Angel Gurría is the Secretary-General of the OECD since June 2006. He was re-appointed to a second mandate in September 2010. As OECD Secretary-General, he has reinforced the OECD's role as a ‘hub" for global dialogue and debate on economic policy issues while pursuing internal modernization and reform.

Mr. Gurría is a Mexican national and came to the OECD following a distinguished career in public service in his country, including positions as Minister of Foreign Affairs and Minister of Finance and Public Credit in the 1990s.

Mr. Gurría holds a B.A. degree in Economics from UNAM (Mexico) and a M.A. degree in Economics from Leeds University (United Kingdom).

Jin Liqun is Chairman of China International Capital Corporation. He is member of foreign policy advisory committee of Chinese Foreign Ministry. Currently he also serves as Chair of the International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Fund. He was Chairman of Supervisory Board, China Investment Corporation & Central Huijing Investment Corporation from 2008 to 2013.

From 2003 to 2008, Mr. Jin Liqun was the Vice-President of Asian Development Bank (ADB) in charge of operations for South Asia, Central and West Asia, and the private sector operations. He was also involved in the formulation of ADB’s medium and long-term strategy and many policies governing its operations for economic and social development, particularly poverty reduction and environmental protection.

Mr. Jin joined China’s Ministry of Finance in 1980. He was promoted to be Deputy Director in 1985, and Deputy Director General in 1988 of External Finance Department. In 1988, he was elected as Alternative Executive Director for China at the World Bank. He became Director General, Department of the Ministry of Finance in 1995.

The same year, he was promoted to be Assistant Minister of Finance and in 1998 became Vice Minister of Finance. As Vice Minister of Finance, Mr. Jin was in charge of budget allocations for governmental organizations, for education, science, and culture sectors, supervising the financial sector and raising funds from domestic and international markets. In that capacity, he served as Alternate Governor for the PRC at ADB, the World Bank Group and the Global Environment Facility from 1998 through 2003. He has been active in international economic affairs for almost two decades, particularly since the Asian financial crisis in 1997.

He has worked on a number of bilateral and multilateral economic and financial forums, such as the China-US Joint Economic Committee, China-UK Economic and Finance Dialogue, APEC Finance Ministers' Meeting, ASEAN Plus Three and G-20. In addition, Mr. Jin was a member of the State Monetary Policy Committee the PRC.

Mr. Jin holds an M. A. degree in English Literature from Beijing Institute of Foreign Languages (now Beijing Foreign Studies University). He was also a Hubert Humphrey Fellow in the Economics Graduate Program at Boston University from 1987 to 1988.

Josef Ackermann was Chairman of Zurich Insurance Group Ltd from March 2012 to September 2013. From 1996 to May 2012 he held various positions in the Deutsche Bank AG, his last position being Chairman of the management board from 2006 until 2012.

Mr. Ackermann is a member of the board of directors of Royal Dutch Shell plc, The Netherlands; a member of the board of directors of Investor AB, Sweden; as well as vice-chairman of the board of directors of Belenos Clean Power Holding Ltd, Biel.

In July 2013 he also became a member of the board of directors of EQT Holdings AB, Sweden. In addition, he is a member of the International Advisory Board of the National Bank of Kuwait as well as of Akbank, Turkey, and plays an active role in the World Economic Forum (vice-chairman of the foundation board). He also has various roles in several foundations and academic institutions.

Mr. Ackermann gained his doctorate in economics and social sciences from the University of St. Gallen Switzerland.

Tyler Cowen is Holbert C. Harris Professor of Economics at George Mason University and also Director of the Mercatus Center. He received his Ph.d. in economics from Harvard University in 1987. His book "The Great Stagnation: How America Ate the Low-Hanging Fruit of Modern History, Got Sick, and Will (Eventually) Feel Better" was a New York Times best-seller.

He was recently named in an "Economist" poll as one of the most influential economists of the last decade and last year Bloomberg BusinessWeek dubbed him "America's Hottest Economist." "Foreign Policy" magazine named him as one of its "Top 100 Global Thinkers" of 2011. His latest book "An Economist Gets Lunch" considers the economics of global food. He also co-writes a blog - " marginalrevolution" and is currently constructing an on-line education project.

Peter Jarrett has PhD in Economics from Harvard. He has been at the OECD for 26 years with 5 years before that at the Bank of Canada and currently oversee the OECD work on France/Poland, Canada/New Zealand, Brazil/Indonesia and Israel.

Janet Tavakoli is the founder and president of Tavakoli Structured Finance, Inc. (TSF), a Chicago based consulting firm providing expert experience to maximize the value of derivatives and structured products and avoid getting burned. TSF consults for financial institutions, institutional investors, and hedge funds.

Ms. Tavakoli is a world renowned author and speaker on derivative products and securities and their systemic risks and granular rewards. She has appeared as an expert before forums of the International Monetary Fund, the Federal Reserve Bank, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and the Securities and Exchange Commission.Her books, Structured Finance & Collateralized Debt Obligations (2003, 2008), and Credit Derivatives (1998, 2001) revealed grave flaws in the methodology for rating structured financial products and abuses in the credit derivatives markets.

In Dear Mr. Buffett: What an Investor Learns 1,269 Miles from Wall Street, she chronicles the causal events and malfeasance leading to the near collapse of the U.S. financial system in 2008. Her 2012 e-book, The New Robber Barons is a compilation of her writings on subsequent ongoing failed regulation, failure to prosecute, and cover-ups for elites and the consequential risks to the global financial system. Her letter to the SEC posted in February 2007 in response to proposed rules for the credit rating agencies makes the case that the NRSRO designation for the rating agencies should be revoked for structured financial products.

Ms. Tavakoli was years ahead of the financial industry predicting lax underwriting, excessive leverage, and misrating of structured products would result in a global financial crisis. The University of Chicago profiled her as "Structured Success," and Business Week as "The Cassandra of Credit Derivatives."

