Originally hailing from Vancouver, British Columbia, Rear-Admiral Jeffery Zwick joined the Canadian Forces in 1989 as a Direct Entry Officer, having previously received his Bachelor of Arts Degree in History from the University of British Columbia. As a junior officer from 1993 to 1999 he progressed through initial naval officer training and subsequent naval warfare positions through to Combat Officer in HMCS ALGONQUIN.

Promoted to Lieutenant Commander in 1999, his position as the Weapons Officer for the Canadian Pacific Fleet prepared him for assuming the duties of the Staff Above Water Warfare Officer for the Commander of the Standing Naval Force Atlantic (SNFL) in 2001. While with SNFL, he participated in OPERATION ACTIVE ENDEAVOUR, in support of NATO Article 5 operations against terrorism in the Mediterranean. This NATO experience was followed by his appointment in 2003 as the J5 Maritime Plans in the Canadian Forces Joint Operations Group (CFJOG) in Kingston, Ontario. His international experience was further rounded out after his appointment as the Executive Officer of HMCS TORONTO in 2004 during OPERATION ALTAIR.

In 2005, he was promoted to Commander and joined the naval staff in NDHQ as the Senior Staff Officer for Fleet Management, Policy and Readiness. He was then appointed Commanding Officer of HMCS MONTREAL in June 2007. Promoted in 2010, Captain(N) Zwick served as the Director of Strategic Coordination in Ottawa and following that appointment served as the Director of Defence Force Planning and Defence Program Advisor to the Vice Chief of Defence Staff. In 2015, he was promoted to Commodore and appointed Commander Canadian Fleet Pacific and Commander of the Naval Training System.

Rear-Admiral Zwick was promoted to his current rank in 2018, and assumed the role of Chief of Force Development in Ottawa. Thereafter, in 2020, he was appointed to the role of Chief of SSE Combat Systems Integration.

Rear-Admiral Zwick holds a Master’s Degree in Defense Studies and is a graduate of the National Security Programme at CFC Toronto. He was appointed an Officer of the Order of Military Merit in 2015. He and his charming wife Marta are currently residing in Ottawa, Ontario.

Francis Govers is the designer of over 30 unmanned land, sea, air and space vehicles. He currently works at Bell Flight as Autonomy Lead for the Innovation Group. He is an Air Force veteran, was head of command and control for the International Space Station, Deputy Chief Engineer for Unmanned Systems at the US Army Future Combat Systems, participated in the DARPA Grand Challenge, and managed a Zeppelin airship.

At Sportvision, he supported the “Yellow Line” for NFL football, and designed the onboard telemetry system for NASCAR and IndyCar. He has published 45 articles or papers and authored the book “Artificial Intelligence for Robotics”. He received five outstanding achievement awards from NASA, the Pioneer Award from the National Space Society, and recognition from Scientific American for “World Changing Ideas”.  Francis earned his master’s degree from Brandeis University.

Kevin Shortt has worked in the space industry since 1996 and has contributed to some of Canada’s largest space missions. He obtained his B.Sc. in Physics from York University in Toronto in 2002 and his M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from the Royal Military College of Canada. In 2012, he joined the Optical Communications Group at the German Aerospace Center just outside of Munich.

In April 2015, he moved to industry to continue his work in optical communications in Business Development and Systems Engineering at Mynaric Lasercom GmbH (formerly ViaLight Communications GmbH). Kevin is currently a Research Project Leader in Airbus’s Central Research and Technology Division and leads advancements in free-space optical communications research.

Eric Belhaire received his PhD Diploma in electrical engineering from the university of Paris-Sud in 1992 after graduating in applied physics from the “Ecole Normale Supérieure de Cachan” with a diploma of master and an “agrégation de Physique”. He was a research scientist at CNRS (French Research Agency) between 1992 and 2007. During this period, he was leading a research group in the Institute of Fundamental Electronics (IEF) at the University Paris Sud. He was working in the field of analog and mixed-signal integrated circuit design with a special interest for vision circuits (image sensors; silicon retinas), Microsystems and new technologies in Systems-on-chip.

