Presenters

Previous Presenters include:

Professor Jennifer Whyte

Programme Director

Director of the Centre for Systems Engineering and Innovation

Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, Faculty of Engineering

 Jennifer Whyte is Laing O'Rourke / Royal Academy of Engineering Professor of Systems Integration. Her research focus is on systems integration in civil infrastructure. This research supports the transformation to an advanced manufacturing industry with digital engineering capabilities, with decision‐support tools for engineers and managers working on complex engineering projects. This involves research with major infrastructure clients and projects to visualize and understand complex product systems; identify risk and build in resilience and support collaborative working.

 Her research interests are in systems integration and innovation in built infrastructure. The vision is of radically improving the delivery of complex infrastructure projects. The ambition for the next five years is to identify risk in and build resilience into engineered systems by developing new ways to visualize and understand relationships between parts and the systemic consequences of changes in complex product systems using digital technologies. Achieving the vision will need a team that brings mathematicians and computer scientists together with scholars of engineering to develop the basis for a new generation of tools and techniques for managing change through the life of complex product systems. She anticipates this bringing learning and innovation from other industries into construction; and exploring fundamentally new approaches that will utilise a range of machine learning, graph theory, systems dynamics and scenario planning techniques.

 Jennifer is a member of Construction Leadership Council, which draws together business leaders from across the sector, working closely with government, to drive industry improvement. She is a member of the Digital Framework Task Group, and of the advisory board for the Transforming Construction programme. She is a coinvestigator on the Transforming Construction Network Plus. She co-curates the World Economic Forum Engineering and Construction transformation map. She is a Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers.    

Professor David Gann CBE CEng FICE FCGI

Professor of Innovation and Technology Management

Imperial College Business School

David Gann is a university and business leader with extensive international experience in innovation strategy and technology management. He is Professor of Innovation and Technology Management at Imperial College Business School and was Vice-President (Innovation) at Imperial College from 2013 until March 2019. He has a PhD in Industrial Economics, is a Chartered Civil Engineer, Fellow of the Institution of Civil Engineers, Honorary Fellow of the Royal College of Art and Fellow of the City & Guilds Institute.

David has written or edited eight books exploring why and how innovation happens, the ways it continually transforms the world we live in, and how it can be managed.

He is Chairman, UK Atomic Energy Authority, non-executive board member, Directa Plus plc the world’s largest producer of pristine graphene and member of the Department of Health & Social Care Tech Advisory Board. David mentors start-ups and advises boards on innovation and technology management, including Citigroup, Gammon, IBM, Huawei, HS2, McLaren and Tata Group. David was Chairman of the Smart London Board (2012-2017), responsible for London’s digital strategy, reporting to Boris Johnson and later, Sadiq Khan. He developed Crossrail’s Innovation Strategy, and was Group Innovation Executive, Laing O’Rourke plc (2007-2011).

David was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2010 Queen's Birthday Honours for services to engineering, and received the 2014 Tjalling C. Koopmans Asset Award for extraordinary contributions to the economic sciences.

David publishes on technology management and innovation strategy in journals such as Harvard Business Review, California Management Review and Sloan Management Review, and on systems engineering in Ingenia, ICE Proceedings and Project Management Journal. He writes a blog with Mark Dodgson for the World Economic Forum (https://www.globalshapers.org/agenda/authors/david-gann/) and is author and co-author of eight books, published in seven languages including Chinese, Malay, Portuguese, Italian, Japanese and Arabic. Most recently:

• ·       The Playful Entrepreneur, with Mark Dodgson, Yale University Press, 2018
• ·       Innovation: a very short introduction, 2^nd edition, with Mark Dodgson, OUP, 2018
• ·       The Oxford Handbook of Innovation Management, with Mark Dodgson and Nelson Phillips, OUP, 2014

Adam Locke, Laing O'Rourke 

Mark Farmer

Founding Director & CEO

Cast Consultancy

Mark has 30 years’ experience in construction and real estate and is a recognised international commentator on a variety of industry and policy related issues. Mark is a member of the Mayor of London’s Construction Skills Advisory Group, a board member for the Construction Scotland Innovation Centre, a co-chair of Constructing Excellence, a vice chair of the ULI UK Residential Council, a trustee of the MOBIE educational charity and is an honorary professor at The University of Salford’s School of Built Environment.

Mark authored the Farmer Review, an influential 2016 independent government review of the UK’s construction labour model entitled ‘Modernise or Die’. He is a member of the Construction Innovation Hub Industry Board and chairs the MHCLG joint industry working group tasked with enabling greater use of Modern Methods of Construction in the residential sector.

Ben Kidd, ARUP 

Alain Wahaa. Buro Happold

Peter Court

Cast Consultancy 

Peter is an experienced Mechanical and Electrical Project Leader with an Engineering Doctorate in Lean Construction. He has over 40 years’ experience in the Construction Industry for major UK based Mechanical and Electrical Contractors delivering a wide portfolio of large, complex, multi-discipline projects across various sectors in the UK and overseas.

Owner of TAKT Consultancy Limited, a Lean Construction advisory organisation which specialises in improving Mechanical and Electrical onsite assembly processes and associated upstream activities on complex construction projects and within businesses.

