices expected to come online over the next decade, simply and cheaply. Fleet will launch the first of more than 100 planned nanosatellites in 2018, creating a global, free connectivity network that will plug directly into the millions of digital sensors already beginning to transform industries like agriculture, logistics, and mining and gas.
Bill Bartee
Co-founder Blackbird Ventures
Bill is co-founder of Blackbird Ventures specializing in investing in and assisting disruptive, innovative companies grow.
As a successful founder and CEO Bill is passionate about helping entrepreneurs and management teams build the next large, category winning companies.
Bill has led investments in and/or served on the Boards of many market leaders including Seek, Altium, Culture Amp, Autopilot, Shoes of Prey and is a mentor at Startmate, Muru-D, and External Lecturer at University of Sydney teaching lean startup methodology/principals to computer science, engineering and graduate students. He also helped design and facilitate CSIRO's accelerator.
Andrea Koch
Adjunct Associate Professor, University of Sydney
Andrea is a Consultant in Digital Agriculture and an Adjunct Associate Professor at the University of Sydney.
Andrea grew up on a South Australian cropping and sheep farm. Andrea is an experienced marketer, strategist and project manager with 20 years of experience in product development in the telecommunication and media industries.
In recent years her focus turned to sustainability. As part of the Dow Sustainability Program, Andrea led a soil policy think tank at the United States Studies Centre at the University of Sydney. During this time, she became Australia’s leading expert on international and domestic soil policy within an environmental and agricultural context.
With her technology development background, Andrea is bringing her knowledge of soil and agriculture together with the big data phenomena to help bring about the digital transformation of Australia’s farming sector.
Paul Fox
Managing Director, Corran Toohill Capital, Partner CalCEF
Paul Fox has worked as an investor, strategist, business builder, and technologist. He is currently focused on helping boards and executives to capitalise on business model and technology disruption. He has been fortunate to have direct experience in multiple industry sectors which are now converging. He was instrumental in creating the New Energy business at AGL Energy Limited, where he introduced lean product management, made several technology investments, and supported the rapid deployment of new products including zero-down solar, home batteries, smart air conditioners, virtual power plants and blockchain enabled P2P trading. He is also a venture capitalist at the California Clean Energy Fund (CalCEF) and spent 14 years working in Silicon Valley. In 2009 Paul was selected to join the prestigious Kauffman Fellows Program, which identifies, develops and networks the next generation of global leaders in venture capital. Paul was also founding CEO of SC Power Systems, a smart grid company using superconductor technology from Australia. In other roles, Paul was a vice president at electronics manufacturer Flex; the CEO of a fuel cell company; built the first mobile phones in Hungary; was a strategy consultant in telecoms, financial services and infrastructure; and was national operations manager for one of Australia’s largest construction organizations.
Wendy Carroll
General Manager, New Business & Stakeholder Relations for Healthdirect Australia
Wendy possesses over 13 years’ experience in commercial and innovation leadership roles across the pharmaceutical/biotech and medical-devices sectors. Wendy is the General Manager, New Business & Stakeholder Relations for Healthdirect Australia – a public government owned disrupter in health services delivery. She is responsible for driving the retention, expansion and promotion of services that Healthdirect Australia delivers on behalf of its government shareholders. Immediately prior to joining Healthdirect Australia, Wendy worked for Sanofi’s start-up Innovation business unit, where she was responsible for bringing to life a vision of improving people’s health outcomes through disruptive technology. This role involved active exploration of partnership, in-licencing and collaboration opportunities; scoping and building evidence-based service/digital solutions aimed at delivering health’s triple aim.
Wendy champions the value of strategic data and has a deep understanding of the Australian and global healthcare systems and its challenges.
Wendy holds an MBA (AGSM) and Bachelor’s degrees in Electrical Engineering (Hons I) and Commerce, and is a Graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.
