An internationally-acclaimed management and marketing consultant and speaker, who literally wrote the book on Sport Marketing. Bernie has over 30 years of experience as a chief executive or senior director in iconic and highly visible sport, entertainment and media driven organizations. He specializes in start-ups and turn-around situations, building winning organizations and developing people to sustained peak performance.

Former CEO Atlanta Hawks (NBA), Atlanta Thrashers (NHL) and Philips Arena, SVP- Marketing and Team Business at the NBA, and Business School faculty member at the University of Massachusetts, Bernie has a highly successful track record of growing revenues and reducing losses in short time-frames. Mullin created and executed many of the "Next-Practices" programs that produced numerous league all-time attendance records, record revenue and profit growth and rising asset value.

Ian Stewart came to Asia from Australia after university in 1990, and never went home. He worked on the agency side in market research for several years before moving client-side with Coca-Cola as their North Asia Trend Manager and then with MTV Asia as their Research and Consumer Strategy Director. Ian then worked as a Strategic Planner for Ogilvy before starting his own Youth Marketing agency Filter, which was acquired by Aegis in 2005. He has since returned to MTV Asia to head up the regional Sales, Marketing, Research and Planning departments. He is currently Senior Vice President for MTV Networks and other Viacom brands in Asia.

Ben is responsible for the management & leverage of the Australia and Asia Pacific sponsorship portfolio for the Fosters group.  This includes Cricket, AFL, NRL, Fashion Week and Racing partnerships across the business.

Ben’s previous roles with Fosters Australia include Group Marketing Manager – Mainstream Beer  Accountable for full P&L management of the VB and Pure Blonde franchises – including all brand strategy, new product and market development, advertising, PR, licensing and promotional activity.  

Michelle has worked with MasterCard since May 2004, and from 2005 has held the position of Vice President, Marketing for Australia & New Zealand.   In that role she has overall responsibility for brand marketing, sponsorships, direct marketing and consumer PR.   (Several key sponsorship properties within her current portfolio are NZRU All Blacks, Cricket Australia, Australian Open Tennis and Rosemount Australia Fashion Week.)

James has been with Traffik since it launched in October 2001 as the National Manager Director.  Previous to Traffik, James was responsible for the establishment of the Clemenger Group Sponsorship department in Sydney during the Olympics looking after 7 Olympic sponsors.  Since launching Traffik, James has expanded its operations into Sydney, Melbourne, Perth and recently launched its Auckland office.  Traffik has also recently become an official partner of the global experiential group - Radiate

Brian Gallagher has over 23 years in the broadcast advertising market, having worked with Nine, Win/NBN, and Ten, and has pioneered brand funded content in Australia with Full Circle Entertainment which launched in January 2005. 

Prior to the launch of FCE and his current role as CEO of FCM, he spent 6 years at Network Ten specializing in advertising related content strategy, brand funded programming and integrated sponsorship, developing a reputation for innovation around advertisers’ use of the media using content.

Brian’s direct relationships with the majority of Australia’s territories top program producers encouraged Brian to launch Full Circle Entertainment to stake a claim on the emerging brand funded content market.

In recent times the business has expanded to work in the Digital (FCD/COGS Media) and Subscriber television advertising sales arenas, business’s that are complementary in today’s fragmented media environment.

Brian is an executive who has worked in across multiple advertiser platforms and has specialized in developing opportunities for brands to Connect to their targets through Content .

Sean Pickwell is the Director of Waterfront Entertainment Marketing, a unique Australian Company that develops partnerships and marketing platforms between all kinds of entertainment properties and major brand marketers.

In the early 90’s Sean was asked to create and build Austereo’s National Promotions unit
providing a unique service to national marketers. For the first time advertisers with Australia’s biggest radio network could get creative ideas and have them implemented nationally through all of Austereo’s stations.Sean grew the division to more than $50m in turnover,assisting Austereo’s massive revenue growth through the 90’s.

In 2001, Sean initiated and was CEO of Austereo Live which created the Rumba and M-one concert events, before leaving in 2003 to start Waterfront.

