EVNT_4_SPKRS

Aban Haq

Head of Innovation Fund - Karandaaz

Adeel Shaffi

Co-Founder PriceOye

Adeel is the Co-Founder of PriceOye, a shopping intelligence company that facilitates consumers in 2nd and 3rd Tier cities shop online. Forbes Magazine listed him as a 30 under 30 member in March 2018.

Co-Founder PriceOye

Adnan Shahid

Digital Transformation and Technology Executive

Adnan is a former corporate C-level executive, entrepreneur and now Chief Commercial Officer of the biggest telecommunications company of Pakistan.

Digital Transformation and Technology Executive

Affan Dar

Engineering leader in the Azure IoT (Internet of Things) Platform

Affan is an engineering leader in the Azure IoT (Internet of Things) Platform group responsible for building and running multiple high scale Azure services related to IoT. A few of the products that his team has built include: Azure IoT Hub Azure IoT Edge Azure IoT SDKs Prior to his foray in IoT, his professional experience has been around building and managing teams that build middleware, cloud platforms, high scale messaging services and tackling complex distributed systems challenges.

Engineering leader in the Azure IoT (Internet of Things) Platform

Ahmed Hassan (Simaar)

Senior UX/UI Designer

Ahmed was introduced to the transformative world of design 8 years ago. Since then, he has worked in Brand, Interface and Experience design at Eikon7, KeepTruckin and now IDEATE. He feels that this is the right time to share whatever little he knows about the field with the community around him.

Senior UX/UI Designer

Ahmed Waleed

Front End Engineer, eMumba

Currently working with various teams to improve architecture and design, Ahmed Waleed loves to work on scalability and re-usability aspects of complex applications. He is very interested in exploring the upcoming web technologies and the possibilities they are going to unfold. He can be found contemplating about the future of tech atop Margallah hills on week-ends!

Front End Engineer, eMumba

Ali Sufyan

Professional for Visual Studio and Development Technologies

Ali Sufyan have done BSCS (Hons) from University of Lahore, and also done ADSE from APTECH worldwide. He has 10+ years of extensive market experience on Microsoft technologies.

Professional for Visual Studio and Development Technologies

Ali Zaidi

Federal Minister Maritime Affairs

Ali Zaidi is one of the famous and leading Pakistani Politician who is the current Federal Minister for Maritime Affairs, in office since 11 September 2018. He has been a member of the National Assembly of Pakistan since August 2018. His professional career includes being a successful entrepreneur and small business owner with vast experience of operating businesses in various sectors.Mr. Zaidi was Founding President of the Imran Khan Foundation US, an IRS tax-exempt 501 C-3 charity organization based in the US. He is currently a member of PTI’s Core Committee. Besides being a member of the Core Committee, also currently on the list of official Spokespersons of PTI.Furthermore, he served as International Coordinator from 2004 until 2008 and organized PTI chapters around the globe

Federal Minister Maritime Affairs

Alyzeh Rizvi

Designer-in-Residence, IDEATE Innovation

Alyzeh Rizvi is a designer based in Providence, US. With an undergraduate degree in architecture and a keen interest in building human-centered products and experiences, she is currently pursuing her graduate degree in Industrial Design at the prestigious Rhode Island School of Design. Alyzeh spent the last couple of years at Architizer, a tech start-up in New York City building tools to revolutionize architecture. This summer, she has traveled to Pakistan on a Graduate Commons Grant awarded by RISD to explore ‘How Sacrificial Rituals are Woven into the Fabric of Pakistani Manufacturing Processes’. She is currently working as a Lead Researcher at IDEATE in Islamabad on ‘Improving Financial Inclusion for Women in Pakistan’.

Designer-in-Residence, IDEATE Innovation

Ambreen Malik

Chief Innovation & Financial Inclusion Officer at U Microfinance Bank Limited

Ambreen Malik runs Blue Saint, a social enterprise aiming to preserve, reimagine & modernize Pakistan's unique handmade crafts & bring them to contemporary homes. An ex-banker and expat Pakistani who writes a famous food blog as well, Ambreen will share the story of Blue Saint.

Chief Innovation & Financial Inclusion Officer at U Microfinance Bank Limited

Amena Shakil

Head of Digital Telco Solutions at Telenor

Amena is an accomplished professional with most of her career in the telco industry. She is the pivot behind Telenor's innovation drive on the network side for Digital Telco Solutions based on community based as well as self built solutions. She has 14 years of working experience in a variety of domains both in IT and networks, leading many digital transformation projects and strategic initiatives. She has Established end to end core network and IT solutions through opensource and inhouse developed modules of both IT and core networks which are vendor agnostics.

Head of Digital Telco Solutions at Telenor

Amer Ather

Senior Cloud Performance Architect at Netflix Performance Engineering Team.

The Netflix performance Engineering Team helps build services that are resilient to hardware and software failures. Our team collaborates with service teams in architecture review, improvement plans and its impact on Netflix ecosystem. We partner with AWS in developing a roadmap for future products and services. Netflix emphasizes on building self-service tools with a goal of accelerating developer productivity and innovation velocity. We build profiling and tracing frameworks and tools for Netflix service teams that allow full software stack analysis. Netflix performance team open source projects: Vector, FlameGraph, FlameScope, AutoBench, Abyss

Senior Cloud Performance Architect at Netflix Performance Engineering Team.

Ammar Mumtaz

OWNER at BURNING BROWNIE

Calling himself a chocoholic, Ammar's quest to make the perfect batch of brownies resulted in him transforming a small rack at local gas stations to the Islamabad famous "Burning Brownies" bakery.

OWNER at BURNING BROWNIE

Aneeqa Ishaq

Practitioner and Teacher of Design Thinking and User Experience

Aneeqa is a practitioner and teacher of Design Thinking and User Experience. She helps business redesign and digitize their services, products and experiences which wow their customers. Since graduating from Stanford University five years ago, Aneeqa has exposed 1,000+ professionals to Design Thinking, led design-focused change movement at the leading Telco, Telenor, and designed well-praised products, solutions and programs for companies, clients and collaborators.

Practitioner and Teacher of Design Thinking and User Experience

Asad J. Malik

Mixed Reality Designer & Artist

Asad J Malik was born on January 11, 1996 in Abbottabad, North West Frontier Province, Pakistan. He is a director and producer, known for Terminal 3 (2018).

Mixed Reality Designer & Artist

Asad Umar

Senior Leader and Policy Head at Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf

Asad Umar is a Pakistani lawmaker and former CEO of Engro Corporation, which he turned into a world-renowned business group, he will share his experiences at Engro and also why Islamabad is a great place for entrepreneurs to be in!

Senior Leader and Policy Head at Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf

Ashar Aziz

CEO | Founding CEO of SkyElectric

"Ashar Aziz is the Founder, Executive Chairman of SkyElectric Inc. He is also the creator of the core energy intelligence and management technologies embedded in the SkyElectric Smart Energy System. In 2018, Mr. Aziz received the most prestigious National award, Sitara-e-Imtiaz for his services in IT Industry. Previously, Ashar founded FireEye, Inc., (NASDAQ:FEYE), a global cyber-security company, in 2004. He served as the CEO of FireEye from 2004 until November 2012 and also served as its Board Vice Chairman, CFO and CTO. Prior to FireEye, Ashar founded Terraspring, Inc., which was acquired by Sun Microsystems, Inc., in November 2002. Following the acquisition, he and served as Chief Technology Officer of the Sun N1 program until October 2003. Ashar graduated from MIT with a BS in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. Mr. Aziz later received the University of California Regents fellowship at the University of California at Berkeley where he completed his MS in Electrical Engineering Computer Science."

