CONVENING LEADERS FROM GOVERNMENT, BUSINESS AND CIVIL SOCIETY.
Our members are building a prosperous Scotland, which looks beyond narrow economic success to deliver better social and environmental outcomes.
Our annual meeting considers the opportunities for Scotland in a global economy and inspires and effects change in national and regional development.
Forum is Scotland’s best cross-sector economic event. Think of it as all the best minds in the economy under one roof sharing knowledge, ideas, building connections and harnessing our collective resources to make a difference.
Why should I be there?
Forum provides you with a platform to showcase your contribution to a better economy, sends a message about your long term commitment to Scotland and willingness to work across industry and sectoral boundaries to secure a prosperous Scotland.
Who is Forum for?
Forum unites thinkers and innovators from large employers and SMEs, local authorities, public bodies, colleges and universities, cultural institutions, charities and social enterprises, trade unions, trade and professional bodies.
The context
Achieving a productive and prosperous Scotland, remains challenging in the face of climate risk, economic challenge and geopolitical uncertainty. Slow productivity growth, an ageing population, low levels of investment, challenging public spending and investment climates are barriers but we also see opportunities.
- to innovate and to harness the best of science and technology to address these challenges
- to maximise wealth retained in Scotland’s communities as part of the transition to a low carbon economy
- to transform levels of entrepreneurship and business ambition and to reshape our learning system to better meet the needs of tomorrow’s learner
SCDI’s Vision
Our Blueprint for long-term plan for growth and for investment provides a framework for sustainable growth. Forum seeks answers to how Scotland’s leaders, resources and policymakers can be harnessed to create a prosperous Scotland:
- where economic growth accelerates but creates fair work opportunities
- which limit the impacts of growth on the climate and sees pledges to invest in sustainable infrastructure delivered
- which reverses weak private sector investment and stimulates a growing tax base to fund our future public services and;
- where economic opportunities are harnessed in a new industrial strategy to create the foundation for our future prosperity
2023 Lineup
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Robert Thorburn is Openreach’s Partnership Director for Scotland, leading the company’s commercial and funded programmes to deliver fast, reliable full fibre broadband working with partners large and small.
These currently include the £600m Reaching 100% contracts with the Scottish Government, as well as working directly with all 32 Local Authorities, Housing Associations, Factors and Managing Agents.
Robert has a 25-year+ career in the IT and communications sector with extensive experience in managing large scale build programmes.
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Gillian leads the offshore wind supply chain activity for Crown Estate Scotland including the Supply Chain Development Statement process introduced for ScotWind. She crosses a number of priority areas associated with enabling supply chain growth and investment and sits on several strategic forums including the Collaborative Framework, the Floating Offshore Wind Taskforce and the Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council. Supporting the development and expansion of offshore wind in Scotland is one of the most important roles Crown Estate Scotland is charged with and working with stakeholders and industry to enable supply chain growth is a critical component.
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Ayesha Hazarika is a political commentator, writer and comedian who served asChief of Staff to Harriet Harman, Labour Deputy Leader and twice Acting Leaderof the Labour Party. She was a senior Labour adviser for more than eight years inGovernment and in opposition.As well as working alongside Harriet, Ayesha prepared Ed Miliband for PrimeMinister’s Questions, conference speeches, interviews and the televised Leaders’debates during the 2015 election. She wrote speeches, questions and responses forboth, as well as delivering the landmark Equality Act onto the statute book andleading Labour’s response to the Leveson Inquiry into phone hacking and pressethics.
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Susie is the Managing Director of the BlueFloat Energy | Renantis Partnership in the UK where she leads the development of 5GW of floating offshore wind. Susie has worked in the energy sector for 13 years in development, construction, operation and decommissioning of projects. Previous roles include executive director positions at EDF (UK) and EDF Renewables. She remains a qualified lawyer, notary public and Writer to the Signet and is currently serving a second term on the Board of Scottish Renewables.
