Global Speakers

Tim Johnson has been with Suncorp for over 10 years and led operations teams and large technology programs for most of that time.  He currently leads the Operations Delivery team for Suncorp’s Insurance Arm which, for his sins, includes launching the Automation capability for Suncorp Insurance.  Prior to Suncorp and a few years consulting Tim spent 14 years in the Army as a Combat Engineering Officer.  Tim graduated from the Australian Defence Force Academy with a Bachelor of Science and later in his career completed his MBA through Deakin.

Zeming is an Actuarial Manager at Cover-More Travel Insurance (now part of Zurich). As a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia he regularly contributes to the Actuaries Institute’s data analytics initiatives.

Zeming joined Cover-More in 2012 and has brought in predictive modelling and machine learning techniques into the business to deliver value across risk modelling, portfolio monitoring and fraud analysis. Prior to joining Cover-More he worked at IAG New Zealand for 7 years across a wide range of actuarial roles. His passion for blockchain started from attending the legendary BokkyPooBah’s Ethereum Workshop, and has since proposed the Ethereum ERC-1201 token standard which tokenises the rental rights for non-fungible rival goods.

Dan currently heads the innovation accelerator at TAL. TAL’s flagship accelerator program brings cross functional teams together to fast-track ideas to market using Human Centred Design, Lean Startup and Agile Delivery.
Dan has 17 years’ commercial experience. Prior to joining TAL, Dan was Head of Brand at Samsung Electronics Australia. During this tenure Dan lived in Korea for a year and worked in the Samsung Global Marketing and Innovation Centre, leading global marketing innovation projects. After five years with Samsung, Dan joined the Beanstalk Factory – an innovation consultancy firm that helps large organisations innovate. Dan is also a part-time Instructor at General Assembly. Across 2015/17, Dan founded a non-for-profit, purpose driven, online community for men who have lost loved ones.

Dan has an MBA from MGSM, Bachelor of Business from CSU and is studying a Master of Data Science and Innovation at UTS.

Andrew Stead has worked extensively with startup founders and early stage investors, through private and public incubators, accelerators and venture funds. As a founder, advisor and board member, he specialises in the commercialisation of technology products, creation of new businesses, capital raising, and mergers and acquisitions. Andrew’s overlapping experiences between corporates, research organisations and startups provides a unique perspective on collaboration and innovation. He currently leads Firemark Labs that is responsible for product incubation at insurer IAG, a committee member of early stage investment group Sydney Angels, director of Hivery and a director of the Data2Decision CRC.

Louise Mercer is the General Manager of APAC for Everledger, a global enterprise that tracks the provenance of high-value assets on a digital global ledger. Trained in translating disruption and strategic risks into opportunities for innovation, she has held senior roles with Australia’s largest general insurers Suncorp and IAG, designing, facilitating and delivering the strategy for the strategic renewal of existing business models. She holds MBA and Commerce degrees and has held Directorship and strategic advisor roles with multiple not-for-profits and social enterprises, including her own business ventures.

Andrew is a Partner at The Digital Insurer (TDI) and is TDI’s Regional Head for Australia & New Zealand. He also leads TDI’s global Telematics & IoT practice and is Editor of TDI’s Insurance Connected blog. He is an adviser to a number of Insurtech & Fintech Start-ups and is ranked as a Global top 50 insurtech influencer (2016 – 2018) by InsurTech News.

Prior to joining TDI in 2016, Andrew was with CSC, based in Asia for nearly 30 years, where he was responsible for Insurance product strategy and product development.

As an industry veteran in the Asia-Pacific region, Andrew is passionate about the transformative role financial services and technology can play in helping communities all over the world to achieve a better life.

Dr Fogelman is an Industry Project Manager for the Faculty of Engineering and Information Technology.  Her key role at UTS is to drive and build strategic research partnerships with industry, government and community organisations, that will enable them to access skills, world leading expertise of UTS researchers (including facilities) to develop innovative solutions to solve real-world problems.  Dr Fogelman has worked with government and industry partners (such as banks, start-ups, water utilities, engineering firms) to develop successful project outcomes in digital transformation.  The projects range from data analytics, artificial intelligence, IoT and robotics.

