Future of Technology speakers

Why organisations work with Jeffrey Schnapp He has done the rare thing of building both a respected academic institution (metaLAB at Harvard, Stanford Humanities Lab) and a venture-backed hardware business (Piaggio Fast Forward, makers of the gita robot). Most innovation speakers have done one or the other. The gita robot, which he co-conceived, won the 2020 Red Dot Award Best of the Best. He can speak to product design as a senior operator, not as a commentator on other people’s products. His framework treats culture, narrative, and material design as part of the same engineering problem. For consumer brands, mobility companies, and cultural institutions, that is the integration most teams never manage internally. He sits at the centre of the most serious institutional conversations on the future of libraries, museums, archives, and AI-augmented knowledge work, with Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center, the Triennale di Milano, and the Canadian Centre for Architecture among his collaborators. Biography highlights Carl A. Pescosolido Chair in Romance Languages and Literatures and Comparative Literature, Harvard University; Chair of the Department of Comparative Literature. Founder and faculty director of metaLAB (at) Harvard; faculty co-director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. Co-founder and Chief Visionary Officer of Piaggio Fast Forward; former CEO 2015 to 2018. Founding director of the Stanford Humanities Lab, 1999 to 2009. Co-author of Digital_Humanities (MIT Press, 2012); author of FuturPiaggio (2017) and Storia rapida della velocita (2025), winner of the 2025 Premio di saggistica “Citta delle rose.” Speaker at TED, the United Nations, and the Royal Academy of Sweden; gita robot recipient of the 2020 Red Dot Award Best of the Best. Biography The gita robot, a two-wheeled cargo follower built by Piaggio Fast Forward in Boston, won the 2020 Red Dot Award Best of the Best. Its co-founder is a Harvard professor of comparative literature. That sentence is the simplest way to describe what Jeffrey Schnapp does: he runs serious cultural scholarship and serious product engineering as a single practice, and ships from both ends. At Harvard he holds the Carl A. Pescosolido Chair, chairs the Department of Comparative Literature, and founded metaLAB, an experimental research unit at the intersection of design, technology and the humanities. He is also a faculty co-director of the Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society. Before Harvard he founded and ran the Stanford Humanities Lab, one of the earliest serious experiments in digital humanities infrastructure. In parallel, he co-founded Piaggio Fast Forward, the robotics arm of the Italian mobility group behind Vespa, and served as its CEO from 2015 to 2018 before moving into the Chief Visionary Officer role. PFF has shipped the gita and gita mini personal cargo robots and, in 2025, the kilo utility robot. His authored work, including FuturPiaggio and the prize-winning Storia rapida della velocita, treats mobility, speed and material culture as questions a serious product company needs to answer. The pattern across his career is a refusal to separate cultural intuition from operational delivery. He has curated exhibitions at the Triennale di Milano and the Canadian Centre for Architecture, redesigned tunnels in Trento into a working history museum, and helped define what the next generation of libraries, archives and AI-augmented knowledge tools will look like. For corporate audiences working on brand, customer experience, mobility, or innovation portfolios, that integrated view is the asset. Key speaking topics Innovation at the intersection of design, culture and technology Mobility and the future of urban life Robotics and human-centred product design The future of libraries, archives and museums AI and the future of knowledge work Cultural history as a strategic asset for brands Design-led entrepreneurship Ideal for Boards and executive teams in mobility, consumer products, and design-led brands Innovation, R&D, and design leaders integrating cultural insight into product development Cultural institutions, libraries, and museum leadership rethinking their operating model Universities and think tanks commissioning on the future of knowledge work and the humanities Audience outcomes A working model for treating cultural history and product design as one discipline rather than two budgets Concrete reference cases from Piaggio Fast Forward, metaLAB, and large-scale curatorial projects A clearer view of how AI is reshaping libraries, archives and knowledge institutions, from someone building inside both the academy and a venture A vocabulary for senior teams who want innovation programmes that produce shipped objects, not slide decks

Why organisations work with Jerry Kaplan He has built the technology he now teaches. Two of his four startups went public, his team at GO Corporation produced the first commercial tablet operating system, and he co-founded the first internet auction site five months before eBay. He teaches the social and economic impact of AI at Stanford and writes the Oxford University Press primers that policymakers and boards actually cite. That sits between technical depth and decision-grade clarity. His framing of AI’s labour market consequences in Humans Need Not Apply was selected by The Economist as a top ten science and technology book of 2015, well before generative AI made the question urgent. He approaches AI as a question of competitive advantage, regulation, and capital allocation, not as a feature roadmap. Boards leave with a sharper view of what they are actually deciding. Biography highlights Adjunct Lecturer, Stanford University (Ford Dorsey Master’s in International Policy; Department of Computer Science) Fellow, Centre for Legal Informatics, Stanford Law School Founding CEO, GO Corporation (PenPoint OS, tablet computing) Co-founder, Onsale Inc., the first internet auction site (IPO 1997) Author, Generative Artificial Intelligence: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2024) and Humans Need Not Apply (Yale University Press, 2015), an Economist top ten book PhD in Computer and Information Science, University of Pennsylvania; inventor on more than a dozen patents; over twenty peer-reviewed papers across ACM and IEEE journals Biography Tablet computing, online auctions, expert systems, and one of the first commercial personal information managers were all built in Silicon Valley before most people had heard of them. Kaplan was inside each of those stories. He was founding CEO of GO Corporation, the company whose PenPoint operating system anticipated the iPad by two decades, and he co-founded Onsale, the first internet auction site, five months before eBay. That operating history is the reason his current work on artificial intelligence is taken seriously by board-level audiences. He teaches the social and economic impact of AI at Stanford and is a Fellow at the Centre for Legal Informatics at Stanford Law School. The Oxford University Press primers he writes, including Generative Artificial