Speaker Biographies

Speakers

Moderators

Cecilia Malmström

Commissioner for Trade, European Commission

Swedish nationality. Married with two children.

European Commissioner for Trade
2014-present

European Commissioner for Home Affairs
2010-14

Minister for EU Affairs, Sweden
2006-10

Vice-President of Folkpartiet (Swedish Liberal Party)
2007-10

Member of Folkpartiet Party Executive
2001-10

Member of the European Parliament
1999-2006

Member of Västra Götaland Regional Council
1998-2001

Senior Lecturer, Department of Political Science, Göteborg University
1998-99

Ph.D. in Political Science, Göteborg University
1998

Vice Chair of Göteborg Municipal Immigration Committee
1994-98

Lay assessor at Göteborg City Court
1991-94

Translator and technical assistant and with SKF in Paris, Stuttgart and Barcelona
1986-89

Anthony L. Gardner

Ambassador, US Mission to the EU

Anthony L. Gardner was sworn in as the U.S. Ambassador to the European Union on February 18, 2014. He presented his credentials to European Council President Van Rompuy and European Commission President Barroso on March 18.

Prior to assuming his current position, Ambassador Gardner was Managing Director for six years at Palamon Capital Partners, a private equity firm based in London, that focuses on providing growth capital to fast growing businesses in a wide variety of service sectors throughout Western Europe. In that capacity he managed financing, legal and tax structuring issues related to the firm's acquisitions and divestitures.

Previously, Ambassador Gardner served as an Executive Director in the leveraged finance departments of Bank of America and GE Capital and as a Director in the international acquisitions group of GE International, all based in London. He has also worked as a Senior Associate at international law firms in London, Paris, New York, and Brussels.

Ambassador Gardner has dedicated more than twenty years of his career to U.S.-European affairs, as a government official, lawyer and investor. He served as Director for European Affairs on the National Security Council in 1994-95. During that period, he worked closely with the U.S. Mission to the European Union to launch the New Transatlantic Agenda, a joint commitment to promoting peace and stability, democracy, and development around the world; responding to global challenges; contributing to the expansion of world trade and closer economic relations; and building bridges across the Atlantic. Ambassador Gardner also participated in the launch of the Transatlantic Business Dialogue, an advisory group bringing together executives from leading American and European companies to advocate for a barrier-free transatlantic market.

Prior to his government service, Ambassador Gardner worked with the Treuhandanstalt (German Privatization Ministry) in Berlin, with the Commission des Operations de Bourse in Paris, and as an intern at the Directorate General for Competition Policy at the European Commission in Brussels. He is the author of A New Era in U.S.-EU Relations?: The Clinton Administration and the New Transatlantic Agenda and numerous articles on EU affairs.

Ambassador Gardner holds a BA in Government from Harvard University, an MPhil in International Relations from Oxford University, a JD from Columbia Law School, and a Masters in Finance from London Business School. He is also a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and has served as Trustee of the Guggenheim UK Charitable Trust, and a Board Member for the Peggy Guggenheim Collection in Venice. Ambassador Gardner is fluent in French, Italian, and Spanish, and also speaks German.

Bernd Lange MEP

Chair, Committee on International Trade, European Parliament

Born on November 14, 1955 in Oldenburg, grew up and attended school in Varel / Friesland district, parents were independent gas station merchants. Married, one daughter, one adopted son. From 1989 - 2013: guardianship for a severely disabled man

Since 2014: MEP, Chairman of the Committee on International Trade, deputy member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy
2012-2014: Trade policy spokesman for the Socialist Group
2009-2014: MEP, Member of the Committee on International Trade and the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy, Rapporteur for the industrial policy of the European Parliament 2011
2005-2009: Head of the "economic, environmental and Europe" unit of the DGB (German Trade Union Confederation) district Niedersachsen-Bremen-Sachsen/Anhalt
1994-2004: MEP from Lower Saxony
Since 1974: Member of the SPD (German Social-Democratic Party) and member of IG Metall (Metalworkers Union)

Awards:
Automobile Association Award 1998 for the improvement of air quality by European
automotive emissions legislation
EU Parliamentarian of the Year 2012 category Commerce ("Parliament Magazine")
Fair Politician of the Year 2012/13 (Max van der Stoel Foundation)

