Isaac Ben-Israel was born in Israel (Tel-Aviv), 1949. He studied Mathematics, Physics and Philosophy at Tel-Aviv University, receiving his Ph.D. in 1988. He joined the Israel Air Force (IAF) after graduating high school (1967) and has served continuously up to his retirement (2002). During his service, Isaac Ben-Israel has held several posts in operations, intelligence and weapon development units of the IAF. He headed the IAF Operations Research Branch, Analysis and Assessment Division of IAF Intelligence, and was the Head of Military R&D in Israel Defence Forces and Ministry of Defence (1991-1997). In January 1998 he was promoted to Major General and appointed as Director of Defence R&D Directorate in IMOD. During his service he received twice the Israeli Defence Award.

After retirement from the IDF Isaac Ben Israel joined the University of Tel-Aviv as a professor and was the head of Curiel Centre for International Studies (2002-2004), the head of the Program for Security Studies (2004-2007), Executive Director of the Interdisciplinary Centre for Technological Analysis & Forecasting at Tel-Aviv University (ICTAF) (2010-2013), Deputy Director of the Hartog School of Government and Policy in Tel-Aviv University (2005-2015) and a member of Jaffe Centre for Strategic Studies (2002-2004). In 2002 he founded and headed the Yuval Ne’eman Workshop for Science, Technology and Security. He was a member of the Board of Trustees of Ariel University Centre (2009-2011), and a member of the advisory council of Neaman Institute for Advanced Studies in Science and Technology at the Technion (2000-2010). In 2002 he founded RAY-TOP (Technology Opportunities) Ltd, consulting governments and industries in technological and strategic issues.

Professor Ben-Israel was a member of the 17th Knesset (Israeli Parliament) between June 2007 and February 2009. During this period he was a member of the Security and Foreign Affairs Committee, the Finance Committee, the Science & Technology committee, the Chairman of the Homeland Security Sub Committee and the Chairman of the Israeli–Indian Parliamentary Friendship Association.

In 2011 he was appointed by the Prime Minister to lead a task force that formulated Israel national cyber policy. Following that he founded the National Cyber Headquarters in the PM Office. In 2014 he was appointed again by the PM to lead another task force which resulted in a government decision (February 2015) to set up a new National Cyber Authority. Isaac Ben Israel was a member of the board of directors of IAI (2000-2002), the board of the Israel Corp. (2004-2007) and the R&D advisory board of TEVA (2003-2007) and Chairman of the Technion Entrepreneurial Incubator (2007). He was the Chairman of Israel National R&D council between 2010-2016.

Professor Ben-Israel has written numerous papers on military and security issues. His book Dialogues on Science and Military Intelligence (1989) won the Itzhak-Sade Award for Military Literature. His book on The Philosophy of Military Intelligence had been published by the Broadcast University (1999) and has been translated into French (2004). His book Science, Technology and Security: From Soldiers in Combat up to Outer Space, was published in 2006. His book on Israel Defence Doctrine was published in 2013.
Isaac is married to Inbal (née Marcus) and they have three sons: Yuval (1981), Roy (1984) and Alon (1988).

Meir Feder is a Chaired Professor, holder of the Information Theory Chair, at the School of Electrical Engineering, Tel-Aviv University. He is also the head of the newly established Tel-Aviv university center for Artificial intelligence and Data science (TAD). In addition, he is a Visiting Professorship appointment at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). His research interests are in information theory, signal processing communication and learning. Parallel to his academic career, he is closely involved with the high-tech industry. He founded 5 companies, among them Peach Networks (Acq: MSFT) and Amimon (Acq:LON.VTC). Recently, with his renewed interest in machine learning and AI, he co-founded Run:ai, a virtualization, orchestration, and acceleration platform for AI infrastructure. Prof. Feder is an IEEE Life fellow. He received several academic and professional awards including the IEEE Information Theory Society best paper award for his work on universal prediction, the “creative thinking” award of the Israeli Defense Forces, and the Research Prize of the Israeli Electronic Industry, awarded by the President of Israel. For the development of Amimon’s chip-set, that uses a unique MIMO implementation of joint source-channel coding for wireless video transmission he is a co-reciepient of the 2020 Scientific and Engineering Award of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. He is also the principal inventor of the technology behind the product Teradek Bolt 4K that attained the 73rd Engineering Emmy Award of the Television Academy.

Prof. Amnon Shashua is a world-renowned expert in AI, computer vision, natural language processing, and other related fields. In 2023, he received the Israel Prize, the nation’s top civilian honor for contributions to society, and had previously been named the 2020 Dan David Prize laureate in the field of Artificial intelligence and the 2022 Mobility Innovator by the Automotive Hall of Fame. Shashua has founded five companies using applied AI in various fields from automotive to assisted wearables to fintech: Mobileye, OrCam, AI21 Labs, Mentee Robotics, and "One Zero," the first digital bank in Israel. Prof. Shashua serves as President & CEO of Mobileye, which was acquired by Intel in 2017 as the largest acquisition in Israeli history and went public again in 2022 on the Nasdaq stock exchange under the ticker symbol MBLY. Prof. Shashua holds the Sachs Chair in Computer Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, has published over 160 papers in the field of machine learning and computational vision, and holds over 140 patents.

