Scenario Planning & Strategic Foresight

Why organisations work with Ella Sy She works inside the signals, not on top of them. Her day job as Business Futures Strategy Director at GDR is reading retail, tech, and consumer change for commercial clients, not curating trend decks from the outside. She pairs a futures lens with delivery discipline. Alongside the strategy work she runs programme at Elevate, so her view of change includes what it takes to operationalise it, not only name it. Her brief is genuinely cross-sector. Named client work spans Google, Microsoft, Jaguar Land Rover, Costa Coffee, Preferred Hotels, and KSL Resorts, which gives her material from both B2B technology and consumer-facing brands. She brings a non-Anglosphere cultural read. French-born, Asian heritage, London based, working in English, French, and Mandarin. Useful for boards with EMEA and APAC exposure who want more than a US-centric view. She is comfortable with soft territory that leadership teams often duck: meaning, purpose, human growth inside commercial strategy. Named bookings in this register rather than retrofitted from a trends talk. Biography highlights Business Futures Strategy Director at GDR, a retail and brand strategy consultancy. Strategy Director and Head of Programme at Elevate, and Chair of its Youth Board Committee. Former Global Strategy Director at Zenith Worldwide, part of Publicis Groupe. 13+ years of strategy across retail, technology, wellness, banking, luxury, and FMCG. Client engagements include Google across LatAm markets, Microsoft, Jaguar Land Rover, Costa Coffee, Preferred Hotels, and KSL Resorts. MA in International Marketing and Communication. Works in English, French, and Mandarin. Biography Most organisations treat foresight as a slide at the start of strategy offsites. GDR, where Ella Sy is Business Futures Strategy Director, sells it as a product to retailers and brands that need to place commercial bets on where consumer behaviour is going next. That is the discipline she brings into the room. Before GDR, she was Global Strategy Director at Zenith Worldwide inside Publicis Groupe, running strategy for large advertising clients. The common thread across the two roles is translation. Taking messy, contradictory signals from culture, technology, and consumer behaviour and turning them into positions a leadership team can defend and a business can execute against. She also holds an operational role: Strategy Director and Head of Programme at Elevate, a UK youth mentoring organisation where she chairs the Youth Board Committee. That side of the work keeps her close to delivery rather than only advice, which is unusual for a speaker working in the futures space. Her client record crosses categories that rarely share speakers: Google across Latin American markets, Microsoft, Jaguar Land Rover, Costa Coffee, Preferred Hotels, KSL Resorts. French-born, of Asian heritage, based in the UK, she works in English, French, and Mandarin, and the cultural range shows up in how she frames audiences outside the Anglosphere default. Key speaking topics Strategic foresight and business futures Consumer and cultural signal reading Customer experience and brand strategy in an AI-shaped market Organisational culture under technological disruption Purpose-driven leadership and human growth Cross-cultural strategy across EMEA and APAC Ideal for CSOs, chief strategy officers, and transformation leads deciding where to place medium-term bets. CMOs and customer experience leaders in retail, hospitality, and consumer technology. Boards and executive teams setting a three-to-five year direction under technology and consumer volatility. International leadership groups that need a non-US-default reading of culture and consumer change. Audience outcomes A sharper read on which emerging signals in consumer behaviour and technology actually matter for the business in the room. Working language for talking about culture and customer experience together rather than as separate agendas. Examples from retail, luxury, hospitality, and technology clients that test the ideas against real commercial pressure. A more honest view of the gap between seeing change and executing on it inside a large organisation. Cross-cultural context for leaders whose markets extend beyond the US and UK.

