Thought Leaders
INNOVATIONS in Pharmaceutical Development®
ROBERT SALCEDO

FOUNDER AND CEO, OCYONBIO GENE AND CELL THERAPY
Robert Salcedo was born in the Dominican Republic on August 26,1964. When he was ten years old, his family decided to immigrate to the United States in search of better opportunities. At an early age Robert understood the need of medicine accessibility for everyone regardless of social status or race....
INNOVATE® Jacksonville
Sara Frasca

Vice President, Innovation Enablement - Platypus Labs
The concept of innovation can be completely overwhelming. Images of Edison inventing the light bulb or Henry Ford revolutionizing manufacturing push the idea of innovation outside the reach of us mere mortals. If we define innovation as a gigantic, change-the-world, cure-cancer type breakthrough, the concept is relegated to a select...
INNOVATE™ Bristol & Bath
Marvin Rees

Mayor Of Bristol
Bristol is rapidly attracting a reputation as a sustainable, innovative city with a dynamic culture of talent and innovation. With our world-class universities, high-tech sector, digital expertise and infrastructure, we are well-positioned to embrace this reputation, while ensuring the benefits are shared by all. We know the pace of digitisation...
INNOVATE® Nashville
SILAS DEANE

VICE PRESIDENT, COURTS AND JUSTICE, TYLER TECHNOLOGIES
I started my company, VendEngine, with zero outside investment, credit, or employees – nothing but an idea. Ten tough years later, managing the business on cash flow management, I sold it to an S&P 500 business for $89 million. It was an atypical entrepreneur’s journey. I’d do it all again....
INNOVATE® Tampa Bay Vol.3
Judy Genshaft

President, USF System
As the state’s first public research university to be located in a metropolitan region, the University of South Florida System has always been proud of its relationship with the Tampa Bay community we serve.We live in an era when the public increasingly depends on research universities to be a key...
INNOVATE® Detroit
BONNIE FAHOOME

CO-EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, DESIGN CORE DETROIT
Detroit has been an epicenter of innovation for well over a century, leading the world in mass manufacturing, music and industrial design. In 1920, for example, Detroit police officer William Potts was credited with inventing the four-way and three-colored traffic light, a standard still used today for regulating traffic flow...
INNOVATE® Seattle
EMER DOOLEY

PHD, MBA, CREATIVE DESTRUCTION LAB (CDL), UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON.
Yet only a small fraction of these ideas, inventions, and potentially game-changing solutions ever make it off campus. Institutions likethe University of Washington have a responsibility to help more of them make it out into the world. Human health, the environment, theeconomy, and society depend on it. In this spirit,...
INNOVATE® Maryland
CYNTHIA RIVARDE

CEO OF ROCKVILLE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, INC. (REDI).
In an era where uncertainty is the new normal, the greatest asset a community can cultivate is not just data or infrastructure – it is creativity. And creativity does not emerge from a vacuum. It is nurtured in spaces where art, culture, and innovation intersect. Rockville is one of those...
INNOVATE® Detroit
RYAN LANDAU

FOUNDER AND CEO OF PURPOSE JOBS
There’s no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic brought on an irreversible shift in the recruiting industry. Of course the sudden move to remote work (and for some, the eventual transition back to the office) turned the way startups hire on its head. But there was an even greater shift that...
INNOVATE® Philadelphia
Stephen K. Klasko

MD, MBA - President - Thomas Jefferson University; and CEO - Jefferson Health
Philadelphia will become a global solutions center when we prioritize a couple of core values: Here’s how I see creativity, and why I believe all of us can use it to make our city the world’s first option for solutions.Creativity comes in different shapes. There is a body of literature...
INNOVATE™ Bristol & Bath
Sacha Mirzoeff

Head Of Channel 4 Bristol
he human instinct to tell stories can be traced back millennia. From paintings on cave walls, to families huddled around campfires, to bingeable boxsets, storytelling is a thread woven deep into the fabric of human experience and often helps set our moral boundaries. The possibility of changing the way that...
INNOVATE® Gaming & Esports
RICHARD BUTLER