Janet Tavakoli has over 22 years of Wall Street experience in finance. Tavakoli has traded, structured and sold derivatives and structured products at major financial institutions in New York and London. Prior to that, Tavakoli was the manager of financial strategic planning for two Fortune 500 companies. She is a former adjunct associate professor of finance at Chicago Booth (the University of Chicago's Graduate School of Business) where she taught "Derivatives: Futures, Forwards, Options and Swaps".

Janet Tavakoli is the former Executive Director, Head of Financial Engineering in the Global Financial Markets Division at Westdeutsche Landesbank in London. She headed market risk management for the capital markets group for Bank One in Chicago. Tavakoli headed the asset swap trading desk at Merrill Lynch in New York, headed mortgage backed securities marketing for Merrill Lynch in New York, and headed mortgage backed securities marketing to Japanese clients for PaineWebber in New York. She also worked for Bear Stearns heading marketing for quantitative research and for Goldman Sachs.

Gideon Rachman is chief foreign affairs commentator for the Financial Times. His book "Zero-Sum Future: American Power in An Age of Anxiety" was published by Simon and Schuster in 2011. He writes a weekly column on foreign affairs for the FT.

Before joining the paper in 2006, he worked for The Economist for 15 years in a range of jobs, including as a foreign correspondent in Brussels, Bangkok and Washington. Mr Rachman read history at Cambridge University and has been a visiting fellow at the Woodrow Wilson school at Princeton University.

Prof. Stanley Fischer stepped down as Governor of the Bank of Israel at the end of June 2013. He began his service as Governor in May 2005, and was reappointed for a second term in May 2010. Prior to joining the Bank of Israel, Prof. Fischer was Vice Chairman of Citigroup from 2002 through 2005.

Prof. Fischer was the First Deputy Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund, from 1994 until 2001. Before he joined the IMF, Prof. Fischer was the Killian Professor and Head of the Department of Economics at MIT. He was a member of the MIT Department of Economics from 1973 to 1994, when he left to join the IMF.

From 1988 to 1990 he was Vice President, Development Economics and Chief Economist at the World Bank. Prof. Fischer was born in Zambia in 1943. He took the B.Sc. (Econ) and M.Sc. (Econ) at the London School of Economics from 1962-66, and obtained his Ph.D. in economics at MIT in 1969. He was Assistant Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago until 1973, when he returned to the MIT Department of Economics as an Associate Professor. He became Professor of Economics in 1977. He has held visiting positions at the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, and at the Hoover Institution at Stanford.

Keith Elliott is Senior Vice President, Eastern Mediterranean Region. He has 33 years’ industry experience, including the past 4 years with Noble Energy. Prior to joining Noble in October, 2009 as Vice President of Major Projects, Keith was employed by BP Exploration for 25 years.
Over the course of that time he held a variety of US and international technical and leadership positions in Drilling and Completions, Production Engineering and Operations, General Asset Management and Project Management.
Keith is a 1980 graduate of Louisiana Tech University and holds a BS in Petroleum Engineering

Monica Woodley manages a range of bespoke research programmes for the Economist Group. Prior to joining the company in 2009, Monica spent almost a decade as a journalist covering the world of business - the financial services industry in particular - at the Financial Times Group, Euromoney and Incisive Media, as well as freelance with the Independent, Wall Street Journal Europe and a range of trade publications. Monica has a master’s degree in politics from Georgetown University and holds the Certificate of Financial Planning.

Alan M. Dershowitz is Brooklyn native who has been called "the nation’s most peripatetic civil liberties lawyer" and one of its "most distinguished defenders of individual rights," "the best-known criminal lawyer in the world, "America’s most public Jewish defender" and "Israel’s single most visible defender – the Jewish state’s lead attorney in the court of public opinion." ... He is the Felix Frankfurter Professor of Law at Harvard Law School.

Dershowitz, joined the Harvard Law School faculty at age 25 after clerking for Judge David Bazelon and Justice Arthur Goldberg. Professor Dershowitz is the author of 27 fiction and non-fiction works with a worldwide audience. His most recent titles include "an exceptional, action packed book," The Trials of Zion, a novel which has been called "a thought-provoking page turner," Rights From Wrong, The Case For Israel, The Case For Peace, Blasphemy: How the Religious Right is Hijacking the Declaration of Independence and Preemption.

In 1983, the Anti-Defamation League of the B'nai B'rith presented him with the William O. Douglas First Amendment Award for his "compassionate eloquent leadership and persistent advocacy in the struggle for civil and human rights." In presenting the award, Nobel Laureate Elie Wiesel said: "If there had been a few people like Alan Dershowitz during the 1930s and 1940s, the history of European Jewry might have been different."

Based in Tel Aviv, Elliott is the only international broadcaster in Israel focusing on technology, company news and the economy.
Since joining Bloomberg in 2007, Elliott has reported on major international events including the 2012 Greek elections; the Irish bailout; and the nationalization of Royal Bank of Scotland. He's interviewed some of the biggest names in business and politics, including David Cameron, Hugo Chavez, Sir Richard Branson and Shimon Peres. In 2008, he was nominated for a Business Journalist of the Year Award. Before joining Bloomberg, he spent six years at the BBC, where he served as a business reporter and South America correspondent. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Geography from the University of Nottingham, and speaks fluent French and Spanish, and a smattering of Italian. He's working on his Hebrew.

Dr. Nariman Behravesh is Chief Economist of IHS and author of Spin-Free Economics: A No-Nonsense, Nonpartisan Guide to Today's Global Economic Debates (McGraw-Hill). Directing the entire economic forecasting process at IHS, he is responsible for developing the economic outlook and risk analysis for the United States, Europe, Japan, China and other emerging markets. He oversees the work of over 400 professionals, located in North America, Europe, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa who cover economic, financial, and political developments in over 200 countries.

