Dr Mario Garcia is CEO and Founder of Garcia Media, a global consulting firm. 

He is also the Senior Adviser for News Design/Adjunct Professor at Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, which he joined in 2013 as the Hearst Digital Media Professor in Residence.

He is known worldwide as one of the premiere media designers, having completed over  700 projects in 120 countries, including TheThe Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Paris Match (France) , South China Morning Post (Hong Kong), New Straits Times (Malaysia),  Aftenposten (Norway), The Philadelphia Inquirer, Die Zeit and Handelsblatt (Germany), all the McClatchy newspapers in the US, eight Postmedia newspapers in Canada, Goteborgs Posten( Sweden), Il Secolo XIX (Italy), The Citizen (South Africa). His current projects include Tagesspiegel (Berlin), Kurier (Vienna) and NOZ Digital group (Hamburg).

Currently, Dr. Garcia devotes most of his consulting and workshops to help organizations with transformation to a mobile-first approach, including training for how to write/edit/design for the smallest platform - that of the smartphone - where a large percentage of users get their information.

His mobile storytelling digital book, The Story, was published in late 2019 in a trilogy covering Transformation, Storytelling and Design.

Mario founded the Graphics & Design program at The Poynter Institute for Media Studies, where he serves as a member of the Poynter Foundation. He has been involved with the Institute's EyeTrack studies since the 1980s, including the most recent EyeTrack for the Tablet in 2012.

His academic career includes full professor at both Syracuse University's Newhouse School of Public Communications and the University of South Florida's Department of Mass Communications. He is the author of 13 books, including his first digital publication, Storytelling in the Age of the iPad.

Mario has received over 300 SND Awards including the Lifetime Achievement Award. People Magazine selected Mario among the 100 Most Influential Hispanics. The University of Missouri awarded Mario its Medal of Honor in Journalism.

Scott Armstrong is an Editor-in-Chief, Arabian Business Dubai, UAE. Prior to that, he was a Chief Executive Editor for Times of Oman (Print and Online titles) since 2014. A journalist with 26 years of experience, Scott has evolved from a traditional print journalist/editor to embrace digital delivery of content on multimedia platforms to maximise audience, global reach and engagement..  

For growing Oman's largest and most successful daily English language news channel in print and on digital, Scott has refocused its print edition on relevant content. Times of Oman is now widely acknowledged as the market leader for journalism in the Sultanate, and the most effective for advertising revenue generation. 

Gregor Waller provides consulting services to international media businesses for developing their digital strategy and transforming their business models for the digital era. Before this, he worked for more than six years in various management functions for Germany's Axel Springer publishing corporation. Most recently, up to February 2011, as a member of the management team of the WELT group, Berliner Morgenpost, Hamburger Abendblatt, he was responsible for strategy & innovation and commercial management of the Zeitungsgruppe Hamburg. After testing a "prototype tablet" with his core newspaper readers – one year before the iPad – he focused on the topics of digital strategy, digital business models and paid content, bringing his experience in these areas to bear also in strategic group projects.

From 1998-2004 he worked for Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung GmbH in positions such as commercial manager for publishing houses Prestel and Xenos Verlag. Waller has a graduate degree in business administration from the University of Augsburg and an undergraduate degree in philosophy from the Munich School of Philosophy.

She is responsible for all WAN-IFRA activities in the countries of the Middle East,
working closely with the company's members in that region.
Previously she has held various leading positions at WAN-IFRA. As Director of Marketing
and Membership, she was Head of the marketing and PR team with responsibility for
all global marketing activities. In this capacity, she introduced a new logo and dynamic
new corporate identity.
As Director of Membership she acted as the contact for all members worldwide, while
also introducing a new membership model and structure.
Upon joining WAN-IFRA, initially as Head of IT, she implemented two editorial systems
at the company.
Before coming to WAN-IFRA, she worked for Monotype in the position of Head of
Application. During her time at that company she played an instrumental role in the
market launch of a new editorial system.
She began her career at ATEX, the leading system supplier for editorial systems, where
she worked as a trainer and application specialist. Her duties in this position included
training editors and journalists in leading media houses in both Germany and the UK.