FOUNDER, RAGE WORKS
There is truly no one size fits all approach when it comes to podcasting and running a business, especially in New York City. However, this flexibility has allowed me to remain passionate about podcasting and do what I can to help the space grow and thrive, either by adding my...
INNOVATE™ Flanders
ANNELEEN VANDER ELSTRAETEN

MANAGING PARTNER, FOUR & FIVE
WHY INNOVATORS NEED A NEW BREED OF LAW FIRM When I first started my legal career, founding my own law firm wasn’t even a consideration. I was content working at a top-tier firm, focusing on drafting contracts and managing legal transactions. But everything changed during a business trip to Silicon...
INNOVATE™ Alberta
TONY WEEKS

PRESIDENT AND CEO, THE BRENDA STRAFFORD FOUNDATION
Artificial intelligence (AI) is a wide-ranging tool that is rapidly changing how we live our lives and evolving at a very fast pace. Beyond the convenience benefits, AI offers significant potential in support of healthy aging, including predicting health risks and adverse events. By 2040, projections suggest that 10.8 million...
INNOVATE® Gainesville
Eric Godet, SR

President/CEO - Greater Gainesville Chamber of Commerce
It has been about a year since I joined the Greater Gainesville Chamber of Commerce as President/CEO. Having served both business and the Chamber in various capacities over the years, I have the professional experience for this job, but what I really bring to the table is passion—we can be...
INNOVATE® Puerto Rico
SOFIA STOLBERG

CEO PILOTO 151
THE GENESIS AND EVOLUTION OF PUERTO RICO’S ENTREPRENEURIAL ECOSYSTEM AND WHAT’S NEEDED TO CHARGE AHEADFew people know that in 2010 Puerto Rico pioneered the first multistakeholder entrepreneurship ecosystem project in the world. Led by the Island’s most successful entrepreneurs in partnership with the Department of Economic Development, the Puerto Rico...
INNOVATE™ Bristol & Bath
NatWest

Olly Reid, Scale Acceleration Manager
THE INNOVATION MYTH – WHY OLD HABITS ARE STIFLING INNOVATION IN A NEW WORLD BY OLLY REID As John Holt once said, ‘’since we can’t know what knowledge will be most needed in the future, it is senseless to try to teach it in advance. Instead, we should try to...
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™ South Africa
CHRIS BOTHA

GROUP MANAGING DIRECTOR, PARK ADVERTISING
Is it possible to put a price on innovation? Not really. I mean, how do you put a price on something that is in essence non-tangible? And how do we know what the real value of innovation is? It is sadly something that is all too often underappreciated because innovation...
INNOVATE™ Bristol & Bath
CHARLES RADCLYFFE

PARTNER, ETHICS GRADE
“WE ARE CONCERNED FOR ALL THE PEOPLE WHO WILL LOSE JOBS AS A RESULT OF AUTOMATION”.– CHARLES RADCLYFFE, PARTNER We are worried. Some of the things we worry about are the same as everyone else who is trying to imagine the impact of technology on our lives. We worry about how...
INNOVATE® Austin Volume 2
Whurley

Founder and CEO
It’s exciting to see the application of technology to address global challenges. But as we advance as a species, so do the complexities of the challenges we face. Quantum computers promise to be useful in advancing solutions to challenges in diverse fields such as energy, finance, healthcare and aerospace, among...
INNOVATE® Phoenix
Joan Koerber-Walker

President & CEO - Arizona Bioindustry Association, Inc. (AZBio)
Arizona is home to one of the fastest growing life science sectors in the country. The Greater Phoenix Area is at the center of the action and holds the greatest concentration of life science and healthcare innovators in the state. Health innovations are born as discoveries, are shaped, tested, and...
INNOVATE® South Carolina
TRICIA RICHARDSON

CEO AT SC THRIVE
As I reflect on the past 15 years of SC Thrive’s journey, I am incredibly proud of what we’ve accomplished. The success of SC Thrive is not only the result of the organization’s hard work, but also the unwavering dedication of our incredible partners, our outstanding team, and our amazing...
INNOVATE™ Bristol & Bath
PROFESSOR IAN WHITE