Anthony is the Co-Founder and Director of AirAssess, an Australian technology startup that brings together the power of drone technology, data analytics, robotic process automation and machine learning to deliver rapid and decision imperative intelligence to insurers, builders and asset managers. Their proprietary technology platform and drone deployment solutions enable their clients and their suppliers to make timely and informed decisions, while removing people from harm’s way, reducing the claim cycle time and improving the customer experience. With over 200 pilots and trades across our network, they have extensive reach all across Australia.

He is also the Director of Aeroeye and SenseAg, emerging technology businesses/startups that are solving real problems in exciting and innovative ways – see below or get in touch for more info. He was also a Co-Founder and COO/Chief Remote Pilot of Swoop Aero up until September 2018, where they have developed the winning solution to the UNICEF tender for vaccine deliveries in Vanuatu.

Meredith leads our team and client transformations with her facilitation expertise coupled with deep experience in the practice of Strategic Risk management. Meredith has run innovation processes and projects in large corporations who seek to adapt and remain relevant. Prior to joining Axilo, Meredith led strategic innovation work within a financial services organisation for 5 years. She started her career in R&D, product management and brand marketing at Unilever, as the co-owner of an education software start-up and as a strategy and design consultant. She has helped clients in diverse fields including engineering, for-purpose, telecommunications and professional services. As a designer, sense-maker and facilitator in company strategy and innovation for resilience, Meredith now works with executives to explore possibility and emergent dynamics of change, shape insight and inform strategic intent. Meredith loves to develop deep insight into system patterns and dynamics through digging into assumptions and uncovering the tensions and relations. She likes to ask the unaskable questions.

With 10+ years’ experience in helping companies build relationships with their customer base most recently as a claims specialist, Gilberto is a passionate and focused Insurtech startup founder. Having worked for both third-party providers as well as large insurers, his keen industry insight and understanding of the problem for both claims teams and claimants lead to the creation of Myclaimmate; a SAAS platform simplifying the claims process for all stakeholders.

Steven has more than 15 years’ experience in business process improvement and business intelligence, with a proven background in leading national operations and strategic procurement teams. He joined QBE in 2005 and has worked across several business units to drive business transformation. Steven took on the Chief Operating Officer (COO) role in 2017. Prior to joining QBE, Steven worked as a Business Process Improvement Manager in telecommunications, using Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems to drive enhancements. Steven is a qualified Chemical and Process Engineer with experience in manufacturing engineering and project management. He is also MBA qualified and has trained in the business improvement techniques of Statistical Process Control and Six Sigma.

Kellie is excited by new technology and passionate about learning and designing processes that are seamless and align to great customer outcomes.

She has pioneered the delivery of Artificial Intelligence and Automation in large organisations and understands how they will be used to transform the customer and employee experience.

Throughout her 25+ years’ experience she has had range of roles in technology and leadership in Hong Kong and the U.S. with a focus on solving complex business problems and delivering world class solutions.

Transforming large companies is becoming increasingly complex, but she is excited by the future of Artificial Intelligence and how Machine and Cognitive learning will help us solve pain points and deliver solutions that exceed and delight our customers.

Aamer is the Research Innovation & Development Specialist at Munich Re. Initially qualified as a medical scientist, Aamer has over 14 years of insurance expertise, spanning digital innovation, design thinking, insurance medicine, actuarial research and risk management. Aamer’s research expertise includes artificial intelligence, social and healthcare robotics, human augmentation and other emerging technological trends. Aamer holds two medical science degrees from the University of Otago, a graduate business degree from the University of New South Wales, and is also a graduate of the University of Oxford’s Fintech Programme.

Nicole is a passionate innovator committed to generating customer excitement for Bupa through the design of interesting and relevant experiences. Putting the customer at the centre, Nicole uses Human Centred Design to develop true innovative business models and deliver ground-breaking solutions to business wide problems. Having worked in the Health Insurance industry for over 6 years she understands how complex the health system is in Australia and uses her knowledge to better understand people’s behaviours and motivations when it comes to managing their health.

Naby Mariyam has 20 years of experience in research, Education, Management consulting and start-ups in the last 5 years. She is passionate about AR/VR, Machine learning and Technology. She Represented Australian and the G20 Young Entrepreneurs Summit in berlin 2017. She is an advocate for Diversity of thought in technology and women in leadership.