Simon Blyth
CEO and founder, LX Group
Simon is the CEO and founder of Smart Elements, an IoT agtech start-up focussed on providing high quality "sensor as a service” solutions for farmers, agronomists and software developers, enabled by the LX IoT Cores. Growing up on a sheep and grain farm in Northern NSW and having a passion for IoT product development, Simon has a strong personal desire to see technology accelerate the performance of Australian agriculture. With a product development consultancy background in the design of mission critical military, medical, industrial and agricultural solutions the team at Smart Elements have develop a wide range of IoT ag sensor and tracking devices with a vision of accelerating innovation by enabling software developers to build niche vertical applications. The Smart Elements HAAS model takes away the pain needing to deal with the on-farm hardware & network problem, allowing organisations focussed on vertical solutions, analytics and end-user support to invest in what matters most. As a previous winner of the Science and Innovation Awards for young people in agriculture and a number of other national and international awards, Simon has spent over 15 years looking at ways of applying ultra-low power wireless technology to increase agricultural performance.
Sarah Nolet
Founder and CEO, AgThentic
Sarah is the founder and CEO of AgThentic, a boutique consultancy firm helping entrepreneurs and investors to build the food system of the future by providing strategy, coaching, and business development support. Sarah is also a writer, speaker, startup advisor, and recognized AgTech innovation expert. Sarah has contributed to leading industry and academic publications such as Forbes, AgFunder News, Sustainable Brands, and the Stanford Social Innovation Review; judged numerous AgTech startup prizes and pitch competitions; and presented at various food and agriculture innovation events globally. Sarah is also the founder of NSW’s first AgTech Meetup, part of a national community of AgTech innovators and investors in Australia.
Sarah holds a Masters in System Design and Management from MIT, where she was President of the MIT Food and Agriculture Club, launched the MIT-Rabobank Food and Agribusiness Innovation Prize, and served as Managing Director of the MIT Sustainability Summit. Sarah wrote her MIT-published master’s thesis on private sector approaches to innovation in agribusiness, which includes interviews with leading corporations, investors, and entrepreneurs across the FoodTech and AgTech landscape internationally.
Professor Sami Kara
Professor, School of Mechanical and Manufacturing Engineering, UNSW
Professor Kara is a mechanical engineer with a PhD in manufacturing. He has a professional background of more than 30 years in industry, research and tertiary education, including several engineering and management positions in manufacturing companies in Australia and around the world. In 2000, he has joined the University of New South Wales with research interests in sustainability in manufacturing, energy and resource efficiency in manufacturing, Life Cycle Engineering, Industry 4.0 and smart manufacturing, and urban production and factories. He is the founder and in‐charge of Sustainability in Manufacturing and Life Cycle Engineering Research Group (www.lceresearch.unsw.edu.au). He is also the co‐ director of joint German‐Australian Research Group on Sustainable Manufacturing (www.sustainable‐manufacturing.com)
Professor Kara is an elected fellow of the UNSW Scientia Education Academy. He is also the member of Institute of Engineers Australia and the elected fellow of the International Academy of Production Engineering (CIRP).
Patrick Sieb
Executive Director, Macquarie Capital, Macquarie Group Limited
Patrick Sieb is an Executive Director at Macquarie Capital. He is responsible for innovation relating to the infrastructure sector. He has over 19 years of experience in the areas of infrastructure and corporate banking combined with a passion for innovation. Since joining Macquarie, Patrick has arranged over A$50bn of financing and has been involved in leading and structuring market leading transactions. Prior to joining Macquarie, Patrick worked at Morgan Stanley’s Global Capital Markets group in New York where he structured asset-backed corporate bonds.
Stuart Waite
CEO,Timpani, Director IoT Associataion Australia
Stuart is a startup investor, mentor, product innovator and digital transformation expert. He's focused on the strategic direction and delivery of innovative products to a multitude of platforms across Mobile, Web, TV and the Internet of Things. With 20 plus years working in digital media he has developed a finely tuned sense of how best to build teams and implement digital transformation in businesses that are struggling to adapt to the disruption around them. As a strong advocate for lean user-centric design, Stuart’s at the forefront of digital innovation and product design whose strategies and concepts are delivering the next generation of user experiences, engagement, business models, and product development.