Intelligence: What Everyone Needs to Know, are designed for readers who need to decide, not just to understand. His 2015 book Humans Need Not Apply, published by Yale University Press and named one of The Economist’s top ten science and technology books that year, argued that AI’s labour market effects would arrive faster than most institutions were preparing for. The argument has aged unusually well. It now reads as a brief on the question every executive committee is asking about generative systems. The combination of a working technologist, a serial founder with two IPOs, and a current Stanford lecturer is rare. Kaplan uses it to translate AI from a procurement conversation into a strategic one, and to tell senior audiences where they are exposed. Key speaking topics Generative AI and the executive agenda AI and the future of work AI regulation and public policy Competitive advantage in an AI-led economy Industry-specific AI disruption AI risks, dangers, and safety Silicon Valley entrepreneurship and innovation Ideal for Boards and executive committees weighing capital allocation to AI C-suite leaders setting AI strategy, governance, and workforce policy Policy and regulatory audiences confronting AI rules and competition Industry leadership offsites in financial services, technology, healthcare, and professional services Audience outcomes A working mental model of what generative AI can and cannot do, stripped of vendor framing A sharper read on where AI will reshape the workforce and on which timelines A view of the regulatory and geopolitical pressures shaping AI competition Specific questions a board should be asking management about its AI exposure A historical perspective on technology adoption cycles, from someone who has run several

Why organisations work with Jim Al-Khalili He is an active research physicist with a publication record in quantum biology and nuclear theory, which means his account of quantum computing, sensing, and adjacent technologies comes from inside the field, not summarised from press coverage. As presenter of BBC Radio 4’s The Life Scientific since 2011, he has interviewed several hundred working scientists, which gives him a rare cross-disciplinary read on where genuine breakthroughs are forming and where they are not. Co-author of Life on the Edge with Johnjoe McFadden, the book widely credited with bringing quantum biology to a mainstream readership and shortlisted for the Royal Society Winton Prize. Holds a Chair in the Public Engagement in Science at the University of Surrey, and has built a career-long discipline of translating technical material for non-specialist senior audiences without losing precision. Recognised by his peers as much as by the public: Royal Society Michael Faraday Medal, Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication, OBE and CBE for services to science. Biography highlights Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Theoretical Physics, University of Surrey, with a PhD in theoretical nuclear physics from Surrey (1989). Fellow of the Royal Society (2018); Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering. Presenter of BBC Radio 4’s The Life Scientific since October 2011. Author or co-author of more than a dozen popular science books, including Life on the Edge, The World According to Physics, and The Joy of Science (Princeton University Press). Royal Society Michael Faraday Medal, Wilkins-Bernal-Medawar Medal, IOP Kelvin Medal, Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication. OBE (2007) and CBE (2021) for services to science; past President of the British Science Association. Biography The hardest scientific decisions facing senior leaders today are the ones the leaders themselves are least equipped to make. Quantum computing, AI, synthetic biology, and the next wave of physics-driven technology demand a level of judgement that confident vendor decks cannot provide. What organisations need is someone who can read the underlying science, place a claim in context, and tell them where the field actually is. That is the role Jim Al-Khalili has built across forty years. A theoretical physicist with a PhD from the University of Surrey and now Distinguished Professor Emeritus there, he has published more than 150 peer-reviewed papers in nuclear reaction theory, quantum mechanics, and quantum biology. With Johnjoe McFadden he co-authored Life on the Edge, the book that did more than any other to bring quantum biology into mainstream scientific conversation, shortlisted for the Royal Society Winton Prize. Since 2011 he has presented The Life Scientific on BBC Radio 4, conducting hundreds of interviews with working scientists across every discipline. Few people in the UK have a sharper sense of where genuine breakthroughs are forming and where the noise outpaces the substance. His books with Princeton University Press, including The World According to Physics and The Joy of Science, frame how non-specialists can think clearly about evidence, uncertainty, and modern physics. Recognition from his peers tracks the public profile: Fellow of the Royal Society, Honorary Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, Royal Society Michael Faraday Medal, Stephen Hawking Medal for Science Communication, OBE and CBE for services to science. He has chaired the British Science Association and continues to advise government, industry, and the public on the science that will shape the next decade of technology. Key speaking topics Quantum mechanics and the science behind quantum computing Quantum biology and the frontiers of life science Scientific reasoning and rational decision-making The history and future of physics Science communication for senior audiences Public trust in science and technology Ideal for Boards and executive teams making capital allocation decisions on quantum, AI, or deep-tech ventures R&D leaders, CTOs, and CSOs who want a credible outside read on where the science actually stands Conferences in pharma, finance, technology, and energy where audiences need a serious scientific keynote rather than a vendor pitch Awards, gala evenings, and high-profile panels needing a hosting or moderating presence with genuine scientific authority Audience outcomes A clearer view of what quantum technologies can plausibly deliver in the next decade and what remains speculative The vocabulary and mental models to question scientific claims without becoming dismissive Exposure to the live debates inside physics and biology that will reshape adjacent industries A renewed sense of why scientific thinking, not just scientific findings, matters for leadership judgement