Why organisations work with Abishur Prakash He defined the geopolitics-of-technology field early. His 2016 book Next Geopolitics set out a scenario framework for state competition over AI, robotics and emerging tech that boards are now living through. He gives executives a working vocabulary for the new operating environment. Concepts he coined, including Vertical Globalization, Geopolitics of AI and Business Iron Curtain, name dynamics that buyers can otherwise only describe in fragments. His work at the Center for Innovating the Future has been cited by the World Economic Forum, Brookings, the Foreign Policy Research Institute, and the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs, signalling that policymakers and corporates draw on the same analysis. He briefs in two registers. He has testified to the Senate of Canada and writes regularly in CNBC, Nikkei Asia, BBC, Politico, Fortune and the WSJ, so he is fluent with both heads of state and operating executives. He runs an advisory firm, The Geopolitical Business, that is built specifically for corporate decision-makers, not academic audiences. The reading frame is always: what does this mean for your next investment, supplier, market or product launch. Biography highlights Founder and CEO of The Geopolitical Business, a Toronto-based advisory firm. Author of five books on the geopolitics of technology, including The World Is Vertical and Next Geopolitics Volumes One and Two. Former geopolitical futurist at the Center for Innovating the Future; represented CIF in testimony to the Senate of Canada in 2017. Work cited by the World Economic Forum, Brookings Institution, Foreign Policy Research Institute, and the UAE Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Bylines and commentary in CNN, BBC, CNBC, WSJ, Nikkei Asia, Reuters, Politico, Fortune, The Telegraph, Scientific American and SCMP. Coined frameworks now used in corporate strategy discussions: Next Geopolitics, Vertical Globalization, Geopolitics of AI, Business Iron Curtain. Biography The intersection of state power and corporate strategy is where most boardroom assumptions are now breaking. Export controls on chips, sanctions regimes that shift quarterly, severed supply corridors and AI rivalry between Washington and Beijing are no longer macro context. They sit on the operating P&L. Abishur Prakash has been mapping this terrain since 2013, when he first set out the case that geopolitics and technology had become a single field. His five books built that argument in stages. Next Geopolitics Volumes One and Two used scenario-based chapters to show how AI, robotics and biotech would force governments and companies into new postures. Go.AI examined the state-level race for artificial intelligence advantage. The Age of Killer Robots looked at autonomy in defence. The World Is Vertical: How Technology Is Remaking Globalization argued that the flat, integrated world of the 1990s and 2000s is being replaced by a layered, segmented one in which corporates choose blocs rather than markets. His vantage point is built on both policy and corporate exposure. As a futurist at the Center for Innovating the Future, his work was cited by the World Economic Forum, Brookings and the UAE foreign ministry, and he testified to the Senate of Canada in 2017. He now runs The Geopolitical Business, a firm built to convert that analysis into decisions for executives, central banks and investors. His commentary appears regularly in CNBC, BBC, Nikkei Asia, the WSJ, Politico and Fortune. What boards take from him is not a worldview, but a working method. Concepts he coined, Vertical Globalization, Geopolitics of AI, Business Iron Curtain, give leadership teams a vocabulary for things they were already feeling on supply, capital and market access. The output is concrete: which corridors are closing, which blocs are forming, where the next sanction or subsidy is likely to land, and what that means for the next investment cycle. Key speaking topics Geopolitics of technology and AI US-China strategic and technology competition Vertical Globalization and the end of flat-world supply chains Sanctions, export controls and the Business Iron Curtain Scenario planning for boards and investors Long-range geopolitical foresight Bloc formation and the future of trade corridors Ideal for Boards, CEOs and CSOs setting strategy across multiple geopolitical blocs CFOs and treasury leaders running capital allocation under sanctions and currency volatility Heads of supply chain, procurement and manufacturing footprint Investors, central banks and policy leaders responsible for long-horizon risk Audience outcomes A clearer reading of how state-level technology rivalry is reshaping their specific industry Named frameworks for describing geopolitical change inside their own strategy process Sharper questions for the next board, investment committee or supply review A view of which corridors, blocs and choke points to watch over the coming cycle Confidence to act on geopolitical risk before it becomes a balance-sheet event

Why organisations work with Ian Dunt He explains the mechanics of UK government, not the gossip: how a bill actually becomes law, where civil service capacity sits, why a policy lands or stalls. Useful to any team pricing regulatory or political exposure. His book How Westminster Works… and Why It Doesn’t became a Sunday Times bestseller and is used as a reference text by people who work in and around Parliament. That is a stronger credibility signal than a television appearance count. He brings a second, distinct intellectual track on liberalism, populism and the condition of democratic institutions, drawn from How To Be A Liberal and the Origin Story podcast. Boards thinking about long-horizon political risk get more than a UK briefing. He writes and speaks for decision-makers, not commentators. The register is direct, argued, commercially relevant, and stays away from partisan theatre. Biography highlights Columnist for The i Paper, one of the UK’s main daily political columns. Former editor of politics.co.uk, the long-running UK politics analysis site. Author of How Westminster Works… and Why It Doesn’t (Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 2023), a Sunday Times bestseller. Author of How To Be A Liberal (Canbury, 2020) and Brexit: What the Hell Happens Now? (Canbury, 2016). Co-host of Origin Story with Dorian Lynskey, and a founding voice on Oh God, What Now? and The Bunker, all Podmasters productions. Appointed chair of the editorial board of New Humanist magazine in 2025. Biography Most UK political coverage describes the weather over Westminster. Dunt describes the building. How Westminster Works… and Why It Doesn’t, published by Weidenfeld and Nicolson in 2023 and an immediate Sunday Times bestseller, walked readers through the actual wiring: Number 10, the Cabinet Office, the civil service, the Commons, the Lords, the party machines, and the specific failure points in each. That is the unusual thing about him as a political voice. The subject is institutions, not personalities. Before the book, a long editorship of politics.co.uk gave him the beat, and a column at The i Paper gave him the public platform he still uses. He writes in plain, argued English, not lobby shorthand, which is part of why the book crossed over from political readers to the general ones. The second strand of his work sits further back from the news cycle. How To Be A Liberal, published by Canbury in 2020, is a history of liberal thought and a defence of it against nationalism and authoritarian revival. Origin Story, co-hosted with the journalist Dorian Lynskey on Podmasters, takes that same method, trace an idea to its root, then show what it has become, across subjects from neoliberalism to conspiracy theory. It is the part of his work that serious boards find most useful when the question is not what happens next week but what kind of political environment the organisation will be operating in for the next decade. In 2025 he was appointed chair of the editorial board of New Humanist, the 140-year-old rationalist magazine, which sits comfortably inside that longer-arc intellectual project. Key speaking topics UK politics and Westminster governance Political and regulatory risk for business UK-EU relations after Brexit Populism and the condition of democratic institutions Liberalism, public reason, and the information environment Media disruption and misinformation Ideal for Boards, executive teams and public affairs leads exposed to UK regulatory and political risk. Risk, compliance and government relations functions inside multinationals operating in the UK and Europe. Investor and membership audiences who want a serious read on Westminster rather than a news recap. Audience outcomes A working mental model of how UK government actually produces decisions, and where it breaks. Sharper judgement on which political stories matter commercially and which are noise. A clearer view of where populist politics is driving institutional change across Europe and the UK. An informed frame for conversations with policymakers, regulators and own-government-relations teams.

