FT-ETNO Summit 2015

Dr Wilhelm Eschweiler is Vice Chair 2015 and the Incoming Chair 2016 for BEREC. He is also one of the two Vice Presidents of the Bundesnetzagentur, a position he has held since May 2014, where his responsibility includes telecommunications and rail. Previously, Dr Eschweiler was responsible for the European ICT policy in the Federal Ministry of Economics and Energy, where he served as Head of Unit from 2007-14. From 2002-06, he was Head of Unit for international telecoms and postal services policy and from 1998-2002, he was an advisor in the unit for the policy of regulation. 

César Alierta has been Executive Chairman of Telefónica since July 2000, and is member of the Boards of Directors of Telecom Italia, China Unicom (Hong Kong) and International Consolidated Airlines Group (IAG). Mr Alierta is also member of the Colombia Business School Board of Overseers and Chairman of the Social Board of the UnED (national Long Distance Spanish University). Between 1970-85, he was General Manager of the Capital Markets division at Banco Urquijo in Madrid. Subsequently, he was the Chairman and founder of Beta Capital, which he combined, from 1991, with his post as Chairman of the Spanish Financial Analysts' Association. Between 1996-2000, Mr Alierta held the post of Chairman of Tabacalera, S.A. (formerly known as Altadis). He has also been a member of the Board of Directors and Standing Committee of the Madrid Stock Exchange as well as member of the Board of Plus Ultra Compañíade Seguros y Reaseguros, Telefónica Internacional, Iberia and Altadis. In January 1997, he joined the Board of Directors of Telefónica. Mr Alierta holds a degree in law from the University of Zaragoza, Spain, and earned an MBA at the University of Columbia (New York) in 1970.

Carlo D'Asaro Biondo became Google’s President of Strategic Relationships for Europe, the Middle East and Africa in January 2015.

He joined the company in 2009, managing operations in southern and eastern Europe, the Middle East and Africa for five years.

Previously, Mr D’Asaro Biondo was CEO of International Operations at Lagardère Active Digital from 2007-09. He became CEO of AOL Europe in 2006, having been CEO of AOL France and Senior Vice President in charge of strategy since 2004. Prior to this, he was Vice President and Managing Director for EMEA Telecommunications and Media at Unisys (2001-04) and CEO for France at KPMG Consulting (1998-2001), having joined KPMG Consulting Italy in 1994.

He began his career as a consultant at Macfin Management Consultants.

A dual French and Italian national, he graduated from La Sapienza University in Rome and lives in Paris.

Mike Fries is President and CEO of Liberty Global. A 30-year veteran of the cable and media industry, he has spent nearly his entire career building international distribution and programming businesses. Today, Liberty Global is the largest international cable company in the world providing 27 million customers with 56 million video, voice and broadband internet services. Liberty Global has operations in 14 countries and generates $18 billion of revenue. Mr Fries was a founding member of the management team that launched the company's international expansion over two decades ago, and has served in various strategic and operating capacities since that time. He was appointed President and CEO in 2005 and is a member of Liberty Global's board of directors and its two-person executive committee along with the company's chairman, Dr John C. Malone.

Mr Fries is a Telecom Governor and Steering Committee member of the World Economic Forum, and a member of the World Presidents Organization. He also serves as a trustee or board member of a number of professional and philanthropic organisations including CableLabs®, The Cable Center, Museum of Contemporary Art - Denver, the Denver Biennial of the Americas, the Alliance for Choice in Education, and Teach for America, among others, and was recently appointed to the board of Grupo Televisa S.A.B. He was named Communications Executive of the Year (2010) by Communications Technology Professionals, Entrepreneur of the Year in Media, Entertainment and Communications (2012) by Ernst & Young, Industry Leader of the Year (2010, 2013) by Digital TV Europe, and honoured by 5280 Magazine's Top of the Town Awards, Reader's Choice as Top Humanitarian (2013). In June 2011, Mr Fries was inducted into Cable Television Pioneers association. Mr Fries holds a BA from Wesleyan University (where he is a member of the President's Advisory Council) and an MBA from Columbia University.

Stéphane Richard has been Chairman and CEO of Orange since March 2011. Having joined the company in September 2009, and has successively occupied the positions of Deputy CEO in charge of French operations, CEO Delegate, and CEO. From 2007 to 2009, Mr Richard was Chief of Staff to the French Minister for the Economy, Industry, and Employment. Prior to that he was Deputy CEO of Veolia Environnement and CEO of Veolia Transport, as well as being a director of Orange. Between 1992 and 2003, he was deputy to the CFO of Compagnie Générale des Eaux, CEO of Compagnie Immobilière Phénix, and Chairman of CGIS (Compagnie Générale d’Immobilier et de Services), now Nexity.

