CyberSecurity

Sem Ponnambalam is the CEO and founder of xahive, a Cyber-Security company established to fulfil the need to provide safe, secure cybersecurity solutions in the ever-expanding internet-based communications space. She has a proven track record of success with over 18 years of private and public sector experience with Secret Clearance from the Canadian Federal Government. She has served as a former Senior Trade Policy Advisor for Prime Ministers Stephen Harper, Justin Trudeau and numerous Federal Cabinet Ministers.

In 2017, Sem was selected as a cyber panellist to represent Canada at the World Economic Forum and G20 Youth. In the same year, she was selected as the only start-up to participate in a business delegation with Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada to Italy. Sem has successfully negotiated global partnership agreements between xahive and IBM as well as Red Hat & BlackBerry. She has further fostered relationships between xahive and the United Nations, NATO, U.S. Department of Commerce, the Department of Homeland Security-Cyber Intrusion Group, London & Partners, P20 Payments, New York Academy of Sciences, and HIMSS to elevate xahive’s global profile and to engage with targeted government and industry stakeholders.

In 2021, Sem was recognized as one of the 10 Women Lead Start-ups to invest in globally by KPMG, Viva Technology, & 50inTech. In the same year she received special U.S. Congressional recognition for having been selected as a cybersecurity panellist for the World Summit on the Information Society.

Sem is the co-author of three books on cybersecurity as well as numerous articles and white papers. She appears regularly in interviews relating to the importance of cybersecurity in Canada and the United States. Sem is currently a Lecturer and Facilitator of cybersecurity governance workshops and courses for businesses, associations, and academic institutions in the United States, Canada, and Europe.

She is the proud mother of four beautiful children.

Ricardo Martinez currently serves as Chief Revenue Officer of DigitalEra Group, a premier Cybersecurity firm dedicated to providing cybersecurity solutions and services to businesses, education and governmental agencies throughout the US and Latin America.

Ricardo is responsible for strategic consulting, including business plan & sales strategy development. Advising on business structures, defining sales compensation plans, and selecting GTM Vendors for
Latin American business and South Florida. With more than 18 years of experience, he has extensive knowledge in
all aspects of business development, channel recruitment, channel enablement, international business, business intelligence and project management. Ricardo has a proven track record in the Americas IT Security market working for global companies.

Prior to DigitalEra, he served in key management roles at Tenable and McAfee where he developed a strong expertise in establishing and leading successful sales and channel teams that consistently overachieved goals. Ricardo holds a Master’s in business Administration and Management from the University of Quebec. He currently lives in Dallas, Texas and enjoys spending his free time travelling with his wife and 3 children.

Expertise:
• Adopting corporate initiatives and driving them out into the field.
• Building out Channel Organizations by recruitment, enabling and taking partners through to revenue.
• Developing dashboards that align with business initiatives and provide business intelligence.

Dr Walcott is the Managing Director of Precision Cybertechnologies and Digital Solutions. In this role, he is spearheading the shift in Digital Transformation and Cybersecurity in Trinidad and Tobago and the region. Dr. Walcott is the former Chief Executive Officer (CEO) of the Telecommunications Services of Trinidad and Tobago (TSTT). Dr. Walcott has an MBA and a DBA both specializing in Financial Management. He also holds several certifications in cybersecurity including CISM, CEH, CompTia among others. He was the CEO of TSTT from 2014-2020. Prior to that, he was the Executive Vice President of Mobile Services in TSTT. He worked at TSTT for fourteen (14) years. Prior to working at TSTT, Dr. Walcott held senior management roles at ANSA McAL Carib Brewery, and he also worked at BWIA (now Caribbean Airlines) where he held management roles in Finance and Technical Operations.

Given his knowledge and qualifications, Dr. Walcott has a wealth of telecommunications, business, technical operations, information technology, cybersecurity, digital transformation and operational technology knowledge, skills, and experience. During his tenure as CEO of TSTT, Dr. Walcott championed digital transformation which was a key tenet of the 5-year strategic plan that he developed and executed. Included in that strategic plan was modernizing TSTT’s entire network, restructuring the organization, securing US$400M in financing and automating and modernizing all customer service and business elements of TSTT.