Between 1998 and 1999 at Thales Company, Eric’s goal was to transfer the laboratory innovations in advanced infrared detectors. After 2000 he was scientific advisor for Thales for the development of QWIP and InGaAs detectors and their associated readout integrated circuits (ROIC) in CMOS technology. In 2008, he left the CNRS to join Thales. After several years of R&D group management, he became senior expert in Electro-Optical technologies within the technical directorate.

Pooja Suresh is the Director of Research & Innovation at Gastops in Ottawa, Canada. In her current role, she manages the Research department and leads her team on technology advancement programs that serve the long term vision and strategic interests of the business in the aerospace, defence and energy markets. She has built Canadian and international partnerships with industry and academia to understand the future market needs and bring to market innovative technology solutions. Pooja first started working at Gastops ten years ago. Her diverse career includes experience in environmental policy for aviation and management consulting.

Pooja chairs the Scientific Committee of the Consortium for Aerospace Research and Innovation Canada, and sits on the Carleton University Mechanical & Aerospace Industrial Advisory Board and European Turbine Network Conference Advisory Board. She has a bachelor’s degree in aerospace engineering from Carleton and a masters in aeronautics and astronautics from MIT.

Manju Henry is a senior system engineer, she gained her PhD in microwave engineering and has been developing a range of microwave systems. In her current position at RAL Space, Manju has worked on a range of instruments for earth observation and security and defense applications.

Daniel is a serial entrepreneur with a background in robotics and electrical engineering. He began his career as a Sales Engineer for a world leader in the manufacturing industry, working on projects for customers such as BMW and McDonalds. A change of pace took Daniel to Apple where he designed customer journeys for Apple stores across Europe – it was at Apple where Daniel met future business partners. He previously co-founded Kairos, an early facial recognition technology in the US (2011) and then SeeCycle, a UK based sensor technology backed by ESA to detect and save the lives of cyclists around large vehicles within our cities.

LGN was founded by Daniel (CEO) and Vladimir Ceperic (CTO) in 2018 and has already played fundamental parts in helping companies to deploy and scale their machine learning solutions. LGN is founded on the belief that our world will be increasingly dependent on AI powered autonomous systems that create huge volumes of data but that also have to react safely and immediately to the ever changing environment in which they are deployed.

Mohammed has a background in environmental engineering, graduating with a Masters from Imperial College London. He has been working on starting and growing early stage technology companies ever since graduating, in the field of sensors. More recently he has started working with RAL Space millimeter wave technology group, working on the development and start-up launch of a high miniature hyperspectral microwave sensor for advanced weather forecasting.

Edward Hunter Christie is an independent consultant and a former NATO official. He has held a succession of roles in research, industry, EU affairs, and NATO. His most recent work focused on the development of NATO framework policies in the areas of Artificial Intelligence and Autonomous Technologies.

Heather Richman is a seasoned corporate development and strategy expert with a longstanding focus on the intersection of national security, technology, and investment. She has a diverse background including time spent on Capitol Hill, in academia, and in the national security innovation sector.

Richman spent 1999-2004 in Washington, D.C., with U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer of New York where she oversaw appropriations, budget, and tax. She helped manage the post-9/11 redevelopment of Lower Manhattan and helped establish the Department of Homeland Security from a funding standpoint. She then managed government relations for Stanford University and outreach strategies for the newly formed Precourt Institute for Energy, which focuses on the intersection of energy and national security.

She was a founding team member of Elemental Excelerator, now the energy arm of Emerson Collective, which was initially funded by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) in 2012. Elemental has leveraged Navy’s initial $36M investment to accelerate 99 portfolio companies and raise more than $2B in private and corporate capital.

Richman now serves as Entrepreneur in Residence for BMNT Partners where she leverages her experience and vast network to build vibrant ecosystems of entrepreneurs, investors, and experts to rapidly transition impactful, national security/dual-use focused solutions for internal USDOD and Intelligence Community clients. In 2019 she launched the Defense Investor Network in response to rising U.S. investor and family office concern around foreign direct investment (FDI) in order to determine the effects of such transactions on U.S. national security and create alternative pathways.