UNLOCK: Blockchain News, Latest Trends and News about Blockchain Technology

Mahmoud has a diverse background with various business and technical architecture projects and challenges, with 22 years of experience in Government, Banking, and Private sector, and Utilities.

 He is currently working as a senior specialist at DEWA looking after Blockchain and Enterprise Architecture, and working with the different stakeholders to architect and design blockchain solutions.

 Previously he held positions such a VP & Head of enterprise architecture at National Bank of Abu Dhabi, where he managed a large-scale enterprise architecture practice and been awarded from the Open Group organization for the best banking architecture practice.

 He has also worked for Dubai Customs and the UAE AirForce.

Jehan Chu is a Managing Partner at Kenetic Capital (formerly Jen Advisors), a Blockchain and Cryptocurrency investment firm. He is a graduate of Johns Hopkins University.

He is a former front-end developer with over ten years’ experience in web and enterprise application development, and has been a cryptocurrency investor since 2013.

Jehan founded the Ethereum HK community (2014), (sponsored by InvestHK), co-Founded the Bitcoin Association of Hong Kong (2014) and founded the Hyperledger HK community (2016).

Alongside the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, Jehan serves as co-Chairman of the Hong Kong Fintech Association Blockchain Committee. He is also a member of the Asia Fintech Angels Association, a Fellow of Singapore University of Social Sciences, a Gerson Lehrman Group (GLG) Council Member and Metta Curator for Blockchain.

Jehan is Advisor to the Melonport, QTUM, Digix and OpenANX Projects, Global Patrons Board of San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. 

Abraham Cambridge is a British born solar entrepreneur and disruptive technologist.

In 2008 he completed an MSc in the Science of Climate Change under a NERC scholarship at UEA and has since established several businesses and projects around the world that use solar energy as a means for creating positive change.

In 2010 he pioneered utility-scale solar in Britain and in 2012 one of his businesses,

The Renewable Energy Cooperative was nominated 'International Co-operative of The Year' in the United Nations Year of Co-operatives.

Abe now lives in South Africa; a country with abundance of sun and from where in 2014 he launched the revolutionary blockchain based solar energy finance company, The Sun Exchange - monetizing sunshine.

 Sun Exchange Winner – SDO Global Blockchain Challenge 2017  

 Sun Exchange Winner – Mondato Award for Social Impact In Sub-Saharan Africa 2017

He is an experienced technologist and entrepreneur who has been at the forefront of the Internet of Things (IoT) revolution for over a decade.

Currently, he is Chief Product Officer and Ambrosus and oversees the engineering team and the development of their core technology.

Prevoiously, he launched and led the Swisscom Digital Lab - a leading innovation center that helps medium and large companies leverage the latest innovations in AI, Blockchain, and IoT to optimise their businesses.

Prior to that he co-founded and led the product and R&D departments EVRYTHNG, an award-winning industry-grade IoT cloud platform used by numerous Fortune 100 companies.

As the founder of WebofThings.org, he is a well-respected expert in distributed embedded sensing and wrote numerous publications, patents and a book about the intersection of Web and IoT. The results of his PhD research carried out at MIT, ETH Zurich, and SAP played a central role in W3C efforts to create a standard for the Web of Things. 

Vlad graduated with a PhD in computer science from ETH Zurich and a MsC in Robotics and Artificial Intelligence from EPFL.

Mahmoud has a diverse background with various business and technical architecture projects and challenges, with 22 years of experience in Government, Banking, and Private sector, and Utilities.

 He is currently working as a senior specialist at DEWA looking after Blockchain and Enterprise Architecture, and working with the different stakeholders to architect and design blockchain solutions.

 Previously he held positions such a VP & Head of enterprise architecture at National Bank of Abu Dhabi, where he managed a large-scale enterprise architecture practice and been awarded from the Open Group organization for the best banking architecture practice.

 He has also worked for Dubai Customs and the UAE AirForce.

Oliver Bussmann is a globally recognized technology thought leader and driver of large-scale transformation at multinational organizations. The Founder and Managing Partner of Bussmann Advisory, he advises enterprises, top-tier consultancies, and financial services companies looking to stay ahead of the digital disruption curve. He also holds important mandates in industry associations, including President of the Swiss Crypto Valley Association, Global Ambassador for UK-based Innovate Finance and as a Board Member of Identity 2020.

From 2013 to 2016 Bussmann was Group Chief Information Officer of UBS, where he successfully led a major IT transformation effort, instituted a new group-wide innovation framework and established UBS as a pioneer in the development of blockchain for use in financial services. Prior to joining UBS Bussmann was Global Chief Information Officer at SAP, where he also spearheaded significant technological transformation, and before that CIO for North America & Mexico at Allianz. Previous roles have included executive positions at Deutsche Bank and IBM.

Bussmann’s achievements have been widely recognized. He was named COO/CTO of the year by Financial News/The Wall Street Journal, European CIO of the Year by INSEAD/CIONET, received the Elite 8 Award, which is given to the most innovative leaders in technology working in capital markets by Wall Street & Technology Magazine, and has twice been included on the Financial News “FinTech 40” list of innovators shaping the future of finance.

He is a graduate of INSEAD Leadership development Program and has a BA from the University of Munster.

Cris Tran is the Executive Director of Projects at Infinity Blockchain Labs (IBL), a Japanese based Startup Group in Vietnam. Cris currently manages the operations and projects of IBL globally.  Infinity Blockchain Labs is now one of the leaders in Blockchain R&D.

