Sebastian Moeritz (Summit Chair)
CEO, Dicas Digital Image Coding GmbH
President, MPEG Industry Forum

"The next generation television experience, regardless of format, requires that we learn from the success of the internet and the continuing progress and evolution of technology. By ensuring the availability of more personal, intuitively selectable content, running of relevant and transactional targeted advertising, amongst other things, the industry is set to adopt a much more sophisticated perspective. Content will always be king and in this context only a consumer-driven business model with all paramount interests of consumers taken care of can ensure recurring and transactional revenues paired with maximum retention of customers"

Sebastian is an entrepreneur with an extensive business experience in a number of international markets. After studies in social sciences and economics, he has previously been specialising in property and investment. Since 1996 he has been involved in a number of information technology related ventures and joined dicas, a developer of ISO MPEG-4 real-time video coding solutions, based in Germany, as its CEO in the beginning of 2001.

Dicas is an MPEG-focused video coding specialist and a leading developer of MPEG-4 AVC/H.264, MPEG-4 and 3GPP compliant real-time video coding solutions for a variety of Broadcast, IPTV, Mobile TV, Internet Streaming, Multimedia and Security applications. For more information, please visit: www.dicas.de

Since 2004, Sebastian is serving as President of the MPEG Industry Forum (MPEGIF); from 2002-2004 he was Board Member and Treasurer. MPEGIF is a not-for-profit organization promoting the adoption of open MPEG standards, such as MPEG-4 (including MPEG-4 AVC and MPEG-4 HE AAC), MPEG-7 and MPEG-21, representing around 100 international companies and institutes from diverse industries. For more information, please visit: www.mpegif.org

Sebastian is a regular speaker and panelist at industry events and conferences; and has written several articles and opinions for various industry and trade publications.

He is listed in "Cable and Satellite Europe's Euro 50 for 2004", which features the leaders in Broadband and Pay-TV across Europe, Middle East and Africa.

He is also the co-author of the book  "Understanding MPEG-4 - Technology and Business Insights" (with Prof. Dr. Klaus Diepold of the Technical University of Munich, Germany) published by Focal Press.
 

Simon Andrews (Keynote)
Chief Strategy Officer Worldwide,
MindShare Interaction

"Mobile has the potential to be a fantastic marketing channel, which is useful as advertisers will be necessary to fund mobile content... But it will only reach its potential if marketers respect consumers ability to avoid their messages and deliver advertising that is useful, relevant or entertaining. Anything less will kill the medium."

Simon has launched 4 digital agencies. The first, in 1995, was a dismal failure - few marketers understood the internet then and even fewer cared. The next three were more successful - Simon was one of three partners who launched what became Modem Media in Europe - growing a business from 6 people in one room in Soho to 250 people in London, Paris and Munich. He then joined DLKW in 1999 at the time of their management buyout and built DLKW Dialogue into one of Londons most respected digital agencies before launching Big Picture in 2005 which focused on emerging media such as mobile, social networks and newTV. He joined MindShare in November 2006. Before going digital Simon was Media Planning Director of Young & Rubicam and Zenith Media, and then Account Planning Director of Ogilvy Direct. Outside of work Simon trys to have his two sons Ethan and Isaac share his enthusiasm for obscure soul and jazz records and the increasingly obscure Leeds United.
 

Stephen Lowe (Keynote)
Chairman,
Broadband Wireless Association (BWA)

"Until Grandma and Grandpa can use mobile multimedia without the help of their grandchildren the technology cannot be said to be useable.  Attention to content discovery and handset design is still too low on the priority list."

Stephen Lowe began his working life at Mullard Research Laboratories where he was part fo the team developing the masers for the Telstar trans-Atlantic television satellite. From there he moved to the BBC Engineering Designs department working on videotape recording systems. He then moved to BBC Television News where he developed the camera and microwave systems for the start of Electronic News Gathering. After a brief return to the videotape group he took over as Technical Training Manager for Ampex Corporation in California. He provided customer training courses worldwide on the full range of broadcast television equipments and military high data rate recorders.

In 1992 Stephen was the project director for the construction of the new television production facility for Westcountry Television and from there for the new cable television and telephony networks for the South West and South East. As part of this project he led teams developing microwave broadband access systems in the UK and Russia.

Stephen became chairman of the Broadband Wireless Association in 1995. The Association was formed to promote the use of broadband fixed wireless access and to encourage harmonosation of the regulatory framework. It is now focussed on the interoperability aspects of the growing range of broadband wireless technologies.

