Peter H. Diamandis

Founder, Exec. Chairman, XPRIZE Foundation

Founder, Exec. Chairman, Singularity University

In 2014 Fortune Magazine named Peter Diamandis as one of the World’s 50 Greatest Leaders.

Diamandis He is the Founder & Executive Chairman of the XPRIZE Foundation which leads the world in designing and operating large-scale incentive competitions.  He is also the Co-Founder & Exec Chairman of Singularity University, a graduate-level Silicon Valley institution that counsels the world’s leaders on exponentially growing technologies.

As an entrepreneur, Diamandis has started 17 companies. He is the Co-Founder and Vice-Chairman of Human Longevity Inc. (HLI), a genomics and cell therapy-based company focused on extending the healthy human lifespan, and Co-Founder and Co-Chairman of Planetary Resources, a company designing spacecraft to enable the detection and prospecting of asteroid for fuels and precious materials.

Diamandis is a New York Times Bestselling author of two books: Abundance & BOLD.  He earned degrees in Molecular Genetics and Aerospace Engineering from the MIT, and holds an M.D. from Harvard Medical School.

In 2016 the Greek Government honored him by issuing a 1.2 Euro stamp into circulation. Also in 2016, the book How To Make A Spaceship, Peter’s biography and the story of the XPRIZE was written by Julian Guthrie with a Foreword by Richard Branson and an Afterword by Prof. Stephen Hawking.

Poppy Crum is Chief Scientist at Dolby Laboratories. At Dolby, Poppy directs the growth of internal science. She is responsible for integrating neuroscience and psychophysical knowledge into algorithm design, technological development, and technology strategy. At Stanford, her work focuses on the impact and feedback potential of new technologies with gaming and immersive environments on neuroplasticity.
Poppy also represents scientific interests among external standards bodies and scientific organizations.

She is currently a U.S. representative to the International Telecommunication Union (ITU), and was a fellow of the US Defense Science Research Council. Prior to joining Dolby Laboratories Poppy was Research Faculty in the Department of Biomedical Engineering at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine where her research focused on the functional circuitry of the auditory cortex. Poppy is a Fellow of the Audio Engineering Society. She completed her: Post-Doctoral work at Johns Hopkins in Biomedical Engineering; PhD at UC Berkeley in Neuroscience/Psychology; M.A at McGill University in Experimental Psychology, and B.Mus at the University of Iowa in Violin Performance.

Classically trained, Harry Hamlin has degrees in acting from Yale University and The American Conservatory Theater in San Francisco. Mr. Hamlin’s stage credits include the Broadway revival of Clifford Odets’ AWAKE AND SING playing Moe Axelrod, the Broadway revival of Tennessee Williams’ SUMMER AND SMOKE playing John Buchanan and the Broadway revival of CHICAGO playing Billy Flynn. Mr. Hamlin played the title role in HAMLET at the McCarter Theatre in Princeton before playing Henry V in HENRY V at the Shakespeare Theatre in Washington D.C.

On television, among many projects over thirty years, Mr. Hamlin received multiple best actor Golden Globe nominations for his role as Michael Kuzak on NBC’s drama LA LAW and recently received an Emmy Nomination for his role as Jim Cutler on AMC’s MAD MEN. His film credits include MOVIE MOVIE ( Golden Globe Nomination), CLASH OF THE TITANS, MAKING LOVE, and the soon to be released independent films SHIVA AND MAY and THE EROTIC FIRE OF THE UNATTAINABLE, THE FOURTH NOBLE TRUTH, and DIRECTOR’S CUT  with Penn Jilette.

Mr. Hamlin is co-founder of Tri Alpha Energy, Inc. and lives in Los Angeles with his wife Lisa Rinna and their two daughters, Delilah and Amelia.

John Paul DeJoria, Co-Founder and Chairman of the Board, John Paul Mitchell Systems and The Patrón Spirits Company, is a first-generation American turned entrepreneur, philanthropist and pillar of the business community. He has struggled against the odds not only to achieve success, but to share his success with others, always living his motto: “Success unshared is failure.”

In 2011, John Paul signed Bill Gates and Warren Buffet’s “The Giving Pledge” as a formal promise to continue giving back. The same year, he established JP’s Peace, Love & Happiness Foundation as a hub for his charitable investments, which support the core values of his companies: sustainability, social responsibility and animal-friendliness.

