Mr. Victor W. Hwang
Victor W. Hwang is the co-founder and Managing Director of T2 Venture Capital, a Silicon Valley venture firm at the intersection of private venture and public policy. T2VC grows startups, manages capital, and builds innovation ecosystems around the world. T2VC advises governments on capital formation and technology policy. Victor is a Kauffman Fellow, a member of a selective program to groom leaders of the venture capital industry. He is the immediate past President of Larta Institute, one of the nation's leading organizations helping to commercialize technology from key government agencies, such as the National Science Foundation and the National Institutes of Health. Victor is the co-founder of Liquidity Corporation, a water purification company backed by leading executives and investors. Victor was Chief Strategy Officer of Veatros, a video search company, where he led the company's acquisition by DivX. Before joining Larta Institute, Victor was a corporate attorney in technology matters with Irell & Manella and the international firm of Mayer, Brown & Platt. Victor practiced in a variety of legal areas, including negotiating venture capital investments, public and private equity and debt, multi-billion dollar mergers and acquisitions, and technology issues. Victor graduated from Harvard University with an A.B. with Honors, studying Government plus additional studies in Computer Science, Computer Architecture, and Operating Systems Design. He graduated from the Law School of the University of Chicago with a J.D. Victor is co-author of the new book The Rainforest, which addresses how society can enhance the output of innovation for economic growth.
Dr. Usama Fayyad
Up until September 2008, Usama was Yahoo!'s Chief Data Officer and Executive VP of Research & Strategic Data Solutions. Usama was the industry's first chief data officer, responsible for Yahoo!'s global data strategy, architecting Yahoo!'s data policies and systems, prioritizing data investments, and managing the Company's data analytics and data processing infrastructure which processed over 25 Terabytes of data per day from the click stream/search activities of over 500 million users. At Yahoo! Usama built the world’s largest behavioral targeting system operating over half a billion user profiles and accurately predicting interests in many categories. He also helped drive the BT business and grew it from $20M when he joined Yahoo! in 2004 to about $500M by the time he left the company in 2008. Usama also founded and managed the Yahoo! Research organization with offices around the world. Yahoo! Research became the premier scientific research organization to develop the new sciences of the Internet, on-line marketing, and innovative interactive applications and has attracted the top research and engineering talent worldwide in its areas of focus. Prior to joining Yahoo!, Usama co-founded and led the DMX Group, a data mining and data strategy consulting and technology company that was acquired by Yahoo! in 2004. In early 2000, he co-founded and served as CEO of digiMine Inc. (now Audience Science Inc), a data analysis and data mining company that built, operated and hosted data warehouses and web analytics for some of the world's largest enterprises in online publishing, retail, manufacturing, telecommunications and financial services. The company today specializes in Behavioral Targeting and advertising networks. Usama's professional experience also includes five years spent leading the data mining and exploration group at Microsoft Research and building the data mining products for Microsoft's server division. From 1989 to1996 Usama held a leadership role at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), where his work in the analysis and exploration of scientific databases gathered from observatories, remote-sensing platforms and spacecraft garnered him the top research excellence award that Caltech awards to JPL scientists, as well as a U.S. Government medal from NASA. Usama earned his Ph.D. in engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (1991), and also holds BSE's in both electrical and computer engineering (1984); MSE in computer science and engineering (1986); and M.Sc. in mathematics (1989). He has published over100 technical articles in the fields of data mining and Artificial Intelligence, databases, and other fields. Usama is a Fellow of the AAAI (association for Advancement of Artificial Intelligence) and a Fellow of the ACM (association of Computing Machinery), has edited two influential books on the data mining and launched and served as editor-in-chief of both the primary scientific journal in the field of data mining (Data Mining and Knowledge Discovery) and the primary newsletter in the technical community published by the ACM: SIGKDD Explorations. He holds over 25 patents in the U.S. and internationally. He is currently the Chairman of the ACM’s special interest group on Knowledge Discovery and Data Mining which runs the premier and largest annual conference on this topic.
Mr.Fayez Husseini
Mr.Fayez Husseini is a member of the investment team of Riyada Enterprise Development (RED). He is based in Palestine. Mr.Husseini, has almost two decades of professional investment experience in Palestine and the Middle East. He began his career with the Palestinian Economic Development Group. As CEO, he helped provide finance to budding small and medium enterprises (SME).