Dr Jonathon Ralston
Integrated Mining Team Leader, CSIRO Energy
Dr Ralston is a Principal Research Engineer with CSIRO Energy and is currently leading the development of integrated mining research. His major focus is the delivery of innovative solutions to promote transformational change in the resources and energy sector. He has extensive expertise in sensing and systems architectures, real-time computing, automation, statistical modelling and identification. He has contributed to world-class industrial automation projects including longwall automation, continuous miner automation, and highwall guidance systems. Jonathon’s current research focuses on developing platforms to advance integrated digital mining capability.
Michael Bullen
Deputy Director General, Department of Primary Industries, Agriculture
Mr Michael Bullen - BScFor (ANU), MBA (UNE), is Deputy Director General, DPI Agriculture (DDG DPI) and Chief Executive of the NSW Rural Assistance Authority. DDG DPI Agriculture is responsible for undertaking Research, Development and Education to improve the profitability and productivity of the agricultural sector.
Before joining DPI Agriculture Mr Bullen was Chief Executive of the Sydney Catchment Authority and prior to this worked for Forests NSW across both plantation and native forest management. All of these roles have involved working to strike the right balance of social, economic and environmental outcomes.
Mr Bullen also Chairs the National Research and Innovation Committee which is charged with overseeing the investment in Primary Industries Research and Development Framework across all of the industry sectors including dairy, fisheries, wine and grape and horticulture.
Frank Zeichner
Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of the IoT Alliance Australia
Frank Zeichner is an industry leader and influencer in building the collaborative Internet of Things (IoT) eco-system in Australia and is Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of the IoT Alliance Australia, the peak Australia IoT body. The IoTAA now has over 250 government, industry and research corporate members and over 500 participants.
Frank is also responsible for Industry collaboration at the Knowledge Economy Institute, an Internet of Things (IoT) hub based at University of Technology Sydney, and Industry Associate Professor in the Faculty of Engineering and IT, School of Systems, Management and Leadership. He is concurrently the Director of Digital Technology Advisory, Creator Tech and the NSW Director of Telsoc, a multidisciplinary society whose aim is to promote knowledge, understanding and excellence in telecommunications.
Previously he has been Alcatel Australia Sales and Marketing Director; Vice President Sales and Marketing, EMEA for Alcatel Data and COO and Acting CEO of Open Telecommunications.
Dr Alan Taylor
Executive Chairman at Clarity Pharmaceuticals
Alan has a background as a scientist, investment banker, entrepreneur and investor. Alan is very active in the Australian start-up area, investing in, advising and taking an active role within a number of early stage companies. Alan is currently the Executive Chairman at Clarity Pharmaceuticals, a company focused on developing radiopharmaceuticals for the treatment of cancer and other diseases. Alan is also the Chairman and co-founder of Mizzen Group Pty Ltd, a new technology start-up company.
Alan has approximately 10 years of investment banking experience, and was until recently an Executive Director and shareholder of Inteq Limited, a boutique Australian investment bank, where he remains on the Board of Directors. Alan has significant experience in capital raisings, mergers and acquisitions, and general corporate advisory. At Inteq, Alan was involved in some of the largest ever medical device transactions in Australia.
Alan completed an undergraduate degree in Applied Science at the University of Sydney, where he finished first in his year and won the prestigious University Medal. He completed his Ph.D. in Medicine at the Garvan Institute of Medical Research.
Matt Tett
Managing Director of Enex TestLab
Matt is the Managing Director of Enex TestLab, an independent testing laboratory with over 28 years history and a University heritage.
Matt is the chair of IoT Alliance Australia Work Stream 5 – Cyber Security and Network Resilience. He also serves on the Communications Alliance Cyber Security Reference Panel (CSRP), the Internet Australia Cyber Security SIG, and is a member of the research advisory committee for the Internet Commerce Security Laboratory at Federation University.