Hobbies
Motorcycling, vintage cars and everything about water

Christina Sevilla

Deputy Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Small Business

Christina Sevilla is Deputy Assistant U.S. Trade Representative for Small Business at the Office of the U.S. Trade Representative (USTR), Executive Office of the President. She develops and coordinates trade policy and outreach related to small and medium enterprises for multilateral, regional and bilateral trade agreements and initiatives. She is the U.S. lead negotiator on small and medium enterprises for the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP) with the European Union. Previously, she has been responsible for USTR’s private sector advisory committee system established by Congress and managed state and local government relations. She speaks around the country and abroad to private sector groups and other organizations regarding the U.S. trade agenda.

Sevilla is also an adjunct professor at George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs. She has been a MacArthur Foundation Fellow, a Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellow, a Krupp Foundation Fellow, and a Harvard Graduate Prize Fellow at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs. She received a Ph.D. in political science and international relations from Harvard University. Sevilla received a B.A. summa cum laude in political science from Boston College, graduating as Valedictorian of the College of Arts and Sciences.

Denis Redonnet

Head of Unit, Trade Strategy, DG Trade, European Commission

Denis Redonnet heads the Strategy division in the Directorate General for Trade in the European Commission, after heading up its WTO division.

Before that, he served as Deputy chief of staff to EU Trade Commissioner Peter Mandelson and advisor to EU Trade Commissioner Pascal Lamy.

He is a career European Commission official, having held positions in the monetary, international economic affairs and internal market directorate generals of the EU Executive. He is an economist by training, and started his career as a corporate banker for a French bank in the city of London.

Jeff Weiss

Senior Advisor for Standards and Global Regulatory Policy, United States Department of Commerce

Jeff Weiss is the Senior Advisor for Standards and Global Regulatory Policy in the Office of the Secretary of Commerce, Penny Pritzker. In that role, he serves as the senior Commerce official with respect to regulatory and standards issues in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP). He provides advice and counsel to the Secretary’s office and the USTR on the negotiations, and meets regularly with U.S. and EU stakeholders and officials from U.S. agencies and European institutions. In addition to T-TIP, he provides advice and counsel to the Secretary’s office and the White House on a variety of regulatory and standards policy matters and other economic issues.

Previously, Mr. Weiss served as the Associate Administrator of the White House Office of Management and Budget's Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA). At OIRA, he helped to lead: the Administration's development of regulatory policy, including with respect to paperwork and reporting burden reduction; White House review of significant Executive Branch regulatory actions; the Administration’s regulatory cooperation initiatives with Canada, the EU, and Mexico; development of Executive Order 13609 (Promoting International Regulatory Cooperation), which seeks to eliminate unnecessary differences in regulation between the United States and its major trading partners; and the revision of U.S. standards and conformance policy (OMB Circular A-119).

Mr. Weiss also served as the senior negotiator on regulatory, standards, and conformity assessment matters in the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR). As Senior Director for Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), he represented the United States in bilateral, regional and multilateral fora, including the WTO’s TBT Committee and Non-Agricultural Market Access (NAMA) negotiations, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) talks. In that role, he negotiated with U.S. trading partners to address standards-related measures that impeded market access for U.S. producers of industrial and agricultural goods, as well as related systemic issues. As part of the TPP negotiations, he served as lead negotiator for the TBT chapter and its sectoral annexes, and was deputy lead negotiator for the chapter on Regulatory Coherence.

Mr. Weiss is a graduate of Duke University, Harvard Law School, and Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Monique Goyens

Director General, BEUC

As Director General of BEUC, Monique represents 40 independent national consumer associations in 31 European countries, acting as a strong consumer voice in Brussels, ensuring that consumer interests are given weight in the development of policies and raising the visibility and effectiveness of the consumer movement through lobbying EU institutions and media contacts.
As a consumer expert and advocate, she was member of the EU High-level Expert Group on reforming the structure of the EU banking sector (Liikanen group - 2012), the EU High-level Group on the sustainability of the food supply chain (2011-2014) and the EU Resource Efficiency Platform (2012-2014). She is a delegate in the Consultative Commission on Industrial Change of the European Economic and Social Committee as well as an effective member of the Euro Retail Payments Board. Recently, she has been appointed in the Advisory Group of the European Commission on the Transatlantic Trade & Investment Partnership (TTIP).