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Amanda Brock is CEO of OpenUK the UK organisation for the business of Open Technology – open source software, open hardware and open data – with a purpose of UK Leadership and International Collaboration in Open Technology and she is the Executive Producer of State of Open Con. She is a Board Member of the Open Source Initiative; appointed member of the Cabinet Office’s Open Standards Board; Member of the British Computer Society Inaugural Influence Board; Advisory Board Member, Sustainable Digital Infrastructure Alliance and Mimoto; and European Representative of the Open Invention Network.
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Jonathan Reynolds is the Shadow Secretary of State for Business and Industrial Strategy. Jonathan was elected as the Labour and Co-operative Member of Parliament for Stalybridge and Hyde in 2010. He has previously served as a Shadow Junior Minister for the Treasury, Energy and Climate Change and Transport. He first entered the Shadow Cabinet as Keir Starmer’s Shadow DWP spokesperson before taking on the Business brief in December 2021. Since then, Jonathan has led the Party’s business engagement as well as major policy development work including Labour’s new Industrial Strategy which was launched at the Party’s Annual Conference in 2022.
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Debbie Strang is a founder Director and Chief Operating Officer of SaxaVord Spaceport in Unst, Shetland, the UK’s first vertical launch facility with access to sun-synchronous and polar orbits. The first Launch pad was complete in December 2022, and the first sub-orbital launch is planned for later this year. She is a former RAF Office, worked for the Cairngorms National Park as Tourism and Economic Development Manager and 9 years ago set up the UK’s most northly distillery in Unst, creating award-winning Shetland Reel Gin.
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Brian is Chief Executive of The Data Lab, Scotland’s Innovation Centre for Data and Artificial Intelligence. He is responsible for strategy, culture and delivery, joining as a founding member of the team in 2015 as Head of Product Management.
Brian was recognised as one of the most influential people in data as a top 5 data influencer in the dataIQ 2023 UK top 100 and he is also nominated for the UKTech50 2023. Prior to The Data Lab, Brian held senior roles at Skyscanner, Sumerian and HP.
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Humza Yousaf was appointed First Minister in March 2023.
He was born in Glasgow on April 7, 1985. He was educated at Hutchesons’ Grammar School and the University of Glasgow, graduating with a degree in Politics. He is also an alumnus of the US State Department’s prestigious International Visitor Learning Programme.
He went on to work in the Scottish Parliament as an aide to the late Bashir Ahmad MSP. He was elected as an MSP for the Glasgow region in May 2011, and to the constituency of Glasgow Pollok since 2016.
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Neil Gray was appointed as Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy, Fair Work and Energy in March 2023.
Neil Gray was born and brought up in Orkney and was educated at Kirkwall Grammar School. He graduated from the University of Stirling in 2008 with a first-class Bachelor of Arts Honours degree in politics and journalism.
He was elected to represent Airdrie and Shotts Constituency at the 2021 Scottish Parliament election.
He had previously won the Airdrie and Shotts Westminster seat in 2015 and held it on two subsequent occasions before resigning to stand for the same area in the 2021 Scottish Parliament election. Prior to becoming an MP, Mr Gray worked for former Scottish Government Health Secretary Alex Neil MSP as his Airdrie and Shotts constituency office manager.
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John is part of IDRIC‘s Policy Team, working to inform UK and Devolved Government policy development in industrial decarbonisation and Net Zero, through a comprehensive synthesis of academic expertise, industry experience and independent policy analysis, taking account of the challenges, opportunities and trade-offs involved. John has previously held roles in the Scottish water research sector and the Scottish Parliament, and holds a PhD in geomicrobiology from the University of Dundee.
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Katie is a senior manager in the CBDC unit overseeing international and stakeholder engagement and work on functional design. Katie has been working at the Bank of England for ten years and has held roles across Financial Stability, Monetary Analysis and Prudential Policy as well as a secondment with JP Morgan. Prior to joining the Bank, Katie worked in economic consultancy. Katie holds degrees in maths and economics from the University of Cambridge and Birkbeck.