CEO | Founding CEO of SkyElectric

Asma Khalil

Country Director Careem

Asma Khalil is one of the few leaders in the country having the experience of working in several key industries of the digital ecosystem. Asma currently a country Director at Careem, is the former COO of Daraz, a start up mentor at the NIC, an e-commerce consultant, and has held several key roles in big corporations like Telenor, Jazz and Nestle. Asma has also worked as an advisor to the government and the ministry of IT and Telecom in shaping up the e-commerce and digital policy for Pakistan. Developing the first mobile banking (easypaisa) strategy, running the first Telco/e-commerce partnership, leading the countrys first Daraz Black Friday and driving the first digital Pakistan website are a few of the many achievements that Asma has to her credit. We are glad to have her as part of our panel to share key insights on the challenges of digital ecosystem expansion in Pakistan and how well the government is supporting this mission.

Country Director Careem

Ather Imran

Chief Executive Officer, Sybrid (Pvt) Limited

Ather Imran currently serves as Chief Executive Officer and Director on Board of Sybrid Private Limited, a company of the prestigious Lakson Group of Pakistan, and as President of OPEN Islamabad. Sybrid is a Business Process Outsourcing company that provides customer support and managed services to clients in Pakistan, UAE and United States. With offices in Karachi, Islamabad and Sharjah (UAE)

Chief Executive Officer, Sybrid (Pvt) Limited

Atif Rais Khan

Co-Founder & Chairman LMKR/LMKT

"Atif Rais Khan is Cofounder and Chairman of LMKR and LMKT; two distinct technology companies. An experienced CEO, Board Member, and entrepreneur with over 30 years of international business experience with private as well as government entities. Atif is also the majority shareholder and Chairman of StarTimes Communications Private Limited, a subsidiary of StarTimes Communications China - global provider of direct-to-home (DTH) broadcasting which was recently awarded a DTH license by PEMRA."

Co-Founder & Chairman LMKR/LMKT

Awais Naseer

Founder and CEO of Softoven (Pvt.) Ltd.

Awais Naseer who is a Lean evangelist and practitioner for past several years. Awais has helped several local and international startups build dozens of products on lean principles. He is the founder and CEO of Softoven (Pvt.) Ltd., a lean product development agency based out of Islamabad with clients across the world.

Founder and CEO of Softoven (Pvt.) Ltd.

Ayesha Hamid

Chairperson/CEO at George Washington American School of International Academics

With a focus to promote education and entrepreneurship in Pakistan, Ayesha is CEO of a major school brand in Pakistan and has been one of the best success stories of women entrepreneurs in Pakistan. She has been an inspiration for many social initiatives and also a founding and board member for OPEN Lahore. Ayesha will be part of one our panel discussions on “Women in Entrepreneurship”.

Chairperson/CEO at George Washington American School of International Academics

Ayesha Iqbal

Private Equity Investment Professional, Investor, and Entrepreneur

A senior private equity investment professional with extensive deal experience across emerging markets.

Private Equity Investment Professional, Investor, and Entrepreneur

Badar Khushnood

VP of Growth @ Fishry.com Ecommerce | Cofounder @ Bramerz.com

Badar is Cofounder and VP of Growth at Bramerz, a leading full-service mobile-first creative agency in Pakistan. Badar primarily focuses on Growth Hacking two of Bramerz product ventures, Fishry.com (ecommerce + performance marketing) & Publishrr.com (content publishing + monetization). Before joining back Bramerz, Badar did small stint with Facebook as 'Product Growth Manager for Pakistan' where he helped add context and narrative to unique local insights buried deep inside big data analytics. Prior to that, Badar worked as Twitter and Google's Country Consultant for Pakistan for over a decade. He acted as a one-man-army-on-the-ground for Google & Twitter liaising closely between internal teams and all-things Pakistan! He has also worked for ASUSTeK, SMEDA & Nishat Textiles. Badar is also a founding board member and an active mentor at several tech incubators & accelerators including Plan9, NIC Lahore, The Nest I/O, etc.. Badar was Vice Chairman at Pakistan Software Houses Association (P@SHA) from 2017~19 and has been judging at Asia Pacific ICT Alliance (APICTA) Awards for the last few years. Badar brings along more than 20 years of rich and diverse experience. In his previous lives, Badar secured his Masters in Economics & Management from the Lahore School of Economics (LSE).

VP of Growth @ Fishry.com Ecommerce | Cofounder @ Bramerz.com

Bilal Awan

Entrepreneur

An Engineer by qualification, Bilal is unique and an exemplary entrepreneur, building startups that range from waste management to restaurants.

Entrepreneur

Dilawar Syed

CEO at Lumiata

Dilawar is the president of FreshDesk North America. Prior to Freshdesk, he was CEO at Yonja Media Group, a social media company. He previously ran platform strategy and operations at Yahoo! and also worked for Siebel Systems and SAP in the past. Dilawar also served on President Obama’s Advisory Commission on Asian Americans & Pacific Islanders. He holds an M.B.A. from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. from UT Austin.

CEO at Lumiata

Dr Ali Tahir

Assistant professor NUST

Dr. Ali Tahir received his B.Sc. (Hons.) degree in Computing and Information Systems in 2004 from Oxford Brookes University and subsequently a Masters degree in Geographical Information Science (GIS) from University of Nottingham in 2006. He completed his PhD in Geoinformatics from the School of Computer Science and Informatics at University College Dublin, Ireland. Recently, he has completed his post-doctorate at the Geo-Environmental Research Centre, School of Engineering, Cardiff University.

Assistant professor NUST

Dr Raja Iqbal

Chief Data Scientist

Experienced data scientist and entrepreneur. Founder of Data Science Dojo, a global leader in data science training and consulting. Data Science Dojo has trained over 3000 aspiring data science and machine learning professionals from 500+ companies in 10 countries.

Chief Data Scientist

Dr Yasmeen Mehmooda

Consultant at Medicsi

"Dr Yasmeen is one of the best and most experienced and respected gynecologists in Pakistan, having served as Head of Department in Shifa Hospital and currently managing the famous Medicsi hospital. She is also a Director on the board of Air Blue airlines. "

Consultant at Medicsi

Dr. Affan Syed

Director Engineering at AN10

With a doctorate from University of Southern California in Computer Science, Affan is a professor and a researcher par excellence. He has won many accolades for his research brilliance and achieved many “first-times” for Pakistan. Affan will share his story and why a researcher is really an entrepreneur at heart.

Director Engineering at AN10

Dr. Andrew Scheuermann

An Entrepreneur/ Founder of Arch

Andrew did his Ph.D. from Stanford University, and has been deeply involved in entrepreneurship education. He was one of the early team members that built StartX, one of the top startup accelerators in the world. Andrew is skilled in venture fundraising and is one of the ‘fundraising architects’ in the StartX community to help other founders who have collectively raised over $2B dollars. He also helped start the Stanford Entrepreneurship Network, Stanford startup weekend, and the Accel Innovations Scholars program.

An Entrepreneur/ Founder of Arch

Dr. Arshad Ali

Chairman, OPEN Islamabad

"Dr. Arshad Ali is currently the Executive Director at the HEC. He has over 100 nationally and internationally acclaimed publications to his name. He has also been awarded numerous medals for being a distinguished scientist and researcher. He is actively working on various research projects with Stanford USA, Caltech USA, UWE UK, and University of South Brittany France. He has served as member of the International Advisory Board of the “International ICFA Workshop on HEP Networking, Grids, and Digital Divide Issues for Global e-Science”."

Chairman, OPEN Islamabad

Dr. Bebo White

Departmental Associate at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory

Dr. Bebo White is a Departmental Associate (Emeritus) at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, operated by Stanford University. Professor White has lectured and spoken internationally to academic and commercial audiences. He is the author of eight books and over one hundred journal/proceedings articles. His current research interests are Web Science, Social Media in Education, and Cloud Computing.

Departmental Associate at the SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory

Dr. Faisal Khan

Cofounder and CEO Peshawar 2.0

With a PhD from Oxford in Biology, Faisal is a true entrepreneur at heart. He has delved into many entrepreneurial ventures over the last decade and is the co-founder of Peshawar 2.0, a social enterprise striving to build a startup community in Peshawar.