In her capacity as BEUC Director General, Monique is currently EU co-chair of the Transatlantic Consumer Dialogue (TACD) a network of EU and US consumer organisations, and she also represents BEUC at Consumers International, the international consumer organisation.

Apart from championing consumer rights, Monique’s passions/challenges are her family, cooking for friends and long walks with her golden retriever.

Sietske De Groot

Senior Policy Advisor EU and International Affairs, Federation of Small Businesses

Sietske is the FSB’s lead on EU affairs in Brussels and Westminster since 2009. She specialises in the European (digital) single market and export. She has previously worked in Brussels, the Netherlands and the UK as a European Affairs specialist covering issues ranging from aviation to local and regional government. Sietske has MAs in French and Political Science from the University of Amsterdam/Sorbonne, and the Free University of Amsterdam respectively. She recently started a degree in ICT.

John Clarke

Director, International Bilateral Relations, DG Agriculture and Rural Development, European Commission

John Clarke was born in England in 1958, and has a first class Honours degree and an MPhil in literature and politics from the University of London.

Mr Clarke joined the European Commission in 1993. He was Head of Unit for WTO Affairs from 2004 to 2007 and was then appointed Deputy Head of the European Commission Delegation to the international organisations in Geneva.

Mr Clarke was Chargé d'Affaires of the EU Delegation in 2010, representing the EU in the WTO, and the UN agencies.

In January 2011 Mr Clarke was appointed Director International Affairs in DG Agriculture and Rural Development, responsible for relations including FTAs with Asia and Latin American countries, neighbourhood policy and EU enlargements.

Since May 2013 Mr Clarke has been responsible for International Affairs, in particular multilateral negotiations, industrialised countries including USA and Japan, and Africa in DG Agriculture and Rural Development.

Before joining the European Commission, Mr Clarke worked from 1983 to 1993 for the Hong Kong Government, positions including Assistant Secretary for broadcasting policy, Deputy Secretary of the Executive Council, member of the HK delegation to the GATT during the Uruguay Round, and Deputy Head of the HK Office in Brussels.

Paul Rübig MEP

Honorary President, SME Global

Paul Ruebig, born in Upper Austria, has been a member of the European Parliament since 1996 and belongs to the European People's Party (EPP). He is the owner of an Austrian blacksmith company and has a degree in Business administration, marketing and production engineering from the University of Linz, Upper Austria. He is married and has two children.

Paul Rübig is full member of the Committee on Industry, Research and Energy and of the Committee on Budgets. He is Vice-Chair of the Delegation for relations with the Korean Peninsula and substitute member of the Delegation for relations with Switzerland, Norway and of the EU-Iceland Joint Parliamentary Committee and the European Economic Area (EEA) Joint Parliamentary Committee. Furthermore, Paul Ruebig is also a substitute member in the Committee on Development.

Paul Rübig is very active in the field of the small-scale business promotion. He is president of SME Global, a working group of the International Democrat Union (IDU), whose objective it is to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SME) and to improve their business environment. Paul Ruebig is also Chair of STOA (Science and Technology Options Assessment), an official body of the European Parliament that is supported by external experts such as universities, scientists or research institutes.

Magda Stoczkiewicz

Director, Friends of the Earth Europe

Magda Stoczkiewicz has been a director of Friends of the Earth Europe since March 2008. She has 14 years of senior management experience in a non-profit organisation. She has advanced knowledge of campaigning on environmental, social and governance issues as well as understanding of human rights and development aspects, coupled with 15 years' experience of the intricacies of the EU policy-making framework.

Polish graduate from the Jagiellonian University in Krakow with Master of Art, afterwards continuing with post degree studies in public relations and European affairs. She is one of the founders of environmental organisation in Central Eastern Europe - CEE Bankwatch Network, for which she worked for 12 years, first in Poland, than in Amsterdam and Brussels.

Friends of the Earth Europe campaigns for sustainable and just societies and for the protection of the environment and unites 31 national European organisations with thousands of local groups. The organisation is part of the world's largest grassroots environmental network, Friends of the Earth International. The office in Brussels coordinates European campaigns and conducts advocacy work in the European Headquarters.