Key speaking topics Geopolitical risk and business strategy Megatrends and global disruption Scenario thinking and strategic foresight Trend analysis for organisations Political conflict and economic impact Technological and societal change Ideal for Boards and executive leadership teams Strategy and risk leaders Corporate planners and transformation teams Business audiences operating in international markets Audience outcomes Clearer understanding of how geopolitical developments affect business environments Structured approaches to scenario thinking and strategic foresight Insight into the economic impact of political conflict Broader perspective on long-term technological and societal trends Why organisations work with Hans Diels Connects geopolitical and macro trends directly to business decision-making. Brings experience spanning EU policy, diplomacy and academic research. Provides structured frameworks for thinking about uncertainty and disruption. Grounds strategic discussion in published research and practical analysis. Biography Hans Diels advises organisations on the strategic implications of geopolitical instability, macro trends and systemic disruption. As a future thinker and geopolitics expert at ETION, he works with business audiences to translate complex political, economic and technological shifts into clear strategic insight. His expertise spans megatrends, scenario thinking and geopolitical risk. Through keynotes and workshops, he equips leadership teams with structured approaches to navigating uncertainty, understanding global volatility and assessing the economic consequences of political conflict. Hans is the author of Het onzekerheidsvoordeel: Strategie tussen feiten en verbeelding and Markt onder vuur: Hoe politieke conflicten de economie verstoren (en wat we eraan kunnen doen). His published work examines how organisations can think more rigorously about uncertainty and how political developments reshape markets and economic systems. His professional background combines policy, diplomacy and academia. He has experience connected to EU trade policy, including the EU Council’s Trade Policy Committee, has worked at the US Embassy in Belgium and in the EU context, and has served as a researcher and lecturer in political science at the University of Antwerp. Hans holds a master’s degree in Political Science from KU Leuven, specialised in International Relations in Louvain-la-Neuve, and studied economics via the University of London / London School of Economics external programme. This combination of academic grounding and policy exposure informs his clear, business-focused perspective on global disruption and strategic foresight.

Why organisations work with Pedro Duque Two flown space missions, STS-95 aboard Space Shuttle Discovery and the Cervantes mission to the International Space Station, give him first-hand experience of mission-critical decision-making in high-risk multinational technical environments. Three years running Spain’s national innovation system as Minister of Science, Innovation and Universities. He saw what happens when research and innovation policy meet the real economy, and where the translation breaks down. Chair of Hispasat, one of three European operators inside SpaceRISE, the consortium awarded the IRIS² concession. He is inside the construction of European technological sovereignty, not commenting on it from the outside. He has approached the same questions about technology, risk, and capability from three operationally distinct positions: as an astronaut at ESA, as a CEO at Deimos Imaging, and as a minister in the Spanish government. Biography highlights ESA astronaut who flew STS-95 aboard NASA’s Space Shuttle Discovery in 1998 and the 10-day Cervantes mission to the International Space Station aboard Soyuz TMA in 2003. Spain’s Minister of Science, Innovation and Universities from 2018 to 2021, and Minister of Science and Innovation from 2020 to 2021. Member of Spain’s Congress of Deputies for Alicante, 2019 to 2020. Chair of Hispasat since December 2023; the company is one of three European satellite operators in the SpaceRISE consortium awarded the EU’s IRIS² satellite constellation contract. Former Managing Director and Executive President of Deimos Imaging during the launch of Deimos-1, Spain’s first Earth observation satellite. Member of the Spanish Royal Academy of Engineering; recipient of Russia’s Order of Friendship, Spain’s Grand Cross of Aeronautical Merit, and the Prince of Asturias Award for International Cooperation. Biography On 29 October 1998, Spain watched its first astronaut launch from Cape Canaveral aboard the Space Shuttle Discovery. Pedro Duque has stayed close to space ever since, but rarely from orbit. After a second flight in 2003, this time on a Soyuz to the International Space Station for the Cervantes mission, Duque moved between roles that few people combine. He led Deimos Imaging during the launch of Deimos-1, Spain’s first Earth observation satellite. He returned to ESA to head its Flight Operations Office, which oversees European activities on the ISS from the Columbus Control Centre near Munich. In 2018, Pedro Sánchez named him Minister of Science, Innovation and Universities. He held the post through 2021, including a period as Minister of Science and Innovation, and represented Spain on the European Space Agency’s Ministerial Council. During his tenure he committed an additional €701 million to Spain’s ESA contribution between 2020 and 2026. Since December 2023 he has chaired Hispasat. The company is now one of three European satellite operators inside SpaceRISE, the consortium awarded the IRIS² concession in late 2024. IRIS² is the EU’s third flagship space programme, a 290-satellite constellation built for European