Speaker Biographies

Keynote Speakers

Tim Bloechl, executive director, worldwide national security, defense and justice, Microsoft

Tim is Microsoft's senior executive, chief strategist and spokesperson for Public Safety and National Security markets and initiatives worldwide. He is responsible for business strategy development and execution for several public sectors including military, intelligence, homeland security, justice and law enforcement. Before joining Microsoft, Tim served as the Director, International Information Assurance (IA) Program, and Deputy Director for IA Operations, for the United States Department of Defense (DoD). He was responsible for international military IA outreach, policy and program development, and was the department's representative for interagency international and operational cyber security coordination. He was also the DoD co-chair for the National Cyber Response Coordination Group under the U.S. National Response Plan. He was assigned in the Pentagon Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense, Networks and Information Integration (OASD/NII). Prior to this assignment, from July 1999 until December 2002, Tim was a Senior Associate with Booz Allen Hamilton, providing international affairs, foreign disclosure, intelligence and military operational consulting support to the Joint Task Force-Computer Network Operations (JTF-CNO) in Arlington, VA. Before joining Booz Allen Hamilton, Tim served a 20-year career in the U.S. Army retiring as a Lieutenant Colonel. 

Patrice Commune, President, PRESAGIS

Mr. Commune, formerly of Engenuity Technologies Inc., began with Engenuity in February 2002 as VP World Wide Sales, and was subsequently appointed President. After successfully overseeing several acquisitions for Engenuity, including the integration of BioGraphic Technologies Inc., and AcuSoft Inc., Engenuity was itself acquired by Canadian aerospace giant, CAE.

Subsequent to this acquisition, Mr. Commune was made president of CAE's independent COTS subsidiary, Presagis. Previously, Mr. Commune was VP of International Operations at MontaVista Inc., a leading global supplier of systems software for intelligent connected devices and associated infrastructure.

From 1999-2000, Mr. Commune was Director of Business Development at WindRiver after the acquisition of ISI, and from 1997 to 1999 was VP of European Operations at Integrated Systems.

Warren Katz, Founder and Chief Executive Officer , VT MÄK

Warren Katz co-founded MÄK Technologies with John Morrison in 1990 and acted as chief operating officer for 16 years. In December 2006, MÄK was acquired by VT Systems of Alexandria, Virginia at which time Katz became chief executive officer.

Katz is a noted industry advocate of open interoperability standards and commercial business models in Department of Defense procurement. Katz also has expertise in the collaboration between the defense and video game industries. He is a prolific author of articles, reports and papers, and frequent speaker on these subjects. He holds two patents on a low-cost eye-tracking device and one patent on a networking protocol for simulated distributed force-feedback.

Katz was six-term chairman of the Simulation Interoperability Standards Organization, the international not-for-profit consortium that manages the process for developing open interoperability standards for synthetic environments. From 1987 to 1990, Katz worked for Bolt, Beranek, and Newman on the SIMNET project. Katz was the resident drive train simulation expert, responsible for mathematical modeling of physical systems.

Katz holds dual bachelor's degrees in mechanical and electrical engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Speakers

After graduating from the Ecole des Mines de Paris in 1987, Pierre developed his expertise in Artificial Intelligence at the CAOR laboratory (ENSMP). He then joined Matra Cap System where he continued research on A.I.

After an MBA at Insead, he worked four years in management consulting at AT Kearney.
In November 2000, Pierre founded Kynogon with Jacques Gaubil , targeting the AI Middleware market for the Video Games industry. Pierre was in charge of R&D, Product Development and Technical Support.

In May 2008, Kynogon was acquired by Autodesk. Pierre is now Senior Director in charge of the Product Development for all games middleware at the Games Technology Group.

Valéry Rousset, director of C4ISR marketing and capability development, THALES Land and Joint

Valéry Rousset is persuing a 17-year career in the Defence sector, centered on Computerised Command, Control, Communications, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance (C4ISR).

A graduate from the institute of Political Studies ( Sciences-Po ) in Paris, he holds a PHD in International Relations from the Sorbonne university and published an operational analysis of the 1991 war for Kuwait ( La Guerre à Ciel Ouvert [the Open Sky War]: Irak 1991 , ADDIM 1996).

His main background experience in Industry or with the French MoD includes involvement in precision-guided munitions programs during the first Gulf War, tactical UAV programs during the Yugoslav civil war, counter-proliferation and WMD remote sensing during the new World Order in the Middle East, and concept, development & experimentation in battlelabs to explore battlespace transformation in the early 2000s. A former light infantry officer, Valéry Rousset regularly provides consultancy and teaching on strategy and technology in the media or for post-graduate students.

Today at 40, Valéry Rousset specialises in powering information-centric, network-enabled operations on the digitised battlespace. As director of C4ISR marketing and capability development in Thales Land & Joint Systems, he has been pulling know-how and references from 8 Thales affiliates worldwide to contribute to the Comm@nder integrated C4I capability, delivering information dominance to networked decision-makers from Joint headquarters to the dismounted squad leader.

Matthew Wood has worked in the GIS field for over 10 years, with a variety of positions including mapping urban utilities and the socio-economic impacts of land mines. Since 2004, he has worked for ESRI Inc. He was first based in the Washington, DC office, supporting customers in the Defence Logistics Agency, the Defense Threat Reduction Agency and the US Army Topographic Engineering Center. In late 2007, he moved to the UK, and became a member of the ESRI European Defence Team, supporting the successful implementation of GIS in Defence across Europe. He holds a BA in Geography from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow.