We have recently assembled a stellar cast of characters for our non-executive Advisory Board to help shape the future direction of 100%Open. Advisory Board meetings take place on a quarterly basis and currently consists of the following people:
- David Rajan – Oracle UK
- Paul Excell – BT Plc.
- Cairbre Sugrue – Edelman
- Eleanor Ford – LikeCube Ltd.
- Kevin Duncan – Expert Advice
- Tim Minshall – Cambridge University
David Rajan – Oracle UK
David is Director of Technology for the UK, Ireland & Israel. He has responsibility for technology strategy and acts as Chief product evangelist. He has particular interest in Data centre Efficiency, highly scalable and available systems, high performance computing, large scale databases, data warehousing and extreme performance.
Prior to this, he worked as a Director focused on Channel Strategy and as Director of Strategic & Emerging Business. Since joining Oracle in 1994, David has focussed on new and emerging technologies, propositions and markets working at Oracle Corporate, as well as in the Asia Pacific and Europe, Middle East and Africa regions. David also has experience starting his own company, securing funding and completing due diligence for Venture Capitalists.
David is a Fellow of the British Computer Society, a Fellow of the RSA and also a Fellow of the IoD.
Paul Excell – BT Plc.
Paul Excell is Chief of Operations (CoO) at BT’s Group Chief Technology Office. He’s responsible for ensuring that BT’s Innovation and Technology business generates £1 billion over the next three years. He holds a Masters degree in Information Systems from the University of Essex and an Honours degree in Electronic Engineering from the University of York. He is a Chartered Engineer and finalist for the Sunday Telegraph National Management Awards. Paul is an alumnus of London Business School.
Cairbre Sugrue – Edelman
Cairbre is responsible for existing client relationships and growing the practice, which includes specialisms in consumer electronics, clean technology, digital entertainment and analyst relations.
He joined Edelman from Oracle Corporation, the world’s largest business software vendor, where he led Corporate Communications for the UK and Ireland. Duties included running thought leadership campaigns for senior executives, internal communications to support change management, corporate social responsibility and B2B programmes to drive demand for Oracle’s products and services. Additionally he oversaw PR for the South Africa market and the Oracle Financial Services Business Unit across Europe Middle East and Africa.
Before Oracle he worked at Weber Shandwick for seven years, including a placement at its Silicon Valley office working for Hewlett-Packard, before returning to London to rise to the board of its UK Technology Practice.
Eleanor Ford – LikeCube Ltd.
Eleanor Ford began her career as an anthropologist and documentary filmmaker, before founding LikeCube Ltd in 2006. Based on her frustration at the lack of sources for personalized recommendations for travelers, Ford won support and initial finance from the National Endowment for Science Technology and the Arts (NESTA), as part of their prestigious ‘Creative Pioneer Programme’ and went on to build an award-winning team (including a world leader in Computer Science and experts in Semantics and Scalability) and cutting-edge technology.
LikeCube Ltd now provides innovative recommendation, personalisation and data intelligence solutions, primarily for the leisure industry, and their recommendations have been described as “faultless”, “spooky” and “bang on the money”. As the originator of the LikeCube concept, Eleanor won Silver Award at the 2007 British Female Inventor and Innovator of the Year Awards, was a Finalist in the Blackberry Women & Technology Awards 2008 and was profiled in the January 2010 edition of WiredUK.
Eleanor regularly consults on innovation, entrepreneurship, social networks and online personalization strategies, and her clients and projects have included work for NESTA, the RSA, the ICA, and high-level business and membership networks.
Kevin Duncan – Expert Advice
Kevin is a business adviser, marketing expert, motivational speaker and author.
He has written seven books, all of which pursue the theme of simplifying businesses and making them more successful. These have sold over 35,000 copies, been voted Telegraph Business Club Books of the Week, been nominated for CMI Management Book of the Year, and have become a number of subsidiary materials such as podcasts, ebooks, and iphone apps.
After 20 years in advertising and direct marketing, he has spent the last ten years as an independent troubleshooter, advising companies on how to change their businesses for the better.
He can turn his hand to many things: change management programmes; motivational speaking; facilitating awaydays and conferences; training; repositioning brands; producing marketing plans, strategies and creative solutions; advising on company structures; writing speeches; improving new business effectiveness; pitch writing; and action non-exec work.
He has hands-on knowledge of how to run many types of businesses, and has worked with around 300 clients in most categories. He has deployed £600m of funds on more than 200 brands, overseen over 1,000 projects, and won 35 awards for creativity and effectiveness.
Expert Advice has completed more than 400 jobs for over 100 clients. Recent examples include Aegis, BT, Carat, Direct Line, Guardian Media Group, Heineken, The Independent, Interbrand, Iris, JWT, Kimberly-Clark, Mindshare, Lloyds TSB, M&C Saatchi, Mediacom, News International, Nokia, Ogilvy, Orange, PHD, Que Pasa, Saatchi & Saatchi, Shell, Starcom, Talk PR, Vizeum, and What If.
Kevin has made a number of radio and press appearances, often appearing as a commentator on the absurdity of modern language at work. Also a cartoonist, his five Little Books of Business Bullshit highlight this in stark detail, and are being made into iPad apps. Every year he travels to somewhere he has never been.
He is currently funding the preservation of jaguars in Brazil, and the successful reintroduction of the Great Bustard to the UK. He collects classic guitars, has written over 500 songs, and has released seven albums. He flies birds of prey, and has two daughters, Rosanna (22) and Shaunagh (18).
Tim Minshall – Cambridge University
Tim Minshall has been involved in a range of projects to support enterprise and innovation since 1998. He is currently a Senior Lecturer at the University of Cambridge Centre for Technology Management at the Institute for Manufacturing. He researches, teaches, writes and consults on the topics of technology enterprise, open innovation, the funding of innovation, university-industry knowledge exchange, and the Cambridge Technopole. He is a non-executive director of St. John’s Innovation Centre Ltd, Cambridge, coordinator of the University Enterprise Network (the network of organisations supporting innovation and entrepreneurship across the University of Cambridge and Anglia Ruskin University), and a Visiting Professor at Doshisha University Institute for Technology, Enterprise and Competitiveness in Japan. He is a member of advisory / steering committees for groups including IdeaSpace Cambridge, Cambridge University Entrepreneurs, Cambridge i-Teams, TEDxCam and 100% Open. He has a BEng from Aston University, and a PhD from Cambridge University Engineering Department. Prior to joining the University of Cambridge, he worked as an engineer, teacher, consultant, freelance writer and project manager in the UK, Japan and Australia. He lives in the City of Cambridge, is married with two children, enjoys running / open water swimming, and is learning to play the guitar.