He later joined the Palestine Commercial Services Company, predecessor of the Palestine Investment Fund (PIF) as investment manager. Other appointments included Chief Marketing Officer for mobile phone company Palestine Cellular Communications (Jawwal), Head of Investment and Corporate Banking at Cairo-Amman Bank in Palestine, and Vice President of Business Development at Jordan-based Accelerator Technology Holdings. Mr. Husseini joined Abraaj Capital’s Riyada Enterprise Development from Dubai-based FRiENDi Group, the Middle East’s largest mobile virtual-network operator, where he was Senior Vice President for Business Development. Mr. Husseni holds a degree in finance from the Kogod School of Business at the American University in Washington DC.
Mr. Zeid Shubailat
Following 7 years of experience in various areas of Microsoft’s business, Zeid Shubailat, was appointed in May 2003 as the Country Manager for Microsoft Eastern Mediterranean. His responsibilities entail all aspects of the company’s business in Jordan.
A veteran at Microsoft, Shubailat’s experience in services business development for Microsoft Consulting Services and his technical skills as a senior architect / developer, contribute to generate business opportunities that would drive Jordan on the leading edge of IT.
Prior to his recent appointment as Microsoft business development manager for Jordan, Shubailat held numerous positions as a senior consultant and project manager with Microsoft Consulting Services in New York. Previously to that, Shubailat was responsible for a high profile .Net project at Citigroup as a senior Enterprise Strategy Consultant/project manager where he helped make .Net a corporate standard for web and web services development. Shubailat also worked as senior architect / developer on numerous financial services projects throughout his career.
Zeid moved after that to become the regional Education Lead for the region of Middle East and Africa and today, he heads the Marketing and Operations of North Africa, EastMed and Pakistan region as the ‘Marketing and Operations Lead’.
Before joining Microsoft, Shubailat worked as manager, new technologies research and development at National Data Corporation where part of his responsibilities included research of new internet technologies. As an entry level programmer, Shubailat earned his way to management positions in the R&D division during which period he also received numerous awards and recognitions.
In 1991 Shubailat received a B.S. in Computer Science from The Citadel, Charleston in South Carolina followed by a Masters in Health Administration from the Medical University of South Carolina. Shubailat is also a graduate of the Amman Baccalaureate School (ABS).
Mr. Jens Redmer
Is responsible for New Business Development for Google's efforts in Europe, Middle East, and Africa. This group works with Google Product and Engineering teams on incubation-exploratory efforts, technology and meta-data licensing, strategic partnerships, urgent special projects, and alternative distribution for existing and new business initiatives.
At Google, Jens was previously heading up the Google Book Search Partner Programme, signing up trade, academic and reference publishers who market their books to Google users and the Library Project, as well as Google's News Archive Search project, working with Newspaper and Magazine publishers. All these programs aim at increasing the visibility and discoverability of content to drive publishers' businesses.
Jens joined Google in January 2005 from Endemol Germany, the world's largest independent television producer, where he was director of multimedia between 2004 and 2005.
He began his career with German publishing group Axel Springer in Hamburg. In the period 1995-98 he played a key role in establishing Springer's first new media operations before becoming regional Managing Director for the group's nascent internet service provider, a joint venture with fellow publishing houses Bertelsmann and WAZ.
Between 1998 and 2001, Jens was Board Member of publicly listed ricardo.de, the premier European online auction service which was bought out by qxl.com in 2000. He ran Premium/ Paid Services for internet service provider AOL in Germany between 2001 and 2004.
Jens holds a degree in computer science and medicine from Kiel University, Germany.
Jens is Member of the Advisory Board at the Publishing Centre at the University College of London.
Professor Deeb is the founder and CEO of the Technical Group for Educational and Administrative Consultation. The group provides consultation in the areas of quality management, control and assurance for higher education as well as program accreditation. Professor Deeb is recognized as an expert in establishing Higher Education institutions in the Middle East; he is also certified EFQM assessor.
Professor Deeb is the founding President and was the President of The Arab American University in Jenin (AAUJ) in Palestine from September 2000 until April 2005. The Arab American University in Jenin is the first private university in Palestine.
He worked on this project for three years from 1997 till 2000, preparing the regulations, bylaws, academic plans and the system that will run the university.
With concentration on information technology fields, and is now considered one of the top universities in the area.
