Thought Leaders
INNOVATE® Kansas City
NEELIMA PARASKER
FOUNDER, PRESIDENT AND CEO, SNAPIT SOLUTIONS
I’ve spent my entrepreneurial career pushing against a simple but powerful reality I witnessed: talent is universal, but awareness of opportunity is not. In a country where innovation fuels our future, we cannot continue leaving untapped potential sitting on the sidelines that happens to be our majority population. The next...
INNOVATE® Blockchain
JASON ENGLISH
CHIEF ECOSYSTEM OFFICER, CG TECH
Governments worldwide are stepping up and playing a crucial role in enabling innovation in their parts of the world. Our leaders can and should do as much as possible to help small businesses, start ups and innovators succeed. These entrepreneurs are the life blood of our future economy. South Africa...
INNOVATE™ Estonia
TÕNU ESKO & MIHKEL TAMMO
VICE RECTOR FOR DEVELOPMENT & HEAD OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP
The development of research-intensive entrepreneurship in Estonia requires much more than researchers’ good ideas. How can we overcome systemic challenges and find opportunities to transfer research-based solutions from universities into business? The worlds of research and entrepreneurship do not always align. Only around 10% of the population is said to...
INNOVATE® Jacksonville
Nathaniel P. Ford Sr.
Chief Executive Officer - Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA)
Innovation is at the heart of everything I do as the CEO of the Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA), and something I expect my teams to integrate into all their initiatives. Being innovative means being bold—taking risks and toppling the traditional ways we’ve operated as providers of public transportation. My industry...
INNOVATION Quebec
MARIE CLAUDE LAGACÉ
DIRECTRICE PRINCIPALE, INNOVATION ET TRANSFORMATION SOCIALE
Plus jeune, j’adorais tous les jeux, du hockey bottine avec mon frère jusqu’au jeu d’échecs avec mon père. J’avais une certaine aversion pour l’ennuyant Monopoly, qui prenait invariablement fin lorsqu’une personne (habituellement ma sœur) provoquait la faillite des autres. Pas de tueur à démasquer, pas d’épique bataille navale, de dessins...
VOICES of the Future
KHALED AL HURAIMEL
SUSTAINABLE FUTURE
My conversation with Khaled Al Huraimel encapsulates a vision that transcends the present and leaps into a realm of sustainability and innovation. The backdrop is BEEAH Group’s headquarters in Sharjah, UAE, a masterpiece designed by the late Zaha Hadid, embodying the future Khaled envisions where technology, sustainability, and culture intertwine...
INNOVATE™ Adelaide
DAVID MALLETT
FOUNDER AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, YANUN PROJECT SERVICES
My people have been innovating on South Australian Country for more than 60,000 years. As a proud Ngarrindjeri man from South Australia’s South-East, my ancestors developed smart solutions to support their day to-day survival within the harsh Australian environment. For example, we would salvage small intricate bird bones to make...
INNOVATE® Austin Volume 2
Luca Carducci
CEO - Skaffolder
Luca Carducci is a 28-year-old entrepreneur, he started as a software developer with many projects starting from the age of 16, his first project was a similar to Netflix to watch movies in streaming, after this he created and directed an e-commerce platform; several developers tools. At the age of...
INNOVATE® Jacksonville
Marc Blumenthal
Co-Founder - Synapse Florida Partner
Marc Blumenthal Co-Founder, Synapse Florida Partner, Florida Funders It is hard to believe that it’s been two years since the launch of Synapse. Every day since then has been a validation of our mission: to connect Florida’s innovation communities in a meaningful, purposeful way. As I’ve traveled the state I’ve...
INNOVATE™ Antwerp Vol.2
Alex Van Breedam
CEO, TRI-VIZOR
Logistics is facing important sustainability and capacity problems. The changing buying behaviour of the consumer, predominantly accelerated by the steep growth of e-commerce, is leading to increasingly smaller, but more frequent and ever faster deliveries. This fragmentation of deliveries is heavily boosting the need for transport capacity, while the shorter...
INNOVATE™ Stockholm
MOHAMAD TAKWA
CEO & CO-FOUNDER, EPIGENICA
When I was a young researcher, I believed invention was the pinnacle of achievement. To discover something new and build something no one had built before – that felt like enough. But after launching several deep tech startups, I’ve learned a powerful lesson. Invention is just the beginning. Innovation is...