Stephen has taught summer schools at Edinburgh and Leeds universities and is now working with Lancaster University to encourage research in broadband wireless.

Stephen is the Electronics Communications Consultant for the Digital Communications Knowledge Transfer Network which is funded by the Technology Strategy Board of the Department for Business Enterprise and Regulatory Reform. He is also a member of the Electronic Communications Resiliance and Recovery Group of the Cabinet Office working to ensure that critical infrastructure is able to withstand natural or malicious damage..
 

Simon Drinkwater
VP Sales EMEA,
Entriq (Moderator)

"The success of distribution models have typically been proportionate to the size of the screen on which the content was viewed. Social media has changed that, challenging the share of eyeballs and share of wallet."

Simon Drinkwater was appointed Vice President of Sales in April 2007 after successfully establishing Entriq's London office as its European sales and operations hub in 2006. As Vice President of Sales for Entriq, Simon's primary role is to lead the company sales growth through a strong customer-focused sales strategy and strategic partnerships combined with new market identification and development.
 

Simon has more 10 years experience in Sales & Business Development in New Media beginning with the successful IPO of TopJobs in 1999. He was Director of Alliances at Servecast before co-founding First Media, a technology and solutions company, specializing in rich media and more specifically, video. First Media were responsible for the technical solution for the worlds first simultaneous online and e-cinema premiere, "This is not a Love Song" in 2003. More recently Simon was tasked with establishing DoubleClick's Rich Media Solution Motif in the International markets.

Simon Studied Fine Art at Middlesex University.  

David MacQueen
Senior Analyst, Head of Mobile Media,
Screen Digest (Moderator)

"Mobile devices have created a new generation of always-connected consumers. The nature of the device opens up new business models as well as providing a way to reach almost any consumer at any time."

David MacQueen is Screen Digest's senior mobile content analyst. David has been working in the mobile content industry at a senior level since 1999, when he founded The Games Kitchen.

In this capacity he worked with the mobile content divisions of many high-profile companies including Disney, Sega and Panasonic.

David has had a number of articles on mobile content published and has spoken at numerous conferences. At Screen Digest, David has authored several in-depth mobile content reports, and worked on numerous consultancy projects for major media groups, regulators and the European Commission.

David holds an Honours degree from Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh where he also undertook PhD research.

Arno Koch
Senior Solutions Development Manager
Nokia Siemens Networks

"With 5 billion people connected and 100-fold traffic in networks by 2015, mobile broadband cannot survive in the competition without radical change in cost per gigabyte"

Arno Koch is Senior Solution Development Manager within the Radio Access Solutions Department of Nokia Siemens Networks, and is based in Munich. He has been working in the mobile industry since having joined Siemens Mobile Networks in 1992, and has held a wide range of assignments in marketing, project and account management, as well as sales management for cellular infrastructure solutions, in Germany and a number of locations in Asia-Pacific.
 

In his present role, he is mainly responsible for radio access evolution and network infrastructure solutions relating to multimedia applications, specifically in the areas of WCDMA/HSPA and it's long-term-evolution (3GPP-LTE) as well as WiMAX. Arno holds master's degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Stuttgart / Germany, and Oregon State University.

He speaks five languages, is married to a Japanese and has two daughters.

Barbara Stelzner
VP, Director News and Programming
CNBC Europe.

You cannot survive as a media content company unless you are accessible on as many different platforms as possible. The challenge is to do this without cannibalising your existing product and destroying the brand".

In 1989-1995 Barbara was a Freelance Producer, German Department, BBC World Service She then became Senior Producer, European Business News from 1995-1998.
 

In 1998-2003, she has also worked at CNBC Europe previously, as an executive producer in both staff and freelance capacities and also as supervising producer on "Market Watch" and senior producer on ?Europe Tonight." Since 2000, she was the Executive Producer and Deputy to Head of News and Programming. and in 2003 became the International Television Consultant based in Ireland.

Barbara Stelzner joined CNBC Europe as Executive Producer from Sky News in Ireland and has also held the position of a senior television project advisor specializing in Pan-European television.

Since 2005, she is VP and Head of News and Programming, CNBC Europe, her current position.

Barbara has a PhD in Film History, University of Bonn, Germany.

