INTERNATIONAL SPEAKERS FROM 2018
Frédérick Bordry
Director of Technology,
CERN
Since 2014 Frédérick Bordry acts as the Director for Accelerators and Technology, where he is responsible for the operation and exploitation of the whole CERN (European Organization for Nuclear Research) accelerator complex, with particular emphasis on the LHC and for the development of new projects and technologies.
His strategic focus is to make sure that the CERN accelerator’s technologies will stay ahead of the technological curve beyond 2040.
Jeffrey Franks
Director,
International Monetary Fund
Europe
Jeffrey Franks is Director of the IMF Europe Office and Senior Resident Representative to the European Union, based in Brussels.
A 25-year veteran of the Fund, he has held numerous other assignments, including heading the resident offices, and leading teams in several countries.
He received his Ph.D. in Political Economy and Government from Harvard, and has Master’s degrees from Princeton and Oxford universities.
Tomas Petricek
Minister of Foreign Affairs,
Czech Republic
GABRIEL EICHLER
Founder & Member of Advisory Board,
Benson Oak Capital
Mr Gabriel Eichler is the Chairman of the Supervisory Board at MONETA Money Bank, a.s.
He serves as Member of Advisory Board at Benson Oak Capital which he founded in 1991. Former positions of Mr Eichler include Chief International Economist of Bank of America, and regional General Manager for Bank of America in Paris, Vienna, and Frankfurt.
ESTHER NAKAJJIGO
Global Young Leader for Women & Migration
Founder, Reality TV show “Saving Innocence Challenge”
At 17, Esther Nakajjigo was named Uganda's Ambassador for Women and Girls.
She donated her university tuition and started a community health facility with a Teenage Centre supporting child mothers. She owns a popular reality television show on teenage pregnancy called “Saving Innocence Challenge” applauded by EU in Uganda as one of the best self-sustaining girl-lead models in the world, championed as well as financed by local girls for local girls
THOMAS ROCA
Data Strategist and Economist,
Microsoft & LinkedIn
Thomas Roca is Data Strategist and Economist at Microsoft & LinkedIn within the Government Affairs team.
Thomas conducts economic research about the future of work, the impact of Artificial Intelligence and automation on the labor market.
His favorite field of research is at the cross roads between data-science and socio-economic analysis.
Thomas gives data-training for the United Nation System Staff College in collaboration with Data-Pop Alliance (ODI, MIT media Lab, Harvard HHI)
ViKtoria Li
Swedish Ambassador
to the Czech Republic
ROBERT-JAN SMITS
Senior Adviser for
Open Access and Innovation
Robert-Jan Smits was Director-General of DG Research and Innovation (RTD) at the European Commission from July 2010 to February 2018.
In this capacity he was responsible for defining and implementing the EU policy and programmes in the field of research and innovation.
Mr Smits was one of the main architects and negotiators of Horizon 2020, the 80 billion EU programme for science and innovation (2014-2020).
SHMUEL BAR
Founder, Chairman of the Board & Chief Executive Officer, IntuView Ltd
Dr. Shmuel Bar founded IntuView Ltd in 2005 and serves as its Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer.
Dr. Bar served for thirty years in the Israeli government, first in the IDF Intelligence and then in the Israeli Office of the Prime Minister. Since the mid 1980's he specialized in the ideology and operational codes of Islamic fundamentalist movements and particularly of the Jihadi movement that later evolved into al-Qaeda.
Gabriela Svarovska is the Deputy Director of the Prague Civil Society Centre and head of the Grants Programme.
She has worked in politics, civil society and journalism in the Czech Republic and EU for more than 20 years, including as human rights director for the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs and in the Office of President Václav Havel.
GABRIELA SVAROVSKA
Deputy Director,
Prague Civil Society Centre
Tony Curzon Price
Economic Advisor to the Rt Hon Greg Clark MP, Secretary of State for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy
Robert Kvile
Ambassador of Noway
to the Czech Republic
Barbora Buhnova
Associate Professor
Masaryk University
Barbora Buhnova is an Associate Professor at Masaryk University (MU) in Brno, leading multiple research teams at both the Faculty of Informatics of MU (software architecture, critical infrastructures, smart cities) and the Institute of Computer Science of MU (big data analytics). Serving in the Academic Senate, she organizes leading conferences around the globe.
She is the Technology and Course Development director of the Czechitas.A non-profit organization , which aims to inspire and empower new talents for stronger diversity in tech.
Carlos Alvarez Pereira
Founder & President,
Innaxis Foundation & Research Institute
An entrepreneur in IT consulting and former researcher in systems dynamics, Carlos Alvarez Pereira created Innaxis to address complexity as a paradigm shift in civilization to jointly serve humanity and the biosphere.