Behravesh is a "Bloomberg Best" and ranked as one of Bloomberg's Top Forecasters for 2009, 2010 and 2011. MarketWatch designated IHS Global Insight "Forecaster of the Year" in 2009 and has bestowed several Forecaster of the Month accolades since. He and his team were designated no.1 in USA Today’s 2004 ranking of top economic forecasters, and in Reuters' 2004 survey of major currency exchange rate forecasters.

In 2008, he was ranked no.2 by USA Today. In The Wall Street Journal’s annual ranking of U.S. forecasters, Behravesh was ranked no.3 (out of 56) for 2006, and was the only forecaster to place in the top six for 2003, 2004 and 2006. As the chief economics spokesperson at IHS, Behravesh is quoted extensively in the media on such topics as the outlook for the U.S. and global economies, exchange rates, the budget deficit, the trade deficit, globalization, country risk, and sovereign debt crises.

Behravesh was the host of the PBS television series "Inside the Global Economy." In addition to his recent book, he has authored numerous articles in such publications as European Affairs and Credit Week, co-authored two books - Economics U$A and Microcomputers, Corporate Planning and Decision Support Systems. He was a contributing author as well to a book on scenario analysis, entitled Learning From the Future.

Before joining IHS, Behravesh was chief economist for Global Insight (now an IHS company). Prior to that, he was chief international economist for Standard & Poor's. He also held a number of other positions, including president and CEO of Oxford Economics U.S.A. and Group Senior Vice President of WEFA.

Early in his career Behravesh worked at the Congressional Budget Office and the Federal Reserve. He has been covering the global economy for over 35 years.Behravesh holds Ph.D. and M.A. degrees in economics from the University of Pennsylvania

Fatih Birol is the Chief Economist at the International Energy Agency in Paris and is responsible for the IEA’s flagship publication World Energy Outlook, which is recognized as the most authoritative source of strategic analysis of global energy markets. He is also the founder and chair of the IEA Energy Business Council, which provides a forum to enhance cooperation between the energy industry and energy policymakers.

Dr. Birol has been named by Forbes Magazine among the most powerful people in terms of influence on the world’s energy scene. He is the Chairman of the World Economic Forum’s (Davos) Energy Advisory Board and has served as a member of the UN Secretary-General’s ‘High-level Group on Sustainable Energy for All’.

Prior to joining the IEA in 1995, Dr. Birol worked at the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) in Vienna. A Turkish citizen, Dr. Birol was born in Ankara in 1958.Throughout his career, Dr. Birol has been decorated with numerous awards in recognition of his contribution to the energy debate and most recently he was presented with two special awards from the Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs in appreciation of the work he and his team carried out for the Iraq Energy Outlook.

Steve Keen is the Professor of Economics and Finance at the University of Western Sydney. He is long standing critic of the conventional economic theory and has been identified as one of 12 economists that warned about the financial crisis before it happened.
He was the winner of the 2010 Revere Award of Economics from the Real-World Economics Review for being the economist who ‘first and most cogently warned of the coming calamity.’ Professor Keen is one of the world's leading experts on Hyman Minsky's Financial Instability Hypothesis.

Lee C. Buchheit is a partner based in the New York office of Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton. Mr. Buchheit’s practice focuses on international and corporate transactions, including Eurocurrency financial transactions, sovereign debt management, privatization and project finance.

Mr. Buchheit is the author of two books in the field of international law and more than 40 articles on professional matters. He has served as an adjunct professor at the School for International and Public Affairs of Columbia University (1994-97), as a visiting professor at Chuo University in Japan (1997-98), as a Lecturer on Law at the Harvard Law School (2000), as a Visiting Lecturer in Law at the Yale Law School (2005), as an adjunct professor of law at Duke University Law School (2006-07), and as an adjunct professor of law at New York University Law School (2008). Mr. Buchheit is a Visiting Professorial Fellow in the Centre for Commercial Law Studies at the University of London.

In 2010, Mr. Buchheit received International Financial Law Review's inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award for his contributions to international finance. He is also recognized by The International Who's Who of Business Lawyers, IFLR 1000: The Guide to the World's Leading Financial Law Firms and the Legal Media Group Guides as one of the best banking lawyers in the United States.

Mr. Buchheit joined the firm in 1976 and became a partner in 1984. From 1987 to 1990, he was resident in the Hong Kong office; from 1979 to 1982, in the London office; and from 1976 to 1979, in the Washington, D.C. office.

Sondra Barbour is Executive Vice President of Lockheed Martin’s Information Systems & Global Solutions (IS&GS) business area and an officer of the Lockheed Martin Corporation. Under her leadership, IS&GS employs 28,000 experienced professionals, who provide integrated information technology solutions, systems and services to support civil, defense, intelligence and other government customers globally.

One of five business areas within Lockheed Martin, IS&GS is headquartered in Gaithersburg, Md., and operates in all 50 U.S. states and 20 countries around the world. It generated $8.8 billion in sales in 2012. Most recently, Ms. Barbour was the Senior Vice President of the Enterprise Business Services organization and the corporation’s Chief Information Officer. In this role, she was responsible for all internal information technology operations, including protecting the company’s infrastructure and information from cyber threats.

In previous roles, she led the company’s Shared Services and Internal Audit organizations that provided knowledge and oversight of supply chain activities, internal controls, risk management and more. Ms. Barbour spent more than 20 years working at a predecessor of IS&GS, including serving as Chief Information Officer and Vice President of Operations for Lockheed Martin Integrated Systems & Solutions. In this role, she was responsible for the Information Technology, Facilities, Supply Chain, Technical Publications, and Environment, Health & Safety operations. Her career includes extensive leadership and technology experience, notably in the design and development of large-scale information systems.