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Since October 2013, Dr. Fabian Zuleeg has been Chief Executive of the European Policy Centre, with overall responsibility, including providing strategic direction, managing its staff and resources and representing the EPC. He remains Chief Economist at the same time (a post he has held since January 2010). Fabian holds a PhD on the political economy of EU accession from Edinburgh University. Before coming to the EPC, he worked as an economic analyst in academia, the public and the private sector.
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Ellis Watson spent the first decade of his career working directly for Rupert Murdoch, before then running Celador TV where he took Who Wants To Be a Millionaire to 106 countries, making it the most successful quiz show in history. He was CEO of Mirror Group before going on to run two large Scottish PLC’s, before returning to TV where he ran Simon Cowell’s TV & record labels around the world. In January, he was appointed as Chief Business Advisor by the First Minister.
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Dr. Matthew Agarwala leads the Bennett Institute’s Wealth Economy project at the University of Cambridge, is a member of The Productivity Institute, and Senior Policy Fellow at Yale University’s Tobin Center for Economic Policy. His research covers natural and social capital, economic measurement, green finance, productivity, and wellbeing. Spanning sectors and disciplines, Matthew’s collaborators include ecologists, social anthropologists, members of UK Parliament, and Nobel Laureates in peace, medicine, physics, and chemistry. Matthew works closely with the UN, World Bank, central banks, finance ministries, and businesses to highlight nature-related financial risks. He is a sought-after public speaker and regular media contributor (BBC, Bloomberg, Channel 4 News, FT, Guardian, NYTimes, Reuters, and The Times).
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Paul McAleavey is a senior advisor for strategy and relations management at the European Commission in Brussels. With broad experience in management and leadership at EU level in the fields of environment, climate and sustainability policies, he is currently engaged in the strategic repositioning of the Commission’s Joint Research Centre. The Centre provides independent, evidence-based knowledge and science for a broad range of EU policies and leads the scientific work on foresight in the European Commission. Paul is from Clackmannanshire and maintains close professional relations with Scotland, not least through his role as a Board member for Environmental Standards Scotland.
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Lindsay Keegans is Senior Vice President of Sales at Ooni Pizza Ovens. In 2017, after business development and project management positions in the more corporate environments of KPMG and Cigna, Lindsay took a leap into the world of pizza ovens. Since then, she’s been on an incredible growth journey helping take Ooni from a start-up to one of the top outdoor cooking brands in the world. Ooni was listed as Scotland’s fastest growing business in the 2022 Sunday Times Fast Track and number 7 in the UK.
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Alisdair is recognised by his peers as one of Scotland’s prominent professional advisers amongst Scotland’s digital and technology sector. Alisdair leads the development of Glasgow City Innovation District – Scotland’s first Innovation District and is the founder of Framewire, Scotland’s first advisory practice dedicated to developing Scotland’s Digital and Tech Ecosystem. Alisdair is the co-founder of the internationally acclaimed Turing Festival and at the inaugural Scottish Tech Startup Awards was awarded the first Tech Ecosystem award where his peers recognised his expertise and commitment to developing Scotland’s Tech Ecosystem. Alisdair is also an Independent Board Adviser for Barclays Eagle Labs.
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Gail Hurley co-leads Finance Earth’s investment advisory work, with a particular focus on marine ecosystems. She is a specialist in innovative financing models for the blue economy, and has worked to assess feasibility, design and implement a range of financing structures across diverse social and environmental issues, including incubation funds, blended finance funds, impact bonds and debt-for-development swaps. Her work has focused extensively on developing financing solutions for the Global South, and she has worked across several jurisdictions, including Africa and the Caribbean. Gail has worked in sustainable finance and international development since 2004, and has held senior advisory roles in the UN (UNDP and the World Food Programme), and has also provided independent advisory services to philanthropic foundations and the non-profit sector. Gail has also worked as a researcher on development finance, and served as a Fellow with Development Initiatives between 2019 and 2021, a leading development organisation in the UK. She is an author and contributor to multiple research papers on development finance. She sits on the Board of the Global Ethical Finance Initiative.
