Geopolitisk påverkan

Why organisations work with Nikolas Badminton He brings a published, named foresight methodology to the room. The Positive Dystopia Canvas, set out in Facing Our Futures, is a structured tool for stress-testing strategy against scenarios leaders would rather not entertain. He has worked the discipline at scale, with leadership teams at NASA, JP Morgan, Disney, Rolls Royce, the United Nations, and the UK Home Office. The methods on stage have been tested in serious rooms first. He bridges AI capability and strategic foresight in a way few speakers can. Most AI speakers stop at adoption. Most foresight speakers treat AI as one signal among many. Badminton treats AI as the variable that breaks existing planning horizons, and shows leaders how to plan accordingly. He served as a key advisor to The Age of A.I. documentary series with Robert Downey Jr., and his work is regularly cited by the BBC, The Atlantic, Forbes, and Fast Company. The audience tends to recognise him before he is introduced. Biography highlights Chief Futurist at Futurist.com, the international strategic foresight consultancy founded by Glen Hiemstra in 1993. Author of Facing Our Futures (Bloomsbury Business, 2023), JP Morgan Private Bank’s Next Gen Pick on its Summer Reading List and a Top-50 Business Book of 2023 by The Next Big Idea Club. Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts (FRSA) and a member of Chatham House. Advisor to The Age of A.I. documentary series with Robert Downey Jr. Research cited by the BBC, VICE, The Atlantic, Fast Company, Business Insider, Forbes, and Sunday Telegraph. Engagements with NASA, the United Nations, Google, Microsoft, JP Morgan, Disney, Rolls Royce, Procter & Gamble, the US Department of State, and the UK Home Office. Biography Most organisations cannot describe the future they are planning toward. They have a five-year strategy and a quarterly forecast, with very little real method in between. This gap is where Nikolas Badminton works. As Chief Futurist at Futurist.com, the strategic foresight consultancy founded by Glen Hiemstra in 1993, he advises executives and government leaders on how to build anticipatory capability into how they plan. His method is set out in Facing Our Futures (Bloomsbury Business, 2023). The book gives executives the Positive Dystopia Canvas, a structured tool for stress-testing strategy against scenarios leaders would rather not entertain. JP Morgan Private Bank named it a Next Gen Pick for its Summer Reading List, and The Next Big Idea Club listed it among the Top-50 Business Books of 2023. The client list reflects the demand for that work. NASA, Disney, JP Morgan, Microsoft, Rolls Royce, the United Nations, the US Department of State, and the UK Home Office have used Badminton’s foresight work to inform planning that runs longer than the political or quarterly cycle. A Fellow of the RSA and a member of Chatham House, he served as a key advisor to The Age of A.I. documentary series with Robert Downey Jr., and his research is cited by the BBC, The Atlantic, Forbes, and Fast Company. Key speaking topics Strategic foresight and futures design Artificial intelligence in the enterprise Anticipatory governance and long-range planning Innovation under disruption Energy transition and the future of resources Geopolitical scenarios and technology futures Ideal for CEOs and CSOs building foresight capability inside annual planning cycles. Boards and executive committees stress-testing strategy against long-range scenarios. Innovation, transformation, and R&D leaders responsible for moving beyond pilot stage on AI. Public-sector leaders and policymakers designing decisions with consequences beyond the political cycle. Audience outcomes A working understanding of the Positive Dystopia Canvas and how to apply it to current strategic decisions. Specific signals and scenarios in AI, energy, and geopolitics mapped onto the organisation’s actual planning horizon. The language to make the case for foresight capability inside a strategy function built around quarterly forecasting. Confidence to extend the planning conversation past 18 months without it becoming abstract or speculative.

Why organisations work with Caspar Veldkamp Direct working experience as the foreign minister of an EU member state during the 2025 NATO summit year, including hosting the first NATO summit ever held in the Netherlands. A documented record of policy principle: he resigned the foreign ministry over the cabinet’s refusal to advance further measures on Israel, and authored the EU review proposal that bears his name. Constituency-level experience of China at the EBRD board, now extended into the EU’s most senior diplomatic post in Beijing from summer 2026. Frontline diplomatic service through two of Europe’s hardest decades of crisis: ambassador to Israel from 2011 to 2015 and to Greece during the Eurozone and migration emergencies. Comfort moving between the transatlantic and Brussels frames, grounded in early service on Senator Richard Lugar’s staff and political counsellor work in Washington. Biography highlights Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Netherlands, 2024 to 2025. EU Ambassador to China designate, taking up post in Beijing in summer 2026. Board Director, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, London, 2020 to 2023. Ambassador of the Netherlands to Israel (2011 to 2015) and to Greece (2015 to 2019). Hosted the 2025 NATO Summit in The Hague. Author of “the Caspar proposal” for EU review of the EU to Israel Association Agreement. Biography The cabinet meeting on 22 August 2025 ended with the Dutch foreign minister resigning his post. Caspar Veldkamp had proposed further measures on Israel over the conduct of the war in Gaza, including an import ban on goods from settlements in the occupied territories. The cabinet would not move. He left office the same evening, and the New Social Contract ministers followed him out in solidarity. It was the kind of public exit that explains in one moment what a leader’s working principle is. The career that led there is unusually broad for a sitting politician. Veldkamp ran the Dutch embassies in Israel from 2011 to 2015 and in Greece from 2015 to 2019, the second through the Eurozone and migration crises. Between politics and diplomacy he sat on the EBRD board in London for three years, with constituency responsibility for the Netherlands, China, Mongolia, North Macedonia and Armenia, chairing the Board Steering Group during a period of governance reform and active climate and Ukraine work. As foreign minister he hosted the 2025 NATO summit in The Hague, the first summit held in the Netherlands. He argued publicly that the two-percent NATO defence benchmark was no longer adequate, backed sustained military support for Ukraine, and authored what came to be called the Caspar proposal: a formal EU review of Israel’s compliance with the EU to Israel Association Agreement. The proposal drew broader member state support than expected and reframed the conversation inside the bloc. In summer 2026 he takes up the post of European Union Ambassador to China, the first Dutch national appointed to the role. For organisations sitting on China exposure, transatlantic supply chain decisions, or the next round of EU sanctions logic, the perspective he carries into Beijing is the one boards are now looking to brief against. Key speaking topics European geopolitics and EU foreign policy NATO, transatlantic security and Ukraine EU to China relations and the Brussels view of Beijing Sanctions, ESG and the Middle East Diplomacy under coalition and parliamentary constraint Crisis-period leadership in foreign ministries and embassies Ideal for Boards and executive committees with material China, Israel or Russia exposure CEO and CFO offsites focused on geopolitical scenario planning Banking, insurance and energy leadership teams sizing sanctions and policy risk Public affairs, government relations and risk leadership functions Audience outcomes A clearer read on how EU foreign policy decisions are actually formed across capitals. A working framework for what the next phase of EU to China relations is likely to demand of European businesses. Specific reference points on Ukraine support, NATO posture and the trajectory of sanctions logic into 2026 and beyond. A first-person account of holding a foreign ministry under coalition strain, useful for any leader managing decisions that carry public principle as well as commercial weight.

