Kate Edwards is the CEO and principal consultant of Geogrify, a consultancy which innovated content culturalization, as well as the CXO and Co-Founder of SetJetters, an app focused on connecting tourists to global filming locations. She is also the former Executive Director of the IGDA from 2012 to 2017 and the Global Game Jam from 2019 to 2022. In addition to serving in several board and advisory roles, she is a geographer, writer, and corporate strategist. Following 13 years at Microsoft, she has consulted for EA/BioWare, Google, Amazon, Facebook, LEGO, Ubisoft, and many other companies. As an award-winning 29+ year veteran of the game industry, in 2021 Edwards was included in the Forbes’ “50 Over 50” Vision List as one of 50 veteran women selected from a wide variety of industries, and in the same year was inducted into the Women in Games Hall of Fame.

Jarryd Huntley is Lead Performance Engineer at the VR studio Owlchemy Labs. He plays important roles in Cleveland’s game development scene, as an educator running workshops and teaching classes, and as an organizer with the Cleveland Game Developers community. He was lead programmer on the 2022 game, We are OFK, which was released on PC, Switch, PS4, and PS5. He was also co-author of the 2017 book Game Programming for Artists. Jarryd was also an inductee in the Video Game Awards Future Class 2021.

With talks at universities and conferences around the world, he brings a unique perspective by drawing on his experiences from enterprise software engineering and as a professional musician. His studio, Polytundra LLC, has helped port console games like Quench, and EarthNight on Switch and PS4. Polytundrea released its debut title Art Club Challenge in 2018, which was featured in the 2017 Smithsonian American Art Museum Arcade.

Mariusz Gasiewski has been with Google since 2007. He works with top gaming companies in CEE region. Additionally he is leading mobile gaming and apps initiatives at Google for Startups Campus in Warsaw, supporting growth of mobile gaming and apps ecosystem in in the CEE region. During most of his career was helping some of Google’s biggest clients in Central and Eastern Europe in preparation and implementation of mobile measurement strategies. He is
a frequent speaker at gaming and mobile conferences and a founder of GameCamp (www.gamecamp.io), one
of the biggest mobile gaming and apps specialists communities in Europe.

Working in video game industry for more than 20 years already, most of the time was focused on creating photorealistic 3D content and managing the game production. Had participation in the first "Painkiller" and “Witcher,” now as dev director of the studio The Farm 51, responsible, among others, for “NecroVisioN,” “Painkiller Hell & Damnation,” “Get Even” and “Chernobyl VR Project.” Within the technological division of company named as Reality 51, he’s involved in research and development on 3D graphics and interactive storytelling within "Chernobylite" - the survival horror game based on scans or real locations and stories of Chernobyl catastrophe’s witnesses. Recently started to work on the unannounced open-world RPG game project.

Professional concept artist and art director working for the movie and game industry in London, UK. Recently Jama worked on such shows as Mandalorian, Ahsoka, Skeleton Crew and movies such as Kong: Skull Island, Ready Player One, Jurassic World 2 and many others

Vlad Micu is a free agent and business development professional in the game industry with a strong reputation for creating long-term relationships and generating new sources of revenue that lead to significant returns for his clients.

He is an experienced evangelist with a strong network who is equally able to take the lead as well as be part of a team and has an established track record of being able to easily adapt to new challenges and environments in order to deliver success. Vlad is credited in over 35 videogame products on mobile, VR, console and PC.

Mike Bodie is an Olivier Nominated and LAMDA trained classical actor and voice actor based in London. He has won 2 OVA awards, received 11 OVA nominations, and was nominated for SOVAS. He is also a voice actor and a member of the BAFTA Games Crew since 2018+. Additionally, Mike Bodie is the founder and performer in the Olivier and Tony Award-Winning Theatre company, Mischief Theatre. He has appeared in projects for Amazon, Netflix, FOX, BBC, Lionsgate, and Legendary.

Vitaliy Moroz is the creator of the game Family Island, one of the highest-grossing mobile farming games that is endorsed by Mariah Carey, with an annual revenue of over $200,000,000. With 15 years of experience as a game designer, Vitaliy has a proven track record of creating hit games and successfully mentoring others in the industry.

Ernist Umetaliev is a respected sound engineer and music producer in the Kyrgyz Republic. He has authored numerous music projects and produced comedy films. He is also the creator of the popular music project D Billions, which has garnered over 40 billion views on the YouTube platform. Currently, the D Billions team consists of around 70 people who are involved in various aspects of content creation, such as developing ideas, writing scripts, filming, editing, creating music and sound design, animation, programming, and translation.

AI-based mobile app for children. A proven track record of developing and implementing AI solutions across 10 different businesses (automating document verification, facial recognition, etc.). Over 8 years of experience as Head of Product in various industries (Kupi.com, Wrike.com, Choise.com - from traveltech to web3).

23 years of experience in IT, progressing from webmaster to group of companies CEO. Confidence backed by a proven ability to build innovative products and lead high-performing teams.

Daniil Mirkin is a game developer with more than 20 years of experience. He has spent most of his time as an independent developer. He developed and released 13 games for PC, MAC, Android, iOS platforms, combining team-lead, programming, game design and artwork skills. He also worked at Alawar as a mobile technical lead. Currently in the process of developing a children's mobile game for D Billions

Alexander Muravyev is a professional artist, animator, art director and sound designer for games with more than 13 years of experience in the game industry. Worked with such companies as Playgenes, Alawar and others. In the release of a large number of games in various casual genres.

Vladimir Tokarev is the CEO of Artmer Studio and has over eight years of experience in the 3D art production industry. He used to work on several high-profile companies. He is passionate about creating visually stunning content and is dedicated to providing his clients with the best possible service.
Learn more about Artmer Studio at artmerstudio.com.