Mr Richard is a graduate of École des Hautes Études Commerciales (HEC) and École Nationale d’Administration.

Timotheus Höttges has been CEO of Deutsche Telekom AG since January 2014.

From 2009 until his appointment as CEO, he was a member of the Board of Management responsible for Finance and Controlling. For the three years preceding that, he was a member of the Board of Management responsible for the T-Home unit. In this position, Mr Höttges oversaw the fixed-line network and broadband business, as well as integrated sales and service in Germany. Under his leadership, T-Home became the market leader in terms of new DSL customers and developed its Internet TV service, Entertain, into a mass-market product while stabilising its profitability. After implementing various cost-cutting programmes at T-Home and in the European mobile communications subsidiaries, Mr Höttges became responsible for the Group-wide Save for Service efficiency enhancement program. In 2005, he headed European operations as member of the Board of Management, T-Mobile International.

From 2000 until 2004, he was Managing Director, Finance and Controlling, before becoming Chairman of the Managing Board of T-Mobile Deutschland.
In 1992, he joined the VIAG Group, where he became divisional manager in 1997 and, later, a member of the extended management board responsible for controlling, corporate planning, and M&A. As project manager, he played a central role in the merger between VIAG AG and VEBA AG, which together formed E.on AG, in 2000.

Mr Höttges studied business administration at Cologne University, going on to spend three years with a business consulting company.

Dominique Leroy has been CEO of Proximus since January 2014.

Having joined Belgacom in October 2011 as Vice President of Sales for the Consumer Business, she became Executive Vice President of the Consumer Business in June 2012, also joining the Executive Committee.

Ms Leroy is an independent board member at Lotus Bakeries and Delhaize, and board member at Proximus subsidiaries Tango, Telindus and BICS.

She started her career at Unilever, where she held positions in marketing, finance, logistics, sales and general management. From 2007 until 2011, she was Country Manager and Vice President Customer Development at Unilever Belgium, and member of the company’s Benelux Board.

Ms Leroy also won the Trends Business Woman Award in the CEO category in 2014.

She is also a member of professional and management associations including Women on Board, Young Professional Organization, UBA and Guberna.

Ms Leroy graduated the Solvay Business School in 1987 with a degree in business engineering. In 2013, she Leroy received the title of Master Marketeer from StiMa (Stichting Marketing).

Ding Yun (Ryan Ding) serves as the President of Products & Solutions of Huawei Technologies and is one of the board’s executive directors.

In his role as President of Products & Solutions, Mr Ding’s responsibility is to provide ICT convergent solutions to service providers as well as enterprise and industry customers. In addition to product planning, development, and delivery, he is also responsible for building product competitiveness.

Since joining Huawei in 1996, Mr Ding has held several senior positions including CEO of Carrier Network Business Group, President of the Global Marketing Department, President of the Global Solution Sales Department, and President of Fixed Network Product Line, Core Network Product Line and Network Product Line.

Mr Ding holds a MSc in Electrical Engineering from Southeast University in China.

Giuseppe Recchi has been Chairman of Telecom Italia since April 2014. He was previously Chairman of the Board of Eni SpA (2011-14). Mr Recchi is a member of the Board of Directors of UnipolSai Assicurazioni SpA, a member of the executive committee of Confindustria (where he chaired the Foreign Investment Committee), the Italian Corporate Governance Committee, the Italian Institute of Technology and a member of the Board of Assonime (Italian Joint Stock Companies). He is also Co-Chair of the B20 Task Force on Improving Transparency and Anti-Corruption and Director of the World Economic Forum Partnering Against Corruption Initiative. Mr Recchi was President and CEO of GE South Europe (until May 2011). He joined General Electric in 1999 and during his time at the company held several managerial positions in Europe and in the USA, including Director of GE Capital Structure Finance Group, CEO of GE Capital SFG Italia and Managing Director for Industrial M&A and Business Development of GE EMEA.  In 1989 he started his career as an entrepreneur at Recchi SpA, a general contractor active in 25 countries in the construction of high-tech public infrastructure. From 1994-99 he served as Executive Chairman of Recchi America Inc., the US branch of the Group, and then as Managing Director for overseas of Gruppo Ferrocemento-Recchi.

Mr Recchi was a member of the Board of Directors of Exor SpA. He has served on several boards, including the European Advisory Board of Blackstone; the Advisory Board of Invest Industrial (private equity); the Massachusetts Institute of Technology E.I. Advisory Board; the Honorary Committee for the Rome Candidacy to the 2020 Olympic Games; FEEM- Eni Enrico Mattei Foundation. Mr Recchi graduated in Engineering at the Polytechnic University of Turin. He has been Visiting Professor in Corporate Finance at Turin University (2004-06).

Rajeev Suri is President and CEO of Nokia. He joined Nokia in 1995 and has held numerous executive level positions in the company. Previously, he was CEO of Nokia Solutions and Networks (2009-14) where he delivered a complete turnaround, taking non-IFRS operating profitability from significant losses to among the highest quality in the sector; cash flow from rapid burn to strongly positive; and, based on external analyst estimates, increasing the value of the business from in the range of €1bn to €9-10bn. In his earlier roles as head of the Global Services unit and APAC region, he delivered both strong growth and profitability improvements.

Mr Suri is a leader with a passion for creating value, generating growth, and delivering technologies that have a positive impact on people’s lives. He has deep expertise in many areas of technology, particularly mobile networks and related topics such as big data analytics, cloud computing, internet business models and more. In his more than 25 years of international experience, Mr Suri has worked in roles comprising strategy and M&A, product marketing, sales, major account leadership, regional and business unit leadership and has lived in Middle East, Asia, Africa and Europe. Mr Suri has a Bachelor of Engineering in Electronics and Communications from Manipal Institute of Technology, India. 

Stephen Howard is Head of the HSBC Telecoms Research team, which specialises in thematic reports analysing the sector's key regulatory, technological and competitive dynamics. Mr Howard has covered telecoms since joining HSBC in 1996, having previously worked with IBM.

Maggie Fanari has been with Teachers' since 2006 when she joined the Public Equities department as a Senior Energy Income Trust Analyst. She moved to Teachers' Relationship Investing group in 2007 and has worked on transactions in multiple sectors. Previously, she worked on equity research at Scotia Capital and started her career at KPMG as an auditor. Ms Fanari is a Chartered Accountant and a CFA charterholder. She also holds a BBA from the Schulich School of Business, York University. 

Warren Low joined the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) in May 2005 as European Portfolio Manager focusing on a range of industrial sectors which include Commercial Banks, Energy, Chemicals and Media. Prior to joining USS, Mr Low worked at Asymmetric Capital Management, a convertible bond hedge fund. Most of his prior career was spent at Pavilion Asset Management, a third party asset management business, managing a range of Life, Pension, Unit and Investment trusts. Mr Low graduated with an Honours Degree in Business Studies from the University of Brighton and is an Associate Member of the UK Society of Investment Professionals (UKSIP).

Henrik Nyblom joined Schroder Investment Management in January 2014, having in total over 17 years of experience as a telecoms investor and analyst. Prior to joining Schroder he was Managing Director in Telecoms Equity Research at Nomura and previously worked for Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch. Mr Nyblom holds an MSc in business administration from Gothenburg University of Business and Commercial Law.

Roger Wilkinson is Head of the Global Research Team at Newton Investment Management, specialising in the telecommunications sector. He is a member of the investment committee and of the research prioritisation and responsible investment groups. Prior to joining Newton in 2000, he worked as a product controller at Nomura, having previously worked as a derivatives controller at UBS. He began his career as an accountant at Ernst & Young, where he qualified as a chartered accountant.

Wolfgang Bock is a Senior Partner and Managing Director of The Boston Consulting Group where he heads the telecoms sector globally.  He has more than 25 years of experience in advising executive teams on strategy, M&A and business transformation. Mr Bock has authored a number of articles on the future of converged communications and co-authored a number of public policy reports.  He is frequently quoted by a range of publications, and is widely recognised as a subject matter expert. He has a degree in business administration and industrial engineering from the KIT, Karlsruhe, Germany.

Steven Tas has been Head of Proximus' regulatory department since 2008 and Executive Board Chairman of ETNO – the association representing Europe’s leading telecom operators – since January 2015.

He has been a member of the ETNO board since 2009 and a member of the board of the Centre on Regulation in Europe (CERRE) since 2010.

Mr Tas joined Belgacom-Proximus in 1994 and has occupied various positions within the company’s strategy division.

Mr Tas holds a Master’s degree in Civil Engineering and Industrial Management from the University of Leuven.

Dan Thomas has been the Financial Times’ Executive News Editor since August 2018. Dan was previously the FT’s deputy companies editor and telecoms editor.

Prior to that, he worked as the FT’s property correspondent. He has also reported for FT Money and FT Weekend’s personal finance supplement. Prior to joining the FT in March 2007, he was an assistant editor for Property Week.

Dan holds a postgraduate degree in journalism from City University and a BA in English and Philosophy from Manchester University. He was named Business Journalist of the Year at the LSL Property Awards and awarded IBP News Reporter of the Year – both in 2010.