Brigitte Alfter, Chairwoman, Journalismfund.eu
Denmark
A journalist by profession, Brigitte is based in Copenhagen and considers Europe her field of interest. From 2004-2008 she was the Brussels correspondent for the Danish daily newspaper Information, she is a co-founder of Farmsubsidy.org , in 2003 she a co-founder and from 2008-2012 the manager of the Scoop project, which gives research grants to journalists in the Balkans, the Ukraine and other countries.
Brigitte has covered European affairs and EU-matters for years; she uses freedom of information legislation as a journalistic tool and conducts training on the subject as well as on covering Europe. She is knowledgeable in media, human rights, justice- and home affairs and minority issues as well as a number of specific sectors she has investigated. She is the co-founder and editor of Wobbing in Europe, a web- and network tool for journalists, who use freedom of information legislation as a research tool.
She was a board member of the Danish Association for Investigative Journalism (FUJ) from 2002-2012, the last four years she was the chairperson of FUJ’s International Committee. She was a board member of the German association Netzwerk Recherche from 2007-2011. Brigitte is a member of Åbenhedstinget, a Danish network of journalist’s and public officials on freedom of information access to electronic documents, under the Danish in job-journalism training center Update. In 2013 she was elected chairwoman of Journalismfund.eu, a support structure for European and cross-border journalism, which gives research grants and facilitates networking for journalists.
In 2006 Brigitte was among the nominees for the prominent Danish Cavling Award. In 2007 she won the Freedom of Information Award of the American Investigative Editors and Reporters, IRE along with Farmsubsidy.org colleague Nils Mulvad. In recent years she was on several award winning teams doing cross-border reporting. In 2013 she won the Leipzig Award for the Freedom and the Future of the Media along with Journalismfund.eu colleague Ides Debruyne.
Twitter: @Hackette7
Martijn Bal, Managing Director, iMinds Media
Belgium
Martijn Bal learned all about “making television programs” at iDTV Belgium as floor manager, director, editor, producer—a self-made man within the business. Later on he worked for the well known production company Kladaradatch. Before working directly for a broadcaster, he lived in Amsterdam while working for iDTV Holland.
This short interlude abroad was followed by nine years at the Vlaamse Media Maatschappij, where he worked for “VTM”, first as producer, later on as Head of Entertainment. From here, Bal transitioned to public broadcasting, joining VRT as Deputy Channel Manager.
After spending many years in traditional television, Martijn switched from “old” to “new media”. Before becoming manager of the iMinds-MiX, he was Head of Digital Media at the Vlaamse Media Maatschappij. There he launched three digital television channels, developed red button usage, and developed a strong VOD offering under the “iWatch” brand. In March 2012 Martijn became director of the iMinds-MiX
Twitter: @martijnbal
Lorena Boix Alonso, Head of Unit, DG Connect, European Commission
Belgium
Lorena Boix Alonso is the Head of Unit for Converging Media and Content Unit, Directorate General for Communications Networks Content and Technology since July 2012. Formerly, she was Deputy Head of Cabinet of Vice President Neelie Kroes, European Commissioner for the Digital Agenda. During Ms Kroes’ mandate as Commissioner for Competition, Lorena Boix Alonso commenced in October 2004 as a member of her Cabinet and became Deputy Head of Cabinet in May 2008.
She holds a Master of Laws, with a focus on Antitrust Law and Intellectual Property, from the Harvard Law School. She graduated in Law from the University of Valencia (Spain) and then obtained a Licence Spéciale en Droit Européen from the Université Libre de Bruxelles.
She joined the European Commission Directorate-General for Competition in 2003. Prior to that, she has worked for Judge Rafael García Valdecasas, at the European Court of Justice, as well as Deputy Director and Legal Coordinator of the IPR-Helpdesk Project and in private practice in Brussels.
Twitter: @LorenaBoix
Xavier Damman, Founder, Storify
United States
Entrepreneur and hacker born and raised in Belgium. Xavier moved to San Francisco in 2009 to create Storify, the social media curation platform used by the largest publishers and brands around the world from CNN, New York Times, the BBC, to The White House, The British Monarchy and Prime Minister office, the United Nations, etc. Storify has been acquired by Livefyre in September 2013.
Twitter: @xdamman
Rik De Nolf, CEO, Roularta
Belgium/France
Rik De Nolf has been involved in Roularta, which was founded by his father Willy De Nolf in 1954, since 1971. He became managing director and CEO of “Roularta Media Group” in 1981. He is also President of “Groupe Express Roularta” in Paris and President of the “Vlaamse Media Maatschappij” (Radio and Television) in Brussels.
Since, Roularta has grown into a multi-media group with operations in Belgium (60 % of turnover) and France (30 % of turnover), but also in the Netherlands, Germany, Slovenia and Serbia.
Rik De Nolf was born in Roeselare in 1949 and holds a degree in Law (RUG).
