Speakers (2026)

Chief Scientific Adviser & Summit Co-Chair

UK Government

Executive Chair & Summit Co-Chair

Warwick Innovation District

Minister of State (Minister for Science, Innovation, Research and Nuclear)

UK Government

Chief Executive

UK Research and Innovation (UKRI)

Chief Executive

Universities UK

Director of Research and Technology

Rolls-Royce plc

Chair, Industrial Strategy Advisory Council and President, Enterprise & Industry

Microsoft

Chief Executive Officer

ARIA (Advanced Research + Invention Agency)

DBT Chief Scientific Adviser

UK Government

DCMS Chief Scientific Adviser

UK Government

Emeritus Professor, Deputy Chair Industrial Strategy Council

University of Manchester

Mayor of the East Midlands

East Midlands Combined County Authority

Mayor of the West of England

West of England Mayoral Combined Authority

Mayor of Cambridgeshire & Peterbourough

Cambridgeshire & Peterborough Combined Authority

Chief Executive

West Midlands Combined Authority

Ed Cox

Chief Executive

West Midlands Combined Authority

Ed is the Chief Executive Officer of West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA).

His broad remit includes the smooth running of the organisation, managing the partnership and relationships with Local Authorities across the West Midlands and acting as the ‘regional convenor’, as well as leading negotiations with Government on English devolution, coordinating the agreement and preparation for the Integrated Settlement and driving the West Midlands Futures work to establish a long-term, sustainable vision for the region.

Prior to joining the WMCA, Ed was Director of Public Services and Communities at the RSA where he led an ambitious programme of work on people, power, place and inclusive growth. He previously led IPPR North for 9 years where he was a champion for devolution and much of the thinking behind the ‘Northern Powerhouse,’ working closely with several combined authorities in the north of England.

Before that, Ed was an adviser to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government where he played a key role in developing the Sub-National Review (2007) and the Empowerment White Paper (2008).

Ed has a background in community engagement. He wrote Manchester’s first community engagement strategy and was a founder of the national Participatory Budgeting Unit. He is founder and chair of the Levenshulme Inspire community hub in inner-city Manchester.

Ed is also a qualified minister of religion in the United Reformed Church and is part of the leadership team for his local congregation in Levenshulme.

Ed was previously Chair of Involve until June 2025.

Sessions

Launch of the Devolution Diplomacy Commission
Tuesday 9 June, 17:00 – 18:00, Fellows Dining Room
Midlands Innovation & Investment Reception
Tuesday 9 June, 18:00 – 20:00, Kohn Centre, Marble Hall

Vice President, UK MoD Business Development

Rolls-Royce plc

Chief Executive Officer

London and Partners

Chief Executive Officer

Oxford-Cambridge Supercluster

Head of Customer Engagement at Rolls-Royce SMR

Rolls-Royce plc

Principal

Octopus Ventures

Chief Executive Officer

Edinburgh Innovations Ltd

Visiting Professor, NED and Advisor.  Emeritus BT Fellow.

University of Surrey

Chair

FinTech Wales

Cheir

CSConnected

Chief Executive Officer

Compound Semiconductor Applications Catapult

Strategic Advisor

Infinity Technology Group Ltd

Director of the UKRI/AHRC Creative Communities Programme

Northumbria University

Partner

Lakestar

Commercialisation Director (Deeptech and Software)

Cambridge Enterprise

Managing Director

MSParc

Executive Director

Innovate Cambridge

Principal

Cambridge Innovation Capital

Chief Executive

UK Private Capital

Chief Executive Officer

Midlands Mindforge

Associate Director, International Development

Anduril Industries

DSIT Chief Scientific Adviser

UK Government

Professor Chris Johnson

DSIT Chief Scientific Adviser

UK Government

Professor Chris Johnson is the Chief Scientific Adviser in the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT) having taken up the role in July 2024. Prior to this, he served as Pro Vice Chancellor for Engineering and Physical Sciences at Queen’s University, Belfast (2020-24) and Head of Computing Science in Glasgow University (2014-2020).

Chris’ research interests lie at the intersection of cyber security and the engineering of safety-critical systems, in applications where it is not possible to halt operation and analyse potential malware without creating significant safety concerns. He helped lead the Department for Transport (DfT) review of UK airports, airlines and air traffic organisations that informed the National Cybersecurity Strategy for Aviation. He set up cyber security labs for the UK Civil Nuclear Industry. He was SG Chair of the National Cyber Security Centre’s Community of Interest in Industrial Control Systems. He is a member of the National Cyber Advisory Board (NCAB) appointed to support the implementation of the UK Cyber Strategy.