Senator Ian Gorst was elected as Chief Minister of Jersey on 14th November 2011. First elected to the States Assembly in 2005, Senator Gorst’s previous role was as Minister for Social Security. He also served concurrently as Chairman of the Jersey Overseas Aid Commission.

Previously, he acted as an Assistant Minister in both the Chief Minister’s Department and in the Treasury Department. Senator Gorst is an accountant with significant experience in private client, private equity and retail fund sectors.

Senator Gorst has a keen interest in overseas development and he and his wife have travelled to participate in Jersey Overseas Aid Commission projects. He is also an Honorary Fellow of UNICEF UK.

Soner Cagaptay is the Beyer Family fellow and director of the Turkish Research Program at The Washington Institute. He has written extensively on U.S.-Turkish relations, Turkish domestic politics, and Turkish nationalism,

. A historian by training, Dr. Cagaptay wrote his doctoral dissertation at Yale University (2003) on Turkish nationalism. Dr. Cagaptay has taught courses at Yale, Princeton University, Georgetown University, and Smith College on the Middle East, Mediterranean, and Eastern Europe.

Dr. Cagaptay is the recipient of numerous honors, grants, and chairs, among them the Smith-Richardson, Mellon, Rice, and Leylan fellowships, as well as the Ertegun chair at Princeton. He has also served on contract as chair of the Turkey Advanced Area Studies Program at the State Department's Foreign Service Institute.
In 2012 he was named an American Turkish Society Young Society Leader.

Hans Timmer is the Chief Economist for the Europe and Central Asia (ECA) region of the World Bank. He assumed this position on September 1, 2013. The ECA region includes the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, the former Soviet Union, and Turkey. Prior to this, Mr. Timmer was the Director of the World Bank's Development Prospects Group where he oversaw the World Bank’s annual publications, Global Economic Prospects, and Global Monitoring Report, in addition to a wide range of monitoring and forecasting publications, including Global Development Horizons.

Before joining the World Bank, Mr. Timmer was head of international economic analysis at the Central Planning Bureau in the Netherlands, where he supervised the development of two world models: a long-term model of the world economy, and an econometric medium-term model of OECD economies.

Mr. Timmer has vast experience working with the European Commission, IPCC and the OECD, as well as with the Indian Planning Commission and the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. He holds a Master’s degree in econometrics from Erasmus University in Rotterdam, and was a researcher at the Erasmus University, the University of Lodz in Poland, and at the Netherlands Economic Institute.

Richard H. Clarida is the C. Lowell Harriss Professor of Economics and International Affairs at Columbia University and since 2006 , Executive Vice President and Global Strategic Advisor with PIMCO. From February 2002 until May 2003, Clarida served as the Assistant Secretary of the United States Treasury for Economic Policy, a position that required confirmation by the US Senate. In that position, he served as chief economic advisor to the Treasury Secretary, and advising him on a wide range economic policy issues, including the U.S. and global economic prospects, international capital flows, corporate governance, and the maturity structure of U.S. debt.

In May 2003 Treasury Secretary John Snow presented Clarida with The Treasury Medal in recognition for his record of outstanding service to the Treasury Department. From 1997 until 2001, Clarida served as chairman of the Department of Economics at Columbia University.

Earlier in his career, Clarida taught at Yale University and served in the Administration of President Ronald Reagan as Senior Staff Economist with the President's Council of Economic Advisers. Clarida has published numerous and frequently cited articles in leading academic journals on monetary policy, exchange rates, interest rates, and international capital flows. He is frequently invited to present his views and research to the world's leading central banks, including the Federal Reserve, the ECB, the Bank of England, and the Bank of Japan.

He has also served as a consultant to several prominent financial firms, including the Global Foreign Exchange Group at Credit Suisse First Boston and Grossman Asset Management. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the National Bureau of Economic Research. Clarida was director of the NBER Project on and Editor of G7 Current Account Imbalances: Sustainability and Adjustment(University of Chicago Press: 2007).

Since 2004, he has served as co-editor of the NBER International
Macroeconomics Annual and since 2009 as Co-Managing Editor of the Journal of Applied Financial Economics

Lorenzo Bini Smaghi is currently Visiting Scholar at Harvard's Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. He is Chairman of the Boards of SNAM and of Fondazione Palazzo Strozzi. He also chairs the Italian Chapter of the Alumni of the University of Chicago.

From June 2005 to December 2011 he was a Member of the Executive Board of the European Central Bank. During that period he acted as G7 and G20 Deputy for the euro area.

He started his career as an Economist at the Research Department of the Banca d’Italia (in 1983) and became Head of the Policy Division of the European Monetary Institute (in 1994) and then Director General for International Affairs in the Italian Treasury (in 1998). He has been the Chairman of the Board of SACE Spa, and member of the Boards of Finmeccanica, MTS, the European Investment Bank.

He holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from the Université Catholique de Louvain (Belgium), a Master’s degree from the University of Southern California and a Ph.D from the University of Chicago.

Charles Wyplosz is Professor of International Economics at the Graduate Institute in Geneva where he is Director of the International Centre for Money and Banking Studies. Previously, he has served as Associate Dean for Research and Development at INSEAD and Director of the PhD program in Economics at the Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Science Sociales in Paris.

He also has been Director of the International Macroeconomics Program of CEPR, the leading European network of economists. His main research areas include financial crises, European monetary integration, fiscal policy and regional monetary integration.

He is the co-author of two leading textbooks (Macroeconomics and European Economic Integration) and has published several books. Previously a founding Managing Editor of the review Economic Policy, he serves on several boards of professional reviews and European research centers.

He is a founding contributor of websites VoxEU and Telos. Currently a member of the Advisory Scientific Committee of the European Systemic Risk Board, of the Panel of Experts of the European Parliament’s Economic and Monetary Affairs Committee, and of the "Bellagio Group".