VICE-CHANCELLOR AND PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF BATH
Innovation and collaboration will always be essential to power progress in our societies and I think are a crucial part of what universities in particular can offer in partnership with others. This is especially important now as we begin to recover from Covid-19, and I have been pleased to play...
ROBERT SALCEDO

FOUNDER AND CEO, OCYONBIO GENE AND CELL THERAPY
Robert Salcedo was born in the Dominican Republic on August 26,1964. When he was ten years old, his family decided to immigrate to the United States in search of better opportunities. At an early age Robert understood the need of medicine accessibility for everyone regardless of social status or race....
Sara Frasca

Vice President, Innovation Enablement - Platypus Labs
The concept of innovation can be completely overwhelming. Images of Edison inventing the light bulb or Henry Ford revolutionizing manufacturing push the idea of innovation outside the reach of us mere mortals. If we define innovation as a gigantic, change-the-world, cure-cancer type breakthrough, the concept is relegated to a select...
Marvin Rees

Mayor Of Bristol
Bristol is rapidly attracting a reputation as a sustainable, innovative city with a dynamic culture of talent and innovation. With our world-class universities, high-tech sector, digital expertise and infrastructure, we are well-positioned to embrace this reputation, while ensuring the benefits are shared by all. We know the pace of digitisation...
SILAS DEANE

VICE PRESIDENT, COURTS AND JUSTICE, TYLER TECHNOLOGIES
I started my company, VendEngine, with zero outside investment, credit, or employees – nothing but an idea. Ten tough years later, managing the business on cash flow management, I sold it to an S&P 500 business for $89 million. It was an atypical entrepreneur’s journey. I’d do it all again....
Judy Genshaft

President, USF System
As the state’s first public research university to be located in a metropolitan region, the University of South Florida System has always been proud of its relationship with the Tampa Bay community we serve.We live in an era when the public increasingly depends on research universities to be a key...
BONNIE FAHOOME

CO-EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, DESIGN CORE DETROIT
Detroit has been an epicenter of innovation for well over a century, leading the world in mass manufacturing, music and industrial design. In 1920, for example, Detroit police officer William Potts was credited with inventing the four-way and three-colored traffic light, a standard still used today for regulating traffic flow...
EMER DOOLEY

PHD, MBA, CREATIVE DESTRUCTION LAB (CDL), UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON.
Yet only a small fraction of these ideas, inventions, and potentially game-changing solutions ever make it off campus. Institutions likethe University of Washington have a responsibility to help more of them make it out into the world. Human health, the environment, theeconomy, and society depend on it. In this spirit,...
CYNTHIA RIVARDE

CEO OF ROCKVILLE ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT, INC. (REDI).
In an era where uncertainty is the new normal, the greatest asset a community can cultivate is not just data or infrastructure – it is creativity. And creativity does not emerge from a vacuum. It is nurtured in spaces where art, culture, and innovation intersect. Rockville is one of those...
RYAN LANDAU

FOUNDER AND CEO OF PURPOSE JOBS
There’s no doubt that the COVID-19 pandemic brought on an irreversible shift in the recruiting industry. Of course the sudden move to remote work (and for some, the eventual transition back to the office) turned the way startups hire on its head. But there was an even greater shift that...
Stephen K. Klasko

MD, MBA - President - Thomas Jefferson University; and CEO - Jefferson Health
Philadelphia will become a global solutions center when we prioritize a couple of core values: Here’s how I see creativity, and why I believe all of us can use it to make our city the world’s first option for solutions.Creativity comes in different shapes. There is a body of literature...
Sacha Mirzoeff

Head Of Channel 4 Bristol
he human instinct to tell stories can be traced back millennia. From paintings on cave walls, to families huddled around campfires, to bingeable boxsets, storytelling is a thread woven deep into the fabric of human experience and often helps set our moral boundaries. The possibility of changing the way that...
RICHARD BUTLER

