50 ideas to change the world: the judges

Clive Cookson

Science editor, Financial Times

Clive Cookson is science editor at the FT. He joined the newspaper in 1988 as technology editor and has also written about the chemical and pharmaceutical industries. Previously, he was the science and medical correspondent for BBC Radio. He also spent four years in Washington DC as American editor of the Times Higher Education Supplement. He has won several science journalism awards and is an honorary member of the British Science Association and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Clive graduated from Oxford university with a first-class honours degree in chemistry.

Alice Gast

Imperial College

Alice Gast is president of Imperial College London. Before her appointment in 2014, she was president of Lehigh University, Pennsylvania. Alice’s academic interest is in surface and interfacial phenomena, in particular the behaviour of complex fluids. She has co-authored numerous scientific publications and a classic textbook on colloid and surface phenomena.

Alice is a member of a number of international advisory committees and boards. She has served as US science envoy to the Caucasus and Central Asia and is on the board of directors for Chevron.

Alice is an elected member of the National Academy of Engineering, a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, fellow of the Académie des Technologies, France, and was a board member of the American Association for the Advancement of Science from 2006 to 2010.

Michael Lauster

Fraunhofer Institute

Michael Lauster is director of the Fraunhofer Institute for Technological Trend Analysis and the spokesman of the Fraunhofer Space Alliance, which comprises 15 institutes with more than 5,000 employees.

Michael, who has two doctoral degrees in engineering sciences and statistics, is also a professor for technology analysis and foresight at the Rheinisch-Westfälische Technische Hochschule RWTH Aachen University.

He also had a long military career in the German Air Force, retiring as a colonel in 2012.

Maija Palmer

Financial Times

Maija Palmer is digital and communities editor for FT Special Reports and is involved in writing and editing for most of its technology-focused reports. Maija has been at the FT since 1999, working in a number of roles, including web editor, technology correspondent and social media editor. She was named TechMark Technology Journalist of the Year in 2005 and 2011.

Brian Solis

Altimeter Group

Brian Solis is principal analyst and futurist at Altimeter, a consultancy, part of Prophet, that advises companies on digital change. Brian is a well-known speaker and digital anthropologist, who studies disruptive technology and its impact on business and society. In his reports, articles and books, he humanises trends to help people understand how the world is changing, why and what to do about it. Brian’s current research explores digital transformation, corporate innovation, experience design, changing business culture and “the future of” industries, trends and behaviour.

Brian is the author of seven best-selling books, including X: The Experience When Business Meets Design, What’s the Future of Business (WTF) and The End of Business as Usual.

Daniela Stawinoga-Carrington

Mitsubishi Heavy Industries

Daniela Stawinoga-Carrington is Emea marketing communications director for Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (MHI) Group, a leading global engineering and manufacturing company. Daniela joined MHI Group in early 2017 from global communications agency Ketchum. Based in New York and London, she advised clients from the energy sector on international financial and corporate communications, and reputation management. Before her time at Ketchum, Daniela spent three and a half years in Tokyo as a director for Kreab Gavin Anderson, a financial communications company, advising Japanese and international companies on cross-border transactions and profile-raising campaigns.

The 50 ideas to change the world project is supported by MHI Group.

Chair: Leyla Boulton

Financial Times

Leyla Boulton is an executive editor of the FT and editor of Special Reports, which produces in-depth reports on countries, sectors and themes ranging from education to climate change. Before spending a decade as a newsroom editor and web evangelist, Leyla was the newspaper’s Turkey correspondent from 1998 to 2003. She started her career at the FT as a correspondent in Moscow from 1990 to 1994 before serving as the newspaper’s global environment correspondent. While in Moscow, Leyla was part of the team that won a British Press Award for the FT’s investigation into Robert Maxwell.