Sarah Austin is a leading voice of the awards & events industry. Following a 15 year career running an international awards portfolio at Informa (formally UBM), during which Sarah was Awards Director for the National Business Awards, in 2021,  The Lloyds Bank British Business Excellence Awards in partnership with Lloyds Bank were launched. The Lloyds Bank British Business Excellence Awards celebrate the resilience, innovation and creativity of British businesses, whether big or small, an innovative new start-up or an established industry player, private, public or third sector. In addition to this, Sarah is a Non-Exec Director at the Tate Galleries and also sits on the Tate Modern Advisory Council. More recently, Sarah has been invited to chair the Employment Advisory Board for HMP Send and the women’s national directorate for supporting women getting into work after prison. Sarah is passionate about supporting women in business and is an advocate for equality. 

Jamie has led the commercial event portfolio for Argus Media since 2017. During summer 2023 Jamie stepped in to the CMO role for Argus, in addition to his existing conference leadership. Prior to Argus, Jamie spent 14.5 years in events divisions of Euromoney Institutional Investor. This included building an Asia division for a financial services portfolio, and then leading the Metal Bulletin Events business (now FastMarkets). Jamie started his career in the conference sector 25 years ago as a conference producer. That background in content creation still informs his commercial decisions today.

David is the CEO and Founder of award-winning creative experience agency, Brandfuel.

From small beginnings with three people working from Pink Floyd’s old recording studio in Britannia Row in 2005, the agency set out to become a specialist in supporting the expansion of high growth global tech companies, while building a strong community of highly skilled freelance talent and a hugely loyal supplier base.

Brandfuel has won more than 80 awards for sustainability, creativity, production expertise, exhibition design and conference production, including the Queen’s Award for Enterprise for International Trade in 2021.

David and his team continue to work with many of the world’s highest value tech, finance and energy companies, creating and delivering events that enhance their brand and reputation at moments that matter most to them, occasions such as Mobile World Congress, the World Economic Forum and the United Nations General Assembly. The agency, now over 70-strong, is focused on driving towards net-zero and delivering all events in the most sustainable way and has set itself a goal to be a leader in net carbon neutral experiential event delivery.

Dominic has been with Solar Media for more than 10 years, working on the development of their global event and awards portfolios alongside growing the content reach of their media, publishing and market research brands. Passionate about the power of events to enact change, he is delighted to join the judging panel this year.

Amanda’s experience spans publishing, digital media, events, conferences and exhibitions. She led a management buy-out of Faversham House in December 2010 and subsequently bought out her private equity partners in 2013. With her fellow directors, she has been responsible for repositioning Faversham House as a multi-media business information provider building on the company’s strong brands in utilities and sustainability. 

John has had a career in B2B media, specialising in financial conferences. He has had a consistent track record in driving growth in a range of market-leading brands and he co-founded a successful media start-up that was sold to Euromoney Institutional Investor (now Delinian).

John started his career at IIR (now Informa), the world’s largest conference producer, before leaving to head up the sales team at Risk Conferences. In 2001, John co-founded Capacity Media, that was eventually sold to Euromoney and today remains one of the latter’s most profitable divisions.

Before starting 1LoD John ran Euromoney’s Capital Markets conferences.

Robin joined EMAP in 2018 and is Managing Director of a portfolio of construction, engineering and public sector brands. Robin was Group General Manager at Aspermont Media between 2014 and 2018 running the UK, Australia and Brazil offices of an International natural resources media company, including one of the world’s oldest magazines Mining Journal. Prior to that Robin was Group Publishing Director at Incisive Media working across a range of industry sectors – technology, legal, finance and institutional investment.

Chris leads MAINSTREAM, an award-winning B2B community serving asset-intensive industries with research, information, events, training courses and membership that celebrate the successes, accelerate the careers, and optimise the performance of Engineers. MAINSTREAM is owned by the Eventful Group, an investment company that has successfully funded, created, nurtured, and sold several event and media assets in New York, Sydney, Singapore, and Cape Town. Chris is a co-founder and Chairman of the Eventful Group.

Lynn has donned quite a few hats in her time, from PR and marketing consultant to professional singer, to stand-up comic, before setting up strategic storytelling consultancy Toucan with former comedy partner Sally Nettleton.  Harnessing the power and magic of storytelling, Toucan delivers award-winning films, campaigns, and experiences.