Prior to this, Cris was the Vietnam’s Senior Market Leader for Frost & Sullivan, a global consulting firm, in Malaysia. His scope of works ranges from Government projects, to Banking, Logistic, Retail and technology.

Cris is a frequent subject matter expert in international magazines like Bloomberg, Forbes and  keynote speaker for conferences across Asia.

Cris received Master of Finance from Massey University in New Zealand and a Bachelor of Finance from Southern Methodist University in the USA.

He is the co-founder of Lakeside Partners, a leading early stage investment company in Crypto Valley as well as the Managing Partner of Inacta www.inacta.ch a major Swiss Information management solution provider offering Blockchain solutions on Ethreum.

He possesses extensive expertise in transforming the finance and insurance industry, as well as a diverse entrepreneurial background stemming from multiple ventures and advisory board positions.

He is strongly focused on delivering "Distributed Ledger Technologies" solutions for corporate entities and supporting startups in the blockchain space!

He is also the initiator of Europe's largest Blockchain Competition (www.blockchain-competition.com) and co-founder of the Crypto Valley Association www.cryptovalley.swiss), he is committed to developing the blockchain ecosystem both in Switzerland and worldwide.

Currently he is focused on opening the Genesis Hub of the Crypto Valley Labs (www.cryptovalleylabs.com) in Switzerland with further blockchain hubs in a worldwide decentralized network to follow in 2018.

Enabling Future is a Dubai based early-stage venture capital firm with a portfolio of 20 companies covering the US, MENA and Europe. The firm is exclusively backed by the two Managing Partners family offices.

Enabling Future is also shareholder in Swiss crypto-hedge fund manager Base58 Capital and has invested in blockchain-based platform providers like Change Bank and Tezos.

Hubertus was co-founder of Babil Games, which became a leading mobile games publisher in the MENA region, acquired in 2016 by NASDAQ-listed Stillfront Group.

He previously held the position of CEO Switzerland of CAI, a market leader in regulated gaming, backed by the Austrian National Bank.

Hubertus' family in turn has a longtime industrial background in the clean-tech industry in Europe and the US.  

Blockchain Global is a profitable Blockchain technology company with offices in Melbourne, Perth, New York, Kobe, Kuala Lumpur, Shanghai, Suzhou and Dalian.

Under his vision and leadership, the company's corporate accelerator program has made over 50 investments in companies leveraging Blockchain Technology, generating know-how to work with government leaders in defining regulation and standards to accelerate industry adoption that ultimately aims to reduce friction, fraud and cost for any company.

In 2014, alongside Blockchain Global, he founded the Blockchain Centre (the world first nonprofit Blockchain Knowledge Hub focused on education and awareness) and industry think tank, Distributed Technologies Institute.

He also established Distributed Group, a Blockchain venture platform that connects corporate, investors and entrepreneurs through a network of +300 DLT pioneers that apply knowledge to create value at all stages.

He has been a panelist at World Economic Forum, as well as in numerous Blockchain Summits. Mr. Lee is a frequent interviewee on CNBC, BBC, Sky News and RT.

In his capacity as Executive Director he oversees the lab’s efforts in education, financial research & consulting, cryptocurrency investments, and technical product development.

He is also a blockchain analyst at Reciprocal Ventures and actively consults in the blockchain space, advising several ICO projects.

Mohamed’s is a computer science graduate from Columbia University in the City of New York,

He was first introduced to blockchain through Bitcoin in 2012 while still in high school.

Prior to this appointment he conducted machine learning research at Purdue University before working in the Artificial Intelligence and Research division of Microsoft.

A graduate of  Belgorod Sate University, with a degree in Economy in 2003 , Igor was also fascinated with new technologies and spent most of his time involved in new innovations. This is how he first started into the world of Blockchain.

It was this year 2017, that he decided to create his own blockchain platform called Credits.

Igor has extensive experience in large Blockchain technology projects over the past 12 years, including those in Fintech, banking.

Kristof is a humanist and serial entrepreneur, passionate about making the world a better place. For the last 15 years, he has founded multiple companies at the forefront of cloud computing with successful exits to the likes of Symantec, Western Digital / Hitachi, Sun Microsystems, Oracle, Belgacom and Telenet, and Terremark/Verizon. Kristof holds an M.Sc. in Electro Technical Engineering from Ghent University in Belgium and a postgraduate in management and economics from the University of Leuven, Belgium.

 Currently, Kristof is an investor, co-founder & chairman of GIG Technology and ThreeFold Foundation where he is building the next generation of IT Infrastructure leveraging blockchain technology.

Ed was the co-founder and CEO of Hoppr, a big data platform that provides the link between digital marketing and offline retail transactions. Ex-South West Chairman of the Institute of Consulting in the UK, Ed has created, owned and consulted for start-ups and traditional businesses for over a decade.

He is now the COO of Acorn Collective, a crowdfunding platform that is free, open to any legal project and available in every country. Ed believes technology brings business within reach of everyone, everywhere. He believes that crowdfunding and blockchain can be harnessed as the key tools to help that vision succeed, fostering the next chapter for humans in this information age.

Until April 2016, Muhammed was the Head of European Equities at Carmignac, one of Europe’s leading asset managers with close to $55bn of AuM. Muhammed was responsible for Carmignac’s European equity funds as well as the European exposure of the global funds adding up to approximately $8bn exposure to European equities.