sovereignty in secure connectivity. Few speakers can describe what that means from the inside. Key speaking topics Space technology and the modern economy Satellite infrastructure and European sovereignty Innovation policy and national competitiveness International cooperation in complex technical programmes Decision-making in high-risk operational environments Earth observation and applied satellite data The space industry and geopolitical risk Ideal for Boards and executive teams setting strategy under technological and geopolitical uncertainty Government, policy, and public sector leadership forums on innovation, science and industrial strategy Aerospace, defence, telecommunications, and infrastructure leadership Corporate audiences shaping long-horizon technology and capability decisions Audience outcomes A reframing of satellite and space infrastructure as a strategic layer of the modern economy A view from inside the IRIS² consortium of what European secure connectivity actually requires How mission-critical decisions get made when failure is unacceptable and teams cross nationalities A grounded read on where national innovation policy translates into commercial outcomes and where it stalls

Why organisations work with Greg Williams His forthcoming book Code, Capital, Power (2027) is the spine of his current work: how big technology companies have redefined markets, reshaped global order and bent society to their design. The keynote is the boardroom version of that argument. Sixteen years at WIRED, including close to a decade as Editor-in-Chief of the UK edition, gave him access most writers on this beat do not get. Satya Nadella, Demis Hassabis, Reid Hoffman, Albert Bourla, Prime Ministers Blair, May and Johnson have all sat across from him. That access feeds directly into how he frames emerging signals for boards. He is cofounder of The Venture Group, an AI-first business operating as a founder accelerator programme. That adds an operator’s vantage point to the journalist’s depth he built at WIRED. Four-time British Society of Magazine Editors Editor of the Year for Science and Technology, and Chair of Judges for The Orwell Prize for Journalism 2026. Both are independent external markers that his judgement on this beat is taken seriously by people who track it closely. He works equally well as keynote, interviewer and on-stage moderator, which matters when the programme needs him to hold a room with a head of state, a founder and a regulator on the same panel. McKinsey and BCG have used him to host private leadership formats for this reason. Biography highlights Former Editor-in-Chief of WIRED UK and Deputy Global Editorial Director, WIRED, after sixteen years at the title; cofounder of The Venture Group, an AI-first business operating as a founder accelerator programme. Author of the forthcoming Code, Capital, Power: How Big Tech Companies Redefined Markets, Reshaped Global Order and Are Transforming Society in Their Image (2027). Chair of Judges, The Orwell Prize for Journalism 2026. British Society of Magazine Editors Editor of the Year, Science and Technology, in 2017, 2018, 2020 and 2024. On-stage interviewer of Bill Gates, Satya Nadella, Demis Hassabis, Reid Hoffman, Albert Bourla and Prime Ministers Blair, May and Johnson. Speaking credits include the World Economic Forum in Davos, UN AI for Good, Cannes Lions, Web Summit, Vivatech, SXSW, DLD, Founders Forum and the World Governments Summit, plus private leadership formats for McKinsey and BCG. Biography The most consequential question for senior leadership over the next decade is no longer whether technology will reshape markets. It is who is doing the reshaping, who is benefiting, and what kind of operating environment that leaves for everyone else. The argument Greg Williams sets out in his forthcoming book Code, Capital, Power is that big technology companies have already redrawn the rules of markets, capital and global order, and that boards now have to lead inside that new geometry. That work draws on sixteen years at WIRED, where he ran the UK edition for close to a decade and held the role of Deputy Global Editorial Director, with editorial responsibility for teams from Mexico to Japan. He is also cofounder of The Venture Group, an AI-first business operating as a founder accelerator programme. Access compounds the credibility. Williams has interviewed Bill Gates, Satya Nadella, Demis Hassabis, Reid Hoffman, Albert Bourla and Prime Ministers Blair, May and Johnson, on stage and in print. He has shared programmes with the World Economic Forum in Davos, UN AI for Good, Cannes Lions, Web Summit, Vivatech, SXSW and the World Governments Summit, and has hosted private leadership formats for McKinsey and BCG. The British Society of Magazine Editors named him Editor of the Year for Science and Technology four times, in 2017, 2018, 2020 and 2024, and the Orwell Foundation appointed him Chair of Judges for its 2026 Prize for Journalism, on a panel with Nick Davies, Meenakshi Ravi and Sayeeda Warsi. For a leadership team, the booking works on two levels. As keynote, he translates AI, cybersecurity and the platform economics shaping global order into decisions a board can act on. As interviewer or moderator, he can hold a complicated panel, ask the sharper question, and keep the conversation honest when a founder, a regulator and a customer are on the same stage. Key speaking topics Artificial intelligence and its impact on business models Cybersecurity and digital risk at board level Technology and geopolitics Innovation and disruption Future of work and workforce transformation Strategic foresight and trend forecasting Leadership in a technology-driven economy Ideal for Boards and executive committees setting AI, data or cybersecurity strategy CEO and CIO offsites that need a credible outside read on the technology agenda Innovation, strategy and transformation leads briefing their organisation on what is coming Industry conferences that need a moderator who can interview founders, regulators and policymakers on the same stage Audience outcomes A sharper filter for separating real technology signal from hype A clearer view of the AI, cybersecurity and platform shifts that will hit their sector next A forward read on the technology economy shaped by his own argument that a small number of big tech companies are restructuring markets and the global order, not a vendor pitch Specific named companies, researchers and regulators to watch Better questions to put to their own technology and strategy teams on return