Why organisations work with Jim Carroll He builds each keynote around the client’s own industry data, not a generic deck. NASA, Pfizer, the World Bank, and the PGA of America have brought him in to map their specific sector horizon, from space to pharma acceleration to manufacturing in emerging economies. BusinessWeek named him one of four leading sources of insight on innovation and creativity, a credential that travels well in C-suite rooms where buyers want an outside voice with editorial standing. He pairs futurist work with a CPA background and a decade inside large advisory firms. That combination tends to land with CFOs and operating leaders who push back on speakers without commercial grounding. Two million-plus attendees across thirty years of corporate, institutional, and conference platforms, including the World Government Summit and the Swiss Innovation Forum, give him a pattern library few peers can match. His column work for the Globe and Mail and trade titles such as Profit and Marketing established an independent public record of trend calls, useful when boards want a speaker whose views predate the engagement. Biography highlights Named by BusinessWeek as one of four leading sources of insight on innovation and creativity. Lifetime Achievement Award, Canadian New Media Awards (2002), for pioneering work in the digital industry. Named “One of 50 International Names to Know” by the Online Journalism Review. Keynote engagements for NASA, The Walt Disney Company, Pfizer, the World Bank, the PGA of America, Mercedes-Benz, Microsoft, BlackRock, the Swiss Innovation Forum, and the World Government Summit. Author of titles including “The Future Belongs To Those Who Are Fast”, “Think Big, Start Small, Scale Fast”, and “Dancing in the Rain: How Bold Leaders Grow Stronger in Stormy Times”. Former national columnist for the Globe and Mail; columns in Profit, Marketing, and hiTech Careers; CPA with prior advisory, tax, and audit experience at predecessor firms of KPMG and EY. Biography The hardest call in any boardroom is timing. Most leadership teams can describe the trend lines reshaping their industry. Far fewer can say, with conviction, which curve bends in the next eighteen months and which is still a decade out. That gap is where Carroll’s work lives. He has spent more than thirty years building a library of industry-specific futurist research, then translating it into keynotes for the executive teams making capital and portfolio decisions. NASA brought him in twice for sessions on the future of the space industry. Pfizer engaged him on the acceleration of medical science. The PGA of America used him to rethink innovation in golf. The World Bank asked him to look at manufacturing in emerging economies. Each engagement is built from the client’s own sector data rather than a generic trends deck. The credentials behind that work matter. BusinessWeek named him one of four leading sources of insight on innovation and creativity. The Canadian New Media Awards gave him a Lifetime Achievement Award in 2002. The Online Journalism Review listed him among “50 International Names to Know”. A CPA designation and roughly a decade in advisory, tax, and audit roles at predecessor firms of KPMG and EY underwrite the commercial register he speaks in. His books, from “The Future Belongs To Those Who Are Fast” through to “Dancing in the Rain: How Bold Leaders Grow Stronger in Stormy Times”, argue a consistent line: the organisations that win in volatile decades are the ones that compress decision cycles, treat optimism as a strategy, and refuse to let the planning calendar set the pace of change. Key speaking topics Industry-specific trend forecasting Innovation and disruption Strategic foresight and scenario planning Acceleration and decision velocity Future of healthcare, manufacturing, and financial services Leadership in volatile markets Workforce and skills transformation Ideal for Boards and executive committees setting three-to-five-year strategy in industries facing structural disruption CEOs, CSOs, and innovation leads commissioning offsites that need an outside trend voice anchored in their sector Conference programmes for healthcare, manufacturing, energy, financial services, and technology that need a headline futurist with sector range Audience outcomes A clearer view of which trends in the audience’s specific industry are accelerating, which are overhyped, and which are mispriced by current strategy. A sharper internal language for talking about decision speed, with examples drawn from sectors as varied as space, pharma, and manufacturing. Confidence to challenge planning cycles and capital allocation assumptions that quietly assume a slower world. Concrete reference points from named organisations (NASA, Pfizer, the PGA of America, the World Bank) that have used the same lens.

Why organisations work with JJ Delgado He runs a corporate venturing unit inside a century-old beverages group, so his AI and digital arguments are backed by current P&L responsibility, not consulting distance. His Amazon background gives him a working view of how the world’s most operationally disciplined digital company actually builds growth, which he translates for non-digital natives. He works across both EMEA and LATAM markets, useful for groups whose digital strategy has to land in mature and emerging consumer markets at once. He brings a named portfolio of work across Burger King, Pepsi, Ford, Bosch, Siemens, Vodafone, and Telefonica, which means his case material is recognisable to senior commercial audiences. Biography highlights General Manager, MOVE Estrella Galicia Digital, the open innovation and digital ventures unit of Hijos de Rivera. Former Head of Marketing, Southern Europe, at Amazon, where he led the company’s largest international sales day at the time. PhD Cum Laude in Digital Economy; MBA from London School of Business and Finance. Guest teaching at the London School of Economics and IE Business School on digital economy and consumer behaviour. Author of three books published on Amazon, including Smash It, an Amazon international bestseller in 2021. Named #1 Amazon LinkedIn profile in the UK across 2016 and early 2017 (self-reported ranking). Biography Amazon’s largest international sales day at the time was run out of Southern Europe by a marketing team led by JJ Delgado. That experience, three years inside the operational engine of the world’s most disciplined digital retailer, is the spine of his work today. He moved from running Amazon’s marketing in the region to running a digital ventures unit inside a legacy corporate, which is a more useful vantage point for the audiences he now speaks to. He is General Manager of MOVE Estrella Galicia Digital, the corporate venturing and open innovation arm of Hijos de Rivera, the Spanish beverages group behind Estrella Galicia. The remit is to build and scale new digital businesses for a company whose core is 100 years old, and to invest in startups that can accelerate that shift. The role gives him live operating responsibility for the questions he speaks on: AI deployment, Web3 commerce, and how a non-digital-native organisation actually generates new revenue from new technology. His commercial track record spans 15 years across EMEA and LATAM, with named work for Burger King, Pepsi, Hertz, Ford, Bosch, Siemens, Vodafone, Telefonica, and Estrella Galicia. He holds a PhD Cum Laude in Digital Economy and teaches as a guest at the London School of Economics and IE Business School. He has written three books on Amazon, the most recent being Smash It, an international bestseller on the platform in 2021, and runs an AI-focused newsletter