Thomas Ayers has spent three decades in the development of innovative products and processes leading and participating in the engineering development of systems, process, pixel, analog VLSI, digital SOC, firmware, software, semiconductor and systems operations. Thomas began his career in DSP software development of sonar systems for the Seawolf submarine before moving to Silicon Valley and spending a decade on development of digital video compression / digital set top box systems and semiconductors. Next Thomas developed 3D ray tracing supercomputer systems and silicon before moving on to work with Cablelabs on the development of the DOCSIS3.0 cable modem RFI specification and related semiconductor and system products which became the first commercial introductions of the technology. Thomas began working in image sensors in 2007 with startup Pixim which he later sold to SONY where he spent a decade running advanced image sensor technology development programs as the top manager of SONY’s image sensor design center (California, NY, Israel). Thomas further spent four years in a position as VP R&D for onsemi automotive sensing division where he lead teams bringing more than a dozen products to production

Mr. Steinmetz is the founder of Barcoding Inc. and Barcoding Canada Ltd. With 25 years of supply chain technology experience, Mr. Steinmetz has been an industry leader, spoken at numerous trade association events, and manufacturers/distributors conferences. Key speaker for Ingram Micro's Partner Conference; addressed the entire Worldwide Motorola/Symbol Engineering team as an integration company with vision and over a dozen patents to his name. Specialties: Barcoding, RFID, BLE, UWB, 4G/5G, Supply Chain Technology, Systems Integration, Warehouse Management Systems, Routing, Dispatch, Direct Store Delivery, Proof of Delivery, Barcode Printing, Barcode Tracking, Fields Service, Work-in-Process

Geoffrey Maroun Akiki has spent almost 40 years in high technology, including executive positions with IBM, GLOBALFOUNDRIES and is currently President of HOYA LSI. He has extensive international experience in both the technical and business side of semiconductors and their associated ecosystems. He holds a B.Sc. in Chemical Engineering from Clarkson University and an MBA from the University of Vermont.

Michael E. White was the Principal Director for Hypersonics (PD,H) in the Office of the Director of Defense Research and Engineering (Modernization) within the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (OUSD(R&E)). In that capacity, Mr. White was responsible for leading the Nation's vision and strategy for developing offensive and defensive warfighting capability enabled by hypersonic systems. This included establishing the roadmap for the DoD-wide developments being pursued to field transformational warfighting capability enabled by hypersonic systems. The roadmap includes air, land and sea based hypersonic strike capabilities as well as the systems required to enable comprehensive layered defeat of adversary hypersonic capability. The efforts also include future developments based on reusable hypersonic systems. The portfolio of activity he is responsible for is in excess of $3B annually across the Services, OSD, MDA, DARPA, and SCO. SDA also has a key role in developing space as an enabler. Before his current position, Mr. White was Head of the Air and Missile Defense Sector at the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory where he led over 1,100 staff members developing advanced concepts to enhance the Nation's air and missile defense capability. Prior to this 2016 appointment as Sector Head, and starting in 2005, Mr. White served as the APL Mission Area Executive for Air and Missile Defense where he was responsible for a program portfolio that included AEGIS, STANDARD Missile, Ship Self Defense System, Cooperative Engagement Capability, the Surface Electronic Warfare Improvement Program, and Aegis Ballistic Missile Defense, along with numerous other Navy and Missile Defense Agency programs. Mr. White earned both his Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Maryland.

Drue Freeman is the former CEO of the Association for Corporate Growth, Silicon Valley, he is also a 30-year semiconductor veteran, with 15 years focused on automotive. He advises companies in the connected car and ADAS/Autonomous ecosystems and is on the Advisory Boards of several public and private.

Sam Smith has over 25 years experience in a variety of disciplines including computational intelligence, machine learning, network automation, autonomic systems, cloud based computing, intelligent control, embedded systems design, autonomous vehicles and blockchain technology. He has over 120 publications in the fields of intelligent control, survivable network automation, autonomous systems, simulation, computational search, and expert systems, including seven book chapters, 20 journal papers, and 100 refereed conference papers.

Steve Lamont focuses mostly on strategy and marketing for technology businesses. He was previously a managing partner in Accenture's strategy practice, head of marketing for McCaw Cellular Communications, and a senior engagement manager at McKinsey and Company. He currently is an angel investor at Sand Hill Angels and Silicon Catalyst Angels. He has a B.Sc. in computer science from the University of Toronto, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.