Morning Stage 2025
Expanding horizons: On the morning of Innovation Day, renowned international speakers will present their visionary concepts, horizon-expanding insights and future-proof recommendations under the theme TOGETHER WE ARE UNLIMITED with a focus on ‘Human-Tech Collaboration’. And once again this year, we’ll be bringing together visionary thinkers from the worlds of business, media and politics to shed light on new perspectives and develop sustainable solutions for companies and their brands.
Look forward to hearing their valuable inspiration and finding out how a collaborative approach can pave the way for lasting success.
Hosts: Janique Johnson and Wolfram Kons
AGENDA
MORNING AGENDA
9:00 am
Arrival & welcome
10:00 am – Morning Stage
- 10:00 am – Keynote: TOGETHER WE ARE UNLIMITED!
- 10:35 am – Topic #RE-THINK with Carlo Masala
- 11:20 am – Topic #PIONEERS with Léa Steinacker
12:00 noon
Lunch, networking & Innovation Track
Stay tuned! Discover the Afternoon Program
OUR SPEAKERS IN 2025
IAN BEACRAFT
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The ‘gonzo futurist’ and global strategy consultant will be kicking off the day.
Considered one of the top voices in AI and the future of work, Ian Beacraft is a trusted advisor to the world’s most innovative companies. The founder and Chief Futurist of Signal and Cipher, Ian leads a strategic foresight and development agency that navigates companies through the rapidly changing technology landscape to find meaningful routes to innovation that impact the bottom line, inspire cultural change and create new products and services.
Previously responsible for P&L development and innovation departments at the largest agencies in the world, Ian is known for making bleeding-edge technology understandable and monetisable. The list of brands he has advised includes Samsung, Intel, Coca-Cola, Google, Microsoft, Nike, Universal Pictures and dozens more.
PROF. CARLO MASALA
As one of the leading experts on international politics and security, he has an unparalleled overview of the political and economic dynamics of our time.
The professor of international politics at the University of the German Armed Forces in Munich and sought-after analyst combines extensive expertise with an exceptionally broad international network. Born in 1968 in Cologne, he began his academic journey by studying Politics, Romance Philology and German Studies at the Universities of Cologne and Bonn, graduating successfully in 1992.
Since then, the main focus of his research has ranged from global security policy, transatlantic relations and NATO issues to geopolitical conflicts such as those Ukraine, Syria and Gaza. He also sheds light on the connections between these crises and issues such as climate change, migration and global economic policy. His ability to convey complex issues in a clear and understandable way has made him a sought-after guest on leading TV programs and at international conferences.
He is also the author of numerous academic articles and books, including World Disorder: The Global Crises and Their Consequences.
CARSTEN KNOP
Carsten Knop is one of the publishers of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung newspaper and will lead the panel discussion with Carlo Masala.
Carsten Knop was born in Dortmund in 1969. Even before graduating from high school, an internship at the Westfälische Rundschau led to him taking on freelance work at the newspaper’s local editorial offices. This was followed in 1993 by a traineeship at the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. His first editorial position followed his journalistic training in 1995 when he was quickly transferred to Düsseldorf as a correspondent for the Börsen-Zeitung, a financial newspaper. In 1996, Carsten Knop returned to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung’s Düsseldorf office where he had completed his traineeship. After working in Düsseldorf, he moved to New York and then San Francisco, where he worked as a business correspondent. He returned to Frankfurt in 2003, where he was responsible for corporate reporting for many years, and later also for the economic news. From early 2018 until March 2020, Carsten was Editor-in-Chief for Digital Products. Since April 2020, he has been publisher of the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
DR LÉA STEINACKER
Award-winning journalist, sociologist and co-founder and Executive Chairwoman of digital platform ada.
Dr Léa Steinacker‘s research focuses on how technology interacts with people, methodologies and the planet. She has published extensively on topics such as automated facial recognition, synthetic voice generation and quantum computing.
Raised in Germany, Australia and Wales, Léa Steinacker (*1989) studied at Princeton, Harvard and the American University in Cairo.
She earned her doctorate from the University of St. Gallen, where she researched the social impacts of artificially intelligent systems before going on to work for human rights organisations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo before joining German magazine Wirtschaftswoche in 2017 as Chief Innovation Officer and later serving as Chief Strategy Officer.
Host and Partner of Innovation Day
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