Abhijit Thosar is a design executive with a focus on design thinking to transform customer and enterprise experience. Over two decades, Abhijit has worked across continents, cultures and industries to help Fortune 100 brands innovate on product and service experiences, deliver business value and differentiate in the marketplace. Abhijit uses research to reframe problems, data to gain insights and design to simplify complexity. Many of his projects have won industry awards and recognition in global markets for their measurable impact on cus­tomer experience and underlying business metrics. Abhijit has built and led large global design teams of digital strategists, researchers, UX designers, creative directors, data scien­tists and UI engineers. He has conducted many workshops on design thinking across North America, Europe and Asia. He has been an early adopter and evangelist of agile product design using Lean UX. Abhijit currently leads a design thinking and innovation practice at the Bank of the West (BNP Paribas). His role involves reimagining customer journeys across lines of businesses and create a customer-centric culture of innovation at the bank. Abhijit is based in San Francisco Bay Area.

Frank Möbius was responsible for Technology Scouting and Forecast within the BMW Technology Office Munich until the end of June this year. His task was to identify, analyse and assess new technology trends from cross industry and science and ensure their successful embedment within the BMW Group. Collaborating closely with all international BMW Tech Offices, the BMW Startup Garage and the BMW R&D departments, he was the central technology matchmaker between external innovation sources and the needs of his internal R&D partners.
After leaving his active role at BMW Group, he is now senior innovation advisor at UnternehmerTUM GmbH, Europe’s biggest entrepreneurship centre.
Before that he was responsible for series development of high voltage batteries and the industrialisation of batteries and electric engines at BMW Group for more than 10 years.
Frank holds a diploma in mechanical engineering from the University of Stuttgart and received his doctorate at the University of Kaiserslautern in production automation and robotics.

Raghavendra is General Manager/Head-Innovation Strategies and Business Ecosystem at Robert Bosch Technical and Business Solutions, GmBH Germany. He is currently responsible for application of new technologies like Blockchain, AI and Analytics for new Businesses. His responsibilities include developing new markets at the intersections of new Technology and Environment trends. Senior Technology leader with Global experiences of working across Multiple Sectors (Automotive-Diagnostics, Infotainment, Embedded lifecycle management, Space research, Sales and Marketing other) in Germany, Brazil, Japan, China and India for more than 15 years. Proven track record of concept-to-product development in the Telemat­ics, Diagnostics, and Engineering Measurement data management. Expertise in mobilizing and leading large cross-functional teams, conducting market research, developing business relevant innovation models and acquisition-to-delivery of large global projects. Adept at handling global delivery, creating and implementing strategic initiatives to augment scope of business and growth, establishing ODCs and centers of competence. Expertise in mobiliz­ing and leading large cross-functional teams, conducting market research, developing busi­ness relevant innovation models and acquisition-to-delivery of large global projects. Prior to joining Bosch, Raghavendra has served in Wipro Technologies and Indian Space Research Organization as a Scientist.

Alex Goryachev is an entrepreneurial go-getter who loves blazing new trails for innovation. Over the past 20 years, he’s turned disruptive concepts into emerging business models. As Cisco’s managing director of innovation strategy and programs, Alex spearheads programs inspiring all employees to share their big ideas, many of which the company helps to co-develop. He also carries the torch for co-innovation across the company’s partner ecosystem via Cisco’s Innovation Centers and Grand Challenges. And he oversees Cisco Technology Ra­dar to spot emerging technology transitions. Prior to joining Cisco in 2004, Alex consulted at Napster, Liquid Audio, IBM Global Services and Pfizer Pharmaceuticals. Alex was the “Emerg­ing Stars” Gold winner of Brandon Hall Group’s 2016 Human Capital Management Excellence Awards, and his organisation also won golds for best “Innovative Talent Management” and “Employee Engagement” programs. Alex has a passion for sharing knowledge.

Hans Vossen joined the DSM Innovation Center as vice president of finance in 2014. The DSM Innovation Center was set up in 2006 to help facilitate the company’s strategic transi­tion toward an intrinsically innovative organisation. It serves as an enabler and accelerator of innovation within DSM. In addition to its emerging business areas in biomedical materials, bio-based product and services, advanced aolar and the DSM Business Incubator, the DSM Innovation Center has a general business development role, focussing on areas outside the current scope of the DSM business groups. Hans has held various roles in DSM in finance and control, strategy and planning, M&A, head of investor relations and VP of treasury. He started his career at KPMG.