Why organisations work with Dominic Sandbrook Reach and recognition that few historians can match. The Rest is History, the podcast he co-hosts with Tom Holland, was named Apple Podcasts’ 2025 Global Show of the Year, the first UK-based show to take the award. A serious academic record behind the public profile: Oxford, St Andrews, Cambridge, a Sara Norton Prize PhD, a visiting professorship at King’s College London and a fellowship of the Royal Historical Society. A specific body of work on Britain since 1945, five volumes from Never Had It So Good to Who Dares Wins, that gives him an unusually deep evidence base for parallels between the post-war decades and the disruptions leaders are now navigating. Storytelling craft developed across BBC Two documentary series, a national newspaper column and one of the world’s most-listened-to podcasts. He briefs senior audiences without lecturing them. Biography highlights Co-host of The Rest is History with Tom Holland; Apple Podcasts’ 2025 Global Show of the Year. Visiting Professor at King’s College London; Fellow of the Royal Historical Society; trustee of the National Archives Trust. Author of five volumes on post-war Britain: Never Had It So Good, White Heat, State of Emergency, Seasons in the Sun, Who Dares Wins. Earlier US-history work: Eugene McCarthy and Mad as Hell, on American politics and the 1970s. Writer-presenter of BBC Two series The 70s, The 80s, Tomorrow’s Worlds, Strange Days: Cold War Britain, Let Us Entertain You, and Das Auto. Columnist for the Daily Mail and the Sunday Times. Nominated Critic of the Year (National Press Awards, 2018) and Comment Journalist of the Year (British Journalism Awards, 2021). Biography Britain since 1945 has lived through repeated cycles of inflation, energy crisis, industrial conflict, technological upheaval and political realignment. Dominic Sandbrook has spent two decades writing the definitive popular history of those decades, in five volumes running from Never Had It So Good to Who Dares Wins. That work gives senior audiences something rare: a careful, evidence-based account of how earlier generations of leaders, governments and companies handled the conditions that today’s executives often describe as unprecedented. The academic foundation is serious. Balliol College, Oxford for an undergraduate degree in history and French; an MLitt at St Andrews; a Sara Norton Prize PhD at Jesus College, Cambridge that became his first book, a biography of Senator Eugene McCarthy. A lectureship at Sheffield and a senior fellowship at Oxford’s Rothermere American Institute followed. Since 2012 he has been a Visiting Professor at King’s College London, and he is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and a trustee of the National Archives Trust. What sets his work apart is the public reach. Since 2020, Sandbrook and his co-host Tom Holland have built The Rest is History into the world’s most listened-to history podcast, named Apple Podcasts’ 2025 Global Show of the Year. He writes columns for the Daily Mail and the Sunday Times, with award nominations from the National Press Awards and the British Journalism Awards, and he has written and presented major BBC Two series on the 1970s, the 1980s, Cold War Britain and the cultural history of science fiction. For a board or leadership audience, the appeal is the combination of scholarly authority and broadcast craft. Sandbrook makes the post-war record useable: how Heath, Callaghan, Thatcher and the country around them dealt with strikes, currency crises, energy shocks and rapid technological change, and what those episodes reveal about how senior decisions actually get made under pressure. He briefs the room without moralising or romanticising the past. Key speaking topics Post-war British political and economic history The 1970s and 1980s as a leadership case study Cold War culture, politics and global influence Historical parallels for present-day disruption Storytelling and narrative craft for senior communicators American politics and society in the post-war era Ideal for Boards and executive committees commissioning a long-view perspective on current economic and political volatility Annual partner conferences, leadership offsites and after-dinner events that want intellectual heft alongside broadcast-grade delivery Communications, public affairs and corporate-narrative teams interested in how serious storytelling holds an audience Member organisations and trade bodies marking anniversaries or commemorating institutional history Audience outcomes A sharper sense of how earlier decades of British and Western history rhyme with present conditions, and where they do not Specific case material on how political and business leaders handled inflation, industrial disputes, energy crises and technological change A more confident vocabulary for putting current events into historical perspective when briefing teams, clients or stakeholders A reminder of how narrative authority is built: through evidence, character and pace rather than slogans

Why organisations work with Federica Mogherini Five years as the EU’s most senior diplomat, chairing the Foreign Affairs Council and running the European External Action Service across the Crimea sanctions, the Iran deal, Brexit, the Trump transatlantic shift and the early phase of EU-China strategic recalibration. As the EU High Representative, she coordinated and chaired the multilateral negotiations that produced the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action on Iran’s nuclear programme, then chaired its Joint Commission, the operational reference point for what a complex multilateral agreement looks like in practice. Author of the 2016 EU Global Strategy, Shared Vision, Common Action: A Stronger Europe, the document that frames how the European Union still describes its place in the world and its relationship with the United States, China and its neighbourhood. A former national foreign minister and former NATO Parliamentary Assembly delegate, which means she can speak with equal credibility on EU institutional dynamics and