David J. Hanger, President, European Magazine Media Association
United Kingdom
David Hanger is President of EMMA and has held the position since January 2006. He formerly was Publisher and Chief Executive of Prospect Magazine, a monthly magazine of current affairs and cultural debate in Britain.
Hanger stepped down as Board Director and Publisher of The Economist, having taken the circulation through the one million mark. He is given much of the credit for having the vision and leading the team that raised The Economist from a small, predominantly UK, specialist title to an accepted global brand, commanding a market leader position.
His interest in the industry continues as a former Vice-President and now Chairman of EMMA, Chairman of the Worshipful Company of Marktors Think Tank, Vice-President of the History of Advertising Trust, Director of The Advertising Standards Board of Finance and Chairman of The Debating Group.
His past activities include past World President of the IAA, past Chief Examiner CAM International Advertising and Marketing, past Chairman of the European Advertising Tri-partite, and Master of the Worshipful Company of Marketors.
Twitter: @MagazineMedia
Pierre Haski, Co-founder and CEO, Rue89
France
Born in Tunis (Tunisia), Pierre Haski graduated from Paris’ Centre de Formation des Journalistes. He joined Agence France-Presse in 1974, and was a correspondent in Johannesburg (South Africa) from 1976-1980. In 1981, he joined the French daily Libération, where he was Africa correspondent, Diplomatic correspondent, Foreing correspondent in Jerusalem and Beijing, later Foreign Editor and Deputy Editor. He left Libération in 2007 as cofounder and CEO of Rue89.com, France’s first pure player online news website, now part of Le Nouvel Observateur Group.
Nadja Hirsch, MEP, European Parliament
Germany
Nadja Hirsch joined the European Parliament in 2009. She is member of the ALDE group and vice-chair of the committee on Employment and Social Affairs. In the Culture committee, she focuses on media policy issues and promotes a liberal approach towards copyright, collective rights management, new technologies and business models as well as advertising.
Prior to joining the European Parliament, she held political positions in Germany as vice-chair of the FDP city council group (2008-2009); honorary municipal councilor of the FDP in the Munich town hall (2002-2008); honorary city councilor of the regional capital Munich (2002-2009) and member of the District Committee, Berg am Laim (2008-2009).
Born in Munich/Germany in 1978, she studied and graduated in psychology at the Ludwig Maximilian University, Munich from 1998-2005. She also obtained a degree in economic sciences at Hagen Open University (1999-2002). She is a trained economic mediator and worked as freelance psychologist and mediator since 2006.
Twitter: @nadjahirsch
Christoph Keese, Executive Vice President, Axel Springer AG
Germany
Christoph Keese is Executive Vice President of Axel Springer AG. Reporting di-rectly to CEO Dr. Mathias Döpfner Mr. Keese is deeply involved in the company’s transformation from print to digital with a strong focus on content business. Recently he spent six months as Visiting Fellow in Axel Springer’s Palo Alto office to explore digital innovation and investment opportunities.
Prior to his current position, Mr. Keese was Editor in Chief of Axel Springer’s WELT am SONNTAG, Germany’s leading Sunday paper, and WELT ONLINE, a leading news portal.
Mr. Keese studied economics at Frankfurt University and is a graduate of Hamburg Journalists’ School / Henri Nannen School. He started his career as assistant to the CEO of Publisher Gruner + Jahr, spokesperson of G+J and Managing Editor of Ber-liner Zeitung.
He has authored several high-profile books, i.e. “Rettet den Kapitalismus” (Save Capitalism) and “Verantwortung jetzt” (Responsibility Now).
He runs a private blog on media and internet policy (www.presseschauder.de).
Christophe Leclercq, Founder and Publisher, EurActiv
Belgium
Christophe Leclercq launched the leading online EU policy media EurActiv in 1999 & managed it for 10 years. Christophe now focuses predominantly on its overall strategy, deepening its Europe-wide network, as well as its external relations. Previously, he worked at the European Commission & was a management consultant with McKinsey.
Twitter: @LeclercqEU
Paul Lee, Partner, Keystone Strategy
United States
Paul Lee is a Partner in Keystone Strategy’s San Francisco office. He is a leading market expert in online publishing, advertising, and search. He has deep knowledge of the workings of the entire online services ecosystem and develops leading edge market, competitive and user behavioral insights from some of the world’s largest “Big Data” sources.
With more than 20 years of experience in technology operations and strategy, Paul provides strategy counsel to clients and guidance for government regulators with respect to online competition issues around the globe. His previous employers include Gartner, Scient, an eBusiness Services firm, management consultancy PRTM, and AT&T Bell Laboratories.
Paul holds a BS in Industrial Engineering from Penn State and an MS in Operations Research from Stanford University.
Robert Madelin, Director-General, DG CONNECT, European Commission
United Kingdom
Robert Madelin is the Director-General responsible for the Digital Agenda for Europe.