Cofounder and CEO Peshawar 2.0

Dr. Farrukh Hassan

CEO at The First Biotechnology Company

Dr. Farrukh Hassan is PhD in Biotechnology & Genetic Engineering. She has an experience of 14 years in R&D of bacterial based bio fertilizers and 5 years teaching at university level and has 5 International Publications to her credit. She setup first Bio- Technology company in the country. She is pioneer in manufacturing and commercialization of bio fertilizers and bio based fertilizers in Pakistan. She got best Upcoming Women entrepreneur Award WiBCON 2010 and Best Women Entrepreneur Award in Science and Technology USAID 2014.

CEO at The First Biotechnology Company

Dr. Rafae Bhatti

Director of Security and Compliance at Mode Analytics

Dr. Rafae Bhatti is an information security expert and a lawyer who works with cloud-based start-ups in Silicon Valley to help build their cybersecurity and regulatory compliance programs. He has worked in technical roles at IBM Research and Oracle, and in advisory roles at Accenture Technology Labs and PwC. He is currently the Director of Security and Compliance at Mode Analytics. He received a Ph.D. in Computer Engineering from Purdue University and also serves as an Adjunct Professor of Computer Engineering at Santa Clara University.

Director of Security and Compliance at Mode Analytics

Dr. Syed Ismail Shah

International Telecommunication Union\\\'s (ITU) Representative for Southeast Asia and Timor-Leste

Dr Syed Ismail Shah, a prolific researcher and the force behind Pakistan’s foray into 3G and 4G space, currently serves as Chairman PTA, Acting CEO ICT&RD and also a Charter Member of OPEN Islamabad.

International Telecommunication Union\\\'s (ITU) Representative for Southeast Asia and Timor-Leste

Dr. Terence Jackson

CEO and Managing Partner of Jackson Consulting Group

Dr. Terence Jackson is CEO and Managing Partner of Jackson Consulting Group, which partners with organizations to align strategy, people, and processes to optimize and sustain peak business performance. He has also worked on developing integrated marketing campaigns for Fortune 500 organizations while working as a director of sales for a multi-million dollar advertising firm. He holds a Ph.D. in Applied Management, Leadership and Organizational Change from Walden University in Minneapolis.

CEO and Managing Partner of Jackson Consulting Group

Dr. Vaqar Ahmed

Joint Executive Director - SDPI

Dr. Vaqar Ahmed is the Joint Executive Director at Sustainable Development Policy Institute (SDPI). Earlier, he has served UNDP as Advisor, and has undertaken assignments with Asian Development Bank, World Bank, and Ministries of Finance, Planning and Commerce in Pakistan. He has published extensively in areas such as macroeconomic modeling, inclusive growth and infrastructure reforms, trade and taxation policies, regional trade agreements, trade in services, energy governance, border-related trade infrastructure, youth employment, women-led social enterprises, and social safety nets.

Joint Executive Director - SDPI

Ehtisham Rao

Founder at Servup. Design Thinker, Telecom Veteran

Ehtisham is Director B2B Marketing at Mobilink and organizational transformation is his passion. He'll talk about Mobilink's initiatives of revamping it's B2B portfolio

Founder at Servup. Design Thinker, Telecom Veteran

Evelyn A. Ashley

Managing Partner, Trusted Counsel (Ashley) LLC

Evelyn advises clients on matters such as mergers and acquisitions, joint ventures, financing and investments, corporate governance, intellectual property strategy, as well as protection, monetization and licensing; commercial agreements and ventures, including manufacturing, distribution, and agency; entity structure and related issues, corporate spin-outs, and international transactions. She has wide ranging experience and brings a refreshing, results focused, pragmatic approach to the practice of law.

Managing Partner, Trusted Counsel (Ashley) LLC

Fahad Tiwana

Founder, Wonderful Engineering | CEO, TechValley

Fahad Tiwana, CEO TechValley, runs a hardware & software consultancy firm, a non-profit organization Tiwana Foundation, and different blogging websites. The most popular one among these sites is, as he calls it, an engineering e-magazine WonderfulEngineering.com which gained 5.5 million readers in a short period of 18 months. This, however, is not his first venture. He started his entrepreneurial journey at age 18 and has so far, created and sold two of his business ventures. US Intermedia Group bought his website – RealityPod for $110,000 when he was a Civil Engineering student at NUST.

Founder, Wonderful Engineering | CEO, TechValley

Faisal Aftab

Lakson Investments Venture Capital Fund

"Faisal is Managing Partner of Lakson Investments Venture Capital (LIVC). He has over 18 years of experience as an executive, investor and entrepreneur in media-tech, real estate, venture capital, financial services and management consulting. He has been employed by, or acted as an advisor to several public and private sector corporations as well as the Government of Pakistan. Prior to leading LIVC, Faisal was an Executive Vice President in New York at CloudStream Media Inc., an Intel Capital backed Over The Top (OTT) content streaming service and technology provider."

Lakson Investments Venture Capital Fund

Farrukh Malik

President OPEN Islamabad

Started the education journey from his hometown and with the glancing period he ended up doing MS in Computer Sciences from NUST in 2005. Succeeding graduation somehow, initiated a couple of business partnering with his comrades. Now! Those first steps handsomely molded & grown up Discretelogix - a leading IT company embracing a team of 70+ members, MONT5 – a leather brand having its own manufacturing facility in Sialkot, Pakistan, IconBunny - Largest single source library with each icon designed into fourteen styles, and now expanding the horizons to agriculture and farming. Farrukh is a serial entrepreneur, who loves challenges, believes in teamwork, strives for innovation, prefers smart work and values sincerity. Farrukh is actively involved in the entrepreneurial culture development of Pakistan and serves as a mentor, speaker and judge at different business plan competitions and startup incubators across the country. He is President of OPEN Islamabad, Chairman at Agile Development Society Pakistan, Charter Member of TiE Islamabad and among Board of Advisors of JumpStart Pakistan. All these organizations help Pakistani entrepreneurs at startup stage and then help them to accelerate the business to next level.

President OPEN Islamabad

Fatima Mazhar

Careem - Early Stage Markets - Director

Fatima Mazher have Investment Banking background with a passion for operations. According to her If the operations run smoothly, everything follows..!! She is now working as Early Stage Markets Director in Careem and before that she have worked on different posts in careem.

Careem - Early Stage Markets - Director

Franziska Scheinhardt

Senior Strategic Designer at BCG Digital Ventures

Franziska Scheinhardt is based in Berlin, Germany. As a passionate Design Thinker and Social Innovator she deeply believes in the principles of user-centered design. Franziska has worked at Education Innovation LAB, Germany, to foster innovations in the educational sector, concluding a comprehensive user research and product development project about digital learning in schools.

Senior Strategic Designer at BCG Digital Ventures

Gabriele Bartolini

Head of Global Support at 2ndQuadrant and Managing Director of the Italian office

Gabriele is the Head of Global Support at 2ndQuadrant and managing director of the Italian office as well as an active member of the international PostgreSQL community and local ITPUG. His commitment is to consistently contribute to the growth of 2ndQuadrant and it’s members through nurturing a lean and devops culture. A long time open-source programmer and entrepreneur, Gabriele has a degree in Statistics from the University of Florence.

Head of Global Support at 2ndQuadrant and Managing Director of the Italian office

Haris Zaheer Bajwa

Attorney at Law at BAJWA IP Law Firm

"Haris Z. Bajwa has spent over a decade developing and defending patents for the world’s leading innovating companies – including Google, Broadcom, NEC, Alcatel Lucent, Samsung, Mitsubishi, Toshiba, Fuji Electronics, and AOL. He has worked as a patent examiner for the US Patent & Trademark Office, as well as for some of the leading firms in this field (Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner, LLP and Sterne, Kessler, Goldstein & Fox, PLLC).

Attorney at Law at BAJWA IP Law Firm

Hira Attique

Blogger | Social Media Influencer

Hira is Social media influencer and content creator, who co-founded the beauty and fashion blog known as HerandHem. She is also widely known on her @hirableeh Instagram account for her fashion and lifestyle-related photos.