In addition to his role as University President, Professor Deeb was also a member of; the council of the Palestinian Higher Education, the Palestinian Education Initiative Executive Board, The Accreditation and Quality Assurance For Higher Education Commission and Al Quds Open University Board of Trustees.
Prior to that, Professor also helped establish Jordan University for Women in 1991, the first university for women in Jordan.
He started his career as a professor of Mathematics in several universities in different countries: University of Petroleum and Minerals in Saudi Arabia, State University of New York at Albany, Jordan University in Jordan, University of Kuwait in Kuwait, and University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA). Professor Deeb has received many awards for distinguished teaching and published over thirty papers in Mathematics.
Professor Deeb received his Ph.D in Mathematics from the State University of New York at Albany.
Mr. Abed Shamlawi
Mr. Shamlawi gathers extensive experience in leading ICT sector development and assisting public and private sector entities develop their ICT strategies and envision efficient use of technology in order to increase business efficiency, he also managed large scale public and private ICT related projects and NGOs. Recently Mr. Shamlawi has been leading the Jordan ICT and BPO Association – int@j towards being an active champion and a thought leader for the ICT Sector in Jordan. He initiated, supervised and assisted in the development and implementation of some of the high profile strategies in Jordan including an ICT investment and promotions strategy, an ICT sector strategy, a new structure and strategy for the National Information Technology Center, Jordan e-Government strategy, Saudi e-Government Program Strategy, and the Aqaba Special Economic Zone ICT Strategy.
Mr. Ashraf Arafeh
Mr Arafeh is the General Manager of Cisco Systems for Jordan and Palestine, and a board member for “Information and Communication Technology Association - Jordan (Int@j)”.
Mr Arafeh holds a BSc degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and an MBA from The American University in London.
With 24 years of industry experience, Mr Arafeh leads Cisco’s efforts to transform the country into a knowledge society by providing thought leadership, developing creative business models, and deploying the state-of-the-art technologies, and life changing networks.
Mr. Arafeh’s primary passion and focus drive private sector led country transformation through Public Private Partnerships-PPP.
Dr. Yahya Al-Salqan
Dr. Al-Salqan, President and CEO of Jaffa.Net, a leading software and communication solution expert in Palestine. He served and serving on the board of PITA and was the first Chairman of The Palestine ICT Incubator (PICTI) and recently co-founded the Mobile Monday Palestine Chapter. Before starting Jaffa. Net, he worked as a Senior Engineer at Sun Microsystems in California where he managed several projects for Solaris Operating System. At Sun, he was ranked as an Outstanding Engineer. Prior to that, he worked as an Associate Research Professor Of Computer Science at West Virginia University. He has 9 international patents, published more than 50 Refereed Articles. He was an invited speaker in many international conferences including: RSA Conference, JavaOne, IEEE COMPSA, IEEE WET-ICE,
IEEE Enterprise Security, and Med-Ibtikar. Dr. Al-Salqan chaired more than 7 international IT conferences in USA, Korea and Tunisia. He holds a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the University of Illinois, M.Sc. in Computer Science from American University, Washington DC, and B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Birzeit University.
Mr. Rafiq Masri
Mr. Rafiq Masri is the founder and president of Network Management, Inc. (NMI) established in 1994. Rafiq successfully made NMI one of the leading IT managed service providers in the Washington, DC Metro area.
Focused on small-to-midsize businesses, NMI provides day-to-day management of clients IT infrastructure, solutions to improve workflow automation, systems integrations and migrations, and troubleshooting and advice on future expansion planning.
Rafiq is an entrepreneur at heart with a wide range of experience in starting and running new businesses and has well over 20 years of experience in the IT infrastructure support and management field.
Rafiq is on the committee of the ASCII organization Cloud Services Strategy Group and is also a member of the Northern Virginia Technology Council International Committee facilitating international business cooperation.
Rafiq Masri was born in Nablus, Palestine, spent most of his childhood growing up in Kuwait, and then moved to the United States in 1979, He lives with his wife and 2 children in Vienna, VA.
Rafiq earned his BS degree in Engineering from the University of Michigan (1983) and has completed graduate level courses in business and software engineering at Harvard University and George Mason University.
In his spare time Rafiq enjoys playing guitar and spending time outdoors biking, hiking, kayaking and sailing.