with a large subscriber base. What makes him useful to boards is the angle of attack. He is not an academic on AI, nor a consultant pitching frameworks. He is an operator who has run digital growth inside Amazon and now runs new business creation inside a traditional corporate, and he speaks from that seat. Key speaking topics AI and ChatGPT in commercial operations Digital transformation in legacy corporates Web3 and new digital business models Consumer behaviour and the emotion behind the click Corporate venturing and open innovation Voice and conversational interfaces (Alexa as customer channel) Ideal for CMOs and chief digital officers in non-digital-native organisations Corporate venturing, innovation, and new business leads Senior commercial and growth leadership teams across EMEA and LATAM Boards weighing AI and Web3 investment decisions Audience outcomes A working view of how Amazon actually built growth from inside one of its regional marketing teams A concrete picture of what AI deployment looks like inside an operating business unit, not a pilot Recognisable case material from named global brands across consumer, automotive, and telecoms A clearer sense of where Web3 has commercial traction and where it does not

Why organisations work with John Ellis He ran Ford’s developer program and the team behind SmartDeviceLink. He has direct operating experience of building a connected-product platform inside a global manufacturer, not a consultant’s view of one. His central thesis, set out in The Zero Dollar Car, gives boards a sharp frame for a question most are still avoiding: when sensor data is worth more than the product that generates it, what business are we actually in? He works across automotive, insurance, smart home, mobile and public infrastructure. Leaders get a view of how the same data economics are restructuring multiple sectors at once, not a single-industry case study. Through Ellis & Associates he advises companies on the commercial reality of connected-product strategy. The keynote content is grounded in current client work, not retrospective career stories. Biography highlights Former Global Technologist and Head of the Ford Developer Program, Ford Motor Company Author, The Zero Dollar Car: How the Revolution in Big Data will Change Your Life (#1 Amazon Best Seller, Auto Industry) Founder and Managing Director, Ellis & Associates, management consultancy at the automotive, consumer, connectivity and software intersection Led the team that delivered SmartDeviceLink, the open-source platform now used by Toyota, Mazda, Subaru and others Prior senior leadership roles at Motorola across engineering, product management, software, services and strategy Featured on NBC’s TODAY Show on the future of connected vehicles and data Biography The cars on the road today produce more usable data per mile than the entire commercial internet did a decade ago. Most of that data still ends up captured by the manufacturer, the platform owner, or the insurer, rarely by the customer who generated it. That asymmetry is the operating question behind John Ellis’s work. As Global Technologist and Head of the Ford Developer Program, Ellis ran the team that delivered SmartDeviceLink, the open-source platform underneath Ford’s AppLink and now adopted by Toyota, Mazda and Subaru. He saw, from inside, how a global manufacturer turns a vehicle into a software platform and what that does to the economics of the product. His book The Zero Dollar Car takes that operating insight and pushes it to its logical end. If sensor data is valuable enough, the vehicle itself becomes a loss leader, financed by what it tells the world while it moves. The argument is now playing out across insurance, smart home, mobility infrastructure and public-space management, each sector that Ellis & Associates currently advises. What Ellis brings to a senior audience is the rare combination of having built one of the early connected-product platforms at scale and then translating that experience into a clear commercial argument that boards in any sector can apply to their own products. The Motorola years sit underneath: two decades inside a company that learned, expensively, what happens when a hardware business misreads a software shift. Key speaking topics Connected vehicles and the future of mobility Data monetisation and the economics of sensor data Business model disruption in hardware industries Software platforms inside traditional manufacturing Smart cities and public-space management Technology disruption across automotive, insurance and smart home Ideal for Boards and executive teams in automotive, mobility, insurance and infrastructure CTOs, CDOs and Chief Digital Officers in product and manufacturing businesses Heads of strategy and corporate development assessing platform and connected-product plays City, transport and public-sector leaders managing connected infrastructure decisions Audience outcomes A clear view of how value migrates from the connected product to the data it generates, and what that does to incumbent business models A working frame, drawn from The Zero Dollar Car, for assessing where their own products sit on that curve Concrete examples from automotive, insurance and public infrastructure of who is winning and losing the data argument A sharper question set for board and executive conversations on connected-product strategy

Why organisations work with Jonathan Reichental He has run the work he now speaks about. As CIO of the City of Palo Alto and CIO of O’Reilly Media, he owned budgets, projects and consequences, which is a different proposition to commenting on them from a research desk. The Palo Alto tenure produced a first-place category ranking in the Digital Cities Survey, a verifiable outcome rather than a claim of impact. His book catalogue, led by Smart Cities For Dummies with multiple follow-on titles across data governance, analytics and cryptocurrency, gives audiences accessible reference material they can share inside their own teams after the session. His adjunct teaching positions at UC Berkeley and the University of San Francisco, combined with LinkedIn Learning courses and a Forbes column, mean his explanations of emerging technology are built for non-specialist audiences without losing technical accuracy. He covers the breadth of the current executive agenda, quantum, AI, blockchain, smart cities, data governance, with the same pragmatic framing, which suits leadership audiences that need one session to cover multiple priorities. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of Human Future Former Chief Information Officer, City of Palo Alto, California; Palo Alto achieved first-place category ranking in the Digital Cities Survey during his tenure Former Chief Information Officer of O’Reilly Media; senior technology leadership at PricewaterhouseCoopers Adjunct professor at UC Berkeley and the University of San Francisco Author of Smart Cities For Dummies, Data Governance For Dummies, Data Analytics & Visualization All-in-One For Dummies and Cryptocurrency QuickStart Guide Forbes contributor; LinkedIn Learning course creator; recognised on CXOTalk’s 20 Influential CIOs list Biography Smart cities is one of the most hyped categories in public-sector technology and one of the hardest to deliver. Jonathan Reichental’s credibility starts with the fact that he did the delivery job. As Chief Information Officer of the City of Palo Alto, he led the technology work that produced a first-place category ranking in the Digital Cities Survey, on a public-sector budget and under the accountability that comes with it. The book that followed, Smart Cities For Dummies, is now one of the most widely used introductions to the field. His private-sector track record sits alongside. Earlier roles include CIO of O’Reilly Media and senior technology leadership at PricewaterhouseCoopers. The combination, public-sector, publishing-and-tech, and global consulting, is the reason his framing on digital transformation holds up in front of different audiences. He now runs Human Future, the advisory, investment and education firm he founded to focus on emerging technology strategy. The writing and teaching extend the same thesis. Alongside the smart cities titles, he has authored or co-authored Data Governance For Dummies, Data Analytics & Visualization All-in-One For Dummies, Cryptocurrency QuickStart Guide and The Apps Challenge Playbook, teaches as an adjunct professor at UC Berkeley and the University of San Francisco, contributes a column to Forbes and creates LinkedIn Learning courses. His recognition on CXOTalk’s 20 Influential CIOs list and Government Technology’s Top 25 Doers, Dreamers and Drivers places him inside the peer group his corporate and public-sector audiences consult anyway. For boards, city governments, utilities and enterprise CIOs trying to make real decisions about AI, quantum computing, blockchain and smart-infrastructure investment, Reichental brings the unusual combination of an operator’s record, a teacher’s clarity and a published author’s reference library. Key speaking topics Smart cities and digital government Emerging technology strategy (AI, quantum, blockchain) Data governance, analytics and the CIO agenda Public-sector technology leadership Digital transformation for enterprise and city organisations Ethics in technology leadership Ideal for CIOs, CDOs and chief transformation officers setting or refreshing digital strategy City governments, utilities and public-sector organisations running smart-city or digital-services programmes Executive committees and boards needing a single session to level-set on emerging technologies Technology conferences and industry summits requiring an author-led keynote with operator credentials Audience outcomes A structured view of which emerging technologies are production-ready, which are near-term, and which are further out Specific reference cases from Palo Alto and other smart-city programmes on what actually works in public-sector digital delivery A clearer executive framing of data governance, analytics and AI choices, grounded in the relevant For Dummies material Practical prompts for translating emerging-tech strategy into a 12- to 24-month roadmap A shareable reading list and follow-on LinkedIn Learning courses for leadership teams

Why organisations work with Jose Morey He has implemented AI inside an actual clinical and research environment, not theorised about it. As former Associate Chief Health Officer at IBM Watson Health, he sat at the intersection where the Watson promise met hospital reality. He brings genuine NASA insight on how the agency screens emerging health and AI technologies, drawn from his roles as Medical Technology and AI Adviser to NASA iTech and Senior Advisor to the NASA Space Breathing Initiative. He connects medical, space, biosecurity, and transportation domains in a way that lets boards stress-test their AI assumptions against problems harder than their own. Few speakers can move from radiology workflows to Hyperloop systems engineering with credibility in both rooms. He is co-author of Latinx Business Success (Wiley, 2021), which gives him a distinct second register on representation, talent pipelines, and how diverse leadership shows up in technology-driven industries. He is a working radiologist and medical society leader, currently President of the Medical Society of Virginia Foundation, which keeps the keynote material grounded in operational practice rather than commentary. Biography highlights Co-author, Latinx Business Success: How Latinx Ingenuity, Innovation, and Tenacity are Driving Some of the World’s Biggest Companies (Wiley, 2021). Former Associate Chief Health Officer, IBM Watson Health; former Chief Medical Innovation Officer, Liberty BioSecurity. Medical Technology and AI Adviser to NASA iTech and Senior Advisor to the NASA Space Breathing Initiative. Eisenhower Fellow, 2020/2021 Zhi-Xing Fellows Program. Adjunct Professor of Radiology and Biomedical Imaging, University of Virginia and Eastern Virginia Medical School; Guest Lecturer, Singularity University. Member, Forbes Technology Council; Informatics Leadership Council, American College of Radiology; public volunteer, NIST Generative AI Public Working Group. CEO and Founder, Ad Astra Media LLC, a STEAM media production company building role models and educational content for under-represented students. Biography Most of the AI conversation inside large organisations is still happening at one remove from where the technology actually meets a patient, a pilot, or a regulator. Jose Morey works at that meeting point. He is a practising radiologist who has built clinical AI tools, advised NASA on which health technologies are worth backing, and helped Liberty BioSecurity think through genetic intelligence and augmented human performance. His operational range is unusually wide. At IBM Watson Health he served as Associate Chief Health Officer during the period when the platform’s clinical claims were being tested against hospital reality. He has advised NASA iTech on the feasibility and commercialisation of emerging health and AI companies, and serves as a Senior Advisor to the NASA Space Breathing Initiative. He sits on the Chief Engineering Council for Hyperloop Transportation Technologies and on the Informatics Leadership Council of the American College of Radiology. The intellectual through-line is translation between domains. Morey co-authored Latinx Business Success with Frank Carbajal (Wiley, 2021), a book built around interviews with Latinx leaders across technology, finance, healthcare and media, and structured around what they call the DIGITAL framework. He is also an Eisenhower Fellow from the 2020/2021 Zhi-Xing programme, an adjunct professor of radiology at the University of Virginia and Eastern Virginia Medical School, and a guest lecturer at Singularity University. He runs Ad Astra Media, a production studio he founded to put serious STEAM role models in front of under-represented students, and contributes as a public volunteer to the NIST Generative AI Public Working Group. The result is a speaker who can take a board from a question about AI hallucination risk to a question about clinical liability to a question about who is actually being trained to build the