Pedro Castro was born in Las Palmas, Canary Islands in 1967. He studied at the German School at Las Palmas and got his University Degree in Administration and Political Science from the Complutense University in Madrid in 1991, specializing in Foreign Affairs. He was awarded a Masters in International Relations at the Spanish Diplomatic School in Madrid and then became specialized in foreign trade through several courses with the Chamber of Commerce, Junta de Andalucía and finally ICEX, the Spanish official foreign trade institution.

He started his professional career as an intern with ICEX at the Spanish Embassy in Santiago de Chile, later becoming Market Analyst in the same office. He joined duty free retailer Aldeasa in 1998 as General Manager for Chile, becoming Managing Director for Canariensis/Aldeasa in Spain in 2000.

Three years later Pedro was named CEO of Aldeasa Jordan and development director for the eastern region, also overseeing the retailer’s Kuwait operation. In December 2006 he was appointed as Operations Director for Spain.

Currently he holds the position of International Operations Director for WDFG, managing its duty free operations in 15 countries. He has been a board member of ASUTIL since 2010.

Michiel Munneke is very passionate about improving the travel experience. He is one of those persons always lost, too late, or in the wrong place at the airport. He expects a better digital assistant on his travel and a better airport experience, and that’s what M2Mobi is building.

He is co-founder of M2Mobi and general manager.

Michiel holds a Master degree in Business Information Systems from the University of Amsterdam and a Master in Management Research at the Said Business School in Oxford.

Alan Glasby is a Product Manager at SITA, where he is responsible for a range of solutions that enhance a passenger’s experience on their day of travel. These solutions use context such as beacon proximity to deliver relevant information to passengers’ mobile devices. This may include navigation assistance, such as the directions to the gate for their flight, queue wait times so they know how long it will take to get to their gate, or the searchable details of airport shops where they can buy a new pair of headphones or other items available for use on their journey or as gifts for friends and family.

Alan has been working in the air transport industry for almost 25 years. After working in the field of baggage reconciliation for 15 years, Alan joined SITA in 2007, developing solutions across the portfolio of airport products provided by SITA before moving to his current Product Management role in 2014. He was born in London in 1959 and is a Chartered Engineer.

Clive Jones is the Chief Executive Officer of Tourvest Retail Services, a division of the Tourvest Group of Companies. Tourvest Retail Services provide food and beverage as well as duty free products, services and technology solutions within the travel retail sector.

Clive has various diplomas, including a degree in commerce, and a Master’s degree in business administration (MBA). Clive is also a Member of the Institute of Directors (United Kingdom) and is currently studying towards a Chartered Director qualification.

Born in South Africa, he emigrated with his family to the United Kingdom in December 2016 when Tourvest secured the inflight retail contract to provide its services to British Airways. The Tourvest business also runs operations in South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria.

In his previous role as Chief Operating Officer of Tourvest Travel Services, he travelled extensively throughout the African continent, given the business was the master franchise rights holder for the American Express Business Travel brand on the continent. The Tourvest Group footprint on the African continent remains extensive.

Clive has been married for 24 years and has two children (Morgan, 21 and Dylan, 19), both of whom are currently attending university.

Clive is a member of his local squash club, as well as being an avid golfer and runner, having previously completed two Comrades Ultra-Marathons (88km).

PRESENTATION

Terry Kane has been Head of Auto, Finance, Telco and Travel for the MENA Region at Facebook Inc since May 2014. He has more than 15 years of experience in technology, strategy and marketing in large national and international organizations, having worked across multiple verticals and industries and in his most recent post as Head of Digital Strategy for the Dubai-based international luxury hotel company, Jumeirah Group.

Terry has developed recognized expertise in multiple disciplines, including brand and strategic marketing, digital communications, research and software development, to name but a few. He has an MBA from London Business School and Undergraduate Degrees from Bournemouth University and The University of Ulster. Terry has published research for The World Economic Forum; he also serves on multiple non-executive boards and is a regular speaker at international events.

Bethlehem Tilahun Alemu is Founder and Managing Director of soleRebels, the world’s fastest-growing African footwear brand and the only WFTO Fair Trade footwear company in the world. She is also the Founder & Creator of Republic of Leather, a new company that is changing the way people around the world buy & love luxury leatherwear.

From the humblest of beginnings in Ethiopia, Bethlehem has built soleRebels into the first global footwear brand ever to emerge from a developing nation. She has created world-class jobs and empowered her community and country, while presenting a galvanized, dynamic face of African creativity to the global market. soleRebels has expanded rapidly and today exports to 45 countries; the brand is targeting 50 stand-alone retail stores across the US by 2019 and 500 worldwide by 2022.

Bethlehem’s achievements in building her businesses have brought wide global acclaim. She is a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader and the first female African entrepreneur to address the Clinton Global Initiative. She was named Outstanding African Business Woman by African Business Awards in 2011, listed in Forbes Magazine as one of the World’s 100 Most Powerful Women to Watch, and Business Insider ranked her one of The Top 5 Entrepreneurs in Africa. CNN recently named Bethlehem one of the 12 greatest female entrepreneurs of the last century, alongside Coco Chanel and Sara Blakely for her ground-breaking influence.

Mark Essien is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Nigeria-based Hotels.ng, an online hotel booking agency which is the first and largest of its kind in Nigeria.

As Nigeria begins to actively diversify its economy from an oil-based one, tourism has emerged as a promising sector, contributing 3.2% of Nigeria’s GDP in 2014, a figure that is expected to double by 2024. Hotels.ng continues to maintain its position as the largest market share holder in the Nigerian hotel booking sector, and is in the process of expanding across the rest of Africa.

Since establishing Hotels.ng in 2013, Mark has overseen the growth of hotel listings on the platform from just over 100 at launch to over 7,000 hotels in 21 regions of Nigeria, with millions of transactions in 2014 alone.

Mark was born in Nigeria and holds a Bachelor of Engineering (B.Eng), Computer Hardware Engineering, from Beuth Hochschule in Berlin, Germany. He also holds an MSc degree in Computer Science from Freie Universität, also in Berlin.

Tim Sebastian is the chairman of The New Arab Debates, currently broadcast and distributed worldwide on Deutsche Welle TV. The award-winning former BBC foreign correspondent was the first presenter of HARDtalk, BBC World’s daily half-hour interview programme, where he worked for more than seven years.

Tim was the founder and chairman of The Doha Debates, which were broadcast across the globe on BBC World News from 2004 until 2012. The programmes, recorded in Qatar, provided a unique, uncensored forum for discussing the most controversial issues in the Arab and Islamic worlds.

In 2012 he presented the Outsider Debates, recorded in India and screened on Bloomberg TV.

In 1982, Tim was the winner of the Richard Dimbleby Award at BAFTA and was also named Television Journalist of the Year by the Royal Television Society. For two years running, in 2000 and 2001, he received the Royal Television Society’s Interviewer of the Year Award.

His began his career as a foreign correspondent in Warsaw, covering the Solidarity revolution, before becoming the BBC’s Europe Correspondent in 1982 and Moscow Correspondent in 1984. A year later he was expelled by the Soviet authorities and sent to Washington until 1989.

Born in London in 1952, Tim speaks Russian and German fluently and also holds a BA Honours degree in modern languages from Oxford University. A best-selling author, he has written eight novels and two non-fiction books.