Blogger | Social Media Influencer

Hussein Kanji

Founding Partner at Hoxton Ventures LLP

Hussein Kanji is a founding partner at Hoxton Ventures LLP with focus on consumer internet, financial technology and software investments. He is a regular investor and advisor - invested in a cupcake startup (Bea’s of Bloomsbury), advised a leading Indian media/entertainment company (Eros) and has invested in at least one unicorn in the making (Deliveroo).

Founding Partner at Hoxton Ventures LLP

Ibrar Ahmed

FinTech Speaker Senior Software Engineer @ Percona

Ibrar Ahmed is a Agile Software / PostgreSQL Architect, Blockchain Crypto Currency / FinTech Speaker Senior Software Engineer @ Percona. He has 18+ years of Software development experience, ranges from architecting the software to extreme programming in C, C++, Visual C++, Java. Experience in development in Windows, Linux, Solaris, HP-UX and PowerPC.

FinTech Speaker Senior Software Engineer @ Percona

Idris Kothari

Chairman OPEN Silicon Valley

Idris is a founding member, past president, and current Chairman of the board of OPEN Silicon Valley. He has over 35 years of professional and entrepreneurial experience and is currently working as the CTO and member of the board of VSi, providing software as a service (SAS) for hospitality and medical industries. He also serves on the board of NED Alumni Association of Silicon Valley and Friends of LUMS USA.Idris has BS in Physics from SM Science College, BS in EE from NED Karachi and MS in CS from Illinois Institute of Technology, Chicago.

Chairman OPEN Silicon Valley

Iqbal Khan

President and Technology Evangelist- Alachisoft

Being a veteran entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience in the software industry, Iqbal Khan brings a lot of inside knowledge about things that OPEN promotes. He has run various software product and services businesses in the US. Currently, he runs a software company based in California and Islamabad. Iqbal has also started a non-profit in Pakistan called Sabaq Foundation that provides free video lectures to Pakistani students.

President and Technology Evangelist- Alachisoft

Irfan Wahab

Chief Marketing Officer Telenor Pakistan Ltd

Irfan Wahab Khan has been Chief Marketing Officer of Telenor Pakistan Ltd. since April 2013 and has also been its Deputy Chief Executive Officer since May 2015. Mr. Khan served as the Chief Executive Officer of Telenor LDI and Executive Vice President of Corporate Affairs at Telenor Pakistan Ltd. until April 1, 2013.

Chief Marketing Officer Telenor Pakistan Ltd

Jehad Zafar

Founder, Wide Side

Jehad is founder and content creator at The Wide Side, a YouTube channel discusses Pakistan's current affairs mainly polices, education, economy, development, social issues plus major global events. It is based on the philosophy that creating solutions and debate culture is better than creating hype and sensationalism. TWS is the answer to conventional print and electronic media. He has worked with multiple mainstream Pakistani news channels like Geo, Express, Dunya, Aplus, 24 News etc in managing their content online w.r.t distribution and copyrights and also worked as an advertiser in a couple of digital media agencies.

Founder, Wide Side

Junaid Akram

Social Media Influencer

Junaid Akram is a social media influencer and a comedian who using the tool of humor has been challenging a lot of social norms and raising cultural and social awareness. He also has a very successful podcasts with over 50 episodes with a wide variety of South Asian diaspora from around the world. Junaid is also heavily engaged in social work and has a free library project with 15 libraries in all provinces of Pakistan.

Social Media Influencer

Junaid Iqbal

Managing Director- Careem

Junaid is spearheading the latest car-riding sensation in Pakistan: Careem. An C-level executive with an entrepreneurial mindset and passion, Junaid has been a turnaround and growth specialist for startups and established organisations.

Managing Director- Careem

Junaid Kalim

Founder & CEO at Kalim Group

Junaid is Founder and CEO of kalim Group. He is voluntarily working as a Charter Member of OPEN Islamabad and TiE.

Founder & CEO at Kalim Group

Junaid Razzaq

Data Engineer

Computer Scientist and Big Data enthusiast. Junaid has a passion for Distributed Systems, Data Engineering, and DevOps. Involved with Big Data stack, engineering software solutions and developing innovative systems.

Data Engineer

Kamran Kundi

Director of Technology Affairs at Elm, KSA

Kamran Kundi is the Director of Technology Affairs at Elm, which is a leading provider of digital services for public and private sector inside the Kingdom. Elm is in the middle of their digital transformation journey to better serve their customers and meet the challenges of the digital age. Kamran and his team are helping build a Dynamic Learning Culture to lay the foundation for a High Performing Organization, which is optimized for speed without sacrificing reliability or quality. Kamran has worked in the Silicon Valley for IBM and couple of startups before he moved to KSA to join Elm.

Director of Technology Affairs at Elm, KSA

Kashan Ahmad

Project Director Safe City at NADRA

Almost 20 years of professional experience on enterprise level applications. Including web, client server, distributed & date warehousing applications. Served at Digital Processing Systems as Section Lead Extraction Transformation and Loading (ETL), for data warehousing department. Served at GeoPaq Technologies as Principal Software Engineer in Project Team Lead’s capacity. Served at Elixir Technologies as Associate Development Manager. Played a major role in re-engineering of www.ehomes.com.

Project Director Safe City at NADRA

Khurram Jamali

Team Lead of emerging South Asia performance team Google

Khurram has a decade long professional and entrepreneurial experience in financial services, consulting and technology across USA, Pakistan, China and Singapore. He presently leads the emerging South Asia performance team at Google, which works with ROI-driven clients that view online as a sales channel. This includes clients in the travel, classifieds, tech and e-commerce sectors. Khurram also has a start up that develops Urdu language learning apps for youngsters amongst the Pakistani diaspora.

Team Lead of emerging South Asia performance team Google

Kimberlee LeBlanc

Leadership Training program Coordinator USAID

Kimberlee has been part of many Education projects of USAID in Africa and Asia.

Leadership Training program Coordinator USAID

Komail Abbas Naqvi

Co-Founder and CEO, FindMyAdventure

A passionate trekker and veteran of Bara Broq, Shimshal Pass and Minglik Sar (6050m) to name but a few, be it skiing in Rattu, cycling across the Karakoram Highway, or rafting in the River Indus, Komail has been hell bent on showing the world a side of Pakistan no one has ever seen before! An Economics Major from the Batch of 2015 at the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), he’s the Co-Founder and CEO of FindMyAdventure and an Alibaba efounder fellow. He has previously worked at Standard Chartered Bank as a Fast track graduate and left his job to pursue his passion in adventure travel and tourism. He aspires to change the way tourism works in Pakistan. He has recently been nominated amongst the top 30 adventurers under 30 around the world – the first Pakistani to appear in the list.

Co-Founder and CEO, FindMyAdventure

Ludger Herget

Rental-preneur / Airbnb superhost

Ludger Herget is studying Entrepreneurship and Innovation Management at TU Berlin, is a rental-preneur from Germany. He is researching the housing market for short term accommodation in Berlin. As an Airbnb superhost, he has curated user experience for guests from all over the world. By sharing and living with more than 1000 guests in his home, Ludger has a few stories about meaningful UX from real life experience.

Rental-preneur / Airbnb superhost

Maleeka Bokhari

Parliamentary Secretary - Law & Justice

Barrister Maleeka Bokhari is currently serving as parliamentary secretary of law & justice. She has over 8 years experience of working in various legal/advisory roles in both UK and Pakistan. She also established a broad civil practice which includes advice on all corporate, regulatory, property and employment law matters. She also works as a lead transaction advisor for a number high profile clients in the oil and gas industry, public-private partnership projects, in addition she also advised and assisted in drafting legislation and legal amendments for a political party in Pakistan, which includes the Anti-Terrorism Act 1996, Islamabad Local Government Amendment Act 2013, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Ehtsesab (Accountability) Commission Act 2016 and Arbitration Amendment Act 2013. She was appointed as a member the judicial commission legal task force on 2013 general elections rigging, and a member of the joint opposition legal team on Panama Papers in Pakistan, involved in drafting the terms of reference for the proposed judicial commission on the aforesaid matter.

