He popularized the concept of paradigm shifts and started the corporate discussion of the importance of vision in 1989 with his video, “The Power of Vision.” He has influenced the role of leadership with his video, “Leadershift.”  His video on “Wealth, Innovation and Diversity” helped redefine the importance of diversity.  Industry Week Magazine refers to Joel Barker’s videos as one of the most influential series of programs in the business world.
His last book, Five Regions of the Future, co-authored with Dr. Scott Erickson, came out in 2005. Formerly Director of the Futures Studies Department of the Science Museum of Minnesota from 1975 to 1978, he has since spoken to more than one million people in North America, Europe, Asia, South America and Australia.
He has received numerous awards including two honorary doctorates. In 2006, he was named one of the 100 most distinguished educators in the past 100 years by the University of Minnesota’s College of Education. In 2008, he was identified as one of the top 100 thought leaders in personal leadership and organizational leadership by Executive Excellence Publications.  In 2009, he joined the Board of Leader to Leader Institute.

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Edward de Bono is the originator of the concept - and formal tools - of Lateral Thinking, which is now a part of language enjoying an entry in the Oxford Dictionary. He has written 70 books with translations into 40 languages and has been invited to lecture in 58 countries.
Dr. de Bono was born in Malta. He was a Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, holds an M.A. in psychology and physiology from Oxford, a D. Phil in Medicine, a Ph.D. from Cambridge, a D. Des (Doctor of Design) from the Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology; an LL.D. from Dundee. He holds professorships at the Universities of Malta, Pretoria, Dublin City University, and the University of Central England. The New University of Advancing Technology in Phoenix, Arizona appointed Dr. de Bono Da Vinci Professor of Thinking in May 2005.

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He returned to politics in 1990 as the president of the Liberal Party of Canada, until he was elected as the first non-European OECD Secretary-General in 1996. After a decade of successful work at OECD, he returned to Heenan Blaikie in 2006. The firm now has more than 500 lawyers in offices in Canada and the United States. In 2008, Mr. Johnston was appointed Officer of the Order of Canada, in recognition of his contribution to public service in Canada as well as his achievements at the OECD.
Mr. Johnston studied Arts and Law at McGill University, graduating from law in 1958 as the Gold Medalist. In 1958-1959 he studied at the University of Grenoble on a scholarship. He taught fiscal law at McGill University from 1963 to 1976. He has written many articles on taxation, law and public affairs and is the author of several books including a best-selling political memoir.

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Braden writes frequently on the topic of continuous innovation and works with clients to create innovative strategies, effective customer marketing, organizational change, and improved organizational performance. He has maximized profits for companies while living and working in England, Germany, and the United States. Braden earned his MBA from top-rated London Business School. In his spare time, Braden runs the BloggingInnovation.com – home to nearly two thousand innovation articles and video interviews with luminaries like Dean Kamen, John Hagel III, Roger Martin, Dan Pink, and more.

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For nearly ten years, he was an executive at Lafarge, a world leader in building materials, holding positions as general manager of a manufacturing subsidiary and vice president of business development. Prior to that he spent five years with Deloitte Touche consulting.
Educated at Swarthmore College, Columbia University, and the University of Paris, Chris earned a Ph.D. in Economics and Management Science. He is a Visiting Professor at Case Western Weatherhead School of Management and at the University of Virginia Darden School of Business as well as a Visiting Scholar at INSEAD.
Dr. Laszlo is the author of The Sustainable Company: How to Create Lasting Value through Social and Environmental Performance, Island Press, 2003. (Paperback July 2005.) His latest book is, Sustainable Value: How Leading Companies Are Doing Well by Doing Good, Stanford University Press, 2008.

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Together with Chen Sin Tan, Yen Ching’s team Backcasters won the Grand Prize of the Challenge:Future 2009/2010 Competition with their win-win-win concept by reinventing the metro system with consideration to increase the metro capacity, wisely utilize the expenses of government and taxpayers, and utmost importantly to reduce the consumptions of the raw materials used to manufacture a metro system.
Beside the triumph of C:F Competition 2009/2010, Yen Ching also had other competition experiences such as Singapore National Concrete Canoe Competition (SNCCC) to design a floating concrete canoe, where her team had won the Grand Champion award, as well IStructE Structural Competition to design a lightweight high strength truss bridge, which also won the first prize.

