Kirsten is a venture capital investor with Artesian, an early stage VC Fund managing over $600M on behalf of LPs. Kirsten has a passion for high growth technology startups, and has led investments across diverse sectors including B2B Software, Fintech, Proptech, Health and Medtech and Deep Tech. Prior to joining Artesian, Kirsten spent time in San Francisco, working as an operator in strategic finance for a venture backed SaaS company. She also worked in technology banking, advising a portfolio of software, ecommerce, and online gaming clients on debt transactions up to $2bn. Prior to her time in the USA, Kirsten worked in technology commercialisation for the University of Adelaide, and Corporate Finance with Big 4 firms KPMG and EY. Kirsten holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Adelaide, and is a graduate member of Chartered Accountants Australia & New Zealand, and the Australian Institute of Company Directors.

Troy Filipcevic is the Founder and CEO of Emergence Insurance, a specialist underwriting agency exclusively committed to providing cyber insurance solutions to businesses and families across Australia & New Zealand.
Emergence distinguishes itself in the market through its unique and customer-centric approach, characterised by a dedication to swift and expert management of cyber incidents, setting it apart from competitors. Emergence prides itself on providing smarter cyber insurance to brokers and their clients.
In 2023, Troy was elected to the Board of the Underwriting Agencies Council.
Before founding Emergence, Troy played key leadership roles at Suncorp, across Technology, operational excellence, and strategy functions.
Prior to Suncorp, Troy worked as a management consultant at Deloitte, focusing on Innovation and Corporate Strategy. During this period, he managed the internal innovation program and provided valuable consulting services to businesses, advising on innovation, strategy, and operational improvements.
Troy’s educational background includes qualifications as a Mechanical Engineer, a Bachelor of Business, and an MBA from the Australian Graduate School of Management (AGSM).

Charmian is a Partner in the Funds & Financial Services team at Hamilton Locke. She provides legal and compliance advice to a broad range of financial services industry participants including insurance brokers, general insurers, underwriting agencies, fintechs and insurtechs. She is often engaged to provide legal sign off on product design and development and insurance distribution, including group purchasing arrangements. She is sought out for her niche expertise in innovative insurance solutions including parametric products, discretionary mutuals and aggregate deductible schemes.
Charmian advises on all aspects of financial services law, she loves nothing more than devising new risk products and solutions – like peer-to-peer models and other alternative risk vehicles. She thrives on helping businesses grow and develop over time, from seed funding through to acquisition or IPO. Startups often seek her out when they need a sounding board to refine their ideas. She creatively finds new solutions that are within the boundaries of the law yet commercial in their execution.

Michael is a Key Account Manager at Compass IoT, a multi-award-winning road intelligence company that leverages connected vehicle data to assist professionals in creating safer cities. Michael has consistently applied advanced analytics and big data methodologies to address and solve complex customer challenges across various industries in both Australia and the United States. Michael is passionate about innovation, developing new verticals and committed to driving progress through data-driven insights and cutting-edge solutions.

Adrian qualified as an actuary in both Australia and the UK, and has extensive experience within the general insurance, reinsurance and corporate finance industries in Australia, the UK, and Switzerland.
In 2004 and 2005 he worked to raise over $500m of capital from the Soros’ Quantum Fund and a Dallas-based hedge fund (HBK) and has been part of the team to road-show the issue of a $1.5bn catastrophe bond facility in 2007.
Adrian has over 25 years’ experience, including seven years as a founding employee and the Chief Actuary of a global insurance and reinsurance group where he was responsible for the pricing, reserving, and capital adequacy functions as well as providing significant input into underwriting and business strategy.
He has been the Managing Director of PFS Consulting since early 2020 after 8 years as a Principal.

Katrin has over 30 years of experience in the insurance industry, demonstrating strong, adaptable leadership and operational expertise. She has driven business transformation, performance improvements, and growth through innovative solutions. Katrin has held underwriting, broking, and operations roles across several countries, including senior leadership positions such as Chief Operations Officer for Steadfast Underwriting Agencies. Currently, she serves as Product Owner, Commercial Markets – Continuous Improvements, for Zurich Financial Services, consistently enhancing customer and user experiences in a fast-changing industry.
Katrin is also an ambassador for the Children’s Cancer Institute – CEO Dare to Cure and takes up a dare each year to help raise awareness and funds for the Children’s Cancer Institute. Over the past 6 years her dares included a skydive, swimming with sharks, shaving off her hair, a snake bath and an ice bath to name a few.