Andrew joined Bartercard in 1994 and has held senior roles within the Australian and international operations. His experience ranges from marketing, sales and franchise management, to client relationship management and administration. Andrew has also held a senior training role which has seen him train and present internationally.

In addition to his current role as Marketing and New Product Development Manager, Andrew owns a company which specialises in sales, marketing and event management, and is also a part owner of an entertainment company in South East Qld. Other business experience includes buying a commercial café and improving revenues by 60% within six months, through simple systems and marketing initiatives.

Prior to his career at Bartercard, Andrew was Director of Sales and Marketing of a hotel group which also included multiple food, beverage and conference facilities. Within a short time, the group was successfully launched to the international and domestic markets with record occupancies at all properties.

A commercially and strategically astute business leader with a keen sense of social responsibility is how Rebekah Horne is described within the digital industry.

Rebekah spent the first eight years of her career in the marketing sector of the music industry, with EMI and then Warner Music as Marketing Director, where she was responsible for the marketing and promotion of all artists to media, retail and consumers.

From music to mobile was the logical step for Rebekah, who moved to the role of Business Development Content Marketing Manager at Singtel Optus. With an entrepreneurial and aggressive spirit, Rebekah was a driving force, actioning the content and portals strategy which involved partnerships with Disney, eBay, EPL, NineMSN and MTV.

Capping off an impressive stint in the Australian & New Zealand markets, Rebekah is now heading to Europe to add to her role in the Australian and New Zealand markets as Managing Director, Europe for Fox Interactive Media. In this role she will lead a team of Country Managers and will be responsible for developing and implementing the strategic direction for Europe as well as being accountable for carrying out the vision for the European team.

Amy started her corporate life in Australia at Telstra, then moved to London in 1993 where she worked for just over a decade running creative advertising agencies and building brands such as Sony PlayStation, Virgin Upper Class, Nike and Revlon, and finally, Honda, for whom she was a driving force in creating one of the most famous advertisements of the past decade, Hondaʼs ʻCogʼ - a celebration of the beauty of things when they just work – capturing their essence and growing their business 40% in two years.

Amy believes creativity has the power to connect people and bring about positive change in the world. She was one of the pioneers in the UK to harness the best creative minds to found a global movement called ‘We Are What We Do’.

She was the integral part of a small team behind publishing two books in Australia on behalf of the movement, ‘Change the World for Ten Bucks’ (1 in 66 Australians has a copy and in 2006 it won the Prime Ministerʼs Award for the best example of a charity and business working together for positive change) and more recently in 2007, ‘Change the World 9 to 5’, which addresses how we can work happier and healthier, bringing her creativity and passion for this movement.

Amyʼs love for Australia and the birth of her second child saw her return to become the CEO of JWT Australia/NZ where she once again became the custodian of the worldʼs biggest brands, including Ford, Nestléʼs Kit Kat, Kimberly-Clark Kleenex, Unileverʼs Lipton and Kraft, for whom she created the Little Vegemites Aussie Reader program.

Now nine months into her role as the MD of Jenny Craig Australia she is on a mission to lead Jenny Craig into the future with confidence.
Her motto is “Life is an occasion, so rise to it!”

In 2004, he successfully launched the NASCAR Sponsorship Study, a national study examining sponsorship effectiveness in NASCAR.  Now entering its fifth season, clients for the study have included such NASCAR sponsors Allstate, Bank of America, Bass Pro Shops, DeWalt, ESPN, Gatorade, the Home Depot, Pepsi, and UPS.

In his decade of sports marketing research experience, he has conducted scores of research studies for blue-chip sponsors, leagues, and teams in every major professional sport, both in the US and overseas. A widely-quoted expert in sponsorship research, his views about sponsorship have appeared in the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Christian Science Monitor, and Penthouse.

Prior to forming Sponsorship Research & Strategy, Larry held senior-level research positions at Ogilvy PR, the Bonham Group, and the Interpublic Group. He received his doctorate in Sport Sociology from the University of Connecticut in Storrs and a B.A. in Intellectual History from Wesleyan University in Middletown, CT. He is also teaches sports marketing at the University of Indianapolis.

