Paul McDonagh-Forde

Assistant Commissioner

Irish Data Protection Commission

Ireland

Paul McDonagh-Forde is the Irish Data Protection Commission’s Brussels-based Attaché. He leads the DPC’s interactions in Brussels with a wide variety of organisations, including the European Commission, the European Data Protection Board and the European Parliament, as well as civil society organisations and regulated entities that have a presence in Brussels.
Having first joined the DPC as a member of the legal unit in 2019, Paul has advised primarily on large scale cross-border regulation, with a focus both on Irish and EU law, in his capacity as an Irish-qualified barrister. He also has extensive experience of engagement with a variety of expert sub-groups within the European Data Protection Board, including procedures that have given rise to opinions, guidelines and binding decisions.
Paul holds an LL.B from Trinity College Dublin, an LL.M from the University of Edinburgh and a Barrister-at-law degree from the King’s Inns in Dublin. Prior to joining the DPC, Paul worked as a judicial assistant/clerk at the Supreme Court of Ireland.

Nicole Büttner

CEO and Founder

Merantix Momentum

Germany

Nicole Büttner is an AI entrepreneur, investor and board member. She is the founder of Merantix Momentum and member of the management board of Merantix, Digital Leader at the WEF, and was selected twice as 40 under 40 by Capital Magazine. She sits on the supervisory boards of several companies and associations and is Vice-President of  the German Startup Association. She has worked as a hedge fund portfolio manager and led global business development for Auctionomics, Nobel Prize winner Paul Milgrom’s firm. Nicole trained in econometrics at St.Gallen, Stanford, and the Stockholm School of Economics.

Anna Gressel

Partner

Paul, Weiss

USA

Anna R. Gressel is a partner in the Paul, Weiss Litigation Department and a member of the firm’s Digital Technology Group. Anna is a sought-after advisor to leading global businesses on a wide range of complex and high-impact matters related to artificial intelligence and other innovative technologies. A pioneer in AI law, she was named by Re-Work as one of the “Top 100+ Women Leading AI in 2023”—one of only three lawyers in private practice listed.

Anna leverages her extensive knowledge of emerging regulations and industry best practices to counsel companies on their most complex and cutting-edge AI issues, including AI safety, integrity, intellectual property, testing and red-teaming, governance, compliance, risk management, national security, privacy, data governance, regulatory compliance and consumer protection. Given her broad experience and up-to-the-minute knowledge of AI policy and legal developments worldwide, Anna often also serves as global AI policy counsel to major companies. Her clients have included leading public and private companies in the technology, asset management, banking, insurance and life sciences sectors, among others.

Maurice Beckand Verwee

Managing Partner

Curiosity VC

Netherlands

Founder of several tech companies and (angel) investor in tech companies and VC funds in and outside Europe

Thomas Jarzombek

Member

Bundestag

Germany

Thomas Jarzombek is from Düsseldorf, North Rhine-Westphalia and has been politically active for more than 25 years. He was a member of the City Council of Düsseldorf, as well as a member of the state parliament of North Rhine-Westphalia. Since 2009, he has been a member of the German Bundestag. From 2014-2018 he was the spokesperson of the CDU/CSU-parliamentary group in the Digital Agenda Committee of the Bundestag. He was also a member of the Transportation and Digital Infrastructure Committee from 2009-2021. From 2018-2021 he was the Commissioner for Digital Economy and Startups within the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy. Currently he is the spokesperson of the CDU/CSU parliamentary group for Education, Research and Technology Assessment and a member of the Digital Committee.

Antonio Krüger

CEO

German Research Center for AI (DFKI)

Germany

Antonio Krüger is CEO and scientific director of the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence GmbH (DFKI) and head of the department “Cognitive Assistants” at DFKI. He is a full professor for Computer Science at Saarland University (since 2009), Head of the Ubiquitous Media Technology Lab and scientific director of the Innovative Retail Laboratory (IRL) at DFKI. Prof. Krueger is an internationally renowned expert on Man-Machine-Interaction and Artificial Intelligence. In 2010 he has established the Mediainformatics study programme at the Saarland University and directs it to this day. Antonio is a co-founder of the Saarbrücken-based technology company Eyeled GmbH, which focuses on the development of mobile and ubiquitous information systems. Many of his research findings have found their way into applications in retail and other industrial domains. From 2004 to 2009 he was a professor of computer science and geoinformatics at the University of Münster and acted as the managing director of the institute for geoinformatics. He studied Computer Science and Economics at Saarland University and finished his Ph.D in 1999 as a member of the Saarbrücken graduate school of „Cognitive Science“. Antonio has published more than 200 scientific articles and papers in internationally recognized journals and conferences and is member of several steering committees, editorial boards and scientific advisory committees.

