Mario Astengo

Mr Astengo is responsible for Customer Satisfaction & Quality at IVECO.

An aeronautical engineer, Astengo worked first in the ITT Group and, from 1977, in the Fiat Group in planning, management control and development of information systems in the Auto Spare Parts sector.

In 1982, he joined Iveco as Purchasing Manager and later became head of the Technical Centre. In 2002 he took over management of the Business Unit Medium & Heavy Commercial Vehicles. He is a member of the Iveco Magirus Board of Directors.

Jerker Sjögren

Since 2008 Mr. Sjögren has been working in the Swedish Ministry of Enterprise, Energy and Communication as coordinator for the Swedish Logistics Forum. The Logistics Forum is one of the Swedish government's advisory bodies, where industry, researchers and politicians meet and discuss solutions for the sustainable development of the transport sector.

The Logistics Forum is working to develop the concept of Green Freight Transport Corridors in the Nordic countries. Mr. Sjögren is acting as project manager for the Green Corridors initiative.

During the Swedish Presidency of the EU, Mr. Sjögren has been involved in a number of different strategic discussions, including debates around the Future of European Transport Policy.

He is an economist by training and has more than 20 years of experience in the ICT field, both in private companies and the public administration.

Dominique Riquet

Dominique Riquet is a French politician from the UMP group and Mayor of Valenciennes in Northern France. He was elected to the European Parliament in 2009, where he is a member of the EPP (European People's Party) group and sits on the Committee on Budgets and the Delegation to the EU-Russia Parliamentary Cooperation Committee. He is also a substitute on and Vice Chair of the Committee on Transport and Tourism and a substitute on the Delegation for relations with the countries of Southeast Asia and the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN).

Mr. Riquet is a surgeon specialising in Urology and, prior to becoming a Mayor of Valenciennes, he served as Deputy Mayor under Jean-Louis Borloo between 1989 and 1995, becoming his First Deputy between 1995 and 2001. Mr. Riquet was appointed as Mayor in 2002, when Mr. Borloo joined the French government.

Mr. Riquet is also a member of the regional council in the North-West Constituency of France and the head of the UMP group within the Council. He headed the list in his constituency in the 2009 European elections and was elected to the European Parliament along with three other colleagues: Tokia Saïfi, Jean-Paul Gauzès and Pascale Gruny.

Xavier Ponsar

Xavier Ponsar started his career at Michelin as production manager in several factories in France. After a couple of years in management recruitment for industry and sales, he was appointed as the head of Logistics for France and later became the head of Purchasing for France.

He subsequently moved to Singapore where he was appointed head of Supply Chain and Logistics for Asia. After holding this position for four years, he was appointed Logistics Director for Europe in 2008.

Patrick Dixon

Patrick Dixon is an experienced speaker who helps organisations further their strategic goals by understanding future trends. He is often described in the media as Europe's leading futurist.

A successful entrepreneur and physician by first training, he is the author of 12 books in 24 languages, including "Futurewise and Building a Better Business". He is also ranked as one of the world's 20 most influential business thinkers alive by Thinkers 50.

His approach is highly energetic, informal and interactive, and engages full attention of large and small audiences from the first moment. Around half of Patrick Dixon's presentations are in-house events for senior leaders, and include detailed research into company priorities, strategy and wider environment. He delivers vitally important insights, specific to each corporation. Patrick Dixon has worked with hundreds of multinationals in over 50 nations, across every industry.

Melinda Crane

Dr. Melinda Crane presents the news programme "Journal" and hosts the talk shows "Quadriga" and "Capital Cities" on Deutsche Welle-TV. She is also Senior Producer of "Global Players", an international discussion show on CNBC. She was also International Affairs Consultant to the discussion show "Sabine Christiansen", including interviews with Kofi Annan, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, andd George Bush) from 2002 - 2005.

As a writer and reporter both in Germany and in the United States she has worked for Deutsche Welle, ARD, The New York Times Magazine, The Boston Globe Sunday Magazine, The Boston Globe, the Christian Science Monitor and others. Melinda Crane has been a member of the Berlin RIAS Commission since 2004.

She has moderated a wide variety of podium discussions and conferences for public organisations and private sector clients, and is a frequent guest and commentator on German television and radio. Among her areas of expertise are: transatlantic politics, climate and environment, business and economics (including globalisation and world trade), new media and the internet.

She holds a J.D. from Harvard Law School and a Ph.D. in political economy from the Fletcher School of Law Diplomacy in Medford, Massachusetts, USA.