Marcelo Ardiles is a cybersecurity consultant with more than 15 years of international experience in IT and cybersecurity positions. Throughout his career he has worked on technical and managerial positions for companies such as Hitachi Systems Security, Capgemini, Deloitte, BASE4 Security, AB InBev, and Siemens.

He specializes in the technical aspects of cybersecurity like IT security architectures, application security, offensive security, technical security audits and cybersecurity consulting for projects that require polyvalent skills.

He holds a BSc. in Software Engineering and a Master of Science in Computer Security from the school of engineering and computer science EPITA Paris, France. Marcelo holds several certifications such as Certified Information Systems Security Professional (CISSP), the Offensive Security Certified Professional (OSCP) and the Offensive Security Certified Expert (OSCE).

MR. ANISH BACHU: Cyber Security Analyst at Trinidad and Tobago Cyber Security Incident Response
Team.

Anish Bachu is an experienced cyber security professional attached to the Trinidad and
Tobago Cyber Security Incident Response Team (TT-CSIRT) under the Ministry of National
Security. His duties vary from incident response, vulnerability and threat monitoring to cyber
security assessments of government systems and infrastructure.

Anish graduated from St. John’s University in New York with a BSc in Cyber Security Systems
and a Masters of Business Administration in Information Systems and Decision Science. He is
also a member of the Cyber Security Industry Advisory Board at St. John’s for their BSc and
MSc programs.

Zia Paton leads Digital Services at PwC in the Caribbean and is also the joint leader of Consulting Practice for PwC in the Southern Caribbean. With over 25years experience, Zia works closely with clients across many sectors to deliver successful outcomes. Zia advises on Strategy as well as Implementation including complexities associated with People and Change, Process and Systems.

Zia advises clients in both the public and private sectors and works closely with multi-national teams as well as multi-disciplinary teams.

Zia has a strong network of global specialists with whom she frequently collaborates and is currently working with teams to increase digital adoption here in the Caribbean. Qualifications and memberships * Fellow Member of Association of Chartered Certified Accountants *Heriot-Watt University (MBA)

With more than 35 years of experience in the Information Technology field, Rob Dyson has held technical and leadership positions while providing IT services for many companies within multiple industries. Rob is currently the Global OT/IoT Security Services Business Leader within IBM’s Global Security Services practice. He is responsible for building, operating, and maturing IBM’s OT/IoT security business to help companies mitigate their OT & IoT cyber risks.

Rob has experience gained from serving some of the largest global companies in multiple industries. He has served as
the Client Executive for some of IBM’s most strategic clients.

Prior to this role, Rob served as the Global SSRC (Security, Strategy, Risk & Compliance) Competency Leader whereby he was responsible for developing unique and relevant solutions to to assist clients in improving the effectiveness and efficiency of their information security program. This includes designing solutions to establish relevant information security strategies, comprehensive IT governance processes, redesigning security organizations, effective security policy management and governance processes, and compliance with leading security standards/frameworks and regulations. In addition, Rob has been at the forefront of delivering leading IT GRC solutions based on market leading IT GRC applications such as OpenPages ITG, RSA Archer, and SAP GRC.

Prior to joining IBM, Rob held senior leadership positions at Accenture as the Global Leader for Application &
Infrastructure Security Services; at Deloitte as the Mid-America Region Leader for Security Services; at Electronic Data
Systems (EDS) in positions of escalating responsibility providing IT professional services; and as an Officer in the U.S.
Army where at the rank of Captain he was in charge of the 82nd Airborne Division Data Center Operations.

Rob is an active CISSP and has a Bachelor of Science degree in Information Systems Management from Missouri
State University in Springfield, Missouri.

Bill has 29 years of information technology experience in a variety of leadership and software engineering roles. He currently serves as both the Chief Information Officer at Indiana University of Pennsylvania (IUP) and as the Technical Executive of the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education's Strategic Information Management System.

Bill was named the 2016 Pittsburgh CIO of the Year for Education. He has presented at more than 35 events on many topics, including project management, security, leadership, organizational management, federated identity management and talent management. Bill has appeared in more than 10 IT publications, including authoring articles for Education Technology Insights and The Enterprisers Project blog.