Muhammed moved to Carmignac with his 5-person strong team from SAC Global Investors where he was a Partner and Portfolio Manager. SAC Global Investors was a US based hedge fund with $15bn AuM (now transformed into a family office called Point72 Asset Management). There he managed a European equities portfolio with $550m AuM. It was during his time at SAC that Muhammed received the “40 under 40” award for the highest achieving 40 investment professionals in the European hedge fund industry.

Muhammed, of Turkish origin, but born and raised in Germany, studied finance and management at European School of Business and graduated with a first-class honours degree both from Reutlingen University of Applied Science in Germany and Lancaster University in the United Kingdom.

Ross is a successful serial entrepreneur and investor who with an abundance of experience within various industries throughout Australia, Africa, and Europe. His wealth of management experience and his passion for making a difference in people’s lives have led him to co-found Curecoin, an innovative blockchain platform for changing the paradigm of venture investing, drug development, and immediate social impact.

He is a natural at creating successful businesses from ideas. He enables companies to grow from early stage to commercialisation, and has success in capital raising, IPO, business turnarounds, extensive change management, performance management, merger and acquisition and business disposal.

Ross’ past and present adventures have been in Commodity, Mining, Global Travel Retail, Corporate Banking, Commercial Businesses, Manufacturing and Retail Industries.

On the social impact front, Ross often provides a pro bono help to social impact ventures. As the latest example, he helped a company based out of Africa to receive funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to bring about a positive change to many African communities through building schools and developing self-sustainable communities.

Ross holds a Bachelor of Commerce from Queensland University in Australia and Post Graduate in Chartered Accountancy. Ross is a dual citizen of Australia and Switzerland.

Mohammed is a blockchain enthusiast and an internet entrepreneur, investor and has previously founded technology, finance and e-commerce companies. Mo has tremendous experience in the eCommerce sector.

 In 2010 he headed up the development side of morethan.com, one of the UK’s largest personal insurers. During his time there, Mo architected and developed a system to drive down online fraud, saving the company over £40 million.

 Prior to that, he ran a boutique consultancy business in the field of mobile web and application development. Together with his brother & co-founder, they own over 8 games and utility applications on the Apple and Google Play apps market, with over 10 million downloads.

 Mo actively invests in technology companies. As well being a Partner in Hearn Capital, he is also a Non-Executive Director on the board of Salic (UK), an agricultural investment company.

 Mo has a degree in eCommerce from Brunel University and an Executive MBA from University of Oxford.

Victor is a software engineer, economist, and hacker.

 Viktor led the full refactorization and conversion optimization of Szallas.hu, one the biggest e-commerce site in the CEE region (sells $56 million worth of services per year) that led to 2259% growth and ultimately a regional the TOP1 Deloitte Tech Fast 50 award.

 Viktor has co-founded a blockchain-based healthcare startup with a goal to improve the lives of 1 billion people by making healthcare more transparent.

Aamer has more than 25 years of experience in various business, management, and technical leadership roles. He has been part of transformational change in many industries including Telco, T&T, Retail and Govt. Aamer’s combination of strong technical and business background has gained him recognition as a highly result oriented leader.

He is currently the MEA Blockchain Leader

Previously he held position of CEO of Teal technology services in Morocco, an IBM OCP venture. He has also held various managerial positions in Etihad airways, and Airtel.

He hold a Master of Science in Computer Science from the University of Houston USA, as well as a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering. 

Apurva Kumar is a Research Scientist with IBM Research and a Blockchain Architect.

He has over 20 years of experience during which his research focus has been: Computer Security, Distributed systems and Wireless networks.

He has contributed to IBM products and services and delivered innovative solutions to customers (esp. Telco). He specializes in Identity and Access Management, API Economy, Blockchain where he brings a unique combination of practical experience and top-end Research.

He has authored 20+ research papers in top CS conferences and has filed 20+ US patents. He has been an open-source enthusiast and contributor from very early on in his career.

Mr. Butler is providing technical leadership across IBM’s cloud services and software portfolio and focusing on helping clients unlock new sources of value through the use of cloud-based technologies, such as blockchain and cognitive computing.

Prior to this, he was Chief Architect, IBM Global Technology Services for Middle East and Africa, where he was responsible for leading complex services solutions for clients across the region. Before relocating to the UAE, he was based in Australia, and held a global role as Chief Architect leading a multi-year IT transformation for one of IBM’s largest clients.

He is a member of IBM’s Academy of Technology and has numerous patent filings in the fields of cloud, mobile and security technologies.

He holds a Masters of Engineering from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology.

Paolo Tasca is a Digital Economist specialising in P2P financial systems. An advisor on blockchain technologies for different international organisations including the EU Parliament and the United Nations, Paolo is founder and Executive Director of the Centre for Blockchain Technologies (UCL CBT) at University College London. Previously, he was Lead Economist on digital currencies and P2P financial systems at Deutsche Bundesbank, Frankfurt.

Paolo is the co-author of the bestseller “FINTECH Book” and the co-editor of the book “Banking Beyond Banks and Money”. He has been Associate Editor of the Journal of Risk Finance since 2016 and Guest Editor of the Journal of Digital Banking since 2017. In addition, he is author of various scientific papers about blockchain, which have been published by prestigious international scientific journals, such as the Harvard Business Review.