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Ian Ritchie is Chairman of Tern plc (AIM: TERN), Computer Application Services Ltd., and Krotos Ltd. He was Chairman of iomart Group plc from 2008 until 2018. He is a board member of Edinburgh’s Royal Lyceum Theatre, and the Scottish Council for Development and Industry (SCDI).
He was Honorary Treasurer of the Royal Academy of Engineering from 2012 to 2016 and Vice President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh from 2012 to 2016. Ritchie has also been active in venture capital as a director of Northern Venture Trust plc from 1997 to 2001 and as a member of the advisory board of Pentech Ventures from 2001 to 2016. He was a founding director, and Chairman (1988-1990), of the Scottish Software Federation (now ScotlandIS).
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Dr Poonam Malik is an entrepreneurial business strategist, Life Sciences leader and an investor in Innovation. She has recently been appointed Co-Chair, by Scottish Government, to lead on First Minister’s ‘New Deal for Business Group’ representing businesses and industry- co-sharing the role with the Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy.
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Indro Mukerjee is CEO of Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation agency. He is a highly experienced technology CEO and business leader with a track record of leading innovation and technology commercialisation in businesses of all sizes across the world, from publicly listed and multinational corporations to new venture and private equity backed technology companies. Indro has extensive experience of leading fast growth; start-up; spinouts; restructuring; turnaround and successful M&A. Much of his time was spent in Asia and the US.
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Malcolm Offord is a Scottish businessman who was appointed a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State to the Scotland Office on 4th October 2021. He was also appointed a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department of Business and Trade on 24 April 2023.
He was born and educated in Greenock and graduated in Law from Edinburgh University in 1987 before embarking upon a 25 year career in The City of London.
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Myrtle Dawes is Chief Executive Officer of the Net Zero Technology Centre where she leads the development of technology for a net zero energy industry.
She is a non-executive board member of FirstGroup, non-executive board member of the Centre for Process Innovation, an advisory board member for the Association of Black and Minority Engineers and sits on the Technology Leadership Board.
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Amee Ritchie is the co-founder of S’wheat, the social enterprise behind the world’s first reusable water bottle made from plant-based materials. Every S’wheat bottle funds the planting of a trackable, native tree, planted where it is needed most. Since the company launched in 2019, Amee and co-founder Jake have funded the planting of native trees all over the world and have worked with some of the world’s most exclusive brands through their corporate branding offerings.
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Chris Yiu is Director of Public Policy for Northern Europe at Meta, the social metaverse company. Meta builds technologies that help people connect, find communities and grow businesses. This includes social apps for 2D screens, and new immersive experiences like virtual and augmented reality. He is also a non-executive director of the Tony Blair Institute, an advisor at the David Hume Institute, and a trustee of the ENABLE Group.
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Robert Thorburn is Openreach’s Partnership Director for Scotland, leading the company’s commercial and funded programmes to deliver fast, reliable full fibre broadband working with partners large and small.
These currently include the £600m Reaching 100% contracts with the Scottish Government, as well as working directly with all 32 Local Authorities, Housing Associations, Factors and Managing Agents.
Robert has a 25-year+ career in the IT and communications sector with extensive experience in managing large scale build programmes.
X
Gillian leads the offshore wind supply chain activity for Crown Estate Scotland including the Supply Chain Development Statement process introduced for ScotWind. She crosses a number of priority areas associated with enabling supply chain growth and investment and sits on several strategic forums including the Collaborative Framework, the Floating Offshore Wind Taskforce and the Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council. Supporting the development and expansion of offshore wind in Scotland is one of the most important roles Crown Estate Scotland is charged with and working with stakeholders and industry to enable supply chain growth is a critical component.