Majed Al Suwaidi was appointed as the Managing Director for Dubai Media City (DMC), Dubai Studio City (DSC) and Dubai Production City (DPC) in March 2016.

Prior to his current role, Majed was the Managing Director of Dubai Internet City (DIC), the MENA region’s largest ICT business community and Dubai Outsource City (DOC), a modern, hi-tech business hub dedicated to the growing outsourcing industry.

Majed began his career at TECOM Group as the Director of Business Development for DIC and DOC where he developed the business parks’ strategy of business partner acquisition and retention. Under his leadership, both business communities witnessed success and the effective implementation of TECOM Group’s strategy, a world-class business community developer, by delivering maximum value to business partners, stakeholders, and community as well as improving the market share.

He played a crucial role in supporting and fostering startups, entrepreneurs and technology SMEs within DIC, enhancing the technology ecosystem in Dubai. Under his leadership, Dubai Internet City launched in5 innovation centre to support start-ups in technology in 2012 and was named a Strategic Partner of Smart Dubai in 2015

Warren Fernandez joined the paper in 1990 as a political reporter and rose to become a News Editor. He went on to serve as Foreign Editor and Deputy Editor.

Fernandez then joined Royal Dutch Shell in 2008 as a Global Manager for its Future Energy Project, before returning to the paper in February 2012 as its Editor. He assumed the role of Editor-in-Chief of Singapore Press Holdings’ (SPH) English/Malay/Tamil Media group (EMTM) from July 2016.

Fernandez graduated with First Class Honours from Oxford University, where he read Philosophy, Politics and Economics. He also holds a Master’s in Public Administration from Harvard University's John F. Kennedy School of Government.

Korey Lee joined the South China Morning Post in March, 2017 to spearhead the data operations of the now 115-year-old news organization. 

Before joining the SCMP, Korey was Vice President of Analytics at KeyMe, a New York-based hardware startup that leverages computer vision technology and machine learning to provide an automated and seamless key duplication experience for customers across the US. Previously, he was co-founder and CIO of SumAll, a connected data platform for over 500,000 businesses worldwide. Prior to this, he led the business intelligence and analytics teams at AppNexus and Squarespace. Korey has also worked in various capacities at Google, including revenue strategy, sales finance, payment operations, and business analytics. He was previously with PriceWaterhouseCoopers in venture capital tax and audit.

Korey holds a B.A. degree in Business Administration, and a B.S. degree in Economics from University of California Berkeley.

Dean is Director of Insights and Editor-in-Chief of WAN-IFRA, he is responsible for coordinating all activities related to the organisation's array of multimedia publications. He has more than 25 years’ experience working in the news publishing industry, much of that time spent researching, analysing, identifying and ultimately reporting about global media developments.

Fatemah Farag is the Founder and Director of Welad Elbalad Media Services LTD, a company dedicated to community media development and media excellence in Egypt. She is also currently a Nieman Fellow, the MENA Director for WAN IFRA’s Women in News Program and a WEF Board Member.

Before establishing Welad Elbalad Media Services, Ms. Farag was the founding chief editor of the English Edition of Al Masry Al Youm. Before 2009, she divided her professional time between the newsroom and journalism training and education. She was Assistant Chief Editor, responsible for the features and life-style sections and senior staff reporter at Al-Ahram Weekly, the English language newspaper issued by Al-Ahram, before which she worked for the Regional Bureau of the Washington Post, was a full time staff reporter for the Middle East Times – Egypt, and has freelanced for a host of local and international news organizations. 

