Political Risk & Policy

Why organisations work with Michelle Bachelet Has personally led major institutional reform inside a G20 economy, including pension overhaul, tax reform, and the creation of Chile’s Ministry of Women and Gender Equality. Held the UN’s senior human rights office at the moment human rights frameworks became binding inputs into corporate due diligence and sanctions risk. Built UN Women from the founding stage as its first Executive Director, which gives her a credible voice on gender equality as an institutional discipline. Brings personal moral authority to questions of democratic resilience: imprisoned and tortured under the Pinochet dictatorship, she returned from exile to become the first woman elected President of the country that had jailed her. Currently nominated as a candidate for the next UN Secretary-General, which keeps her active at the centre of debates on multilateralism and global governance. Biography highlights Twice elected President of Chile (2006-2010 and 2014-2018), the country’s first and only woman in the role. Former United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, 2018 to 2022. First Executive Director of UN Women, established 2010. First woman Defense Minister of Chile and of Latin America. Previously Chile’s Minister of Health. Recipient of the 2024 Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development. Distinguished Fellow at Columbia University’s Institute of Global Politics. Biography Human rights frameworks have moved from political commentary into the substance of investor due diligence and regulatory scrutiny. Bachelet has been at the centre of that shift. She served two terms as President of Chile, then four years as the seventh United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. Her two presidencies delivered structural reform of a kind few G20 leaders attempt. Pension overhaul, tax reform, equal pay legislation, and Chile’s Civil Union Act for same-sex couples were each politically expensive inside a centre-right legislative environment. Her administrations also established the Ministry of Women and Gender Equality, the National Institute for Human Rights, and the Museum of Memory and Human Rights. Between her presidential terms she served as the first Executive Director of UN Women, building the agency’s mandate from the founding stage. She returned to the United Nations in 2018 as High Commissioner for Human Rights under António Guterres, leading global human rights monitoring across country situations from Myanmar to Venezuela. Earlier in her career she had been the first woman to serve as Defense Minister of Chile and of Latin America, and Minister of Health before that. In 2018 she founded Horizonte Ciudadano, a civic foundation working on territorial democracy and climate adaptation in Chile. She is a Distinguished Fellow at Columbia University’s Institute of Global Politics and the recipient of the 2024 Indira Gandhi Prize for Peace, Disarmament and Development. In February 2026 she was nominated by Brazil and Mexico as a candidate to succeed António Guterres as Secretary-General of the United Nations. Key speaking topics Geopolitics and political risk Democratic governance and institutional resilience Global human rights frameworks in business and policy Multilateralism and the future of the United Nations Gender equality and women’s leadership Social protection and public-sector reform Civil-military relations Ideal for Boards and CEOs facing political risk and democratic instability in their operating markets CHROs and ESG leaders integrating human rights and gender frameworks into corporate practice Governments, multilateral institutions, and development finance leaders working on social policy reform Sovereign and institutional investors with long-dated political and governance exposure Audience outcomes A first-hand reading of how political risk plays out inside a country’s executive The mechanics of how human rights frameworks now shape corporate due diligence and sanctions exposure A frank assessment of where multilateral institutions are working and where they are failing A perspective on gender equality as institutional discipline, drawn from building UN Women from the founding stage The case for democratic resilience, made by someone who returned from exile to be elected president of the country that had imprisoned her

Why organisations work with Margarida Matos Rosa She has run a national competition regulator from the inside. Decisions on banking, telecoms, energy, health, digital services and advertising cartels passed across her desk between 2016 and 2023, giving her a working view of how cases are built, prioritised and defended. She has sat at the policy table that shapes EU and global competition rules, as ICN Vice-Chair for Growth and Recovery and as a Bureau member of the OECD Competition Committee. Few speakers can read the regulatory direction of travel from inside both bodies. Her background bridges competition policy and capital markets. Earlier roles at the Portuguese Securities Market Commission and at BNP Paribas, Santander Investment and UBS Bank mean she speaks credibly on the Savings and Investments Union, financial regulation and the cost of capital, not only antitrust. She translates regulation into board language. Boards leave with a sharper view of how competition enforcement, digital rules and capital markets integration affect their pricing, M&A pipeline and growth assumptions. Biography highlights President of the Portuguese Competition Authority, 2016 to 2023. Vice-Chair, International Competition Network (Growth and Recovery), 2022 to 2023. Bureau member, OECD Competition Committee, elected by peer authorities. Senior Consultant, Compass Lexecon International practice. Former Managing Director, Portuguese Securities Market Commission (CMVM), investment management supervision. Earlier career at BNP Paribas, Santander Investment and UBS Bank in economic research, investment banking and asset management. MPA, Princeton University. Economics degree, Université Catholique de Louvain. Fulbright scholar at MIT. Biography Competition policy used to sit in a corner of corporate strategy: a compliance file, occasionally a deal-breaker, rarely a board-level lens. That has changed. Digital markets rules, merger thresholds and cartel enforcement now move pricing, investment and M&A decisions across whole sectors, and the EU is moving on capital markets integration in parallel. Margarida Matos Rosa led Portugal’s competition regulator through that shift. As President of the Autoridade da Concorrência from 2016 to 2023, she oversaw enforcement decisions across banking, telecoms, energy, health, digital services and advertising, and built up the authority’s technical capability in AI and IT forensics