Paul Coelen is currently responsible for shaping and deploying the innovation processes in Signify, previously named Philips Lighting. Paul has more than 25 years of experience in innovation, including software and systems development, development outsourcing, supply base management, R&D management, and business process management. Paul holds a master’s degree in computer science from the Eindhoven University of Technology.

Stephan is a professor in strategic management & business development at the Univer­sity of Applied Sciences, Mannheim Germany. Stephan is senior manager for strategic innovation management at BASF SE, where he focuses on supporting the organisation in developing and improving effectiveness and efficiency in planning and implementa­tion for innovation excellence. After holding positions in R&D, business development, business management, strategic planning and controlling as well as innovation manage­ment, he is dedicated to creating value with individual people and organizations as a whole in an effort to making BASF more successful at creating profitable growth from innovation in different business environments. Stephan is also a professor at the Univer­sity of Applied Sciences, where he teaches international innovation and technology and general management with focus on key principles for strategic planning and operational implementation. He is also responsible for developing a new international study program in applied engineering & management dedicated to teaching competencies anticipated for the University’s graduates in 2025 and beyond. His research is focused on how to create and operate open virtual innovation players successfully. Stephan holds a Ph.D. in biophysics from EMBL, Heidelberg and University of Ulm and a masters in physics and economics from the University of Heidelberg. He is also an honorary professor at University of Ulm, Germany.

Alessandro Zedda is VP of R&D for Saint Gobain Performance Plastics (USA and France) and leads an R&D organisation with a few hundred researchers and engineers distributed over 3 continents. He worked as VP of material development for Konarka Technologies in USA, senior manager printed elec­tronics for BASF Future Business, and R&D director for the BU electronics ma­terials at Ciba Specialty Chemicals in Switzerland. He has held other positions always in R&D and new business development in Ciba and Ausimont in Italy.

He holds a master’s degree in physics and a Ph.D. in computer science. Lazos started with Siemens in 1998 in the telecommunication and later in the rail­way signaling business. Different positions in the R&D field include: systems engineering, system testing, product reliability and safety design and R&D process management. Current position: Heading the R&D department for vi­tal computer systems and railway signaling components including platform product management and strategy.

Dr. Claudia Hundeiker is corporate director international R&D oral care, skin care, advanced research biology & fragrance coordination at Henkel Beauty Care and lecturer at the Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Applied Sciences, Lemgo, Germany. She has been working in Henkel since 2009 as corporate director R&D biological & clinical research, cosmetics & toiletries, corporate director international R&D oral care & fragrance coordination, cosmetics & toiletries, and corporate director international R&D oral care, skin care & fra­grance coordination, beauty care. She held other positions always related to R&D in Henkel and Phenion.

Dr. Wim van der Meer (age 59) graduated in theoretical and physical chem­istry and subsequently obtained a Ph.D. in experimental physics. He joined Tata Steel in 1987 and initially held various positions in R&D. Between 2000 and 2010, a number of positions were held in various Tata business entities. These varied from continuous improvement manager to director strategy and product market development for one of the business units, and in a later stage business development director for the Strip Products Division. Around 2010 a move back to R&D was made, to pick up the role of director programmes R&D for Tata Steel in Europe. In this role, the main responsibility is to ensure strategic alignment of the R&D portfolio with the immediate as well as the longer term development needs of the company.

Pree Kolari is a UX executive, product designer, engineer, entrepreneur, cy­clist, beekeeper, and dad of 2 amazing girls. He has a history of shipping innovative consumer and mobile products like the eBay 5.0 mobile app, Moto 360, Moto G, Windows Phone 7 & XBox Kinect. He uses design thinking and user centered design to define the core product vision and deliver compelling user experiences. Currently, Pree is a senior director of design research and strategy at eBay. Previously, Pree was at Google/Motorola heading up the design research team and at Microsoft as innovation strategist and UX director working on the first version of Xbox Kinect. He was also VP at SonicRim. He co-founded MemeTales which went on to be one of the featured apps on the Apple app store and had about half a million downloads.

Lionel Schilli is responsible for the non-clinical research program management office (PMO) at Philip Morris International Biomedical R&D. Initially trained as an earth scientist, he holds a EMBA from HEC Lausanne University. He has man¬aged global projects in different business areas such as construction, environ¬mental engineering, quality and safety assurance, new product de­velopment and supply chain. In last 7 years, he has established the non-clin­ical research PMO and worked cross-functionally with product development & innovation, operations and marketing. With his team of project managers, he managed large multi-years non-clinical and clinical research studies. More specifically, he is responsible for the outsourcing and relationships with exter­nal partners such as CROs, universities, startups and consulting firms.