Dror Bin is the CEO of the Israel Innovation Authority, an independent public entity that operates for the benefit of the Israeli innovation ecosystem and Israeli economy as a whole. Its role is to nurture and develop Israeli innovation resources, while creating and strengthening the infrastructure and framework needed to support the entire knowledge industry.

Prior to his role at the Authority, Dror served as President and CEO of RAD Data Communications, a leading global telecom network solutions company with hundreds of employees at the company’s headquarters in Tel Aviv, a manufacturing center in Jerusalem and development center in Beer Sheva as well as dozens of corporate branches around the world.

Dror also served in a series of positions for close to a decade at Comverse Technology, the last one as a member of the management team and VP of Global Sales. Following this, Dror served as a venture partner at Carmel Ventures and a chairman at several of its portfolio companies. In addition, Dror served as a partner at Shaldor, a leading management consulting firm in Israel, where he led the development and implementation of business and marketing strategies for major organizations in the financial, consumer, retail, high-tech, banking and other industries.

Dror holds two bachelor’s degrees from the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology: one in systems information engineering and the other in industrial management, as well as an MBA from Tel Aviv University.

Ellen P. Goodman, @ellgood, is Distinguished Professor at Rutgers Law School and Visting Professor at Yale Law School. She recently served as Senior Advisor for Algorithmic Justice at NTIA, U.S. Department of Commerce. At Rutgers, she co-directs and co-founded the Rutgers Institute for Information Policy & Law (RIIPL) and was prior to government service a Senior Fellow at the German Marshall Fund. Goodman has published widely on media and telecommunications law, smart cities and algorithmic governance, freedom of expression, and advertising law. Her short-form writing has appeared in the Washington Post, Guardian, Slate, Los Angeles Times, Democracy Journal, etc.  She served in the Obama Administration as a Distinguished Visiting Scholar with the Federal Communications Commission and has been a visiting scholar at the London School of Economics and the University of Pennsylvania. Goodman has received grants from the Knight Foundation, Ford Foundation, Democracy Fund, and Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation for work on digital platform regulation, transparency, advancing new public media models, and public interest journalism. Prior to joining the Rutgers faculty, Goodman was a partner at the law firm of Covington & Burling LLP, where she practiced in the information technology area. She is a graduate of Harvard College and Harvard Law School, clerked for Judge Norma Shapiro on the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, and has three grownish children. 

Fernando Garibay is a record producer, songwriter, artist/ DJ, entrepreneur, academic, and polymath. He was the Musical Director of Lady Gaga's Born This Way Ball and Executive Producer of her Born This Way album.  Fernando has written, produced and creatively directed a multitude of artists, including Lady Gaga, U2, Whitney Houston, Britney Spears, Enrique Iglesias, Bruno Mars, Sia, Kylie Minogue, Shakira, Paris Hilton, and many more.

Fernando, a former executive at Interscope Records, has lectured at Harvard University, Harvard Business School, Harvard Medical School and at M.I.T., Stanford University, and California Western School of Law. Fernando has also participated with the World Economic Forum's Young Global Leaders as a keynote speaker, served as a salon contributor, co-produced and co-hosted  Digital Davos, now Davos Worldwide, served as Keynote Speaker for the Future Blockchain Summit in Dubai in mid-October 2023; as well as the 29th session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 29) to the UNFCCC.

Fernando is the founder of the Garibay Institute, the first and only research and development center focused on art, creativity, entertainment, film, gaming, and music as an instrument for soft power, cultural identity and patrimony, intellectual renaissance, sustainable economic growth, and public diplomacy. The Garibay Institute unites global leaders, best in-class universities, financial institutions, and influencers/key opinion leaders with elite members of the creative class to catalyze innovation, empower dialogue, and cultivate engaged and inspiring icons of the future.

Ayelet Benjamini is an Engineering Director at Google. She is leading research and product efforts in the Climate space. Her work spans a portfolio of initiatives from Climate Adaptation research and development of Early Warning systems, Climate Mitigation efforts set to reduce GHG emissions as well as Foundational research in Geo-Spatial modeling.  

Ayelet has pioneered various engineering efforts at Google, focusing on big data and large scale analytics initiatives, from YouTube through Account management to building clinician focused models and tools through Google Health. 

Ayelet holds a PhD in Computational Chemistry from UC Berkeley and a Bsc in Physics and Chemistry from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Ziv heads Israel’s National Program for AI Infrastructure, which is a coordinated, collaborative government effort aimed at ensuring Israel’s future leadership in the global AI arena. The program is focused on the long-term infrastructure required for promoting sustained innovation and growth. At its first stage, the program focuses on four pillars – Establishing an Israeli High-Performance Computer; Creating infrastructure for Natural Language Processing in Sematic languages that will fuel innovation and support AI assimilation in public sector services; Extending human capital in the Israeli academia and removing regulatory barriers to AI based innovations. The program is a mutual effort of Israel’s Ministry of Innovations, Science and Technology, Israeli Innovation Authority, the Directorate of Defense Research and Development, the Higher Education Council and the Ministry of Finance. Ziv is a versatile multi-disciplinary technologist with profound knowledge of Artificial Intelligence, communication networks, big data, and distributed systems. He is an experienced manager with proven capabilities of working at matrix environments as well as direct management skills, a versed innovation leader, and a growth-oriented CTO. Ziv holds a MSc. degree from the department for Software and Information Systems Engineering at the Ben Gurion’s University of the Negev and is about to complete his PhD studies researching the vulnerability of AI systems to adversarial manipulaitons.