for cartel detection. Her tenure is widely credited with raising the authority’s international standing. That national role sat alongside two international ones. She was elected by peers to the Bureau of the OECD Competition Committee, and was appointed Vice-Chair of the International Competition Network for Growth and Recovery in 2022, a portfolio focused on the interface between antitrust and macro-economic policy after the pandemic. She now advises clients of Compass Lexecon’s International practice as a Senior Consultant. Her earlier career gives her an unusually wide read of the regulatory landscape. Before competition policy, she ran investment management supervision at Portugal’s Securities Market Commission, and held roles at BNP Paribas, Santander Investment and UBS Bank covering economic research, investment banking and asset management. That financial markets grounding is what makes her credible on the Savings and Investments Union and on how capital allocation responds to a tighter EU regulatory perimeter. Key speaking topics Competition policy and antitrust enforcement EU single market and strategic autonomy Digital markets regulation Productivity and AI in regulated markets Savings and Investments Union and capital markets integration Financial regulation and capital markets oversight Institution building in economic regulators Ideal for Boards and executive committees of regulated firms in banking, telecoms, energy, digital and consumer markets General counsels, heads of strategy, heads of M&A and chief economists managing competition and digital regulation exposure CFOs and treasurers reading EU capital markets and Savings and Investments Union signals Policy and government affairs leaders shaping engagement with national and EU competition authorities Audience outcomes A clearer read on how EU and national competition enforcement is moving, and where it is likely to bite next A working understanding of how digital markets rules interact with innovation, pricing and platform strategy A view from inside a regulator on how cases are prioritised, built and resolved A sharper sense of how the Savings and Investments Union and capital markets integration affect cost of capital and cross-border deals A practical framework for engaging credibly with competition authorities, the European Commission and the OECD

Why organisations work with Dan Walters Five decades inside the Sacramento Capitol press corps, from Jerry Brown’s first governorship to the current administration, with relationships that predate most of the elected officials he covers. Founding editor of the California Political Almanac and co-author of The Third House, the standard reference on lobbying inside the California legislature. One of the few commentators who reads the state budget, the floor calendar and the ballot initiative pipeline as a single connected system, then explains it in language a board can act on. Over 9,000 columns syndicated across dozens of California papers, with a track record of calling political and fiscal shifts before they reach the national press. Biography highlights Opinion columnist, CalMatters (2017 to present), writing four times weekly on California politics and policy. Daily column previously ran in The Sacramento Bee for 33 years and The Sacramento Union for three. Author, The New California: Facing the 21st Century, used as a college text on California socioeconomic and political trends. Co-author, The Third House: Lobbyists, Money and Power in Sacramento (University of California Press). Founding editor, California Political Almanac. Frequent on-air commentator on California policy for CNN, Fox and PBS SoCal. Biography California’s legislature, governor’s office and ballot system together set policy that reshapes regulation, labour costs and capital allocation across the country. Reading that system from the outside is hard. Reading it from inside the Capitol press corps for fifty years is a different proposition. Walters joined the Sacramento Union’s Capitol bureau in 1975, became its bureau chief, and in 1981 launched the only daily newspaper column dedicated to California state politics. He moved the column to The Sacramento Bee in 1984, where it ran for 33 years, then to CalMatters in 2017, where it continues four times a week. The total now exceeds 9,000 columns syndicated across dozens of California papers. The body of work behind the column matters. The New California: Facing the 21st Century, drawn from a 9,000-mile drive through all 58 counties, became a college text on the state’s socioeconomic direction. The Third House, co-authored and published by the University of California Press, remains a standard reference on how lobbying actually functions inside the California legislature. He is also the founding editor of the California Political Almanac. For an audience trying to anticipate California’s next move, that history is the value. Walters can name which committees decide what, which lobbies are ascendant, which budget assumptions are about to fail and which initiatives have the signatures to reach the ballot. CNN, Fox and PBS SoCal use him as a California policy commentator for the same reason boards do: he has been inside the room while the rules were being written. Key speaking topics California political and policy outlook Sacramento legislative and budget process Lobbying and interest-group power in California California ballot initiatives and direct democracy California’s economic and demographic trajectory Public works planning and finance under polarised politics Election-year political climate Ideal for Boards, general counsel and government-affairs leaders with material California exposure Industry associations, infrastructure and public-works bodies operating in the state Investors and operators tracking California regulatory and fiscal direction Public agencies, joint-powers authorities and policy convenings Audience outcomes A clearer read of where California policy is heading on tax, regulation and spending Specific names and committee dynamics behind the issues most relevant to their sector A working sense of which interest groups are winning and losing inside Sacramento Sharper questions for their own government-affairs and risk teams Distinction between political theatre and the decisions that will actually move