next generation of these systems, without losing the room. Key speaking topics Artificial intelligence in clinical medicine Health technology and the future of patient care AI for space exploration and human performance in extreme environments Emerging technology and innovation strategy Latinx leadership and representation in technology industries Generative AI policy and responsible deployment Frontier infrastructure: Hyperloop, biosecurity, and the new technology renaissance Ideal for Healthcare boards, hospital executives, and CMIOs evaluating clinical AI deployment and governance CTOs, CIOs, and innovation leads in regulated industries who need a practitioner view of frontier technology Public-sector and defence audiences focused on biosecurity, space health, and emerging-technology policy DEI sponsors and talent leaders looking to connect representation with technical workforce strategy Audience outcomes A grounded reading of where clinical and operational AI actually works today and where it is still marketing Specific examples of how NASA, biosecurity, and healthcare institutions evaluate emerging technologies before they buy A framework, drawn from Latinx Business Success, for thinking about leadership, talent and innovation in technology-driven industries A clearer view of which frontier technologies (AI, biotech, space health, hyperloop-class infrastructure) are converging on the same set of organisational problems Direct, practical answers to executive questions on AI governance, regulation, and risk

Why organisations work with Juan Senor Co-edits the WAN-IFRA Innovation in News Media report and the FIPP Innovation in Magazine Media report, the two annual reference works on what is actually working commercially across global publishing. Has advised hundreds of news organisations on every continent on the parallel work of rebuilding the news product and rebuilding the business model that funds it. Speaks with authority on disinformation, AI slop, and platform dependency from inside the industry, not as an outside commentator. Hosts the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity and the Reinvention Festival, with moderating credits at Money20/20 and the World Economic Forum, which means a senior commercial audience already knows him on stage. Biography highlights President and Principal Partner, INNOVATION Media Consulting Group, London. Co-editor of the annual Innovation in News Media World Report (WAN-IFRA) and the Innovation in Media report (FIPP). Former visiting fellow, Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, University of Oxford. Former foreign affairs and defence reporter, PBS’s MacNeil-Lehrer NewsHour; team recipient of a DuPont-Columbia Journalism Award and Emmy nomination for interviews with Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin. Former presenter and correspondent for CNBC Europe, EBN/Wall Street Journal TV, and International Herald Tribune Television. Long-running host of the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity; moderator at the World Economic Forum, Money20/20, and the WAN-IFRA World News Media Congress. Biography Most news organisations are now wrestling with two structural problems at once. Their commercial model has been hollowed out by platform dependency. Their editorial product is competing for attention against AI-generated content produced at industrial scale, much of it designed to mimic real journalism. Juan Senor has spent two decades inside that problem. As President of Innovation Media Consulting Group, he has advised hundreds of news and media organisations across every continent on the parallel work of rebuilding the news product and the business model that funds it. He co-edits the WAN-IFRA Innovation in News Media report and the FIPP Innovation in Magazine Media report, the closest the industry has to a running ledger of what audiences are willing to pay for. His authority on the editorial side comes from the desk. He spent seven years as a war and conflict reporter for PBS NewsHour, where the team’s coverage won a DuPont Award and his own work earned an Emmy nomination. He went on to present for EBN-Wall Street Journal TV and CNBC Europe and served as London correspondent for International Herald Tribune Television. He is a former Visiting Fellow at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at the University of Oxford, and is quoted regularly in The Economist and The Financial Times. He has also hosted the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity for fourteen years and the Reinvention Festival for a decade, with moderating credits at Money20/20 and the World Economic Forum. That hosting work places him in front of the same senior commercial audience whose business problem he is now advising on. Key speaking topics Business model innovation in news and magazine media Paid content, subscription, and reader-revenue strategy Newsroom transformation and product strategy Digital disruption and the platform economy The future of journalism and trust in media Media leadership and editorial commercial alignment Ideal for Publisher CEOs, editors-in-chief, and chief product officers in news and magazine media CMOs and brand leaders rethinking owned-content and editorial strategy Industry associations, media congresses, and creative festivals needing a credible main-stage host or keynote Boards of content-driven businesses navigating subscription, advertising, and platform shifts Audience outcomes A current read on which paid-content models are working, with named publishers and live revenue figures A clearer view of what editorial leaders should stop doing, not only what to start Frameworks for aligning newsroom, product, and commercial teams around a single paid-content thesis A working language for board-level conversations about media disruption, drawn from the WAN-IFRA report

Why organisations work with K D Adamson She has named and framed the shift. Her concept of “nobleization” – the argument that the next phase of business is not globalisation but morally accountable, purpose-led value creation – gives leadership teams a precise, shareable thesis rather than a trend briefing. She challenges the techno-optimist default from a position of intellectual rigour. When AI, automation and digital transformation dominate the conversation, Adamson’s argument that tomorrow is a value problem, not a technology problem reframes the strategic question at board level. This is a harder case to make but her broadcast record on BBC World News, Bloomberg, CNN and the Financial Times confirms it holds up under interrogation. Her “Seismotectonic” model gives leaders a practical foresight tool, not just a perspective. The three-movement framework of what changes rapidly, what changes slowly, what appears not to change at all is actionable in strategic planning contexts and transfers directly from a keynote into workshop and executive briefing formats. Her client base spans sectors where the future-of-value argument has immediate strategic urgency including Google, Airbus, Mastercard, CHANEL, Allianz, and PwC, which gives her the commercial credibility to speak to