Why organisations work with Rory Stewart He has sat inside the decision-making structures most geopolitical analysts only describe – as a UK Cabinet minister, National Security Council member, and coalition administrator governing two Iraqi provinces at 29. That is not a background organisations can easily find elsewhere on a speaker platform. His co-authored book Can Intervention Work? (2011) makes a specific, tested argument about the conditions under which external state interventions succeed or fail – relevant to any organisation navigating politically unstable markets or working alongside governments in fragile environments. Politics on the Edge (British Book Awards Non-Fiction Narrative Book of the Year 2024) provides a forensic account of how democratic governance hollows out – useful for any leadership team trying to anticipate political risk in Western markets, not just emerging ones. He teaches grand strategy at Yale’s Jackson School alongside his public engagement – his analysis is grounded in academic rigour about how states make long-term choices under uncertainty, not in the rolling commentary of the news cycle. Co-hosting the UK’s most-listened podcast across all genres (The Rest Is Politics) gives him an unusually clear read of where public and political opinion is moving – and why the gap between elite decision-making and public trust continues to widen. Biography highlights Inaugural Brady-Johnson Professor in the Practice of Grand Strategy and co-director of the Brady-Johnson Program in Grand Strategy, Yale Jackson School of Global Affairs (from January 2024) Former UK Secretary of State for International Development and member of the National Security Council; held six ministerial roles across four government departments under David Cameron and Theresa May Former Director of the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy and Ryan Family Professor of Human Rights, Harvard Kennedy School Founder of Turquoise Mountain Foundation, Kabul – a cultural heritage and livelihoods charity operating under the patronage of King Charles III Author of six books including The Places in Between (Ondaatje Prize, Royal Society of Literature, 2005) and Politics on the Edge (British Book Awards Non-Fiction Narrative Book of the Year 2024, #1 Sunday Times bestseller) OBE for services in Iraq (2004); Livingstone Medal, Royal Scottish Geographical Society (2009); Ness Award, Royal Geographical Society (2018); three BBC television documentaries; contributor to the New York Review of Books, London Review of Books, and Times Literary Supplement Biography Rory Stewart served as a UK Cabinet minister and member of the National Security Council, held six ministerial roles across four departments, governed two Iraqi provinces as a coalition administrator at 29, and founded an operating NGO in Kabul before it was fashionable to work there. He is now the inaugural Brady-Johnson Professor in the Practice of Grand Strategy at Yale’s Jackson School of Global Affairs, where he co-directs the programme that trains the next generation of strategists. He is not a commentator who studies power. He is someone who has held it. His intellectual contribution goes beyond memoir. Can Intervention Work? (2011) – co-authored with Gerald Knaus – makes a specific argument about why external state interventions fail and under what conditions they can succeed. Politics on the Edge (2023), winner of the British Book Awards Non-Fiction Narrative Book of the Year and named a best book of the year by the Financial Times and Foreign Affairs, dissects the structural causes of democratic decline from the inside – cronyism, the hollowing of expertise, the capture of institutions by short-term political incentives. Both books ask questions that boards are now asking about the environments in which they operate. Before Parliament, Stewart served in the UK Diplomatic Service in Indonesia and Montenegro, walked solo across Afghanistan in 2002 – documented in The Places in Between, winner of the Ondaatje Prize – and later led Turquoise Mountain in Kabul. He directed the Carr Center for Human Rights Policy at Harvard Kennedy School before abandoning that chair to stand for Parliament. The breadth is not accidental: his authority on geopolitical risk rests on having moved between every layer of the system that produces it. Co-hosting The Rest Is Politics – the most-listened-to podcast in the UK across all genres – has given him a reading of the gap between institutional decision-making and public trust that no think-tank report captures. For organisations trying to understand not just what geopolitical risk looks like but why it is so consistently misjudged by the institutions they rely on, that perspective is specific and hard to replicate. Key speaking topics Geopolitics and the shifting global order Grand strategy and statecraft Political risk and institutional failure The limits of state intervention International development and fragile states Democratic