on member-state and alliance politics. Biography highlights High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission, 2014 to 2019. Italian Minister for Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, 2014, in the Renzi government. Member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies, 2008 to 2014, and head of the Italian delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. Coordinator and chair of the E3+3 negotiations that produced the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action with Iran, finalised July 2015 and endorsed by UN Security Council Resolution 2231. Co-Chair of the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Internal Displacement, 2020 to 2021. Holds honorary doctorates from the University of Tampere, the University of Surrey and the University of Tirana, and has been recognised with the Hessian Peace Prize, the Kaiser Otto Prize for European unity, and Japan’s Order of the Rising Sun, Second Class. Biography For five years from November 2014, every formal EU position on Iran, Russia, Ukraine, the Middle East, the Western Balkans and the transatlantic relationship was coordinated through one office. Federica Mogherini ran it. As High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy and Vice-President of the European Commission, she chaired the Foreign Affairs Council, led the European External Action Service and represented the Union at the United Nations, NATO and the G7. The defining file of that tenure was Iran. After twelve years of EU-led negotiation, the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action was finalised in July 2015 and endorsed by UN Security Council Resolution 2231. Mogherini then chaired its Joint Commission, the body responsible for monitoring implementation, including through the Trump administration’s withdrawal in 2018. Alongside that, she developed and launched the 2016 EU Global Strategy, Shared Vision, Common Action: A Stronger Europe, the framework that still shapes how Brussels describes its strategic interests in a multipolar order. Before the Commission role, she had served as Italian Foreign Minister in 2014 and as a member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies from 2008, including as head of the Italian delegation to the NATO Parliamentary Assembly. That sequence gives her the unusual range of having sat as a national minister, an EU vice-president, and a transatlantic security parliamentarian inside one career. What she offers serious audiences is the reading you get from someone who chaired the room: how decisions on Russia, Iran, China and the United States are actually made in European capitals and at the Berlaymont, and where the next pressure points sit for organisations operating across those geographies. Key speaking topics European foreign and security policy Transatlantic relations and the future of US-EU cooperation Iran, the Middle East and nuclear diplomacy Multilateralism and the rules-based international order The European Union’s role in a multipolar world Migration, displacement and human rights Women’s leadership in global affairs Ideal for Boards and executive committees scoping geopolitical exposure across Europe, the Middle East and the transatlantic corridor. Government affairs, public policy and sustainability functions tracking EU regulatory and foreign-policy direction. Financial institutions and energy, defence and industrial businesses with sanctions, Iran or Russia exposure. Senior leadership audiences at multilateral institutions, foundations and NGOs operating on conflict, migration or displacement files. Audience outcomes A direct reading of how European foreign and security decisions are taken, from someone who chaired the Foreign Affairs Council. A clearer sense of where the EU, the United States and China are heading on the strategic files that shape international business. An informed view of the Iran file and the wider Middle East from the lead EU negotiator of the JCPOA. A grounded perspective on the limits and uses of multilateral diplomacy in a fracturing order. Confidence that the briefing reflects how the institutions actually operate, not commentary from the outside.

Why organisations work with Paolo Petrocelli He runs a flagship cultural institution and can speak to the operating discipline behind cultural ambition, not the slogan version. His work in cultural diplomacy is recognised by named bodies that buyers respect: the World Economic Forum, the Italian Republic, the World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates, UNESCO. He bridges Europe and the Gulf at a moment when both regions are rewriting their cultural and economic positioning, and he has executive experience inside that bridge. He is a credible voice on how youth, talent, and creative capital flow internationally, with a track record of building institutions that move those flows in practice. Biography highlights Head of Dubai Opera since 2023. Young Global Leader, World Economic Forum, Class of 2023. Knight of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic. Founder and President of EMMA for Peace; co-founder of Opera for Peace. PhD, IULM Milan; Executive MBA, SDA Bocconi; Oxford Executive Leadership Programme, Said Business School. Author of The Evolution of Opera Theatre in the Middle East and North Africa, Cambridge Scholars Publishing; research affiliate at metaLAB at Harvard; Forbes contributor and TEDx speaker. Biography Dubai Opera is the kind of asset a city builds when it wants to be taken seriously on the international stage. Running it is closer to running an embassy than running a theatre. The person commissioning a season is making decisions about national positioning, talent attraction, and the symbolic capital of a place. Petrocelli took over the institution in 2023, after building EMMA for Peace into one of the better-known music-diplomacy platforms operating between Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. The World Economic Forum named him a Young Global Leader the same year. His earlier book on the evolution of opera theatres in