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In 2000, Muff co-founded Yupango, a coaching consultancy dedicated to developing start-up companies and training management teams. Prior to that, Muff was Director, Strategic Planning EMEA of IAMS Pet Food, a division of Procter & Gamble, in the Netherlands. Throughout the 1990s, Muff held several positions for ALCOA (Aluminum Company of America), working in Moscow, Russia as General Manager for Building Systems International, in the United States as an Industry Analyst for Global Mergers & Acquisitions and in Switzerland as a Business Analyst for Europe.
A Swiss native, Muff began her career with Schindler Lifts in Lucerne, then in Australia, and holds both a Master’s and Bachelor’s in Business Administration from Business School Lausanne. She is a speaker at international conferences on topic of leadership in business, executive coaching, developing future leaders and sustainable entrepreneurship. At BSL, she is responsible for all academic programs, spearheads the doctorate program and co-teaches the entrepreneurship track of the MBA & EMBA programs.

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Mr. Oborne was educated at the University of California at Berkeley (BA, MA, and PhD), Cambridge University, and the Ecole Normale Supérieure in Paris. He has taught at universities in the United States, Great Britain, France and Italy (as a Senior Fulbright Professor). In the 1980s he worked on the political economies of the Pacific Basin countries, and published books and articles on technology and direct foreign investment issues in the People's Republic of China.
Over his career, Mr. Oborne has worked extensively in the areas of biotechnology, science policy, innovation policy frameworks, information technology policy and the political economy of China. Currently, the International Futures Programme is working on projects focused on space, the new security economy (particularly biosecurity issues), monitoring and managing new systemic risks, the emerging bio-economy, and Infrastructure. Mr. Oborne chairs the OECD Internal Coordinating Group on Biotechnology and Nanotechnology.

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With a background in architecture, medicine, and psychology, Ruben is a founder of Institute of Esotery and Para-Psychology in Belgrade (Serbia). He is also a healer and personal coach, renowned for his work and success in addressing severe cases of addiction and terminal illness. As a speaker at Challenge:Future Summit 2010, Ruben became one of the most admired thought leaders among youth, recognized for his challenging, inspiring, and provocative insights.

A frequent subject of media attention, Ruben has appeared in countless magazines and TV shows, and offers frequent keynotes at events and conferences.

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In 2010, Prahalad co-authored the book, Predictable Magic: Unleash The Power of Design Strategy To Transform Your Business (Wharton School Publishing). She has spoken at business schools such as USC and Harvard on design strategy using the EMPOWER framework she developed and conducts workshops for executives.
Prahalad has a BA in Economics and Political Science from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth. Prahalad’s work as a management consultant includes writing the first business plan for MyOwn.MD, (now Anvita Health), a real-time clinical decision support system and Google Health partner. More recently, she worked with Harvard Business School to develop a case exercise on design and blogs on the Huffington Post and Harvard Business Review.

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He is an Engineering Science major specializing in Nanotechnology under the University Scholars Programme at the National University of Singapore. He has also published papers on photonics and desalination technologies. His passion for innovation brought him to Silicon Valley where he worked at Zong mobile payments. After studying at Stanford University, he earned his minor in Technopreneurship. He then studied Health Systems at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy. He has also written multi-disciplinary cases on mobile commerce, elderly care and rural health.
 
Previously, he worked on sustainable technologies at the Housing and Development Board. Recently, he was tasked to refine innovation management at the Ministry of Home Affairs. He has also provided advice for cultural events and competitions. He co-founded an energy non-profit and an inter-faith youth society. In his spare time, he designs, plays city-building games and works on DIY prototypes with his friends.