INNOVATE® Philadelphia
Fran Griesing
Managing Member - Griesing Law
As data has shown, disadvantaged groups are notably underrepresented and underpaid across all industries. The educational and professional opportunities for women, people of color, members of the LGBTQ community, and persons with disabilities, are still not where they need to be in order to even the playing field. Further, those...
INNOVATION Quebec
RICHARD CHÉNIER
CENTECH CEO
The next decade will offer several strategic opportunities for entrepreneurship and innovation, particularly technological. Several scientific advances, once considered fundamental, are now transiting at lightning speed to real applications. These new applications must act as a catalyst for concrete solutions to meet our climate challenges and improve the quality of...
INNOVATE® Washington DMV Edition
Troy LeMaile-Stovall
CEO OF TEDCO
CEO OF TEDCO From Southeast Houston to the boardrooms of the tech world, my journey has been anything but ordinary. Guided by a principle instilled in me by my mother, I’ve always believed that our primary purpose is to make a difference. This belief has not only shaped my personal...
INNOVATE™ Flanders
FRANÇOIS DE VRIENDT
OWNER OF NEW VALMAR
Perspectives on InnovationTo thrive in today’s competitive business landscape, SMES must embrace automation and streamline all its processes to ensure cost-effectiveness and compatibility with other players in the market. At New Valmar, we understand this well and have made significant investments in cutting edge technologies that augment our Enterprise Resource...
INNOVATE™ Adelaide
FLAVIA TATA NARDINI
CEO AND CO-FOUNDER, FLEET SPACE TECHNOLOGIES
TRANSFORMING INDUSTRIES. CHANGING THE WORLD.Australia’s vast natural resources have made it a global economic powerhouse. But with worldwide demand for minerals soaring, and finding new sources is becoming ever more complex and costly, our nation’s biggest industry urgently needs a radical new approach. One potential solution is seismic imaging. The...
INNOVATE® Maryland
SETH GOLDMAN
CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, JUST ICE TEA
My journey as a mission-driven entrepreneur began right here in Maryland where I led a youth service demonstration program in Baltimore. After graduating from the Yale School of Management, I returned to the state determined to build businesses that aligned profit with purpose. From launching Honest Tea out of my...
INNOVATE® Phoenix
Deborah Helitzer
Dean and Professor - College Of Health Solutions, Arizona State University
IntroductionThe College of Health Solutions at Arizona State University was formed in 2012 to offer students an education in ten health disciplines. In 2017, the college began a major transformation to better align with its mission to address the nation’s most pressing health challenges, eliminating disciplinary divisions and better positioning...
INNOVATE™ Montréal
Catherine Mounier
Vice-Rectrice à la Recherche, à la Création et à la Diffusion | Vice-President Research - UNIVERSITÉ
English: UQAM joined the university landscape in 1969 and quickly distinguished itself through its commitment to serving society. Fostering entrepreneurship and social impact innovation, the University believes in the concerted ability of social actors to bring about change in response to issues as they arise. Building knowledge together Like many...
INNOVATE® Nashville
MARTY PASLICK
SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF INFORMATION OFFICER, HCA HEALTHCARE
Marty Paslick is HCA Healthcare’s chief information officer. He has been with the organization for more than three decades and leads its Information Technology Group (ITG), a team of more than 6,000 colleagues that provide IT strategy and support for HCA Healthcare and its 182 hospitals and more than 2,300...
INNOVATE® New Jersey Vol.2
STEVE SASHIHARA
FOUNDER AND CEO, PRINCETON CONSULTANTS
Innovating by OptimizingIn 1980 I founded Princeton Consultants based on the thesis that optimization could improve business decision making. Princeton University, from which I’d just graduated, and Bell Labs were pioneers in the academic study of optimization algorithms. “Optimization” gets used in many contexts. I define it as, “a decision-...
INNOVATE™ Stockholm
ALI SARRAFI
CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, 4THBRAIN
We are on the threshold of a creative renaissance powered by GenerativeAI—technology that frees us from specialized skills and speeds up the path from idea to execution. In mere hours, what once took months can be accomplished, fueling rapid experimentation and bold innovation. By automating tasks like image generation, software...
INNOVATE® Gaming & Esports
JESSICA MEDEIROS & SUZANNE DUNCAN
FEMME GAMING
As women representing a mosaic of cultural diversity in the esports and the traditional sport industry, both Jessica Medeiros & Suzanne Duncan are no strangers to the heavy lifts asked of female leadership at executive tables in the gaming space. As the founders of Femme Gaming, we are both passionate...