Mr. Issam Andoni
Mr. Andoni is a seasoned technologist with over 20 years of enterprise and consulting experience. Mr. Andoni is the founder and current president of Zeva Incorporated; a startup company with strong credential in identity management. In addition to provide high level consulting in the field of Identity Management, Zeva Inc has developed a set of cutting edge products and tools. Recognizing Palestine as a great destination for innovation, Zeva re-allocate its research and development office to Bethlehem Palestine. For more information about Zeva, please visit http://www.zevainc.com
As part of Mr. Andoni’s commitment to innovation, he along his wife Jihan Andoni sponsor a reward called “The Andoni Young Arab Science and Technology Award”. The award objective is to recognize and encourage youths of Arab descent who have demonstrated excellence and promise in science and technology. For more information about the reward, please visit http://www.andoni.net
Mr. Andoni is a frequent speaker in many Information Identity Management focused conferences. He holds a Master’s Degree in Computer Science from American University and a PhD candidate status in Information Security from George Mason University. In addition, Issam holds many industry certificates such as: CNE, MCSE, MCT, CCNA, CCDA, CISSP, and CISM.
Mr. Samir Hulileh
Mr. Hulileh has held various management positions in the public and private sectors. Prior to joining PADICO HOLDING in 2008 as CEO, he was the Managing Director of The Portland Trust in Palestine. He also served as the Cabinet Secretary General of the Palestinian government during 2005-2006 and the Assistant Undersecretary for the Ministry of Economy and Trade in 1994-1997.
Mr. Hulileh is an active member in many economic and academic establishments. He was the Chairman of the Palestine Trade Centre (PALTRADE) in 2004-2005 and a board member since 2002. Mr. Hulileh is also the Chairman of Palestine International Business Forum as well as a board member of the Palestine Economic Policy Research Institute (MAS), Palestinian Banking Corporation, Palestinian-British Business Council, Palestinian-Russian Business Council, and the International Chamber of Commerce ICC/Palestine. He is also a member of the Board of Trustees of the Friends Schools, Ramallah.
Currently, Mr. Hulileh represents PADICO HOLDING on the boards of various subsidiary and affiliate companies; he is the Chairman of Palestine Industrial Estate Development Company (PIEDCO Holding), and a board member of PALTEL Group, Palestine Exchange (PEX), Palestine Real Estate Investment Company (PRICO), and Palestine Mortgage and Housing Corporation (PMHC).
Mr. Hulileh graduated from the American University of Beirut in 1983 with a Masters degree in Economics.
Mr. Thomas Uhl
Mr. Thomas Ludwig Uhl graduated from the University of Heidelberg as a medical computer scientist. He published several books on Linux. In 1994, he founded Thinking Objects Software GmbH, based in Stuttgart.
He was appointed to the board of directors of Topalis AG at the beginning of 2003. Mr. Thomas Uhl is a founding member of the association Open Source Business Alliance (www.osb-alliance.com) - an European Open Source business development organization. He was appointed to the board of Grau Data AG in November 2008 and became debuty chairman of the board of OSB-Alliance. Thomas Uhl is one the initiators of the project "Deutsche Wolke" (German Cloud).
Dr. Jawad Naji
Dr. Jawad Naji is currently the Prime Minister’s Advisor for Islamic and Arab Funds’ affairs; he’s also Deputy Governor of Palestine to the Arab Fund for Economic Development in Africa and the The representative of Palestine in the Administrative Committee for the AL-AQSA and AL-QUDS Funds and the Representative of Palestine to the Arab Investment and Export Credit Guarantee Corporation since 2005.
Dr. Naji was the Vice President of the Board of Directors of Palestine Capital Market Authority and the Vice President of the Board of Directors of the Municipal Development and Lending Fund for three years 2006 – 2009.
He also held many prestigious positions since the year 1974 and until this day.
Ms.Rasha Rasem
Ms. Rasem is a student at Birzeit University. Currently works for Google as a Google Student Ambassador, that markets Google products and services in campus through events. Started an initiative with couple of young Palestinians called "e7na elBalad" that aims to raise awareness about some problems we face in Palestine. Cofounded Bazinga! Ramallah and worked there as an event Planner. Volunteered at PaleXO to teach kids and their teachers how to use the XO laptop. Wokred as a trainer in the technology summer camp that taught kids game development using scratch. Loves Google!"
Mr.Hatem I Sahouri
Hatem I. Sahouri has been with MEDCOR, Inc., since 1991 serving as the CIO and Vice President of Information Systems. Sahouri is responsible for all Information Systems and related department functions at MEDCOR.