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In the course of his international IBM career Richard Straub held various executive line and staff positions in IBM such as Assistant General Manager PC Marketing for IBM Europe based in Paris, global Chief Learning Officer based in the US and Director of Learning Solutions for Europe, Middle-East and Africa.
For the last 10 years he has been increasingly involved in European Union level industry initiatives in the area of skills, lifelong learning and innovation as Chair of the European Career Space Consortium (ICT skills and new University curricula required for the 21st Century Economy), the Living Labs Policy Group and the Open Innovation Strategy Group.
As a thought leader at the intersection of business and academia he is a keynote speaker at international conferences and member of various boards and Advisory Groups.

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His academic interests include construction informatics, computer integrated construction, internet, Web and grid computing, design communication, philosophy of conceptual modeling and CAD. He wrote several papers on these subjects. He was a coordinator or partner in several EU projects since the 4th framework. He held graduate and undergraduate courses in Ljubljana, Istanbul, Zagreb and Stockholm.

In 2007 and 2008 dr. Turk was a Minister for growth in the government of Slovenia, national coordinator for the Lisbon Strategy, chief negotiator for the Slovenia's accession to the OECD, chairman of the national Sustainable Development Council and Chairman of the Competitiveness Council. His other activities outside of the academia include: Chairman of the Supervisory Board, Telekom Slovenia and Mobitel, member of the Reform Council, Vice Chair of the Strategic Council for Culture, Education and Science etc.

During the Slovenian presidency to the EU, he was in charge of the updates to the Lisbon Strategy and involved in the management of the energy and climate change package. His interest include creativity, entrepreneurship, open access to knowledge, open innovation, renewable energy, and  R&D policy.

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Antoine has a Master of Law from the University of Fribourg, Switzerland. Passionate about politics, he was the youngest member ever elected of the Parliament of Lausanne, his home city, at the age of 20. Together with the partner of an important Swiss private bank, now retired, he co-founded a liberal think tank in 2003 (“Groupe de Riencourt”).

He is an occasional columnist in Le Temps, a major Swiss newspaper. He worked for Mediaprocessing – a consultancy for electronic media – and gained a lot of experience in event management by organizing numerous festivals and parties while at high school. In 2010, Antoine was named by Swiss magazine L’Hebdo among 100 top Swiss personalities.

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He was recently awarded a Rhodes Scholarship to study Development Economics at Oxford. Prior to this he received the University Medal in Economics at The University of Sydney, and was the Top Student in the Economics and Business Faculty in 2007 and 2009.
Nat has served as the World Vision Youth Ambassador, Environment Convenor for the University of Sydney Union, Conferences Director of the United Nations Society, and Student Representative on the Sydney University Academic Board. He has represented Australia at the International Youth Leadership Conference and as a Goldman Sachs Global Leader at the Global Leadership Institute. Nat is a World Public Speaking Grand Finalist, was selected as the New South Wales Lions Youth of the Year, was Best Delegate at the Asia-Pacific Model United Nations Conference, and was awarded the 2010 Sydney Chinese Lions Humanitarian Scholarship.
In the 2009/10 Challenge:Future competition, Nat led the team that won the IEDC (Education) competition. His team developed a proposal for a student-to-student free online university to increase the quality, accessibility, and relevance of education globally.

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In 1999, David coined the term “Youth-Led Development" to draw attention to the enormous amount of work being done in the development field by young people under age 25. Always, David stretches the envelope never for a second imagining that anything is impossible for young people. He is on a one-man mission to empower young people – and thousands have joined his campaign which is now unstoppable. From getting young Americans to learn an entire musical in Russian in 4 days, to getting them to manage a thousand delegates at an International Congress, David inspires young people to rise beyond their comfort zone. Peace Child International has done much already: watch this space: it will do much more in the future.

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He was a member of the supervisory boards in numerous companies, such as Telekom Slovenia and the member of the first Slovenian Senate.  He is a member of the International Advisory Board of the DMA (Direct Marketing Association), a member of the Clinton Global initiative, a member of the board of Balkan Children and Youth Foundation, a member of the Business Advisory Council of Faculty of Economics in Ljubljana, and a member of the Supervisory Board of IEDC - Bled School of Management.

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