What Will The Future Look Like?

As a prominent businesswoman in the Middle East, Dr. Raja has been recognised with many awards, including as one of Forbes ‘The World’s 100 Most Powerful Women’ and was ranked first in Forbes Middle East's ‘100 Power Businesswomen in the Middle East’. 

Dr Raja is an active supporter of entrepreneurial business, particularly amongst Arab women.  She is President of the Dubai Business Women Council and board member of the Dubai Chamber Of Commerce & Industry and the Dubai Women’s Association.  She provides counsel to various business groups and international trade alliances, including being part of the Government of Dubai’s official delegation for various trade and commerce meetings.

Aymeric Sarrazin is the CEO of Siemens Advanta, a business unit of Siemens with over 8000 employees in 19 countries that offers companies end-to-end support on their unique digitalization journey, delivering services ranging from consulting to solutions implementation in the IoT and digital transformation domain.

Sarrazin joined Siemens in 2011 as part of the company’s CEO Leadership Program and has held positions within the Siemens energy business in the U.S., China, and Germany, including Senior Vice President of Controls and Digitalization and, prior to this, Vice President of Strategy.

Nadimeh Mehra is VP Transition Unit, District 2020.

Ms. Mehra joined Expo 2020 Dubai in early 2016 and is responsible for the commercial development of the post-Expo site – District 2020 – supporting its transition into a mixed-use community and innovation-focused ecosystem.

In this role, she oversees Business Development, Sales and Partnership Management. This includes driving commercial strategy, business and financial planning, ecosystem development and global business engagement, with the aim of supporting the creation of a sustainable legacy and long-term economic opportunities.

Prior to joining Expo 2020, Ms. Mehra headed the Development Capital division of UAE-based Daman Investments for 10 years.

Dr. Varkki Pallathucheril is Professor and Dean of the College of Architecture, Art and Design at the American University of Sharjah.

He has an undergraduate degree in Architecture from India and graduate degrees in Urban Planning from The Ohio State University.

Formerly on the faculty at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, his research and teaching looks at developing and applying software tools in urban planning and design.

This includes large-scale fine-resolution simulations of future land-use change and their use in planning smart cities

Following two decades with Siemens in the UAE, Libya, Germany and Pakistan, Helmut von Struve became CEO Siemens UAE and Middle East in 2020. 

As an engineer and business executive, he has been an advocate of implementing technologies in infrastructure and industries that improve our lives and protect our planet.

These days his focus is on melding technologies – such as AI, cybersecurity, additive manufacturing, 5G and the future of automation – into a cohesive bundle that will create immense value for customers. 

Her Excellency Sarah Bint Yousif Al Amiri is the UAE Minister of State for Advanced Technology. In this role, her Excellency spearheads the Ministry of Industry and Advanced Technology’s (MoIAT) efforts to empower the adoption of Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies, promoting research and development in the advanced science and technology sector to create new industries that drive the shift towards a knowledge-based economy.

As Chairwoman of the UAE Space Agency, she is also responsible for overseeing the agency’s mandate of pioneering the space sector, ensuring its contribution to the UAE’s economy and development.

Her Excellency is also the Chairwoman of the Emirates Scientists Council, Chairwoman of the UAE Council for the Fourth Industrial Revolution, Chairwoman of the Dubai Future Academy Board of Trustees, and Deputy Project Manager and Science Lead of the Emirates Mars Mission (Hope Probe) at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Space Centre (MBRSC).

Dr. Roland Busch is President and CEO of Siemens. He joined Siemens because he is passionate about applying technology to solve the world’s biggest challenges; today, he is positioning Siemens as a sustainably growing, focused technology company that will work with its customers to transform the backbone of our economies.

From more agile factories to intelligent buildings and grids, to sustainable transportation and better healthcare, Siemens’ technologies transform the everyday for the betterment of industry and society. Roland’s nearly three decades at Siemens span industries and locations – from automotive supply to the Internet of Things, from Erlangen to Shanghai.