Rinat Zilberstein is an accomplished professional and leader with over 20 years in the Hi-Tech industry. Currently serving as the General manager for AT&T Israel, she has held several key roles within the company. These include serving as the Product & R&D AVP for Consumer Platforms, R&D Director of Media Platforms, and Product Group Leader for AT&T Conferencing. Rinat's expertise spans various areas of technology and product development, contributing to the success and growth of AT&T.

Rinat holds a B.Sc. in Computer Science and GMBA from Tel Aviv University.

Niva Elkin-Koren is a Professor of Law at Tel Aviv University Faculty of Law and a Faculty Associate at the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University. She is the academic director of the Chief Justice Meir Shamgar Center for Digital Law and Innovation, a co-director of the Algorithmic Governance Lab at TAU Innovation Lab ("TIL"), and a member of the Academic Management Committee of TAU Center for Artificial Intelligence and Data Science. Before joining Tel Aviv University, she served as the Dean of the Law Faculty at the University of Haifa and was the founding director of the Center for Cyber, Law, and Policy (CCLP) and the Haifa Center for Law & Technology (HCLT). Her research is located at the intersection between law and information technology, focusing on values in design, intellectual property, governance by AI, and governance of AI.

Izhar Ashdot is a leading Israeli musician, working in the Israeli and international music industry for over 30 years as a Composer, Singer/Songwriter, Record Producer and Music Technology expert.

In the early 1980’s he met fellow musician Yair Nitzani and together they formed the groundbreaking rock band T-Slam which operated between 1980-1983 and became the most successful band in Israel. Izhar composed most of its songs and co-produced T-Slam’s albums.

Following T-Slam’s breakup, Izhar began a highly successful career as a songwriter and Record Producer, working with top Israeli artists, creating dozens of Gold and Platinum albums.

One of Izhar’s career peaks was his work with Israeli singer Ofra Haza. In 1988 Izhar arranged and produced the single “Im Ninalu” which reached number one in many European countries. Following this success, Izhar became a well known musician in Europe and is considered to be one of the pioneers of World Music.

In the 1990’s, Izhar began a career as a singer-songwriter and has since released several successful solo albums that reached Platinum and Gold status.

Izhar Ashdot’s creative environment, named “Izhar Ashdot’s Studio”, has become one of Israel’s busiest recording studios and a hotbed for new musical talents, including Rona Kenan and Peter Roth.

Izhar is known in Israel as a Music Technology Guru, sharing his adventures in Music, Electronics and AI with a new generation of musicians, via his Sound & Vision Facebook page.

In 2023, Izhar received a Lifetime Achievement Award from ACUM, the Israeli copyright society.

Izhar Ashdot lives in Tel Aviv with his wife, the acclaimed novelist Alona Kimhi. Their son Ilai is a successful producer and artist in his own right.

François Pachet has been a pioneer in AI-Assisted music creation. He has developed many AI tools with the attempt to combine both the viewpoint of musicians and scientists. He was Principal Investigator of the Flow Machines ERC-funded project, which produced (with the musician SKYGGE) Daddy’s Car, a song in the style of the Beatles, and Hello World, the first mainstream music album composed with AI. He is also a musician and has published two music albums (jazz and pop) as composer and performer, as well as an augmented book about the ontogenesis of a musical ear, Histoire d’une Oreille (story of an ear). He was elected EurAI Fellow in 2014 and doctor Honoris Causa of the University of Pernambuco (Brazil) in 2017. 

25 Years experience in IT and Data Science with great passion to public service.

Raja Giryes is an associate professor in the school of electrical engineering at Tel Aviv University. His research interests lie at the intersection between signal and image processing and machine learning, and in particular, in deep learning, inverse problems, sparse representations, computational photography, and signal and image modeling. Raja received the EURASIP best P.hD. award, the ERC-StG grant, Maof prize for excellent young faculty (2016-2019), VATAT scholarship for excellent postdoctoral fellows (2014-2015), Intel Research and Excellence Award (2005, 2013), the Excellence in Signal Processing Award (ESPA) from Texas Instruments (2008) and was part of the Azrieli Fellows program (2010-2013). He is an associate editor in IEEE Transactions on Image Processing and Elsevier Pattern Recognition and has organized workshops and tutorials on deep learning theory in various conferences including ICML, CVPR, and ICCV. He serves as a consultant in various high-tech companies including Innoviz technologies and developed a technology that was used as the basis for the MultiVu technologies startup.