Since 2015, Noura Selim is the Executive Director (ED) of the Sawiris Foundation for Social Development, one of the largest grant-making foundations in Egypt. In her role as ED, she is responsible for developing the strategic plans for the foundation; Managing the foundation’s financials and endowment; Leading the foundation to implement the strategic goals including overseeing the planning, implementation and monitoring of activities across three core areas of work (economic empowerment, social empowerment and education & scholarships); Overseeing the assessment of funding proposals; Planning and managing human resources; Setting up effective partnerships with civil society, government agencies and the private sector to maximize the foundations’ impact; and representing the foundation externally.

Prior to that, Noura worked as an Engagement Manager at McKinsey & Company in New York, Dubai and Cairo for 5 years, joining as an Analyst in 2007. At McKinsey, Noura served public and private sector clients, particularly in health care and education. Her healthcare work spanned the pharmaceutical sector as well as public payers and providers in the US, Europe and the Middle East, while her education work spanned K-12 and technical and vocational education. During her time at McKinsey, Noura was involved in leading the implementation of a large-scale transformation in technical education and training, as well as leading a health care reform program aimed at increasing access and quality of care.

Prior to McKinsey, Noura worked as a Teaching Assistant at the University of Pennsylvania's Engineering school.

Noura holds a Masters in Business Administration from Harvard Business School, a Masters in Biotechnology from the University of Pennsylvania and a Bachelor of Science in Bioengineering from the University of Pennsylvania, graduating Magna cum laude.

Noura serves as an Advisory Board Member on the Harvard Business School MENA Advisory board, Advisory Board Member of Alternative Policy Solutions at the American University in Cairo, Board Member of the Egyptian National Investment Charity Fund for Education (NICE), Board Member of Manara Boarding School, and Investment Committee member at Mezzan.

Noura previously served as Chairwoman of the Board of Arab Foundations Forum 2017-2020, and as Treasurer of the Board of the Harvard Arab Alumni Association 2014-2016.

Venetia Bell is Group Chief Sustainability Officer and Head of Strategy at Gulf International Bank (GIB) where she has the overall responsibility for the bank’s sustainability efforts, providing strategic direction and developing a leading-edge ESG product suite. As Head of Strategy, she has overall responsibility for devising and implementing the company’s strategy for scaling and mobilizing capital in support of sustainable investment strategies. She is also responsible for governance and communication. Bell joined GIB from the Bank of England where she was Deputy to the Chief Operating Officer. In 2017, she was named one of Management Today’s 35 Women Under 35. She is an alumna of the Mentoring Foundation and a Fellow of the Forward Institute, and is a Certified Investment Fund Director and Trustee of two charities. Prior to GIB, Bell had several high-profile roles at the Bank of England, publishing a range of policy-focused research, playing an instrumental role in the BoE’s strategy and pushing the adoption of inclusion initiatives. She graduated with an MSc in Economics from the London School of Economics and an MA in Economics from the University of Cambridge.

Mr. Khaled Bin Braik is a Partner in PwC’s Government & Public Sector consulting practice in the Middle East with a focus on public sector strategy, organisational transformation and human capital development. He serves as the first homegrown UAE National Consulting Partner at PwC Middle East. With over a decade of consulting experience, Khaled is also the firm’s Nationalisation Leader in the United Arab Emirates and spearheads the award-winning nationalisation program “Watani” to create a sustainable national workforce in the professional services sector. He partners with key government stakeholders and policymakers to drive youth engagement across economic sectors, and increase the employability and participation of nationals in the labour market. Khaled has deep expertise in shaping human capital development strategies and has led diverse large-scale civil service modernisation, institutional effectiveness and upskilling programmes to meet the long-term economic, social, and environmental aspirations of the region. During his tenure at PwC, Khaled has also advised leaders, governments and industry champions on evidence-based and purpose-driven policy reforms, strategic planning, organisational restructuring, governance and transformational leadership. Khaled is a recognised thought leader, public speaker, and author on public sector revitalisation, the future of work and sustainability. He is regularly featured in press such as Emirates News Agency (WAM), Arabian Business and multiple industry conferences, podcasts and webinars. Khaled has been felicitated by the Ministry of Human Resources and Emiratisation for his leadership impact across the nation and is a recipient of the  “Leader of the Year in the Private Sector” national award. He was selected to participate in the flagship Impactful Leaders Programme, run by the Mohammed bin Rashid Center for Leadership Development, an exclusive leadership development programme for the top-tier of public and private sector national leaders identified to advance the sustainable development of Dubai. Khaled is a graduate in Political Science and Business Administration from Concordia University in Canada and has an MBA from Cardiff University in the UK. He is also certified in strategic foresight, transformative leadership and disruptive innovation with INSEAD, Imperial College, IMD, UC Berkeley, among others.

Jeff Lu is CEO and Co-Founder of Engine Biosciences, which discovers and develops new precision medicines based on novel biology uncovered by its platform integrating next-generation CRISPR screening, machine learning, and drug discovery chemistry. Engine Bio identifies patient subpopulations defined by specific genetic mutations sensitizing cancers to certain drugs, and the company is advancing its pipeline of oncology therapeutics and biomarkers. Engine Bio is backed by US$80M in funding from blue chip investors across US and Asia.