Ahmed Al Khatib is Chief Development and Delivery Officer at Expo 2020 Dubai. He is responsible for the delivery and management of the Expo site masterplan as well as all its supporting utilities, infrastructure services, roads, networks and transportation. His role also involves managing the sustainability of the site, and coordinating with key government entities and stakeholders on the final design and construction of the site masterplan.

Ahmed joined the Expo 2020 Dubai team in 2015 having played a pivotal role in the development of the site masterplan during the UAE’s successful bid to become the host city.

He has more than 20 years of experience in end-to-end project delivery and construction in the field of buildings, utilities and infrastructure with blue-chip companies such as Dubai World Trade Centre, Dubai Holding Group, Roads & Transport Authority and Dubai Municipality.

He has played a key role in the delivery of major projects for Dubai including the Dubai Airport Tunnel, access roads and bridges to Jumeirah Palm Island, the infrastructure of Dubai Health Care City Phase II, Dubai World Trade Centre Exhibition Halls and recently the mixed-use development on Dubai Trade Centre District Phase 1.

Lubna Bouza is the Editor in Chief - Business News and Presenter at Sky News Arabia TV based in Abu Dhabi, UAE. She has led the coverage of International and GCC stock markets, trading trends, global and regional financial stories for nearly ten years.

She presents and produces "Alam Al Taqa" show: A weekly program that reviews the most important energy issues worldwide while discussing them with industry decision makers and analysts.

During her years in financial journalism, Lubna interviewed a wide range of regional and international leaders, CEOs and Ministers including ECB President Christine Lagarde, Billionaire Bill Gates, President of the World Bank David Malpass, US Special Presidential Envoy for Climate John Kerry, HE Dr. Sultan Al Jaber CEO ADNOC Group, The Minister of Finance in KSA HE Mohammed Al Jadaan, CEO of Aramco Amin Al Naser among others.

Asha Alexander is the Principal at GEMS Legacy School, Dubai. With 33 years of experience in the provision of education to K-12 students, she has overseen the school’s transition to an exclusively digital curriculum.

Asha believes in nurturing students’ hearts and minds and is particular about a value-based education. Forward thinking, she is a believer in all things digital. She is excited by the prospect of watching every child achieve his or her potential.

Asha is a UN certified Climate Change Leader in the UAE.  She has made presentations at numerous conferences and has conducted workshops on leadership, and change management for several schools in India and the UAE.  She holds Masters degrees in Educational Leadership and English. 

Daniel Render is the Director of Sustainability at Expo 2020 Dubai.  He has 27 years of experience as an registered architect and sustainability professional and has worked on major urban development and global event programmes over the last 13 years.  Outside of his role at Expo, he is the Global Technology Lead for Sustainable Programme Management at Jacobs.  Recently he has worked with experts from across sectors to develop an approach to decarbonization at a city scale that addresses a range of challenges that cities face in addition to reducing and removing carbon emissions, making cities more livable, equitable, and resilient.

Judith Wiese is Siemens’ Chief People and Sustainability Officer (CPSO), Member of the Managing Board of Siemens AG and Labor Director.  Judith has more than two decades of international experience in a wide range of HR fields. Her core capabilities also include the development and targeted application of agile work and leadership tools. She was previously Chief Human Resources Officer at DSM, a Dutch company active in health, nutrition and sustainable living. Prior to DSM, she was Vice President, People and Organization, at U.S. food group Mars Inc., where she worked for 20 years.

She studied at the International School of Economics Rotterdam (Netherlands) and the University of Duisburg (Germany) and holds an MBA in the areas of human resources and economics.

Mohammed Aly Sergie is the co-head of communications for Siemens in the Middle East. He was previously an editor at Bloomberg News where he shaped coverage of energy and commodities in the region and was the company's sole reporter in Qatar. Prior to Bloomberg, he was a senior writer/editor at the Council on Foreign Relations, where he wrote about diverse topics such as currency crises, the Northern Ireland peace process, and Islam's sectarian divide. He reported extensively from rebel-controlled territories in Syria in 2013. Mohammed covered private equity deals for Dow Jones in New York and established a bureau for the news service and The Wall Street Journal in Saudi Arabia. He graduated from Northwestern University with a degree in political science and has a master’s in economics from Fordham University.