Keynote Speakers

Chris White, Senior Vice President, Internet of Things (IoT) Sales, Cisco

Chris White is Senior Vice President for Internet of Things (IoT) Global Sales. He is responsible for the go-to-market strategy, solutions, and global sales for Cisco’s industry-leading IoT growth initiative.

A passionate change agent, Chris believes companies must act now and transform to compete in an ever-changing digital world. As everything becomes connected, “we are facing the biggest transition ever in technology during our lifetime,” Chris noted speaking at digital business industry events including TEDxOrangeCoast2014 and the Internet of Things World Forum 2015.

In his two decades working for Cisco, Chris has built a track record of launching new businesses and building them into market leaders. In his current role, he transformed five Cisco business units into Cisco’s market-leading Internet of Things growth initiative, building Cisco’s number one market share in sports and entertainment solutions, and creating Cisco’s fast-growing Internet of Things solutions business.

As Cisco’s vice president of emerging technologies, Chris incubated and launched a number of technologies, including building Cisco’s Smart Grid solutions into a global market leader by helping companies manage energy more efficiently.

While serving as Cisco’s vice president of globalization, Chris pioneered Cisco’s globalization strategy from his base in Bangalore, India, setting up support for Cisco’s growth engine in emerging countries, and forming important new partnerships with Wipro, Infosys, and Tata.

Chris holds a bachelor’s degree in business from Kingston University in Kingston-upon Thames, London. He is also a member of the advisory board of the Paul Merage School of Business at the University of California, Irvine. He lives in Southern California with his wife, Trish, and children, Elle and Alec.

Follow Chris on Twitter @cnwusa, and read his perspectives on Cisco blog posts.

Abdullah Al-Swaha, Managing Director, Cisco Saudi Arabia

Abdullah Al-Swaha is responsible for Cisco Saudi Arabia Country Operations as a Managing Director, a multimillion organization that oversees the business development and acceleration of Saudi’s Digital Transformation Plan.

Cisco Saudi Organization’s vision is for Cisco to be the #1 IT Company for customers, partners and employees through delivering innovative solutions for growth, profitability and competitiveness through the adoption of digitization.

With more than a decade of industry experience of building high performance teams and organizations Abdullah oversaw the development and growth of Cisco Saudi’s engineering, public sector, commercial, service provider, channel and country operations.

Abdullah is an active member of the regional ICT community. He is a Board member of the Technology Advisory Board in Prince Mohammed Bin Fahd University (PMU). He’s also the founder of a social entrepreneurship technology incubator that delivers life changing solutions in education and healthcare. He was a keynote speaker at a number of events such as the Internet of Everything, Cisco Connect, Business Innovation and Saudi Mobile Conference.

In addition to his engineering and computer science background, Abdullah holds multiple executive education credentials from Harvard Business School in Finance, Economics, Business Analytics and Disruptive Strategy.

Osama Al-Zoubi Chief Technology Officer Cisco - Middle East

Osama Al-Zoubi is the Chief Technology Officer (CTO), Cisco Middle East. In his current role, Osama focuses on the development and execution of technical strategies for Digital Transformation. He drives technical strategy and innovation, through working closely with Government Agencies, Enterprise Customers, Private Sector, and Partners, across the Middle East.

He is inspirational and experienced technical leader who leads the Systems Engineering organization in Cisco ME, that partners with all customers across ME to drive innovation and Digital Transformation. More than nineteen years of ICT experience, with primary focus on developing Business & Technology Architectures, to deliver on business outcomes for customers and partners.

He received his Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), and Masters in Computer Science from the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), in Chicago, IL USA.

He received his Bachelor of Science in Computer Engineering from the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC), and Masters in Computer Science from the Illinois Institute of Technology (IIT), in Chicago, IL USA.

Dr. Sulaiman A. Mirdad

Dr. Sulaiman Mirdad is Deputy Governor for Information Technology at the Communications and Information Technology Commission (CITC), Saudi Arabia. Prior to Joining CITC, Dr. Mirdad was VP for Technology at the Advanced Arabian Systems (Naseej), and Cofounder and Principal Engineer at InfoLibria, a provider of Internet solutions for content distribution and delivery products. With more than 20 years of experience in the field of IT, Dr. Mirdad coauthored a number of worldwide patents, while working at InfoLibria, in the subject of Content Distribution and Delivery. For his achievements, Dr. Mirdad was granted the King Abdulaziz Order of Merit (First Degree) in 2008 by the Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz.

Dr. Mirdad has a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Boston University. His patented research was one of the first to propose the integration of application and communications layers (known today as Layered Switching), and integration of routing and caching (transparency between networks and applications). He was the first to introduce the concept of Transparent Proxies. Dr. Mirdad received an M.S. in Computer Science from The American University at Washington D.C. and a B.S. in Computer Engineering from King Fahad University of Petroleum & Minerals.

Waleed Alorani, STC

Extensive experience in establishing and managing telecommunication and IT companies with focus on technical capabilities. Currently leading Horizontal Technology department at STC Solutions to build technical capabilities for specialized new solutions and technologies and serve as a technology support unit for different stakeholders. Before that, Waleed was leading several key technical positions in Telecom and IT sectors. Waleed holds a PhD in system engineering from Reading university and master from King Saud University.