Nadim started his career with 8 years at Informa working on the Mobile World Congress and it’s spin offs. In 2003 he brought his skillset to fighting climate change by creating commercially focused congresses dedicated to accelerating the clean energy transition and mitigating climate change. Over the decades, using the Green Power Conferences and Green Power Global companies he has created several high profile, impactful, £1m+ events including World Bio Markets, MIREC and AIREC, as well as many failures.

World Hydrogen Leaders was founded in 2018 and brings together everything you need to de-risk critical decisions, enable sector coupling and accelerate the role of clean hydrogen as key part of the transition to a clean energy system. We provide over 60+ hydrogen events per annum in a mix of inperson congresses, online conferences, online training courses and quarterly regional intelligence briefings. We also host an online, content rich, community platform, circulate regular reports and provide a weekly news analysis service. Our acclaimed, live inperson congress portfolio bring together global energy decision-makers to provide actionable insights, networking and help de-risk the pathway to the clean hydrogen energy transition.

Sustainable Aviation Futures Limited runs the leading SAF Congress and training portfolio for senior executives working to decarbonise the aviation sector.

Steve has been enjoying the world of events & digital community platforms for over 20 years & currently European Managing Director of the market leading financial services brand Money20/20 at Ascential. Prior to this Steve has been on the senior leadership teams at both B2C and B2B well known institutions like BBC Haymarket, Hearst Media, The Telegraph, River Street Events, TouchPoint Live and Single Market Events.  Why over 20 years…because the power of F2F is only getting stronger as we move further into a more digital world and driven by both consumer experience demand & business growth needs.

Kazee is the Senior Executive Director at The Black British Business Awards (BBBA) and The Network of Networks (TNON), two organisations dedicated to championing diversity and inclusion globally. With over a decade of experience in events and marketing, Kazee has cultivated a robust skill set that includes strategic leadership, financial management, business development, client relations, public relations, and precise event management. Her commitment to fostering diversity and inclusion is underpinned by a comprehensive background in the dynamic realm of events.

Rhian joined Kisaco Research in 2020 and is the Managing Director. Kisaco Research runs over 70 conferences a year with a focus on investment and innovation predominantly in the health sector but also with events in the life science, tech and legal sectors. With over 18 years experience, Rhian worked at Euromoney for 13 years of her career, leading the growth of the wholesale telecoms events division and has experience of running a range of event formats from executive leadership dinners to large-scale confex’s across every continent. Rhian’s passion is developing high-performing teams and driving growth through a depth of customer and market knowledge.

Rhian holds a Master of Science in Psychology.

Chris has worked in events for over 20 years starting in AV and production he has worked for some of the best-known media companies in B2B events including Emap, Wilmington and Procurement Leaders. Now with Insurance Insider (part of the Delinian group) Chris is Product Director for their portfolio of events and digital media. 

John has 20 years of global B2B events experience, working across a range of sectors including Architecture, Health, Finance, Fashion HR and Retail and for operators including; Emap, Ascential, Pageant Media and now Unleash.

Orson Francescone has worked in the b2b media and events industry for over 15 years. He has led global conference and exhibitions businesses for Euromoney Institutional Investor, the Daily Mail Group and Haymarket Media.  Since November 2019 he is Managing Director of FT Live, the global event business of the Financial Times. Throughout his career he has specialised at enabling publishers to monetise their audiences and drive high margin revenues via all formats of events. From conferences, to awards to large scale exhibitions and trade shows and more recently through digital events. He has launched and run some of the world’s most successful and award winning events including Gastech, the Festival of Work and, more recently The Global Boardroom . He is an Irish Italian national and an economics graduate of Trinity College Dublin.

Martin Fullard is Director – News & Content at brand communications agency Davies Tanner, where he fronts The Business of Events, an independent Think Tank and platform for Policy, Advocacy, Content, and Engagement, which works to research and develop Government policy initiatives for the events industry.

Alongside supporting clients with their own brand content, he offers industry commentary and supports advisory work to the All-Party Parliamentary Group for Events, the DCMS, and industry trade bodies.

He was previously an industry journalist at Conference News and Exhibition News, appearing on the BBC, LBC, CNN, and in a host of national and regional titles advocating for the events sector.