Frank Appel

Dr. Frank Appel is Chief Executive Officer of Deutsche Post DHL.

He joined the company as Managing Director of Corporate Development in 2000. In November 2002 Frank Appel became Member of the Corporate Board of Deutsche Post with management responsibilities for Logistics, Mail International, Global Customer Solutions, Global Business Services, Corporate Regulatory Management and the First Choice programme before he was appointed as new CEO of the company in February 2008.

In 1999, he was elected Partner and Member of the German Business Management of McKinsey & Co. He had previously worked for the company as a consultant and project manager. Frank Appel holds a Master of Science degree in chemistry from the University of Munich and a doctorate in neurobiology from ETH, Zurich.

Paolo Monferino

Paolo Monferino is the Chief Executive Officer of Iveco, the Fiat Group Company.

Born in Novara in 1946, Mr. Monferino received a degree in Mechanical Engineering from the Polytechnic of Turin and entered Fiat in 1973 initially as a Design Engineer and then in the Purchasing department of the steel manufacturing division of the Group.

In 1981 he moved to Chicago, Illinois, as Senior Vice President of Worldwide Procurement and Material Management at FiatAllis, a joint venture between Fiat’s construction equipment business and the American Allis Chalmers.

Within FiatAllis, he became General Manager of the Latin American subsidiary based in Brazil in 1983 and Chief Operating Officer of the company in 1986. In 1987, he was appointed Chief Operating Officer of Fiat Agri, the farm machinery division of the Fiat Group.

Following the acquisition of Ford New Holland in 1991 and the creation of New Holland, Mr. Monferino was named Executive Vice President for Strategies and Business Development of the new company headquartered in London.

From July 1996 to March 2000 Paolo Monferino was Executive Vice President of the Fiat Group with responsibility for the following Sectors of Fiat: Magneti Marelli (Automotive Components), Teksid (Metallurgical Products), Comau-Pico (Production Systems), FiatAvio (Aviation), Fiat Ferroviaria (Rolling Stock and Railway Systems), Fiat Engineering (Civil Engineering), C.R.F. (Fiat corporate advanced research center).

In 2000, Paolo Monferino was appointed Chief Executive Officer of CNH (Case New Holland), a worldwide leading Company in the agricultural and construction equipment business, set up from the merger of New Holland and Case Corporation, with headquarters in Chicago, Illinois.

In March 2005 Paolo Monferino returned to Italy as CEO of Iveco S.p.A., the Fiat Group Company that designs, manufactures, and markets a broad range of light, medium and heavy commercial vehicles.

Mr. Monferino is a director of the Board of CNH (Case New Holland), Ferrari S.p.A., Toro Assicurazioni S.p.A., Indesit Company and of several companies of the Iveco Group, including the newly established Chinese joint ventures.

Antonio Tajani

Antonio Tajani has been the Vice President of the European Commission for Transport since May 2008. Prior to this, he was a Spokesman for the President of the Italian Council of Ministers during the first Berlusconi Government. He was elected as member of the European Parliament in 1994, 1999 and 2004 with over 120 000 preference votes. During his 15 years of parliamentary activity he took part in many committees (Foreign Affairs, Constitutional Affairs, at the time chaired by the President of the Republic Giorgio Napolitano, Transport and Tourism, Fisheries, Security and Defence).

Tajani was the Vice-Chair of the European People's Party, elected at the EEP Congress in Estoril in 2002 and re-elected at the EEP Congress in Rome in 2006. He was also a member of the Convention on the Future of Europe, which drew up the text of the European Constitution, as well as the head of the Forza Italia delegation in the European Parliament and a member of the Bureau of the Group of the European People's Party. He has taken part in all EPP summits in preparation of the European Councils.

He has lived in Paris, Bologna and Rome and was an Officer in the Italian Air Force. He completed officer training at the Florence AirWarfare School (Scuola di Guerra Aerea) and attended a specialisation course for Air Defence Controller at the Training Technical Centre at Borgo Piave. Assigned to the Operational Base of the 33rd Air Force Radar Centre, he worked as Air Defence Controller and was Head of the Operations Room monitoring Italian and European civil and military air traffic.He is a professional journalist and has held various positions in this field. He was the editor of the Italian weekly 'Il Settimanale', a presenter for the RAI 1 radio news programme, head of the Rome editorial office of the Italian daily 'Il Giornale' and special correspondent in the Lebanon, the Soviet Union and Somalia. Together with Silvio Berlusconi, he was one of the signatories of the founding act of Forza Italia.

He holds a degree in Law from 'La Sapienza' University, Rome and speaks French and English.