Dr. Barmak Heshmat is a research scientist and technology conceiver at MIT media lab. Dr. Heshmat research is focused on novel optical materials and imaging systems including computational and ultrafast imaging systems and his designs evolves and combines elements from mechanical and electrical engineering. Dr. Heshmat received his Ph.D. (on optoelectronics and nanomaterials) at the University of Victoria in 2013 before he moves to MIT. He has published over 20 journal papers and is cofounder of the iMT ‘The Imaginarium of Technology’. Dr. Heshmat has developed numerous concepts for different companies such as TOYOTA, DENSO, KYOCERA and many others. His inventions have been featured on cover page of MIT website and MIT news multiple times. He has also given numerous invited talks on cutting edge technologies and their future such as: “Future of imaging” at TEDxBeaconstreet, “Before your immortality” at Boston Convention center.

Anousheh Ansari is co-founder, chairwoman, and chief executive officer of Prodea Systems, an innovative Internet of Things platform that connects people, data, and devices. As she launched her new company in 2006, she blasted off for an 11-day space expedition and captured headlines around the world as the first female private space explorer, the first astronaut of Iranian descent, and the first Muslim woman and fourth private explorer to visit space. This was the accomplishment of her childhood dream. As a successful serial entrepreneur and active proponent of world-changing technologies, she and her family provided the title sponsorship for the Ansari X Prize, a $10 million cash award that ignited a new era in private space industries. Ansari has published her memoirs, titled “My Dream of Stars,” to use her life story to inspire young woman around the world. She is a board member of the X Prize Foundation and a Vision Circle member. She is a UNESCO Good Will Ambassador and serves on the board of The Peace First and Museum of Mathematics, as well as several other not-for-profit organizations focused on STEM education and youth empowerment. She currently works to enable social entrepreneurs to bring about radical change globally, with organizations such as ASHOKA, which supports social entrepreneurship around the world. Ansari holds a bachelor’s degree in electronics and computer engineering from George Mason University; a master’s degree in electrical engineering from George Washington University; and honorary doctorates from George Mason University, Utah Valley University, and the International Space University.

Xavier Niel is the majority shareholder and historic leader of the Iliad Group. A self-taught entrepreneur, he has been a player in the telematics, Internet and telecommunications industries since the late 1980s.

In 1999 he launched Free, the first free access internet provider in France. In 2002, he created the Freebox, the first multi-service set-top box providing access to “triple play” (internet-phone-TV) in the home and since 2012, Free has also brought mobile phone usage within everyone’s reach.

He is also the founder of 42(a free IT university open to everyone and aimed at training 1,000 developers a year) and 1000 start-ups@ La Halle Freyssinet (the world’s largest digital incubator). Along with with Pierre Bergé and Matthieu Pigasse, he is also the controlling shareholder of the newspapers Le Monde and Le Nouvel Observateur.

Xavier is based in Paris, France

Twitter: http://twitter.com/@Xavier75

Pedro Domingos is Professor at University of Washington and the author of “The Master Algorithm”. He is a winner of the SIGKDD Innovation Award, the highest honor in data science. He is a Fellow of the Association for the Advancement of Artificial Intelligence, and has received a Fulbright Scholarship, a Sloan Fellowship, the National Science Foundation’s CAREER Award, and numerous best paper awards.

His research spans a wide variety of topics in machine learning, artificial intelligence, and data science, including scaling learning algorithms to big data, maximizing word of mouth in social networks, unifying logic and probability, and deep learning.

Jeff Dean is a  Senior Fellow in Google’s  Research Group, where he leads the Google Brain project. His areas of interest include large-scale distributed systems, performance monitoring, compression techniques, information retrieval, application of machine learning to search and other related problems, microprocessor architecture, compiler optimizations, and development of new products that organize existing information in new and interesting ways.

Pablos is a futurist, inventor, and notorious hacker.  He helped create the world’s smallest PC; 3D printers at Makerbot; & spaceships with Jeff Bezos.  Currently, Pablos is working for Nathan Myhrvold at the Intellectual Ventures Laboratory inventing solutions to the world’s biggest problems

Louie Schwartzberg is an award-winning cinematographer, director and producer whose notable career spans more than four decades providing breathtaking imagery using his time-lapse, high-speed and macro cinematography techniques. His three TED talks have over 47 million combined views.  Louie’s recent theatrical releases include Mysteries of the Unseen World (IMAX) with National Geographic, narrated by Forest Whitaker, and Wings of Life for Disneynature, narrated by Meryl Streep. His Gratitude Revealed web series was featured on Oprah.com. Louie also directed Soarin’ Around the World, an international update to the original Soarin’ ride now showing at Disney Parks worldwide.

