Dr. Olaf Arndt
Head of „Analysis & Scientific Debate“, Federal Government’s Center of Excellence for the Cultural and Creative Industries, and Vice-Director at Prognos AG

Olaf Arndt was born near Hanover in 1967. He studied economic geography, economics and urban planning. An important role in his work is played by the topics of cultural and creative industries, market potentials for medium-sized businesses, regional development, innovation strategies and dialogue-oriented strategy processes. He is co-author of the 2006 Federal German baseline study on the identification of the common characteristics of the sub-sectors of the cultural and creative industries. He has also directed numerous creative reports at federal, regional and local level. He was engaged in studies about digital forms of self-marketing in the cultural and creative industries and their effects on the social security system for artists as well as the CCI in the economic value chain and innovative potentials.

Philippe Kern
Founder and managing director of KEA European Affairs

Philippe Kern was born in Strasbourg in 1962. He is founder and managing director of KEA European Affairs, a research centre specialised in advising territories and organisations on culture policy since 1999. He has authored numerous studies for European and national institutions on culture, copyright, culture and creative industries as well as audiovisual policies notably The Economy of Culture in Europe and The Impact of Culture on Creativity. KEA is involved as an initiator or scientific coordinator of various high profile European projects in the field of creative entrepreneurship, art and science or artistic interventions. Kern is the founder of IMPALA – the association of independent music companies. He acted as Secretary General from 2000 to 2008. He is expert adviser to the European Union, the Council of Europe, WIPO, the European Investment fund (EIF), Eurocities as well as numerous public authorites. He is chairman of b.creative an international association aimed at networking creative entrepreneurs worldwide. He managed a KEA office in Shenzhen (China) for 7 years. In 2014 he was appointed by the Mayor as a member of Shenzhen Internationalisation Strategy Committee. Philippe was former Director of Public and Legal Affairs of PolyGram (now Universal) and head of the IFPI Brussels office. He graduated in law from the universities of Strasbourg and Paris as well as the College of Europe in Bruges. He writes blogs and is author of the book „European. What about Union? Culture in the European Union Project“ and this year  he launched a new book on „The Future of Cultural Policies“.

www.keanet.eu

Barbara Stacher
Policy Officer, DG for Education and Culture, European Commission

Barbara STACHER has been working for the European Commission for over 20 years in different areas. Currently, Barbara works at the European Commission’s Directorate-General for Education and Culture (DG EAC), in the Cultural Policy Unit. Her field of work is the crossroads of cultural and creative sectors/ industries/spaces and how to contribute in terms of city and regional development, social inclusion, job creation, participation, linking up creative sectors and policy-makers, creative hubs and cultural and creative spaces.

Simone Orgel
Digital Strategist

Simone Orgel is a Berlin based Digital Strategist and artist focusing on participation processes and community building in the digital space and political landscape. She teaches on these topics at the European-University Viadrina Frankfurt (Oder) and does research at the Universität der Künste. Simone studied Communication in Social and Economic Contexts at the Berlin University of the Arts as well as the University of Toronto and has worked as a communications expert for several public and private institutions. Until December 2017 she was Head of Project & International Relations at re:publica, one of Europe’s largest conferences for the Internet and society.