Handdii is a digital-first managed repair program. Its proprietary technology connects insurance companies and their customers to a network of pre-vetted local contractors.
Christie and her wife and Co-Founder, Kathryn Wood believed technology could bring the ecosystem together to streamline the insurance claims process and at the same time empower local contractors to do their best work.
Prior to handdii, Christie was National Sales Director and an owner of Johns Lyng Group for 10 years. She played a pivotal role in the national expansion and exponential revenue growth of the business from $12 million in 2004 to $350 million in 2015.
Her Co-Founder, Kathryn led short-tail claims at QBE for 8 years, with extensive experience in claims, workforce optimization, change management & customer experience. Kathryn intimately understood the challenges and priorities for claims from an insurance company perspective.
Christie and Kathryn have been living (in multiple places) in the United States for the last 5 years building the handdii team, raising venture capital, securing large insurance company contracts, on-boarding thousands of local contractors across 42 states in the U.S and doing their best to make property claims both digital and delightful for everyone.

Sonya is Chief Data and Analytics Officer at QBE Australia Pacific, and responsible for leading data and analytics vision and strategy. This includes building capability and good practice to accelerate through new technologies such as Generative AI.
With over 20 years’ experience across a broad range of industries, Sonya has a great breadth of experience including the role of Chief Innovation Officer for a large entertainment group where her role focused on using human centred design to create new value.
Sonya is recognised in the top 100 Global Data Innovators, is listed in the Global Data Power Women for the past four years and is a previous winner of the Global Chief Data Officer Award for Governance.

Dr Kenneth Graham PhD has more than 30 years’ experience in Australian High-Performance Sport. Having previously held positions at both the NSW Academy of Sport, and in multiple roles, including 14 years as Principal Scientist, at the NSW Institute of Sport.
He is now the Principal Scientist at eo, an Australian-based sports technology company utilising world-class sports scientists and engineers to help elite athletes redefine their limits. eo is developing a range of products designed to improve performance, accelerate recovery and adaptation, prevent injury, and aid rehabilitation. Kenneth works with eo’s R&D partners and academics to turn ideas into products and then, with eo’s panel of sport experts, ensures that all products are fully fit for purpose.
Kenneth has a history of leading and driving innovation. He has coached and project managed athletes to medals in World Championships and Olympic Games. Kenneth was also involved in the design of a portable High Performance Hypoxic-Hyperoxic System and the development of a canopy for swimming pools to help swimmers undertake hypoxic training. He led the design and development of a high-speed somersaulting frame for aerial athletes to train their somersaulting capacity effectively and efficiently in the areas of specific body strength, aerial orientation, and vestibular and proprioceptive skills.

Kenneth is an Adjunct Senior Lecturer at the University of Sydney. He is also a member of the Australian Institute of Sport’s Research Review Committee, the National Sports Tribunal and advisory committees at the University of Canberra, Western Sydney and Sydney University. He is an associate PhD supervisor at Southern Cross University and the University of Canberra. He is also Honorary Treasurer of the Wayback Drug and Alcohol Organisation.

Ben is an Actuary by profession and spent the early part of his career working in actuarial teams at the large insurers across pricing, product and tech transformation projects. Outside of the large insurers, Ben has experience with start ups, from founding his own to consulting and work in others.
Ben formally joined Ag Guard in 2019 as a co-owner, transforming the business from a small agri-insurance broker to an underwriting agency. Ben currently oversees the finance and operations functions of the business as well as providing an actuarial lens to the products it offers.

Dr Jenny Legge is the Founder and CEO of Staunch Technology, an Insurtech startup focused on reducing the number and costs of workplace injuries.
A physiotherapist and ergonomist by background, Dr Legge’s PhD research investigated the predictive validity of pre-employment functional testing, demonstrating workers have a 3-5 times increased risk of musculoskeletal injury when they do not meet job-specific test criteria. She has worked in Australia and the US in mining, transport, construction, utilities, security, manufacturing, municipality and logistics sectors for more than 25 years.
Dr Legge has now bundled her knowledge and experience into an expert system AI platform called the JobFit System that seamlessly highlights whole person injury and illness risk and automates the return to work planning and approvals process.

Andy is a Sydney based Partner at EY and a leader in the Technology Consulting Practice. Andy has worked in financial services for the past 28 years across capital markets, wealth management and banking but with a specialisation in life and general insurance. During this time he has shaped and led complex business and IT transformation engagements for clients in the UK, mainland Europe, Asia, and Australia spanning business strategy, IT strategy, offshoring, outsourcing, and large scale software implementation. Andy has worked extensively with FinTech hubs to promote InsurTech within Australia and is a regular speaker on the topic of InsurTech and Innovation.

Dominique is a seasoned underwriter with a technical background as a chemical engineer and over fifteen years of experience writing construction and property insurance in London and Australia. During this time, she set up the Australian construction practice for one of the most respected syndicates at Lloyd’s. She gave up the security of corporate life to embark on an adventure with CoverRadar and Hutch Underwriting, where she is COO of CoverRadar and CUO of Hutch.