Sukruti Narayanan Founder – President Sukruti Narayanan is a multi-award-winning technologist, journalist, and global STEM advocate whose work bridges Robotics, AI, space education, ethical media, and cross-border innovation leadership. She is Founder and President of AIMERS Foundation and Global Head of Partnerships for Mission ShakthiSAT.
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Veena Nair Chair Veena Nair is an award-winning STEM educator, consultant, strategic advisor, and systems-thinking specialist with over 30 years of experience working across schools, universities, industry, and government-linked initiatives in Australia and internationally. She supports organisations to design future-ready learning, workforce pathways, and innovation programs that respond to rapid technological change while addressing persistent equity gaps. Veena brings deep expertise in emerging technologies, systems engineering, STEM strategy, and curriculum design, with a particular focus on increasing girls' participation and leadership in STEAM. Her work centres on dismantling structural, cultural, and curricular barriers that limit girls' engagement with engineering, technology, and advanced science, and on designing programs that are inclusive, authentic, and aspirational. She has collaborated with multiple universities to develop and pilot new STEAM programs, most recently with RMIT University on the COMBs Project, contributing to interdisciplinary, problem-based approaches that connect education, research, and industry. Veena is also an Educational Consultant for Lunaria One, advising on education frameworks linked to Australia's first commercial lunar mission, with a strong emphasis on ensuring girls see themselves represented in space, engineering, and future technology careers. Veena is the recipient of the Prime Minister's Prize for Excellence in Science Teaching (2022) and has advised on curriculum reform, systems engineering pathways, sustainability education, and industry–education partnerships at state, national, and international levels. She has served on curriculum review panels, judging bodies, and advisory committees influencing STEM participation and policy outcomes. Her consulting portfolio includes girls-focused STEM program design, professional learning for educators, strategic planning, partnership development, and impact evaluation. Veena is known for her ability to bridge education, industry, and innovation ecosystems to deliver practical, equity-driven solutions that build long-term capability and representation in STEAM. Veena continues to teach at Viewbank College Melbourne.
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Professor Scott Sleap Co-Chair Professor Scott Sleap is a senior STEM education leader with the NSW Department of Education, where he leads large-scale programs that connect schools with industry, universities and community partners to expand opportunity for students across New South Wales. He is Professor of Practice (STEM) at the University of Sydney and an Honorary Professor at the University of Newcastle, bringing deep expertise in education, research, and outreach. Scott holds a PhD in Environmental Engineering and is widely recognised for his impact as a STEM teacher and system leader, including receiving the Prime Minister's Prize for Excellence in Secondary Science Teaching, the University of Newcastle Alumni National Leadership Award, a Winston Churchill Fellowship, a Commonwealth Bank Teaching Fellowship, and the BAE Systems Global Chairman's Award. Scott has a strong focus on space education and the future space workforce, with international partnerships that connect Australian students and teachers to global space, science and technology networks. He works closely with the Australian Space Agency and a range of national and international partners to create authentic pathways and experiences for young people, particularly those in regional, rural and remote communities. Equity is central to his work, with a strong emphasis on lifting participation for girls and young women in space and STEM, and removing barriers that limit access to high-quality learning, mentoring, and leadership opportunities. Through his Winston Churchill Fellowship, Scott undertook a study tour of the United States to examine leading approaches to STEM and space education, bringing back insights that continue to shape high-impact programs across schools and systems. His work is grounded in a belief that talent is everywhere, and that education, mentorship and real-world opportunity are the levers that allow young people to not only prepare for the future, but actively shape it.
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Farai Mazhandu is Founder and Director of the Africa Quantum Consortium (AQC), leading cross-continental quantum strategy across Africa, the U.S., and global partners. Trained in experimental quantum physics at the Colorado School of Mines and the University of the Witwatersrand, he brings 15+ years across quantum research, education, and institutional strategy – mobilizing talent, aligning policy, and building durable quantum capability at continental scale.
