Ahmed Adel is the DPE Sales and Operations Director for Microsoft Middle East and Africa. DPE (Developer and Platform Evangelism) delivers programs targeting Software developers and IT Professionals in Academia, ISVs, customers and communities ensuring latest Microsoft technologies and platforms are accessible. Ahmed has 21 years of experience in technology with focus on the Software industry with a mix of different roles in multinational companies and managing Egyptian Software houses. Ahmed is a graduate of Engineering Cairo University 1990 and holds a M.Sc. degree in Computer science from University of Louisville, Kentucky, USA. During July 2009, Ahmed led the hosting of Imagine Cup WW Finals in Cairo, Egypt.

Aly Ibrahim has been a Software Engineer at Google since 2007. He is currently working on Google’s Customer Relationship Management platform. Previously he worked on the Billing and Payments team, helping to building one of the world’s most flexible and global monetization systems. Aly holds a Bachelor’s of Science in Computer Science from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Amina Belghiti is Facebook’s Head of Platform Partnerships for New Markets. Her team is tasked with increasing the use and engagement of the Facebook Platform across CEEMEEA markets through the establishment of partnerships with media, commerce and gaming companies and innovative start-ups. Prior to Facebook, Amina held senior roles at eBay and PayPal where she led PayPal’s developer platform in Europe and previously worked in the strategy & business development team at the company’s headquarters in San Jose, California. Amina holds a degree in Economics from Williams College and an MBA from Harvard Business School. Born in Morocco, she has lived across the US, Europe and MENA- she is now based in Paris.

Anas Toumeh is the Director of Operations at Vardot, a company that provides web and mobile services to clients and partners within the region and worldwide. His role is to drive the strategic positioning of Vardot by building global partnerships and creating the internal platform that allows Vardot to provide technical road maps that target their specific business growth. Anas uses his expertise in agile project management and data mining to build and manage teams that successfully implement data driven decisions and effectively (ultimately) execute well structured projects. In addition to web development, Anas has worked in engineering, specifically robotic path planning using artificial and computational intelligence.

Anna Chernova works as a Quantitative Analyst at Google. She is responsible for data analyses for Google Geo teams, including Google Maps for Desktop and Mobile, Google Earth and other geo-related products. She has been with Google since 2007, conducting data scientist work in London and Zurich in close collaboration with engineering and user experience teams. Anna holds a B. Sc. in Physics. She studied at the University of St-Petersburg, Russia, and in a Ph. D. programme at the Oxford University, UK, and worked in a bioinformatics group at the National Institute of Medical Research in London. The main focus of her studies and work prior to Google was quantitative data analyses and statistics, applied to various fields of knowledge.

Basel Al-Naffouri is a Software Engineer on the Google+ Mobile team. Specifically, he works on the Messenger feature of the Google+ app, helping users communicate on the go. Prior to that, Basel was part of the Arabic Engineering team working on improving Google technologies for the Arab world. Basel joined Google in 2010 from Oracle Corporation where he was a Senior Member of Technical Staff. At Oracle, he developed tools to help DBAs manage and tune Oracle Databases as part of the Enterprise Manager team. He has also worked at ArsDigita corporation and started his own venture, Validyss corporation, specializing in cloud storage management. Basel holds a Bachelors and Masters degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT.

Beshr is a Python and web developer based in Beirut. He is managing the development of ArabNet's online services and leading the ArabNet Developer Days. Beshr is involved with the open source community, specially projects related to the Python programming language and Django web framework. He's passionate about algorithms, web design, and indie music.

George caught the digital bug in the late 90s and since then he's immersed in 0 and 1, particularly the user experience aspect of the digital sphere. He believes that simplicity is beauty in all design contexts. From interfaces to interiors to architecture to graphic design. He found himself in the User Experience field after one of his managers pointed out a natural tendency for usability and UX in general. By putting people at the heart of the design process – from brief to execution, George aims to deliver top-notch experiences that are reflected in the diverse portfolio he worked on. Prior to heading the digital planning at Born Interactive where, he was an interactive manager at Wunderman with an emphasis on mobile and a user experience consultant for different agencies.

Ghassan focuses on the promotion and adoption of Microsoft Platform technologies. Before joining Microsoft, Ghassan has more than 8 years of experience in the IT industry. He was a software developer at An-Nahar Newspaper. At the same time he was managing his own company that deals with software/web development. Ghassan is also the creator of the Green Search Engine Gusfinder.com, an engine that combines all search engines.

Prior to working in Microsoft Goksin Bakir led one of the leading manufacturing software companies in Turkey. Besides his experience of over 17 years in the IT Industry, Goksin used to be the Microsoft Regional Director for Middle East and Africa. During his work as Regional Director, He also worked as a part time faculty for Bogazici University, MIS department. He is in the INETA Speakers Bureau and has spoken to many groups worldwide as well as at international conferences and seminars like Microsoft Teched, MDC, PDC, and NDC. He contributes to IT publications like PC Week, IT Weekly. Goksin has many excellence awards from leading software and IT companies. Goksin’s main areas of interest are; Cloud computing, parallel programming, data perception and Security. He has completed many projects in academia and large corporations with his teams; His recent work includes Enterprise solutions on .Net technologies.

In this current role, Gustavo Lang is responsible for bringing new business opportunities around technologies, platforms and services to local markets through Nokia mobile phones. Bringing 11 years of experience working for Nokia in product marketing and sales positions in Latin America, he is now helping Nokia to connect the next billion internet users across Africa, Middle East and India. Gustavo holds a BE in Telecommunications Engineering from the Faculdade de Engenharia Industrial, Sao Paulo.