Parliamentary Secretary - Law & Justice

Maliha Elahi

Delivery Assurance Teradata pakistan Pvt Ltd.

Maliha has a rich career as a consultant, trainer and executive, having served as a head of Marketing and PR for Teradata Pakistan. Maliha has been an active mentor and has served as President of Islamabad Toastmasters Club.

Delivery Assurance Teradata pakistan Pvt Ltd.

Meenah Tariq

Consultant and Head of Strategy at Invest2Innovate (i2i)

Meenah Tariq’s latest position was the Head of Strategy and Accelerator at Invest2Innovate Pakistan. In her role at i2i, Meenah supported hundreds of entrepreneurs since 2015, across a wide variety of industries and geographies. She is a passionate supporter of the entrepreneurship ecosystem in Pakistan and has been designing and implementing programs to practically support women entrepreneurs, encourage entrepreneurial mindsets in young people, and equip entrepreneurs across the country with the business acumen required to scale high-impact businesses and SMEs. Beyond running the i2i Accelerator program, she conducts trainings on business creation and scale, mentors a number of startups, and teaches entrepreneurship at local business schools at the undergrad level. Meenah is also constantly experimenting with business ideas of her own - the latest is an experiential gift delivery platform operating in Islamabad and Pindi! Prior to I2I, Meenah was completing her MBA at Babson College, as a Fulbright Scholar.

Consultant and Head of Strategy at Invest2Innovate (i2i)

Mehzad Sahar

Information Security C level Executive/ Keynote Speaker

Mehzad Sahar is an Information Security C level Executive, Keynote Speaker, Visionary, an eloquent strategist with a flair for Information Security creativity, with 19+ years of experience and currently working as Head/Director Business security in Telenor Pakistan. He has effectively crafted Information Security framework and Infrastructure Design for different Information Systems, national level policy making and implementation, Security Risk Management, across different industries.

Information Security C level Executive/ Keynote Speaker

Melinda Good

Operation Manager World Bank Pakistan

Melinda Good is the Operations Manager in the World Bank Pakistan office. She oversees the World Bank’s approximately $8b investment program in Pakistan, covering human development, sustainability, infrastructure and economy and competitiveness. Melinda has worked in the World Bank’s Washington, DC and Indonesia offices. Melinda began her career as a lawyer in private practice, and worked with the Asian Development Bank and the Millennium Challenge Corporation.

Operation Manager World Bank Pakistan

Mohsin Lodhi

Enterprise Trainer and Executive Development Coach

Mohsin Lodhi is a founder, enterprise trainer & executive development coach at Mohsin Lodhi Training & Coaching Centre- a company specializing in training and coaching executives on a one-on-one basis on leadership, communication, emotional intelligence, team building and personal development skills. Mohsin has over 35 years' experience in leadership, management, consulting, sales, teaching & training experience by leading a team of 10-50 people. He has trained and coached over 14,000 executives in 7 years on a wide variety of topics. He was honored "Best Performance Teacher Award" three times at SEECS NUST-Pakistan with 97.5% feedback. He completed certifications in training from IFC World Bank (USA), Franklin Covey (USA), INSEAD Business School (France) and Stanford University (USA).

Enterprise Trainer and Executive Development Coach

Mohsin Termezy

ICT Sector Specialist at USAID Small & Medium Enterprise Activity Program

Mohsin seeks passionate talent who are out to write new stories. He is a fintech professional evangelizing and supporting organizations preparing themselves for digital transformation. Born into an expat family, his belief in entrepreneurship, diversity and inclusion helped him traverse a journey of 22 years from flight simulators to payment systems to development sector engagement. Working for global brands like Citibank, Samba Financial Group, Dhabi Holdings taught him growth but his true pride is his experience of building the first true mobile app development company of Pakistan in 2001 raising money with TMT Ventures- the first VC fund of Pakistan. He is currently building ICT sector interventions with USAID Small and Medium Enterprise Activity (SMEA) program to help IT/ITES enterprises achieve growth , enable SME digitization and access to finance. He holds a bachelors in Avionics Engineering, MBA from IBA, Karachi and diploma in Supply Chain Management

ICT Sector Specialist at USAID Small & Medium Enterprise Activity Program

Mowadat Rana

Psychiatrist/ Chairman of The Healing Triad

Dr. Mowadat Hussain Rana is a renowned psychiatrist who was awarded Sitara e Imtiaz by the Government of Pakistan for his contributions. He has authored of nine books and fifty national and international publications. His interests include psychotrauma, health professions education and psychosocial interventions in the field of mental health. He is currently the Chairman of The Healing Triad, an organization committed to mental health and education.

Psychiatrist/ Chairman of The Healing Triad

Mrs. Firoza Zaidi

Founder of EMS - Elementary Montessori System

An entrepreneur for 25 years and an educationist at heart, she is the founder of EMS - Elementary Montessori System, one of the most respected educational institutions of Islamabad.

Founder of EMS - Elementary Montessori System

Mudassar Hussain

Board Member | Member Telecom, Ignite, USF, PSEB. PTCL | MOITT

Mr. Mudassar Hussain is currently serving as a Member (Telecom) in the Ministry of Information Technology & Telecom. He sits on the board of PTCL, ,Ignite, USF and PSEB. He is an expert in Telecom Policy, Information Technology, strategy formulation and Telecommunications research. Prior to joining MoITT, working as Telecom Policy & Regulatory Consultant with Ufone and being at the MoITT as Director he served on the Boards of the National Telecommunications Corporation, the Telecom Foundation and the National Radio Telecommunications Corporation.

Board Member | Member Telecom, Ignite, USF, PSEB. PTCL | MOITT

Muhammad Ahmed Khan

Front End Engineer, eMumba

Muhammad Ahmed Khan is a JavaScript nerd and is proficient in many frameworks including React, Agular & Node. He is particularly passionate about graphics in JS and its evolving ecosystem around WebGL.

Front End Engineer, eMumba

Muhammad Haroon

PostgreSQL Consultant

Muhammad Haroon is a PostgreSQL Consultant at 2ndQuadrant. Over a decade of experience in analyzing, designing/ developing applications, deployment, testing, configuration management, research and code reviews on diversified domains, platforms and technologies he is specialized in Database management, PostgreSQL, Technology Management,Business Intelligence, ETL, Configuration Management, VOIP & IVR based applications, SMS based applications,Call Center Solutions, Middleware, Databases.

PostgreSQL Consultant

Muhammad Nasrullah

Founder and CEO at Integry

Nasrullah, popularly known as Nash, is a technologist who co-founded Pring, a social network that works on every phone in Pakistan with 5 million users. He's started and has sold several companies. Currently, he works as VP of Customer Solutions at Convo.

Founder and CEO at Integry

Muhammad Wasaaq

Technical Lead

Mr. Wasaaq is a professional software developer with 7 years of experience including 2.5 years of experience in Big data technologies. His expertise includes the development experience of Kafka/Cassandra/Postgres and various programming languages.

Technical Lead

Muniba Mazari

Social Activist

Muniba is an artist and a writer. More importantly, she is a symbol of resilience and turning her adversity into an opportunity. Met with a life threatening accident that left her paralyzed, Muniba used her exceptional artistic skills to pursue her goals and become an inspiration for so many. She will be narrating the story of Dhere Bolo which is a storytelling project that believes in the extraordinary power of our ordinary Pakistani stories.

Social Activist

Naeem Iqbal

Project & Program Management | Speaker | Trainer | Strategist | Storyteller

Naeem Iqbal has a decent 21 years of experience in IT/ Technology Management/Contract & Project Management, Planning, Implementation and Roll-out etc. He has managed cross cultural teams ranging from as low as 10 to as high as 500 members. He has spent more than 1450 hours of his life in delivering talks and training sessions. He has approx 3.9 Billion USD projects on his portfolio. Moreover, his experience includes engagements in Project management/implementation, Post Disaster Program Design, Implementation and Management, Social Safety net program management, Safety and Security projects execution (Smart City/Safe City Projects), Business Analysis, Training and Development, Coaching and Mentoring Start-ups.