Jeff is passionate about generating impact from new technology, data, and biotechnology. He serves as a co-founder of NSG Ventures, a biotech venture capital and venture building firm. He has helped build several companies through significant value creation, financings, and exits, including Enleofen (acquired by Boehringer Ingelheim), AAE (acquired by Expedia), PairX Bio, GDMC, and others. Earlier in his career, he led corporate and commercial strategy and data analytics at AirAsia and was a consultant at Bain & Company.

Izkia Siches Pastén, MD, is a graduate of the Universidad de Chile Medical School and trained in internal medicine at the same university. She works in the Infectious Diseases Unit of the San Juan de Dios Hospital in Santiago de Chile since 2018, one of the most reputed Infectious Diseases units in Chile. She is also a member of the board of directors of the NGO "Médicos Sin Marca" which seeks to promote evidence-based clinical practice, free from pharmaceutical influences. In 2017, after a superlative performance as a student union representative, she assumed the Chilean College of Physicians' presidency, being the first woman in this position and recently reelected in 2020 for a second period. Nowadays, after the social outbreak in Chile in October 2019, she leads the most valued institution for the Chilean population in a convoluted country. Notably, she and the Human Rights department of the Chilean College of Physicians have denounced the use of kinetic impact projectiles by the police, which resulted in severe ocular trauma and permanent disability to thousands of Chileans during the social outbreak. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she has been advised by a reputed group of experts from different disciplines, being the voice of evidence-based recommendations and interventions that connect with common sense and most disadvantaged populations. Siches has been the counterweight of a government with one of the highest mortality and contagion rates. Today, she still works in the pandemic response and argues for health rights in her country's new constitution, about to be written in April 2021.

Christoph is one of the three founders and CEO of the German agency and boutique consultancy for digital business “Torben, Lucie und die gelbe Gefahr” in short “TLGG” with offices in Berlin and New York. He and his team counsel international companies and brands in the strategic use of digital technologies, building out new organizational innovation infrastructures and the development of new business models. Even public authorities and NGOs seek the expertise of Christoph in dealing with the digital change around topics like single market integration, investment taxation, education and else. He has authored numerous essays and articles on digital change and is a renown speaker at global conferences and board meetings. Christoph is actively facilitating change as a mentor and investor to startups around the world.

Thomas Crowther is a Welsh ecologist in the department of Global Ecosystem Ecology at ETH Zurich, where he founded Crowther Lab, an interdisciplinary group of scientists studying global ecosystems and generating knowledge to protect biodiversity and address climate change. He serves as chair of the advisory board of the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration and chief scientific advisor to the UN’s Trillion Trees Campaign. Crowther is the founder of Restor, a science-based open data platform that provides ecological insights, transparency and connectivity to conservation and restoration efforts across the globe. Restor was named a finalist for the Royal Foundation’s 2021 Earthshot Prize. Crowther serves on the advisory council of WEF’s Trillion Trees initiative (1T.org).

Maryam Khansari, born on September 1984 in Tehran, is the General Manager at one of Iran’s top construction companies. Herison Company is one of the country’s oldest companies, working on a wide range of infrastructure projects such as industrial sites, power stations, refineries, sports complexes, sewage treatment plants, residential buildings, roads and bridges, for over sixty years.
She is also a board member and the International Relations Manager at the Syndicate of Construction Companies of Iran, the oldest syndication of firms in construction industry and the leading association advocating the rights of the private sector in engineering and construction.

Xuemei SUN, Deputy Editor-in-Chief of IFENG.com, Initiator of "Girls protection" and Chairman of Beijing All-in-One Public Welfare Foundation, is a long-devoted pioneer in Chinese child protection development area. Prior to her current roles, she served as a journalist for the Beijing Times, and Editor-in-chief of the philanthropy channel of IFENG.com. On June 1, 2013, she united 100 female journalists and several media organizations to launch a public welfare project “Girls Protection”, which upgraded to a special fund in 2015. In 2018, she further developed the "Girls Protection" team into the Beijing All-In-One Public Welfare Foundation, with a firm long-term commitment to preventing sexual assaults against children and adolescents, spreading sex education knowledge, promoting the dissemination of gender equality concepts, and ultimately improving Chinese legal systems and institutions on child protection.

By the end of March 2022, more than 10,000 volunteer lecturers had passed the assessment of "Girls Protection" in 31 provinces across the country, more than 6.1 million children 700,000 parents had been taught face-to-face anti sexual assault courses, online courses cover tens of millions of people. In 2018, based on “Girls Protection”, the Foundation launched new sex education course "Embrace Adolescence" for adolescents, which was taught face to face to around 150,000 teenagers by the end of March 2022.

For 9 consecutive years, she organized and held a symposium of Representative members of the National People's Congress and the Chinese Political Consultative Conference (NPC & CPPCC) of the "girls protection" and issued the investigation report on sexual assault case statistics and anti sexual assault education to promote the improvement of laws and systems.

Awards: National March 8th red flag bearer, CCTV charity figure of the year，Beijing Youth May 4th medal and other awards.