the MENA region, published by Cambridge Scholars Publishing, is one of the few serious surveys of cultural infrastructure across a region now investing heavily in it. The credential set is unusual. A PhD in cultural economics from IULM Milan and an Executive MBA from SDA Bocconi sit alongside an Oxford Executive Leadership certificate from Said Business School and a research affiliation at metaLAB at Harvard. He has held cultural diplomacy roles for the World Summit of Nobel Peace Laureates and within UNESCO-aligned youth structures. The Italian state has knighted him in the Order of Merit. What makes him commercially distinctive is the combination of operating responsibility and diplomatic standing. Most cultural strategists write about soft power from outside it. He runs one of its more visible instruments while sitting on the platforms that shape policy around it. Key speaking topics Cultural diplomacy and soft power Leadership of mission-driven cultural institutions Culture, creative industries and global development The Gulf, Europe and the new geography of cultural capital Music and the arts in international relations Youth, talent and the future of cultural leadership Cultural strategy for nations, cities and corporates Ideal for Government and city leaders working on cultural positioning, place branding, or soft-power strategy Boards and CEOs of foundations, sponsors, and corporates with serious cultural portfolios Heads of public affairs, communications, and brand who treat culture as strategy rather than sponsorship Senior leaders in international organisations and diplomatic services working on cultural cooperation Audience outcomes A clearer view of why culture has become a strategic asset for nations, cities and major brands A working sense of how cultural institutions actually run, and where ambition fails in execution Specific examples of soft power and music diplomacy as instruments of international standing A read on where the centre of gravity in global culture is shifting, and what it means for talent, capital, and policy

Why organisations work with Kim Darroch A first-hand reading of US, EU, and UK political dynamics from someone who has sat opposite the people now setting policy, not a commentator interpreting from the outside. A decade at the operational core of UK national security and European policy, covering Brexit, the Trump administration, Russian aggression in Ukraine, the rise of Daesh, and the Libya collapse. Author of Collateral Damage, the most senior insider account of the UK-US relationship under the first Trump presidency, published by HarperCollins and reviewed in Foreign Affairs. A career-long perspective on the transatlantic alliance at the moment it is under the most pressure since the Cold War, useful for boards exposed to US, European, and China risk in the same quarter. Biography highlights British Ambassador to the United States, 2016 to 2019. National Security Adviser to Prime Minister David Cameron, 2012 to 2015. UK Permanent Representative to the European Union, 2007 to 2011. Head of the Cabinet Office European Secretariat and EU adviser to Prime Minister Tony Blair, 2004 to 2007. Crossbench life peer, House of Lords; Chairperson, Best for Britain. Author, Collateral Damage: Britain, America and Europe in the Age of Trump (HarperCollins, 2020). KCMG (2008). Biography The British Ambassador to Washington is meant to be the cable channel between Downing Street and the White House. In July 2019, Kim Darroch’s frank diplomatic cables about the Trump administration were leaked to the British press, and the post became untenable. He resigned, closing a forty-year career in HM Diplomatic Service from inside the most public diplomatic incident in modern British memory. That career was built at the centre of UK foreign policy. As National Security Adviser to David Cameron from 2012 to 2015, he chaired the brief covering Daesh in Iraq and Syria, Russian operations in Ukraine, and the collapse of state authority in Libya. Before that he was UK Permanent Representative to the European Union, and before that Tony Blair’s senior EU adviser inside the Cabinet Office. Few living British diplomats have held that range of senior posts in sequence. His memoir, Collateral Damage, is the closest thing to a Washington-side account of how the UK read the Trump administration through Brexit and the early trade negotiations. Foreign Affairs reviewed it; HarperCollins published it in the UK and PublicAffairs in the US. He served as a Resident Fellow at the Harvard Institute of Politics in spring 2020 and now sits as a crossbench peer in the House of Lords, chairing Best for Britain. What boards get from him is unusual at the senior diplomatic level. He speaks operationally about how Washington, Brussels, and Whitehall actually decide, who holds the file, what moves the principal, where the brittle points are. That is the reading senior executives need when they are asked to price political risk into a five-year plan. Key speaking topics US politics and the Washington decision-making system The transatlantic alliance under strain The war in Ukraine and European security China, the US, and strategic competition UK foreign policy after Brexit Geopolitical risk for boards and investors Ideal for Boards and audit committees pricing political and sanctions exposure into strategy CEOs and CFOs of multinationals with significant US, European, or China revenue General counsel, government affairs, and strategy heads reading regulatory and trade risk Investor and asset management audiences exposed to sovereign and policy risk Audience outcomes A grounded reading of the current US administration’s foreign policy trajectory from someone who has worked with the principals. A clearer view of where the transatlantic alliance is brittle and where it still holds. The questions a senior leadership team should be asking its risk function about geopolitics, not the headlines. A sharper sense of how Washington, Brussels, and London actually negotiate, useful when planning lobbying, market entry, or sanctions response.