Charles Wyplosz has advised the Presidents of France and of the European Commission as well as the governments of the Russian Federation and of Cyprus. He holds degrees in Engineering and Statistics from Paris and a PhD in Economics from Harvard University

Dr. Elliot Hentov is Associate Director for Sovereign Ratings at Standard & Poor's covering Europe, Middle East and CIS based in London. Prior to joining S&P, Dr. Hentov was Political Affairs Officer at the United Nations headquarters in New York, advising senior UN officials on political and economic issues in the Middle East and Europe.
In addition, Dr. Hentov has authored publications on the contemporary Middle East in the New York Times, Financial Times, Foreign Policy, Washington Quarterly and holds a Ph.D. from Princeton University as well as a Master’s degree in international affairs from Georgetown University.

Ed Morse is Managing Director and Global Head-Commodities, Citi Research in New York. He previously held similar positions at Lehman Brothers, Louis Capital Markets and Credit Suisse.

Widely cited in the media, he is a contributor to journals such as Foreign Affairs, the Financial Times, the New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post. He was most recently ranked one of "The 36 Best Analysts On Wall Street by Business Insider (one of two commodity analysts) and no. 23 among the "Top 100 Global Thinkers of 2012" by Foreign Policy.

He worked in the US government at the State Department, and later was an advisor to the United Nations Compensation Commission on Iraq as well as to the US Departments of State, Energy and Defense and to the International Energy Agency on issues related to oil, natural gas and the impact of financial flows on energy prices.

A former Princeton professor and author of numerous books and articles on energy, economics and international affairs, Ed was the publisher of Petroleum Intelligence Weekly and other trade periodicals and also worked at Hess Energy Trading.

Yukon Huang is currently senior associate in the Carnegie Endowment’s Asia Program in Washington D.C. Prior to joining Carnegie, he was the World Bank’s Country Director for China based in Beijing and earlier the World Bank’s Director for Russia and the former Soviet Union. His research focuses on China’s economic and financial prospects and its impact on the United States/Europe and the Asia region. He was an advisor to the World Bank team that prepared the joint Chinese Government - World Bank "China 2030" report on China’s long term strategy.

Dr. Huang has published widely on development issues affecting China and East Asia. He is the A-List commentator for the Financial Times on China and his articles are seen frequently in the Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, Foreign Affairs and other major media.

His recent books include East Asia Visions which addresses future prospects for the region and Reshaping Economic Geography in East Asia which analyzes how the growth patterns in East Asia have been shaped by spatial and economic factors. He has a PhD in economics from Princeton University and a BA from Yale University.

In 1993 Jonas "Birger" Birgersson starts several assignments for the Swedish government and later forS weden’s incumbent Telia's broadband strategy. Birgersson came to be known as the IP evangelist at Telia and other telcos in Europe.
In 1995, Birgersson founded Framfab together with four friends. As CEO Birgersson lead the fantastic development, from a small "Incubator Company" in Lund to Europe’s largest Internet Services Company.
In 1998, Birgersson founded "Bredbandsbolaget" known as "B2" or "The Broadband Company". In 1999 Jonas Birgersson acquired ViaEuropa through one of his companies to develop its full potential as the world’s first Open Service Exchange Operator. In 2007 Birgersson created RELAKKS that became a leading supplier of anonymous broadband connections.
Birgerson was elected Global Leader of Tomorrow and Tech Pioneer by World Economic Forum

Dan Buchner is an award-winning designer, entrepreneur, and innovation consultant who has driven innovation in a wide range of organizations worldwide. For nearly 30 years, Dan has been developing innovative new products, creating compelling new services, and helping organizations establish design and innovation capabilities to drive their success.
Dan is a sought-after international keynote speaker and workshop facilitator on innovation practices and organizational strategies. He has directed interdisciplinary organizational innovation projects for leading organizations such as Procter & Gamble, PepsiCo, USAID, and the Prime Ministers Office of Singapore.
Dan believes in the power of innovative thinking to positively impact society. His recent work has involved using innovative thinking as an economic, leadership and social development tool in emerging markets such as South Africa, El Salvador, Jordan, and India.
Current Role As Director of Innovation at the Center for Creative Leadership, Dan leads the innovation incubator. The incubator is focused on developing innovative ways to deliver CCL’s world-class leadership development expertise to leaders worldwide.
Dan co-developed the Innovation Leadership Workshop, an interactive workshop allowing leaders to experience the process of innovation and leading their organizations to innovate.
Dan holds an Industrial Design Degree from the Fanshawe School of Design, London Ontario, Canada. He is also a CTI-trained coach.

Stephen Bohot is the Supplier Management (SM) Leader for all operations in Israel for Boeing Commercial Airplanes. As SM leader, Bohot is responsible to work with the leadership of Boeing’s partners and suppliers across Israel. Stephen held various assignments domestically and internationally and has built a reputation for strong problem solving skills and relationship building. Stephen began his career with The Boeing Company in 1986 working as a Machinist and entered his first management assignment in 1995. He has held various leadership roles on the on the 777, 747, 767 and 737 programs in Operations and Quality. Stephen holds an MBA from the University of Washington, and certificate degrees from Yonsei University in South Korea and Columbia University in New York.

Dr. Dirk Brown Director of the Faber Entrepreneurship Center, Clinical Professor at the Darla Moore School of Business, University of South Carolina. Dirk Brown is the Director of the Faber Entrepreneurship Center and a Clinical Professor at the Darla Moore School of Business, University of South Carolina.
Dr. Brown is a seasoned executive with a strong track record of developing, marketing, and licensing disruptive, proprietary technologies. He is the founding CEO of Pandoodle Corporation, a digital media technology company with offices in California, New York, and South Carolina.
Previously, he was CEO of Neoconix, a venture capital-funded electronics technology company serving Fortune 100 customers with worldwide sales and manufacturing. Earlier in his career, Dr. Brown was Executive Vice President of Operations and Marketing at High Connection Density (HCD), with P&L responsibility for all of the company's product lines, and before that a Member of Technical Staff at Advanced Micro Devices (AMD).
He holds over 25 patents, has written over 30 technical papers and journal articles, and is an active member in a number of professional societies. Dr. Brown holds an M.B.A. from San Jose State, a Ph.D. (Materials Science) and M.Eng. (Applied Physics) from Cornell University, and a B.Sc. (Eng) in Applied Physics/Electrical Engineering from Queen's University in Canada.