Matt has a deep technical background in network and security systems and he holds the following security certifications in good standing for 10+ years: CISSP, CISM, CSEPS and CISA. He holds Government and Police Contractor security clearances.
David Goad
P.Eng. MBA PMP CPIM, Postgraduate Fellow, The University of Sydney Business School
David has over 30 years of industry experience having held senior leaderships roles with recognised IT brands such as KPMG Consulting, Microsoft and Hitachi Solutions. A consummate entrepreneur David has created his own successful IT start-up, built it up to being a global award winning business and then sold it off. Currently a Post-Graduate Fellow at Sydney University, David teaches at both Sydney University and the University of New South Wales in the areas of Innovation, Business Applications, Digital Business Management and Accounting Information Systems. His research areas are the Internet of Things, Business Models and Innovation. A published author he is presenting his work on IoT Architecture at the American Conference on Information Systems in August. A member of the IoT Association of Australia, David participates in the New Business, Security, Privacy and Architecture work streams for the alliance. He also provides consulting advice to entrepreneurs starting new businesses
Stephen JK Parker
General Manager APAC, Elements.cloud
A 30 year career of business transformation experience. Providing creative and challenging thinking that aligns essential business needs with innovative technology.
Passionate leadership across large enterprises, start-ups, SMBs, and business turnarounds. Cloud business model transformation across the whole IT channel (vendor, distributor & reseller)
Experience gained from executive leadership roles, working closely with leading software vendors on their global cloud strategy, providing associate services to industry analysts, sharing knowledge as a keynote speaker, convener of the ACS Cloud & IoT SIG and writing a variety of books covering the Cloud space.
Dr Adrian Cohen
Founder and CEO, HeadSafe
Dr. Cohen is an internationally acclaimed expert in remote area medical services, occupational medicine, international medical evacuation and emergency medical services. He has spent over 20 years in Emergency Medical Services in Australia and abroad specialising in Medical Risk Management, pre-hospital care, helicopter and international retrieval with a special focus on preventable head and neck injuries. Dr Adrian Cohen graduated with honours from the University of NSW in 1983 before residency in orthopaedics and emergency medicine at Prince of Wales Hospital. Following that he became the first Chief Medical Officer with the Westpac Rescue Helicopter Service from 1987 to 1990, flying over 1,000 hours and treating hundreds of trauma and medical cases. After experiencing firsthand the lack of understanding and awareness of effective treatments for head and neck injuries he published a “Guidebook for the Management of Acute Spinal Injuries” for medical and rescue personal, as well as lecturing locally and Internationally on this topic, later this was followed by “NeckSafe: the Acute Management of Spinal Injury”. Necksafe is a registered charity dedicated to the elimination of preventable head and neck injuries through advocacy, awareness, education and research.
Rob Fitzpatrick
CEO, Australian Information Industry Association (AIIA)
Rob Fitzpatrick is a passionate technology advocate, and has been so for much of the past 3 decades. His career spans research and advocacy at the Property Council of Australia, corporate strategy, sales & marketing at McKinsey & Company, telecommunications at SingTel Optus, technology innovation at shopfast.com.au, commercialisation of early stage research at Data61, foundation investor in technology-based startups and company director influencing technology adoption in traditional businesses.
As CEO of the Australian Information Industry Association, Rob helps shape Australia’s innovation agenda, connecting members with public and private sector organisations as the nation embraces disruption to improve our economy and society. AIIA's members - from large 'born global' Australian companies, to talented small and medium businesses, to entrepreneurial startups and the incubators that nourish their journeys, to global players making a difference in our society - are the digital leaders helping Australian industry embrace disruption to grow wealth, stake out globally relevant leadership and remove friction from our economy.
Rob has Economics and Law degrees from the University of Sydney and a Master in Business Administration from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Rob is an active family man, avid traveller, ocean swimmer and surfer.