X
Ayesha Hazarika is a political commentator, writer and comedian who served asChief of Staff to Harriet Harman, Labour Deputy Leader and twice Acting Leaderof the Labour Party. She was a senior Labour adviser for more than eight years inGovernment and in opposition.As well as working alongside Harriet, Ayesha prepared Ed Miliband for PrimeMinister’s Questions, conference speeches, interviews and the televised Leaders’debates during the 2015 election. She wrote speeches, questions and responses forboth, as well as delivering the landmark Equality Act onto the statute book andleading Labour’s response to the Leveson Inquiry into phone hacking and pressethics.
X
Susie is the Managing Director of the BlueFloat Energy | Renantis Partnership in the UK where she leads the development of 5GW of floating offshore wind. Susie has worked in the energy sector for 13 years in development, construction, operation and decommissioning of projects. Previous roles include executive director positions at EDF (UK) and EDF Renewables. She remains a qualified lawyer, notary public and Writer to the Signet and is currently serving a second term on the Board of Scottish Renewables.
X
Amanda Brock is CEO of OpenUK the UK organisation for the business of Open Technology – open source software, open hardware and open data – with a purpose of UK Leadership and International Collaboration in Open Technology and she is the Executive Producer of State of Open Con. She is a Board Member of the Open Source Initiative; appointed member of the Cabinet Office’s Open Standards Board; Member of the British Computer Society Inaugural Influence Board; Advisory Board Member, Sustainable Digital Infrastructure Alliance and Mimoto; and European Representative of the Open Invention Network.
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Jonathan Reynolds is the Shadow Secretary of State for Business and Industrial Strategy. Jonathan was elected as the Labour and Co-operative Member of Parliament for Stalybridge and Hyde in 2010. He has previously served as a Shadow Junior Minister for the Treasury, Energy and Climate Change and Transport. He first entered the Shadow Cabinet as Keir Starmer’s Shadow DWP spokesperson before taking on the Business brief in December 2021. Since then, Jonathan has led the Party’s business engagement as well as major policy development work including Labour’s new Industrial Strategy which was launched at the Party’s Annual Conference in 2022.
X
Debbie Strang is a founder Director and Chief Operating Officer of SaxaVord Spaceport in Unst, Shetland, the UK’s first vertical launch facility with access to sun-synchronous and polar orbits. The first Launch pad was complete in December 2022, and the first sub-orbital launch is planned for later this year. She is a former RAF Office, worked for the Cairngorms National Park as Tourism and Economic Development Manager and 9 years ago set up the UK’s most northly distillery in Unst, creating award-winning Shetland Reel Gin.
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Brian is Chief Executive of The Data Lab, Scotland’s Innovation Centre for Data and Artificial Intelligence. He is responsible for strategy, culture and delivery, joining as a founding member of the team in 2015 as Head of Product Management.
Brian was recognised as one of the most influential people in data as a top 5 data influencer in the dataIQ 2023 UK top 100 and he is also nominated for the UKTech50 2023. Prior to The Data Lab, Brian held senior roles at Skyscanner, Sumerian and HP.
X
Humza Yousaf was appointed First Minister in March 2023.
He was born in Glasgow on April 7, 1985. He was educated at Hutchesons’ Grammar School and the University of Glasgow, graduating with a degree in Politics. He is also an alumnus of the US State Department’s prestigious International Visitor Learning Programme.
He went on to work in the Scottish Parliament as an aide to the late Bashir Ahmad MSP. He was elected as an MSP for the Glasgow region in May 2011, and to the constituency of Glasgow Pollok since 2016.
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Neil Gray was appointed as Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy, Fair Work and Energy in March 2023.
Neil Gray was born and brought up in Orkney and was educated at Kirkwall Grammar School. He graduated from the University of Stirling in 2008 with a first-class Bachelor of Arts Honours degree in politics and journalism.
He was elected to represent Airdrie and Shotts Constituency at the 2021 Scottish Parliament election.
He had previously won the Airdrie and Shotts Westminster seat in 2015 and held it on two subsequent occasions before resigning to stand for the same area in the 2021 Scottish Parliament election. Prior to becoming an MP, Mr Gray worked for former Scottish Government Health Secretary Alex Neil MSP as his Airdrie and Shotts constituency office manager.