Bahgat Mostafa, Regional Manager – END-Western Region, BTC Networks

Qualifications:

BSc. In Telecommunication Engineering – Helwan University, Egypt - 1988
Master of Business Administration – Birmingham University, UK - 2011

27 years of experience in the IT and Telecommunication industry focused on converged network, multimedia applications and contact center, providing the best of breed technical support and operation management.

Currently working as a Regional Manager for the Western Region in BTC Networks, Enterprise Network Division (END), where I am responsible to develop and implement a business plan to identify the WR objectives and strategies to increase Revenue, Profit and reduce operational expenses, In alignment with BTC vision by adapting the up to date market trends and developing BTC approach for a best fit to the Saudi market. No doubt retaining of customer satisfaction is in the core of BTC vision to underpin our business process and utilizing the in-house skills and competitive advantage to define new market trends.

Nicolas Pampilli, General Manager, BT Al Saudia

Nicolas Pampilli joined BT in 2006. Based in Riyadh, Nicolas runs the business for BT in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, managing operations and teams across the 3 main offices in the Kingdom.

As general manager for BT Al Saudia, Nicolas is in charge of growing the company’s business and leading the management team. Nicolas joined BT in 2006 as product manager for network access solutions for BT in France. He moved then to the United Arab Emirates taking charge of strategy and marketing for Middle East and Africa. Prior to joining BT, he was in charge of business development for Africa at SFR. Before that, Nicolas was the head of international business line for T-Systems in France. He has more than 18 years’ experience in the ICT field.

Nicolas holds an International Business Administration degree from ESSEC – BBA, France. He also developed his skills and knowledge in networked ICT managed solutions and financial planning in post graduate studies.

Nicolas is married with two kids. In his free time, Nicolas enjoys spending time with his family, playing golf and sailing.

Dr. AbdulRahman Al-Azzam, Senior VP & General Manager, ICT Business Unit, AEC

Dr. AbdulRahman Al-Azzam is the Senior VP & General Manager of the ICT Business Unit at Advanced Electronics Company. He has more than 19 years of technology experience within KSA, He started his career with AT&T then he held a number of leadership positions in Lucent Technologies which became later Alcatel-Lucent, before moving to Advanced Electronics Company in 2013.

At AEC, he is leading & championing the ICT business of AEC that encompasses Infrastructure solutions, Enterprise Applications, Security & Health-IT Solutions. He directs all operations of the business unit and provides leadership for all account management and program management staff and holds full P&L responsibility. He oversees all business development, marketing, technical, contractual and financial activities of the business.

Dr. Azzam has done his Ph.D. from University of Florida & Executive Management from IMD Business School. He also served as the Chairman of Saudi National Quality Committee.

Mohammed Kiki, General Manager Saudi Arabia, NetApp

Engineer Mohammed Kiki is NetApp District Sales Manager for Saudi Arabia. He has more than 15 years of experience in Enterprise Systems, Storage, Information Security, Cloud Computing, Big Data, Data Center Operations, Disaster Recovery, Business Continuity, Backup, Recovery and Archiving.

Mohammed has gained his experience on the customer side, at system integrators, and vendor side. He started his career at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, SABIC, and Mobily in the Data Center as well as in Information Security Operations space, and moved later on to SBM to lead the IBM Tivoli brand. Mohammed then worked for various vendors like EMC, HP, Dell, and finally Cisco, covering various roles.

Mohammed has a bachelor degree of Science in Computer Engineering from KFUPM.

Kareem Sherif, Intel Saudi Arabia General Manager

Kareem Sherif is Intel KSA’s General Manager, He is responsible for Intel sales and marketing in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.

With 14 years of experience across Saudi Arabia and senior Sales, Solutions and Engineering posts at multinational telecommunications companies and local system integrators; such as Alcatel-Lucent, Alcatel CIT France, and BTC Networks, Kareem brings extensive leadership capabilities and experience enriched by his diverse engineering, technical and sales career exposure. Kareem has a deep understanding of Service Providers and Enterprise Clients’ business models and their sophisticated challenges and needs, and a strong background in expanding and driving Intel's business into new market segments and verticals.

He also held the role of Business Development Manager at Intel – Riyadh branch prior to his current role. Kareem holds a Master’s degree in Business Administration (MBA) and a Bachelor’s degree in Electronics & Communications Engineering.

Tom O’Reilly

Tom O’Reilly is the CTO for EMEA at VCE, EMC Converged Platforms.

Tom is responsible for the technology strategy of VCE across the region, working with counterparts globally, to ensure that customers can best take advantage of the benefits of converged and hyperconverged infrastructure platforms, as well as engineered solutions such as Enterprise Hybrid Cloud, Native Hybrid Cloud and Business Data Lakes.

Tom has more than 15 years of IT experience, working in management roles throughout the US, Europe and the Middle East. Tom has also worked for leading companies across industries including hospitality, transportation, IT consulting, and oil & gas. He currently lives in Dubai, UAE.