Responsible Innovation Conference

Claire loves building the culture and community at Ormeau Baths. Since its inception and under her watch Ormeau Baths has run hundreds of events, meetups, accelerator and innovation programs.

She has deep relationships with the Startup community, Angels and VCs and the wider Hubs in Northern Ireland.

Passionate about people and community she is always keen to connect people to the right people with the right information at the right time.

Professor Jonathan Wallace is Professor of Innovation within the Faculty of Computing, Engineering and the Built Environment at Ulster University. His excellence in both Knowledge & Technology Transfer and lecturing has been recognised by his being awarded a Distinguished Business Fellowship and Distinguished Teaching Fellowship. 

He has led the development of numerous software systems in diverse market sectors and has attained broad experience of managing successful research projects at both a local, national and international level. Jonathan has a significant track record in the field of Digital Health & Wellbeing and is recognised as an innovator in the co-creation of user-centred Digital Health product and service solutions. He is a founder member of the TRAIL Living Lab based at the Ulster University as well as the BCS Health NI Special Interest Group. He is a founder member and Deputy Chair of the Northern Ireland Science Festival which has just has just completed its 10^th Anniversary Festival. Professor Wallace is a member of the All-Party Advisory Group on Science, Engineering, Technology and Maths for the local devolved Government Assembly. Jonathan is a member of the BCS NI Committee and ESG & EDI Lead for BCS NI. He is a board member of the Northern Ireland Trusted Research Environment (NITRE) Strategy Board for the HSC in Northern Ireland and a member of the BSI CH/210/1 – Quality Systems for Medical Devices standards committee working group. He is Chair of Antrim Enterprise Agency and a Board Member of Belfast Healthy Cities. 

He currently has a leading role in a number of regional, national and international Digital Health & Wellbeing research projects where he is particularly applying his expertise in Co-creation, UX & Usability Engineering, Data Science and Business Model Development. He is the Ulster University industry engagement lead for the newly launched £14M Artificial Intelligence Collaboration Centre (AICC). Jonathan is a judge on a number of UK national awards competitions for Innovation in Digital Health and Wellbeing. Jonathan led the Ulster University academic team which successfully completed Phase Zero for the EC-funded H2020 MAGIC PCP Project for Stroke Rehabilitation and he was also Dissemination and Exploitation Workpackage Leader and Chair of the Policy Board for the successfully completed EC-funded H2020 MIDAS Project for ‘Big Data Supporting Public Health Policies’. He is currently Leader for WorkPackage 1: “Human-centred and Trustworthy AI Solutions” for the 4 year €12.5M LUCIA Horizon Europe Project on AI for multi-omic, socioeconomic and epigenetic risk factors for Lung Cancer. He is also a co-investigator on the multidisciplinary £4.8M EPIC Futures NI project addressing the economically inactive and within this is co-leading the workpackage for  the development of  a Labour Market Observatory digital portal for Northern Ireland.

A champion of developing entrepreneurial and intrapreneurial skills and knowledge in Ulster’s students, Jonathan has also been a judge on the UUSU’s Shark Tank Awards and is on the Steering Committee for the annual Catalyst Inc. INVENT Awards as well as a judge for INVENT. The ‘engage’ service solution which Jonathan has led the development and commercialisation of, has been significantly used as a real-time stakeholder engagement tool to gain strategic consensus across government, industry, academia and service users, (PPIE),  including for the HSC NI Workforce Strategy 2017 to  2026; including all the sub-specialisms for the AHP Workforce Strategy.  Most recent engagements have been both sides of the border in Ireland, identifying user needs as part of our North South HEA funded project AIM4HEALTH which focuses on AI approaches to reducing mental health inequalities in Ireland, as well as the establishing the User Requirements and KPIs across partner members states for the LUCIA project as well as the Diabetes Programme of Care Strategic Workforce Review for the Department of Health.

With over 108 peer-reviewed publications, Jonathan lectures on the University’s innovative M.Sc. Digital Marketing Communication and Leadership, as well as their undergraduate and postgraduate Computing degrees. 

With more than 15 years of experience as a digital innovation leader, I help customers navigate the complexities of the digital landscape and emerging technologies to achieve their goals. As the Head of Innovation at Kainos, I merge end-to-end service design with product innovation, underpinned by a robust entrepreneurial and optimistic spirit.

My expertise lies in identifying and leveraging opportunities for digital transformation, translating user insights into useful and usable products with agility and precision. I foster a culture of innovation, collaboration, and continuous improvement, driving teams to exceed expectations and achieve ambitious strategic objectives. I have led the ideation and execution of groundbreaking digital products that have impacted millions of people, securing over £150m in revenue. With a solid foundation in business management from UCL and the entrepreneurial experience of founding and growing a creative agency, I possess a deep understanding of what it takes to bring an idea to life and ensure it works.

I am passionate about leveraging digital innovation to not only drive business growth but also create lasting positive impacts on society. My goal is to lead organisations towards sustainable growth, operational excellence, and market leadership, harnessing the power of digital tools and agile methodologies to deliver value and drive change for good.

Nancy Brown is a lecturer in Management Development at Ulster University’s Business School. As a senior fellow of the Higher Education Academy, she also serves as the Course Director for the MSc in Executive Leadership programme developing bespoke programmes for organisations committed to leadership development.  Nancy has been nominated for numerous teaching awards and has received an Excellence Education award for Equality, Diversity and Inclusion and a Collaborative Excellence Award.

With over 20 years of extensive business experience across the Americas, Asia, Africa, Europe, and the Middle East, Nancy was involved in the launch of Virgin Mobile and has collaborated with global brands such as Coca-Cola, Diageo, Grafton, Microsoft, Nintendo, and Rimmel as well as local organisations.

With her background in disability and international work, Nancy is dedicated to transforming lives through inclusive education and fostering the principles of equality, diversity, and inclusion.  Nancy is deeply committed to inclusive innovation, recognizing its importance for organizational growth. She is passionate about inclusive leadership for innovation and has been a founding member of the steering group for the Special Interest Group on Inclusive Teaching at Ulster University.

Originally from New York, Nancy has called Belfast her home for over two decades.

Specialties: Mobile Apps, IVR, Speech Recognition, Web Content Management, RDBMS, Enterprise Architecture, SaaS, Cloud Integration, Healthcare IT, Big Data, Internet of Things, Technology Foresight, Technology Strategy, Technology Education/TechEd, Innovation Management, Content Curation for Technology Conferences, Immersive Tech, Artificial Intelligence

A member of the MIT Technology Review Global Panel, a community of business professionals.

Dr Virginia Portillo is a multidisciplinary Research Fellow at Horizon Digital Economy Research Institute, at the University of Nottingham, and the Responsible Research and Innovation (RRI) and EDI Coordinator for Responsible AI. Her scientific and research ethics background has motivated her interest in investigating, conducting and promoting RRI across multidisciplinary projects surrounding trustworthy digital technologies and Human-Centred AI. She has led the RRI work of several projects within Horizon DER and TAS programmes, and had a key role developing a tool to support responsible innovation practice: RI Prompts and Practice Cards. She is currently Co-Investigator of RAKE (Responsible Innovation Advantage in Knowledge Exchange), RAI UK Impact project in partnership with KAINOS. Virginia’s areas of interest include: KE on Responsible AI, embedded RRI in the design and governance of autonomous systems; trustworthy AI; transparency and data privacy; policy impact; RRI training and public engagement.