mixed leadership audiences without being narrowed to a single industry vertical. Her ecocentrist positioning is analytically distinct. Placing ecological systems rather than human enterprise at the centre of value creation is not rhetorical positioning. It is the foundation of her ESG and circular economy arguments, and it produces conclusions that differ meaningfully from those of speakers whose sustainability work begins and ends with reporting frameworks. Biography highlights Founder and former CEO, Futurenautics Group; former Futurist, The Futures Agency Author of Shipping and the 800-lb Gorilla (2017), the foundational foresight text on digital transformation in the shipping and maritime industry Broadcast commentator for BBC World News, Bloomberg, CNN, Financial Times, Al Jazeera, Channel News Asia, and BBC R4 Today Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts; stated member of Chatham House, The Aristotelian Society, the Society of Antiquaries, CERN Open Quantum Institute, and the International Society for the Circular Economy Global client roster includes Google, Airbus, Mastercard, CHANEL, Allianz, PwC, Deloitte, Capgemini, Rolls-Royce, Vodafone, Oracle, and Pfizer Biography The thesis K D Adamson has built over two decades is a direct challenge to the most widely held corporate assumption about the future: that it is, above all, a technology problem. In a landscape where most foresight is organised around what AI, automation, or quantum computing will do to a given industry, Adamson argues that what actually determines where organisations end up is what they believe about value, about purpose, and about who business is ultimately for. Her concept of “nobleization” names this argument precisely. Where globalisation provided the operating logic of the late twentieth century, Adamson contends that the defining shift of the current era is from a global business to a noble one, where ESG, the circular economy, and purpose-led strategy are not peripheral compliance exercises but the competitive architecture of the world arriving. The implication for leadership is significant: the strategic planning tools built for the previous era are no longer sufficient guides. Adamson founded and led Futurenautics Group, where her work on the digital transformation of the shipping and maritime industry made her the sector’s authoritative futurist – a standing substantiated by Shipping and the 800-lb Gorilla (2017), which set the analytical agenda for how one of the world’s most conservative global industries understood its own disruption. She is a Fellow of the Royal Society for the Arts and a regular broadcast commentator for BBC World News, Bloomberg, CNN, the Financial Times, and Al Jazeera, which means her frameworks are tested in real time against the hardest current questions, not only in controlled conference settings. Her “Seismotectonic” model of change, mapping three simultaneous rates of disruption: what changes rapidly, what changes slowly, and what appears not to change at all, gives senior teams a working tool for strategy under deep uncertainty. It is this combination of named intellectual frameworks, commercial range across clients including Google, Airbus, Mastercard, and CHANEL, and the ecocentrist perspective that places ecology rather than enterprise at the centre of value analysis, that separates Adamson from speakers covering adjacent territory. Key speaking topics Future of business value and sustainable transformation The limits of techno-optimism ESG as competitive strategy, not compliance Geopolitics and the end of globalisation AI: belief, systemic risk, and organisational response Leadership beyond control Strategic foresight and scenario planning Ideal for C-suite and board audiences navigating how to reframe business strategy as stakeholder expectations, geopolitical pressures, and ecological imperatives converge Chief Sustainability Officers and strategy leads responsible for translating ESG from reporting obligation into organisational design Global leadership conferences convening senior executives across multiple sectors and geographies, where a macro-systemic perspective is required rather than a sector-specific one Executive leadership teams of multinationals at significant inflection points – where the question is not only operational but concerns organisational identity and the long-term logic of value creation Audience outcomes A named conceptual framework, “nobleization”, for articulating why business strategy must move beyond profit primacy, framed as competitive logic rather than ideology Clarity on why the next wave of disruption is a value problem rather than a technology problem, and what that distinction means for strategic planning and capital allocation A working model for reading simultaneous, differently-paced change: the Seismotectonic framework, applicable in strategy sessions and scenario planning processes A more rigorous way to frame AI risk: focused on collective belief and systemic dependency rather than technical capability alone Greater confidence in articulating an alternative vision of organisational purpose to boards, investors, and internal leadership audiences

Why organisations work with Kaihan Krippendorff He runs Outthinker, a working peer network of chief strategy, innovation and growth officers from Fortune 500 companies. The research that feeds his keynotes is drawn from sitting CSOs, not desk study. His IDEAS process, Outthinker Playbook, and 9Ps business model framework give strategy teams a structured way to surface non-obvious options. These are taught inside Wharton Executive Education, NYU, and FIU. Proximity, co-authored with Robert Wolcott of Kellogg, is the most developed business-side thesis on what just-in-time production, AI, and on-demand services mean for where value is created. It earned Thinkers50 recognition and a Next Big Idea Club endorsement. He bridges strategy and internal entrepreneurship. Driving Innovation from Within (Columbia Business School Publishing) addresses the operational problem of getting new ideas through a corporate immune system, the issue most CSOs actually wrestle with. Biography highlights Founder of Outthinker, a peer network of chief strategy, innovation, growth and transformation officers from Fortune 500 and large private organisations. Former McKinsey consultant; senior fellow at Wharton; teaching roles at NYU School of Professional Studies and Florida International University. Author of six books including Outthink the Competition, Driving Innovation from Within, and Proximity (co-authored with Robert Wolcott, 2024). Thinkers50 Radar Class of 2019; shortlisted for the Thinkers50 Innovation Award (2019) and Strategy Award (2023). Host of three podcasts: Outthinkers, The Chief Strategy Officer Podcast, and Strategy at Scale Podcast. Contributor to Harvard Business Review and Fast Company. Biography Competitive advantage in most large companies is built on assumptions that quietly stop holding. The Outthinker network was set up to surface those assumptions early. It is a working group of chief strategy, innovation, growth and transformation officers from