Clare is COO and Co-Founder of The PIE – an independent B2B media, events and recruitment platform for the international education community, which transforms knowledge and networks globally. The PIE runs conferences each year in the UK, US and Australia, as well as The PIEoneer Awards, which celebrate innovation and achievement across the international education sector. Clare heads up the events team and is passionate about delivering the best possible experiences and outcomes for attendees. 

Ben is the Founder and Managing Director of Commodities People – an events and media business covering global commodity and energy markets.

Over his 20 years career in conferences, exhibitions and events he has organised everything from niche workshops to largescale B2C expos, in locations across the globe, including some of the most challenging frontier markets. Commodities People events follow the Confex model with events taking place in Europe, Asia and the US.

Ian started his media career at Haymarket and then Informa. Events for him came later at both Reed and Emap. Over a few pints in 2018 with mate and now business partner Dan Brain they decided to create a business festival that felt a bit like going to Glastonbury and MAD//Fest was born

Alison Jackson has over 30 years experiences in B2B trade shows and conferences. She has worked in PE backed businesses as well as private and public companies. She has run some of the largest trade shows in the UK as well as bought and sold events.  She is now Group MD of Nineteen Group in Wimbledon which is a fast-growing trade show, summit and other media business.  

Michaela Jeffery-Morrison is Founder & CEO of Ascend Global Media and Founder of the Women in Technology World Series; the world’s largest events series focused on women in tech and the only B2B company dedicated to improving diversity and inclusion in business. Since its creation in 2015, Maddox Events, now Ascend Global Media, has exploded in popularity. In just five years, the Women in Tech World Series, has grown from one event in London to seven globally, while attendance has risen from 300 to more than 6,000. Ascend Global Media delivers content, opportunities, inspiration and knowledge to the women and businesses that make up the technology sector through a series of live events and attracts hundreds of speakers from the world’s most innovative companies and tens of thousands of attendees from across the globe.

As Managing Director of Informa Connect’s Global Finance vertical, Julian Kirby has built a strong portfolio of events, media and financial intelligence products. 

With a 300+ strong team of high achievers, market leading brands including SuperReturn, IM Power, Finovate, WealthManagement.com and Inside ETFs, delight audiences across the U.S, Europe, Asia and the Middle East. 

Lucy is the Managing Director of Anthropy, a significant national leadership gathering which inspires a better Britain, and works to envisage a future which is more positive, sustainable, equitable and successful.

During her 20 year career in the events industry, Lucy has delivered large scale public events, awards evenings, national roadshows and incentive travel programmes, as well as developing brand experiential guidelines and overseeing retail design roll outs.

Jim is Managing Director, Western Europe and Nordics at Foundry. Foundry/ IDC produce conferences, awards and custom events for IT professionals and decision makers across the world. Jim’s teams in London and Stockholm deliver events, media, data and software solutions to technology clients. Before joining Foundry in 2014, Jim was Group publishing Director at Incisive Media.

Elisabeth is a highly experienced events professional with over 20 years of expertise in the industry. Currently, she serves as the Managing Director of Global Communications and Events at Mintec, where she leads the event strategy to support the subscription business and drive business growth.   

Kate Nicholls OBE has been CEO of UKHospitality, the powerful voice representing the broad hospitality sector, since its inception in 2018, having previously worked as CEO and Strategic Affairs Director of the ALMR.

Kate is Chair of the Tourism Alliance and co-Chair of the London Tourism Recovery Board, representing the needs of the wider tourism sector in discussions with Government and the Mayor of London. She sits on the Government’s Tourism, Hospitality and Food & Drink Sector Councils and has previously Chaired the London Night-time Commission. She is a Board member of Best Bar None, PASS and is a trustee at Hospitality Action. In July 2021, she was appointed as the first Government Disability Ambassador for hospitality, promoting inclusivity. Kate was appointed co-Chair of the London & Partners’ Tourism Advisory Group in November 2022, who have a critical role in turning London’s 2030 Tourism Vision into reality.

Kate initially worked as a researcher in the House of Commons and European Parliament on food, employment and environmental policy before joining Whitbread to work in Strategic Affairs. She has extensive experience as a political and strategic communications consultant and is a graduate of Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge and Kings College London.