Project & Program Management | Speaker | Trainer | Strategist | Storyteller

Naeem Zamindar

Ex Chairman Pakistan Board of Investment

Naeem Zamindar is CEO of Zamindar Capital and Former Minister of state and chairman of Pakistan Board of Investment. Naeem has on his credit the setting up of Pakistan fund initiative as Acumen Pakistan chief executive officer. Previously, Naeem had served as Wateen Telecom CEO; Mobilink (now Jazz) CEO, and a senior investment manager at Intel Capital in Silicon Valley, where he was involved in over 20 investments in high tech firms. He is a professional certified by the State of Washington as a CPA and has an MBA from the prestigious INSEAD Business School. His vision is to promote and enable Pakistan as an attractive investment destination.

Ex Chairman Pakistan Board of Investment

Narjis Ali

CEO and President at Sure Secure Solutions

Narjis was instrumental in helping establish OPEN’s Islamabad chapter. She has over thirty years technology and management experience and is highly skilled at Security Engineering and Security Requirements Management for large Government contracts.

CEO and President at Sure Secure Solutions

Nauman Sheikh

Founder, CEO ASRYM Inc.

Nauman Sheikh's experience in data and analytics is across 3 continents and over 2 decades and involves hands on projects from data warehouse systems to anti-money laundering, fraud detection, risk management, customer analytics and Smart Meter Analytics (IoT) solutions; all built and delivered with hands-on involvement in data architecture, ETL, NoSQL coding, statistical modeling and both predictive and clustering type of models.

Founder, CEO ASRYM Inc.

Navera Waheed

CEO, Orbit

Navera believes that technology and innovation are two pillars on which the future is based. She is currently working on revolutionizing how the knowledge is transferred through the power of Augmented Reality. Augmented Reality has a proven effect in improving the process of knowledge transfer by increasing the focus of pupils by more than 80%.

CEO, Orbit

Owais Anjum

CEO, eMumba

Owais is currently CEO of eMumba. He is a Silicon Valley trooper for a good number of years, is a Spartan armed with an MBA from San Jose State University, the oldest public institution on the West Coast of USA. He has led a subsidiary of a Silicon Valley Company in Pakistan and is now administering his own startup, eMumba. One of the biggest achievements of his startup is “Cricout – A Social Network for Cricket” available online and in the form of smartphone apps. Owais is an esteemed and distinguished member of the Islamabad entrepreneurial circle and volunteers his time for mentoring. He has also been an active member of OPEN Silicon Valley chapter in the past.

CEO, eMumba

Owais zaidi

Co-Founder CreditFix

Owais is the Co-founder and CEO of CreditFix, Pakistan’s first Digital Lending Company. CreditFix utilizes Machine Learning and Big Data and combine to enable low income borrowers to borrow for big ticket loans for starting or growing business. It is the only digital lending player in emerging market that is doing ticket sizes up to ,000 completely digitally. Owais also founded The Hive, Pakistan’s most premium co-working space which is currently in growth mode and expanding across Pakistan. He actively evangelizes open source technology and believes in power of collaboration through crowdsourcing and social networks. He has delivered lectures across South Asia and Middle East on electronic payments and commerce, founding and managing startups and financial inclusion. He is passionate about value creation through use of technology for business and social development."

Co-Founder CreditFix

Pernian Faheem

Retail Lead in NTT DATA Digital

Originally from Islamabad, Pernian is now based out of Boston. She is the Retail Lead in NTT DATA Digital and also runs her own e-commerce company that provides custom tailor made professional suiting for working women.

Retail Lead in NTT DATA Digital

Prof. Dr. Anwar-ul-Hassan Gilani

Chairman, Pakistan Council for Science & Technology

Prof. Gilani is currently the Chairman, Pakistan Council for Science & Technology. He started his professional career as a Lecturer (Pharmacy), at the Bahaudin Zakariya University Multan, where he stayed till 1986 and later joined the Aga Khan University. Dr. Gilani has earned 3 Patents, is a Member, Editorial Boards of 10 journals of international repute, is a co-editor of two WHO Books on Essential Medicine and published around 350 articles with cumulative IF around 700.

Chairman, Pakistan Council for Science & Technology

Rabeel Warraich

CEO Sarmayacar

Rabeel Warraich is the Founder of Sarmayacar, a recently launched seed fund syndicate dedicated for Pakistani startups. He is currently vice president at private equity firm GIC Investment Management based in London. He specialized in Economics from University of Oxford and Massachusetts Institute of Technology and has experience of working with Morgan Stanley, Convergent Wealth Advisors etc.

CEO Sarmayacar

Rabia Pervez

Project Manager | Technical Delivery Expert | Agile Coach

Having industrial experience of 12 years, Rabia Pervez has contributed to many areas including Analytics, Mobile Apps, Digital services and Financial Services. She started her career as a Software Developer and had hands-on experience in different technologies. Moving on she came up with roles as Technical Lead, Business Analyst and Project Manager. Having a good vision and study in the areas she soon realized that Agile is going to be the real strength in the industry. She learnt and contributed to this domain exceptionally. She is certified in Agile Scrum.and the pioneer in her organization to implement Agile Methodologies in her organization and has groomed people and processes to adopt best practices and achieve the best results.

Project Manager | Technical Delivery Expert | Agile Coach

Rebecca Garcia

Co-founder of CoderDojo NYC

Rebecca Garcia is the Co-founder of CoderDojo NYC, a community led 501(c)3 non-profit program teaching K-12 youth to code and an advocate for tech Diversity & Inclusion especially for women and girls. Experience includes Agile/SCRUM cross-functional software engineering. Front-end & fullstack web development, program management, UX/UI - user research & testing.

Co-founder of CoderDojo NYC

Rhett Power

Co-founder of Wild Creations

Rhett Power is co-founder of Wild Creations, an award-winning start-up toy company named one of Inc. Magazine’s Fastest Growing US Companies. A member of the United States Department of State’s International Speakers Program, he travels the globe speaking about entrepreneurship, leadership, and management alongside the likes of Gates Foundation CEO Sue Desmond-Hellmann, AOL Founder Steve Case, and President Barack Obama. He has written for the Huffington Post, Business Insider, Time, and The Wall Street Journal.

Co-founder of Wild Creations

Rohma Labeeb

Accelerator and Partnerships Lead at Invest2Innovate (i2i)

Rohma Labeeb has been engaged in the social impact sector in Pakistan, Canada and the UK for over 4 years now. After graduating from the University of Toronto with Bachelors in Management, she had the opportunity to be a part of the marketing and business development of several new initiatives across the globe, including Artez Interactive and Margalla Logistics. Her passion for sustainability in social change have also led her to be in project design positions at the Human Development Foundation and Idara-e-Taleem-o-Aagahi. She has recently completed her Masters in Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship from The London School of Economics, through which she has developed extensive international networks in the field of innovation and gained expertise in sustainability research and social delivery. As the lead of the i2i Accelerator, Rohma aims to bring a systematic change to the start-up ecosystem in Pakistan, encouraging sustainability, impact and expertise in every initiative.

Accelerator and Partnerships Lead at Invest2Innovate (i2i)

Saba Zaidi

Senior Interaction Designer at Google

"Almost 7 years of UX experience: first at a startup, then Ancestry.com and for the past ~5 years at Google. Projects usually involve close collaboration with engineers, product managers and other UX'ers like research, visual and motion designers, and prototypers. Work spans mobile, web, desktop as well as emerging surfaces like Smart Displays for the Google Assistant. Graduated with Bachelors of Science and honors in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Harvard ('11).

Senior Interaction Designer at Google

Sadaf Tausif

Motivational Speaker

Sadaf was a runner up in Spelling Bee 2014 contest and a writer of stories. One of her books recently got published in the US.