As Executive Director of the UCL CBT, Paolo is also directly involved in various research projects concerning different application fields of blockchain technologies. Among them, the BARAC Project (Blockchain technology for Algorithmic Regulation and Compliance) supported by EPSRC, and the P2P-IoET Project (The Internet of Energy Things: Supporting peer-to-peer energy trading and demand side management through blockchains) supported by Lloyds Register Foundation.  

Dr Tasca holds an M.A in Politics and Economics (summa cum laude) from the University of Padua and a M.Sc. in Economics and Finance from Ca’ Foscari, Venice. He did his PhD studies in Business between Ca’ Foscari Venice and ETH, Zürich. His doctoral dissertation on Systemic Risk in financial markets was subsidized by the Swiss National Science Foundation with more than 500.000 Euros.

Other current appointments: Permanent Member of ISO TC 307 committee on standardisation of blockchain systems at the International Organization for Standardization (ISO); Senior Advisor of the Beihang Blockchain & Digital Society Laboratory in Beijing; Board member of the Cyprus Blockchain Innovation Centre; Steering Committee Member of the Construction Blockchain Consortium (CBC).

Julio heads R&D in Santander's Innovation Division. He executes major innovation projects globally. He also leads new business incubation and venture creation efforts, and actively contributing to Santander's M&A and Venture Capital activity in Fintech.

He leads Santander's activities around Blockchain, distributed ledgers and smart contracts, and has founded Santander's crypto Lab, a collaborative space to bring Blockchain technology to the market both applying it within Santander Group as well as in partnership with other leading banks and specialized technology players.

He is the chairman of the Enterprise Ethereum Alliance, the chairman of Spain’s Alastria network, a member of the board of the Wall Street Blockchain Alliance, and a senior advisor of the Global Payments Steering Group.

Julio’s career started out as chip designer, focusing on high performance analogue (full custom) and digital systems-on-chip as well as complex chip design platforms that led to more than 30 publications in international refereed forums.

He then worked for McKinsey & Co, where he specialized in Banking serving many of the top financial institutions in Spain, Europe and LatAm. In 2007 he joined Santander, where he has played corporate leadership roles in Investment Banking, Consumer Finance, and IT & Operations, and has participated in many of Santander’s acquisition processes during the last years.

Julio is a Telecommunication Engineer (UPM-Spain), PhD in Computer Science (UAM-Spain), and MsC in Management of Technology (MIT-Sloan). He is also a part-time entrepreneur working on capital markets technology startups, focusing on low latency algorithmic trading in Fx markets.

Previously Yasmin held the post of ‘Superintendent – Licensing Research & Development’ in the Licensing Director at the Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB) where she has been working for the past 12 years.  She has worked on a wide range of applications for establishing financing institutions (both conventional and Shari’a compliant) in the Kingdom of Bahrain ranging from applications for banks, investment companies, insurance companies, capital market companies and other non-banking financial institutions.

Yasmeen is also a member of the Regulatory Sandbox Applications Committee at the CBB and has been directly involved in drafting the Crowdfunding regulations for Bahrain and assisted in the drafting of the Regulatory Sandbox directives.

Yasmeen has a Bachelors of Science in Banking and Finance from the University of Bahrain

Sam is responsible for several fintech innovation initiatives within the Financial & Risk business of Thomson Reuters.  He has worked for the company in product strategy and product management roles for 12 years in New York and Hong Kong.  Sam has a Masters in Financial Strategy from the University of Oxford and currently lives in Zug, Switzerland, where he is focused on alternative finance, crypto-currencies, blockchain technology and identity management.  Sam is on the board of the Crypto Valley Association. 

In 2006, Sam joined Thomson Reuters in New York within the product marketing and strategy team for Investment Management and Investment Banking products In 2013, Sam moved to Canton Zug, Switzerland as Director of Strategy and Innovation, specializing in evolving the company’s businesses in blockchain, digital identity and alternative finance. Sam’s current focus areas are blockchain, peer-to-peer finance and digital identity.

Sam has a Masters in Financial Strategy from the University of Oxford and a Certificate in Corporate Treasury from the Association of Corporate Treasurers.

Veronica Lange is the global Head of Innovation at UBS Chief Technology Office.

In this role she is responsible for the managing Group innovation projects and building out innovation activity with internal teams and with the external ecosystem.  Recent activities include open the UBS Future of Finance challenge and think tank forums, the UBS blockchain research program in the London based innovation lab at Level 39 as well as the Artificial Intelligence research program in Zurich.

Prior to joining UBS, she worked eight years with Barclays and Barclaycard as Retail and Business Banking Head of Customer Experience Internet, Head of e-Channels in Western Europe / International Cards markets and Chair of the Barclays eBusiness Council.

She  worked  for seven years with Olympus, a Japanese opto-electronics Multinational, heading the New Media department and Marketing Communications for Digital Cameras in Europe and Africa, and another three years in international Business Consulting that followed her academic career.

She holds a Doctorate in Economics from the University of Kiel, Germany, obtained in the area of Technology and Innovation Management which concluded her Business administration studies in Göttingen and Kiel.

She is a board member of Mobey Forum since December 2013.

Mohammed founded ArabianChain Technology in 2017. As the CEO of this startup, he is responsible for bringing the first public and decentralized blockchain to the Arabian economy.

He is among the first Certified Innovation Strategist in the region, a blockchain Evangelist, and an Expert in Service Management with a Bachelor in Software Engineering from King Fahd university of Petroleum and Minerals.