FOUNDER, RAGE WORKS
There is truly no one size fits all approach when it comes to podcasting and running a business, especially in New York City. However, this flexibility has allowed me to remain passionate about podcasting and do what I can to help the space grow and thrive, either by adding my...
ANNELEEN VANDER ELSTRAETEN

MANAGING PARTNER, FOUR & FIVE
WHY INNOVATORS NEED A NEW BREED OF LAW FIRM When I first started my legal career, founding my own law firm wasn’t even a consideration. I was content working at a top-tier firm, focusing on drafting contracts and managing legal transactions. But everything changed during a business trip to Silicon...
TONY WEEKS

PRESIDENT AND CEO, THE BRENDA STRAFFORD FOUNDATION
Artificial intelligence (AI) is a wide-ranging tool that is rapidly changing how we live our lives and evolving at a very fast pace. Beyond the convenience benefits, AI offers significant potential in support of healthy aging, including predicting health risks and adverse events. By 2040, projections suggest that 10.8 million...
Eric Godet, SR

President/CEO - Greater Gainesville Chamber of Commerce
It has been about a year since I joined the Greater Gainesville Chamber of Commerce as President/CEO. Having served both business and the Chamber in various capacities over the years, I have the professional experience for this job, but what I really bring to the table is passion—we can be...
SOFIA STOLBERG

CEO PILOTO 151
THE GENESIS AND EVOLUTION OF PUERTO RICO’S ENTREPRENEURIAL ECOSYSTEM AND WHAT’S NEEDED TO CHARGE AHEADFew people know that in 2010 Puerto Rico pioneered the first multistakeholder entrepreneurship ecosystem project in the world. Led by the Island’s most successful entrepreneurs in partnership with the Department of Economic Development, the Puerto Rico...
NatWest

Olly Reid, Scale Acceleration Manager
THE INNOVATION MYTH – WHY OLD HABITS ARE STIFLING INNOVATION IN A NEW WORLD BY OLLY REID As John Holt once said, ‘’since we can’t know what knowledge will be most needed in the future, it is senseless to try to teach it in advance. Instead, we should try to...
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...
CHRIS BOTHA

GROUP MANAGING DIRECTOR, PARK ADVERTISING
Is it possible to put a price on innovation? Not really. I mean, how do you put a price on something that is in essence non-tangible? And how do we know what the real value of innovation is? It is sadly something that is all too often underappreciated because innovation...
CHARLES RADCLYFFE

PARTNER, ETHICS GRADE
“WE ARE CONCERNED FOR ALL THE PEOPLE WHO WILL LOSE JOBS AS A RESULT OF AUTOMATION”.– CHARLES RADCLYFFE, PARTNER We are worried. Some of the things we worry about are the same as everyone else who is trying to imagine the impact of technology on our lives. We worry about how...
Whurley

Founder and CEO
It’s exciting to see the application of technology to address global challenges. But as we advance as a species, so do the complexities of the challenges we face. Quantum computers promise to be useful in advancing solutions to challenges in diverse fields such as energy, finance, healthcare and aerospace, among...
Joan Koerber-Walker

President & CEO - Arizona Bioindustry Association, Inc. (AZBio)
Arizona is home to one of the fastest growing life science sectors in the country. The Greater Phoenix Area is at the center of the action and holds the greatest concentration of life science and healthcare innovators in the state. Health innovations are born as discoveries, are shaped, tested, and...
TRICIA RICHARDSON

CEO AT SC THRIVE
As I reflect on the past 15 years of SC Thrive’s journey, I am incredibly proud of what we’ve accomplished. The success of SC Thrive is not only the result of the organization’s hard work, but also the unwavering dedication of our incredible partners, our outstanding team, and our amazing...
PROFESSOR IAN WHITE

VICE-CHANCELLOR AND PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF BATH
Innovation and collaboration will always be essential to power progress in our societies and I think are a crucial part of what universities in particular can offer in partnership with others. This is especially important now as we begin to recover from Covid-19, and I have been pleased to play...