Juan Pablo is an Argentinian actor and singer. He is best known in the US for playing the role of Jesus Christ on NBC’s “A.D. The Bible Continues” for which he won the Movieguide Grace Award for ‘Most Inspiring Performance” by an actor; and for portraying the role of the outrageous Fernando on Netflix’ Original series “Fuller House”. Juan Pablo has an extensive music theatre background, appearing in the movie “Mamma Mia!”, in London’s production of “Chicago” and originating the role of Danny Zucco in the Spanish production of “Saturday Night Fever” in Madrid.

As a musician, Juan Pablo has performed concerts around the world (Buenos Aires, Madrid, London and Los Angeles) and recorded an album entitled “Primer Acto”. His song ‘We Wanna Rock” was No. 1 on iTunes Spanish Charts. He appears on 3 original cast recordings (“Mamma Mia! The Movie”, “Mas de 100 Mentiras” and “Saturday Night Fever”) and is currently recording his second solo album, produced by Rion Michael. The second season of “Fuller House” premieres on December 9^th

Arash Derambardh  is a councillor in France, whose campaign against food waste led to a law forcing French supermarkets to donate unwanted food to charity has set his sights on getting similar legislation passed globally.

Arash Derambarsh declares it  “scandalous and absurd” that food is wasted and in some cases deliberately spoiled while the homeless, poor and unemployed go hungry.

Brent Bushnell is the CEO of Two Bit Circus, a Los Angeles-based experiential entertainment company building products and events that combine story and technology. Most recently the team launched STEAM Carnival, a showcase of high-tech entertainment and workshops to inspire invention. They also built a 360 video production pipeline and deployed Virtual Reality content with haptic feedback for live events with clients including NFL, NBA, Indy, Olympics, Sundance and more. The company regularly serves as immersive entertainment partners for brands and location-based facilities. Previously, Brent was the on-camera inventor for the ABC TV show Extreme Makeover: Home Edition. He was a founding member of Syyn Labs, a creative collective creating stunts for brands like Google and Disney and responsible for the viral hit Rube Goldberg music video for OK Go which garnered 45 million views. Brent is board president of the non-profit Trash For Teaching which upcycles clean corporate waste for school art supplies. In his spare time, Brent enjoys mentoring teens in entrepreneurship via programs such as NFTE. He’s a supporter of Clowns Without Borders and publishes on Twitter at @brentbushnell.

Marcus Shingles is the Chief Executive Officer of The XPRIZE Foundation (www.XPRIZE.org), a 501(c)(3) non-profit founded by its Executive Chairman, Dr. Peter Diamandis.  XPRIZE is the global leader in designing and implementing innovative competition models that utilize the unique combination of gamification, crowd-sourcing, incentive prize theory, and exponential technologies to solve the world’s grandest challenges.

Prior to XPRIZE, Marcus was a Partner at Deloitte Consulting LLP and leader of Deloitte Consulting’s Innovation Group where he worked with corporate executive teams to better understand and plan for the opportunities and threats associated with disruptive innovation driven by “exponentials” (e.g., 3d printing, block-chain, crowd-sourcing, AI) resulting from the accelerated pace of discovery, invention, and technology.  At Deloitte, Marcus also championed the strategic global partnership with Singularity University, and helped establish and lead the Innovation Partnership Program (http://ipp.biz) with XPRIZE and SU.

Marcus has over 20 years of experience, and prior to his most recent roles at XPRIZE and Deloitte, he was a successful entrepreneur founding a management consulting business working with Fortune 500 leadership teams on innovation, technology, and analytics initiatives. Earlier in his career he was the leader of the Consumer Products CRM consulting practice at Ernst & Young, and he started his career in industry at the Kellogg Company in Sales & Marketing, Global IT, and the Customer Strategy departments.

Marcus has published numerous thought-leadership pieces and presents regularly on technology trends, disruptive innovation, and related business and social impact strategies.

In his spare time, Marcus has pioneered a program in partnership with the public school system in both Los Angeles and Boston to bring “exponential entrepreneurial” training and contemporary thinking to high school students in currently underserved communities.  The program has been implemented as part of a multi-year curriculum in the classroom, designed to teach self-sufficiency and prepare students for an optimistic and exponential future.