Laura Nuhaan is passionate about innovation and the opportunities of tech. As an executive digital advisor at Microsoft she helps companies and executives taking full advantage of digital opportunities aligning business, IT and research to come with better results and ac­celerate execution. Before as a partner at The Andeta Group she worked with management to redefine (sales) strategies and transform their sales organizations to the digital world of today. Laura has worked in Silicon Valley for 10 years before returning to Europe in 2011. She has been the driving force behind several start-up companies across many industries in Europe and Silicon Valley. As founder of the first sales-management focused consulting company in the Netherlands, She developed a wide range of methodologies such as bench­marking for sales. She is the author of various publications, such as the book Sales-Balanced Score Card and Social Selling.

Curtis Carson is the Head of Engineering Development System (Process, Methods, Tools, Performance and Improvement) @ Airbus Defense and Space. Holder of an engineering degree from Ryerson Polytechnic University in Canada, Curtis has extensive international experience in both the aerospace and automotive industries. Curtis’ new role since July 2017 covers transforming and integrating processes, implementing model based methods and Agile, driving interconnection of digital design tools across the diverse and rich engineer­ing landscape of Airbus Defense and Space. Curtis previous roles have enabled bringing to life forward thinking projects in the framework of the “Industry 4.0” revolution, Internet of things, advanced automation and digitalization.

Dr. Daniel Witthaut is Head of Corporate Innovation Strategy at Evonik Industries AG. Prior to his current role he has worked several years as a Vice President in building up and leading the New Business Development Department for the former Advanced Intermediates Business Unit of Evonik. Daniel has more than 19 years of professional experience in Innovation, Strategic Controlling, and Strategy functions in different areas of the chemical industry and has lived 7years in diverse cultures (USA, Germany, China, Singapore). Daniel holds a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of Münster, Germany (with summa cum laude), and a MBA from the University of Chicago, USA (with High Honours). He is member (Vice President) of the Board of the European Industries Research Association (EIRMA), a lecturer at the TU Munich School of Business on “Strategic Innovation Management” and contributor to blogs and books on Innovation Management and New Business Development.

Nina van Krimpen is an experienced Optimization Manager with a demonstrated history in process mining, improvement and standardization. Skilled in Business Process Analytics, RPA use case generation, defining and rolling out end to end process best practice.

After founding a startup working on 3D scanning technology for Virtual Reality applications in the entertainment sector, Florian Couret moved over to the real estate world and now works at BNP Paribas Real Estate. He is currently in charge of developing, in conjunction with various technology providers, a XR platform for remote sales of real estate, both ex­ist- ing and under development.

After graduating in industrial engineering and innovation management, Shéhérazade Benzerga has taken several positions to support the Digital Transformation of traditional industry companies and NGO’s. She worked in several fields like IT, transport, and logistics, as well as strategy and corporate functions. In her current position, she is responsible for developing and implementing the digital transformation strategy and the innovations linked to this process for the legal, compliance, and integrity board of management.

Sven Grüneberg is a R&D LEAN Performance Manager who helps Research & Develop­ment professionals to improve their way of working with LEAN and Operational Excellence Methods. Before starting into the LEAN & Operational Excellence Business, Sven spent 15 years as a R&D Site Administration Officer and a Computational Chemist (Researcher). After a successful career supporting R&D Functions with any contractual, procurement and ac­counting needs and supporting many research projects with computational methods for drug discovery, Sven now consults & trains them on how to get processes optimized. Sven enjoys trying new sports, running DIY projects and spending time with his family.

Srinivas ‘Srini’ Siripurapu received his Doctor of Philosophy in Chemical Engineering from NC State University. His graduate research focused on polymer blends and alloys, structure property relationships of polymers, polymer rheology, nanomaterials and supercritical fluids. Srini joined General Electric Company after graduating from NC State and held multiple roles of increasing responsibility in product development and technology innovation. He served as their Global Product Technology Manager for the Specialty Polycarbonates Business. While at GE, he completed his Design for Lean Six Sigma Black Belt Certification. He moved to Gen­eral Cable Corporation and went on to serve as Vice President of Global Technology with re­sponsibility for the Research & Development and Engineering functions of the company. Srini currently serves as Chief R&D Officer of Prysmian Group the world leader in the energy and telecom cable systems industry. In his current role he is responsible for the company’s world wide R&D strategy, R&D talent development and Innovation pipeline. Srini has a proven track record of building high performance teams and successful customer driven innovations in Energy, Electrical Infrastructure, Communications, Automotive, Aerospace, Healthcare and Consumer Electronics market segments. Srini is active in industry organizations such as Society of Plastics Engineers, American Chemical Society and National Science Foundation IUCRCs. He mentors young scientists and engineers through these professional organiza­tions. He is an inventor on over 50 patent applications and holds 27 granted US patents.

After the studies of business administration at HTWG Constance, Oliver Hirschfelder has taken over several positions in the field of strategy, business development and R&D con­trolling. In his current position Oliver is responsible to identify and assess new business opportunities as well as implementing of new business models.