View full bio →Media
Andrew Curran is a Sydney-based journalist specialising in aerospace. He currently runs his own business producing industry reports and print news articles about commercial aviation in the Southwest Pacific. Andrew also has extensive experience covering the space and defence sectors, primarily focusing on emerging Indo-Pacific markets, but also covering the big space and defence economies such as China, the United States, and Europe. Before working as a journalist, Andrew worked in a variety of roles for a major investment bank, including spending several years living and working for the bank in London. Andrew holds an undergraduate degree in business and has postgraduate degrees in business administration and history.
View full bio →Digital Platforms & AI Systems
Vivek Narayanan is a technology leader with 17+ years of experience across FinTech, MediaTech, HealthTech, GameTech, and SolarTech, specialising in cloud-native platforms, DevOps transformation, and secure delivery at scale. He also contributes to AI and STEM capability-building initiatives.
View full bio →Emerging Fields
Dusya Lyubovskaya is an American citizen working in Switzerland at the intersection of clean energy, advanced materials, and real-world-asset tokenization. She serves as Global Ambassador at IPRI.Tech AG, where she advances international partnerships for Ultra High Temperature Pyrometallurgy™, enabling next-generation industrial processing, critical-materials recovery, and breakthrough materials innovation. Through The Thorium Network, Dusya supports international cooperation and education focused on safer, more sustainable nuclear-energy pathways for both emerging and developed economies. She also contributes to OrdinalGold, driving the ethical tokenization of in-ground gold reserves through blockchain transparency and Web3-based asset-verification frameworks. Beyond her industry work, Dusya is a Ph.D. candidate in nuclear medicine, conducting research on future-facing technologies with applications in global health. She additionally serves as IGC Chair for Education and International Collaboration on Safer, Sustainable Nuclear Energy (U.S.), where she champions knowledge exchange, policy alignment, and multi-stakeholder cooperation across borders. She is also a member of Global Goals Connexions (GGC), further reinforcing her commitment to globally aligned, impact-driven collaboration. Across her industry, academic, and governance roles, Dusya focuses on strategic outreach, global partnerships, and aligning transformative technologies with governments, industry leaders, and mission-aligned investors to accelerate a cleaner, more resilient future. In recognition of her leadership and impact, Dusya Lyubovskaya has been featured as one of the Top 10 Most Influential Female Leaders of the Year.
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Ben Newsome is a pioneer in STEM education and the founder of Fizzics Education, which has inspired 4 million students since 2004. A 2013 Churchill Fellow and UTS Chancellor's Award recipient, Ben specialises in science education outreach and links to industry career pathways. He co-founded Virtual Excursions Australia to produce digital live education programmes and the AVA Challenge to bring space design thinking to students across Australia and beyond. Beyond teaching, Ben is a casual academic at Western Sydney University, host of the FizzicsEd Podcast, and author of 'Be Amazing!'. His work as a board member and ambassador continues to shape international collaborative learning and industry engagement.
View full bio →Space Technology
Iver Cairns has over 30 years of experience in space physics and space weather research, with over 400 written and published refereed papers. His primary contributions relate to the growth and saturation of plasma waves, especially Langmuir waves, the generation of radio emission in association with shocks, and associated space weather. He is a Co-Investigator on NASA's STEREO mission and, since June 2019, on NASA's two new SMEX missions, PUNCH and TRACERS. In Australia he led the 2010-2019 Decadal Plan for Australian Space Science. Since then he has worked to "put runs on the board" to convince Governments to invest in the space sector. He led the INSPIRE-2 CubeSat project, which launched in May 2017 and re-entered still working in November 2018. For 2017–2025, but continuing now as a research collaboration, Prof. Cairns led CUAVA (the ARC Training Centre for CubeSats, UAVs, and Their Applications), training people, solving research problems, and working on commercial outcomes for its industry, academic, and governmental partners. CUAVA's 1st CubeSat, CUAVA-1, was deployed from the International Space Station in October 2021. He also leads the Waratah Seed project, Australia's 1st ride-share satellite project. His satellites CUAVA-2 and Waratah Seed-1 launched in August 2024 and are both operating successfully in space.
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