Why organisations work with Nicholas Hopton A serving British Ambassador to four of the region’s most sensitive postings inside a decade: Yemen, Qatar, Iran and Libya. That working contact list is not replicable from outside government. Reopened the British Embassy in Tehran as the first UK Ambassador to Iran since 2011, giving a first-hand reading of how Iranian decision-making actually functions under sanctions and confrontation. Runs Belmont Advisory, a private geopolitical consultancy, alongside the Middle East Association: advice is shaped by what clients have actually done with it, not by think-tank distance from the deal. Current platforms at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative and as a RUSI Distinguished Fellow keep the analysis tested against serious peer scrutiny. Comfortable with senior business audiences and broadcast media in equal measure, including Bloomberg, the New Statesman and The Spectator, which means a board briefing lands without needing translation from policy register. Biography highlights British Ambassador to Libya, 2019 to 2021; Iran, 2015 to 2018; Qatar, 2013 to 2015; Yemen, 2012 to 2013. First British Ambassador to Iran after the embassy’s reopening, following the 2011 closure. Director General of the Middle East Association. Founder and Managing Director of Belmont Advisory, a geopolitical consultancy. Nonresident Senior Fellow, Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative, Atlantic Council; Distinguished Fellow, Royal United Services Institute. Led the drafting team for the UK’s first National Security Strategy in 2008; Private Secretary to four UK Ministers for Europe, 1998 to 2000. Biography The reopening of the British Embassy in Tehran in 2015 closed a four-year diplomatic break with Iran. Nicholas Hopton was the ambassador who walked back in. Running a mission in a country that had just expelled the previous one is a particular kind of education in how power, sanctions and personal access actually interact. That posting sits inside a 35-year career in the British Diplomatic Service that ran from junior roles in Paris, Rome, Morocco and Mauritania to four ambassadorships in under a decade. Yemen during the early collapse, Qatar at the moment Gulf finance reshaped global asset flows, Iran through the nuclear deal years, then Libya. Each post was the kind of brief in which the embassy is the analytical asset, not a passive observer. In Whitehall he led the team that drafted the UK’s first National Security Strategy in 2008 and served as senior UK official at the 2011 Perth Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting. He spent 1998 to 2000 as Private Secretary to four successive Ministers for Europe. The London grounding matters for clients: he understands how the British system actually decides, not just how it appears to. He now runs the Middle East Association as Director General, founded the geopolitical consultancy Belmont Advisory, and holds research positions at the Atlantic Council’s Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative and at RUSI. The combination gives boards something most political-risk providers cannot: a practitioner who can still place the phone calls, and whose interpretation has been tested in real negotiating rooms. Key speaking topics Iran: politics, sanctions and the post-Khamenei trajectory The Gulf states and the geopolitics of capital Libya, North Africa and Mediterranean security UK and European policy towards the Middle East Political risk and market access in conflict-adjacent economies The mechanics of British and European decision-making on foreign policy Ideal for Board and executive committee briefings on Middle East exposure Chief risk officers and heads of government relations in firms with regional operations Investor and family-office audiences weighing Gulf capital allocation Foreign-policy and defence audiences in think tanks, universities and policy fora Audience outcomes A working map of where power actually sits in Tehran, Doha, Riyadh and Tripoli, separated from media shorthand A clearer view of how sanctions regimes affect commercial decision-making in practice An informed read on the UK and European policy posture toward the region, and where it is likely to move Direct answers to the questions a senior team would otherwise be unable to ask in the open

Why organisations work with Jeff Speck He has translated walkability from a planning preference into a measurable argument about carbon, healthcare costs, property values and downtown economic performance, set out in Walkable City and applied in master plans for Memphis, Grand Rapids, Lowell and Tampa. His General Theory of Walkability gives mayors, developers and corporate site selectors a single framework for evaluating the trade-offs in any street, block or downtown investment. He brings both sides of the table: ten years inside Duany Plater-Zyberk shaping the New Urbanism, four years running design policy at the National Endowment for the Arts, and almost two decades leading his own consultancy advising cities and the real estate industry. Walkable City is the best-selling urban planning book written this century, and his two 2013 TED Talks have passed six million views, which means audiences arrive already familiar with the argument and ready to discuss application. The 2022 Seaside Prize, awarded previously to Jane Jacobs and Christopher Alexander, places him in a small group of figures recognised for shaping how cities are now planned. Biography highlights Principal of Speck Dempsey, the urban design consultancy he has led since 2007. Director of Design at the US National Endowment for the Arts, 2003 to 2007, where he ran the Mayors’ Institute on City Design and founded the Governors’ Institute on Community Design. Former Director of Town Planning at Duany Plater-Zyberk and Company, a ten-year tenure inside the firm at the centre of the New Urbanism movement. Author of Walkable City and Walkable City Rules; co-author of Suburban Nation and The Smart Growth Manual. FAICP, FCNU, LEED-AP, Honorary ASLA. Master of Architecture with Distinction, Harvard Graduate School of Design. 2022 Seaside Prize, an award whose previous recipients include Jane Jacobs and Christopher Alexander. Ranked among the ten most influential urbanists of all time in Planetizen’s 2023 reader poll. Biography Most arguments about downtowns get stuck on aesthetics. The serious case is economic. Jeff Speck has spent twenty years showing public officials, developers and corporate leaders that the width of a lane, the placement of a parking lot and the design of a block decide whether a city captures investment, talent and tax base, or quietly loses it. Walkable City, published in 2012, set out the General Theory of Walkability and the ten-step process Speck uses to apply it. It became the best-selling urban planning book written this century, and his two 2013 TED Talks have since passed six million views. Walkable City Rules followed in 2018 as the operating manual for practitioners. The argument is built on three decades inside the work. Ten years as Director of Town Planning at Duany Plater-Zyberk and Company, the firm at the centre of the New Urbanism movement. Four years running design at the US National