Mohammed also is the founder of Palmex which is one of the first crypto currency and digital assets exchange-markets in the region. A Cofounder @ Kaizen Tch. focusing on Apps, IoT and VR/AR innovations.

Mohammed have served major accounts with Microsoft in Saudi Arabia including the Central Bank of Saudi SAMA working as a Senior Technical Account Manage. Prior to Microsoft he led several transformative initiatives as an Enterprise Architect at the National commercial bank NCB.

Mohammed has spent some time studying various topics ranging from Innovation and technology management, to digital economy and future of banking and all the way to philosophy, psychology, culture and languages. During that time, he was advising startups on growth and business strategy and volunteering in different national and multinational organizations.

He is the co-founder of Lakeside Partners, a leading early stage investment company in Crypto Valley as well as the Managing Partner of Inacta www.inacta.ch a major Swiss Information management solution provider offering Blockchain solutions on Ethreum.

He possesses extensive expertise in transforming the finance and insurance industry, as well as a diverse entrepreneurial background stemming from multiple ventures and advisory board positions.

He is strongly focused on delivering "Distributed Ledger Technologies" solutions for corporate entities and supporting startups in the blockchain space!

He is also the initiator of Europe's largest Blockchain Competition (www.blockchain-competition.com) and co-founder of the Crypto Valley Association www.cryptovalley.swiss), he is committed to developing the blockchain ecosystem both in Switzerland and worldwide.

Currently he is focused on opening the Genesis Hub of the Crypto Valley Labs (www.cryptovalleylabs.com) in Switzerland with further blockchain hubs in a worldwide decentralized network to follow in 2018.

ERES is the first company to provide real estate solutions that are registered in seventeen countries worldwide. Al Suwaidi played an instrumental role in creating ERES, which is supported by Dubai Land Department and the Real Estate Regulatory Agency in its mission to provide state-of-the-art solutions in the local, GCC and international real estate markets.

Khalifa has developed and still manages multiple solutions on behalf of Dubai Land Department including Rental Contract Registration (Ejari), Off-Plan Registration, Trustees and Services, Project Development Progress, Simsari, eMart and the Investment Map. He is responsible for laying down strategic goals and plans to support new solutions, and handles ERES’ relationship with Dubai Land Department, acting as its technology advisor and commercialising its IPs, data and systems to be used globally.

Prior to his role with ERES, Khalifa was IT Senior Director for Dubai Land Department, where he developed the Land Knowledge Database in 2007, the Strategic Maturity Project 2008-2009, and the Tabu 2.0 real estate registration and regulation electronic system. It was during this time that he first launched the ERES initiative.

Bluenote is a Blockchain solution provider to build a zero emission world.

He previously founded Planet Internet, the largest internet company in the Netherlands (acquired by Royal Dutch Telecom KPN)

He has also invested in technology and media startups such as Flabber (acquired by Vice).

Yusuf has more than 10 years of experience in the field of Information Security at Enterprise Level.

 He started his career by working as Security officer at one of the biggest Government ISP looking specifically to analyze the risk toward Government network, and build strategic plan on how to secure it with emerging Global Cyber threats as Proactive rather than reactive.

 By moving to business sector, he focused on building Information Security Strategy align with business mission & its dynamics change based on emerged technology, build Information Security framework across the entity, identify critical business process with related operation risk.

 He also focused on identifying security requirements for the business projects such as: Mobility, Application, Cloud and latest technology trend:IoT and Blockchain to ensure Secure services. 

In addition he built SOC framework based on risk analysis and how to monitor the risk toward business rather than traditional method of monitoring.

Since 1996 Dmitri has been working in private equity and venture capital industry in Russia and

Europe. He has played varied and challenging roles acting as a C-level executive, an investment officer and a company director. He contributed to the launch or leaded high growth initiatives in disruptive venture projects in post-Soviet era Russia, such as MTV Russia TV channel, “36,6” a retail pharmacy chain, as well as “Katren,” a pharmaceutical distributor.

 Dmitri has been running and advising successful businesses through dynamic stages of their development, from seed to IPO, for more than 20 years.

 In early 2015, Dmitri Moiseyev took the helm of Yota Device Group (a dual screen smartphone producer and marketer) operating in EMEA and China. Prior to 2015, Dmitri was the chairman of the management board of Flexis IT group.

Today, Dmitri is focused on developing his own project Naviaddress, www.naviaddress.com. Like his earlier successful projects, as an innovative digital addressing system for places and objects linked to geocoordinates and metadata, Naviaddress is revolutionary in its field. The mission is to create a decentralized, global, unified address platform on the blockchain for the real and virtual worlds. Naviaddress strives to turn the conventional addressing system into a more universally-viable digital format.

The project has already attracted 2.5 million dollars (US) from private investors and is raising 25 million dollars of investments during the ICO in the first quarter of 2018. Raised funds will be used for the development and deployment of the blockchain technology stack, migrating addressing system and related applications to the blockchain, development, promotion and global roll-out of the address platform.

In 2014 Andrea joined the State of Delaware as founding Director of the Division of Corporate and International Development a year later she launched Global Delaware, the state’s first Business brand.

In 2016 Andrea conceived the Delaware Blockchain Initiative launched then by Governor Markell and now directs this initiative.

Prior to that Andrea was Vice President Business Development and Assistant General Counsel of Corporate Service Company.

