Dirk Fransaer is Managing Director of VITO, the Flemish Institute for Technological Research, the largest research institute in Belgium in the field of sustainability and cleantech: energy, chemistry, health and materials. VITO focuses on interdisciplinary research into cleantech and pilot installations and demonstrators to de-risk research for companies and thereby strengthen the economic and social fabric. He is author and co-author of more than 30 scientific papers published in national and international journals.

Dirk Fransaer is president of the board of directors of LIBOVITO (a 100 % daughter company in China, Beijing), of VITO Middle East (Qatar) and VITO Arabia (Dubai), member of the board of directors of VITO Asia (Hong Kong), member of the board of SOV Balmatt, member of the board of Clean Vision Invest, also member of the board of directors of the Von Karman Institute for Fluid Dynamics, president of the Audit Committee and the Board of Programme Evaluation of the University of Antwerp, member of the Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and Arts, and Honorary professor Engineering at KU Leuven.

Julie is a Commercial Engineer from KULeuven and holds a master’s degree in Financial Management from Vlerick Business School. She has several years of experience as a business consultant at Arthur D Little and as a business analyst at Barco. She isa board member of the Belgian textile federation Fedustria, Textirama Foundation, and various educational institutes in Belgium. Julie's expertise lies in knowledge of fibres and sustainable yarns, as well as in circular development projects. Founder of Ariadne Innovation. Ambassador for sustainable textiles. 

Juan Carlos Alonso joined Bekaert on 1 July 2019. He began his career in 1998 with the Boston Consulting Group where he led projects in Mexico, the US and Australia. In 2006, he joined CEMEX, a global building materials company, to take up the assignment of Global Corporate Strategic Planning Manager, based in Spain. He joined the Comex Group in 2010 as Vice President of Sales & Operations for the US Western Region, before he moved to the Belgian lime and minerals company Lhoist Group where he held various business development and strategy leadership positions with increasing responsibility and scope.

In 2017, Juan Carlos moved to the Imerys Group as Head of the Americas and development regions for the Group’s Monolithic Refractories division and, in parallel, as Global Head of Strategy, Business Development and Marketing for the High Temperature Solutions business.

Juan Carlos Alonso, Mexican national, holds a Bachelor of Science in Industrial Engineering from Universidad Panamericana, Mexico City, and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business, US.

Peter has headed the Climate Change Service at the Environment Directorate-General within the Federal Public Service Health since 2003. In that capacity he serves a dedicated team of about 25 climate policy experts, federal civil servants committed to preparing and implementing Belgian, European and international climate policy, in close dialogue with all other actors in the field.  He chairs the Belgian Coordination Working Group on Greenhouse effect of the Coordination Committee for International Environmental Policy (CCIM-CCPIE), where the federal and regional governments of Belgium prepare common positions for the international climate negotiations. 
Peter has been heading the Belgian delegations to the UNFCCC negotiations for close to 20 years and represents Belgium in the Working Party for International Environment Issues (Climate Change) of the Council of the European Union.
He regularly lectures on international, European and Belgian climate change policy at different Belgian universities.
For more information on the federal Climate Change Service: see www.climatechange.be 

As policy and project coordinator, bio-engineer Benjamin Clarysse supervises all projects and policy trajectories of Bond Beter Leefmilieu. He also coordinates advice to policymakers and consultation with stakeholders on the five major transition themes (energy, food, mobility, circular economy and spatial planning).      

Frank Beckx is the Director of the Knowledge and Lobby Center of Voka, the Flemish employers’ association. He is also Board Member of the Science Center Technopolis and member of the STEM Platform advising the Flemish Government on Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) issues.

Bruno Reyntjens has been VITO’s Commercial Director since 2017. His career has been versatile with jobs in business development, business and product management as well as product development. Bruno has held international positions, focussing on the functionality of gluten protein at Amylum’s R&D lab in Aalst, on fine chemistry and biofuels at Proviron in Hemiksem/Ostend and on technical polyurethane foams for different niche applications at Recticel in Wetteren. At VITO, Bruno focuses on the transformation of a strongly research driven organization towards a more valorization driven research organization that meets the innovation needs of companies and governments. Bruno also coordinates VITO’s international activities. He holds a degree in bioscience engineering from Ghent University.