Endowment for the Arts, where he oversaw the Mayors’ Institute on City Design and created the Governors’ Institute on Community Design. Almost two decades leading Speck Dempsey on master plans and street designs for cities including Memphis, Grand Rapids, Lowell and Tampa. The 2022 Seaside Prize, awarded previously to Jane Jacobs and Christopher Alexander, recognises the small group of figures whose work has changed how American cities are now planned. For boards, mayors and developers wrestling with the future of downtown, Speck is the rare adviser who can move between climate strategy, real estate economics and the design of a single intersection without losing the thread. Key speaking topics Walkable cities and downtown economic performance The General Theory of Walkability Street design and the public realm New Urbanism and smart growth Cities, climate and public health economics Downtown revitalisation and real estate investment Transportation policy and the future of the car Ideal for Mayors, city managers, planning directors and downtown development authorities Real estate developers, REITs and corporate site selectors making place-based investment decisions Sustainability, ESG and climate leads in organisations linking property and emissions strategy Boards and senior teams in retail, hospitality and mixed-use real estate Audience outcomes A working definition of walkability as four conditions a street must meet, applicable to any block under review The economic case for walkable places, expressed in terms of property values, retail performance, healthcare costs and carbon A ten-step sequence for prioritising downtown investments when the budget will fund a fraction of what is on the wishlist A clear view of the trade-offs between car capacity, street life and downtown tax base, with named examples of cities that have got it right and wrong A shared vocabulary between planners, developers, finance teams and elected officials for the next set of decisions

Why organisations work with Yuval Noah Harari The NEXUS framework – which distinguishes self-correcting from self-reinforcing information networks – gives boards and governance teams a precise conceptual tool for evaluating AI strategy and regulatory exposure, grounded in historical evidence rather than prediction. Sapiens introduced the argument that large-scale human cooperation is built on shared fictions. For leadership teams, this reframes how institutions, legal systems, and monetary frameworks actually hold power – and what causes them to fail. Direct conversations with heads of state including Macron, Merkel, and Rutte put his arguments at the level of active geopolitical decision-making, not commentary. Audiences engage with someone whose thinking is tested at the highest levels of governance. His Distinguished Research Fellowship at Cambridge’s Centre for the Study of Existential Risk anchors his arguments on AI in active institutional research on civilisational-scale risk – not opinion or futurism. The 100,000-year historical lens is genuinely rare in this space. It gives senior audiences a method for distinguishing structurally permanent change from cyclical volatility – applicable immediately to strategy, regulation, and organisational design. Biography highlights Professor of History, Department of History, Hebrew University of Jerusalem; PhD from the University of Oxford, 2002 Author of Sapiens, Homo Deus, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, and NEXUS – published in more than 65 languages; Sapiens held the Sunday Times bestseller top three for 96 consecutive weeks and ranked #10 in the NYT’s 100 Best Books of the 21st Century (2024) Distinguished Research Fellow, Centre for the Study of Existential Risk, University of Cambridge Two-time Polonsky Prize for Creativity and Originality (2009, 2012); Moncado Award, Society for Military History (2011); Handelsblatt German Economic Book Award for Homo Deus (2017) WEF Davos keynote speaker in 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2026; CBS 60 Minutes profile (2021) Regular contributor to the Financial Times, The Guardian, The Economist, New York Times, and Nature Biography Organisations making decisions about AI governance are operating without historical context. The scale of information networks has changed before – with writing, printing, and broadcasting – and power has reorganised around each transition. What makes AI structurally different is not its speed or scale, but the fact that, for the first time, the network itself can generate and act on information without human instruction. Yuval Noah Harari is a Professor of History at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and a Distinguished Research Fellow at Cambridge’s Centre for the Study of Existential Risk. His four major works – Sapiens, Homo Deus, 21 Lessons for the 21st Century, and NEXUS – form a sustained argument about the relationship between information, power, and human agency, tracing it from the deep past to the governance decisions of the AI era. NEXUS, published in 2024, made that argument most directly relevant to organisations. Harari’s central distinction – between information systems that are self-correcting and those that reinforce existing power – gives leaders a practical framework for evaluating AI governance, regulatory exposure, and institutional design. The book argues that how organisations and governments navigate this distinction is the defining question of the current period. NEXUS reached number two on both the New York Times and Sunday Times bestseller lists within a week of publication. Harari has held public conversations with heads of state including Emmanuel Macron, Angela Merkel, and Mark Rutte on the future of AI and information. He has delivered keynote addresses at the World Economic Forum in Davos in 2016, 2018, 2020, and 2026, and contributes regularly to the Financial Times, The Guardian, The Economist, and Nature. His books have been translated into more than 65 languages. Key speaking topics Artificial intelligence and information governance The history and future of information networks Geopolitical risk and global power Long-term civilisational change and strategic foresight Human agency and technological disruption Shared fictions, institutions, and how societies hold together AI regulation and democratic resilience Ideal for Boards and C-suite leadership teams navigating AI governance, information strategy, or long-term geopolitical risk Policy, government affairs, and strategic foresight functions at senior level Global conference and forum audiences at CEO, minister, or board director level Technology strategy and corporate affairs teams working on the societal and regulatory implications of AI Audience outcomes A macro-historical framework for reading which changes are structurally significant vs cyclical – applicable to strategy, governance, and regulatory positioning Practical understanding of the NEXUS distinction between self-correcting and self-reinforcing information systems, and its implications for AI governance design Clearer thinking about where power resides in information networks, and what that means for institutional and organisational decisions Historical context for positioning AI decisions within the longer pattern of how information technologies have redistributed political and economic power Sharper questions to bring back to leadership, board, and regulatory conversations already underway

