Hisham El Khazindar is Co-Founder and Managing Director of Qalaa Holdings, a leading investment company in Africa and the Middle East. Prior to co-founding Qalaa Holdings (formerly Citadel Capital), El Khazindar was Executive Director of Investment Banking at EFG Hermes where he advised on landmark M&A and IPO transactions in the region. During 1999-2000, he was on secondment to Goldman Sachs in London. El Khazindar serves on the boards of leading regional companies, including El Sewedy Electric and Magrabi Retail, and on the Advisory Committee of the Emerging Markets Private Equity Association. He also serves as a Trustee of the American University in Cairo, as a Trustee of the Cairo Children's Cancer Hospital and as a Fellow of the Aspen Institute's Middle East Leadership Initiative. He holds a BA in Economics from the American University in Cairo (1996) and an MBA from Harvard Business School (2003).

Undergraduate and Master's degrees, Harvard University; PhD, Stony Brook University. Policy and ethics expert in stem cell research for over 15 years, has been committed to changing the perception of life-saving science. Currently, Assistant Professor, Stony Brook University; Director, Education and Ethics, Stony Brook Stem Cell Facility. Co-Founder, VENTure Think Tank, to provide policy and technological solutions for ventilator users. Associate Director, Center for Community Engagement and Leadership Development, to empower underserved communities. Former Member, Empire State Stem Cell Board, which designed New York State's stem cell policy. At age 11, was in an accident leaving her paralyzed from the neck down and dependent on a ventilator. Author of memoir, Miracles Happen (2002), which was made into a movie, The Brooke Ellison Story, directed by Christopher Reeve.

Ilwad Elman is a social entrepreneur at the forefront of the Somali peace process.

•Chief Operating Officer at the Elman Peace Center.

•The Elman Peace Centre is a women lead peace building organization founded and based in Somalia. Our dynamic force comprises visionary thought leaders, fearless activists, and trailblazing social- entrepreneurs. Our young and diverse team adopts a start-up like approach to resolving the seemingly intractable conflicts and social justice issues in our community. We're bridge builders, forming potent alliances with civil society organizations and initiating public-private partnerships that fuel the greater, common good.

Bachelor of Laws (Hons), King's College, London; Postgraduate Diploma in Legal Practice, Oxford; Master of Laws (Hons), Harvard Law School, UK Fulbright Scholar. Admitted to the Supreme Court of England and Wales as a Solicitor. Public international law and policy development expert focused on international relations from peacebuilding initiatives to the governance of emerging technologies. Nima has previously worked in investment banking, at the United Nations, for international law firms in London and the Middle East, and as an adviser and strategist to senior officials in Government in East Africa and at the African Union. She is an angel investor, public speaker, lecturer and thought leader on technology governance, and sits on the Boards of start-ups in the health and venture funding spaces. Nima has been recognised for her achievements by the UK Powerlist as a Rising Star in 2012 and selected to join the Forum of Young Global Leaders by the World Economic Forum in 2016.

Amal Enan is Chief Investment Officer at the American University in Cairo and Partner at 500 Global. She places her investment expertise where it can alter outcomes for the Middle East and Africa. Being a woman investing in the Middle East with a commitment to equity and sustainability, Enan applies herself as a catalyst for channelling inclusive capital to invest in growth and sustainability.

BSc and MSc in Mechanical Engineering, Keio University in Japan; 2012, PhD, MIT. 2005, started to work on human biomechanics and development of transtibial prosthesis as a PhD student, Biomechatronics group, MIT Media Lab; concurrently, taught a course to develop orthopaedic devices for developing countries as an instructor of MIT D-lab. Currently Associate Researcher, Sony Computer Science Laboratories, working on human physical augmentation with robotic technology. Director, D-Leg, targeting design and dissemination of appropriate orthopaedic technology; President, See-D, which organizes an appropriate technology business workshop and contest. Named one of the world's most outstanding innovators under the age of 35, Technology Review, TR35 (2012).

Dr. Abasi Ene-Obong is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of 54gene, a health technology company advancing the state of healthcare through large-scale discovery and translational research, advanced molecular diagnostics, and clinical programs for the benefit of Africans and the global population. He holds a Ph.D. in Cancer Biology from the University of London, a Masters in human molecular genetics from Imperial College London, and a Masters in Business Management from Claremont Colleges, California. He also worked as a cancer researcher and published a seminal paper on pancreatic cancer immunology, Gastroenterology Journal. He has extensive experience operating in the US, UK, and Nigerian healthcare industries. Prior to 54gene, Dr. Ene-Obong worked with leading healthcare organizations, including Fortune 100 pharmaceutical companies, academic and research institutions, and governments as a management consultant with PwC and IQVIA (formerly QuintilesIMS). Founded in 2019, 54gene has made the Time Magazine list of 12 innovations that would change healthcare in the 2020s and has been listed by Nigeria’s Punch newspaper as 1 of 5 innovations that would improve healthcare for Africans. 54gene also made the Fast Company list of the world's Most Innovative Companies’ in 2020. It was also awarded the best health technology solution by AppsAfrica. Dr. Ene-Obong was listed as 1 of the 30 most innovative entrepreneurs on the African continent in 2019 by Quartz Africa. In September 2020, Dr. Ene-Obong was labelled a Nigerian hero in the fight against COVID-19, by a Nigerian newspaper, ThisDay. Dr. Ene-Obong is also included in Fortune’s 40 under 40 most influential people in healthcare for the year 2020.