Mike began his career in the media department at BMP in London, where he worked with the subsequent founders of Naked, and progressed to Director.

Mid-nineties, Mike jumped ship to join the client side. He was a marketer at Warner Music and was responsible for marketing acts such as Madonna, REM, Green Day and the Red Hot Chili Peppers amongst countless others.

Mike came to Australia in 1997, and went on to be GM of mediaedge:cia.   The call from long-standing mates and Naked founders came in 2004 and was too hard to resist.

Mike is the nicest chap you’ll meet in marketing, unless you criticise his beloved Chelsea football club.

Steve began his career at a global corporate sponsorship leverage firm, where he worked on both television and event projects. His clients were in the areas of FMCG, new technologies, finance, and IT.
Realising that it was the sponsorship leverage of events that excited him, rather than television, Steve moved into non-traditional marketing. He did so in a variety of small to midsized agencies in Sydney, including the Making Waves Group.

Steve then moved back to big agency land, where he worked on a multinational financial client. Whilst enjoying his time there, he jumped at the opportunity to return to the Making Waves Group. His next big challenge lies in leading the expansion of the Australian office.

Annick has twenty years experience in the media industry working on many high profile clients, the majority being FMCG.  Currently leading the Coca-Cola offline and digital teams and previously worked on Unilever, Nestle, Kelloggs, Johnson & Johnson, KFC & Pizza Hut, Mastercard, Freedom Furniture, Boots, Aussie Home Loans, Volkswagen, Audi and others.
 
Annick has lead numerous client teams and her strengths include: passion for and understanding of clients business, being planned and organised to lead a team to deliver their clients creative thinking, innovation, impact, business sense and results.
 
Annick strongly believes in collaboration amongst clients and their agency partners to achieve excellent results and deliver
clients/brands KPIs.

James Tuckerman is a young man on a mission. As founder and Editor-In-Chief of Anthill Magazine and trained in law at the University of Melbourne, James commenced his career as a public relations consultant, for Weber Shandwick Worldwide, where he specialised in corporate finance and investor relations communications, providing consultancy services to some of Australia’s largest and most respected corporate institutions, including Telstra, Holden, AAMI and JB Were.

At age of 26, James launched Anthill Magazine with no experience in the publishing world. Since then, he has grown Anthill from the seed of concept to become Australia’s leading business magazine specifically focussed on innovation and entrepreneurship. Importantly, it is Australia’s first magazine by entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs.

Nathan Schipper has been with Tangibility since it launched 8 years ago. It was in 2001 that the dream of a boutique Promotional Marketing Company become a reality. Founded with the desire to raise the bar by injecting some creativity into promotional marketing, Tangibility has won multiple Industry Awards in recognition of the creative marketing solutions it has designed for clients.

Nathan has spent 8 years working with some of Australia's largest companies. From Resource, Engineering and Mining Services through to Building and Consumer Goods companies, all have benefited from the passion and creativity which Nathan brings to their company. Never happy with anything but the most effective and creative solution the budget can sustain!

Gina Unwin has over 10 years experience in the sport and sponsorship marketing industry.  Her career has seen her work for rights holders across a wide range of sports, agencies and over the last four years large global brands.  Gina spent over four years with IMG in Australia developing skills across all aspects of the sports marketing business focusing on sponsorship consulting, sales, event management and customised hospitality platforms for large corporates. 

Following her time at IMG, Gina moved across to agency life, leading the Qantas M2006 sponsorship program.  After the Commonwealth Games project, Gina accepted a brand and sponsorship role at American Express working on the Australian Open, Cirque du Soleil and Skifields partnerships. Early in 2008 Gina accepted her current role at HSBC as the Brand and Sponsorship Manager, leading the sponsorship portfolio, including the HSBC Waratahs, Hawthorn Hawks, Mt Hotham and Cirque du Soleil for the global bank.

*speakers subject to change