Thomas Boué

Director, Government Affairs, EMEA, BSA | The Software Alliance

Thomas Boué oversees the BSA | The Software Alliance’s public policy activities in the Europe, Middle East and Africa region. He advises BSA members on public policy and legal developments and advocates the views of the ICT sector with both European and national policy makers. He leads on security and privacy issues as well as broader efforts to improve levels of intellectual property protection and to promote open markets, fair competition, and technology innovation in new areas such as cloud computing.

Prior to joining BSA, Boué served as a consultant in Weber Shandwick where he advised clients on a wide range of technology and ICT-related policy issues and represented them before the EU institutions and industry coalitions. In this role, he also served as policy and regulatory adviser for both EU and US telecom operators. Prior to that Boué worked for the EU office of the Paris Chamber of Commerce and Industry where he was responsible for the lobbying activities towards the EU Institutions in the areas of trade, education, and labor, as well as for the organization and running of seminars on EU affairs for SMEs and business professionals.

Boué holds a Masters of Business Administration from the Europa-Insitut (Saarbrücken, Germany), a Certificate of Integrated Legal Studies (trilateral and trilingual Master’s degree in French, English, German and European Law, from the Universities of Warwick (UK), Saarland (Germany) and Lille II (France) as well as a Bachelor of Arts in Law from the University of Lille II, France. He is based in BSA’s Brussels office.

Hanne Melin

Director Global Public Policy and Head of Public Policy Lab EMEA, eBay Inc.

Hanne Melin heads the EMEA arm of eBay Inc.’s Public Policy Lab where she develops strategy and vision for policy and legislation fit for a globally connected economy and society. Prior to joining eBay, Hanne was an associate at the law firm Sidley Austin LLP, where she practiced competition law for five years in Brussels. Hanne is a guest lecturer at the law faculty of Lund University (Sweden) and a member of the European Commission’s Strategic Policy Forum on Digital Entrepreneurship. She has written for many legal journals on the topic of online commerce and she is a frequent speaker on the topic of trade policy in the digital economy. In addition to an LLM from Lund University, Hanne holds a Master in International Business Law from King’s College London.

Hosuk Lee-Makiyama

Director, European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE)

Hosuk Lee-Makiyama is Director of the European Centre for International Political Economy (ECIPE). He has published several papers and articles for ECIPE since 2010 on free trade negotiations, EU-Asia relations, World Trade Organization, services trade, privacy and the digital economy.

Prior to joining ECIPE, he was the Senior Advisor on WTO issues to the EU Presidency of Sweden, serving in Geneva as EU chairperson on trade in services, intellectual property, customs-technical issues and their related UN/WTO-bodies. He represented the EU in World Intellectual Property Organisation (WIPO) and served also on the executive committee of the UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE). He also worked in the private sector advising Fortune 500 companies and served on the European board of governors of a top 3 US PR/advertising group.

Lee-Makiyama appears regularly in European, US and Chinese media, and was named one of the 20 most influential people for open internet by the readers of the Guardian UK in 2012. He is also a columnist of China’s only nationwide business daily, 经济参考网 [Economic Information Daily]

He is also a visiting fellow of the department of International Relations at the London School of Economics.

Klaus Berend

Head of Unit, REACH, DG GROW, European Commission

Dr. Klaus Berend joined the European Commission in 1994 and is currently Head of Unit in the European Commission’s Directorate-General Enterprise & Industry, responsible for the implementation of the EU Regulation concerning the Registration, Evaluation, Authorisation and Restriction of Chemicals (REACH), which sets out the overall framework for regulating chemicals in the EU.

Before, he was Head of Unit in DG Enterprise & Industry, responsible for EU legislation on the Classification, Labelling and Packaging of substances and mixtures (CLP), Good Laboratory Practices (GLP), detergents, fertilisers, drug precursors, explosives and pyrotechnic articles. The unit also dealt with the sustainability and competitiveness of the chemicals industry in the European Union.

Previously, he was Deputy Head of Unit in the Commission’s Directorate General for Environment, Unit Biotechnology & Pesticides, where he co-ordinated the work concerning biocides, plant protection products and the Community’s participation in the Rotterdam Convention on Prior Informed Consent (PIC).