Gregory C. Clark oversees the SCRA Technology Ventures IP Commercialization business unit. He is responsible for leading a team of professionals in identifying, evaluating, and advancing technologies from university, industry, military and federal sources. Additionally, Greg is a member of the SC Launch team, where he is responsible for identifying seed and early stage venture investment opportunities within South Carolina. Since joining the SC Launch team in December 2010, he has led several financings for companies in the information technology, life sciences, advanced mobility and advanced composites industries. Greg brings more than 15 years experience in corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, and investment management to the SC Launch team.

Prior to SC Launch, he served as president and founder of Riverside Property Management, a real estate management and investment company. Earlier, Greg was a Vice President in Investment Banking and Structured Finance in the Investment Management Industry Group of ING Capital LLC in New York. While at ING, he provided acquisition financing and portfolio leverage to private equity funds, hedge funds and investment management companies. He also led private placement and M&A transactions for client companies.

Prior to ING, Greg served as a portfolio manager with Bank of America Capital Management. There, he managed large-cap equity investment portfolios for high net worth and institutional investors. Greg is a former intelligence officer in the U.S. Navy.

Gene Eidson is Professor of Biological Sciences at Clemson University and the director of the Institute of Computational Ecology and the Urban Ecology Center. He leads the environmental efforts of the Clemson University Restoration Institute and is founding director of the EPA-designated Center for Watershed Excellence.
Dr. Eidson is Principal Investigator of the SmartState Centers of Economic Excellence in Sustainable Development and Urban Ecology & Restoration. He is a principal investigator of the Intelligent River Research Enterprise, Clemson University’s largest interdisciplinary research program. He is recognized nationally as an expert in community-based engagement and environmental programming.
He teaches restoration ecology courses at Clemson and also serves as adjunct faculty at the University of Georgia’s Odum School of Ecology.
Eidson is founder and former president and CEO of Southeastern Natural Sciences Academy, a non-profit research and educational institute headquartered in Augusta, Georgia. He led restoration of a 3,000-acre floodplain swamp to establish the Phinizy Swamp Nature Park and the Center for Urban River Research in Augusta. He also led restoration of the 2,000-acre closed Kennecott-Ridgeway Gold Mine in Ridgeway, S.C. Both sites include education and research facilities that support K-12 education, undergraduate and graduate research, and public outreach.
In addition, Dr. Eidson developed the restoration plans for the North Augusta Brick Pond Park and served as PI for the Sand River Ecological Restoration Master Plan in Aiken, SC. Eidson earned a B.S. in biology from USC-Columbia and the M.S. and Ph.D. in zoology from Clemson University.
Current key projects include Intelligent River, Intelligent Farm, Intelligent Forest, Intelligent City, Aiken Green Infrastructure, City of Aiken Stormwater Hydrological Assessment, and Charleston Vertical Farm.

Morris Ellison has negotiated economic incentive packages on behalf of clients on the state and local levels, and has counseled clients on various real estate, regulatory and permitting matters. He represents local, national and international investors, lenders, and real estate developers in a variety of complex real estate and business related issues including economic and real estate development, real property tax appeals, entity disputes and structuring. Ellison is a graduate of Yale University, magna cum laude, and the Duke University School of Law, he is a fellow in both the American College of Real Estate Lawyers and the American College of Mortgage Attorneys. He is listed in the current edition of Chambers USA's list of leading lawyers for business, and Best Lawyers in America.

David has been with the Charleston Regional Development Alliance since its inception in 1995, and currently serves as the organization’s President & CEO, a position he has held since early 2000.
David relocated to the Charleston region of South Carolina in 1993, when he joined the Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce as Executive Director of the Trident Economic Development Authority, the predecessor of the Alliance. He has also held positions with the Savannah Economic Development Authority, and the Atlanta Gas Light Company.
A native of Atlanta, Georgia, David holds a degree in Economics and International Business from the University of Southern Mississippi, and studied abroad at the London School of Economics. He is also a Certified Economic Developer (CEcD). David serves on the Trident Technical College Foundation Board, Charleston Metro Chamber of Commerce’s Education Foundation Board, and Charleston Maritime Law Institute’s Board of Advisors (Charleston School of Law).

Russ Keller joined SCRA in 2005 to establish the company’s alternative energy business unit. Focusing initially on in-state opportunities for commercializing hydrogen and fuel cell technologies, he helped create the Columbia-based Fuel Cell Collaborative that received national and international recognition for developing successful collaborative partnerships with the public, private, university, government and nonprofit sectors.

Prior to joining SCRA, served a 26 year career in the U.S. Navy. A nuclear-trained submarine officer, he completed four tours of duty at sea, culminating in command of USS SPRINGFIELD, a nuclear-powered fast attack submarine. B.S. in mechanical engineering from United States Naval Academy and M.P.A. from Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Bill Kirkland currently serves as the Executive Director of the newly-created Office of Economic Engagement at the University of South Carolina. Appointed by President Pastides, Bill and his office have been charged with fostering statewide economic growth through increased commercialization of cutting edge research; connecting new and existing businesses with university resources and creating an environment where entrepreneurial students, faculty and staff can thrive; and to serve as a single point of contact for anyone who wants to partner with the university to meet these goals.
Bill also serves as the Executive Director of the USC/Columbia Technology Incubator. In this role, he guides early stage companies in strategic and operational planning, business development and investor management. Bill is also a Managing Partner of LK Global Consulting LLC, a company he founded. Prior to LK Global Consulting, LLC, Bill co-founded and served as the President & Chief Executive Officer of Collexis Holdings, Inc., helping to bring European technology into the American market in 2006. He managed the successful sale of the company and its subsidiaries to Reed Elsevier in June of 2010. While at Collexis, he raised over $25M in private funds from global investors. P
rior to joining Collexis, Bill spent two decades serving in executive management positions with both IBM and Pfizer. Bill earned a degree from the University of South Carolina.