Peter’s passion is to share and apply the knowledge he’s gained and contribute to lean principles and methodologies to drive efficiencies in cost, labour and productivity and to improve on health and safety performance, thus transforming the way we construct. He also enjoys self-development, keeping fit and socialising.

Danny Budzac, LLDC

Phil Langley

Creative Technologies, Board Director, ARB

Bryden Wood

Phil leads the ‘Creative Technologies' team’ at Bryden Wood which brings together different strands of BIM and computational design including algorithmic design + simulation, connected tech, mixed reality environments, big data analytics and robotics + digital manufacture. This group is focused on developing innovative new approaches to digital technology that can be used by the design and delivery teams as well as clients and end-users.

Rory Bergin

Partner, Sustainable Futures

HTA Design LLP

Rory Bergin set up HTA’s Sustainable Futures team in 2007 to improve the sustainability of our work. Areas of expertise include building physics, daylight and sunlight, energy, microclimate, prefabrication and the BREEAM sustainability standards.

Rory led the sustainability aspects of many of HTA’s award-winning projects including Hanham Hall, Apex House, the Aylesbury Estate and the Merton estates.

Rory presents HTA’s work in the UK and abroad, and contributes to the press on sustainability matters from energy policy to the ethics of development.

He leads the practices involvement in offsite R&D and represents HTA on the Construction Leadership Council, the advisory Board of Active House and The Housing Forum.

Darren Twomey

Construction Director

Tide Construction

Darren Twomey BE. C. Eng is Construction Director for Tide Construction; one of the world's leading modular Development and Contracting Companies specialising in the Residential, Hotel and Student sectors.  Together with its accredited offsite manufacturing company; Vision Modular Systems, Tide has delivered some of the most high profile modular projects in the UK including the 29 storey Apex House; Europe's Tallest Modular Building within a 12 month total construction programme.

Darren was educated in the University of Glamorgan where he acquired his Civil Engineering Degree majoring in structural engineering.  He then spent three years working as a Civil Engineer in highway construction in Ireland before moving to Australia where he gained experience in infrastructural projects. On returning to Ireland, Darren completed his chartership in  civil engineering and has since then been involved in offsite construction methodologies.

With his Engineering and Construction background, Darren brings over 25-years' experience and has overall responsibility for Tide's Construction and Estimating Teams, who are currently on-track to deliver the World's Tallest Modular building at 44 & 38 storeys high providing 546 homes within a 2 year construction programme.  He has an in-depth knowledge of modular construction and has been instrumental in advancing and refining the Vision Modular System through significant investment in research and development.

Some of the key benefits of the Tide / Vision Modular system include reduced construction programmes, programme and cost certainty, enhanced quality and significate sustainability benefits such as 80% less construction waste and 50% less CO2 produced during construction.  Darren and his dedicated teams work diligently to ensure the many benefits are executed on all of Tide and Vision's projects.

Dr Andreas B. Eisingerich 

Business School

Professor of Marketing

 Dr Andreas B. Eisingerich is Professor of Marketing at Imperial College Business School, Vice-Head of the Management Group and Programme Director of the Full-Time MBA. He obtained a two-year scholarship to attend Li Po Chun United World College in Hong Kong, holds a BSc degree from the London School of Economics, and a PhD from the University of Cambridge, Judge Business School, where he also earned his master degree. Prior to joining Imperial College Business School, Dr Eisingerich managed the Center for Global Innovation at the University of Southern California's Marshall School of Business in Los Angeles.

Dr Eisingerich is best known for his work on brand attachment, consumer engagement, service innovation, and digital marketing strategies. Recently Dr Eisingerich published a book together with Professor C. Whan Park and Deborah J. MacInnis called Brand Admiration: Building a Business People Love (Wiley; 2016), exploring how brand love, trust, and respect can be built, strengthened, and leveraged over time. Current research projects are on the effective use of cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) and gamification in the context of mobile health (mHealth) solutions, the design of digital applications for enhanced user well-being, consumer attachment to digital offerings, reducing the demand for illegal wildlife products, psychological ownership in the sharing economy, and consumer relationships with brands in different business and industry contexts. 

Dr Eisingerich's research work has been accepted for publication at the Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Psychology, Journal of Service Research, Harvard Business Review, Journal of Medical Internet Research, European Journal of Marketing, MIT Sloan Management Review, Research Policy, California Management Review, Journal of Services Marketing, and the Wall Street Journal, among others. He served on the editorial board of Ernst & Young's Performance magazine. Dr Eisingerich co-developed a novel index of innovative firms published by the USC Marshall Center for Global Innovation and manages a Bill & Melinda Gates foundation sponsored global pre-marketing research project together with the World Health Organization, UNAIDS, and the World Wildlife Fund. His work was translated into several languages worldwide, including Chinese, Korean, Spanish, Polish, and Japanese. Professor Eisingerich acts as a reviewer for the Journal of Marketing, Journal of Consumer Psychology, Journal of Service Research, Research Policy, Journal of Medical Internet Research, and Journal of Services Marketing, among others. He taught as visiting professor at the Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich.

Schedule