In addition to his role as the founder of the Innaxis Foundation and Research Institute, Carlos is also a Member of the Board of the Club of Rome, an organization that strives to promote understanding of global challenges and proposes solutions through scientific analysis, communication, and advocacy.
IaIN Begg
Professor, London School of Economics, leading European expert on economic governance
DAVID WELCH
Professor of Political Science at the University of Waterloo
David A. Welch is CIGI Chair of Global Security at the Balsillie School of International Affairs, Professor of Political Science at the University of Waterloo.
Mr Welch is also Senior Fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation, where he has recently been working on Asia-Pacific
Mr. Karel Janecek, MBA, Ph.D. serves as Chief Executive Officer of RSJ: From 1998 to 2000, he worked for a hedge fund Market Research, Ltd. as a mathematical analyst. He teaches graduate courses in Financial Mathematics for the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics at Charles University Mr. Janecek is a Ph.D. graduate in the field of Mathematical Finance at Carnegie Mellon University.
He graduated from the Faculty of Mathematics and Physics of Charles University in the field of Probability and Mathematical Statistics. He also holds an MBA in finance from Bradley University.
Karel Janecek
Founder,
Institute for Democracy 21 &
Neuron Fund
bohumil kartous
Head of Communications & Analyst,
EDUin
Dominik stroukal
Economist &
Expert on Cryptocurrency
Dominik Stroukal is and is a Chief Economist at Roklen, Czech financial group. He is a former director of Liberální institut, the first Czech (and Slovak) classically liberal think-tank, and a former president of the Czech and Slovak Ludwig von Mises Institute. He holds a Ph.D. in Economic Theories and MA in Economic Analysis at the University of Economics, and MA in Media Studies at Charles University, both in Prague, Czech Republic. He is a lecturer at the CEVRO Institute University. He taught at University of Finance and Administration, University of Economics in Prague and at two high schools.
Jinelle piereder
Waterloo Institute for Complexity and Innovation
Jinelle Piereder is a PhD candidate in Global Governance at the Balsillie School of International Affairs (BSIA), specializing in conflict and security.
Supervised by Dr. Thomas Homer-Dixon, Jinelle works within the Ideological Conflict Project based at the School. Using approaches and tools from complexity science, her research focuses on the role(s) of ideological conflict in global governance around arms trade/control and climate change.
Ronen Palan, Professor of International Political Economy, City University London is the author of several books and articles on topics ranging from offshore to evolutionary theory.
Books include The Offshore World: Sovereign Markets, Virtual Places and Nomad Millionaires (Cornell 2003), Tax Havens: How Globalization Really Works (with Richard Murphy and Christian Chavagneux (Cornell 2010).
Ronen Palan
Professor of International
Political Economy,
City University London
Andrew Thompson
Global Governance Program Officer,
Basillie School of International Affairs,
University of Waterloo, Canada
Andrew S. Thompson is adjunct assistant professor of political science at the University of Waterloo, senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation, and the program officer for the global governance programs at the Balsillie School of International Affairs.
He holds a Ph.D. in history from the University of Waterloo, and is a specialist in the fields of international human rights, civil society movements and fragile states.
ANNA SHAVIT
Anna Shavit is head of the Department of Marketing communication and public relations, Faculty of Social Sciences, Charles University in Prague. Her specialization includes areas such as political and electoral marketing in the Czech Republic and worldwide.
She also deals with the development of the electoral campaign, the government’s communications and public affairs. In 2007 she worked as a volunteer in the campaign of Hillary Clinton, in 2011 she participated in the campaign of candidate for mayor of San Francisco, Tony Hall.
Head of Marketing, Communication & Public Relations,
Charles University in Prague
Jiri Schneider
Deputy Director,
Prague Civil Society Centre
Jiri Schneider is the Executive Director of Aspen Institute Central Europe.
Between 1990 and 1992, Mr Schneider served as a Member of Czechoslovak Parliament. In 1995, he became
Czech Ambassador to Israel until 1998.
Between 2010 and 2014, Mr Schneider served as First Deputy Foreign Minister of the Czech Republic.
He graduated at The Czech Technical University (ČVUT) and obtained a Diploma in Religious Studies from University of Cambridge.
Oldrich Bures
Founding Director,
Center for Security Studies
Oldrich Bures is the founding director of the Center for Security Studies and Professor of International Political Relations at Metropolitan University Prague.