INNOVATE® Washington DMV Edition
JEFF REID
FOUNDING DIRECTOR OF GEORGETOWN ENTREPRENEURSHIP
As the founding director of Georgetown Entrepreneurship, Jeff Reid is passionate about educating, mentoring, and infl uencing the next generation of entrepreneurs to use their new business ventures to serve the common good. “Common good entrepreneurship involves creating and operating businesses that not only aim for fi nancial success but...
NEELIMA PARASKER
FOUNDER, PRESIDENT AND CEO, SNAPIT SOLUTIONS
I’ve spent my entrepreneurial career pushing against a simple but powerful reality I witnessed: talent is universal, but awareness of opportunity is not. In a country where innovation fuels our future, we cannot continue leaving untapped potential sitting on the sidelines that happens to be our majority population. The next...
JASON ENGLISH
CHIEF ECOSYSTEM OFFICER, CG TECH
Governments worldwide are stepping up and playing a crucial role in enabling innovation in their parts of the world. Our leaders can and should do as much as possible to help small businesses, start ups and innovators succeed. These entrepreneurs are the life blood of our future economy. South Africa...
TÕNU ESKO & MIHKEL TAMMO
VICE RECTOR FOR DEVELOPMENT & HEAD OF ENTREPRENEURSHIP
The development of research-intensive entrepreneurship in Estonia requires much more than researchers’ good ideas. How can we overcome systemic challenges and find opportunities to transfer research-based solutions from universities into business? The worlds of research and entrepreneurship do not always align. Only around 10% of the population is said to...
Nathaniel P. Ford Sr.
Chief Executive Officer - Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA)
Innovation is at the heart of everything I do as the CEO of the Jacksonville Transportation Authority (JTA), and something I expect my teams to integrate into all their initiatives. Being innovative means being bold—taking risks and toppling the traditional ways we’ve operated as providers of public transportation. My industry...
MARIE CLAUDE LAGACÉ
DIRECTRICE PRINCIPALE, INNOVATION ET TRANSFORMATION SOCIALE
Plus jeune, j’adorais tous les jeux, du hockey bottine avec mon frère jusqu’au jeu d’échecs avec mon père. J’avais une certaine aversion pour l’ennuyant Monopoly, qui prenait invariablement fin lorsqu’une personne (habituellement ma sœur) provoquait la faillite des autres. Pas de tueur à démasquer, pas d’épique bataille navale, de dessins...
KHALED AL HURAIMEL
SUSTAINABLE FUTURE
My conversation with Khaled Al Huraimel encapsulates a vision that transcends the present and leaps into a realm of sustainability and innovation. The backdrop is BEEAH Group’s headquarters in Sharjah, UAE, a masterpiece designed by the late Zaha Hadid, embodying the future Khaled envisions where technology, sustainability, and culture intertwine...
DAVID MALLETT
FOUNDER AND MANAGING DIRECTOR, YANUN PROJECT SERVICES
My people have been innovating on South Australian Country for more than 60,000 years. As a proud Ngarrindjeri man from South Australia’s South-East, my ancestors developed smart solutions to support their day to-day survival within the harsh Australian environment. For example, we would salvage small intricate bird bones to make...
Luca Carducci
CEO - Skaffolder
Luca Carducci is a 28-year-old entrepreneur, he started as a software developer with many projects starting from the age of 16, his first project was a similar to Netflix to watch movies in streaming, after this he created and directed an e-commerce platform; several developers tools. At the age of...
Marc Blumenthal
Co-Founder - Synapse Florida Partner
Marc Blumenthal Co-Founder, Synapse Florida Partner, Florida Funders It is hard to believe that it’s been two years since the launch of Synapse. Every day since then has been a validation of our mission: to connect Florida’s innovation communities in a meaningful, purposeful way. As I’ve traveled the state I’ve...
Alex Van Breedam
CEO, TRI-VIZOR
Logistics is facing important sustainability and capacity problems. The changing buying behaviour of the consumer, predominantly accelerated by the steep growth of e-commerce, is leading to increasingly smaller, but more frequent and ever faster deliveries. This fragmentation of deliveries is heavily boosting the need for transport capacity, while the shorter...
MOHAMAD TAKWA
CEO & CO-FOUNDER, EPIGENICA
When I was a young researcher, I believed invention was the pinnacle of achievement. To discover something new and build something no one had built before – that felt like enough. But after launching several deep tech startups, I’ve learned a powerful lesson. Invention is just the beginning. Innovation is...