He studied chemistry at the universities of Heidelberg, Freiburg, and Stanford, and obtained a PhD in polymer chemistry from the University of Freiburg (Germany).

Jos Dings

Director, Transport & Environment

Jos Dings is director of T&E, Transport & Environment, the Brussels-based federation of around 45 environmental organisations in 24 countries campaigning for more sustainable transport. He joined T&E in 2004.

At T&E he leads a team of 17 staff focusing on EU policies for cleaner vehicles and transport energy, strengthening economic incentives for sustainable transport, greening the EU’s transport investments, and policies for sustainable aviation and shipping.

Before joining T&E in 2004, Jos worked at CE Delft, an environmental consultancy, where he headed the transport division. Jos graduated in Mechanical Engineering at the Delft University of Technology.

Jos, born 27 May 1969, is married with three children, and loves bike racing in the mountains.

Lutz Güllner

Acting Head of Unit, Information, Communication and Civil Society, DG Trade, European Commission

Lutz Güllner works in the European Commission's Directorate General for Trade, where he is Acting Head of the Unit for Information, Communication and Civil Society. In his work, he particularly focusses on communication activities regarding the EU-US trade negotiations. Prior to his current position he served as Deputy Head of the Trade Strategy Unit. He was also responsible for the coordination of EU-US trade and economic relations, including the Transatlantic Economic Council.

In 2009 and 2010, Lutz Güllner was spokesperson for the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, Catherine Ashton. He was also the Commission's spokesperson for trade policy. For a number of years, he coordinated trade and economic relations between the EU and Russia.

Prior to joining the European Commission, Lutz Güllner worked as public affairs consultant in Brussels.

Lutz Güllner studied political science and international relations at the Free University of Berlin and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques (Sciences Po) in Paris. He is teaching trade policy and EU foreign affairs at the post-graduate studies programme for European studies in Berlin.

James Higgiston

Minister Counselor for Agriculture, US Mission to the EU

Jim Higgiston joined the Foreign Agricultural Service in 1984 after graduating with a Master's Degree in International Trade and Finance from Georgetown's School of Foreign Service. He joined the Foreign Service in 1987.

Jim has served in Moscow (1988 - 1992), Warsaw (1997 - 2001), and Ankara (2002 - 2006). He has also held a variety of positions in Washington dealing with analysis, food assistance and trade policy. Since August 2010 Jim served as Deputy Administer for the Office of Foreign Service Operations (OFSO).

As Deputy Administrator for OFSO, Jim was responsible for all FAS overseas operations which included 96 posts, 110 American officers and 320 Locally Engaged Staff with a budget of over $90 million. His office was also responsible for recruitment, deployment and oversight of all USDA personnel stationed in Afghanistan.

Jim is married. His wife Melissa worked at the U.S. Department of State for the past five years.

Mark Abdoo

Director for Public Health and Trade, US Food and Drug Administration

Mark Abdoo is the Director for Public Health and Trade in the Office of International Programs at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. His duties include, inter alia, developing the strategic vision for FDA's engagement in fora that are primarily related to trade; positioning regulatory systems within the broader context of national security and development policy, leading FDA's engagement in the TPP and T-TIP negotiations and coordinating FDA's participation in the TBT and SPS committees at the WTO.

Mr. Abdoo has traveled abroad extensively in support of the U.S. Government's national security, global health and development objectives. Prior to joining FDA, Mr. Abdoo was Senior Advisor for Food Security and Agricultural Economics at USAID where he advised the USAID Administrator and other senior officials on the development-related components of the U.S. Presidency of the G-8, acted as a lead U.S. negotiator for the 2012 G-8 food security and accountability working groups and led USAID's engagement in the G-20 process. From April 2010 - August 2011, Mr. Abdoo was Director for Global HEalth and Food Security at the National Security Staff at the White House. Prior to that he served in various positions, including Deputy Director (acting) of the Office of Global Affairs (OGA) in the Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services.

Mr. Abdoo received a Bachelor of Arts degree from College of the Holy Cross, and was a Doctoral candidate at Brown University. Before joining the Federal civil service, he lived in Asia for close to nine years, where he owned two consulting companies. He is fluent in Mandarin.