Motivational Speaker

Saima Khan

Founder of The Hampstead Kitchen

"Saima Khan started as a private chef specializing in creating cuisines that focus on the enjoyment & sharing of fresh seasonal produce. Realizing there was a gap in the market She set up The Hampstead Kitchen. They focus on clientsaround the Hampstead and neighbouring areas but also travel to the rest of the UK, the US, Europe& the Middle East for our clients. Before starting Hampstead Kitchen she have served more then then 16 banking & finance organisations.

Founder of The Hampstead Kitchen

Salman Wasay

Co-Founder Chaaye Khana & Couch Potato

Salman Wasay has more than 25 years of corporate experience. He was the former Chief Commercial Officer at Ufone and Director Marketing at Zong. He's now a full time serial entrepreneur and currently the Founder & CEO at Couch Potato - Islamabad. Interestingly, the love for fine food & entrepreneurship had urged him to open some of the best restaurants in the twin cities.

Co-Founder Chaaye Khana & Couch Potato

Sayyed Ahmad Masud

CEO | Co-Director of Change Mechanics | Founders Institute

Sayyed Ahmad Masud is CEO & Co-director of Change Mechanics | Founders Institute.He is an advertising & branding guy with over 3 decades in the industry who now helps build Start-ups and develop an innovation economy. He used to mentor and coach the new generation of Start-ups and aspiring entrepreneurs. Previously he is not only the part of Pakistan’s entrepreneurial ecosystem but also had a wide network in Asia and Silicon Valley. He was also the part of The Indus Entrepreneurs and the Islamabad Director for the Global Tech Accelerator. He is also teaching Entrepreneurship at the Master’s level and also in the Advisory Committees of 3 leading Universities.

CEO | Co-Director of Change Mechanics | Founders Institute

Shabahat Ali Shah

Chief Executive Officer, National IT Board @ Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication, Govt of Pakistan.

Shabahat is a versatile and highly innovative leader with 20+ yr experience in Innovation Management, Business Development, Global Marketing & Product Management across a wide variety of technologies. He possesses extensive experience in leading large teams to expand the corporate footprint in EMEA, North and South America, and JAPAC regions. He holds progressive experience with industry-leading companies in developing sustainable business strategies. Shabahat is an MBA graduate from MIT and completed the Public Leadership and Corporate Strategy Program at Harvard. A self-motivated leader known for both technical and business acumen.

Chief Executive Officer, National IT Board @ Ministry of Information Technology and Telecommunication, Govt of Pakistan.

Shafiq Akbar

CEO, Graana

An overseas Pakistani, Cambridge alumnus and a successful entrepreneur. Mr. Shafiq Akbar returned to Pakistan after living in the UK for 15 years. As an accomplished investment advisor and real estate developer, he not only created more than 450 jobs for the Pakistani youth, but also established a conglomerate of 7 companies. Mr. Shaﬁq Akbar is the Chairman and Founding Chief Executive Officer of Graana and Imarat Group of companies. He brings considerable real estate development and international business experience to the group. He is also the Chairman of Agency 21 International.

CEO, Graana

Shahnaz Kapadia

Founder and CEO at Empowerment thru Creative Integration (ECI)

Shahnaz has thirty years of national and international experience working as a master trainer, instructional designer and implementer of large-scale cascade projects and programs. As founder and Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Empowerment thru Creative Integration (ECI), Shahnaz specialized in large-scale cascade training for the development sector and the Government. During her 23 years leading ECI, she worked with the Federal and Provincial Governments, over 200 Civil Society Organizations, and a very large number of international NGOs and development agencies.

Founder and CEO at Empowerment thru Creative Integration (ECI)

Shamoon Hashmi

Joint Secretary at National Assembly of Pakistan

Shamoon Hashmi’s diverse career, spanning over three decades, has traversed multiple disciplines of print and electronic media, development sector, civil service, academia and legislative service. He presently serves as a Joint Secretary in the National Assembly of Pakistan but is more known for his TV career as an anchor, compere, Script Writer and a documentary producer. As a social activist, his personal commitment to gender and development issues are widely respected. He is a recipient of President’s award of “Tamgha-e-Essar” and PTV Award."

Joint Secretary at National Assembly of Pakistan

Shandana Gulzar Khan

Parliamentary Secretary Ministry of Commerce

Shandana is Parliamentary Secretary at Ministry of Commerce. She is experienced Trade and investment Legal professional with a demonstrated history of working in the legal services industry. She is Skilled in Negotiation, International Trade, International Economic Law, Policy Analysis, Strategic legal frameworks and Dispute Settlement. Strong, disciplined legal professional with a Master of Laws (LL.M.) focused in Corporate Governance; Economics of Law and Regulation; WTO and International Economic Laws from University of Cambridge.

Parliamentary Secretary Ministry of Commerce

Sheba Najmi

Senior Manager, Product Design at LinkedIn | Founder & Executive Director, Code for Pakistan

"User Experience Leader with 14 years of experience creating and leading teams, strategy, and highly functional and usable web and mobile products. Entrepreneur/CEO in civic technology. As a frequent speaker on user-centered design and civic technology, She has been a keynote speaker for audiences such as the Ukrainian Parliament, addressing global parliamentarians on citizen-centered design and engaging citizens in creating better, more transparent legislations and services. "

Senior Manager, Product Design at LinkedIn | Founder & Executive Director, Code for Pakistan

Shehryar Hydri

Secretary General, P@SHA

Shehryar has two decades of diverse experience as a Tech Entrepreneur and Marketer, founding and scaling cross-functional teams that have delivered products and services for some of the top brands in the world. Prior to joining P@SHA, Shehryar was the Director, Marketing & Operations at Convo and a member of the Convo board. He also served on the Advisory Board of Ingrain.io (formerly Groopic) which was recently acquired by KeepTruckin. Shehryar also co-founded Trango Interactive, one of the pioneering game development and CGI studios of Pakistan. Trango was nominated in the Red Herring Asia 100 list within two years of its formation and delivered world-class content for some of the most well-known games and consumer brands in Europe and North America. He did his MBA from IBA Karachi.

Secretary General, P@SHA

Shoaib Akmal

Cloud and VirtualizationArchitect | Consultant | Public Speaker | BlockChain Enthusiast

I am a highly accomplished leader with 17+ years of demonstrable record of leadership and business results in the wireless telecommunication industry with expertise in Network Services developement and innovative Network Technology. Looking for a position within an organization that provides opportunities to utilize my leadership and business skills as well as extensive experience to deliver strong business results

Cloud and VirtualizationArchitect | Consultant | Public Speaker | BlockChain Enthusiast

Syed Ahmed

Chairman | CEO of PASHA | DPL

"Syed Ahmad is the Founder and CEO of DPL, a leading IT exports company based in Islamabad. He is also an industry leader . Currently, he is the Chairman of P@SHA, the only Govt licensed representative IT trade body in Pakistan. He is also the author of Digital Policy of PTI, which is part of PTI’s manifesto. At present, he is a member of Prime Minister's Task Force on IT & Telecom. Syed is currently serving various government entities such as Pakistan Software Export Board, KPIT Board and incubators such as NEST I/O and Comsats Cubator-1ne."

Chairman | CEO of PASHA | DPL

Syed Junaid Ali Gilani

Senior Information Security Consultant & Instructor/Keynote Speaker

Syed Junaid Ali Gilani is a seasoned Information Security Professional, Keynote speaker and lecturer with 7+ years of experience in multidimensional organizations including PTCL, ZTE and Government of Pakistan. Currently he is serving Nayatel Pvt. Ltd. as Deputy Manager Network Security. In addition, he has experience in Security Governance, Risk Management, Policy Compliance and security awareness.

Senior Information Security Consultant & Instructor/Keynote Speaker

Syed Muzamil Hasan Zaidi

Data Scientist | Content Engineer | Digital Media SME | Digital Influencer

With his inspiring videos that went viral to millions, Muzamil has become a celebrity in Islamabad. Muzamil will share his story of Lolz Studios whose videos with an over-aching aspect of doing good has inspired and reached millions. He is now the face for many popular brands and become an icon for young Islamabad entrepreneurs.