Coverhero is an intelligent insurance Robo advisor that helps to understand, buy and manage your insurance in one place. When you download the app, the first thing you do is upload your existing insurance policies (incredibly easy with the Gmail Scanner). Coverhero advisor analyses your insurance needs and gives you visibility on where you are underinsured. Coverhero intelligently shops the market on your behalf, keeping your insurance portfolio optimised.

Jan-Philipp Kruip is co-founder and CEO of FitSense. Jan-Philipp’s background is in finance and economics. He started his career in management consulting with Stern Stewart & Co, primarily serving clients in Pharma and Financial Services. Jan-Philipp left global trading company Louis Dreyfus Commodities as a project manager in Singapore to cofound FitSense in 2015. He is married and lives in Sydney.

Aleksandar Kovacevic is a Fellow of the Financial Services Institute of Australasia, Fellow of the Australian Institute of Management, Member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and a Member of the Business Continuity Institute in the United Kingdom. He has served as Adviser to the Australian Federal Government on competitiveness matters and has served as a Board Member of the Transparency International SEE chapter, a global coalition against corruption.

Aleksandar has been a Board Member and CFO of a Bayerische Hypo und VereinsBank (HVB) Central European subsidiary, senior advisor to KPMG Barents-US; Director of Deloitte & Touche in both Hungary and Poland; served as Country Director of Raiffeisen Investments; and held management roles at Westpac Banking Corporation’s head office in Sydney Australia where he was responsible for prudential reporting and overall data analytics.

Ben is the founder of Insured By Us, a brandable travel insurance service and platform configured to meet your needs. Over the past three years he and his team have built a solid portfolio of clients that use our Voyager platform to sell insurance to hundreds of thousands of travellers around Australia. Ben is also part of the co-organiser of Insurtech Sydney as well as he is a serial entrepreneur in the insurance sector having founded a number of insurance related technology businesses.

Jason is the Expansion Director for Australia and New Zealand with NEM.io Foundation based in Melbourne, Australia. NEM.io Foundation is embarking on a global expansion plan and Jason will focus on driving partnerships to increase the adoption of the NEM Blockchain technology.

Recently acknowledged in the Forbes 30 Under 30 Asia 2018 list, Jason also sits in the Advisory Board of the Blockchain Philanthropy Foundation, Blockchain Centre in Australia and is a founding member of the FinTech Association of Malaysia. Apart from that, he is the co-founder Consortio, a commercialisation consulting firm, InsurTech startup PolicyStreet (which raised USD500k) and Finnext Capital, a smart city accelerator programme based out of Cyberjaya, Malaysia.

He is a deal-maker, community-builder and entrepreneur with a background in business development, client proposition, digital enablement and innovation & commercialisation consulting. He started his career with Standard Chartered Bank’s international programme having worked in front line customer-facing roles, Wealth Management, CEO’s Office, Commercial & Retail Banking with business exposure in Singapore, Dubai and Kuala Lumpur. He has been a speaker, judge, mentor, consultant and investor in startups and is familiar with working with the private and public sector including regulators and incubator & accelerator programmes.

Jason is currently enrolled in the Emerging Leaders Development Programme with Eagles Leadership Institute and holds a Masters of International Business and Bachelor of Laws from the Australia and had attended executive programmes in strategy and management with Cambridge Judge Business School.

Perry is currently leading the development of Friendsurance in Australia. Friendsurance is the pioneer in digital insurance innovation, launching peer to peer insurance and now a new approach to bancassurance. Perry had previously been Director with Friendsurance Germany for more than four years and saw the business grow from an idea to over 150,000 customers and expand into bancassurance.

Friendsurance created the world’s first peer to peer insurance model over 8 years ago and is now leading the reinvention of bancassurance globally. In January 2018 Friendsurance was appointed the digital insurance partner for Deutsche Bank.

The connection between an Australian and this global first were the result of some chance meetings, which provided the unique opportunity to be part of the startup that helped create the Insurtech revolution. Friendsurance has positively challenged so many of Perry’s views of insurance, distribution and customer experience.