His early work helped deliver a range of analysis techniques to identify lessons learned from previous failures. He subsequently served as an expert witness to the Grenfell Tower public inquiry where he helped identify recommendations to improve data and communications across the UK emergency services.

His more recent work has delivered techniques for the ethical introduction of machine learning in military systems, including safety and security requirements, on behalf of the UK Ministry of Defence (MoD).

He has held fellowships from NASA, as well as the US Air Force and the US Navy (Office of Naval Research).

Sessions

UK Industrial Strategy Zone: Digital & Technologies (AI)
Tuesday 9 June, 12:00 – 12:45, Wellcome Trust Lecture Hall
UK Industrial Strategy Zone: Digital & Technologies (Semiconductors)
Tuesday 9 June, 13:00 – 13:45, Wellcome Trust Lecture Hall

Chief Executive Officer

Medilink Midlands

Co-Founder & CEO

Hacktron AI

Chief Strategy Officer

Apatura

Vice-Chancellor and President

Loughborough University

Professor Nick Jennings CB FREng FRS

Vice-Chancellor and President

Loughborough University

Professor Jennings is Vice-Chancellor and President of Loughborough University. Previously, Professor Jennings was the Vice-Provost for Research and Enterprise at Imperial College London, the UK Government’s first Chief Scientific Advisor for National Security, and Regius Professor of Computer Science at the University of Southampton.

Professor Nick Jennings is an internationally-recognised authority in the areas of AI, autonomous systems, cyber-security and agent-based computing. He is a member of the UK government’s AI Council, the governing body of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council and chair of the Royal Academy of Engineering’s Policy Committee. Before Imperial, Nick was the UK’s first Regius Professor of Computer Science (a post bestowed by the monarch to recognise exceptionally high quality research) and the UK Government’s first Chief Scientific Advisor for National Security.

Nick’s personal research focuses on developing AI systems for large-scale, open and dynamic environments. In particular, he is interested in  how to endow individual autonomous agents with the ability to act and interact in flexible ways and with effectively engineering systems that contain both humans and software agents.  He is passionate about the real-world impact of research and has been involved with deployments of systems in domains such as business process management, smart energy systems, defence, telecommunications, sensor networks, disaster response and citizen science. He is  also involved with a number of start-ups including Aerogility, Crossword Cybersecurity,  Contact Engine, Darktrace, Rebellion Defence and Reliance Cyber Systems. In undertaking this research, he has attracted grant income of £33M, published 680 articles (with over 400 co-authors) and graduated over 50 PhD students (including two winners and one runner-up of the BCS/CPHC Distinguished Dissertation Award). With 87,000 citations, he is one of the world’s most cited computer scientists. He was the founding Editor-in-Chief of the International Journal of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems and a founding director of the International Foundation for Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems.

Nick was made a Companion of the Order of the Bath (CB) in the Queen’s New Year Honours List in 2016 for his services to computer science and national security science. He has received a number of prestigious awards for his research including the Computers and Thought Award, the ACM Autonomous Agents Research Award, and the Lovelace Medal.

He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering, the Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers, the British Computer Society, the Institution of Engineering and Technology, the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence (AAAI), the Society for the Study of Artificial Intelligence and Simulation of Behaviour (AISB), the Royal Society of the Arts, the City and Guilds of London Institute, the German AI Institute (DFKI) and the European Artificial Intelligence Association and a member of Academia Europaea.

Sessions

UK Industrial Strategy Zone: Digital & Technologies (AI)
Tuesday 9 June, 12:00 – 12:45, Wellcome Trust Lecture Hall
Midlands Innovation & Investment Reception
Tuesday 9 June, 18:00 – 20:00, Kohn Centre, Marble Hall

Global Director of Innovation

Magnopus

Professor of Earth Sciences & Associate Head

University of Oxford

Chief Executive Officer

Technology Scotland

Vice-Chancellor and Principal

University of Birmingham

Strategic Lead for Birmingham Knowledge Quarter

West Midlands Combined Authority

Chief Scientific Adviser

Scottish Government

Chief Executive Officer

Creative UK

CEO

Royal Academy of Engineering

Chief Scientific Adviser

Office for Science and Technology, Northern Ireland

Pro Vice-Chancellor Research

Ulster University

Vice-Chancellor and President

University of Warwick

Professor Stuart Croft

Vice-Chancellor and President

University of Warwick

Professor Stuart Croft has been the Vice-Chancellor and President of the University of Warwick since 2016, following his tenure as the University’s Provost. Under his leadership, Warwick has seen significant growth, with both the University’s overall income and research income doubling. Remarkably, a third of all Warwick graduates in the University’s history have completed their studies during his tenure.

