George Uriesi’s career spans more than 20 years, mostly in airline and airport operations as well as the safety and economic regulation of the industry. He also spent three years in the FMCG business as a Product Supply Manager with Procter & Gamble South Africa.

Tim Young is the Assistant Vice President Marketing Director for Brown-Forman Global Travel Retail/India, Middle East and Africa.

Nisreen Shocair has been the President of Virgin Megastore for the Middle East since 2006. Virgin Megastore Middle East is a leading entertainment brand and retailer in the region, synonymous with youth, trends, entertainment and culture. Nisreen has been instrumental in building the Virgin brand across the region by incorporating local and international consumer trends into one shopping experience.

Before joining Virgin Megastore, Nisreen held positions at Sony Music, Bertelsmann AG and Hearst Entertainment. She has extensive experience within the music, publishing, licensing, digital and retail sectors.

Nisreen holds Masters degrees in Business Administration from both London Business School and Columbia University, and has a global perspective on business, having lived and worked in New York, London, the Middle East and Africa. She is on the advisory board of several digital and environmental start-ups.

Nisreen was awarded Female CEO of the Year by CEO Middle East in 2011 and Businesswoman of the Year by Women in Leadership in 2011. She was ranked 35th Most Powerful Arab Woman 2012 by CEO Middle East Magazine and the 104th World’s Most Influential Arab 2012 by Arabian Business Magazine.

John Reynolds is a business graduate from Dublin, Ireland. He began his retail operations career with Aer Rianta in Dublin before working with Aer Rianta International – Middle East from 1992 to 2002.

Grant Hatch is an experienced strategy consultant, business leader and entrepreneur with highly developed analytical, programme management and team leadership skills. He has extensive experience in Africa leading market and sector research, market entry, acquisition due diligence and business structuring assignments across Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Ethiopia, Senegal, Angola, Botswana, Mozambique and South Africa. His research focus has been on understanding consumer growth and segmentation in Africa. He has worked extensively along the agri production and processing, consumer goods and retail value chain in Africa.

In the past, Grant led JP Morgan-Cazenove’s European Technology Research team in London and was a Vice-President and Head of Strategy for Capgemini South Africa before he led Accenture’s Strategy and Sustainability practices across all industries for three years as a member of the Europe, Africa and Latin America (EALA) Leadership team and was Global Lead for Africa Expansion. His strategy focus is on providing industry-relevant corporate and business unit strategy development and implementation including business and operating model transformation, financial and macro-economic modelling and growth strategy including M&A. Grant is currently a Partner with Griffin Advisors providing research, corporate strategy and private equity advisory to clients in Africa.

Grant holds an PhD in agriculture from the University of Natal and an MBA from the University of Cape Town.  In his spare time, he runs ultra-marathons and farms and makes award winning wine under the Star Hill label.

Philip Eckles is the CEO of Aer Rianta International – Middle East WLL (ARIME), a subsidiary of Aer Rianta International cpt and of DAA in Ireland. ARIME is headquartered in Bahrain, from where the company is involved in a number of duty free operations across the region including in Lebanon, Bahrain, Oman, Iran, Qatar, Cyprus and India (Mumbai and Delhi).

Philip joined ARI in 1993 as Retail Manager at ARI’s duty free concession in Karachi, Pakistan and since then has held several senior management positions, including Operations Manager at Eurotunnel, UK and General Manager at Kievrianta in Ukraine. He has also held consultancy roles at Birmingham Airport in the UK and Sofia Airport in Bulgaria as well as other retail related projects from the company’s base in Ireland.  Before moving to the Middle East Philip was ARI’s Regional Manager in North America, overseeing the group’s operations in Canada, the US and the Caribbean.