Fran Griesing
Managing Member - Griesing Law
As data has shown, disadvantaged groups are notably underrepresented and underpaid across all industries. The educational and professional opportunities for women, people of color, members of the LGBTQ community, and persons with disabilities, are still not where they need to be in order to even the playing field. Further, those...
RICHARD CHÉNIER
CENTECH CEO
The next decade will offer several strategic opportunities for entrepreneurship and innovation, particularly technological. Several scientific advances, once considered fundamental, are now transiting at lightning speed to real applications. These new applications must act as a catalyst for concrete solutions to meet our climate challenges and improve the quality of...
Troy LeMaile-Stovall
CEO OF TEDCO
CEO OF TEDCO From Southeast Houston to the boardrooms of the tech world, my journey has been anything but ordinary. Guided by a principle instilled in me by my mother, I’ve always believed that our primary purpose is to make a difference. This belief has not only shaped my personal...
FRANÇOIS DE VRIENDT
OWNER OF NEW VALMAR
Perspectives on InnovationTo thrive in today’s competitive business landscape, SMES must embrace automation and streamline all its processes to ensure cost-effectiveness and compatibility with other players in the market. At New Valmar, we understand this well and have made significant investments in cutting edge technologies that augment our Enterprise Resource...
FLAVIA TATA NARDINI
CEO AND CO-FOUNDER, FLEET SPACE TECHNOLOGIES
TRANSFORMING INDUSTRIES. CHANGING THE WORLD.Australia’s vast natural resources have made it a global economic powerhouse. But with worldwide demand for minerals soaring, and finding new sources is becoming ever more complex and costly, our nation’s biggest industry urgently needs a radical new approach. One potential solution is seismic imaging. The...
SETH GOLDMAN
CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, JUST ICE TEA
My journey as a mission-driven entrepreneur began right here in Maryland where I led a youth service demonstration program in Baltimore. After graduating from the Yale School of Management, I returned to the state determined to build businesses that aligned profit with purpose. From launching Honest Tea out of my...
Deborah Helitzer
Dean and Professor - College Of Health Solutions, Arizona State University
IntroductionThe College of Health Solutions at Arizona State University was formed in 2012 to offer students an education in ten health disciplines. In 2017, the college began a major transformation to better align with its mission to address the nation’s most pressing health challenges, eliminating disciplinary divisions and better positioning...
Catherine Mounier
Vice-Rectrice à la Recherche, à la Création et à la Diffusion | Vice-President Research - UNIVERSITÉ
English: UQAM joined the university landscape in 1969 and quickly distinguished itself through its commitment to serving society. Fostering entrepreneurship and social impact innovation, the University believes in the concerted ability of social actors to bring about change in response to issues as they arise. Building knowledge together Like many...
MARTY PASLICK
SENIOR VICE PRESIDENT AND CHIEF INFORMATION OFFICER, HCA HEALTHCARE
Marty Paslick is HCA Healthcare’s chief information officer. He has been with the organization for more than three decades and leads its Information Technology Group (ITG), a team of more than 6,000 colleagues that provide IT strategy and support for HCA Healthcare and its 182 hospitals and more than 2,300...
STEVE SASHIHARA
FOUNDER AND CEO, PRINCETON CONSULTANTS
Innovating by OptimizingIn 1980 I founded Princeton Consultants based on the thesis that optimization could improve business decision making. Princeton University, from which I’d just graduated, and Bell Labs were pioneers in the academic study of optimization algorithms. “Optimization” gets used in many contexts. I define it as, “a decision-...
ALI SARRAFI
CO-FOUNDER AND CEO, 4THBRAIN
We are on the threshold of a creative renaissance powered by GenerativeAI—technology that frees us from specialized skills and speeds up the path from idea to execution. In mere hours, what once took months can be accomplished, fueling rapid experimentation and bold innovation. By automating tasks like image generation, software...
JESSICA MEDEIROS & SUZANNE DUNCAN
FEMME GAMING
As women representing a mosaic of cultural diversity in the esports and the traditional sport industry, both Jessica Medeiros & Suzanne Duncan are no strangers to the heavy lifts asked of female leadership at executive tables in the gaming space. As the founders of Femme Gaming, we are both passionate...
JEFF REID
FOUNDING DIRECTOR OF GEORGETOWN ENTREPRENEURSHIP
As the founding director of Georgetown Entrepreneurship, Jeff Reid is passionate about educating, mentoring, and infl uencing the next generation of entrepreneurs to use their new business ventures to serve the common good. “Common good entrepreneurship involves creating and operating businesses that not only aim for fi nancial success but...