Dr. Stephen Lanier recieved his doctorate in pharmacology from the University of Tennessee Center for Health Sciences. Completed his postdoctoral training at Harvard Medical School in the Cardiac Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital, and received an appointment to the faculty. Associate Provost for Research and Professor of Pharmacology at MUSC since 2006. For the past 20 years, he has studied various aspects of signal processing by neurohormones with a particular emphasis on the super family of receptors coupled to heterotrimeric G-proteins, which mediate the response of the cell to external stimuli.

Bill Mahoney is the CEO of the South Carolina Research Authority (SCRA). Bill has held this post since August, 2005. Since assuming leadership, SCRA annual revenues from its applied research and commercialization services operations have grown from $74M to over $195M. In this same timeframe, SCRA has received national best practices recognition from the defense industry for its Navy Centers of Excellence, and from the State Science and Technology Institute, Southern Growth Policies Conference, International Economic Development Council, Entrepreneur Magazine, and Forbes Magazine for its SC Launch program.
In 2008, Bill was named by TechJournal South magazine as one of the top 25 technology leaders in the southeastern United States. During the roughly 35 years prior to coming to SCRA, Bill led companies which commercialized ″first-of-a-kind″ solutions in telecommunications, electronic publishing, automatic remote monitoring and other emerging applied systems markets. Among these companies was SCT Utility Systems, of Columbia, SC. Between 1995 and 2000, SCT grew from startup to $175M annual revenues, prior to its sale to Indus International (now Ventyx Corp). SCT′s installed systems base is still the largest of its kind in the world. He is a Harvard graduate and former member of the US National Rowing Team.

Dr. Mintzer currently is the Executive Director of the Clinical Biotechnology Research Institute (CBRI) at Roper St. Francis Healthcare in Charleston, SC. He is also a professor in the Department of Health Studies at the Medical University of South Carolina (MUSC).
Dr. Mintzer completed his medical school at the University of Buenos Aires, Argentina. He did his residency in psychiatry at Hadassah Hospital at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. In addition to his residency while at the Hebrew University, he continued his research on regulation of microtubules activity in Alzheimer’s disease. He continued this research while completing his fellowship in Geriatric Psychiatry at the University of California, Los Angeles. Dr. Mintzer initiated his academic career at the University of Miami, where he developed the Geriatric Psychiatry Fellowship Program and started his career as a clinical researcher in Alzheimer’s disease.
He joined MUSC as an associate professor in 1991. At MUSC, he developed the Geriatric Psychiatry program which includes inpatient, outpatient, and consultation services as well as a fellowship program. Dr. Mintzer’s main activities involve facilitating the process of translating new discoveries in the basic sciences to apply technology to improve care for patients suffering from brain diseases. His personal research focus is in the development of new treatment for Alzheimer’s disease. In that capacity, Dr. Mintzer has designed and conducted more than 150 clinical trials, more than half of them supported by the National Institute on Aging through the RO1 mechanism or the Alzheimer’s Disease Cooperative Study (ADCS) group. Dr. Mintzer is currently participating in a consortium conducting the first gene therapy clinical trial for the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease.
Dr. Mintzer is the founder of BioPharma Connex (BPC), a private company based in Charleston whose mission is to assist in bringing cutting-edge technology to Latin America and around the world. This company has already developed ongoing relationships with Israeli biotechnology companies and is exploring the marketing of three different compounds in Latin America.
Additionally, Dr. Mintzer serves as Vice President of Clinical Affairs for NeuroQuest, an Israeli biotech company currently working on the development of an immune based blood biomarker for Alzheimer’s disease.
Dr. Mintzer is Past-President of the International Psychogeriatric Association (IPA). This association currently has 1500 members in 60 countries and 20 affiliate national societies. The IPA functions as a "think tank" dealing with issues related to mental health and neurodegenerative disorders affecting the aging population.

Dr. David Orr is Chief Operating Officer directing KIYATEC's engineering development, operations and financial management. Prior to KIYATEC, David garnered significant experience in biomedical and industrial R&D, operations, financial modeling, and strategic business analysis while serving in a variety of roles with Cook Medical, Ingersoll-Rand, Dwyer Instruments, and Toyota Motors.
He serves as an adjunct professor and visiting lecturer at Clemson University teaching courses on "Medical Device Commercialization" in the Department of Bioengineering and "Technology & Innovation Management" in the School of Business MBA program.
David has completed a Ph.D. in Bioengineering with a minor in Experimental Statistics from Clemson University where his research focused on bioreactor development and tissue engineering of three-dimensional cellular constructs. Inventor of KIYATEC's platform technology, David continues his work to deliver enabling products and services for the pharmaceutical and biomedical industries

George B. Patrick III joined the South Carolina Department of Commerce as the Deputy Secretary in February of 2011. He is a successful small business entrepreneur and a retired United States Air Force general officer. Patrick, the previous Executive Coordinator of the South Carolina Military Base Task Force, brings to Commerce extensive experience working with business, political and military leaders as well as numerous federal, state and private entities.
For 22 years, Patrick was engaged in diversified agribusiness operations, restaurant ventures and other business enterprises, while actively serving with the South Carolina Air National Guard and US Air Force. Spanning a 35 year military career Patrick served extensively at all command levels of the U.S. Air Force.
He is a highly decorated combat veteran who returned to active duty after September 11, 2001 and served in leadership roles in support of Operation Noble Eagle, Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom. Patrick flew 50 combat missions in Operation Desert Storm.