John Chave

Secretary General, Pharmaceutical Group of the European Union (PGEU)

Mr Chave has been Secretary General of the PGEU since June 2006.
The Pharmaceutical Group of the European Union (PGEU) is the European Association representing community pharmacists in 34 European countries.

A lawyer by training, he worked in the health field in Brussels for seven years before joining PGEU.

He is a British national, and was educated at the Universities of Sheffield, Trent and Exeter.

In addition to English as mother tongue, Mr Chave speaks Spanish and French.

He lives in Brussels and is married with three children.

Erik Bergelin

Trade and Economics Director, ACEA

Erik Bergelin is currently the Trade and Economics Director of ACEA (European Automobile Manufacturers Association) in Brussels, which represents the interests of the European Automobile Manufacturers with the EU and International Institutions, Governments and other relevant bodies and stakeholders.

Erik Bergelin previously held, among others, the positions of Legal Counsel, Public Affairs Advisor, Supplier Account Manager for steel and aluminum products at Renault, and Vice President Executive Director for Purchasing of Dacia. He was as such responsible for the Purchasing Department and notably for part of the launching of the Logan model.

Charles Faid

Director, EU Government Affairs, Pfizer

Charles Faid has been a Director in Pfizer’s EU Government Affairs office in Brussels since January 2014, and has worked on a range of EU and international policy areas related to pharmaceuticals, including trade, anti-counterfeiting and vaccines. Charles started with Pfizer in 2006; prior to this he worked in the NGO sector in the former Yugoslavia and subsequently in Brussels with the European Youth Forum. He has also worked briefly at the European Commission (Directorate General for EU Enlargement) and the London office of the Friedrich Ebert Stiftung.

Charles holds an MA in German from the University of Edinburgh, UK, and an MA in Politics, Security & Integration from the School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London, UK.

Arnaud Petit

Director, Commodities and Trade, Copa-Cogeca

Biography to appear here shortly.

Ivone Kaizeler

Negotiating Area Lead, Pharmaceuticals, European Commission

· Background: Engineer specialised on the environmental domain – graduated in 1994

· 20 years of work experience from which:

· 5.5 in the private sector (including on industry and on a consultancy) and

· 14.5 years in the European Commission (amongst those 6 in DG EMPL, 4 in ENTR and 4.5 in DG TRADE)

· In DG TRADE, administrator at the unit dealing with tariff and non-tariff negotiations

· Co lead negotiator in TTIP for the sector annexes on PHARMA, MEDICAL DEVICES, COSMETICS and TEXTILES

· Negotiator in the India FTA (TBT and NTB annexes such as pharma, cars, chemicals etc.)

· Negotiator for Morocco DCTFA – TBT

· Negotiator for MERCOSUR – TBT

· Represent, with other colleagues, the European Commission at the WTO TBT Committee (Technical Barriers to Trade)

Jan-Willem Verheijden

Trade Negotiator, Services, DG Trade, European Commission

Jan-Willem Verheijden is a trade negotiator at the European Commission's Trade Directorate General. He is the EU negotiator in charge of e-commerce and telecommunications in both the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership and the Trade in Services Agreement. Prior to becoming a trade negotiator, Jan-Willem worked eight years in the European Commission's Internal Market Directorate-General on policy development in a number of areas, including e-commerce. Jan-Willem is a lawyer and an economist by training.

Lena Perenius

Executive Director, International Chemicals Management, Cefic

Lena Perenius is Executive Director for the International Chemicals Management since January 2012, prior to which she was Executive Director for Programme Product Stewardship from November 2007 until December 2011. Lena joined Cefic in 2002 as Director REACH Implementation.

A Swedish national, Lena Perenius has a degree in chemistry (biochemistry/microbiology) from the Stockholm University. She has more than 25 years of work experience with industry, national authorities, the European Commission and trade associations.

In Sweden she worked 8 years for the pharmaceutical industry and 11 years for Authorities, mainly for the Chemicals Inspectorate.

She joined the Commission, DG Industry, in 1996 with responsibility for harmonisation of chemicals legislation, notably restrictions on the marketing and use of dangerous substances.