He was previously a senior lecturer at Palacky University, a Fulbright Fellow at the Joan. B. Kroc Institute, University of Notre Dame, and an External Research Fellow at the Centre for European Security, School of English, Sociology, Politics & Contemporary History, University of Salford.
Johann Cas
Institute of Technology Assessment of the Austrian Academy of Sciences
Johann Čas is an economist with a technical background.
His current research focus is on artificial intelligence, data protection and privacy in the information society, security and surveillance, and assistive technologies with a particular focus on societal impacts and compliance with fundamental rights and values. He is also acting as ethics reviewer and advisor of research proposals and projects.
Josef urban
Principal Researcher,
Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics (CIIRC)
Joseh Urban is a Principal Researcher at the Czech Institute of Informatics, Robotics and Cybernetics (CIIRC) of the Czech Technical University in Prague where he is heading the ERC-funded project AI4REASON. His interests include Automated Reasoning, Formal Verification and Machine Learning.
In particular, he is interested in development of combined inductive/learning and deductive/reasoning "strong AI" methods and systems over large formal (fully semantically specified) knowledge bases.
Joerg Forbig
Director,
Fund for Belarus Democracy
Dr. Joerg Forbrig is a senior transatlantic fellow for Central and Eastern Europe, and director of the Fund for Belarus Democracy. Based in GMF's office in Berlin, he leads the organization's efforts to assist civil society in Belarus, while his analytical and policy work focuses on Europe's East broadly, including the new member countries of the European Union and the EU's Eastern neighborhood.
Prior to joining GMF in 2002, Forbrig worked as a Robert Bosch Foundation fellow at the Center for International Relations in Warsaw, Poland.
Wojciech Przybylski
Editor-in-Chief, Visegrad Insight
Chairman, Res Publica Foundation in Vienna
Wojciech Przybylski is the editor-in-chief of Visegrad Insight and chairman of Res Publica Foundation in Warsaw. Previously he was the editor-in-chief of Eurozine - a magazine representing a network of European cultural journals, and - a Polish journal Res Publica Nowa.
In 2014 he has launched and leads the 'New Europe 100' project that is networking and bringing forward a community of successful innovators from CEE across the fields of business, research media, NGO and public administration run jointly by Res Publica, Financial Times and Google. He is a member of the advisory board of the European Forum of New Ideas and the European Digital Forum.
Madeleine Boem
Research Associate,
Department of International Relations, University of Erfurt
Madeleine Boehm is a PhD candidate at the department of International Relations at the University of Erfurt. After having completed a Master’s degree in Freiburg, Cape Town and Delhi, she is now working on understanding how International Political Economy deals with technologies and how technologies change labour on a global level.
Her research interests include International Political Economy, International Relations Theory, Labour Economics and Labour Sociology and Technologies
Marek Havrda
Strategic Advisor,
GoodAI
Jukka Pesola
Finnish Ambassador
to Czech Republic
Tomas Sedlacek
Author of Economics of Good and Evil
philosopher of economics
Tomáš Sedláček is a Czech economist and university lecturer.
He is the Chief Macroeconomic Strategist at ČSOB, a former member of the National Economic Council of the Czech Republic and an economic advisor to former President Václav Havel.
Frantisek Sulc
Army and Defence Expert
Seth Adler is the Editor of the AI Network and host of the AI Network Podcast, part of IQPC's flagship podcast series, B2BiQ. Seth aims to provide a pithy, sharp and entertaining peek into this fast-growing sector through the personal experiences of senior execs that are driving extraordinary change within their organizations
Seth Adler
Editor,
Artificial Intelligence Network
Maksym Kyiak is a Doctor of Philosophy, a Deputy Director in the Central European Institute and a Co-Founder of the “Global Ukrainians”, a worldwide network of public diplomats.
He worked at various academic and governmental institutions in Ukraine and abroad. He has represented Ukraine at the CAHROM Committee in the Council of Europe and one of the co-authors of the research of the NATO StratCom COE on a role of humor in strategic communications `StratCom laughs: in search of an analytical framework`. Maksym is also working on his postdoctoral research on information society and its influence on religious processes.
Maksym Kyiak
Deputy Director, Co-founder,
Central European Institute, Global Ukranians
teresa raiter
Security Consultant,
NEOS
Teresa Reiter is a policy advisor for the Austrian liberal party, NEOS. She covers foreign policy, European affairs, defence and development. Previously, she worked as a journalist focussing on the Western Balkans region. Teresa graduated from the Diplomatic Academy of Vienna and Kingston University in London and holds degrees in German language and literature, international affairs and journalism.
rory field
CEO,
ViennEast
Rory Field lives in Vienna and is C.E.O. of ViennEast Ltd, a business
intelligence, due diligence and risk advisory consultancy, focused on the
Central and Eastern European region but with global reach.