Andrea is a graduate of Magna Cum Laude from Delaware Law School, and received her undergraduate degree from Brown University. She sits on the advisory board of Weinberg Center for Corporate Governance at the Lerner College of Business and Economic at the University.

Dr. Kravitz is involved in the provision of research insights on a variety of cyber security topics including public key infrastructure and developments in Blockchain. He is also well versed in authentication, authorization and accounting services.

He has over 35 years experience in cyber security related domains. Prior to joining DarkMatter he was a research staff member with IBM in identity management architecture.  He also oversaw the development of cryptographic constructs for next-generation ultra-high-definition content protection.

He began his career at the National Security Agency (NSA), where he “combined his exceptional skills in protocol and algorithm design with his evaluation capabilities to profoundly enhance the security posture of communications,” as stated in the Certificate of Achievement he was awarded by the Director of the NSA.

Dr. Kravitz was Principal Architect of Blockchain Fabric Membership Services for the open-source Linux Foundation Hyperledger Project, and acts as Advisory Board Member to Federal Guardian LLC, a cyber security consolidation platform.

He holds a PhD in Electrical Engineering Systems from University of Southern California, and a Masters in Mathematical Sciences from John Hopkins University. During his 11-year tenure at NSA, Dr. Kravitz invented the Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA), which forms one of the dozens of issued and pending patents in his name.

Waqas Mirza is the Managing Director and CMO of Avanza Solutions. He is responsible for managing and driving the annual business performance of Avanza and is also involved in formulating and executing long-term business strategies for the company.

He has been serving on the board of directors since November 2011 and is also a member of Avanza’s Global Leadership Committee.

Waqas has been associated with Avanza Solutions since 2006 and has been instrumental in taking Avanza’s product portfolio to the next level, also leading product development, implementation, and support functions for Middle East. He has successfully led technology ventures and niche product development initiatives within Avanza.

He holds a bachelor’s degree in Computer Sciences from FAST-NU and master’s in business administration from London Business School.

With a Background in emerging technologies, business, jewellery and insurance and a large experience in creating successful startups, Leanne works towards creating global transparency and ethical trade.

Everledger a global enterprise that tracks the provenance of high value assets, is a leading the market in real world application of blockchain, boasting a set of peer recognition and awards, including the Meffy Award 2015 for innovation in FinTech, BBVA Open Talent 2015, Fintech Finals Best in Show Award 2016 Hong Kong and nominee for The FT ArcelorMittal Boldness in Business Awards 2016.

Leanne is an appointed member of the World Economic Forum’s Blockchain Council and a Co-Chair for the World Trade Board's Sustainable Trade Action Group.

Micity is an alternative marketplace for smart identity based on blockchain. micity addresses citizens’ concerns in their routine interactions with government entities or large corporations and makes them personalized, seamless, highly secure by harnessing the powers of the latest technologies including biometrics, Artificial Intelligence and largely blockchain.

As a former executive at a software company that offers award winning mission critical monetization solutions in the cloud, Issa was the mastermind of “Redknee” $700 million IPO and acquisition of Nokia BSS business unit. This position has provided Issa, the opportunity to develop unique leadership skills to manage key relationships and governance in North America and across numerous and complex markets.

Issa is currently serving as an advisor of handful of blockchain startups in crypto-mining and cryptocurrency. He is applying his knowledge of traditional marketplaces to the creation of next generation startups by advising on the strategy and execution, branding, research, organization and Leadership, and ICO preparation.

An engineer by trade, computer scientist, futurist and solutionist, Issa has earned a MBA in Sales and Marketing, a Master of Professional Consulting, a bachelor of engineering degree in computer and communication and a black belt in SIX Sigma.

Issa speaks six languages, engaged dynamically in coaching young leaders and is an active member of few NGOs such as Habitat for humanity among others.

Mahmoud has a diverse background with various business and technical architecture projects and challenges, with 22 years of experience in Government, Banking, and Private sector, and Utilities.

 He is currently working as a senior specialist at DEWA looking after Blockchain and Enterprise Architecture, and working with the different stakeholders to architect and design blockchain solutions.

 Previously he held positions such a VP & Head of enterprise architecture at National Bank of Abu Dhabi, where he managed a large-scale enterprise architecture practice and been awarded from the Open Group organization for the best banking architecture practice.

 He has also worked for Dubai Customs and the UAE AirForce.

Jason Cooper is a Blockchain Specialist with DarkMatter, a role in which he designs and implements the Research & Development team’s Blockchain SDK product suite. In this assignment, Jason focuses on identity management, gradual integration, and support for the Internet of Things (IoT).

He has spent a majority of his career as a Senior Systems Engineer, designing custom secure communications systems for select portions of the U.S. Government. More recently, he was the Vice President of Special Technical Projects at Silent Circle; working closely with two founders of PGP on cryptographic messaging protocols and key management.

Jason earned a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Grove City College; he’s an active member of the Open Source community and has been a part-time Linux Kernel Maintainer for several years.

Dr. Kravitz is involved in the provision of research insights on a variety of cyber security topics including public key infrastructure and developments in Blockchain. He is also well versed in authentication, authorization and accounting services.

He has over 35 years experience in cyber security related domains. Prior to joining DarkMatter he was a research staff member with IBM in identity management architecture.  He also oversaw the development of cryptographic constructs for next-generation ultra-high-definition content protection.