governance and the crisis of political trust Leadership under uncertainty in high-stakes environments Ideal for Boards and executive committees assessing geopolitical exposure in global strategy and investment decisions Chief Risk Officers and political risk functions in financial services, energy, and infrastructure sectors Government affairs and public policy leadership navigating an unstable regulatory and political environment International development organisations, multilaterals, and NGOs operating in fragile or conflict-affected contexts Audience outcomes A clearer framework for distinguishing genuine geopolitical risk from noise – grounded in how decisions are actually made inside governments, not how they are reported Specific insight into why state interventions and institutional responses to crises so often fail, and what the structural causes are A more calibrated understanding of the relationship between democratic instability in Western markets and long-term strategic planning Practical exposure to how grand strategy is taught and applied – the long-arc thinking that boards and senior leadership teams rarely build time for Greater confidence in engaging with geopolitical complexity without defaulting to the oversimplified framings of media commentary

Why organisations work with Andrew Marr Direct line of sight into Westminster and Whitehall built across forty years of political reporting, including five years as BBC Political Editor and sixteen years presenting the BBC One Sunday political programme. Historical context most political commentators cannot offer. His BBC One series and accompanying books on modern Britain, the making of modern Britain and the Elizabethan era are the standard popular references for how the British state and economy got to where they are. Non-partisan, on-the-record reading of UK politics that can be quoted in front of clients, regulators and international visitors. Marr has interviewed every recent UK prime minister and most senior cabinet figures. Working journalist, not a retired one. Political Editor of the New Statesman and presenter of Tonight with Andrew Marr on LBC, so the analysis is current to the week of the event. Equally effective as keynote speaker, interviewer and moderator. The same craft that drove fifteen years of Sunday political interviews carries into corporate fireside formats and on-stage conversation with senior leaders. Biography highlights BBC Political Editor, 2000 to 2005. Editor of The Independent, 1996 to 1998. Political Editor of The Independent before that. Presented The Andrew Marr Show on BBC One from 2005 to December 2021. Political Editor and columnist at the New Statesman, since February 2022. Presents Tonight with Andrew Marr on LBC and a current affairs show on Classic FM. Author of A History of Modern Britain, The Making of Modern Britain, A History of the World, The Diamond Queen, and Elizabethans. Companion BBC documentary series accompanied most of them. BAFTA Richard Dimbleby Award (2004), British Press Awards Columnist of the Year (1995), Royal Television Society Best Presenter (2008), RTS Scotland Current Affairs Award (2017). Read English at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, first class honours. Biography British politics has rarely moved at a pace this difficult for boards and senior leaders to track. Election cycles, fiscal reversals, the state’s relationship with business, and Britain’s position in the world are all in motion at once. Reading the signal underneath the noise is now part of corporate planning, not an adjacent interest. That is the contribution Andrew Marr brings to a corporate audience. As BBC Political Editor from 2000 to 2005, and then as presenter of the BBC One Sunday political programme for sixteen years, he interviewed every recent UK prime minister and most senior cabinet figures across two decades of British government. Few broadcasters have that continuity of access. The historical work is what separates him from other political commentators. A History of Modern Britain, The Making of Modern Britain, and Elizabethans, each a Sunday Times bestseller with a major BBC television series alongside it, gave a generation of British readers their working picture of how the country got from 1945 to now. The BBC series for A History of Modern Britain won a BAFTA. He left the BBC at the end of 2021 and now writes as Political Editor of the New Statesman, presents Tonight with Andrew Marr on LBC, and a current affairs programme on Classic FM. The journalism is current to the week. Awards include the BAFTA Richard Dimbleby (2004), British Press Awards Columnist of the Year (1995), and Royal Television Society Best Presenter (2008). He read English at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, with first class honours. Key speaking topics UK politics and Westminster British government and policy Modern British history and national identity UK economic policy and the state Elections and the political cycle Media and public life Scotland and the union Ideal for Boards and executive committees of UK and international businesses with material UK exposure Senior partner and client events for professional services firms hosting clients on UK affairs Annual conferences and leadership offsites seeking a credible on-the-record political read Event organisers needing a senior moderator or interviewer for political and economic sessions Audience outcomes A clear, non-partisan read on where UK politics is heading in the next political cycle Historical context for current political and economic shifts, traced back to identifiable turning points in post-war Britain An informed sense of how Westminster, Whitehall and the Treasury actually interact on the issues that matter to business A sharper picture of the UK’s standing internationally and what that means for British operations and investment