Dr. Nikolaos C. Rigas is the Associate Director of the Clemson University Restoration Institute. He is responsibilities include managing the wind turbine drivetrain testing facility, 15 MW Hardware-in-the-loop Grid Simulator, completion of the Hunley Project, development of the graduate education center and associated graduate programs.

Prior to his appointment, he served as Vice President at EcoEnergy LLC and was responsible for the development of clean energy projects throughout the Upper Midwest. Dr. Rigas has served as the Director of the South Carolina Institute for Energy Studies at Clemson University.
Prior to joining Clemson University, Dr. Rigas served as Manufacturing and Technology Director for FMC Corporation, Lithium Division in Charlotte, NC.
He holds a doctoral degree in chemical engineering from Washington University in St. Louis.

Mr. Rusnak is the Executive Director of the Foundation for Research Development at the Medical University of South Carolina. He has over 25 years of life science experience most recently holding the position of Director of New Ventures and Technology Development within the technology transfer office at the University of Rochester Medical Center. In his six year tenure at Rochester he led the office in life science licensing and directed the University’s Technology Development Fund and the award process.
Mr. Rusnak also played a lead role in additional fund raising, including SBIRs and STTRs, for the Fund’s applicants, pre and post award. Mr. Rusnak additionally established numerous collaborations to foster commercialization, further investments, and advance drug discovery including agreements with the Moulder Center for Drug Discovery Research at Temple University, the Medical Research Council in the United Kingdom, Califia Bio, Inc., and Johnson & Johnson.
Previous to Rochester, he was an entrepreneur-in-residence with BCM Technologies, Inc. the venture subsidiary of Baylor College of Medicine where he was involved in starting and incubating more than five spinout companies from the medical school. Mr. Rusnak has held senior positions in biotechnology business development with Ceros Pharmaceuticals, CombiChem and Lexicon Genetics, among others, where he was involved in over $100 million of partnering activity in the areas of drug discovery, combinatorial chemistry, and genomics. Prior to Lexicon he held various positions in marketing, sales, and project management with Baxter, Bayer, and Cetus.
Mr. Rusnak received his Master’s Degree in Clinical Science/Lab Management from San Francisco State University and has a B.S. in Microbiology from St. Bonaventure University.

Karan Sorensen is the president of Sorensen Strategieshas. She has over 20 years of senior management and consulting experience in Fortune 500 companies across multiple industries. A technopreneur, she also serves as a board member and advisor for technology start-ups, colleges and universities.
Sorensen previously served as Vice President and Chief Information Officer for Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research & Development, Centocor R&D and Life Technologies. In addition, she served as Vice President of Global Infrastructure Programs for Johnson & Johnson Networking & Computing Services and Total Oncology Digital Officer for Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical R&D.

Dr. Thomas Vogt is the Director of the NanoCenter and Education Foundation Distinguished Professor in the Department of Chemistry and Bichemistry at the University of South Carolina. Since 2009 he has also been a faculty member in Materials Science at the African University of Science & Technology in Abuja, Nigeria.
He received a Ph.D in Chemistry from the University of Tübingen in Germany in 1987, was scientist at the Institute Laue-Langevin in Grenoble France from 1988-1992 and joined Brookhaven National Laboratory in 1995 where he became leader of the Materials Synthesis & Characterization Group in the Physics Department and directed initial Materials Science efforts in the Center for Functional Nanomaterials.

In 2005 he joined the University of South Carolina. His research focuses on structure-composition-property relationships of new materials and he has worked extensively in materials science, solid state chemistry and physics with a focus on developing and applying neutron, x-ray and electron diffraction and imaging techniques. He is also interested in philosophical, legal, ethical and societal implications of nanotechnology and other emerging technologies.

Vogt is past member of the Board of Directors for the USC Research Foundation and the Technical Advisory Board of the atom probe manufacturer IMAGO and serves as a CTO for three technology startups in the US. Dr. Vogt is author of more than 270 peer reviewed papers, has authored 5 US patents and is a fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Kevin Weir is the Business development and Innovation Leader at Milliken Infrastructure Solutions LLC based in Spartanburg, SC. USA. After a 7 year spell with Shell Chemical in the UK, developing important skills in materials science and technology, Kevin joined The Dow Chemical Company in 1985, where he enjoyed a successful international career with assignments in the US and Germany. A key role has been the development and implementation of innovation best practices. Through this, Kevin led many successful international New Business Development initiatives and collaborations in the fields of plastics, particularly foams and structural composites and for markets as diverse as transportation, building and construction, appliances, cold storage and packaging.
Beyond innovation best practices development, Kevin has had roles in business management, Stage Gate process development, project management, product development and in R&D.
In 2007, Kevin opened an Innovation management company in Germany where he led a number of new technology development projects for fortune 100 and 500 chemical companies. Kevin supported a number of start-up companies including a Vice Presidents role at an innovative, low cost, modular buildings provider in Istanbul, and as interim Strategy Advisor for an advanced membrane water recycling technology in Vienna.

Jonathan is the President at The InterTech Group, which is a diversified holding company with operating companies and portfolio investments in multiple sectors including aerospace, industrial and engineered products, financial transaction services, utilities and energy, specialty chemicals, recreation and leisure, medical technology, security and real estate.

Jonathan is also the President of Z-Man Fishing Products, the world’s premier fishing products, lure, and accessory manufacturer. He recently held the position of Director at the Hudson’s Bay Company where he was part of the management team overseeing the operations of Canada’s largest department store retailer and North America’s oldest corporation.

He received his Master of Business Administration with highest honors from The Citadel and his Bachelor of Science in Management and Information Systems with high honors from the Georgia Institute of Technology.