Why organisations work with Josef Joffe Four decades inside the engine room of European opinion-shaping as publisher-editor of Die Zeit and columnist for Suddeutsche Zeitung, giving boards a primary source on how Berlin, Paris and Brussels actually think. A contrarian intellectual record on American power. The Myth of America’s Decline (Liveright, 2013) dismantled the standard declinist consensus and predicted China’s strategic limits years before they became conventional wisdom. Co-founder of The American Interest with Brzezinski, Cohen and Fukuyama, and of its successor American Purpose. He has shaped the most serious post-Cold War conversation on the West’s strategic future. Stanford Hoover and Freeman Spogli affiliations alongside teaching at Harvard, Johns Hopkins SAIS and Stanford. Boards get an academic seriousness uncommon among geopolitical commentators. Bilingual fluency in the German and American political mind. He is one of the few public intellectuals who can address a transatlantic audience without translating awkwardly between the two political cultures. Biography highlights Publisher-editor of Die Zeit, 2000 to 2023, after fifteen years as editorial page editor of Suddeutsche Zeitung. Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution and courtesy professor of political science at Stanford; Senior Fellow of Stanford’s Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. PhD in Government from Harvard; MA from Johns Hopkins SAIS; BA from Swarthmore. Author of The Myth of America’s Decline (2013), Uberpower: The Imperial Temptation of America (2007) and The Limited Partnership (1987). Co-founder of The American Interest (2005) and American Purpose (2020), with Brzezinski, Cohen and Fukuyama. Recipient of the Theodor Wolff Prize, the Ludwig Borne Prize and Germany’s Federal Order of Merit. Biography The post-1945 international order is being rewritten in real time. War has returned to Europe, the China-US contest has hardened, and Germany has begun a defence and energy reorientation that would have been unthinkable a decade ago. Reading these shifts is now part of board-level strategic work, not foreign policy commentary. Josef Joffe has been working this territory for forty years. As publisher-editor of Die Zeit from 2000 to 2023, and before that as editorial page editor of Suddeutsche Zeitung, he shaped how the German political class understood its place in the Atlantic alliance. His books, including The Myth of America’s Decline (Liveright, 2013) and Uberpower: The Imperial Temptation of America (W.W. Norton, 2007), argue against the prevailing declinist reading of US power, drawing on demographic, economic and military fundamentals that he was naming well before they became consensus. At Stanford he is a Distinguished Visiting Fellow at the Hoover Institution, courtesy professor of political science, and Senior Fellow of the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies. He took his PhD in Government from Harvard and has taught at Harvard, Johns Hopkins SAIS and Stanford. In 2005 he co-founded The American Interest with Zbigniew Brzezinski, Eliot Cohen and Francis Fukuyama; in 2020 the successor publication American Purpose. What Joffe offers leadership teams is rare. A working bilingual command of the German and American political minds, an analytical record that has been right on the durability of American power, and the willingness to make a contrarian argument in front of a room that expects the conventional one. Key speaking topics US foreign policy and the future of American power Transatlantic relations and the Atlantic alliance Germany and the European political order China, Russia and the great-power contest The Middle East and Israel The fracturing post-1945 international order Ideal for Boards and executive committees with material exposure to US-China decoupling, Russia sanctions or European political risk CEOs and strategy leaders of transatlantic firms briefing their leadership on geopolitical scenarios CFOs and treasurers making capital allocation decisions against macro-political volatility Investor and partner forums where senior audiences expect serious foreign-policy analysis rather than commentary Audience outcomes A clearer reading of where US power, the China contest and European politics are actually heading, against the prevailing headlines A frame for distinguishing structural shifts from cyclical noise in transatlantic politics Direct insight into how Berlin, Paris and Brussels are recalibrating after the war in Ukraine A contrarian’s stress test of the assumptions their organisation is currently working from on geopolitics

Why organisations work with Miloš Maričić He gives investment boards a working diagnostic for distinguishing real machine learning from AI marketing, anchored in his SPEC framework and his CFA Institute Enterprising Investor work on weak quant models. He chairs Executive AI, the network of CEOs of major European institutional investment organisations, and represented that industry in the EU Artificial Intelligence Act standardisation process. Few speakers can describe AI regulation from inside the room where the rules were written. He has co-edited the Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy with the University of Geneva, the standard reference for AI in the social sector. That gives foundations and philanthropic boards a credible voice on the same subject. He has built and exited two AI companies and ranks in the top five per cent of the Numerai global leaderboard for market prediction models, so the technical claim is matched by personal track record. He is an OECD AI Expert and a World Economic Forum contributor, which means his framing is already calibrated for senior policy and regulatory audiences. Biography highlights Founder of the Altruist League, Geneva, a philanthropy consultancy whose network reports AUM above USD 10 billion. Chair of Executive AI, a network of CEOs of major European institutional investment organisations. AI Expert at the OECD and contributor at the World Economic Forum. Co-editor, The Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy, Routledge, 