Paula Escobar Chavarria is a chilean journalist, editor and author. She is a columnist/ panelist at La Tercera, CNN Chile and Duna radio. She is a professor at Universidad Diego Portales and member of the board of the Young Global Leaders Foundation and of ComunidadMujer.. She is also Executive Director of the Chair on Women and Media at Universidad Diego Portales and member of the Council of the WEF Gender Parity Initiative (Chile). She is a Young Global Leader (2006), Yale World Fellow(2012), won the Lenka Franulic award for the best woman journalist in Chile (2014) , and was chosen one of the BBC 100 Inspiring women of 2015. In 2019 she won -with her team- the Excellence in Journalism Award in print media in Chile, for their coverage of sexual misconduct and abuse. She studied Journalism at the Catholic University of Chile and has a Master's degree studies in Comparative Literature. She has published six non-fiction books: in one of them she interviewed all Chilean Presidents after the return of democracy. Former Magazines Editor at El Mercurio, former Editor in Chief of Caras magazine and former Editorial Director of Televisa Group in Chile. She also wrote for the Huffington Post.

Richard is the CEO and Co-founder of SkyCell; SkyCell delivers a system-critical service to secure the distribution of medicine and vaccines worldwide to doctors, patients, and pharma companies while reducing the CO2 footprint of the shipments by 50%. Before SkyCell, he helped to build up the Institute for Value-Based Entrepreneurship "IVE Institute" in Switzerland, which provided more than 3500 students with business plan creation classes and leadership insights from top CEOs free of charge. He co-led the Alumni Organization for more than ten years. Richard holds a Bachelor of Arts in Management from Université de Fribourg. Richard is married and lives in the Zurich area with his two daughters. His hobbies include skiing, sailing, and coaching startups pro bono.

Agustina is the Regional Director for Spanish-speaking South America and Miami for Meta (formerly known as Facebook). Before her arrival to the company, Fainguersch was CEO and Funding Partner of Wolox, an Argentine digital transformation company that provides technological solutions for companies in the process of digital innovation, which was later acquired by Accenture. She then served in Accenture as Managing Director until the end of January 2022. Today she’s also a professor at the Executive MBA of Universidad de San Andres.

She is an Engineer and has a Master's Degree in Software from Instituto Tecnológico de Buenos Aires (ITBA), and has extensive experience in projects with high technological impact. In 2016, she won a scholarship to be part of the Global Solutions Program at Singularity University and the Launchpad at SU Labs at NASA, Silicon Valley. In 2017 she was recognized by MIT among the 35 innovators under 35. In 2018 she received the Argentine Digital Innovation Profile Award. Her project Muzi received recognition as an innovative project with social impact by the Argentine Creative Circle and the Sadosky Award for innovation; and in 2019 she was selected as an Endeavor Entrepreneur.
In 2019 she was recognized as the “Nearshore Executive of the Year” by Nearshore Americas, in
2020 she was selected as “EY Entrepreneur of the Year” and in 2021 and 2022 and 2023 she was selected as one of the top 100 most influential CEOs in Argentina by the HORSE ranking. In 2022 she was also selected President of the Engineering Week of CAI, Argentine Engineer Center.

Scholar and entrepreneur to bridge machine intelligence and creativity. Founder of Tezign.com, a leading technology start-up with the mission to build digital infrastructure for creative resources. Founding Chair, Tongji University Design Artificial Intelligence Lab. World Economic Forum Young Global Leader; Aspen Institute China Fellow. Member, IEEE Global Council for Extended Intelligence. Recipient, National DDF Award (2018). Doctorate, Harvard University; Master's degree, Princeton University. Recently published From Universality of Computation to the Universality of Imagination, a book on how machine intelligence would influence human creativity.

eL Seed uses Arabic calligraphy and a distinctive style to spread messages of peace, unity and to underline the commonalities of human existence. His artwork can be found all over the world and consistently aim at unifying communities and redressing stereotypes. Born in 1981 in Paris to Tunisian parents, he was disconnected from his Arabic roots, speaking only the Tunisian dialect of the language at home. In his teenage years in a kind of quest for his identity, he began to delve into his own heritage and learned to read and write standard Arabic.It was during this journey that he began to develop his artistic style of calligraphy, which would later bring him worldwide acclaim. He found that Arabic calligraphy was a way of building a link between his equally important French and Tunisian backgrounds and as he matured, eL Seed began to use that same calligraphy as a tool to build bridges all over the world. Whenever he works within a community, he spends a long time researching to find an appropriate quote to summarise the voice of the community he is working within and to underline his key principals of love, respect and tolerance. His work has been shown in exhibitions and in public places all over the world including most notably on the façade of L’Institut du Monde Arabe in Paris, in the favelas of Rio di Janeiro, on the DMZ in between North and South Korea, in the slums of Cape Town and in the heart of Cairo’s garbage collectors neighbourhood. In 2017, he won the UNESCO Sharjah Prize for Arab Culture. He was named a Global Thinker in 2016 by Foreign Policy for his project ‘Perception’ in Cairo. In 2013, he collaborated with Louis Vuitton on their famous ‘Foulard d’Artiste’.