Perry has had the pleasure of working in various executive operations, commercial and finance roles within the Reliance Group, Wesfarmers Insurance, Superpartners and the DXC.

Dr. Andrew Kuper is an award-winning investor and entrepreneur in emerging markets. He founded and leads LeapFrog Investments, now the world’s largest dedicated investor in insurance and related financial services for emerging consumers. LeapFrog’s companies currently reach over 44 million people across 20 countries in Africa and Asia with life-changing financial tools. Dr. Kuper is a former Managing Director of Ashoka, which has supported and connected over 3000 social entrepreneurs in 70 countries. He is also a founding Advisory Board member of Purpose.com, which builds movements around new economic and social models, and In-Films, a social purpose documentary film production company. A pioneer in Profit with Purpose business, Dr. Kuper is a recipient of the Ernst & Young National Entrepreneur of the Year award and the YPO SEN Leadership Award from among the 20,000 chief executive members of the Young President’s Organisation. He is a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader. Dr. Kuper holds a PhD from Cambridge and is the author of two books on globalisation and governance.

Brad is a Social Innovation and Strategy Consultant, Personal Innovation Coach and Professional Board Director. Brad is currently on the Board of the Hunter New England and Central Coast Primary Health Network, Central Coast Montessori Primary School and Chairs the Board of Conscious Capitalism Australia and New Zealand. Brad has also built a successful practice in Personal Innovation where he has developed a unique approach to bringing the principals of Corporate Innovation to impact the ability of professionals to innovate through the uncertainty that exists in our current business climate and within their lives.

Juliette is the CEO and Co-founder at FloodMapp, a startup providing predictive flood mapping and personalised alert products for insurers. With flooding becoming more frequent, and more severe, FloodMapp helps insurers reduce preventable claims, streamline the event response and improve the customer experience in the times that matter. Previously, Juliette was a senior professional water resources engineer for ten years, specialising in surface water management, flood modelling, and hydrology. Juliette started her career at Golder Associates and worked across Australia, Indonesia and Canada; gaining diverse experience with different climates and hydrological challenges. Following this she worked at Seqwater and Jacobs, where she managed various hydrology and flood modelling projects.

Juliette is a passionate and driven individual, inspired by solving big-impact problems. After seeing first hand the loss and devastation caused by the Queensland 2011 floods and then the Calgary, Canada 2013 flood, Juliette applied her domain experience and founded FloodMapp to improve flood preparedness and response.

Andy Jamieson is the founder of Advisr.com.au, an insurtech platform that connects people with insurance brokers they can trust. Advisr is a 2018 Insurance Industry Awards Finalist for Insuretech Program of the Year and winner of InsuranceBusiness TechDen 2018.

Prior to Advisr, In 2015 Andy exited Switched on Media, a digital marketing agency he co-founded in 2007, through a trade sale to global advertising group WPP. Switched on Media’s clients included Westfield, CBA, Canon, Spotify and Vodafone and its growth was recognised through the multiple BRW Fast 100 and Deloitte Technology Fast 50 awards. Prior to founding Switched on Media, Andy worked in various marketing roles at Fairfax Digital and eBay.

Dan Sandaver has worked in the insurance industry for over ten years. On one hand as the successful owner and Managing Director of Australian Building & Construction Group, a property repair company servicing the major Australian insurers during catastrophe events. On the other hand as the successful owner of scale-up technology company Codafication; an Insurtech solving data complexity at the heart of the insurance industry.

From chasing cyclones, to chairing technology companies, Dan has a broad experience in project management, business development, enterprise solutions and change management. Dan is also the proud father of two sets of twins, four boys under four, of which, like the companies, is a blessing, dynamic and a new challenge every day.

Dan is passionate about innovation across the value chain, and down the supply chain, connecting fragmented systems, operational services and data in real-time to drive transformation across an enterprise. His company Codafication was recently voted in October 2018 as “Most Strategic Impact to the Insurance Industry” at the Digital Insurance Agenda in Munich by over 1,000 crowd attendees.