He began his career at the National Security Agency (NSA), where he “combined his exceptional skills in protocol and algorithm design with his evaluation capabilities to profoundly enhance the security posture of communications,” as stated in the Certificate of Achievement he was awarded by the Director of the NSA.

Dr. Kravitz was Principal Architect of Blockchain Fabric Membership Services for the open-source Linux Foundation Hyperledger Project, and acts as Advisory Board Member to Federal Guardian LLC, a cyber security consolidation platform.

He holds a PhD in Electrical Engineering Systems from University of Southern California, and a Masters in Mathematical Sciences from John Hopkins University. During his 11-year tenure at NSA, Dr. Kravitz invented the Digital Signature Algorithm (DSA), which forms one of the dozens of issued and pending patents in his name.

In his capacity as Executive Director he oversees the lab’s efforts in education, financial research & consulting, cryptocurrency investments, and technical product development.

He is also a blockchain analyst at Reciprocal Ventures and actively consults in the blockchain space, advising several ICO projects.

Mohamed’s is a computer science graduate from Columbia University in the City of New York,

He was first introduced to blockchain through Bitcoin in 2012 while still in high school.

Prior to this appointment he conducted machine learning research at Purdue University before working in the Artificial Intelligence and Research division of Microsoft.

He is responsible for Wanxiang's technology planning, strategic investments, business model innovation, global partnerships, and, ultimately, incorporating and operating Wanxiang's Innovation & Entrepreneurship platform.

Before joining Wanxiang, Vincent was the General Manager of IBM Greater China’s New Business Initiatives organization, where he was responsible for IBM Greater China’s new technology landing, strategic partnership, and ecosystem development. He led the creation and execution of IBM's blockchain strategy in Greater China, launching HyperLedger Fabric in China.

He has held a series of executive positions at leading multinationals incl. Intel, Infineon and SMIC. He co-founded Tangram Technologies Inc. He led the award-winning Intel Edison program (4 CES 2014 awards, incl. “Best Innovation”) that greatly contributed to IoT edge computing and Maker Movement.

Vincent holds an MBA degree from UC Berkeley, and Master of Science in Material Science Engineering from University of Southern California.

Paolo Tasca is a Digital Economist specialising in P2P financial systems. An advisor on blockchain technologies for different international organisations including the EU Parliament and the United Nations, Paolo is founder and Executive Director of the Centre for Blockchain Technologies (UCL CBT) at University College London. Previously, he was Lead Economist on digital currencies and P2P financial systems at Deutsche Bundesbank, Frankfurt.

Paolo is the co-author of the bestseller “FINTECH Book” and the co-editor of the book “Banking Beyond Banks and Money”. He has been Associate Editor of the Journal of Risk Finance since 2016 and Guest Editor of the Journal of Digital Banking since 2017. In addition, he is author of various scientific papers about blockchain, which have been published by prestigious international scientific journals, such as the Harvard Business Review.

As Executive Director of the UCL CBT, Paolo is also directly involved in various research projects concerning different application fields of blockchain technologies. Among them, the BARAC Project (Blockchain technology for Algorithmic Regulation and Compliance) supported by EPSRC, and the P2P-IoET Project (The Internet of Energy Things: Supporting peer-to-peer energy trading and demand side management through blockchains) supported by Lloyds Register Foundation.  

Dr Tasca holds an M.A in Politics and Economics (summa cum laude) from the University of Padua and a M.Sc. in Economics and Finance from Ca’ Foscari, Venice. He did his PhD studies in Business between Ca’ Foscari Venice and ETH, Zürich. His doctoral dissertation on Systemic Risk in financial markets was subsidized by the Swiss National Science Foundation with more than 500.000 Euros.

Other current appointments: Permanent Member of ISO TC 307 committee on standardisation of blockchain systems at the International Organization for Standardization (ISO); Senior Advisor of the Beihang Blockchain & Digital Society Laboratory in Beijing; Board member of the Cyprus Blockchain Innovation Centre; Steering Committee Member of the Construction Blockchain Consortium (CBC).

Ismail Malik is ranked 75 of the top 100 most influential Blockchain people according to Rise Global. He currently holds the position of Founder and CEO of Blockchain Labs which specializes in crypto development projects and placement of lead developers for existing DLT projects. The Lab Retains a strong focus on R&D primarily researching, and secures embedded smart contract trusted execution environments on the Ethereum, Bitcoin and Corda blockchains. He is also editor in Chief of ICO Crowds the first publication for ICO industry. He previously worked at Smartledger which develops smart contracts for Smart Cities.

He has also held positions such as Editor in Chief of Bitcoin Entrepreneurs, Co-Founder of CoinViral, CoinDesk, Director at Sqft Crowd and many others.

He has a degree in International relations from Birbeck University London, A Degree in NameCommon Wealth Networking from School of Advanced Study London, as well as a degree from UCL Institute of Education.

Marc Taverner has more than 18 years of experience working with leading marketing and technology companies.

He is also the founder of a successful modem distribution company.

He has held sales leadership roles with the world's largest provider of unified communications services and market leaders in educational technology solutions.

He holds a BA Honors in European Business Studies from Brunel University, UK and holds a BA in business studies from Ecole supérieure de Commerce de Clermont-Ferrand, France.

Maksim Izmaylov is a serial entrepreneur with background in software engineering and law. He thinks that blockchain and other technologies can help us create a better world, e.g. reduce inequality.