Dale has been in the presentation and communication industry for over 40 years. He left school with one goal to run his own business, after just 3 years the opportunity arose and Dale took it, operating at first from a small outbuilding at his parent’s home as a filmmaker. 

Today drpg is recognised as one of the leading integrated, full- service presentation and communication groups, winning agency of the year multiple times. The drpg team comprises of over 420 specialists across seven locations in Worcestershire, London, Windsor, Manchester, Germany, Ireland and the USA. 

drpg designs and produces communications solutions globally. Working with a wide range of clients to effectively communicate to internal and external audiences, all through award-winning film & video, events, experiential, print, design, digital, exhibition and creative solutions. 

Dale is past Chairman of EVCOM and he is actively involved with key corporate clients, he works at a senior level assisting in the development of communication strategies and creating presentation vehicles. 

Dale is passionate about sustainability and believes businesses should be fully integrated into the community. DRPG was the first agency globally to gain the ISO14001 and ISO20121 accreditations plus more recently being awarded the Queen’s Award for Enterprise in Sustainable Growth and B-Corp. 

The past 17 years Sustainability and CSR has been a major priority for all the group’s operations. With an active community programme, a series or environmental initiatives which include renewable energy, zero land fill waste and elimination of single use plastic. 

Dale is passionate about nurturing new talent and putting his people first. drpg has appeared in the Sunday Times best 100 companies to work for list at number 16 and in 2020 has been awarded the Investors in People platinum standard, one of only 70 companies in the UK. In 2015 he was presented with the events industry personality of the year and in 2016 honoured with a fellowship award for services to Communication, presented at the House of Lords. In 2022 Dale has been awarded CIPR Leader of the Year. 

Iain is currently Managing Director at Clarion Events.  He currently overseas multiple global portfolios across Clarion in insurance, energy, life sciences and enterprise tech.  Prior to this Iain co-founded the Energy Council, which was sold to Clarion in 2017.  Iain has previously been a finalist in the EY Entrepreneur of the Year Award, and has been given the honour of closing both the New York Stock Exchange and NASDAQ. 

Kiera is Head of Events at Alzheimer’s Society, leading a team to deliver a range of income generating sporting, mass participation and special events that fund support for people affected by dementia. As part of her role, Kiera also leads a cross-fundraising innovation team at the Society. She is passionate about the importance of knowing your supporters and using supporter insight to drive innovation and development within events and fundraising. Kiera has over 15 years’ experience in Events Fundraising, previously leading Events and Community teams at Terrence Higgins Trust and British Lung Foundation.

Rubie has over 18 years events marketing experience, and now heads up the marketing department across all services and products at The Channel Company EMEA. Rubie oversees 90+ live and virtual events across the year, with over 14 being awards ceremonies, varying from 250 to 1,500 guests. Rubie is passionate about events marketing, growing awards year on year across the spectrum. 

Laura has been working at CloserStill Media for over 12 years, rising through the ranks from a Sales Manager to Portfolio Director, where she leads an multi award-winning portfolio of 12 medical trade shows. 

Laura has a solid background in sales and marketing, and more than 20 years’ expertise in the pharmaceutical and healthcare industries, predominantly working with service providers, publishers, events, and exhibition organisers. Most recently, Laura was elected the President of UK Chapter of Women in Exhibitions.   

Raphael Sofoluke is a serial entrepreneur, author, visionary & Founder and CEO behind UK Black Business Show, UK Black Business Week, Birmingham Black Business Show & Black Tech Achievement Awards. The UK Black Business Week is the first dedicated week in the UK for Black entrepreneurs, professionals, and allies of the Black community. 

 The UK Black Business Show was founded in 2017, it is an annual conference and exhibition show which takes place during Black History Month to highlight and promote the amazing businesses founded by people from the black community. The show has been endorsed by Sadiq Khan the Mayor of London and David Lammy MP for Tottenham. 

 The show highlights the achievements and contributions black businesses have made to the economy and attendees can hear insights and advice in entrepreneurship, leadership, and business from some of the UK’s leading black business professionals. 

2023 marked the show’s seventh year and was a resounding success. Now a whole week of event it attracted over 15,000 across the week with the flagship UK Black Business Show attracting over 6,000 attendees on one day and 200 Exhibitors. The Show was featured in Forbes, The Sunday Times, The Telegraph and many more with some of the biggest organisations in the world also attending. 