Why organisations work with Scott Amyx Active deep tech investor with personal capital in D-Orbit (space logistics), Brightseed (plant bioactives), Bloom Diagnostics, Omnitron Sensors and Lunar Station Corp. His read on which technologies matter is filtered through real investment decisions. Range that few speakers credibly hold: climate adaptation, longevity science, the space economy, quantum computing and autonomy. The breadth lets him connect technologies most boards still see as separate silos. Forbes innovation columnist for nearly four years and a Harvard Business Review Advisory Council member. His frameworks have been published and stress-tested in serious commercial venues. Active judge at SXSW Pitch and a Singularity University Smart City Accelerator mentor. He sees the next wave of deep tech startups well before the press cycle catches up. Biography highlights Chair and Managing Partner at Astor Perkins, a New York based deep tech and sustainability venture capital firm. Founder and CEO of Uplifty AI. Author of Strive (Wiley, 2018), endorsed by Tony Robbins; co-author of academic publications with John Wiley & Sons and IGI Global on the Internet of Things and wearable technology security. Forbes innovation columnist, 2019 to 2022; Harvard Business Review Advisory Council member. TEDxRutgers speaker on Strive; co-organiser of TEDxWallStreet; SXSW Pitch judge; Tribeca Disruptor Foundation Fellow; Singularity University Smart City Accelerator mentor. Featured in The New York Times, TIME, Forbes, The Washington Post, WIRED, TechCrunch and Inc. Biography Most boardroom conversations about innovation traffic in the same handful of headline technologies. The deep tech that will actually reshape the next decade is being funded quietly by a much smaller group of investors. Most executive teams have no real view of what they are betting on. Scott Amyx is one of those investors. As Chair and Managing Partner at Astor Perkins, he runs a New York based deep tech and sustainability venture firm. The portfolio backs companies in space logistics, longevity science, climate adaptation and the space economy, including D-Orbit, Brightseed, Bloom Diagnostics, Omnitron Sensors and Lunar Station Corp. Beyond the fund, he writes prolifically. He spent nearly four years as a Forbes innovation columnist and now sits on the Harvard Business Review Advisory Council. His Wiley book Strive, endorsed by Tony Robbins, argues that consistent achievement comes from deliberately seeking discomfort. The thesis traces his own move from impoverished Korean immigrant to deep tech investor. For corporate audiences, the value is specific. Boards routinely struggle to discriminate between technologies that are loud and technologies that are commercially serious. Amyx makes that call on his own balance sheet, with active positions in space logistics, climate technology, longevity science and the broader space economy. Key speaking topics Deep tech and exponential technologies The space economy and frontier markets Climate adaptation and sustainability technology Artificial intelligence and the future of work Innovation strategy for large organisations Longevity and human health technology Venture capital and the next industrial revolution Ideal for Boards and C-suite leadership setting five to ten year strategy under technological uncertainty Chief Innovation Officers, CTOs and Chief Strategy Officers evaluating emerging technology bets Corporate venture capital and M&A teams scoping deep tech partnership or acquisition targets Government agencies and sovereign innovation programmes shaping national technology priorities Audience outcomes A working view of which exponential technologies are commercially serious and which are still speculative A current map of where venture capital is actually placing bets in deep tech A more rigorous lens for board level decisions on technology and capital allocation Specific examples from Astor Perkins portfolio companies that ground abstract trends in real businesses

Why organisations work with Johan Rockstrom He is the originator, not the explainer, of the framework that now sits beneath the TNFD, Science Based Targets and a growing share of corporate climate disclosure. Organisations come to him for the source, not the summary. He connects nine specific Earth systems, from climate to freshwater to biogeochemical flows, to commercial decisions on capital, supply chain and product. Boards leave with a map of which limits actually constrain their business. He carries scientific authority that holds in regulator and investor rooms. The 2024 Tyler Prize, the 2009 Nature paper and the directorship of the Potsdam Institute mean his framing survives external scrutiny. He has spent two decades inside the policy process at Davos, the Club of Rome and UN climate negotiations. He speaks to executives in their language about decisions, trade-offs and time horizons, not in the language of an academic seminar. Biography highlights Director, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK), since 2018 Professor of Earth System Science, University of Potsdam Lead author, “A safe operating space for humanity,” Nature, 2009 Co-founder and former Director, Stockholm Resilience Centre (2004 to 2018) 2024 Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement; German Environmental Prize (2015); International Cosmos Prize (2015); Hillary Laureate (2017); Knight of the Legion of Honour (2016) Co-author, Earth for All: A Survival Guide for Humanity (2022), the report to the Club of Rome marking 50 years since Limits to Growth Biography In 2009, a paper in Nature titled “A safe operating space