Rory was Director of Public Prosecutions (D.P.P.) of Bermuda (2007-2016),
Legal Advisor on Organized Crime for the O.S.C.E. in Serbia (2003-2007)
and D.P.P. of Belize (1999-2001). He is a barrister specialized in criminal
law who was called to the Bar in 1980 and is a door tenant of 15 New Bridge
Street Chambers, London. Rory is also a certified civil and commercial
mediator.
Marcus How is the head of research and analysis. He studied at the University of Nottingham and Kings College London, ultimately obtaining a Masters in International Political Economy. He has seven years of experience in the political risk sector, which included working at a leading information consultancy in London. He is specialised in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) generally but with particular expertise in Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Romania and Ukraine.
Marcus how
Head of Research & Analysis,
ViennEast
Brady Hills currently manages operations and ICT related components at the International Republican Institutes Beacon Project, which examines the nexus of disinformation & other forms of hostile influence, democratic governance in Europe. He currently holds a Bachelor’s degree from Arizona State University and a Masters in Philosophy from the Trinity College in Dublin.
brady hills
Programme Officer,
International Republican Institute
alena vranova
ex-CEO,
Satoshi Lab
jonas Syrovatka
Security Analyst,
Prague Security Studies Institute
Jonáš Syrovátka is a Program Manager at PSSI, working primarily on projects concerning Russian influence activities in the Czech Republic. He holds a Master's degree in Political Science and International Relations from the Masaryk University in Brno.
During his undergraduate studies he focused on the development of Russian political system and its history.
Lukáš Kovanda, Ph.D., is a Czech economist and author focusing on economic literature, and is Chief Economist at CZECH FUND. His work there includes analyzing and commenting on macroeconomic issues, investments, and emerging phenomena such as sharing economy, cryptocurrencies and fintechs.He is a Department of Economics lecturer at the University of Economics in Prague and is a member of the Scientific Board of the Czech Banking Association. He has published two collections of interviews with Nobel laureates and other prominent economists.
lukas kovanda
Chief Economist,
Czech Fund
Jan Capek
CEO,
Braiins
As the CEO of Braiins, Jan Capek runs the company which has been operating the very first Bitcoin mining pool - Slush Pool - since 2013, and is also behind Braiiins OS, the very first open-source software for cryptocurrency mining devices.
tomas sedlacek
Chief Economist Strategist,
CSOB
Author of Economics of Good and Evil, philosopher of economics Tomas Sedlacek gained international fame for his award-winning, bestselling book "Economics of Good and Evil: The Quest for Economic Meaning from Gilgamesh to Wall Street". He was listed among the top 100 most influential global thinkers (Top 100 Thought Leaders, GDI). Born in 1977 in Prague, Sedlacek became, at the age of 24, an economic advisor of Czech president Václav Havel. He currently works as a chief macroeconomic strategist at Czech commercial bank CSOB.
Jan Koukal
Jiri skuhrovec
President,
EconLab
Expert on both big and small data on public investments. Jiri Skuhrovec team extracts information on public procurement of all EU, bringing novel insights and approaches into this largely rigid field. In award-winning zindex.cz he benchmarks procurement performance of cities and government offices to motivate their improvement. Their current work should soon shed light on major portion of EU tenders awarded to tax-haven based companies.
jan lukacevic
Research Assistant,
Academy of Science
vladimir marik
Founder,
CIIRC & Neuron
Tomáš Strážay, PhD works as a Senior Fellow and Head of the Central and Southeastern Europe Research Program at the Slovak Foreign Policy Association (SFPA), Bratislava, Slovakia. He is a leading expert in the projects focusing on regional cooperation in Central Europe and EU enlargement. Since 2007 he has cooperated with the European Economic and Social Committee, Committee of the Regions and European Parliament as an expert advisor to the rapporteurs/author of briefing notes.
tomas strazay
Senior Researcher,
SFPA
Roland Galharague
French Ambassador
to Czech Republic
Graduate of the Ecole Normale Supérieure, a graduate of advanced studies in history of the School of Advanced Studies in Social Sciences, Roland Galharague was first secretary at the Embassy of France in Washington (1996-1999), head of the press service and spokesperson of the French Embassy in London, second in command of the French Embassy in South Africa, and Ambassador of France in Budapest. In Paris, he was notably Deputy Director of the Center for Analysis and Forecasting, Director of Continental Europe, Deputy Director General of Political Affairs and Security at the Quai d'Orsay.