2024. Co-author, Fixing Philanthropy: Six Principles for Actually Improving the World When Giving Away Money, 2021. Educated at the London School of Economics, New York University and Harvard Business School. Biography Most institutional investors now have AI somewhere in their portfolio, their managers, or their operations. Very few have a working method for telling genuine machine learning from a factor model dressed up for a board meeting. That is the gap Maričić has spent his career filling, first inside his own AI ventures, now as Chair of Executive AI, the network of CEOs of major European institutional investment organisations. His SPEC framework, developed for capital allocators and published through CFA Institute’s Enterprising Investor, gives investment committees a short diagnostic for evaluating quantitative managers who claim AI capability. It is the kind of practical tool a CIO can take into a manager meeting on Monday morning. He represented the institutional investor industry in the EU Artificial Intelligence Act standardisation process, and serves as an AI Expert at the OECD and a contributor at the World Economic Forum. Maričić founded the Altruist League, a Geneva-based philanthropy consultancy that pioneered the use of AI in sourcing investments, distributing funds and managing portfolios, and whose network now reports AUM above USD 10 billion. With Giuseppe Ugazio at the University of Geneva, he co-edited The Routledge Handbook of Artificial Intelligence and Philanthropy, the 2024 reference work for foundations and social sector boards thinking about AI governance. He is educated at the London School of Economics, NYU and Harvard Business School, ranks in the top five per cent of the Numerai global leaderboard for market prediction models, and writes The Specification, a newsletter that translates frontier AI research into practical tools for institutional allocators. Key speaking topics AI governance for investment boards and fiduciary committees Due diligence on machine learning in quantitative investment strategies AI regulation, the EU AI Act and institutional capital allocation AI in philanthropy and the social sector Causal inference and the limits of factor investing Geopolitics of AI for sovereign wealth funds and central banks Trust-based giving and systemic-change philanthropy Ideal for Chief Investment Officers, investment committees and manager-selection teams at pension funds, sovereign wealth funds, central banks and endowments Boards of foundations and philanthropic organisations setting AI strategy and governance Risk, audit and fiduciary committees taking responsibility for AI-driven strategies they did not build Senior policy and regulatory audiences working on AI in financial services Audience outcomes A clear diagnostic for distinguishing real machine learning from AI marketing inside quantitative managers Specific questions a board or investment committee can put to managers and internal teams about AI claims A current read on the EU AI Act and what it means for institutional allocators in practice A grounded view of where AI is genuinely changing philanthropy and where it is hype A working vocabulary for fiduciary AI oversight that does not require a technical background

Why organisations work with Rory Cormac He brings archival-grade authority on how states actually conduct covert action, drawn from declassified British and allied intelligence records, not commentary or speculation. His work on the grey zone gives boards a structured way to read sabotage, subversion and information operations as connected forms of state pressure, not isolated incidents. He translates the playbooks of Russian and Chinese covert activity into specific implications for industries exposed to critical infrastructure, supply chains and intellectual property. How to Stage a Coup (Atlantic, 2022) is one of the few mainstream studies of secret statecraft to be taken seriously by both academic intelligence scholars and practitioners. Fakers (Oxford University Press, 2026) reads the British Cold War forgery operations as a working playbook for present-day state disinformation, giving leaders a historical pattern they can apply to current incidents. He has given oral evidence on foreign interference to parliamentary inquiries in both the UK and Australia, and has fronted three Channel 4 documentaries with Richard Aldrich on intelligence and the British state, making him equally credible in front of policy committees, expert rooms and public audiences. Biography highlights Professor of International Relations and lead for security and resilience research at the University of Nottingham, specialising in secret intelligence and covert action. Fellow of the Royal Historical Society; previous Leverhulme and AHRC Fellowships. Author of Fakers (Oxford University Press, 2026) on state disinformation, How to Stage a Coup (Atlantic, 2022), Disrupt and Deny (Oxford University Press, 2018) and Confronting the Colonies (Hurst, 2014). Co-author with Richard J. Aldrich of The Black Door and The Secret Royals: Spying and the Crown from Victoria to Diana (Atlantic, 2021). Co-presenter of three Channel 4 documentaries: Spying on the Royals, D-Day: The King who Fooled Hitler, The Queen and the Coup. Has given oral evidence on foreign interference to parliamentary inquiries in the UK and Australia, with regular appearances across national press, radio and television on intelligence matters. Biography Most boards still treat espionage as a film genre. The pipeline interruption, the leaked tender, the social media campaign that crashes a launch, the supplier suddenly entangled in a sanctions investigation: these are read as separate operational problems, not as connected acts of state pressure. The work of Rory Cormac, Professor of International Relations at the University of Nottingham, is to give senior leaders the language and the historical pattern recognition to see them as one problem. Cormac is Professor of International Relations and lead for security and resilience research at the University of Nottingham, specialising in covert action and secret statecraft. His authority is built on archival research into declassified British and allied records, the basis of Disrupt and Deny (Oxford University Press, 2018) and Confronting the Colonies (Hurst, 2014). With Richard J. Aldrich he co-authored The Black Door and The Secret Royals, broadening that material into a wider reading of how states use the hidden hand. How to Stage a Coup (Atlantic, 2022) brought the argument into the present. Eleven lessons drawn from a century of secret statecraft, applied to a world of sabotage, ambiguous warfare and adversaries operating just below the threshold of open conflict. Fakers (Oxford University Press, 2026) extends