Michal Dunaj holds a Ph.D. in management of innovation, with a focus on net­worked R&D, and innovation barriers, and approaches used against those bar­riers. He leads small and agile European operations and exploration team at Telekom Innovation Laboratories (T-Labs), a central go-to-point for research and exploration in the Deutsche Telekom Group. They build cutting - edge EU Labs Program – the connected applied R&D network for Deutsche Telekom EU footprint countries. Their passion is exploration of emerging topics and pro­totypes for T-Labs. He is interested in creative leadership in order to set the innovation teams apart from average. Michal is committed to unconventional exploration of new fields. One example is ‘Extreme Exploration’, by design­ing an extreme case, develop a product, and discover benefit for every user. Ideas worthy of further thinking are e.g. social robots for blind people could be used by all users, exoskeletons developed for disabled people could help everybody walking in challenging environments, non-invasive brain-computer interface could improve the smart home experience for all, and etc.

Dr. Flohr holds a diploma and a Ph.D. in biology with focus on molecular oncol­ogy and molecular pathology and he was a postdoctoral research assistant at Sanofi-Aventis GmbH in the department ‘Genomic Sciences’, Laboratory ‘Mo­lecular Pathology’ from 2004 - 2006. He joined Roche Diagnostics GmbH in 2006 as a project manager in the pharmaceutical division, global department ‘Translational Research Sciences, Core Competence Center Histopathology and Tissue Biomarker’. Since 2011, he is an innovation & IP project manager in the Roche Diagnostic Division, Centralized and Point of Care Solutions, De­partment ‘Innovation & IP Management’. He is certified in ‘Theory of Inventive Problem Solving’ (TRIZ) - Level 3.

Arjan Rensma holds a master’s degree in strategic & marketing management at Erasmus University Rotterdam, in 1994. Currently, he is the manager in­novation excellence material sciences cluster and Bell Mason practitioner (cor­porate venturing) at DSM Innovation Center, member Advisory Board Master Innovation & Change, and guest lecturer at Hogeschool Zuyd and board mem­ber of Interregional Platform Creative Industry/Creative Entrepreneurship.

After 15 years (1992 – 2007) in Ansaldo Ricerche (Finmeccanica group), where he spent all his career in R&D covering from time by time the role of process engineer, project engineer, and project manager in the field of innovation in waste/biomass to energy processes, in 2008 he joined Süd- Chemie (now owned by Clariant), being appointed as R&D project leader for innovative selective oxidation catalysts. In 2010, he was assigned the task to establish a project management office (PMO) within the R&D function of busi­ness unit catalysts unit of Clariant, with the mission to establish a project and portfolio management system and with the direct responsibility of managing strategic, complex, and multisite projects. In July 2014, he joined Clariant innovation excellence as Innovation Master Black Belt. Clariant Innovation Ex­cellence is a key corporate initiative to strengthen Clariant’s innovation capa­bilities by providing innovation process blueprints and by building capabilities to translate knowledge into innovations. A small central team of Innovation Master Black Belts supports innovation projects with all the business units to ensure a crossbusiness perspective.

Johan Sanders has worked in the food industry in the field of R&D and in­novation in various functions, companies, and product categories. He started his career in Unilever working in the Netherlands and UK in developing and managing various development projects, R&D projects, and organisational projects in bakery, culinary products, and tea. In Saralee’s coffee division, he worked in both R&D and marketing roles focused on innovation. In these roles, he was heavily involved in setting up and improving the innovation pro­cess. In his current role at Dawn foods, he leads the VP global R&D innovation and category management.

R&D and innovation enthusiast, working at the Competence Center R&D Man­agement of the Fraunhofer Institute for Industrial Engineering IAO at the forefront of applied research, since the year 2002. While continuously ap­plying the toolbox of strategic R&D and technology management in interna­tional consulting projects with industry, his involvement in research projects provides a playground for the continuous questioning and improvement of existing methodologies. His current activities involve the interlinkage between scenarios and roadmapping as well as the identification, evaluation, and inte­gration of potentially disruptive innovations.