Tom Saylor

Chairman of the SME Platform, EuropaBio

Tom Saylor is an experienced CEO with a track record of building and managing entrepreneurial organizations. His experience includes fundraising, strategy development, in- and out-licensing, and acquisitions in Asia, Europe and the United States. He is CEO of Arecor Limited, a British company focused upon enabling the next generation of therapeutic proteins and vaccines through advanced formulation technologies. Previously, he was CEO of Sirus Limited, a drug targeting and delivery company. Tom was Chairman and founder of Lotus Healthcare Corporation, an Asian-based fully integrated pharmaceutical company.

Tom was CEO of Cell Systems Limited, a company focusing on medical applications of cryopreservation and algal biotechnology. Tom was Executive Vice President of a multi-billion dollar diversified industrial and financial group based in New York. He held a ministerial appointment and was a principal negotiator in the Tokyo Round of multilateral trade negotiations for the United States.

Tom is Chairman of the SME Platform, a member of the board of EuropaBio. He holds an MBA from Harvard University, undertook doctoral studies in molecular biology and a degree in molecular biology from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Robb Tanner

Director for Telecommunications and E-Commerce, USTR

Biography to appear here shortly.

Søren Therkelsen

Serial entrepreneur, Silicon Valley expert and NASA student

Søren Therkelsen is a serial entrepreneur with a background in business. For the better half of his life, Søren has been developing and working with digital products in the web and mobile space. In 2011 he co-founded an initiative bringing almost 100 European companies to Silicon Valley. In his career Søren has also developed a pan-European health initiative named MONARCA - a real time monitoring service for bipolar patients, using sensor information and user interactions to predict new occurrences. The main project for Søren is Qurasense - a non-invasive blood diagnostics platform, monitoring the health of menstruating women by building technology in to the female hygiene pad - wirelessly transferring the results to her smartphone. Søren recently graduated from Singularity University at NASA in California.

Sybilla Fries

Counsel, Sidley Austin LLP

SYBILLA FRIES advises clients on the enforcement of international trade agreements, with particular focus on litigation in the World Trade Organization’s dispute settlement system. Sybilla’s in depth knowledge of governmental action in trade and other international law matters builds on her experience of 10 years of service in the legal department of the European Commission. Her ability to adopt both government and industry perspectives on trade issues serves her public and private sector clients alike.

Sybilla is fluent in English, French and German.

EXPERIENCE
Sybilla’s WTO litigation experience extends across all phases of WTO dispute settlement and a wide range of substantive areas, ranging from sanitary and phytosanitary issues over subsidies to customs valuation. Prior to joining the firm, Sybilla served for four years in Geneva as legal counsel to the EU’s Permanent Representation to the International Organizations, including the WTO. She was in charge of dispute settlement affairs and advised generally on WTO legal matters, which allows her to draw on a wealth of experience on WTO legal issues, as well as on general public international law and diplomatic relations.
During her years at the European Commission, Sybilla was also closely involved in the negotiations of trade and other international agreements. Furthermore, her litigation experience during these years extends to other international courts such as the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights.

PRO BONO
In the context of Sidley’s Africa-Asia Agricultural Enterprise Pro Bono Program, Sybilla advises the Bangladesh Fish and Shrimp Foundation on sanitary and phytosanitary issues as well as on certain issues affecting Bangladesh’s trade under unilateral trade preference systems.

Christian Borggreen

Director, International Digital Economy Policy, CCIA

Christian Borggreen is Director of International Digital Economy Policy in the Brussels office of the Computer & Communications Industry Association. He leads CCIA’s work on international trade and Internet governance and engagement with international institutions such as the WTO, ITU, and the OECD.

Before joining CCIA in August 2014, Mr. Borggreen served since 2010 as Senior Policy Advisor at the U.S. Mission to the EU. In his role for the U.S. Department of State, he managed and advised senior U.S. decision makers on digital policy issues. He played a key role in securing transatlantic alignment on Internet governance and in promoting interoperability in the areas of data privacy and online commerce. From 2008 to 2010 he managed the advocacy on digital economy policy advocacy for the American Chamber of Commerce to the EU. Prior to that, he worked for the United Nations in New York and Santiago de Chile, in the area of digital and economic development.