Arnaud Castaignet

VP, Strategic Partnerships

Skeleton Technologies

Estonia

Arnaud Castaignet is Vice President of Government Affairs & Strategic Partnerships at Skeleton Technologies, the European leader in mission-critical high-power and fast-charging energy storage technology, powered by its own patented “curved graphene” material. Skeleton’s supercapacitors and high-power batteries power AI data centres, decrease CO2 emissions, stabilize grids, and enable the twin energy and AI revolutions. Skeleton Technologies Group currently employs more than 300 people and has four main locations: its HQ in Tallinn (Estonia), its supercapacitor manufacturing in Saxony (Germany), its materials development in Saxony-Anhalt (Germany), and its SuperBattery pilot production facility in Varkaus (Finland). Since its inception, Skeleton has raised over 330 M EUR from European and non-European leading industrial investors. Arnaud has been working in government and public affairs for 15 years. Additionally, he is also a business mentor in several incubators such as NATO DIANA accelerator.

Dr. Carolina Pinart

AVP, Group Head R&D IT

Nestle

Switzerland

Dr. Carolina Pinart is the Group Head for R&D Information Technology at Nestlé, the world’s biggest food and beverages company. Before that, she was Nestlé’s global Product Director for new generation technologies, in charge of industrialising emerging technologies across the group, including augmented reality/virtual reality, artificial intelligence, chatbots or voice. She also led Nestlé’s company-wide AI Global Strategy Program.

She holds a PhD in engineering from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya and has conducted business studies at the London Business School and New York University, specializing in executive leadership. and organizational behavior. Prior to Nestlé, Carolina was the chief operating officer of a New York City-based start-up, where she developed and launched an app ecosystem to match taxi supply and demand in real time. She also led Telehealth and Connected Car product development and new business launches for wireless carrier Telefónica, based in Madrid and the UK, with operations in Europe and Latin America.

Carolina started her career as a consultant for Altran in France and worked in research and innovation for Siemens in Germany and for the Centre Tecnològic de Telecomunicacions in Barcelona. Over that period, she published more than 70 papers in international journals and conferences and obtained one patent in diverse areas such as mobile video, wireless communications and optical networking.

Besides her research record, Dr. Pinart has given 50+ talks about technology and leadership, appeared in 15+ press articles and has been a mentor in several tech startup programs (Conector Accelerator, LactApp startup, EU-Silicon Valley Startup Accelerator) and graduates and women in tech (Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Barcelona Tech, European Innovation Council, Esade). She is also a Partnerships Committee Member of European Women on Boards and an ambassador for AI Swiss Cognitive, AI4 and London & Global Tech Advocates, and an expert reviewer in Data & AI for Horizon Europe.

Last, Carolina is the recipient of a Nestlé CIO Award, DonaTIC award by the Generalitat de Catalunya, post-doc fellowship by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science, pre-doc award by Agrupació Mútua and executive education fellowships for sustained high performance at Telefónica and Nestlé.

Christian Darkin

Head of Creative Artificial Intelligence

Deep Fusion Films

UK

Daniel Abbou

CEO

German AI Association - KI Bundesverband

Germany

Daniel Abbou has been Managing Director at the German AI Association since May 1, 2020. His responsibilities include political and press communication as well as support for funding projects.
Daniel Abbou previously founded AI Hub Europe and advised politicians and companies. He was press spokesman in various ministries of finance and economics, including spokesman for the former Senator of Finance and current State Secretary in the Federal Ministry of Economics Ulrich Nußbaum. In the first Baden-Württemberg cabinet of Kretschmann, he held the position of deputy government spokesman. His enthusiasm for digitization and innovation has accompanied him since his time as a television and radio journalist for new technologies.