Sahouri has experience in application development, database design and system administration. He teaches programming and database design to senior level students at Roosevelt University in Schaumburg, Illinois.
In 1994, Sahouri established a local ISP in McHenry, IL in cooperation with American Information Systems, Inc. which was then acquired by Exodus. Sahouri also served as a technology advisor and director of LifeLine Pilots, a non-profit organization facilitating access to free air transportation on private aircraft for health care and other compelling human needs. Sahouri also served as a director on the BOD of Pharmacy OneSource, a healthcare Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) provider. Pharmacy OneSource was acquired by Wolters Kluwer in 2010.
In 2007, Sahouri established Iconnect. A software development and outsourcing company with offices in Ramallah. Iconnect specializes in outsourced software development with clients in the USA and Europe. Iconnect has developed several successful software systems in the healthcare and financial sectors.
Born October 13, 1965, Sahouri graduated with Honors from Illinois Institute of Technology with a Bachelor's degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering and a Master’s degree in Computer Science and Web Technology from Roosevelt University. Sahouri is also a nationally certified Emergency Medical Technician.
Dr. Hisham Kassab
Hisham Kassab, Ph.D. is the founder and president of MOBILAPS, LLC.
MOBILAPS is based in Silver Spring, MD, and specializes in mobile applications; geospatial technologies; and innovative applications for network appliances, including next-generation emergency notification technologies such as web-browser alerts and streaming video alerts.
MOBILAPS has been funded by NSF, USDA, and the state of Maryland; and counts NASA and the Open Geospatial Consortium among its clients.
Hisham received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering, M.S. in EECS, M.S.
in Operations Research, and Ph.D. in EECS from MIT. His Ph.D. dissertation was in the field of wireless networks. After MIT, Hisham worked for several years in the strategy consulting industry, first working for the multinational Booz & Co.; and then joining TMNG, a boutique firm specializing in the ICT industry.
In 2005, Hisham left the management consulting industry to launch MOBILAPS.
Mr.Marwan Tarazi
Marwan Tarazi is the Director of the Center for Continuing Education (CCE) in Palestine. CCE is a community outreach arm of Birzeit University. Its mission is to develop the capacity of institutions with a primarily impact areas focusing on i) educational institutions and ii) institutions working in community development and empowerment.
Mr. Tarazi is specialized in strategy formulation and particularly in the design and engineering of developmental interventions that respond to strategic needs of the Palestinian community with a focus on human resource development. His approach is to seek “outside-the-box” solutions, innovation, and affordable and effective modern tools and technology to achieve scalable and sustainable outcomes. He is a heavy promoter of partnerships, collaboration, research and inclusion as fundamentals for development and change.
Marwan firmly believes that one of the greatest impediments to the development and growth in the Arab World whether socially, economically or politically is the outdated and ill performing educational system at all levels: early childhood, basic education, vocational education, tertiary, and non-formal education. He believes that without serious and effective educational reform, the Arab World shall be facing much more serious social, political and economic problems in the future, with the current revolts and uprisings in many Arab countries being just the “tip of the iceberg”. This is why, Marwan believes that capacity building for educational institutions should be the single most important developmental priority in the Arab World today.
Marwan also strongly supports the principle “it takes a whole village to raise a child and it takes well raised children to make strong communities. Strong communities make strong nations”. Based on this ideology, Marwan believes that community development and empowerment at the grassroots level are also fundamental building blocks in individual and community development and in nation-building.
Some of the main initiatives that Marwan is currently involved with are: (i) “Schools.21”, a program that aims at transforming a selected number of schools into “21st Century schools”; (ii) “Knowledge Bearings”, a comprehensive vocational education program designed specifically for the Palestinian context aiming at qualifying vocational students to become employable and competitive locally and globally; (iii) “Stepping Stones into the Job Market”, a professional development program that aims at qualifying young graduates for knowledge-based industries leading to employability; (iv) “The Arab Learning Objects Bank”, a program that aims to provide a parallel learning track for students using entirely different learning strategies; ones that tap into modern communications and social media tools – combined with well-crafted methodologies, and (v) “Community Based Education”, a model for deploying the various capitals within the community in a manner that would support children’s learning and healthy growth and development outside the formal educational system.
