Confirmed Speakers

Bronte Adams, Principal and founder of dandolopartners, has worked in senior positions in both the public and private sectors. Bronte has led and managed public sector policy development and implementation, and consulted to a wide range of clients in the education, innovation, telecommunications, information technology, biotechnology, tourism and arts sectors. Her principal areas of focus are technology and education. Prior to her work with government, Bronte was a consultant at McKinsey & Co and an academic at Oxford University.

Ross Dawson is Chairman of Future Exploration Network and CEO of international consulting firm Advanced Human Technologies He is author of the acclaimed Living Networks and the Amazon.com bestseller Trends in the Living Networks blog. Dawson has delivered keynote speeches to senior executive audiences across six continents, while his frequent global media appearances include CNN, Bloomberg TV, Washington Post, SkyNews, Reuters, ABC TV, European Business Network, Channel News Asia, and many other leading print and broadcast media. He has lectured or run executive programs at numerous leading academic institutions around the world. Prior to establishing Advanced Human Technologies in 1996 Dawson worked in a range of senior positions in London, Tokyo and Sydney, most recently as Global Director - Capital Markets at Thomson Financial.

Andrew Mills is the Chief Information Officer for the Government of South Australia, leading the development and implementation of across-government ICT strategy, policies, frameworks and standards.

Andrew's previous role was the Director ICT Strategic Sourcing in the Office of the CIO, accountable for central ICT sourcing support, procurement projects for a range of ICT products and services and the strategic management of the vendors responsible for ICT infrastructure delivery on behalf of the government.

Andrew has worked in the public sector for 30 years, for both the South Australian and Australian Governments. He has been an executive for the SA Government since 1998 and in that capacity, worked on a range of projects including an innovative spatial information industry facilitation project, an ICT infrastructure project for the Parliament of South Australia and an Aboriginal Heritage project. He has also fulfilled a number of operational roles within the government's central ICT business unit and Department for Aboriginal Affairs & Reconciliation. In his most recent role he was responsible for the delivery of the Future ICT Program, the implementation of the second generation of across government ICT infrastructure contracts.

Before joining the SA Government he undertook a broad range of roles in the Defence Department, including operational management, procurement and contract management, training and lecturing, ICT strategy and policy development, systems engineering and personnel management.

Andrew has a BSc from UNSW and an MSc in Electronic Systems from Cranfield University in the UK.

Dean Tognella is the Director, Southern Region for Optus Business. He has responsibility for the operations of Optus Business in Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania.

Dean was previously Chief Executive of Uecomm Limited, a highly respected provider of high-speed data services to Australian businesses. Uecomm was acquired by Optus in 2004.

Dean has undertaken many roles in the telecommunications industry including Business Development, Corporate Finance and Strategy. He has also gained extensive experience during a six year career with PricewaterhouseCoopers, where he worked with clients including Telstra, Swisscom, AT&T and British Telecom.

He holds and MBA from the AGSM, a Graduate Diploma in Applied Finance and Investment from the Securities Institute of Australia, a Bachelor of Business from Swinburne University of Technology and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants.

Chris is responsible for the technological requirements of Tennis Australia. With the increasing focus on technology within tennis, it was decided that a separate and more focused approach was required. A key strategy of the IT business unit is to invest in the game and to continually improve the infrastructure to support tennis nationally at all levels. This includes delivering substantial services nationwide and strongly supporting the Melbourne Assosications.