Ibrahim Kivanc is responsible for client technologies development, Windows 8 and HTML5. He is focused on XAML + C# development and User Experience on client applications. Ibrahim holds a bachelor degree in Computer Engineering and has started his Master degree in MIS.

Joumana has a background in graphic design from the American University of Beirut and a Masters in Design Management from IED, Barcelona. Passionate about connecting brands to people, she works on creating processes that engage users and create loyalty. She enjoys facilitating workshops to reach a customized process that combines design, user needs, and market demands, helping companies change perspectives. Truly passionate about visual expression and storytelling, she is always looking for inspiration from street photography to blogging with her cat.

Mashhoor Aldubayanis a User Experience Designer passionate about improving how things work, and understanding how users think. Worked with a plenty of companies and startups in improving their web and mobile experiences to reach their potential. Mashhoor started a specialized resource about User Experience in Arabic at uxfix.com, with more than 100 specialized articles to evangelize the benefits of this field.

Maya Zankoul is a visual artist and UI/UX designer, specialized in web, mobile and tablet. Her passion is designing fun, hand-crafted and unique apps which stand out from the crowd. She's the author of two best-selling comic books based on her popular blog 'amalgam'. She enjoys all types of challenges: from designing a local small home-made website to a full-fledged mobile application for international brands. She currently works from her own design studio in Beirut, by her own rules. You can find more about her work on pro.mayazankoul.com

Mia Azar completed her MA in Spatial & Product Design at Kingston University London in 2009 after obtaining her BFA in Graphic Design from the American University of Beirut. In February 2010, she joined PenguinCube, an award-winning design consultancy in identity design, interface design and wayfinding design, and has been part of their team of design enthusiasts ever since. Mia has the incredible ability to appear composed and nonchalant in stressful situations. She makes even the most extreme sports look like casual Sunday activities. A technophile and serial ‘tweeter’; her laugh will resonate in your ears for hours.

Mohamed Yamama works on evangelizing Windows Phone Platform and development to MEA developers. Yamama’s history with mobile development is not recent. He developed an application on Windows Mobile during the Imagine Cup 2009 in Egypt that was awarded the “Best Windows Mobile Application” trophy by Steve Ballmer personally. Yamama holds a Bachelor degree in Computer Science from the American University in Cairo.

Riccardo Musolesi started his career with a degree in Interior Design from IED Milan, a post grad in designing Food Experiences from POLI.design Milan, and a Master in Design Management from IED Barcelona. He's an infoholic and needs to get his daily dose of world, economy and tech news along with his espresso. Putting all this knowledge to work in order to create the customized programs at Mirada, he bridges the gap between design and business, through training and consulting, engaging people to undertake design that led solutions within their companies.

Runa is a security researcher and developer based in London, UK. She is interested in security, cryptography, privacy, and online anonymity.

Sébastien Marteau is the VP of Mobile Services at Intigral, with a mandate to oversee the company’s mobile operations and manage third-party ecosystem. Sebastian also supports in the migration of traditional mobile services (SMS/MMS) into the more advanced internet mobile applications. He plays a key role in expanding the company’s operations regionally and internationally. Prior to joining Intigral, Sebastian was Vice President - Sales and Business Development of Fox Mobile Group. He led the sales and operations team to secure content portals & services outsourcing partnerships with major operators in Europe across all content verticals. He established successful account management strategies with key service providers. He was also in charge of all billing aggregators and mobile operators wholesale & direct connectivity activities in 23 countries. Sebastian has extensive experience in the mobile industry in both large multinationals and start-ups and is very well versed in all aspects of mobile content and value added services.

Connecting hungry people with restaurant owners, that was Sleiman's first mission when he decided to leverage the tools available online. Going through the different stages of the "one website project", he turned that into a lot of websites and his project into an agency. The agency's focus: digital emotions through innovative use of available tools and creative set of custom made development. Based on the idea that most of the industries have yet to adapt to this new world order, he built a team of passionate people to support companies willing to make the move. He believes in SEO, content and emotions.

Stephane Crozatier is a software engineer at Facebook based in Paris. His team is tasked with helping strategic regional partners build social products leveraging the Facebook platform through the open graph. Before Facebook, Stephane worked for Microsoft. He helped software companies build scalable solutions on the Windows Azure cloud computing platform, and managed the technology partnerships with the leading Independent Software Vendors in France. He also previously worked on Windows Phone, Windows and .Net.

Tammam Yamout earned his bachelor of Graphic Design at the American University of Beirut in 2004. Since then he has been working at PenguinCube, a design consultancy which he co-founded that same year. PenguinCube, which provides consultancy in identity design, interface design and wayfinding design, has gone on to gain international recognition for their work and have been recipients of the Red Dot Design Award, the IF Design award as well as the prestigious SEGD honor award in wayfinding. Starting off as a team of two, he has seen the company grow to a multidisciplinary team of fourteen enterprising individuals working together. Tammam has super-human energy and an uncanny ability to think of (and tackle) twenty things at once. A geek and admitted air miles addict, with a passion for running, and a ridiculously good memory.

William Kanaan, New Business Development Manager - Emerging Markets, is a high tech veteran who has founded and worked for several startups in the Silicon Valley and Canada. He has been a senior software architect and consultant at Netscape, Sun and Fujitsu consulting. During the last 7 years at Google, William worked on Mobile, News and Ads systems. William holds a bachelor degree in computer science.