the work into disinformation directly, using the declassified history of Britain’s Cold War forgery operations to read the mechanics of present-day state influence campaigns. Both books sit at the centre of current debates on the grey zone among scholars and practitioners alike. Beyond the academy he is a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society, a former Leverhulme and AHRC Fellow, and a co-presenter with Aldrich of three Channel 4 documentaries on intelligence and the British state. He has also given oral evidence to parliamentary inquiries on foreign interference in both the UK and Australia. The result is a speaker who can hold a room of historians, a corporate security committee, and a Hay Festival audience using the same material. Key speaking topics Covert action and secret statecraft Grey-zone conflict and hybrid threats Russian and Chinese subversion Disinformation and information warfare Intelligence history and the modern state Political risk for critical infrastructure and IP-heavy sectors Resilience against sabotage and infiltration Ideal for Boards and risk committees in defence, energy, telecoms and critical infrastructure Chief security officers, heads of corporate intelligence and political risk leads Government, military and policy audiences working on national resilience Industry associations and conferences focused on geopolitical exposure Audience outcomes A clearer reading of how state adversaries combine sabotage, subversion and disinformation against commercial targets A working vocabulary for the grey zone that makes specific incidents legible as part of a larger pattern A historically grounded view of Russian and Chinese covert practice, rather than headline impressions Sharper questions for security, communications and supply-chain teams about where the organisation is exposed A sense of where the boundary sits between state interference and ordinary commercial risk

Why organisations work with Geoff Cutmore He has interviewed every president of the European Central Bank and the last three Bank of England governors, which means a central banker on his panel will recognise the questioning standard and answer accordingly. He moderated the Global Economic Outlook panel and other plenaries at the World Economic Forum in Davos for more than twenty years, including a 2022 session with Kristalina Georgieva, Jane Fraser, Francois Villeroy de Galhau, and David Rubenstein. His 2014 panel with Vladimir Putin at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, which Putin closed by calling him a “scary person” who kept the conversation businesslike, is on the record as evidence of his composure with hostile principals. He authored New Market Mavericks (Wiley, 2004), a book of interviews with leading market traders, giving him a working vocabulary for the buy side as well as the policy desk. A decade based in Hong Kong with CNBC Asia before Europe gives him fluency on Boao, China Development Forum, and the Asia leg of any global economic story. Biography highlights Anchor of Squawk Box Europe on CNBC from 1999 to June 2023, after a thirty-year career across CNBC Asia and CNBC Europe. Author of New Market Mavericks, published by Wiley in 2004. Moderator of the Global Economic Outlook and other plenary sessions at the World Economic Forum in Davos for more than twenty years. Conducted on-stage interviews with Vladimir Putin at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, Tony Blair, John Major, Gerhard Schroeder, and George Soros. Regular moderator at IMF and World Bank annual meetings, the Boao Forum, the China Development Forum, and United Nations Climate Change conferences. Contributor to the World Economic Forum Agenda. Biography Squawk Box Europe is where European institutional money starts its day, and from 1999 until June 2023 the person setting that agenda was Geoff Cutmore. Over three decades at CNBC, first in Hong Kong with CNBC Asia and then in Europe, he built the interviewing range that takes a guest from rate expectations to sanctions exposure to a board-level cash question without losing the room. The list of principals he has questioned on air or on stage is the working evidence. Every president of the European Central Bank. The last three governors of the Bank of England. US Treasury secretaries, IMF and World Bank heads, Tony Blair, John Major, Gerhard Schroeder, George Soros. In 2014 he chaired a ninety-minute panel with Vladimir Putin at the St Petersburg International Economic Forum, which closed with Putin calling him a “scary person” who had kept the exchange businesslike. That is the kind of credit only earned by holding a difficult line in front of a hostile principal. He has moderated the Global Economic Outlook panel and other plenaries at the World Economic Forum in Davos for more than twenty years, including the 2022 session with Kristalina Georgieva, Jane Fraser, Francois Villeroy de Galhau, and David Rubenstein. He also chairs sessions at the IMF and World Bank annual meetings, the Boao Forum, the China Development Forum, and United Nations climate conferences. His book New Market Mavericks, published by Wiley in 2004, collects interviews with leading traders and gives him a working second language for the buy side. What an organisation gets when it puts him on stage is a chair who has already had the conversation with the person sitting next to him, usually more than once, and who can move the panel through monetary policy, geopolitics, and corporate strategy without giving up the line of argument. Key speaking topics Global economic outlook and central bank policy Geopolitical risk and the world order Financial markets and investor strategy Energy transition and climate policy China and the Asia growth story Conference and panel moderation Senior executive interviews Ideal for Boards and investment committees commissioning a moderated session on the macro and geopolitical outlook CFO, treasury, and capital markets audiences requiring a chair who can question central bankers and policymakers on equal terms Global summits and annual conferences with multi-principal plenary panels on economy, energy, or geopolitics C-suite client events for asset managers, banks, and professional services firms Audience outcomes A clearer read on the current macro, monetary, and geopolitical picture from the principals shaping it, drawn out in real time rather than rehearsed. A session that holds shape across competing speakers, with the chair keeping the argument moving and the audience oriented. Specific named answers from policymakers and CEOs on the questions a senior audience actually has, not the questions a moderator has been briefed to ask. A conversation calibrated to the room, whether that is a Davos plenary, an investor day, or a board offsite.