for humanity” set out nine biophysical systems that keep the planet in the conditions civilisation grew up in. Johan Rockstrom led the team of 28 international scientists behind it. The framework, planetary boundaries, has since become the scientific foundation for the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures, the Science Based Targets Network and a widening set of corporate and regulatory climate frameworks. That work is now the working definition of environmental risk in serious institutions. Boards, central banks and investors increasingly need a defensible answer to the question of where the limits actually lie, and his framework supplies it. The 2024 Tyler Prize for Environmental Achievement, often called the Nobel for the environment, recognised the framework as the field-defining contribution. He directs the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research, one of the leading climate science institutions in Europe, and holds the chair in Earth System Science at the University of Potsdam. Before Potsdam, he co-founded and ran the Stockholm Resilience Centre for fourteen years. He is a co-author of Earth for All, the 2022 report to the Club of Rome that revisits Limits to Growth fifty years on with concrete economic and policy turnarounds. The room he tends to be most useful in is the one where strategy meets disclosure: where leadership has to decide which targets to commit to, which trade-offs to accept and how to justify both to investors and regulators. He is unusually direct about the scale of action required and equally direct about what is still possible inside that window. Key speaking topics Planetary boundaries and Earth system risk Climate tipping points and resilience The science behind ESG, TNFD and Science Based Targets Food, land and water systems within planetary limits Net zero and the energy transition Sustainable economic transformation and the Earth for All agenda Ideal for Boards and executive committees setting climate, nature and ESG strategy under tightening disclosure regimes CSOs, Chief Risk Officers and Chief Sustainability Officers building defensible science-based targets Investors, banks and asset managers integrating climate and nature risk into capital allocation Government, multilateral and policy audiences working on energy, food and land system transitions Audience outcomes A working understanding of the nine planetary boundaries and which ones materially affect their sector A clearer view of how regulatory frameworks (TNFD, SBTN, EU disclosure) trace back to the underlying science A direct read on where global climate and nature trajectories sit relative to scientific safe limits Sharper questions for their own strategy and risk teams about which limits the business actually operates inside A grounded sense of what credible action looks like at the scale and pace the science requires

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

Key speaking topics Human behaviour and artificial intelligence Organisational decision-making in the age of AI Human-centred AI strategy Cultural and behavioural impacts of emerging technologies Scenario planning and simulation for technology strategy AI and organisational transformation Data, culture, and organisational change Ideal for Senior leaders responsible for technology and digital strategy Organisations navigating AI adoption and transformation Technology and innovation conferences Corporate audiences exploring the human impact of AI Audience outcomes Clearer understanding of how AI affects human behaviour and organisational dynamics Practical perspectives on human-centred approaches to AI strategy Frameworks for interpreting cultural and behavioural shifts driven by technology Insight into scenario planning and simulation approaches for strategic decision-making Why organisations work with Ali Rebaie Combines AI analysis with human-science perspectives on behaviour and culture. Helps leaders interpret the organisational and societal implications of emerging technologies. Provides structured thinking on AI strategy, scenario planning, and decision-making. Brings international conference speaking experience across technology and industry contexts. Biography Ali Rebaie advises organisations on how artificial intelligence is reshaping human behaviour, culture, and decision-making inside modern enterprises. His work focuses on helping leaders interpret the organisational implications of AI and apply human-centred thinking to technology strategy. He is the Founder and President of Rebaie Analytics Group, a research and management consulting firm that explores the intersection of AI, human science, and organisational systems. Through this work, he supports organisations with AI strategy, scenario planning, and approaches designed to place human behaviour and cultural dynamics at the centre of technological change. Ali’s perspective combines analysis of emerging technologies with insights drawn from the study of culture, behaviour, and social systems. His work examines how organisations adapt to AI-driven disruption and how leaders can better understand the human factors that influence technology adoption and strategic decision-making. Alongside his advisory work, Ali contributes to education and training initiatives in the data and AI ecosystem. As a Senior School of Data fellow, he has delivered workshops and learning programmes focused on data and digital capability. He is also an international keynote speaker at technology and industry events, where he explores the relationship between artificial intelligence, organisational behaviour, and strategic decision-making. His speaking engagements include a presentation at Hannover Messe, one of the world’s major industrial technology exhibitions.