Why organisations work with Dame Wendy Hall Direct line of sight into where AI rules are heading. Hall sat on the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Body that wrote “Governing AI for Humanity”, and co-chaired the UK government’s 2017 AI Review with Jerome Pesenti. A framework for the geopolitics of digital infrastructure. Her book with Kieron O’Hara, “Four Internets”, sets out the competing Silicon Valley, Brussels, Washington and Beijing models that determine where data and AI capability can actually be deployed. Engineering credibility, not commentary. Her team at Southampton built the Microcosm hypermedia system in the mid 1980s, before the Web existed, which gives her arguments about platform design a foundation most policy voices lack. She can explain how AI systems actually produce their outputs to a board with no technical background. That is the subject of her next book, “AI Explained” (Wiley, September 2026), written for exactly that reader. Standing inside the institutions that boards now have to follow. Fellow of the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering, President of the British Science Association from September 2026, former Chair of the Ada Lovelace Institute, founding co-director of the Web Science Research Initiative with Tim Berners-Lee. Biography highlights Regius Professor of Computer Science, a Crown appointment, and Director of the Web Science Institute, University of Southampton; co-founder of the Web Science Research Initiative with Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Sir Nigel Shadbolt. Member, UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Body on Artificial Intelligence; contributor to “Governing AI for Humanity” (2024). Co-chair of the UK government’s independent AI Review with Jerome Pesenti, “Growing the artificial intelligence industry in the UK” (2017), and the UK’s first AI Skills Champion. Co-author, with Kieron O’Hara, of “Four Internets: Data, Geopolitics, and the Governance of Cyberspace”, Oxford University Press, 2021; co-author, with Pete Rai, of “AI Explained: A Guide for Non-Technical Readers”, Wiley, September 2026. Managing Director of the Web Science Trust; President of the British Science Association for 2026-27; Co-Editor-in-Chief of Royal Society Open Science; co-chair of the ACM Publications Board. Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire; Fellow of the Royal Society; Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, which awarded her its Sir Frank Whittle Medal in 2026; first non-North American President of the Association for Computing Machinery. Biography The teams writing the rules for AI and digital infrastructure are small, and they sit inside a handful of governments and multilateral bodies. Most boards now have to operate within those rules without much access to the people drafting them. Dame Wendy Hall is one of those people. She co-chaired the UK government’s 2017 AI Review with Jerome Pesenti, “Growing the artificial intelligence industry in the UK”, which set the structure of the country’s AI strategy. She became the UK’s first AI Skills Champion the following year. In 2023 the UN Secretary-General appointed her to the High-Level Advisory Body on Artificial Intelligence, which delivered “Governing AI for Humanity” in 2024. She chaired the Ada Lovelace Institute from 2020 to 2023. The policy work rests on three decades of original computer science. Her team at Southampton built Microcosm, a hypermedia system, in the mid 1980s, before the Web existed. In 2006 she co-founded the Web Science Research Initiative with Sir Tim Berners-Lee and Sir Nigel Shadbolt. Web Science, the field she helped establish, treats the Internet and AI as social systems shaped by politics, power, and human behaviour as much as by code. She is now Regius Professor of Computer Science at Southampton, a title conferred by the Crown, and directs the university’s Web Science Institute. Her book with Kieron O’Hara, “Four Internets” (Oxford University Press, 2021, with a foreword by Vint Cerf), maps the four competing value systems, Silicon Valley, Brussels, Washington and Beijing, that now determine where data flows, where AI can be trained, and where products can be sold. Senior teams come back to it when they have to make a capital decision about where to put a data centre or a model. Her next book, “AI Explained: A Guide for Non-Technical Readers”, is published by Wiley in September 2026, the same month she takes office as President of the British Science Association. Key speaking topics Artificial intelligence policy and governance The geopolitics of data and digital infrastructure Web Science and sociotechnical systems AI strategy for national and corporate competitiveness Internet governance and platform regulation Women in technology and the AI skills pipeline Ideal for Boards and executive committees making capital allocation decisions on AI, data and digital infrastructure Chief technology, chief data and chief AI officers responsible for defensible deployment Government, regulator and multilateral audiences working on AI and Internet governance University and research leadership shaping national AI strategy and skills Audience outcomes A working map of the four competing models of Internet governance and what each means for cross-border data and AI A sharper read of where UN, EU, UK, US and Chinese AI rules are converging and diverging A view of AI strategy that connects technical reality, regulation and national competitiveness A first-hand account of how independent AI reviews and advisory bodies are drafted and how to influence them

Why organisations work with Marcelo Carvalho He has run a global economics function at a major European universal bank, which means his read on rates, currencies and country risk is the same view senior fund managers and corporate treasurers are paying for. He has been Chief Economist for Brazil at three global investment banks (J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley, Bank of America), giving him a depth on Latin America and emerging markets that very few generalist macro speakers can match. He bridges markets and policy: two years at the IMF, two decades on the sell side, now a Senior Research Associate at ODI Global, the London-based development and policy think tank. He briefs CFOs and finance ministers with equal fluency. He has been recognised repeatedly by Institutional Investor and Latin Finance for Brazil macro coverage, signalling that his calls have been judged credible by the buy-side audience that uses his research commercially. He briefs in English, Spanish and Portuguese, which matters for organisations whose leadership team or investor base sits across the Americas and Europe. Biography highlights Senior Research Associate, ODI Global, London Former Global Head of Economics at BNP Paribas, after leading the bank’s Global Emerging Markets Research and Latin America Research desks Former Chief Economist for Brazil at J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America Two years as an economist at the International Monetary Fund PhD in Economics, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign; MSc and BA in Economics, University of Sao Paulo Multiple Institutional Investor and Latin Finance awards for Brazil macro research; regular contributor to Bloomberg, CNBC, Reuters, Financial Times, The Economist and Wall Street