CNBC Europe is the only pan-European real-time financial and business channel dedicated to European CEOs and senior corporate executives, the European financial services industry and the European investor. Today the channel is available in over 110 million homes, 1,400 banks and financial institutions and thousands of four and five star hotel rooms throughout Europe, the Middle East and Africa. CNBC Europe is a wholly owned subsidiary of NBC Universal. NBC Universal is the broadcasting unit of the General Electric Company (GE).
 

Patrick Walker
Head of Content Partnerships
Google Video EMEA

"As users become more involved in the production of content, professional and amateur content creators begin to cross-feed and enrich each other. Today the quality and creativity of some amateur content can easily match or exceed professional productions in terms of popularity. We have recognised this with our YouTube Partner Programme, recently rolled out in the UK, upgrading the best and most popular YouTube users to partner status and allowing them to generate revenue through their videos. Recognising this user demand for participation is a big step for many media companies, but is critical."

Patrick Walker joined Google in January 2006 to lead the development of content strategy and partnerships for Google Video in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. He has over 15 years of experience in the television, radio and online media industry, including his tenure as General Manager of International Video Services for RealNetworks, where he was instrumental in launching Real’s first premium audio and video services in Europe, Asia and Latin America. While at Real, Patrick was also responsible for developing direct-to-consumer broadband video products with partners such as UEFA, BBC Worldwide and Channel 4.

Patrick began his career in international media and technology as a TV producer for Japan’s public broadcaster, NHK. While in Tokyo, he produced and directed award-winning educational and documentary TV programmes and participated in the launch of the world’s first HDTV channel. He later joined BBC News a Senior Broadcast Journalist in Japan and South East Asia. Returning to London in 2000, Patrick accepted a role with TWI’s management team to launch one of the earliest ‘converged’ web and TV services.

Patrick holds a Master’s degree in International Administration, Planning and Social Policy from Harvard and a Bachelor’s degree in Journalism from the University of Southern California. He also studied at Keio University in Tokyo and the University of Paris.
 

Lourens de Beer
Managing Director
Minick UK

"Re-purposing your Traditional or Online content for Mobile is a recipe for disaster."

"Made for Mobile" content is the key to success on this medium. But will this change as a result of the iPhone and next generation Mobile Internet browsers?"


Lourens de Beer is the Managing Director of Minick UK a leading mobile service provider who delivers to a broad range of global businesses, including Channel 4 (Big Brother SMS Voting), Universal Pictures, Sony Pictures and Emap, mobile portals and interactive mobile services. He has 10 years senior level experience in the Mobile Entertainment sector and pioneered a number of mobile initiatives including the first ringtone adverts on UK terrestrial television and ad funded mobile content services.

He joined Minick from Pitch Entertainment Group where he was CEO and led the expansion of the group from the UK to a world wide operation in 16 countries. Prior to Pitch he spent five years at iTouch Plc in various roles culminating as Head of Global Marketing overseeing direct to consumer mobile services in 22 countries. Lourens de Beer was born and

 

Paul Kanareck
Head of FM Ventures,
Fremantlemedia

"Television is dead, long live TV"

Paul is Head of Ventures at FremantleMedia, the global production business owned by RTL Group and Bertelsmann.

FM Ventures is responsible for driving business diversification beyond FremantleMedia's core business. Paul started his career as an investment banker at NM Rothschild and then rode the dotcom wave as one of the first employees at boo.com. He subsequently built new businesses at Vizzavi (a Joint Venture between Vodafone and Vivendi) and Channel 4 Television. Most recently, Paul was founder and MD of TV Nation.

Paul is a graduate of Cambridge University

Myles MacBean
VP, Disney Online, Walt Disney Internet Group Europe

"Connected new media is a new medium in its own right uniquely bringing together rich broadband media, interactivity, community and personalisation. The opportunity is to change the way we tell stories not just how we distribute them"

Mr. MacBean educated in South Africa and was one of the first Internet entrepreneurs on the continent having launched Africa.com in 1995. Later joined the Walt Disney Internet Group, where he has held a variety of international responsibilities across commercial, technical, and production disciplines, in 2000. In his present role, Mr. MacBean has general management responsibility for Disney's on-line and interactive TV portfolio in EMEA and Latin America and technology/operations responsibility for Disney's on-line services outside the United States. He is also managing director of Walt Disney Hungary Ltd.