Mr. Borggreen is the founder of the Young Professionals in Digital Policy (YPDP) network which convenes young tech policy enthusiasts to discuss and shape Europe’s digital future.

He holds a master’s degree in Public Administration comprised by university studies in the United States, Argentina, Italy, and Denmark.

Mr. Borggreen is fluent in English, Danish and French and conversant in Spanish, Italian, and German.

Lénaïc Vaudin d'Imécourt

Trade Editor, EU Trade Insights

Lénaïc is Trade Editor of ViEUws’ bi-weekly publication EU Trade Insights. She joined the ViEUws team in 2012 as a freelance trade and foreign affairs correspondent while covering external affairs for the EU daily Europolitics. Lénaïc has a Masters’ degree in European Affairs from the Sorbonne and is an alumna of the US IVLP exchange programme for journalists.

Paul Adamson

Chairman, Forum Europe

Paul Adamson joined Forum Europe as Partner and Chairman in 2014, bringing with him an unrivalled experience and in-depth knowledge of EU affairs spanning more than 30 years.

Paul works with the team on content, business development and strategy both through Forum Europe and the company's international subsidiary, Forum Global.

In addition to his role at Forum Europe, Paul is editor-in-chief and founding publisher of E!Sharp, an online magazine dedicated to covering the European Union and Europe's place in the world. He is also a Senior European Policy Advisor at Covington & Burling.

Paul is a member of Rand Europe's Council of Advisors and sits on the advisory board of YouGov-Cambridge, a polling think-tank. In addition, he is a member of the advisory group of the Washington European Society, the American Security Project, and British Influence - an organisation that promotes the UK's role in the European Union.

Paul is a patron of the University Association of Contemporary European Studies (UACES), a Fellow of the UK Academy of Social Sciences, and a trustee of the Citizenship Foundation.

He founded the consulting firm Adamson Associates, which was sold to Weber Shandwick and The Centre, which was later sold to Edelman.

In 2012, Paul was made an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) "for services to promoting understanding of the European Union”, a part of the Queen's 2012 New Year Honours Diplomatic Service and Overseas List.

Victoria Breck

Director, Grayling

Victoria, an American national, is a Director in the Grayling Brussels EU Public Affairs Department, where she manages the Grayling Food and Consumer Goods Practice.

Working for a range of clients in the field of nutrition, health, food safety, and consumer protection, she assists her clients in developing advocacy campaigns to mitigate potential barriers stemming from EU legislation and supports them in the development of thought-leadership and outreach programmes.

Prior to working at Grayling, Victoria worked in the Public Affairs department of the American Embassy in Bratislava Slovakia, and taught English in Prague, Czech Republic. In addition to her native English, she speaks fluent Slovak and is proficient in Italian and French.

Talander Jansen

Director, Grayling

Talander is a Director in Grayling’s public affairs department and head of the Transport practice group. In addition he is familiar with EU energy and environment policies.

Talander has seen the impact of EU policies on a variety of transport modes having worked for clients in the road transport sector (a car manufacturer, a coach operator and a goods and logistics association), in the air sector (an EU airport and airlines) and in the rail sector (an international rail company).

Prior to joining Grayling, Talander worked in in the French diplomacy and as a marketing assistant in Spain. He holds a Master degree in European politics and Administration from the College of Europe. Bilingual Dutch and French, Talander also speaks English, Spanish and German.

Hannah Herscheid

Director, Grayling

Hannah is a Director in Grayling’s Brussels office. A German national, she works on a range of PA/PR advocacy and communications campaigns for clients, with a focus on healthcare and pharmaceutical policy.

Hannah provides clients with political intelligence and assists in implementing campaigns for leading pharmaceutical companies focusing on both disease specific areas and horizontal healthcare policies. In addition, she is involved with various aspects of event management and conducts pan-European research projects.

Prior to her work at Grayling, Hannah earned her Bachelor’s degree in European Studies and graduated in European Public Affairs at Maastricht University in the Netherlands. Additionally, she gained practical experience from placements with Ketchum Pleon in Brussels and with the Delegation of the European Union to the United States in Washington, D.C.

In addition to her native German, she is fluent in English, with a very good knowledge of French and Dutch.