Data Scientist | Content Engineer | Digital Media SME | Digital Influencer

Syed Shahzad Sherazi

Co-Founder & COO, Clicky.pk

I am an engineer and tech entrepreneur passionate about e-commerce, fin-tech & ed-tech sectors in Pakistan. Co-founder of Pakistan's fast-growing fashion e-commerce marketplace Clicky.pk, enabling consumers in Pakistan to buy from a variety of small, medium and large brands and retailers from Pakistan and abroad. Before this, I have worked in the telecom sector and provided technical consultancy to various national and international telcos in Pakistan, Middle-east and Africa.

Co-Founder & COO, Clicky.pk

Taimur Rasheed

General Manager & Head of Worldwide Customer Success, Azure Cloud at Microsoft

"Cloud technology executive with over a decade of experience in new market development, strategic business development, and solution architecture related to emerging technologies. He has passion for technology, business, public policy, and he enjoy bringing new ideas and products to market. Currently leading worldwide Customer Success for Microsoft’s Intelligent Cloud. Previously served as Managing Director for Amazon Web Services (AWS) Platform Technology and Applications where he lead strategic business development from 2008."

General Manager & Head of Worldwide Customer Success, Azure Cloud at Microsoft

Taimur Rehman

Director Programs (Peace Building, Women Entrepreneurship, Democracy)

Taimur Rehman is an IT entrepreneur, a Web Consultant with UNICEF and also a Student Mentor with Middlesex University, Dubai. Sheer passion, makes him revive the lost art-form of Urdu narrations and he has performed at Literature Festivals in Pakistan, UK and TEDx.

Director Programs (Peace Building, Women Entrepreneurship, Democracy)

Umair Shafique

Chief Innovation Officer, IDEATE Innovation

Umair has 10 years of total experience and he is the Chief Innovation Officer at IDEATE Innovation which is Pakistan’s first dedicated UX design firm. He is a mechatronics engineer with a double master in Innovation Management and Entrepreneurship from TUBerlin and Warsaw School of Economics with a Design Thinking certification from HPI Potsdam and UX certification from Neilsen Norman Group. He has co-founded two startups in Germany and Poland, in the domains of agriculture technology and shared economy sector, respectively. Previously, he has spent over 5 years in process engineering design, working closely with product technology centres in the FMCG sector. He is a strong believer in technology and its potential to solve greater challenges that technology combined with deep user insights can be served as a great tool to solve a lot of social problems, especially poverty. We can use right technological solutions to mitigate poverty from the regions of the underserved part of the world and that, we all, who are ‘privileged’ have an innate responsibility to give something back to where we think we belong.

Chief Innovation Officer, IDEATE Innovation

Umair Shahid

Head of Marketing & Products at 2ndQuadrant

Umair is a Data Management Professional, focused on open source software, with over 14 years of experience and has served some of the highly competitive software markets globally. With his experience of managing teams for software product releases and lust for continuous improvement, he brings in lot of value to the OPEN team.

Head of Marketing & Products at 2ndQuadrant

Umar Qamar

Founder at Export Leftovers

Umar is considered a pioneer in the Pakistani eCommerce Industry. He started elo (Export Leftovers) as a 2 person operation in 2013 in a small meeting room in his father's factory in Faisalabad that currently employs 107 people & has grown to become one of the biggest & fastest growing eCommerce stores of the country. elo was also recently featured in the top 100 start ups of Pakistan. He has an M.A (Hons) from University of Edinburgh and an M.Sc in Marketing Strategy from Cass Business School, London. When he is not glued to the computer screen or making product videos, he spends his time trying out new food, reading, globetrotting & improving his Marathon time.

Founder at Export Leftovers

Veqarul Islam

Director and Chief Executive at Jaffer Business Systems

Veqar is one of the pioneers of IT industry in Pakistan and very well respected one. He will talk about different ventures that he has been part of with a detailed personal note on how NCR’s TeraData was built in Pakistan.

Director and Chief Executive at Jaffer Business Systems

Wahaj Siraj

CEO and Co-founder of Nayatel

Wahaj Siraj is the CEO and co-founder of Nayatel, one of the largest connectivity providers in Pakistan, and has championed the causes of IT industry for decades.

CEO and Co-founder of Nayatel

Waqar Azim

COO, Quixel

Waqar Azim is a Computer Science graduate of National University of Computer and Emerging Sciences, Islamabad. He moved to Sweden in 2009 to pursue a Masters degree in Interactive Media Design.

COO, Quixel

Zeenat Khan

Owner at Pappasallis

If you have lived in Islamabad at anytime during the last 25 years, you will definitely have a few memories of waiting for a table at Pappasallis with your family. Ayesha is the iron lady behind this sumptuous icon of Islamabad.

Owner at Pappasallis

Zeeshan Shafquat

Serial Entrepreneur, Digital Media Strategist, Public Speaker

Zeeshan is a multi-dimensional and hyper dynamic person known as a Blogger, Restaurateur, Social Media Strategist and Speaker at tech events. He owns Café Rooftop which is a magnet for people who love food in style.

Serial Entrepreneur, Digital Media Strategist, Public Speaker

Zoaib Khan

Application Modernization Practice Lead, Red Hat, USA

Zohaib Khan is currently the Application Modernization Practice Lead for Red Hat Public Sector. He helps companies makes sense of emerging technologies like APIs, Microservices and Containers and use them to deliver new capabilities and business models, the Open Source way. He has been a regular speaker at Red Hat Summit and has presented at various conferences, including StackWorld and APIWorld. He writes about DevOps, Application Modernization, disruption with technology and innovation (at his blog https://stackinnovator.com). Prior to Red Hat, Zohaib was a senior manager in healthcare and financial services and experimented with entrepreneurship by co-founding a technology services company.

Application Modernization Practice Lead, Red Hat, USA

Speakers for this event

Aban Haq

Aban Haq

Adeel Shaffi

Adeel Shaffi

Adnan Shahid

Adnan Shahid

Affan Dar

Affan Dar

Ahmed Hassan (Simaar)

Ahmed Hassan (Simaar)

Ahmed Waleed

Ahmed Waleed

Ali Sufyan

Ali Sufyan

Ali Zaidi

Ali Zaidi

Alyzeh Rizvi

Alyzeh Rizvi

Ambreen Malik

Ambreen Malik

Amena Shakil

Amena Shakil

Amer Ather

Amer Ather

Ammar Mumtaz

Ammar Mumtaz

Aneeqa Ishaq

Aneeqa Ishaq

Asad J. Malik

Asad J. Malik

Asad Umar

Asad Umar

Ashar Aziz

Ashar Aziz

Asma Khalil

Asma Khalil

Ather Imran

Ather Imran

Atif Rais Khan

Atif Rais Khan

Awais Naseer

Awais Naseer

Ayesha Hamid

Ayesha Hamid

Ayesha Iqbal

Ayesha Iqbal

Badar Khushnood

Badar Khushnood

Bilal Awan

Bilal Awan

Dilawar Syed

Dilawar Syed

Dr Ali Tahir

Dr Ali Tahir

Dr Raja Iqbal

Dr Raja Iqbal

Dr Yasmeen Mehmooda

Dr Yasmeen Mehmooda

Dr. Affan Syed

Dr. Affan Syed

Dr. Andrew Scheuermann

Dr. Andrew Scheuermann

Dr. Arshad Ali

Dr. Arshad Ali

Dr. Bebo White

Dr. Bebo White

Dr. Faisal Khan

Dr. Faisal Khan

Dr. Farrukh Hassan

Dr. Farrukh Hassan

Dr. Rafae Bhatti

Dr. Rafae Bhatti

Dr. Syed Ismail Shah

Dr. Syed Ismail Shah

Dr. Terence Jackson

Dr. Terence Jackson

Dr. Vaqar Ahmed

Dr. Vaqar Ahmed