Robert was educated in England at the Royal Grammar School, High Wycombe and at Magdalen College, Oxford. He has also studied at the Ecole Nationale d’Administration in Paris.
Born in 1957, a British civil servant since 1979, Robert has served in the Commission since 1993: in his current post since 2010; as Director General for Health and Consumer Policies from 2004 to 2010; on trade and investment policy before that.
Twitter: @eurohumph
Bertrand Pecquerie, CEO, Global Editors Network
France
In March 2011, Bertrand Pecquerie was appointed CEO of the Global Editors Network, the association for editors-in-chief and media innovators from all platforms - print, digital, mobile and broadcast. Already, more than 900 editors-in-chief have joined GEN.
From 2003 to 2011, he was the Director of the World Editors Forum (WEF), an organisation for newspaper editors within the World Association of Newspapers.
He served as CEO of the World Media Network from 1989 to 2001. WMN was a press syndicate gathering major European and Arabic newspapers (El Pais, La Stampa, Libération, Süddeutsche Zeitung, Der Standard, Al Ahram, An Nahar, amongst others).
From 1996 to 2001, Bertrand was also in charge of World Media Live, a subsidiary of Vivendi Universal in charge of international websites (Cannes Film Festival, Tour de France…).
Formerly, Bertrand was a lecturer at the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Paris.
Twitter: @bertrandp
Nick Piggott, Head of Creative Technology, Global Radio
United Kingdom
After starting out as a programmer, he led the launch and development of national digital radio stations in 1999, and established a team to use technical innovation to make better radio. Since then the team has innovated across on-line, mobile, digital radio and is now playing a leading role in the development of hybrid radio. Nick evangelises on the benefits of digital technology for radio, and is also Chairperson of the RadioDNS hybrid radio project.
Twitter: @nickpiggott
Xavier Prats Monné, incoming Director-General, DG EAC, European Commission
Spain
Xavier Prats Monné is a high-ranking official of the European Commission. He is currently the Deputy-Director General of the Directorate-General for Education and Culture (since 2011).[1][2] The main policy areas under his responsibility are: the modernisation of European education and training systems; educational mobility, including the “Erasmus” programme for students; and international relations in the field of education, culture and youth. He represents the European Commission (EC) at the European Institute for Innovation and Technology (EIT).
From mid-2007 till the end-2010, he served as the EC Director for employment policy, Europe 2020 Strategy and international relations in the field of employment; in this capacity, he was also responsible for relations between the EC and the International Labour Organisation (ILO), and EC “sherpa” representative at the G20 Labour Ministers meeting. He was also, from 2007 to end-2010, one of the five founding members of the EC Impact Assessment Board, which vets all impact assessments produced by the institution and reports directly to the President. He previously served as: Director for the European Social Fund; Deputy Chief of Staff of the EC Vice-President for external relations; Advisor of the EC Commissioner for Regional policy; assistant to the European Commission Spokesperson; Administrator at the Directorate General for Development policy and at the General Secretariat of the European Commission.
Twitter: @XavierPM
Christian Röpke, CEO, ZEIT ONLINE (Die Zeit)
Germany
Christian Röpke has been Managing Director of ZEIT ONLINE since February 2009. He has over 13 years experience in digital media, working in leading media companies like Gruner + Jahr. Christian Röpke is putting great emphasis on building qualified reach on www.zeit.de, increasing monetization as well as innovation in all relevant business models, being foremost display advertising, classifieds as well as apps and e-publishing.
Jeroen Smit, Journalism Professor, University of Groningen
The Netherlands
Jeroen Smit (1963). Studied Business School, started out as a consultant. Worked for newspapers (Financieel Dagblad, Algemeen Dagblad and was editor-in-chief of FEM/DeWeek (business weekly published by ReedElsevier) between 1990-2002. Worked as a freelance investigative journalist since 2002, wrote bestselling books about Ahold-drama (2004) and the breaking up of ABNAmro (2008): De perfect prey. The ABNAmro-book was turned into a play (Nationale Toneel: 2012) and a price-winning TV-series (Vara/IDTV: 2013). Smit presented on radio (BNR) and TV (newsshows: Nova and Buitenhof). Since 2011 he is journalism-skills professor at the University of Groningen.
Twitter: @jeroensmitenzo
Mario Tedeschini-Lalli, Deputy Director of Innovation and Development, Gruppo Editoriale L’Espresso
Italy
Mario Tedeschini-Lalli is Deputy Director, Innovation and Development, at the Italian media company Gruppo Editoriale L’Espresso, where he helps defining digital policies. He went digital in 1997, after many years in print journalism as a reporter and an editor, mostly covering foreign affairs. He has been managing editor of Repubblica.it, CNNitalia.it, and Kataweb.it, where he led a small team experimenting with multimedia narratives. He is also a part-time teacher of Digital Journalism and History of Journalism, and member of the Board of the Online News Association (ONA).
Twitter: @tedeschini