Meet the Speakers


Ivan Mulcahy Mulcahy Associates Literary Agency Literary agent


Ivan’s career was largely spent with media giant Reuters, until 2002, when he set up his London- based literary agency


Mulcahy Associates. His interest in find- ing new Irish writing talent, such as Bai- leys Prize-winner Lisa McInerney, has created a core agency strength. In 2016 Mulcahy Associates joined with Milburn Browning talent agency to form MMB Creative, and it has since created a dra- matic rights division and voiceover sister agency, Fuller Voices.


@mulcahylitagent Julia Porter Board director/business advisor


Julia is an experienced board director, mentor and business advisor spe- cialising in media, tech- nology and data busi-


nesses. She sits on the board of the Direct Marketing Association, having previously been its chair. She also man- ages a portfolio of consultancy projects, which range from advising tech start- ups in the media and data space, to projects around customer data strate- gies for established businesses. Her most recent role was as director of con- sumer revenues at the Guardian.


@julia1610


David Roper Heavy Entertainment Founder and m.d.


David founded Heavy Entertainment in 1992, and is an author who teaches on an MA in writ- ing skills at the University


of London. He was a presenter/pro- ducer at Kaleidoscope and Night Waves for five years before becoming BBC Radio’s arts reporter. He left the BBC to take on the same role at Channel 4 News. He has delivered over 2,200 audiobook titles and won a range of industry awards, including Audiobook


and Readings Producer of the Year. @davidroperheavy


Asi Sharabi Wonderbly Co-founder


Asi started Lost My Name as a DIY project with friends. The project soon changed from a labour of love to a funded tech and


storytelling start-up, with the ambition of making millions of kids around the world more curious, clever and kind. Recently rebranded to Wonderbly, the company is a unique, award-winning start-up that lives in the intersection of storytelling, engineering, digital and print, on a mission to help grown-ups inspire self belief in every child.


www.thebookseller.com


Niclas Sandin Bookbeat C.e.o.


Niclas has been c.e.o. of BookBeat since its incep- tion in 2015. BookBeat, a start-up under Bonnier Books, is one of Bonnier


Group’s biggest digital transformation ventures. BookBeat has offered unlim- ited listening audiobooks for a fixed fee in Sweden and Finland since 2016, and is now one of the leading audiobook services in the Nordic countries. Before joining Bonnier in 2012, Niclas was a data analyst and consultant, working with growth companies at Ernst & Young.


Tushar Sharma Blippar


Commercial director, education and enterprise


Tushar directs education activity at Blippar, the world’s leading visual dis- covery platform. Blippar has built a dedicated


product suite for a community of over 20,000 schools worldwide, and partners with major international content pro- viders to enhance the delivery of edu- cational material. Tushar was a found- ing member of an incubator tasked to launch edtech start-ups in Africa and Latin America.


@blipparedu


Sam Reid Think Sprint Co-founder


Sam has extensive experi- ence in building online problem-solving commu- nities, with outputs fea- tured on BBC2, Tech


Crunch, the Huffington Post and BBC Radio 4, and in the FT. Clients have included Disney, Hewlett Packard, Pen- guin Random House, Pan Macmillan, Liberty London, Diesel, the Barbican Centre, Ted Baker, Chloé and Central St Martins. Sam currently leads 100,000 users who provide crowdsourced output for the likes of the BBC and Sky.


@thinksprint


Chantal leads the overall global digital strategy and foreign- language publishing


programme for HarperCollins. She works with each division around the world to manage commercial relationships with new and existing digital part- ners, grow digital revenues and oversee the company’s develop- ing foreign-language publishing. She is also a member of the com- pany’s executive commitee.


Edwin Scholte McGraw-Hill Education Chief operating officer and chief financial officer


Edwin is c.o.o. and c.f.o. for McGraw-Hill’s global edu- cation businesses. He was hired as part of the pri- vate equity-backed team


to deliver on the operating plan post- acquisition by Apollo Global Manage- ment in 2013. Edwin is a board member of busuu, the world’s largest social online language-learning community, where he works with management and other investors to develop and execute the company’s growth strategy.


Kiren Shoman SAGE London Editorial director


Kiren is responsible for SAGE London’s textbook and reference programme, and the strategic lead of SAGE Video. At SAGE since


1995, Kiren has played an instrumental role in the development of both tradi- tional and digital platforms for dissemi- nating its book and textbook content. Kiren works closely with colleagues across SAGE to further explore new product innovations within print and digital publishing, and content develop-


ment within emerging digital streams. @kirenshoman


Sarah Shrubb Hachete Audio Audio publisher


Sarah joined Little, Brown in 1994 as an editor, before taking on start-up imprint Time Warner AudioBooks in 2003. Ini-


tially it published abridged CDs and cassettes, but downloads rapidly became the format of choice; the imprint evolved into the digital-only Hachette Audio list. It has published nearly 1,400 titles across all genres, from authors such as J K Rowling/ Robert Galbraith, Ozzy Osbourne and Carol Ann Duffy.


@hachetteaudiouk 21


Jeff Norton Awesome Media & Entertainment Founder


Jeff is an author, writer- producer and founder of Awesome, a creative incu- bator. He is the author of the award-winning thriller


series MetaWars, the comedic Memoirs of a Neurotic Zombie and the upcoming picture book Stomp School. He’s also the creator and co-writer of the best- selling Princess Ponies series (Blooms- bury). As a filmmaker, Jeff has written and directed short films and music videos, and is developing a number of high-concept TV drama projects.


@thejeffnorton


Kiera O’Brien The Bookseller Charts and data editor


Kiera is The Bookseller’s charts and data editor and the author of two chil- dren’s books, both pub- lished by Quercus. Her


analysis of the audio market in 2017 to date can be found on page six.


Joshua Perry Assembly, Ark Schools Director


Joshua leads Assembly, an education data platform that is part of the Ark family of ventures. Assem- bly helps the education


sector to use data more effectively by integrating systems and providing man- agement analytics to schools. Prior to Assembly, Josh was part of the leader- ship team of Ark Schools, a highly- regarded Multi Academy Trust. He also founded Unlocked Guides, a children’s publishing company that sells travel books and apps.


@keiraobrien


Sophie Rochester Yodomo


C.e.o. and founder


Sophie set up Yodomo as an online destination for creative learning. Yodomo is now working with pub- lishers, retailers and arts


Chantal Restivo-Alessi HarperCollins


Chief digital officer and executive vice-president, international


organisations to produce online video courses around lifestyle skills and tech- niques for the growing generation of creative upskillers. Previously she worked at Random House, Fourth Estate and Good Technology, and consulted clients on content marketing, digital communications and digital product development.


@yodomoco


KEYNOTE


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28  |  Page 29  |  Page 30  |  Page 31  |  Page 32  |  Page 33  |  Page 34  |  Page 35  |  Page 36  |  Page 37  |  Page 38  |  Page 39  |  Page 40  |  Page 41  |  Page 42  |  Page 43  |  Page 44  |  Page 45  |  Page 46  |  Page 47  |  Page 48  |  Page 49  |  Page 50  |  Page 51  |  Page 52  |  Page 53  |  Page 54  |  Page 55  |  Page 56  |  Page 57  |  Page 58  |  Page 59  |  Page 60  |  Page 61  |  Page 62  |  Page 63  |  Page 64