Dr. Feiyu Xu

Non-Executive Director

Airbus

France

Dr. Feiyu Xu is a distinguished AI expert with extensive leadership experience in research and industry. She is CEO of Amber Iris AI Consulting, serves on the supervisory board of ZF Group, and is a Non-Executive Director at Airbus Group, ChainIQ Group, and Zühlke Group. As senior advisor of A.T. Kearney,  she helps many companies by defining their AI governance and AI strategy. Previously, as Senior Vice President at SAP SE, Dr. Xu led the corporation's intelligent transformation as Global Head of AI, defining and implementing a comprehensive AI strategy integrating R&D, productization, marketing, and partnerships. At Lenovo Group (2017–2020), she was Vice President and Head of the AI Lab, driving AI strategies and solutions for PCs, devices, and data centers, integrating advanced technologies such as NLP, computer vision, and IoT. Prior to Lenovo, she was Principal Researcher at the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) and co-founded Yocoy Technologies GmbH.

Dr. Xu holds a PhD in applied NLP and a habilitation in big-data text analytics. Her contributions have earned prestigious accolades, including the DFKI Research Fellowship and a Google Focused Research Award. She combines deep expertise in AI with hands-on innovation and commercialization experience, making her a transformative leader in the field.g

Michael Müller-Wünsch

Executive board member Technology (CIO) & Logistics

OTTO

Germany

Dr. Michael Müller-Wünsch is the Executive Board Member for Technology (CIO) and Logistics at the Hamburg-based platform provider OTTO. Born in Berlin, he studied computer science and business administration at the Technical University of Berlin and earned his doctorate in artificial intelligence. After holding various executive positions in the IT world, he joined OTTO in August 2015 as the Executive Board Member for Technology, shaping business transformation and since then has been responsible for the development of the IT landscape and the 1,000-strong tech team. Müller-Wünsch is actively involved as a board member, presidium, and advisory board member in various tech initiatives (IT Executive Club, University of Hamburg Endowed Chair for IT Management and Consulting, VOICE, Hamburg IT Strategy Days, BMBF Research Program "Future of Value Creation", BMBF "Quantum Computing/RYMAX One", BMBF "Data Competence Toolbox", Expert Council "Artificial Intelligence" Microsoft) and promotes networking, exchange, and expansion of IT experts and tech knowledge. Müller-Wünsch has been awarded CIO of the Year twice (Innovation Award 2017 and Large Enterprise Award 2022) by a renowned jury from academia and practice. He often speaks on topics such as business and technology transformation, artificial intelligence, cloud architectures, sustainability in and by IT, and tech talent development at conferences and podcasts. His passion is to have more women in tech professions. As a father of three, he actively advocates for establishing more training and educational opportunities for girls and women and inspiring them for tech topics.

Roman Khaves

Co-founder

Rizz

USA

Roman's entrepreneurial journey began at the age of 16 when he founded his first business, displaying an early knack for identifying opportunities and bringing ideas to life. As he honed his skills and ventured into the world of growth hacking, Roman quickly made a name for himself by acquiring millions of users for several venture-backed apps. His expertise in user acquisition and understanding of the market have been instrumental in the success of his projects.

In 2021, Roman found himself struggling with the reality of dating apps: trying to stand out in a sea of carefully crafted profiles, vying for attention from potential matches with the wittiest lines he could think of, only to find his messages left with no response. Feeling discouraged, he often sent "SOS" screenshots to a group chat with some of his friends, pleading for help on what to say next. When he embarrassingly admitted this to a female friend of his, she laughed and told him that she does the same with her girl friends. Roman knew there had to be a better way.

With the advent of OpenAI's GPT technology, Roman and his co-founder, Josh, saw an opportunity to revolutionize the online dating space. They decided to create RIZZ, a platform designed to provide invaluable assistance to millions of men and women who struggle with the online dating experience. Roman's drive, vision, wealth of experience as a prolific entrepreneur, and personal understanding of the challenges faced by online daters are key factors in the team's commitment to transforming the way people connect and find love in the digital age.