WHAT IS
THE GLOBAL Industry Forum?

Developing Socially Conscious Engineering Innovators, Experts and Leaders

Left arrow slider - GEDC Industry Forum photos
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GEDC Industry Forum - 2017 Fontainebleau event
GEDC Industry Forum - 2019 Bucharest event
GEDC Industry Forum - 2017 Fontainebleau event
GEDC Industry Forum - 2017 Fontainebleau event
Left arrow slider - GEDC Industry Forum photos
Right arrow slider - GEDC Industry Forum photos

Engineering and technology leaders from the private sector and education gather to exchange on critical issues in a unique, interactive and creative event.

The Industry Forum creates the opportunity for an influential and meaningful dialogue to take place among all participants allowing their collective knowledge and experience to be leveraged and concrete solutions to real world problems to be elaborated.  Each event is inspired by a concept paper that explores current issues impacting innovation and skills in engineering education. A detailed event report that includes a full description of all ideas developed is published after the event. You can access these valuable resources here.

The events to-date have gathered senior delegates from 40 countries across 6 regions. Based on the feedback shared, over 90% leave satisfied, inspired and looking forward to joining us again.

See the list of speakers who have shared valuable and inspirational input to previous editions.  

Core content

GEDC Industry Forum - 2017 Fontainebleau event

Inspirational Sessions

The Industry Forum was designed to gather inspiring experts AND to create a platform where a learned community of industry and academic leaders can come together to build on our collective experience.

"

Dora Smith

Senior Director, Global Academic Program, Siemens

A very unique opportunity for academic and industry leaders to engage on emerging trends and best practices in engineering education.

GEDC Industry Forum - 2019 Fontainebleau event

Interactive Panels

Panelists representing industry, education, and the public sector, share their experience and insights on a topic relevant to one of the event themes. The panelists are deliberately chosen to represent a range of perspectives and their presentations are structured not simply to ‘inform’ participants but to stimulate discussion and debate among all attendees.

"

Lintuo Wu

Director of Global Partnership Program, Huawei

One of the benefits of the Industry Forum is to be connected to the elite circle of international engineering educators, to learn about the experiences of both industry partners and academia.

GEDC Industry Forum - 2019 Bucharest event

The Global Learning Expedition

The student voice is a key feature of the Global Industry Forum. Ahead of the 2020 event, a diverse and truly global cohort of 48 selected students worked together in teams to re-design how we learn, work and live in the future. The best student presentations were shared with Industry Forum delegates for inspiration.

"

Jenna Carpenter

Dean of School of Engineering, Campbell University

Truly unique and engaging. The Industry Forum provided a great platform for helping attendees truly get to know one another and share ideas, generate future collaborations and more.

"

Dave Wilson

Vice President, Product Marketing Academic, Customer Education, Software, National Instruments

The GEDC Industry Forum gave an excellent opportunity to discuss and generate ideas on how universities and industries can work together to better prepare students for their careers.

GEDC Industry Forum - 2017 Fontainebleau event

Dynamic Design Groups

Participants work collaboratively in groups, each of which is tasked with designing solutions to challenges identified under one of the event themes. Each design group presents their conclusions and recommendations to the whole audience at the end of the Forum.

GEDC Industry Forum - 2017 Fontainebleau event

Presentations

Each design group delivers an engaging, creative presentation of their work. This is where we design the future together by agreeing on what recommendations to take forward.

advisory board

Soma Chakrabarti - GEDC Industry Forum
Michael Auer- GEDC Industry Forum
Natacha DePaola - GEDC Industry Forum

Soma Chakrabarti

Michael Auer

Natacha DePaola

Materials Education Resources
Team Lead, Ansys

Founder & CEO, CTI - Consulting,
Technology, Information
Vice-Rector emeritus & Professor, School of Engineering & IT, Carinthia University of Applied Sciences, Villach, Austria

Professor of Biomedical Engineering / Director Digital Medical Engineering & Technology Center,
Illinois Institute of Technology

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Sunil Maharaj

Sunil Maharaj- GEDC Industry Forum
Andrew Hogg- GEDC Industry Forum
Stephen Isherwood- GEDC Industry Forum

Andrew Hogg

Stephen Isherwood

Deputy Chairman, Group Ethics
Committee, TotalEnergies

Professor and Dean, Faculty of Engineering, Built Environment and Information Technology,
University of Pretoria

Chief Executive, Institute of
Student Employers (ISE)

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Dora Smith - GEDC Industry Forum

Senior Director, Global Academic Program, Siemens Digital Industries Software

Dora Smith

Oliver Michler - GEDC Industry Forum
Mitrankur Majumdar- GEDC Industry Forum

Oliver Michler

Chair of Transport Systems Information Technology, Institute of Traffic Telematics, Technical University Dresden

Mitrankur Majumdar

Vice President - Regional Head,
Services (Americas), Infosys

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Kirsten Williamson

Kenneth Ball

Kirsten Williamson  - GEDC Industry Forum
Kenneth Ball
Sirin Tekinay - GEDC Industry Forum

Şirin Tekinay

Founder & CEO,
Petrus

Dean, College of Engineering and Computing Professor, Mechanical Engineering

Chair, Global Engineering
Deans Council

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Get involved

To maintain the highly interactive nature of the event which allows every voice to be heard, participation is by invitation only with the number of places available deliberately low. We’d be delighted to hear from more potential participants and contributors so if you would like to receive an invitation, please get in touch: contact@global-industry-forum.com

A small number of engaging, interactive sponsorship opportunities are available to support this initiative, our publications and outreach activity. Find out more here or contact: dominic@petruscommunications.com

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Join us in Cape Town, South Africa for the 2022 GEDC Industry Forum Dean & Industry Design Workshop.

Find out more