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John is part of IDRIC‘s Policy Team, working to inform UK and Devolved Government policy development in industrial decarbonisation and Net Zero, through a comprehensive synthesis of academic expertise, industry experience and independent policy analysis, taking account of the challenges, opportunities and trade-offs involved. John has previously held roles in the Scottish water research sector and the Scottish Parliament, and holds a PhD in geomicrobiology from the University of Dundee.
X
Katie is a senior manager in the CBDC unit overseeing international and stakeholder engagement and work on functional design. Katie has been working at the Bank of England for ten years and has held roles across Financial Stability, Monetary Analysis and Prudential Policy as well as a secondment with JP Morgan. Prior to joining the Bank, Katie worked in economic consultancy. Katie holds degrees in maths and economics from the University of Cambridge and Birkbeck.
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Since October 2013, Dr. Fabian Zuleeg has been Chief Executive of the European Policy Centre, with overall responsibility, including providing strategic direction, managing its staff and resources and representing the EPC. He remains Chief Economist at the same time (a post he has held since January 2010). Fabian holds a PhD on the political economy of EU accession from Edinburgh University. Before coming to the EPC, he worked as an economic analyst in academia, the public and the private sector.
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Ellis Watson spent the first decade of his career working directly for Rupert Murdoch, before then running Celador TV where he took Who Wants To Be a Millionaire to 106 countries, making it the most successful quiz show in history. He was CEO of Mirror Group before going on to run two large Scottish PLC’s, before returning to TV where he ran Simon Cowell’s TV & record labels around the world. In January, he was appointed as Chief Business Advisor by the First Minister.
X
Dr. Matthew Agarwala leads the Bennett Institute’s Wealth Economy project at the University of Cambridge, is a member of The Productivity Institute, and Senior Policy Fellow at Yale University’s Tobin Center for Economic Policy. His research covers natural and social capital, economic measurement, green finance, productivity, and wellbeing. Spanning sectors and disciplines, Matthew’s collaborators include ecologists, social anthropologists, members of UK Parliament, and Nobel Laureates in peace, medicine, physics, and chemistry. Matthew works closely with the UN, World Bank, central banks, finance ministries, and businesses to highlight nature-related financial risks. He is a sought-after public speaker and regular media contributor (BBC, Bloomberg, Channel 4 News, FT, Guardian, NYTimes, Reuters, and The Times).
X
Paul McAleavey is a senior advisor for strategy and relations management at the European Commission in Brussels. With broad experience in management and leadership at EU level in the fields of environment, climate and sustainability policies, he is currently engaged in the strategic repositioning of the Commission’s Joint Research Centre. The Centre provides independent, evidence-based knowledge and science for a broad range of EU policies and leads the scientific work on foresight in the European Commission. Paul is from Clackmannanshire and maintains close professional relations with Scotland, not least through his role as a Board member for Environmental Standards Scotland.
X
Lindsay Keegans is Senior Vice President of Sales at Ooni Pizza Ovens. In 2017, after business development and project management positions in the more corporate environments of KPMG and Cigna, Lindsay took a leap into the world of pizza ovens. Since then, she’s been on an incredible growth journey helping take Ooni from a start-up to one of the top outdoor cooking brands in the world. Ooni was listed as Scotland’s fastest growing business in the 2022 Sunday Times Fast Track and number 7 in the UK.
X
Alisdair is recognised by his peers as one of Scotland’s prominent professional advisers amongst Scotland’s digital and technology sector. Alisdair leads the development of Glasgow City Innovation District – Scotland’s first Innovation District and is the founder of Framewire, Scotland’s first advisory practice dedicated to developing Scotland’s Digital and Tech Ecosystem. Alisdair is the co-founder of the internationally acclaimed Turing Festival and at the inaugural Scottish Tech Startup Awards was awarded the first Tech Ecosystem award where his peers recognised his expertise and commitment to developing Scotland’s Tech Ecosystem. Alisdair is also an Independent Board Adviser for Barclays Eagle Labs.
