Archives: People

Dipanwita Das is the CEO and Co-founder of Sorcero.

She is an award-winning global technology entrepreneur and a Sir Edmund Hilary Global Impact Fellow.

Dipanwita previously founded and led 42 Strategies, which built the technological platform infrastructure for the largest private-sector global public health policy initiative in history, partnering with the Gates Foundation, Bloomberg Philanthropies, and the International Red Cross. This initiative positively influenced health outcomes for over three billion people across 20 countries.

Dr. Chalmers is the CEO of CiteAb and a visiting Lecturer at the University of Bath. He conceived the idea of a citation-based antibody search engine, co-founded CiteAb, and now leads the company in its mission to help scientists and suppliers by collecting reagent citation data.

He has a long-standing interest in antibody validation and is a scientific organiser of the International Antibody Validation Meeting series.

Dr. Chalmers’ research background is in cell biology and prior to moving to a full-time position at CiteAb his research group focused on understanding the development and proliferation of epithelial cells.

Tord Ytterdahl is CEO and co-founder of Appsens, the Norwegian MedTech company. The company has invented and introduced the innovative heart monitoring device and system; ECG247. ECG247 enables an easy-to-use, effective, and low-cost ECG procedure (electrocardiography) which detects atrial fibrillation and other arrhythmias to prevent stroke and heart failure. The ECG247 technology with advanced algorithms, data processing, and AI, is presently in use at Norwegian hospitals, heart specialist clinics and general practitioners as well as being available at pharmacies.

Tord Ytterdahl has held leading positions in several international companies within different industries. Ytterdahl has his education from the Royal Norwegian Navy, Norwegian Business School, and Copenhagen Business School. Inspiration and drive come from working with other people with different skills and solving global health problems.

Ytterdahl has through 4 years of complex development work had the overall responsibility for more than 50 employees and hired personnel. The successful development project has delivered close to 200,000 working hours.

Dr. Francesco Mazzotta is the CEO and co-founder of Pilloxa. Dr. Mazzotta has a PhD in Physics from Chalmers University of Technology and is a Clinical Innovation Fellow from Karolinska Institute. He has broad experience in the pharmaceutical and digital health industry from several years establishing international collaboration and bringing innovations to the market.

Ted Gies leads the Digital Accessibility Team at Elsevier and chairs the RELX Accessibility Guild.  Ted has worked across RELX companies as a UX designer, researcher, and global accessibility authority. He chaired the company accessibility policies, developing several tools and coalitions across divisions. 

Fascinated by easy-to-use and barrier-free information in the STEM field, his current projects include 3D Anatomy Diagrams, accessible visualizations, EPUB3 books, and a belting training system.

Ted has led design and user studies in Oil & Gas Geoscience, Academic Research, and Corporate Innovation.  Ted collaborates with many leading universities and IT vendors on accessibility. Ted has a patent award on a file naming system user interface and has published in several scholarly journals.

Mark is the Business Development Director for the UK and Europe at codemantra U.S. LLC.

He has worked in publishing for over 30 years and has been involved in and led digital solutions since the 1990s, when he launched and managed Random House’s digital initiatives, including the company’s first eBook programme.

Additionally, he has produced digital strategies and solutions for a number of publishers and provided publishing insights to global brands, and the consultancy and investor community.

At codemantra Mark is responsible for managing the company’s UK and European account base and developing new business opportunities markets outside of publishing – principally in the public sector for accessibility.

Since 2019 he has collaborated with UK publishing’s accessibility advocates and experts (for instance, codemantra are on the W3C Accessibility Advisory Board and Mark attends the EU’s Web Accessibility Initiative meetings) to understand the challenges and requirements of making truly accessible content.

In my professional and voluntary roles, I undertake substantial work advocating for access to inclusion and equality in education for those with sight loss and other print disabilities, at both a national and international level. My work centres around working with stakeholders, publishers and content producers, to ensure that those with disabilities have equal and unhindered access to the content they need, be it for education, work or leisure. 

Until recently, I  led the RNIB Bookshare UK Education Collection service which provides accessible, digital educational materials to learners with print disabilities; working directly with over 1,100 publishing partners; providing a growing collection of near 700,000 titles in accessible formats. In addition I manage all publisher relationships across the RNIB library and Reading Services platforms, enhancing the collections to provide audiobooks in a variety of accessible formats. 

I now work for Taylor And Francis as accessibility manager. I am responsible for ensuring accessibility across all T&F platforms, content and ensuring our knowledge remains current and compliant, across everything we do. My role includes working with other publishers, platform providers and our staff and customers, to ensure an inclusive experience for all.

I am passionate about ensuring that those with different needs are afforded the same access and opportunities as all other members of society. I serve on various boards and committees, including the UK Parliament as part of its Regional Stakeholder Network, in which I campaign to MPs for policies that will address the needs of people with disabilities, to bring about effective and lasting change.

I am also delighted to bring my knowledge and personal and professional experience as Chair of the Accessibility Action Group for the Publishers Association UK

As a person who is blind, completed a degree in Mathematics, and developed a successful career, I am well aware of the challenges disabled people face, particularly when it comes to equal access to education. However, I have also seen much positive change and the benefits that key developments have brought. I am forever dedicated to advocating for these positive developments, ensuring that every person with a need has an equal voice in society and this passion has been key in steering my career.

Barry Bealer is currently the Chief Revenue Officer of Access Innovations, makers of the Data Harmony Suite that builds explainable AI for a better search experience. 

As an entrepreneurial leader in the software and information industry, Barry enjoys building and managing teams to execute sound business strategies.

For over 30-years he has brought structure and process to business practices to execute more efficiently and profitably.

Barry is a frequent speaker and moderator at industry events and has been involved as a board or committee member of the Software and Information Industry Association, the Society for Scholarly Publishing, and the W3C Accessibility Education and Outreach Working Group.  

Inmaculada Placencia Porrero is a Senior Expert in Disability and Inclusion at Directorate-General Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion at the European Commission.

Her unit is responsible for the coordination of European policies for persons with disabilities. She works on European disability policies including the European Disability Strategy 2010-2020, and the EU implementation of the UNCRPD.

Inmaculada holds a degree in Physics and Computer Science and worked in research and development before joining The European Commission in 1991.

She has worked on research programmes addressing accessibility as well as assistive technologies and was Deputy Head of Unit for various disability-related units in the Commission. Her work in the “e-Inclusion” unit of the Directorate-General for Information Society and Media addressed accessibility policy.

While at the Directorate-General for Justice she contributed to disability-related antidiscrimination legislation. She was responsible for the Task Force for the preparation of the European Accessibility Act and remains responsible since its adoption in 2015. Currently, under the Directorate-General for Employment, Social Affairs, and Inclusion, she is also leading the team working on the Strategy for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities 2021-2030.

Jodi Schneider is Assistant Professor at the School of Information Sciences, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where she runs the Information Quality Lab. She studies scholarly communication and the science of science through the lens of arguments, evidence, and persuasion with a special interest in controversies in science.

Her recent work has focused on topics such as systematic review automation, semantic publication, and the citation of retracted papers. She has held research positions across the U.S. as well as in Ireland, England, France, and Chile.

Her work has been funded by IMLS, NIH, Science Foundation Ireland, the European Commission, and an NSF CAREER award. She leads the Alfred P. Sloan-funded project, Reducing the Inadvertent Spread of Retracted Science: Shaping a Research and Implementation Agenda.