Industry veteran with over 25 years of experience in content production, project management, game development education, community outreach and business development. Editor, gamedev evangelist, product owner, mentor, bizdev.

Companies: Gameland, Akella, IT Territory, Epic Games, ITHub Games, Long Tale Games.

Ilya Eremeev is a Co-Founder and the Managing Partner of The Games Fund, one of the top gaming VC funds. Ilya is a games Industry veteran with over 15 years of experience in major international companies on production and management roles. For the last 5 years Ilya is focused on investments in video games companies. Before founding The Games Fund Ilya was one of the founding employees of MGVC - $100m corporate investment fund of MY.Games.

Maria is the Co-founder and Managing Partner of The Games Fund, a $50m VC fund investing in early-stage gaming companies. Before founding The Games Fund, Maria worked for over ten years in the VC and PE industry, including an investment director position in MGVC (a corporate investment arm of MY.GAMES with $100m under management). Maria is a competitive gamer holding platinum in League of Legends and Apex Legends.

Maxim Rate is a highly accomplished professional with a wealth of expertise in the dynamic and rapidly-evolving Chinese market, specifically in the fields of Gaming and Fintech. With a decade of experience living and working in China, Maxim has held influential roles at prominent organizations such as Tencent, Leiting, and Swiftpass, where he was responsible for leading cross-border projects and collaborations. He is currently engaged in several high-profile projects, some of which are deeply integrated into the local ecosystem.

Andrey Amortiz is one of the first pioneers of the gaming industry in the Kyrgyz Republic. Under his leadership, one of the first games from Kyrgyzstan was released on the Steam platform - World of One, as well as mobile games Mask Merge and Merge and Burn, which received high awards. Currently, he is an independent author and developer of indie games, who has independently released the game Rooten, and is currently working on a new dark game.

Founder of GameDev Goethe, the first game development incubator in Uzbekistan.
Lecturer of Game Development discipline at Westminster International University in Tashkent.
Managing partner at AmayaSoft, the largest company in Uzbekistan focused on developing mobile games for children.

Author of a column in Spot, the largest online business and startup publication in Uzbekistan https://www.spot.uz/ru/tag/akmalsalikhov/

Founding CEO of Astana Hub - the driving force of Kazakhstani IT-ecosystem development. Currently Astana Hub has 1200 participating companies that generate $600.000 per year. Raised > $2 million in Naimi.kz, valuation of the startup today is $17 million.

Azis is a member of the HTP Supervisory Board and the founder of the Kyrgyz Association of Software and Service Developers (KSSDA), also HTP.
Besides, he is the founder and head of the IT company "Unique Technologies", one of the most successful software development companies in Kyrgyzstan.
Mr. Abakirov was an active member of the Bishkek Business Club, where he helped to communicate and establish contacts between business leaders of Kyrgyzstan.
Azis has made a major contribution to popularizing the IT professions in the country and has inspired many IT companies to enter international markets.

Chubak Temirov is responsible for the general management of the HTP and plays one of the key roles in the development and support of ICT in Kyrgyzstan and HTP residents, extending markets of residents, creating favorable ecosystem for startups, and creating physical infrastructure for tech companies. Chubak is also in charge of consulting, recruting international and local IT companies, expanding global markets of HTP resident companies. Chubak has more than 10 years of experience in the IT sector, in addition to sales and consultancy experience. He earned his bachelors degree in Business Administration from AUCA, also, MS degree in Operations and Logistics Management from the University of East Anglia, UK.

Azamat Burzhuev is the Head of the Supervisory Board of the High Technology Park of the Kyrgyz Republic, leading the strategy engine of the technopark towards its mission and goals.
In addition, Mr. Burzhuev has been the head of the digitalization department of the Presidential Administration of the Kyrgyz Republic since 2021.
He has extensive experience in leading digitalization and information technology government agencies and in building a strong IT foundation in Kyrgyzstan.
From 2018 to 2019 he was the Deputy Chairman of the State Committee for Information Technologies and Communications of the Kyrgyz Republic.

ololo group of companies includes a chain of creative hubs in Bishkek and Osh, ololoAkJol co-working resort, ololoFamily art hotel on Issyk-Kul, John Galt business accelerator, Liberterra real estate management company, ololoEvents event agency, ololoMedia digital agency, WelcomeKG and ololo creative impact fund, which are aimed at developing female entrepreneurship and creative businesses. He is a member of Global Council on Creative Economy, a co-founder and Supervisory Board member of KG Analytics think tank, and a co-founder and Chairman of Kyrgyzstan’s Creative Industries Association.

Ilya Chuvashov is an expert in project management and product development with over 9 years of experience. His knowledge and skills encompass areas such as digital marketing, asset management, web3/crypto, and artificial intelligence.

Today, Ilya serves as Chief Product Manager of PIXY, a Telegram bot that provides users with access to content generation through the cascade neural networks tools of PIXY AI Hub.

Avigail Menashe is an Executive Director of the biggest Kyrgyz IT Association with 6+ years of experience in tech industry, tech education, global expansion and business development in Central Asia. Her area of work and skills span across: Strategic Partnerships with the Governments; VCs and Universities; Tech; Software Development and Project Management; Business Development and Sales; Consulting and Mentoring; Tech Education.

Additionally, Avigail advances equity for women and girls through advocacy, as well as education in Tech through different projects around the country.

Danai Dairov received a higher technical education in Moscow and South Korea. He has collaborated with the UN and EU and has implemented innovative IT projects at the Engineering Science Center. Since 2021, he has been engaged in research at a leading South Korean think tank specializing in international security. For 15 years, he has practiced Eastern martial arts. He believes that critical thinking and a positive mindset are the best guides to self-realization and human happiness.