Dr Raghav Murali-Ganesh is the Co-Founder & President of CancerAid. Completing his Medical Training at Nottingham University, UK, Raghav moved to Sydney, Australia and undertook training in Radiation Oncology at RPA hospital, having completed his specialist qualifications in Radiation Oncology in 2016. Raghav has the ambition of improving healthcare outcomes with the use of digital tools and was drawn towards developing CancerAid. Combining oncological knowledge, entrepreneurial skills and a vision for technology solutions, CancerAid has become the number 1 Cancer App in Australia, the US and the UK. Having received prestigious honours including an appearance on Shark Tank 2017, Emerging Company of the year 2017 (AusBiotech / Johnson & Johnson), Best Global Startup (Sir Richard Branson), Best Startup creating Social impact (Steve Wozniak) and the EY Accelerating Entrepreneur award for recognition towards the initiative in creating CancerAid as an innovative healthcare solution to change cancer care on a global scale.

Michael is an InsureTech innovator and responsible for overall strategy relating to the Mercurien Group. Mercurien Insurance Pty Ltd is an underwiting agency specialising in light commercial vehicles.
Prior to forming Mercurien, Michael Graham was Managing Director of Landor Associates (Australia), a global marketing and brand development consultancy part of WPP Plc.

Michael’s experience covers high-level management of professional services firms as well as marketing strategy and brand development in services, industrial markets and packaged goods in the United Kingdom, Germany, Japan, China, Singapore, Korea, the United States and Australia.

Duncan is a road safety innovator who is responsible for overseeing strategy and commercial development activities. He is a regular ‘thought leadership’ contributor the National Road Safety Partnership Program (NRSPP) and, at times, consults to the Australian Road Research Board (ARRB).

Duncan has over a decade’s experience in the cognitive neuroscience software sector, with a focus on its application to road safety.
Prior to being in this sector, Duncan’s experience covered business development / client liaison activities in international commodity derivates markets; the design and implementation of risk mitigation strategies.

Scott is a Corporate Venture Capitalist & Start-Up enthusiast. Partner with business leaders to help them identify and understand strategic opportunities, then help them deliver transformation to achieve customer growth. Scott is currently the Director of Commercial Development of IAG Firemark Labs and responsible with the development of opportunities between IAG and the companies they are investing in.

Geoff Swain is an Enterprise Services Director at leading data sharing technology company, Data Republic.
Joining Data Republic in 2017, Geoff leads the implementation of strategic data initiatives between Australia’s leading banks, airlines, media firms and partner consultancies, driving data sharing transformation programs within Data Republic’s major clients.
With a career working at the intersection of financial services, technology, and data, Geoff has previously held roles at Core Logic, RGA, AMP and Barclays practices.

Mark has over 20 years business, technology, finance and start-up experience. He loves to invent, reimagine and create, and very passionate about entrepreneurial start-ups, business innovation and dramatically improving value for the customer.

He is the Founder of Picnic, an Insurtech seeking to establish a global collective of licensed insurance mutuals, owned by customers, where customers review claims & share the profits. Picnic’s mission is to harness the power & compassion of communities to deliver insurance with heart.

Previously, Mark was a Co-founder of Articulate (Australia’s leading technology adoption consultancy), built and scaled over 15 years and sold to EY in June 2018. He is also one of the Founding Non-Executive Directors of the Sanfilippo Children’s Foundation and an avid supporter of non-profit organisations investing in life changing opportunities for vulnerable young people in our community. Besides that, he has been a member of the Entrepreneurs Organisation for 8 years and thoroughly enjoy engaging with other entrepreneurs and leaders to share and learn from experience.

Chris Bayley is the cofounder of Cover Genius, one of the fastest growing InsurTechs globally. Cover Genius is the parent company of B2B2C global specialty line insurer RentalCover.com, and BrightWrite, a B2B platform that brings data science & Machine Learning to distribution.

Prior to starting Cover Genius, Chris was responsible for the insurance vertical at Google. Chris has an MBA from University of Technology Sydney and a BA with Honours.

Anu brings 17 years of experience across Risk & Compliance management, Governance, Regulatory, Internal Audit, Management Consulting and Tax. She has worked across many industries: Insurance, Bank, Government, Manufacturing, Energy and Telecommunications.