Marwan has an undergraduate degree in Electrical Engineering from McGill University in Canada, and an MBA degree from the Kellogg’s School of Business at Northwestern University. Marwan started his career in the US and Canada in the mid 1980s, and moved back to Palestine in the early 1990s. He has been at Birzeit University since 1993 and served as director for the Computer Center and the director for the Information Technology Unit before joining CCE in 2004.
Dr. Adnan Yahya
Adnan H. Yahya is a Full Professor at the Department of Computer Systems Engineering, founding Dean of the Faculty of Information Technology and the current Vice President for Academic Affairs at Birzeit University, Palestine.
He received his PhD degree from Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois, USA in Computing in 1984.
His research interests are in Artificial Intelligence in general and Intelligent Databases, Nonmonotonic Reasoning, natural Language Processing Applied to Arabic in particular and ICT and Society. He authored/coauthored many journal and conference papers and a series of high school textbooks on ICT for the Palestinian school system. He also coordinated the evaluation of Engineering and IT programs at Palestinian Universities in 2006-2007 on behalf the Palestinian Accreditation Commission (AQAC).
Adnan Yahya had several visiting appointments at universities and research labs in the US (Duke University, University of Maryland at College Park), Germany (Munich, Koblenz, Stuttgart, Saarbrucken, and Wurzburg), France (LAAS-Toulouse) and the UK (Edinburgh), including stints as Senior Fulbright Scholar, Alexander von Humboldt Scholar and an Arab Fund for Economic and Social Development (AFESD) distinguished Scholar.
Adnan Yahya is a member of the ACM, IEEE and IEEE Computer Society and the Palestinian Engineering Syndicate.
Mr.Salim Ismail
Salim Ismail is a sought-after speaker, strategist and entrepreneur based in Silicon Valley. He travels extensively addressing topics including breakthrough technologies and their impact on a variety of industries.
Salim spent the last three years building Singularity University as its founding Executive Director and current Global Ambassador. SU is based at NASA Ames and is training a new generation of leaders to manage exponentially growing technologies. Before that he built and ran Brickhouse, Yahoo’s internal incubator. His last company, Angstro, was sold to Google in August 2010. He has founded or operated seven early-stage companies including PubSub Concepts, which laid some of the foundation for the real-time web. Salim also serves on the board of Breakthrough, a global human rights organization.
Ayman Adhair
Ayman Adhair is founder and CEO of Global Integrated Management Consulting (Global IMC), an international company providing management and technology consulting services for government and private sector clients in emerging markets. He has significant experience in government transformation, delivery of large complex IT and management consulting programs, and the development of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector in the developing and emerging markets.
He is also recognized as a thought-leader in public services quality improvement, governance, senior leadership capacity development, and electronic government. Mr. Adhair has been instrumental in developing several innovative service offerings that enabled the successful delivery of such complex engagements in the emerging markets. This included the development of: Integrated, Innovative and Informed Government (i-Gov) Solution; National ICT Eco-system; National e-Services Assessment Solution; Leaders Developing Leaders Solution; and National Project Management Capacity Building Solution.
He is a former Managing Director for BearingPoint/KPMG Consulting, $16 billion global consulting firm, where he spent 12 years with the firm UK/US offices and led expanding the firm global footprint in the developing and emerging markets. He was instrumental in developing business cases for establishing two new offices for BearingPoint, one in UAE and Qatar. Mr. Adhair led all aspects of business development and program delivery of large management consulting and IT implementation projects in several countries including projects in Qatar, Abu Dhabi, Dubai, Sharjah, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, West Bank and Gaza, Pakistan, South Korea, Montenegro, Spain, Malaysia, Brunei and USA.
Mr. Adhair has been strong promoter for the utilization of ICT for socio-economic development and government transformation. He has contributed and chaired several international events and conferences, including:
Mr. Adhair has been strong promoter for the utilization of IT for government transformation. He has contributed and chaired several international events and conferences, including:
• Speaker at the 3rd China International ICT Outsourcing Development Conference (in Wuhan) and the 2nd International Outsourcing Business Development Summit (in Hangzhou) where he shared his vision to differentiate China outsourcing industry.
• Invited by the U.S Department of Commerce to participate in a video conference with an emerging market professional association to assist them in how to enhance their sector competitiveness in order to enter the US market. He shared with the audience current US, regional and global trends and proposed a roadmap for strengthening their sector.