Why organisations work with Horst Köhler Direct experience at the top of the IMF during the Brazil and Turkey debt crises, with operational responsibility for the response and for expanding debt relief to the poorest countries. Negotiator of the Maastricht Treaty on Economic and Monetary Union, giving boards a primary-source perspective on how the architecture of the eurozone was built and where its stress points lie. Sustained authority on Africa-Europe relations through the AU-EU High-Level Panel and the Partnership with Africa initiative he convened as Federal President. Rare combination of central-bank-adjacent technical credibility (EBRD presidency, IMF) with elected political legitimacy at head-of-state level. Biography highlights President of Germany, 2004 to 2010. Managing Director and Chairman of the Executive Board, International Monetary Fund, 2000 to 2004. President, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, 1998 to 2000. State Secretary, German Federal Ministry of Finance, and Germany’s chief negotiator of the Maastricht Treaty on Economic and Monetary Union. UN Secretary-General’s Personal Envoy for Western Sahara, 2017 to 2019. Co-founder, Eva Luise and Horst Köhler Foundation for rare disease research, established 2006. Recipient of the Global Economy Prize, Kiel Institute, 2017. Biography The institutions that defined the post-1990 economic order were built in a specific moment. The Maastricht Treaty, the IMF’s debt-relief frameworks, the G7’s coordination architecture were all designed for a world that assumed open trade, declining inflation, and the gradual integration of emerging economies. Köhler spent his career inside those institutions at the moments they were being built and stress-tested. As State Secretary in the German Federal Ministry of Finance he was Germany’s chief negotiator on the Maastricht Treaty and on the German-German monetary union, before moving to the presidency of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in 1998. From 2000 to 2004 he led the IMF through the Brazilian and Turkish debt crises and expanded debt relief for the world’s poorest economies. The technical brief and the political brief were the same brief. His presidency of Germany, 2004 to 2010, made the Africa-Europe relationship the centre of his public agenda. He convened the Partnership with Africa initiative as a sustained dialogue between heads of state, entrepreneurs, and intellectuals from both continents, and after leaving office co-chaired the African Union High-Level Panel on Africa-Europe relations and served as UN Personal Envoy for Western Sahara. The intellectual position underneath the work is that Europe still does not treat Africa as an independent political subject with its own agency and options. That argument, developed across two decades of speeches, is what made him a distinctive voice rather than a former office-holder on a circuit. Key speaking topics International monetary system and sovereign debt The Africa-Europe partnership The eurozone, Maastricht, and the architecture of EMU Global poverty reduction and development finance Multilateralism and the reform of international institutions Sustainability and climate finance Ideal for Boards and executive committees in financial services, multinational industrials, and infrastructure with material exposure to emerging markets, especially African economies. Government, multilateral, and development-finance audiences working on debt, climate finance, or institutional reform. Foundations, family offices, and impact-investment platforms with an Africa or Global South thesis. Audience outcomes A primary-source account of how the IMF actually handles a sovereign debt crisis at executive-board level. An informed view on what the AU-EU relationship looks like from inside the panels that have shaped it. A grounded reading of where the post-1990 multilateral order is brittle and where it still functions. Direct exposure to the strategic case for treating Africa as a peer political and economic counterpart, not an aid recipient.

Why organisations work with Raekwon Chung The Low Carbon Green Growth Roadmap, a UN publication Chung directed at ESCAP provides a named, five-track policy architecture for pursuing growth while reducing carbon intensity; organisations that understand this framework can make the economic case for climate investment, not just the compliance case. Very few speakers have shaped the rules of international climate governance from inside the room; Chung has participated in UN climate negotiations since 1991, advised a UN Secretary-General directly, and co-authored the IPCC’s foundational report on technology transfer. His specific IPCC contribution; the Technology Transfer Report addresses one of the least resolved tensions in corporate climate strategy: how emerging-market operations can access and deploy clean technologies at scale. The Green Growth argument Chung developed is an economic one, not a moral one; he shows how resource efficiency and low-carbon investment can generate a double dividend; higher growth with lower environmental impact, a position grounded in a verifiable UN policy architecture rather than consulting opinion. As Board Director for Climate and Energy at the Ban Ki-moon Foundation for a Better Future, he remains an active participant in the international climate architecture rather than a commentator on it. Biography highlights Korea’s first Climate Change Ambassador; engaged in UN climate negotiations since 1991 Principal Climate Change Advisor to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon Director, Environment and Development Division, UN ESCAP; led development of the Low Carbon Green Growth Roadmap for Asia and the Pacific (2012) IPCC Lead Author, Technology Transfer Report; received personal copy of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize awarded to the IPCC Chairman, International Award Committee, Global Energy Prize Board Director for Climate and Energy, Ban Ki-moon Foundation for a Better Future; Professor Emeritus, Incheon National University, Korea Biography Whether climate action and economic growth can be pursued simultaneously is no longer a theoretical question: it is the defining tension in development strategy. Raekwon Chung has spent three decades not analysing that question but helping to answer it, from South Korea’s first climate ambassador to the UN official who directed the Low Carbon Green Growth Roadmap. The Roadmap, published in 2012 under Chung’s leadership at the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific, set out a five-track policy architecture for governments pursuing growth while reducing carbon intensity. It became a reference document for Asia-Pacific policymakers and shaped how international institutions framed the relationship between development economics and climate obligations. The core argument is economic: resource efficiency and low-carbon investment generate a double dividend: higher growth alongside lower environmental impact. His direct involvement in the institutions that set climate rules is unusual. He served as Principal Climate Change Advisor to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and was Lead Author on the IPCC’s Technology Transfer Report. The IPCC was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007; Chung received a personal copy in recognition of his contribution. He also proposed the concept of unilateral CDM, enabling developing countries to initiate emissions reduction projects independently, without waiting for partner-country involvement. He now chairs the International Award Committee of the Global Energy Prize and serves as Board Director for Climate and Energy at the Ban Ki-moon Foundation for a Better Future. His perspective is that of a practitioner inside the international climate architecture, not an observer of it. Key speaking topics Low-carbon development policy Green Growth as economic strategy International climate governance Climate diplomacy and multilateral negotiation Energy transition in emerging economies Technology transfer and clean energy access ESG strategy and climate-aligned investment Ideal for Government ministers, senior civil servants, and diplomats engaged in climate policy or international negotiations Chief Sustainability Officers and ESG leads at multinationals with Asia-Pacific exposure or supply chain decarbonisation mandates Boards and executive committees making the economic case for net-zero commitments International organisations and multilateral institutions working on development finance or energy transition Audience outcomes A clearer understanding of how international climate frameworks are designed, and how organisations can position themselves within them rather than simply react to them The economic logic of Green Growth as a lens for reframing climate investment as a development opportunity rather than a compliance cost Insight into the real dynamics of multilateral climate negotiation and what drives national ambition levels Practical perspectives on technology transfer and clean energy access, particularly relevant for emerging-market operations and supply chain decarbonisation Context for the convergence of climate policy, development economics, and energy transition across the Asia-Pacific region