A leading member of the prestigious Russell Group, Warwick now ranks sixth among these institutions in UK league tables. Its graduates continue to command the highest salaries of any UK university outside London and the South East. In 2022, Warwick won the Times University of the Year for Teaching Quality Award and was subsequently shortlisted for both the Times and the Daily Mail University of the Year Awards in 2024. The University was named University of the Year for Student Social Mobility 2025, ranked the Number 1 University in the West Midlands in the Complete University Guide 2026, and awarded The Times and Sunday Times Midlands University of the Year 2026. These 2026 honours were achieved during Warwick’s landmark 60th anniversary year. Warwick was also highly commended as Russell Group University of the Year 2026.

In addition, Warwick was awarded the prestigious Institution of the Year Award at the UKCISA #WeAreInternational Awards 2025, selected from an exceptionally competitive pool of more than 420 nominations from 120 institutions.

With four subjects ranked in the global top 25 by QS, Warwick earned the highest UK rating—the coveted ‘triple gold’—in the 2023 Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF), one of only four Russell Group universities to achieve this distinction.

Professor Croft’s academic work is in the field of international security.

Sessions

University Capital Investment Showcase: Midlands
Tuesday 9 June, 15:00 – 16:45, Fellows Dining Room

Chief Executive Officer

Health Innovation Research Alliance NI (HIRANI)

Investment Director

Future Planet Capital

House of Lords

Co-Executive Director

Venture Cafe Global Institute

Head of UK

Venture Cafe UK

Chief Executive Officer and Vice Chancello

Universities UK

Director of Defence and Security

Cranfield University

Co-Founder and CEO

Hacktron AI

Co-Founder, Non-Exec. Director and Government Advisor on AI

Linchen AI

Product Manager

ARIA (Advanced Research + Invention Agency)

Senior Investment Manager and sector lead for Defence and Advanced Manufacturing

British Business Bank

Managing Partner – EMEA

Plug and Play

Director of the Ulster Screen Academy

Ulster University

Innovation Commissioner

Innovation City Belfast

Interim Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research and Enterprise

University of Leicester

Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer

Space Forge

Head of Technology Adoption

Digital Catapult

Chief Scientific Adviser for Wales

UK Government

Chief Executive Officer

Infinity Technology Group Ltd

Professor of Sustainable Energy Systems

University of Leeds

General Partner

Lakestar

Chief Executive and Vice-Chancellor

Cranfield University

Professor Dame Karen Holford DBE FREng FIMechE FLSW FWES

Chief Executive and Vice-Chancellor

Cranfield University

Professor Dame Karen Holford is Chief Executive and Vice-Chancellor at Cranfield University and is married with two adult children.

Karen’s engineering career spans industry and academia; starting as an undergraduate engineering at Rolls-Royce (Aero), gaining a BEng (Hons) at Cardiff University, followed by a PhD, sponsored by the HSE. She then took a role as graduate engineer at AB Electronic Products Ltd., culminating in a position as senior engineer with technical responsibility for all projects and leadership of a large mechanical design team. At Rolls-Royce she contributed to a range of technical projects including development of Adour and Pegasus engines in collaboration with engineers from Europe and the United States and spent an interesting period in engine strip and rebuild during the Falklands war. At AB Electronic Products she was responsible for management of technical projects including the design and development of a significant new product (a thin film pressure sensor for BMW ABS systems) as well as developing automotive electronic products for Jaguar and Rover.

She returned to Cardiff University in 1990, pursuing an academic career where she engaged in research with industrial impact and research-led learning and teaching together with a significant administrative and leadership profile. Her primary research theme, damage assessment using acoustic emission, was pursued in collaboration with colleagues in the structural performance laboratory and applied across a range of industrial applications including bridges and aerospace landing gear. Her enthusiasm for user-inspired research led her to engage with industry at every level, from leading global engineering organisations through to local SMEs. Her passion for motorsport led her to form the successful Cardiff Racing Formula student team. She became Head of the School of Engineering in 2010, led the College of Physical Sciences and Engineering as the founding Pro Vice-Chancellor 2012 -2017, and served as DVC from 2017 to 2021