Prior to joining Disney, he worked in major telecoms and Internet organizations, starting in semiconductor optoelectronic device engineering and progressing to software/systems engineering. He became involved in the commercial exploitation of the Internet when it emerged from the scientific community. He has held a series of senior management roles with responsibility for the development, delivery, product management, and distribution of Internet/intranet services, culminating in leadership of BT's eCommerce product division.

Chris Townsley
Director of Strategic Accounts
Limelight Networks

"The high-fidelity expectations of traditional media experiences have collided with the instant-access expectations of the searchable, hyperlinked Web. Every digital asset in a library must be instantly delivered, in the maximum resolution possible, to a global audience, whenever that asset is requested. To accomplish that, we must re-imagine the paradigm of content delivery."

Chris Townsley is Limelight Networks' the United Kingdom and is responsible for managing existing and establishing new accounts in EMEA. Chris has over 20 years of global sales experience and prior to joining Limelight Networks, Chris held sales positions with a number of media and technology companies in Europe and Australia including VitalStream, Gomez Europe, Computacenter UK and EMC. Most recently, Chris was sales manager with VitalStream where he led the United Kingdom sales team and helped open the Amsterdam data center. Chris has an established sales record having directed teams of all sizes, built sales teams from the ground up to service various vertical markets and has also developed account strategy, partner engagement and relationship management best practices for his worldwide teams. Chris holds a degree from Scots College, Wellington, New Zealand.

Dan Whiley
Commercial Vice President, Digital Media,
MTV Networks International

"There is no "vs" in mobile vs online, Traditional vs New media. All forms of distribution and all variations in content can, and should, be complementary"

Dan Whiley joined MTV Networks International (MTVNI) in 2005 as Commercial Vice President, Digital Media, to lead the company's commercial activities in the digital media space. In this role, Whiley is responsible for developing initiatives and partnerships that strengthen MTVNI’s global presence as a multi-platform entertainment group spanning all technologies from broadcast TV to broadband, PC and mobile handsets. He reports directly to Gideon Bierer, Senior Vice President of Digital Media, MTVNI.

Working with the US and regional Digital Media teams, Whiley leads the team focused on generating new business opportunities across multiple territories including Europe, Asia and Latin America. His role encompasses selecting new business opportunities, initial business modelling, negotiating with key suppliers and multi-territory customers, together with ongoing development and support for these fledgling business models. Whiley is a key stakeholder in MTVNI’s strategic relationships with the record labels and directly responsible for these accounts.

MTV Networks International includes MTV: Music Television, Nickelodeon, VH1, TMF: The Music Factory, Comedy Central and Game One, which collectively provide the largest global network of localized TV channels and websites targeting kid, youth and adult audiences

Prior to joining MTVNI, Whiley was responsible for new media business development at Universal Music International. During his 5 years at UMI, he successfully introduced ringtones to the record labels in Europe, oversaw the licensing of online digital download services and developed the business policies for both video and audio online exploitation. Before joining Universal Music International, Whiley spent 4 years with strategy consultants LEK Consulting, based in London and Los Angeles. During this time, he advised on many major entertainment and technology brands such as Disney and AOL Time Warner as well as undertaking a wide range of M&A work.

Dan has a Masters degree in Engineering Economics and Management from Oxford University.

Whiley is based at MTV Networks International’s European headquarters in London.
 

Giorgio Riva
Managing Director,
RCS Digital

"Mobile Content is undoubtedly an extraordinary opportunity to integrate the online experience, making it more complete, and increase the brand awareness of the majority of our products. We're as well convinced that the business model that's going to win in the near future should necessarily be a model that would provide a fair mix of advertising and consumers revenues"

Giorgio Riva is the Managing Director of RCS Digital, the italian media company dedicated to manage and develop the digital publishing activities of Rizzoli Corriere della Sera MediaGroup: Corriere.it, Gazzetta.it, Online Classified (Trovolavoro.it, Trovocasa.it, Automobili.com), Online Gaming (Fueps.com), ipTV and Mobile Offering. Before joining RCS in 2001, Riva held senior management roles at a leading European Insurance Company and, previously, spent 8 years at Accenture where he was Senior Manager in the Financial Services Group.