X
Gail Hurley co-leads Finance Earth’s investment advisory work, with a particular focus on marine ecosystems. She is a specialist in innovative financing models for the blue economy, and has worked to assess feasibility, design and implement a range of financing structures across diverse social and environmental issues, including incubation funds, blended finance funds, impact bonds and debt-for-development swaps. Her work has focused extensively on developing financing solutions for the Global South, and she has worked across several jurisdictions, including Africa and the Caribbean. Gail has worked in sustainable finance and international development since 2004, and has held senior advisory roles in the UN (UNDP and the World Food Programme), and has also provided independent advisory services to philanthropic foundations and the non-profit sector. Gail has also worked as a researcher on development finance, and served as a Fellow with Development Initiatives between 2019 and 2021, a leading development organisation in the UK. She is an author and contributor to multiple research papers on development finance. She sits on the Board of the Global Ethical Finance Initiative.
X
Ian Ritchie is Chairman of Tern plc (AIM: TERN), Computer Application Services Ltd., and Krotos Ltd. He was Chairman of iomart Group plc from 2008 until 2018. He is a board member of Edinburgh’s Royal Lyceum Theatre, and the Scottish Council for Development and Industry (SCDI).
He was Honorary Treasurer of the Royal Academy of Engineering from 2012 to 2016 and Vice President of the Royal Society of Edinburgh from 2012 to 2016. Ritchie has also been active in venture capital as a director of Northern Venture Trust plc from 1997 to 2001 and as a member of the advisory board of Pentech Ventures from 2001 to 2016. He was a founding director, and Chairman (1988-1990), of the Scottish Software Federation (now ScotlandIS).
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Dr Poonam Malik is an entrepreneurial business strategist, Life Sciences leader and an investor in Innovation. She has recently been appointed Co-Chair, by Scottish Government, to lead on First Minister’s ‘New Deal for Business Group’ representing businesses and industry- co-sharing the role with the Cabinet Secretary for Wellbeing Economy.
X
Indro Mukerjee is CEO of Innovate UK, the UK’s innovation agency. He is a highly experienced technology CEO and business leader with a track record of leading innovation and technology commercialisation in businesses of all sizes across the world, from publicly listed and multinational corporations to new venture and private equity backed technology companies. Indro has extensive experience of leading fast growth; start-up; spinouts; restructuring; turnaround and successful M&A. Much of his time was spent in Asia and the US.
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Malcolm Offord is a Scottish businessman who was appointed a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State to the Scotland Office on 4th October 2021. He was also appointed a Parliamentary Under Secretary of State in the Department of Business and Trade on 24 April 2023.
He was born and educated in Greenock and graduated in Law from Edinburgh University in 1987 before embarking upon a 25 year career in The City of London.
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Myrtle Dawes is Chief Executive Officer of the Net Zero Technology Centre where she leads the development of technology for a net zero energy industry.
She is a non-executive board member of FirstGroup, non-executive board member of the Centre for Process Innovation, an advisory board member for the Association of Black and Minority Engineers and sits on the Technology Leadership Board.
X
Amee Ritchie is the co-founder of S’wheat, the social enterprise behind the world’s first reusable water bottle made from plant-based materials. Every S’wheat bottle funds the planting of a trackable, native tree, planted where it is needed most. Since the company launched in 2019, Amee and co-founder Jake have funded the planting of native trees all over the world and have worked with some of the world’s most exclusive brands through their corporate branding offerings.
X
Chris Yiu is Director of Public Policy for Northern Europe at Meta, the social metaverse company. Meta builds technologies that help people connect, find communities and grow businesses. This includes social apps for 2D screens, and new immersive experiences like virtual and augmented reality. He is also a non-executive director of the Tony Blair Institute, an advisor at the David Hume Institute, and a trustee of the ENABLE Group.
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