DESNZ Chief Scientific Adviser

UK Government

Chief Technology Officer

Warwick Manufacturing Group (WMG)

Managing Partner

Clean Growth Fund

DHSC Chief Scientific Adviser

UK Government

Head of Research and Development (Platform Technologies )

University College London

Executive Chair

EPSRC

Professor Charlotte Deane MBE

Executive Chair

EPSRC

Charlotte Deane MBE is a Professor in the Department of Statistics at the University of Oxford, Executive Chair of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) and Co-Founder of Dalton Tx. She is the Senior Responsible Owner (SRO) for the UKRI Programmes in National Security and Defence, AI, Quantum, Advanced Connectivity Technologies, Cyber and Semiconductors.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, she served on SAGE, the UK Government’s Scientific Advisory Group for Emergencies, and acted as UK Research and Innovation’s COVID-19 Response Director.

In 2025, Charlotte was elected as a Fellow of the International Society for Computational Biology (ISCB).

At Oxford, Charlotte leads the Oxford Protein Informatics Group (OPIG), who work on diverse problems across immunoinformatics, protein structure and small molecule drug discovery; using statistics, AI and computation to generate biological and medical insight.

Charlotte’s research focuses on the development of novel algorithms, tools and databases which are openly available to the community. They are widely used in both academia and industry and embedded in pharmaceutical drug discovery pipelines. She is a member of several advisory boards and has consulted extensively with industry, having also established a consulting arm within her research group as a way of promoting industrial interaction and use of the group’s software tools.

Charlotte is part of the team leading OpenBind, a £8 million government-backed consortium aiming to create the world’s largest open dataset of drug-protein interactions to accelerate AI-driven drug discovery. She also serves as one of five experts advising the UK Government’s new AI for Science strategy, which aims to boost AI adoption across research and accelerate scientific discovery.

Sessions

UK Industrial Strategy Zone: Digital & Technologies (Quantum)
Tuesday 9 June, 14:00 – 14:45, Wellcome Trust Lecture Hall

Enterprise & Knowledge Exchange, University of Southampton and

University of Southampton (SETsquared)

Founding Chief Executive Officer

Kromek

Dr Arnab Basu MBE DL

Founding Chief Executive Officer

Kromek

Arnab Basu is a business leader, scientist, and non-executive director, best known as the

founding CEO of Kromek Group plc, a UK-based, AIM-listed technology company with global

operations in radiation and biological pathogen detection. Over a career spanning more than 20

years, Arnab has earned a formidable reputation for leading innovation-driven enterprises from

concept to global scale, while influencing economic and innovation policy at national and

regional levels.

Since founding Kromek in 2003 as a university spin-out, Arnab has transformed it into a global

enterprise with over 150 employees across the UK and US. Under his leadership, the company

has developed a world-class portfolio of patented technologies, serving customers in more

than 50 countries. He led the company’s IPO on the London Stock Exchange in 2013, raising

over £100 million to date for growth, R&D, and strategic expansion.

Arnab has successfully executed key acquisitions—including NOVA R&D Inc. (California) and eV

Products (Pennsylvania)—and secured many major strategic licensing and partnership deals.

He has built enduring relationships with Tier 1 global medical and security OEMs and secured

many high-value, multi-year contracts with the US Department of Defense (DARPA, DTRA), UK

Ministry of Defence, and UK Home Office, cementing Kromek’s role in national security,

defence, and medical imaging.

A passionate advocate for industrial innovation, Arnab has held senior non-executive and

advisory roles with organisations such as Innovate UK and Russell Group Universities, Health

Innovation North East and North Cumbria , North East Local Enterprise Partnership and

Business Durham. He currently chairs the County Durham Culture Trust and serves on both the

North East Investment Zone Advisory Board and Russell Group Industrial Strategy Expert panel.

Arnab is the High Sheriff Durham and in recognition of his contributions, Arnab was appointed

MBE in 2014 and Deputy Lieutenant of County Durham in 2020. He is a dedicated member of

the local community, previously chair of the Durham City Cricket Club, one of the largest

community cricket clubs in the region and was appointed as a Patron for St Margaret’s, a mental

health Charity in Durham, along with ambassador for the Advanced Manufacturing Forum.

A physicist by training with a PhD from Durham University, Arnab is a Fellow of the Institute of

Directors, the Royal Society of Arts, and an Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Physics. He was

awarded an Honorary Doctor of Science by Northumbria University in 2016. He is also a regular

media commentator on international trade, innovation, and technology policy.

