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Gus BalbontinInvestor, Advisor and Adventurer
Born and bred in wild Patagonia, Gus never allowed his small town and humble beginnings get in the way of his big dreams. A healthy disrespect for authority and a severe case of FOMO (fear of missing out) landed him in Australia at the Young age of 17. |
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Dr Catriona WallaceFounder of Responsible Metaverse Alliance
Catriona is an expert in the field of Artificial Intelligence and the Metaverse and is an Adjunct Professor, keynote speaker and Founder of the Responsible Metaverse Alliance. Catriona is also the co-author of the book Checkmate Humanity: the how and why of Responsible AI. |
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Robert BrittainExpert Consultant in Advertising and Media Efficiency.
Robert Brittain is an Independent marketing consultant and strategic advisor to CMOs. Focused on enabling enterprise-wise marketing effectiveness capability. UA-published writer and speaker in his field, Robert is co-author of the “Advertising Effectiveness Rules” series of reports from the ACA Effectiveness Database with the globally renowned Peter Field. These include “Winning or Losing in a Recession”, “To ESOV and Beyond” and “Attention and Effectiveness”. Prior to becoming an independent marketing consultant Robert spent 20 years in client-side commercial roles including leading Marketing Effectiveness at ANZ Bank Banking Group and Marketing Analytics at Mondelez International across the Asia-Pacific region. |
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Sarla FernandoDirector of Regulatory & Advocacy - ADMA.
Sarla is a globally experienced, digitally-grounded professional passionate about using her legal and commercial skillset to help businesses navigate the sometimes complex world of data governance and Privacy. Sarla is also proficient in developing Digital Marketing strategies, Data compliance frameworks and audience growth strategies for large multi-divisional/ multi-national businesses. With industry experience obtained through a career spanning Privacy, Digital Media, Television, Publishing, Events, Film, Ticketing, Data, Social Media, Sales, FMCG, Education, Hospitality, Marketing and Advertising, Sarla brings a unique perspective to regulatory and advocacy advisory. Sarla has also provided legal, governance, marketing and branding advisory for large-scale projects that cross jurisdictions for businesses in Australia, NZ, Germany, UK, USA, HK and Sri Lanka. |
Carl Hartmann is a prominent, multi-award winning Australian serial entrepreneur, who is best known for his work in co-founding Temando, Compono and Lyre’s Non-Alcoholic Spirit Co, and his involvement as an investor & board member/advisor to a range of leading technology companies around the world.
Carl Co-Founded his first start up Temando in response to the disconnect between the delivery experience consumers were receiving and the fulfillment capability of today’s merchants. Carl took Temando from an idea to a global business, raised over $56M in funding, established 5 major global offices and established many global strategic partnerships with both carriers and technology partners, and was successfully acquired in a trade sale by Neopost S.A. ($1.5B Revenue French Listed Company) in 2017.
Having experience firsthand the challenges of talent in a fast-growing technology company, after exiting Temando, Carl co-founded Compono, which brings a data driven view to talent, applying algorithmic matching around skills, qualifications, and culture. Compono has the world’s leading structured data set of skills & qualifications which it uses to also deliver a range of curated immersive learning platforms around specific upskill pathways, with a particularly strong customer base in the government sector. Compono has raised $30M in funding to date, and is now going through tremendous growth.
Most recently, Carl also co-founded Lyre’s Spirit Co – an innovative beverage company using cutting edge food science, that has recreated all the major alcoholic spirits in non-alcoholic format. Lyre’s has raised over $80M to date and has quickly become not only the most awarded product in the non-alcoholic spirit category with over 300 awards, but also the largest in terms of both revenue and global distribution, available in over 100 countries.
Carl is also the adjunct Professor of Entrepreneurship & Innovation at the University of Queensland (the leading Australian University and a top 50 global university); Serves as a Non-Executive Director on a several boards, and has won a number of awards including the IBM Global Entrepreneur of the Year Australia, Asia Pacific and global runner up, EY Entrepreneur of the Year Regional Winner and National Finalist, amongst others.