Anu has assisted clients and worked hands-on in industry to identify risks and build solutions to manage them across all types of financial and non- financial risks. The work Anu and her team did around advanced risk management was awarded an Australian Bank CEO Employee of the year award.
Anu is currently focussed on Risk Innovation, assisting businesses through designing and developing new business risk & compliance solutions to support their future business needs.

Anu is a graduate from Australian Institute of Company Directors (AICD), a Chartered Accountant (ICAANZ) and holds a Bachelor of Commerce in Accounting and Information Systems (UNSW).

Mark Pittman is the General Manager Government Services at Allianz Australia, a leading global insurer and workers compensation service provider to some of Australia’s largest government organisations.

Mark leads the strategy and operations for claims and injury management services to federal, state and territory government personal injury schemes. He is a collaborative leader who values innovation and is passionate about finding people-centred solutions that improve the quality of life for workers and provide strong financial results for employers and governments.

Mark has worked across a number of areas in personal injury, from underwriting and distribution, claims and injury management, strategic program development and senior corporate and operational roles.

Nicholle is a senior finance and tech leader, mentor, VC advisor, founder, strategist and innovator. Her expertise includes domain expertise in banking, payments, FinTech, RegTech, InsurTech, Blockchain, and technical skills in CX, Biometrics, Lean Digital, Robotics, AI & Agile.

Nicholle has worked in top tier organisations such as Merrill Lynch, CBA, NAB, Westpac, Unisys and AT Kearney / EDS. Nicholle also acts as an entrepreneurial coach and mentor to new fintech start-ups. She holds a BEc / LLB (USyd) and an MCom (IT) from UNSW AGSM. In 2016 she completed programs at LSE in Innovation and Entrepreneurship.

In 2017 Nicholle became a globally recognised advisor on Blockchain and became a member of the Advisory Board of Arkratos Blockchain Solutions, a new Blockchain platform based in Singapore in 2018. Nicholle is currently the Vice President and Partner for Genpact leading AI, Robotics and Lean Digital Solutions for APAC.

Nicholle’s professional attributes include strategic and innovative design thinking, strong relationship capabilities, innovative technology commercialisation and business development skills and a strong sense of entrepreneurship.

Nicholle has successfully launched and founded new businesses and products, managed complex M&A, transformed businesses and turned around and repositioned them for success. Her experience in major corporates has included playing key leadership roles in significant initiatives such as the “Which New Bank” transformation at CBA, the “Fair Value” strategy and new digital brand (UBank) at NAB, the integration and turnaround of cards at Westpac, the re-launch of the Bank of Melbourne brand, the design of a new digital customer model for St George, the launch of a new challenger financial services & payments business at Flexigroup; and working with Fintechs in global hubs Stone &Chalk, Level39 and Lattice80.

Tim Lea is a Blockchain Entrepreneur, Keynote Speaker & Advisor. He is the author of the leading Blockchain Book – Down the Rabbit Hole – speaks regularly, both domestically and internationally, and is a Cryptocurrency & ICO Investor. He is an advisor to two early stage security token projects that are in stealth mode currently. He is launching the Down the Rabbit Hole Podcast Series (www.downtherabbithole.news) in mid-November and believes Security Tokens will mark the next wave in the crypto markets with the advent of Cryptocurrency 3.0 – where Institutional funds will be able to enter and participate in the cryptocurrency space.

Brian has over 15 years of experience in Transformation, Lean/Six Sigma, and Process Automation within the Health, Financial Services, and Manufacturing Industries. He is passionate about new technology and innovation, and how it can be used to improve customer experience, and make people’s lives easier. After beginning his career as an Automotive Engineer, Brian then transitioned into Banking and Finance where he spent the next 8 years as a Business Process Improvement specialist. Most recently he worked with BUPA Australia & NZ, where he was responsible for standing up their Intelligent Automation Program, and delivering numerous automation solutions across the business.

Hayley is the head of Market and Competitor Strategy for Allianz Australia, where her work focuses on analysing the global macro forces affecting the insurance industry and its operating environment (read: bringing the outside in).  In addition to analysing competitor strategies and tactical plays, Hayley’s key focus areas are social, competitive, and technology trends, with insurtech being a subject of particular focus given Allianz’s global initiatives in this space.  Prior to Allianz, Hayley held similar analytical and strategic research roles as an academic, consultant and in the industry.