Sessions

UK Industrial Strategy Zone: Defence
Monday 8 June, 13:30 – 15:00, Wellcome Trust Lecture Hall

Chief Executive Officer

The University of Manchester Innovation Factory

Research Staff Member

IBM Quantum

Fractional CMO / CCO

Delta.g

Chief Executive Officer

PrecisioHealth Technologies Accelerator (PHTA Ltd)

Senior Partner, Head of UK, and Science Partner, Pioneering Intelligence

Flagship Pioneering

Junaid Bajwa

Senior Partner, Head of UK, and Science Partner, Pioneering Intelligence

Flagship Pioneering

Junaid Bajwa is Senior Partner, Head of UK, and Science Partner, Pioneering Intelligence.

Junaid brings over two decades of experience across primary care, secondary care, and public health settings. He has also worked as a payer and policy maker in the UK, specializing in informatics, digital transformation, and leadership. He joins Flagship from Microsoft Research where he served as Chief Medical Scientist focusing on how trusted, reliable, and human-centered AI can transform the practice of medicine. In this role, he led a number of strategic partnerships with leading health and life sciences organizations and spearheaded Responsible AI initiatives in the sector. He was previously the Global Lead for Strategic Alliances and Solutions for the Global Digital Centre of Excellence at Merck Sharp & Dohme where he led a range of strategic initiatives to improve patient care including the establishment of internal partnerships across the enterprise and external partnerships across the health care ecosystem. Junaid cofounded VelocityHealth, Europe’s first prevention-focused digital-health accelerator, in partnership with Telefonica, and has consulted for health care systems across the US, Australia, New Zealand, Singapore, the Middle East, and Europe.

Junaid serves on the boards of University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency, and HDR UK, a national institute for health data science. He is also a Clinical Associate Professor at University College London and a Visiting Scientist at both the Harvard School of Public Health and NTU Singapore.

A practicing physician, Junaid is triple board certified in internal medicine, surgery, and primary care, and gained his medical degree from King’s College London. He received his MBA at the Imperial College Business School in London.

Sessions

UK Industrial Strategy Zone: Life Sciences
Tuesday 9 June, 08:30 – 09:45, Wellcome Trust Lecture Hall

Director General, Growth and Productivity & Chief Scientific Advisor for HM Treasury

UK Government

Arup UK Science Architecture Leader

Arup

Professor of 3D vision and co-founder of Synthesia Technologies

University College London

Managing Partner – UK&I, Nordics

Plug and Play

Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Nourished

Chief Executive Officer

University of Nottingham Innovation Park

Corporate Partner, Head of Digital & Technology

VWV

Director of Economy and Innovation

North East Combined Authority

Director Portfolio Leader, Cities Planning Design UKIMEA, Arup

Arup

Director

MetroDynamics

Legal Director

Osbourne Clarke

Chief Executive Officer

The Academy of Medical Sciences

Chief Executive Officer

Responsible AI UK

Defra Chief Scientific Adviser and Director General for Science, Data and Analysis

UK Government

Professor Anjali Goswami

Defra Chief Scientific Adviser and Director General for Science, Data and Analysis

UK Government

Professor Anjali Goswami was appointed Chief Scientific Adviser and Director General Science, Data and Analysis at the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs on 1 July 2025.

Anjali is a research leader in evolutionary biology and former Dean of Postgraduate Education at the Natural History Museum, London, an Honorary Professor in the Department of Genetics, Evolution and Environment at University College London, and Past President of the Linnean Society of London.

She received her B.Sc. from the University of Michigan in 1998 and her PhD from the University of Chicago 2005, followed by a US National Science Foundation fellowship held at the Natural History Museum and a JRF at King’s College and lectureship in Earth Sciences at the University of Cambridge. Her expertise is in vertebrate evolution and development, particularly in the emerging area of evolutionary phenomics. She and her group develop and apply new approaches to capturing the complex three-dimensional shapes of organisms in order to reconstruct the evolution of biodiversity. Her work spans insects to dinosaurs, but her main interest is in the evolution of mammals. To fill key gaps in the palaeontological record, she has searched for fossils from Svalbard to Madagascar, with her primary fieldwork being based in South India.

She is the recipient of the Linnean Society Bicentenary Medal, the Zoological Society of London Scientific Medal, the Hind Rattan Award, the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology Robert L. Carroll award, the Palaeontological Association President’s Medal, and the Humanists UK Darwin Day Medal. She was elected to the fellowship of the Royal Society of London in 2024