Fortune 500 and large private companies, convened by Kaihan Krippendorff to pressure-test where their industries are actually moving. Krippendorff trained at McKinsey before founding Outthinker. His doctorate is in economics and business; his engineering degree comes from the University of Pennsylvania School of Engineering, with further study at Wharton, Columbia Business School, and London Business School. He is a senior fellow at Wharton Executive Education and teaches at NYU School of Professional Studies and Florida International University. His published work has the same emphasis. Outthink the Competition sets out the strategic patterns disruptors use that incumbents rarely consider. Driving Innovation from Within, published by Columbia Business School Publishing, addresses the harder operational problem of moving an idea through a corporate immune system. Proximity, co-authored with Robert Wolcott of Kellogg, argues that AI, on-demand production, and digital infrastructure are collapsing the distance between supply and demand, and that this shift, rather than any single technology, is what redraws competitive position. He hosts three podcasts aimed at the same audience: Outthinkers, The Chief Strategy Officer Podcast, and Strategy at Scale Podcast. Thinkers50 has ranked him on its Radar list and shortlisted him for both its Innovation and Strategy awards. Key speaking topics Strategy under accelerating disruption Business model innovation Corporate innovation and internal entrepreneurship AI and the proximity economy Outside-in strategic foresight Chief strategy officer practice Growth strategy for Fortune 500 organisations Ideal for CSOs, chief innovation officers, and chief growth officers running strategy refresh cycles Boards and executive teams reassessing competitive position in an industry under structural change Corporate transformation leads building internal innovation pipelines Audience outcomes A clearer view of which assumptions underpinning the current strategy have already expired A working vocabulary, drawn from the Outthinker Playbook and 9Ps, for generating non-obvious strategic options A framework for thinking about AI and on-demand technology as a shift in where value is created, not a productivity tool Sharper questions for the next strategy offsite, informed by what sitting CSOs in the Outthinker network are actually working on

Why organisations work with Karl Lillrud He speaks about AI from the seat of someone who has run digital commerce businesses since the late nineties and is currently building one. PodManager AI, his AI-driven podcast production platform, is shipping to paying customers as he speaks about AI to other operators. His work connects AI directly to revenue mechanics: pricing, conversion, retention, and customer acquisition, the parts of the P&L the C-suite is actually accountable for. Nine published books, including «You, Me and AI» and «AI, Your Second Brain: Evolve or Go Extinct», give leadership teams a shared language for the second-order effects of AI on work, governance, and customer trust, beyond the productivity headlines. Membership of the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council and recognition in Thinkers360’s AI thought-leader rankings signal that the perspective travels at board level, not just at the developer conference. The client footprint, including Volvo, Spotify, Klarna, H&M, AstraZeneca, and 3, gives him pattern recognition across regulated and consumer-facing businesses that few AI speakers can match. Biography highlights Founder of PodManager AI, an AI-driven podcast production platform he is currently building. Founder of Pricelizer, a Swedish e-commerce startup named to CNBC’s 20 hottest startups list in 2015. Author of nine books on AI and digital business, including «You, Me and AI» and «AI, Your Second Brain: Evolve or Go Extinct». Member of the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council since August 2024. Two-time TEDx speaker. Recognised across multiple years in Thinkers360’s AI thought-leader rankings and Global Gurus’ Top 30 Motivational Speakers list. Public engagement footprint includes Volvo, Spotify, Klarna, H&M, AstraZeneca, Qliro, 3, Tele2, and TUI. Biography Most AI keynote speakers have never run a checkout flow at scale. Karl Lillrud has. He has been building digital businesses since the late nineties, founded Pricelizer in 2013 to solve the abandoned-cart problem he kept hitting as an operator, and watched it land on CNBC’s 20 hottest startups list in 2015. He is now building PodManager AI, an AI-driven podcast production platform shipping to paying customers. That operator history, still in present tense, is the through-line for everything he says about artificial intelligence. His books reflect the same instinct. «You, Me and AI» treats the technology across 54 chapters covering work, creativity, education, governance, and the human-machine boundary, rather than as a productivity story. «AI, Your Second Brain: Evolve or Go Extinct» focuses on how leaders and their teams should actually integrate the tools day to day. The two sit inside a wider catalogue of nine published books, written for people who have to make decisions, not people studying the field. The institutional signals followed the work. Thinkers360 has recognised him across its AI thought-leader rankings. Global Gurus has placed him repeatedly in its Top 30 Motivational Speakers ranking. In August 2024 he joined the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council. Volvo, Spotify, Klarna, H&M, AstraZeneca, Qliro, and 3 sit on a public client list that runs across consumer retail, telecoms, and pharma. What a buyer is paying for is the translation layer between board ambition and operating reality. Lillrud has been the person trying to ship the next quarter’s numbers, and he is still in the chair, building an AI product while advising executives who have AI strategies they cannot yet execute. The argument lands because he has been on both sides of the table. Key speaking topics Artificial intelligence and the C-suite agenda AI in retail and consumer experience Digital commerce and customer acquisition Innovation and business model reinvention Leadership in technology-driven organisations AI ethics and governance Future of work in the AI era Ideal for Boards and executive committees moving from AI strategy approval to execution. CEOs, CMOs, and chief digital or commerce officers in retail, telecoms, and consumer brands. Innovation, transformation, and AI leads inside large enterprises building the operating model for AI. Founder and growth-stage leadership teams using AI as a commercial wedge. Audience outcomes A sharper read on which AI use cases move commercial metrics and which are theatre. A vocabulary for discussing AI’s second-order effects on customers, employees, and brand trust at board level. Concrete reference points from operators who have shipped AI inside consumer-facing businesses. A clearer view of where leadership attention should sit next versus where it can wait. Confidence to challenge vendor narratives and refocus internal AI portfolios on revenue impact.