• Speaker at U.S. World Best Technology Showcase in Dallas, Texas, where he conducted a presentation about Innovation Eco-system for Emerging Markets as a key component of economic growth. He also was nominated as a Judge to evaluate and select this year world best technology among 50 shortlisted new technologies.
• Chaired the e-Gov strategy roundtable part of e-Strategies for Africa conference in Cape Town, South Africa. The objective of the conference is to share practical experiences of e-Gov implementations that can influence the ICT policy making at a national level.
• Conducted a workshop for Columbia University Global Executive MBA program, in New York City, addressing opportunities and risks of doing business in the Emerging Markets.
Mr. Adhair has been selected to serve in the Advisory Council of America Near East Refugee Aid (ANERA), a 42 years old $75 million nonprofit organization serving refugees across MENA region. Mr Adhair was elected as a member of the United Nations’ Information and Communication Technology Task Force. He is also the Vice President of Egyptian-American Cultural Association, one of the largest Egyptian-American non-for-profit foundations in Washington Metropolitan area.
Recently, Mr. Adhair has been selected to serve in the Advisory Board of Africa Freedom Endowment, a multibillion dollar program to enhance ICT utilization across the African continent. The endowment is managed by Phelps Stokes, a 100 year old nonprofit organization focusing on identifying, investing in, and transforming under-served communities worldwide.
Mr. Adhair holds two postgraduate degrees from London School of Economics and Political Science and a Bachelor of Science in Pure Mathematics and Computer Science.
Dr. Omar Ghosheh
Dr. Ghosheh is a founder and CEO of Dimensions Healthcare. He has more than 16 years of experience in the healthcare field. He was involved in health IT, healthcare market and scientific research. Furthermore, he managed the development and implementation of numerous health informatics solutions projects including e‐Claim solutions, medical coding and information systems for hospitals, clinics and pharmacies serving more than one thousand healthcare facility. Dr. Ghosheh before joining Dimensions Healthcare in 2008, worked with several US and Canadian companies. He has M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Kentucky, USA. He is an author of 27 international publications and has 2 patents. In October 2011, Dimensions Healthcare (a health IT company with offices in Dubai, Abu Dhabi and Ramallah) has been recognized as one of Dubai’s top innovating, performing and fastest growing companies by the Dubai SME 100 selected out of more than 72,000 SMEs in Dubai, a premier ranking launched by the Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment and Government of Dubai for SME development.
Prof.Dr. Mohammed M. Al-Subu
Was born in Jenin – Palestine, and received his university degrees; B.Sc. & M.Sc. in Chemistry from the University of Jordan, Amman, and the PhD from the University of Florida, USA in 1984. He has published over 40 research papers and books. Since 2006, Mohammed is head of the Accreditation & Quality Assurance Commission (AQAC). Besides managing the commission, he has supervised a large number of projects related to the quality of Higher and General Education; the establishment of HE bylaws, regulations, governance, self assessment, and strategic planning, etc. He was also an external reviewer of several HEIs and academic programs, and participated in several national, regional and international conferences/ workshops in HE – QA. He is a board member of ANQAHE, and an active member of several national and international steering committees, associations and organizations related to QA. Mohammed is married, and a father of two sons and three daughters.
Huda El Jack
Huda El Jack is a Senior Investment Manager, Successful Entrepreneur and a Business Development specialist with over 15 years’ leadership experience in the Middle East and USA. Ms. El Jack specializes in company diagnostics and audits, formulation and execution of turnaround strategies and company restructuring With a proven track record as an Executive Level Manager and Successful Entrepreneur, Ms. El Jack has a great passion to build and help grow successful enterprises and is keen on using expertise and industry networks to impact economic growth through promoting sustainable private sector development in Palestine.
In December 2008 Ms. El Jack, along with two friends, launched ZAMN Premium Coffee Brand with its first Flagship store opening in Al Tireh neighborhood, Ramallah. The 2nd Store, in Al Masyoon, opened in November 2010 and the partners plan to continue taking the Brand across the country and region.
Ms. El Jack currently serves as a Senior Investment Manager and ICT Subject Matter Expert in Siraj Fund Management Company, a subsidiary of Massar International. The Company currently manages Siraj Fund I - an $80 Million Private Equity Fund that made history on February 3rd 2011 – by being the first fund, dedicated to investment in Palestine, to ever close. The company is proud to already have an impressive active & diverse portfolio of investments.
Ms. El Jack holds an International Executive MBA from the Kellogg Recannati School of Management.