Giorgio Riva, tells us about digital publishing. This Business Unit of the Rizzoli Corriere della Sera Group, is focused on digital media management and development - mainly Internet and mobile - reaching about 20 million European users. "A year ago, when watching video on Internet was not a fashionable topic of discussion, RCS Digital started to develop an innovative video offer, both through corriere.it and gazzetta.it. It was based on different formats: - video-news and video-newspapers providing news and current events coverage; - weekly thematic columns; Marco Comastri CEO of Microsoft Italia Giorgio Riva of RCS Digital Massimo Intorrella Director of Service Development Wireline for Telecom Italia Andrea Zappia Chief Marketing Officer of Sky Italia - digital meetings, with in-studio guests interviewed live by online readers. Last July, just 9 months after the launch of this special video offer, over 2 millions online readers (over 10% of reach in Italy) watched 8 millions of streaming video. The same month in the USA, the reach of Web-majors video was 3%-5%. The ability and courage to innovate and launch new products and services can be a key to success even in less receptive markets".

Simon Protheroe
New Media and IT Director,
Eidos Interactive

"We are facing a huge opportunity but we won't crystallise it until we stop frustrating consumers and start first meeting and then exceeding their expectations. For mobile gaming to break out of its current niche the industry needs to address the fundamental issues of interoperability and service delivery across the value chain."

Simon Protheroe joined Eidos in 1993 and was appointed Technical Director in 1994, back when the Sony PlayStation was another exciting new platform that showed a lot of promise. He served in that position until late 2003, when he took responsibility for the newly created New Media division as Director of New Media and Online Technologies.

Following SCi's acquisition of Eidos in 2005, Simon became New Media and IT Director and he currently manages the combined company's growing new media business, including its activity in mobile gaming.

Prior to joining Eidos Simon was involved in academic research and development in artificial intelligence, covering a range of fields as diverse as nuclear power and military image analysis.

Simon Gunning
Senior Vice President Digital,
EMI MUSIC

Simon Gunning joined EMI Music UK in July 2007 as Senior Vice President, Digital, where he is responsible for all digital activity for EMI UK and its repertoire worldwide.

Simon works closely with EMI UK Sales and across all record labels - including Charisma, EMI Classics, EMI Records, Mute, Parlophone, Relentless and Virgin - on digital strategy for sales and marketing, the formation of brand partnerships and alliances, and to oversee digital product development for its wealth of artists. He sits on the EMI Music UK board, reporting directly to the Chairman and CEO and working closely with the global head of digital.

Before joining EMI, Simon was Director of Entertainment for Yahoo! Europe where he lead the company’s activity across the region for the production and monetisation of entertainment products including video, games, TV and movies. His responsibilities ranged from the technical development of multi-platform applications, to the development, acquisition, and commercial exploitation of intellectual property and formats. From 2000 onwards, Simon worked for Flextech Television, the largest broadcaster of Pay TV in the UK at the time, firstly as Head of Business Development and then as Controller of Digital Media across the company’s five broadcast channels.

He then went on to become Director of Digital Media at TV production and rights management company Celador International, working on brands such as "Who Wants to be a Millionaire" and "You Are What You Eat" globally across all digital platforms. Simon worked in the key areas of web, interactive TV and DVD. Also in his remit was the company's activity with brands including ad-funded programming and sponsorship.

Simon graduated with a degree in political history from The School of Slavonic and East European Studies at London University. After university he kicked off his career as a promoter for the Reading Festival and went on to manage music producers for several years before moving into digital media.

James Fabricant
Director of Entertainment and Head of Video,
Europe, My Space

"The evolution of social networks is kick-starting a broad global shift for how people, content and culture collide on the Web. With the emergence of the social web, content has to be distributed in a way that's more personal, portable and collaborative."

Director of Entertainment and Head of Video, Europe, for MySpace, the world's most popular social network. After qualifying as a corporate finance and private equity attorney at leading international law firm Linklaters, James moved into the entertainment business in Los Angeles joining the prestigious agent training program at International Creative Management.

He subsequently co-founded a management production company producing content for multi-platform distribution from where he was recruited to launch MySpace, Europe, as the Head of Marketing and Content for the UK and Ireland in February 2006.

Patrick Jubb
Head of global Communication,
Vodafone

The future of mobile marketing lies at the point where connectivity, time and place meet. Imagine a situation where you are never lost, you always know where your friends are, and you have a companion by your side that can put you in contact with them, or point you in the direction of any one of a thousand things that it knows you like. This is what the mobile phone can do now; we don't even need to invent anything new.

Current role - Head of Communications for Vodafone Global Brand and Marketing. I've been in the advertising and communications industry for over 15 years on both agency and client side and everyday it still manages excite, inspire and at times frustrate the hell out of me.