Nigel Fellowes-Freeman is Founder and CEO of Expense Check, who are on a mission to unlock the power of data to help small businesses make great decisions through Expense Check’s innovative AI and data-driven platform simplifying and streamlining the insurance process.  Nigel brings 10 years of experience technology to the company, from product development, to growth hacking to building long-term strategic partnerships and leans on this experience in his role as an Entrepreneur in Residence at Boston Consulting Group Digital Ventures.  Nigel has a passion for people and believes that a strong team is the most vital building block to a successful company.  This approach has played a crucial part in Expense Check’s exponential growth.

Michael’s career spans over 20 years servicing large corporates in various consulting roles across audit, tax and business in top tier professional services firms and senior in-house positions. Michael’s deep understanding business pain points, keen interest in solving problems through technology, and his desire to deliver tangible value to clients, lead Michael to investigate the emerging Robotic Process Automation (RPA) industry in 2014-15. After detailed research regarding the various RPA technologies, ROIs being achieved offshore and proven business cases, in late 2015 Michael created the Data Interactive Group to help Australian businesses ‘unlock the value of data’ through RPA. Michael’s vision for Data Interactive is to ensure RPA project remain ‘business lead’ with IT blessing rather than deployment of technology for technology sake. Today, Data Interactive provides both RPA advisory and RPA implementation services that focus on two principles: use subject matter expertise (SME) to match specific business pain points to RPA technologies (‘best fit’ RPA); and ‘enabling’ clients to become self-sufficient with the use of RPA.

Paul Reynolds has 20+ years experience the finance industry. Paul has spent the last 10 years launching new digital finance products across Asia and Australia, including consulting to the World Bank on digital financial inclusion programs in Indonesia, India and Myanmar. Four years ago, Paul founded Factfin, a digital analytics business that helps SME manage their trading risk. Factfin has worked with clients including ANZ, Euler Hermes (Allianz Group), Xero, Coca-Cola, Telenor and the Australian Department of Industry, Innovation and Science.

Annette is a co-founder of Galileo Platforms, a blockchain insurtech company serving the insurance sector. She is also an independent non-executive director of FNZ, a fintech company specializing in wealth management technology. And she is a director of the Actuaries Institute. She has a career spanning 28 years in the financial services sector. She has a successful track record as a CEO, founder, non-executive director, client experience leader and actuary, leading businesses through growth and change in life insurance, wealth management and pensions.

She has been CEO, CMO, CFO, and has worked in HK, Singapore, Australia, New Zealand and held regional responsibility across Asia. She has worked for companies such as Manulife, AXA, Mercer and Colonial. She was President of the Life Insurance Association and has been a council member for the Singapore Actuarial Society. She current sits on the board of the Actuaries Institute in Australia. She holds a Bachelor of Economics from Macquarie University in Australia, and she is a Fellow of the Institute of Actuaries of Australia and a Fellow of the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Angat is a Partner based in Oliver Wyman’s Sydney office and leads their Australian Insurance practice. He is motivated to improve consumer awareness and trust in the insurance sector and believes the industry needs to further increase transparency, simplify and make better use of advances in technology and data analytics. Prior to joining Oliver Wyman, he worked at Macquarie Group and at Willis Towers Watson. He is an Actuary, a holder of the right to use the Chartered Financial Analyst® designation and the Financial Risk Manager designation.

Amy is the EM Corporate & Commercial Underwriting WA for Vero. She has spent the last 19 years in the Insurance Industry across both Commercial General Insurance and Life Insurance and held senior roles through Underwriting, Product, New Business and Service Delivery. Amy specialises in Emotional Intelligence, Strategic Delivery and Inspirational Leadership with key strengths in:

• Building great teams: lifting a team to its full potential, career development, mentoring, creating strong positive culture, managing through change, communication and stakeholder relationships,
• Customer focus: understanding the customer (both internal and external) and reviewing processes to improve the end experience,
• Relentless execution: setting and delivery of clear strategic focused goals to improve the long term result for the customer and the business.

In addition, Amy is an internationally recognised NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) Practitioner, published Author, Time Line Therapy Practitioner and Certified Level 2 Coach.