As an educator she has held the position of Training Consultant for the Heikal Foundation for Arab Journalism and has also consulted and trained for various organizations including the European Union, the British Council, Free Voice and the Bibliotheca Alexandrina. She also taught journalism at the American University in Cairo (AUC) for two years and continues to dedicate time to journalism training.
Ms Farag began her career specializing in development issues with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), and as a reporter and newspaper editor she has dedicated much of her work to the coverage of social issues. She is a graduate of the American University in Cairo, from which she also received a Masters degree in political science.

Her Royal Highness Princess Rym Ali founded in 2007 the Jordan Media Institute (JMI), a non-profit institution whose aim is to establish an Arab center of excellence for journalism education with a Master’s program at its core and training-modules in parallel (www.jmi.edu.jo/en).  She has also been a member of the Board of Commissioners of the Royal Film Commission - Jordan since July 2005 (www.film.jo/en). And she is the president of the Amman International Film Festival “AIFF” Awal Film since 2017.

Prior to marrying HRH Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein, Princess Rym worked extensively for international broadcasters including CNN, where she began as a producer in 1998 and later worked as a Baghdad correspondent from 2001 until 2004. She had developed her portfolio working for the BBC, Dubai TV, Bloomberg TV, Radio Monte-Carlo Moyen-Orient and United Press International-UPI.

A graduate of Columbia University’s School of Journalism, Princess Rym Ali also holds a “Diplôme d’Etudes Avancé” ” in Political Science from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Paris and a MA in English Literature from the Sorbonne.

Princess Rym Ali received a prestigious Alumni Award from the Columbia University School of Journalism in April 2011. In July 2011, she was also awarded the “Best International Journalist” prize at the 32nd Ischia International Journalism Awards Ceremony, one of the most renowned journalistic awards in Italy.

In September 2011, Princess Rym Ali received the French Knight of the Legion of Honor decoration from the French government.

In October 2012, the Global Thinkers Forum awarded Princess Rym Ali the Excellence in Media Award.

In November 2013, Princess Rym Ali received a PhD honoris causa from Coventry University – England, for her contribution to the field of Journalism and Media and as founder of the Jordan Media Institute.

Mohamed Alayyan is the publisher and CEO of Al Ghad newspaper; Jordan’s most   independent Arabic daily newspaper.

Mohamed entered the media industry in 1998, when he established Al Waseet weekly classifed newspaper in Jordan. The publication’s weekly circulation exceeds a whopping two hundred thousand copies, and a leading reach of two million readers on a weekly basis. Mohamed established Al Faridah Specialized Printing, which publishes Layalina, JO, Ahlan,Teen World, Viva, Venture and U magazines.  Mohamed is also a board member in Al Kawn for Advertisements & Media, which launched the first independent radio station Fann FM. He also serves as chairman in several media companies, including outdoor media.

Alia Ibrahim is co-founder and CEO of Daraj Media, a Beirut-based independent digital media organization that engages in the production and promotion of impactful and conversational journalism for Arab millennials, focusing on the coverage of marginalized groups and censored topics. Launched in November 2017, Daraj is based on a hybrid funding scheme involving donors and strategic investors, and a scalable business model prioritizing the sustainability of independence through profitability.

Until March 2016, Ibrahim was a Senior Correspondent at Al-Arabiya News Channel. She produced and directed 22-minute features for Special Mission, a prime time investigative reporting show. Ibrahim joined Al-Arabiya in 2008 as a senior news correspondent. Her assignments took her to a number of countries including Tunisia, Yemen, Libya, Bahrain, Turkey and Syria. 

Ibrahim’s opinion and news stories appear in a number of publications including Al-Hayat newspaper, Al-Arabiya.net, and until 2011, The Washington Post, where she had been a contributing reporter since 2005.

Ibrahim started her career in 1996 as a general news reporter at The Daily Star in Beirut. She became managing editor of the newspaper in 2004.

After that, Ibrahim shifted broadcast and became Dubai TV’s  Beirut-based correspondent.

She was also the Beirut-based correspondent for Womenenews in New York.

She is a mother of two girls Yasma, 12, and Mia, 10 and also has been teaching Journalism at the Lebanese American University since 2016.