He founded two travel startups, Roomstorm and Winding Tree, and Travel Tech Con, a conference for startups and software engineers from the travel industry.

Currently, Maksim is working on Winding Tree, a decentralized marketplace for the $7T travel industry that is dominated by just a handful of large corporations.

A computer engineer by education and 14 years of experience in technology and business management, Atul Khekade has built several companies and driven millions in revenue by scaling these businesses worldwide. He is also the Co-Founder of XinFin where he is dedicated towards investor management and developing alliances with corporates and governments worldwide.

He has been associated with companies like Oracle, New York based MonetaGo , UK based Smart Stream Tech and Netz Capital Advisors LLP. He is also the Co-Founder of Airnetz Traveltech Pvt. Ltd.

At XinFin, Atul brings extensive industry knowledge and experience in the fields of institutional and government liasoning, apart from his robust experience across BFSI, Asset Management, Real Estate, Aviation, among other industries. He is also responsible for the conceptualization and demonstration of first permissioned blockchain system for the consortium of Indian banks. He is also a member of Blockchain FinTech Working Group.

Violet is a passionate entrepreneur and expert matchmaker who has been running her dating company since 2004.

Violet is a Certified Matchmaker, Best-selling Author, Relationship Columnist and Media Darling who has been featured in over 4,000 media globally.

Viola.ai is Asia’s biggest premier lunch dating company with offices in Singapore, Hong Kong, Kuala Lumpur, Penang, Jakarta and Bangkok with the largest lunch dating membership base.

Violet is happily married to her university sweetheart cum business partner Jamie.

 Viola.AI is the latest AI and Blockchain project that helps achieve the goal and sets to revolutionize and disrupt the world’s dating and relationship industry.

A passionate serial entrepreneur, Aytunc founded Developeo which is a startup which that aims to revolutionize the open-source ecosystem with token based rewards system. As a huge believer in open-source and blockchain, the goal is, with the help of DEV the technology  will progress and become much more accessible for everyone in a faster way.

Before founding Developeo, he founded several other startups since his childhood and the most recent ones are SNTRY and RISE Invst, Galata Penthouse.

He also advises  new tech companies, and currently resides in Budapest.

As an ex-international athlete and filmmaker, Ozturk believes in untapped potential, teamwork. He alos believes it is always the little things that make big things happen.

Giorgio Pallocca is Head of Development Division - he is responsible for the system and blockchain architecture: he is in charge for the development of the platforms, smart contracts and takes care of the system security together with the Development Team.

Mr. Yu believes that the UAE remittance payers can benefit from Japan's fintech technology by assisting almost  2 billion non bank account holders, remittance migrants, and middle-income employees to make their household finances healthier through JobCoin located in Zug Switzerland.

He started his career with New Japan Securities (currently Mizuho Securities) overseas division for large foreign institutional investors, distribution and underwriting etc. of Japanese stocks and bonds ·

He has also worked with Cologne Reinsurance (Current Reinsurance: 100% subsidiary of Berkshire Hathaway) works in Cologne · Alibaba Division, Optical Communication Co., Director of Business Development

With over 18 years experience (which 11 years have been at board level) in creative design for global FMCG and Financial Services brands, Paul focuses on strategic and creative thinking to evolve Gimmers’ proposition, service design and business model.

He personally believes that the truly peer-to-peer nature of blockchain technology gives consumers the truth and the trust, that they so desperately need. And that the decentralization of data and services will change the way the world does business forever.

Alex is a software architect and entrepreneur with vast experience in different areas of technology. With over more than 16 years of career in software development, Alex was providing services for companies such as Motorola, Sony Ericsson, Kyocera, Ford, Hyundai and Jaguar Land Rover, and stands behind the architecture of significant pieces of their software solutions.  Alex was also playing a CTO/Architect role in European startups PixIt (creation of personalized products on demand) and Semilimes (ERP as a Service).

Alex founded and, together with his team, built a distributed software development platform Dogezer, which will completely revamp the way how people cooperate.

Dogezer is a platform which integrates all of the necessary tools for people to work together on innovative projects, with the ability to use project-specific tokens to reward results and incentivize collaboration.

Saad Mohib started his career with UK Management Consulting firm, in Australia in 2007.

In 2010, Saad founded Business Technology Innovations, a digital platform company building unique custom digital platforms for businesses in ASEAN.

He Successfully completed Bitcoin exchange in Hong Kong and Blockchain social entrepreneurship projects in UK & Switzerland.

He is currently serving on the Executive Board of Malaysia Infocomm Foundation and the Advisory board of StartsupKL.

Until April 2016, Muhammed was the Head of European Equities at Carmignac, one of Europe’s leading asset managers with close to $55bn of AuM. Muhammed was responsible for Carmignac’s European equity funds as well as the European exposure of the global funds adding up to approximately $8bn exposure to European equities.

Muhammed moved to Carmignac with his 5-person strong team from SAC Global Investors where he was a Partner and Portfolio Manager. SAC Global Investors was a US based hedge fund with $15bn AuM (now transformed into a family office called Point72 Asset Management). There he managed a European equities portfolio with $550m AuM. It was during his time at SAC that Muhammed received the “40 under 40” award for the highest achieving 40 investment professionals in the European hedge fund industry.

Muhammed, of Turkish origin, but born and raised in Germany, studied finance and management at European School of Business and graduated with a first-class honours degree both from Reutlingen University of Applied Science in Germany and Lancaster University in the United Kingdom.