Journal Biography The macro environment that institutional investors and corporate boards built their playbooks around between 1990 and 2020 is no longer the environment they are operating in. Trade is fragmenting, monetary policy is diverging across the major blocs, and emerging markets are once again a source of structural opportunity and structural risk at the same time. Reading that map well is now a board-level skill, not a back-office function. That is the territory Marcelo Carvalho has worked in for three decades, now as Senior Research Associate at ODI Global, the London-based development and policy think tank where he contributes to its macroeconomic research series. He was previously Global Head of Economics at BNP Paribas in London, leading the bank’s economics function across developed and emerging markets, having earlier run its Global Emerging Markets Research and Latin America Research desks from Sao Paulo. His earlier career sits squarely on the trading floor of global investment banking. He was Chief Economist for Brazil at J.P. Morgan, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America, the kind of seat where the call has to be defensible to portfolio managers within the hour. Two years as an economist at the IMF before joining BNP Paribas in 2010 give him a public-sector perspective that most sell-side economists do not have. He holds a PhD in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Masters and Bachelor degrees from the University of Sao Paulo. His research on Brazil has been recognised in successive Institutional Investor and Latin Finance polls. He briefs boards and investor audiences in English, Spanish and Portuguese, and is a regular voice on Bloomberg, CNBC, Reuters, Financial Times, The Economist and the Wall Street Journal. Key speaking topics Global macroeconomic outlook Geopolitics and global markets Emerging markets strategy Latin America macroeconomics Monetary policy and inflation Trade policy and supply-chain fragmentation Currency dynamics and capital flows Ideal for Boards and investment committees setting medium-term capital allocation against a shifting macro backdrop CFOs, treasurers and CIOs at corporates and asset managers with exposure to emerging markets or currency risk Strategy and risk leaders translating geopolitical fragmentation into corporate planning and decision-making Banking, insurance and financial services leadership teams briefing clients on global outlook Policy forums, sovereign investor conferences and economic summits with a Latin America or emerging-markets agenda Audience outcomes A clearer read on which macro shifts are cyclical noise and which are structural enough to change planning assumptions A working view of where rates, inflation and currencies are likely to diverge across major economies and what that means for cross-border decisions A specific assessment of emerging market risk and opportunity, with Brazil and wider Latin America treated in detail rather than as a sidebar An understanding of how trade policy, supply-chain fragmentation and political risk are being repriced by global investors Macroeconomic content delivered as a narrative a leadership audience can repeat back to its own board, not a research deck

Why organisations work with Elena Boheme She has run the full development lifecycle, from hotel operator design management and fit-out contracting through to property M&A and family office advisory. That breadth is rare; most advisors sit on one side of the design, build, or operate split. She co-founded Metrix Projects and Metrix Advisory in the Kingdom, and sits on the advisory board of RED Summit KSA and the Modern Building Summit KSA. That places her inside the rooms where Saudi development decisions are made, not adjacent to them. She works credibly across the capital stack, advising AETOS MFO on luxury asset and yacht financing and Triversa Holding at executive board level. International family offices use her to translate Gulf real estate exposure into something they can actually govern. She operates in English, French, and Russian fluently, with working Arabic and Mandarin, and has executed projects in China, Macau, Korea, Monaco, the UAE, and Saudi Arabia. Cross-cultural deal structuring is a practised skill, not a claim. Biography highlights Co-founder and Development Director, Metrix Projects; co-founder, Metrix Advisory and AETOS MFO. Executive Board Member, Triversa Holding. Strategic Advisor on Project Management, Coldwell Banker Commercial Saudi Arabia. Advisory Board member, RED Summit KSA, and Advisory Board member plus moderator, Modern Building Summit KSA 2025. Speaker and moderator across AlMashtal Knowledge of Design 2024, Cityscape Saudi Arabia 2024, Hospitality Leadership and F&B Forum UAE 2025, Furtech Show Dubai 2025, and Women in Private Equity Forum London 2025. Host of LinkedIn Live series Development Dialogues and author of the LinkedIn newsletter Project Within. Biography Saudi Arabia’s development pipeline is the largest in the world and the least forgiving. International capital arrives expecting Dubai and discovers a market with its own regulatory architecture, its own localisation requirements, and its own definition of what delivered means. Elena Boheme’s work sits inside that translation problem. She co-founded Metrix Projects and Metrix Advisory in Riyadh to do one specific job: take hospitality and residential developments from concept through to operational handover without the gaps that quietly consume budget. Before that, she spent a decade on hotel operator design management, fit-out contracting, and property development across China, Macau, Korea, Monaco, and the UAE, including hospitality projects valued at over two billion US dollars in Korea and Macau. A second strand of her work runs through capital. She co-founded AETOS MFO, a multi-family office advising on luxury real estate and yacht financing, and sits as an executive board member at Triversa Holding and strategic advisor on project management to Coldwell Banker Commercial Saudi Arabia. The combination matters: developers usually understand bricks, family offices usually understand money, and Saudi-bound investors need someone who can hold both sides of the conversation at once. She moderates and chairs across the Kingdom’s main industry platforms, including the RED Summit KSA advisory board, the Modern Building Summit KSA, Cityscape Saudi Arabia, and AlMashtal Knowledge of Design, and hosts the LinkedIn Live series Development Dialogues. The track record is operational rather than academic. For a leadership team weighing a Vision 2030 entry, that is the more useful kind of credibility. Key speaking topics Project deliverability in Saudi Arabia Localisation and market entry strategy for the Kingdom Real estate development lifecycle, from design through operations Cross-cultural deal structuring in the Gulf Women in real estate development and leadership Family office exposure to Gulf real estate Ideal for International hospitality operators and developers planning entry into Saudi Arabia Family offices and private investors building Gulf real estate exposure Boards of project management, design, and construction firms expanding into the Kingdom C-suite teams at firms shifting from regional MENA presence to substantive KSA delivery Audience outcomes A clear-eyed view of what separates a signed Saudi deal from a delivered asset The localisation choices that decide whether a foreign operator can actually execute in the Kingdom A working map of how design, build, operate, and capital decisions interact across a Gulf development Specific failure modes she has seen at the hand-off between international design teams and local execution A perspective on Saudi development from someone embedded in it, not commenting from outside