Raphael has spoken for and featured on several well-known platforms including Sky, BBC, ITV News, Forbes, Mastercard, CBS, Facebook & BET as well as a personal invite to 10 Downing Street during Black History Month. 

Raphael has also launched the Black Tech Achievement Awards which is set-up to celebrate and acknowledge black role models and innovators within the tech sector and to help illuminate the pathways to greater black representation of the community within the industry. Companies that have attended the awards includes some of the biggest tech companies in the world. In 2020 the awards were featured on BBC and in 2022 Raphael appeared on Sky News talking about the event. In 2020 Raphael was also listed as one of Forbes 25 Leading Black British Business people to follow. 

Raphael is also the Co-Author of Twice as Hard book alongside his wife. The book was released in the UK and the US in June 2021, and it is published by DK (Penguin Random House). Twice as Hard will share valuable lessons from 40 Black trailblazers from across the UK and US. It will address the real challenges faced by Black people navigating predominantly white spaces while providing tried and tested recommendations on how to navigate these environments to create personal and professional success. The book includes interviews with Mathew Knowles (Beyoncé & Solange Dad), Trevor Nelson MBE, Bianca Miller, Pamela Hutchinson, Munya Chawawa and many more. 

In 2021 Raphael has launched the UK Black Business Week, the first dedicated week in the UK for Black Business Owners, Professionals and Allies of the Black Community. The week had up to 8,000 attendees and included sponsors such as JP Morgan, HSBC, American Express, Moody’s, EY and more. It also had some incredible speakers such as Sir Trevor McDonald, June Sarpong and more. 

In 2022, Raphael has featured in a nationwide campaign with Axa and Evening Standard as one of Three Axa Start up Angels who will give £25,000 to two business people. He was also named in a global list of most influential people of African descent 

Today, the UK Black Business Week & Show has sponsors and partners including HSBC, JP Morgan, American Express, Moody’s, Ralph Lauren, PWC, Barclays, The Times, TalkSport, Tesco, Dentsu, EY, Moneysupermarket, Morgan Stanley, British Business Bank, McDonalds, Capital One, Mastercard and more. All of his shows are considered as the number one event for Black entrepreneurs, professionals, and allies of the Black community not only in the UK but also Europe too. 

Catherine Turner has spent her career working all over the world in all aspects of communications. A passionate entrepreneur, she started CTL Communications in 2009, building it from start-up to 100+ people.  It is now one of the largest and fastest growing communication agencies.  She remains CEO running the global, multi-award winning agency supporting clients on strategy, narrative and creative execution.  

Mandana White is the Founder, CEO and Creative Director of Smart Grid Forums, an independent conference production company serving the European power grid sector. Mandana’s career in conferences started in 1995 at IIR Telecoms (now Informa) where she developed a series of highly successful and influential technical conferences and training programmes for the European telecom sector. From there her passion for technical markets took her into sectors such as Construction, Aviation, Supply Chain, Food Technology, Pharmaceuticals, and Healthcare. She launched Smart Grid Forums in 2011 with a Customer-first ethos and a desire to help drive the clean energy agenda. Mandana has one daughter aged 9, is a keen yogi, enjoys stand-up comedy, and talks about gender equality in the workplace. 

Hesham Zakai is the Managing Director of the Exile Group, a leading media and events company which encompasses the TXF, Proximo and Uxolo brands. The Group specialises in the fields of trade, commodity, export, project and development finance, working with governments, corporate companies, financial institutions and other key facilitators globally. Hesham has previously worked at the Special Reports team of the Financial Times and in the Press department at the European Parliament.

Yoav Zand is an experienced business leader who has extensive knowledge of the public policy landscape in the UK and its commercial implications. He is Managing Director of Inside Government and Understanding ModernGov, both part of GovNet Communications, the UK’s public policy events specialist, where he has led various departments for more than 11 years, previously serving as Chief Operating Officer.

Under his leadership, both divisions have demonstrated consistent and sustainable growth over years. Understanding ModernGov is now the leading independent B2B provider of soft skills training courses for public sector professionals. Inside Government runs award winning content-led conferences, forums and training courses designed to support best practice in the delivery of public services.