Why organisations work with Stefan Löfven Direct head-of-government experience of running a minority coalition through migration shock, terror response, the pandemic, and a vote of no confidence, useful for boards weighing political risk in their own operating geographies. Chair of SIPRI, the institute whose annual data on military expenditure, arms transfers and conflict is the reference set used by foreign ministries and defence analysts globally. Co-Chair of the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, which produced the 2023 report A Breakthrough for People and Planet on reforming global governance. Co-led, with Cyril Ramaphosa, the ILO Global Commission on the Future of Work, the body whose 2019 report shaped the ILO Centenary Declaration on labour standards and social protection. Career rooted on the factory floor as a welder and union leader, which gives a credibility on labour, industrial policy and the social contract that very few former heads of state can claim. Biography highlights Prime Minister of Sweden, 2014 to 2021, across two coalition governments. Chair of the Governing Board, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), since 2022. Co-Chair, UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, 2022 to 2023. Co-Chair, ILO Global Commission on the Future of Work, with President Cyril Ramaphosa. President, Party of European Socialists, elected 2022. Resident Fellow, Institute of Politics, Harvard Kennedy School, Fall 2022. Biography The seven years of Löfven’s premiership covered the European migration crisis, a fatal terror attack on central Stockholm, a vote of no confidence that briefly removed him from office, and the COVID-19 response in a country that diverged from most of its neighbours on lockdown policy. Few European leaders held office continuously across that span. Fewer still did so while running minority governments dependent on votes from across the political spectrum. That experience is the foundation of the international roles he now holds. As Chair of SIPRI’s Governing Board since 2022, he sits over the institute that produces the data foreign ministries rely on for arms transfers, military spending, and conflict trends. As Co-Chair, with Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, of the UN High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism, he led the 2023 report A Breakthrough for People and Planet, which set out concrete reforms to the global financial architecture and the UN system itself. The labour and industrial dimension of his work is harder to fake. Trained as a welder at Hagglunds and active in the Swedish Metalworkers’ Union from his twenties, he became the first president of IF Metall in 2006 before entering elected politics. That background is why the ILO chose him, with Cyril Ramaphosa, to co-chair its Global Commission on the Future of Work, and why the Global Deal he launched in 2016 with the OECD and ILO is built around social dialogue rather than purely fiscal levers. For audiences, what travels is the practical weight of having held the line on multilateral cooperation when the politics moved against it, and the clarity that comes from briefing other heads of state, not from observing them. Key speaking topics Geopolitical risk and the rules-based order Multilateral cooperation and UN reform Crisis leadership in coalition government Future of work and the social contract European political alignment and the rise of the populist right Industrial policy and the labour market Peace, security and disarmament Ideal for Boards and executive teams scoping geopolitical exposure, sanctions risk, and operating decisions in a fracturing global order. CHRO and policy leaders working on the social contract, labour standards, and the future of work agenda. Government affairs, sustainability, and ESG functions tracking multilateral reform and UN-level policy direction. Senior leadership audiences at financial institutions, defence and dual-use industries with direct exposure to peace, security and arms-control data. Audience outcomes A first-hand account of how a head of government weighs political risk, security, and economic exposure inside the same decision. A clearer reading of where multilateral institutions are likely to bend, break, or reform over the next cycle. A grounded view of the European political map, including the rise of the populist right and its operating consequences. An informed perspective on labour, social dialogue and the future of work from a leader who has lived both sides of the table. Confidence that the briefing reflects current institutional reality, not commentary from the outside.

Why organisations work with Jean Asselborn Nineteen years of continuous EU foreign ministerial decision-making, spanning the 2008 financial crisis, the eurozone crisis, the 2015 migration shock, Brexit, and Russia’s war on Ukraine. A board hearing him is hearing from the room, not about it. Led Luxembourg into its first ever UN Security Council seat in 2013 to 2014, including chairing the Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict and steering humanitarian resolutions on Syria. A working brief on how small-state diplomacy moves a multilateral system. A public record of confronting democratic backsliding inside the EU, including a documented call for Hungary’s expulsion in 2016. Useful for any leadership audience wrestling with values, compliance, and political risk in European markets. Decorated by both the German and French states (Grand Cross of the Order of Merit, 2010; Commander of the Legion of Honour, 2013) and recognised with the Grand Media Prize of the Franco-German Journalism Prize, 2016. A credible Franco-German interlocutor at a moment when the Paris-Berlin axis is again the structural question. Biography highlights Minister for Foreign and European Affairs of Luxembourg, 2004 to 2023; the longest-serving foreign minister in EU history. Deputy Prime Minister of Luxembourg, 2004 to 2013, under Jean-Claude Juncker. Presided over the Council of the European Union in 2005. Architect of Luxembourg’s elected seat on the UN Security Council for 2013 and 2014. Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (2010); Commander of the French Legion of Honour (2013); Grand Media Prize, Franco-German Journalism Prize (2016). Subject of two published political biographies, “Merde alors!” by Margaretha Kopeinig (Czernin Verlag, 2021) and “Die Tour seines Lebens” by Michael Merten. Biography For nineteen years, every major European foreign policy crisis crossed the desk of Luxembourg’s Minister for Foreign and European Affairs. Russia’s annexation of Crimea, the 2015 migration emergency, Brexit, the rule-of-law fights with Warsaw and Budapest, the full-scale invasion of Ukraine. Jean Asselborn was in the room for all of them, from 2004 to 2023, longer than any foreign minister in EU history. The seat mattered. Luxembourg is small enough to be heard without threatening anyone, and Asselborn used that position to push the EU on values when larger member states preferred to look away. He called publicly for Hungary’s expulsion from the bloc in 2016 over the treatment of asylum seekers, and remained one of the most consistent ministerial voices on democratic backsliding inside the Union. He also built institutional weight beyond Brussels. As Deputy Prime Minister from 2004 to 2013, he presided over the Council of the European Union in 2005, and engineered Luxembourg’s first elected seat on the UN Security Council for 2013 and 2014. During that term Luxembourg chaired the Working Group on Children and Armed Conflict and helped pass the Syria humanitarian resolutions that defined the Council’s response that year. France and Germany have both recognised him at the highest civic level: the Grand Cross of the Order of Merit in 2010, the Legion of Honour as Commander in 2013, and the Grand Media Prize of the Franco-German Journalism Prize in 2016. For organisations trying to read what the Paris-Berlin axis, the European Commission, and a more brittle multilateral order will actually do next, Asselborn is one of the few accessible voices who spent two decades inside those decisions. Key speaking topics European integration and the future of the EU The rules-based international order and multilateralism Democracy and rule of law inside the European Union Franco-German relations and the EU institutional axis UN Security Council diplomacy and small-state influence Migration, asylum, and European border policy Transatlantic relations and EU strategic autonomy Ideal for Boards and executive committees with material European exposure assessing political and regulatory risk Public affairs, government relations, and ESG leads working at EU-institution level Banking, asset management, and defence audiences pricing geopolitical and sanctions risk in Europe Foundations, NGOs, and policy convenings on democracy, human rights, and multilateralism Audience outcomes A first-hand reading of how decisions actually get taken inside the European Council and Foreign Affairs Council A sharper view of where rule-of-law tensions inside the EU are heading, and what that means for operating in those member states A clear sense of how the Franco-German axis and the European Commission are likely to align on the next phase of sanctions, enlargement, and defence An informed perspective on the limits and uses of multilateral institutions, drawn from a UN Security Council term A serious, non-partisan frame for discussing democracy, migration, and European values without recourse to talking points

Why organisations work with Jim Sciutto Direct access to senior U.S. and allied national security officials. The reporting in The Return of Great Powers draws on named on-record interviews with cabinet-level figures, intelligence chiefs and frontline commanders that almost no other broadcaster can convene. A view from inside government, not only outside it. Two years as Chief of Staff and Senior Advisor to the U.S. Ambassador to China gives him a working understanding of how Washington and Beijing actually negotiate, not how the relationship looks from a studio. Authoritative on the specific files that hit balance sheets: U.S. China decoupling, Russia and Ukraine, Iran, North Korea, and state-sponsored cyber operations against Western companies. A New York Times bestselling author whose books are reviewed in Foreign Affairs, the Wall Street Journal and the Guardian, which means the analysis presented to a client audience has been pressure-tested in the foreign policy community first. Comfortable in both keynote and moderator roles, which suits closed sessions where a senior speaker is being interviewed in front of a leadership audience. Biography highlights CNN Chief National Security Analyst; anchor of The Brief with Jim Sciutto on CNN International and CNN Max. Author of The Return of Great Powers (Dutton, 2024), The Madman Theory (2020), The Shadow War (2019) and Against Us. Former Chief of Staff and Senior Advisor to U.S. Ambassador to China Gary Locke, U.S. Embassy Beijing, 2011 to 2013. Senior Fellow, Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs; member, Council on Foreign Relations. George Polk Award; two Emmy Awards for Iraq reporting; Edward R. Murrow Award; Merriman Smith Memorial Award; Overseas Press Club citation. Yale graduate in Chinese history; Fulbright Fellow, Hong Kong; previously ABC News senior foreign correspondent, reporting from more than 50 countries. Biography Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the steady militarisation of the Taiwan Strait, and the open contest between Washington and Beijing have ended the assumptions most companies built their strategies on. Sciutto’s 2024 book The Return of Great Powers argues that the post Cold War order has already broken, and that boards and governments are still adjusting to a world in which great-power conflict is back as a default condition. He is unusually well placed to make that argument. As CNN’s Chief National Security Analyst he covers the U.S. defence, intelligence and diplomatic agencies as a daily beat, and as anchor of The Brief he interviews the officials shaping policy in real time. The reporting behind his books has been reviewed in Foreign Affairs and the Wall Street Journal, and he sits as a Senior Fellow at the Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. His perspective is not only journalistic. From 2011 to 2013 he served as Chief of Staff and Senior Advisor to U.S. Ambassador Gary Locke in Beijing, working inside the embassy on national security and trade priorities during a formative period in the U.S. China relationship. That experience gives him a working understanding of how policy is actually made between the two capitals, which is the question most exposed companies are now trying to answer. Earlier in his career he reported from more than 50 countries as ABC News’ senior foreign correspondent, covering Iraq, Afghanistan, Iran and Ukraine. His awards include the George Polk Award for undercover reporting inside Myanmar, two Emmys for Iraq coverage, the Edward R. Murrow Award, and the Merriman Smith Memorial Award for presidential coverage. Key speaking topics Great power conflict and the post Cold War order U.S. China strategic competition Russia, Ukraine and European security Iran, North Korea and nuclear proliferation State-sponsored cyber operations and hybrid warfare U.S. foreign policy and the intelligence community Geopolitical risk for boards and investors Ideal for Boards and audit committees pricing political and sanctions risk into capital decisions CEOs and CFOs of multinationals with material China, Russia or Middle East exposure General counsel, government affairs and corporate security leaders Investor and client conferences where geopolitics is the headline frame Audience outcomes A clear read on where U.S. national security thinking sits on China, Russia, Iran and North Korea, sourced from named officials rather than commentary. A working map of which geopolitical files matter most for commercial decisions over the next 12 to 24 months. A sharper sense of how cyber, disinformation and sanctions operate as instruments of state power against Western companies. A direct conversation with one of the senior national security correspondents most trusted by the U.S. policy community, with time for board-level questions.