Steve Canepa is responsible for IBM's overall results in the  Entertainment, Publishing, Broadcast, Cable,  Satellite, Sports and Advertising customer segments worldwide.  He is also the founder of  and a key leader in IBM's cross-industry Digital Media initiative. Mr. Canepa has guided the marketplace strategy and solution offerings for IBM's Global M&E Industry organization since 1995 and directs the worldwide sales of  IBM’s broad portfolio of  hardware, software and services and is responsible for IBM’s marketing activities, including all messaging and partnerships.

Cassian Elwes' producing career began in 1983 with the film "Oxford Blues," starring Rob Lowe and Ally Sheedy.  He went on to produce 30 features to his credit including: John McTiernan's "Nomads," Donald Cammell's "White of the Eye," "Men At Work,"  starring Emilio Estevez and Charlie Sheen, and "The Chase" with Charlie Sheen. Elwes joined the William Morris Agency's (WMA) motion picture department as Vice President in 1994 to run the Independent Film Department. He is now a Senior Vice President of the agency and co-head of the recently renamed WM Independent.

Albhy Galuten works as a consultant in the technology and digital policy field. In addition to his technological achievements, Mr. Galuten is a Grammy award-winning record producer, songwriter and arranger. Until recently, Mr. Galuten was Senior Vice President, Advanced Technology, Universal Music Group. Under Mr. Galuten, eLabs and Universal's Advanced Technology group: provided strategic advice to senior management in the technology space, performed technical due diligence of software, hardware and business systems, invented technology and filed patents.

Darin Hollings was the Visual Effects Supervisor on “The World of Tomorrow,” where he oversaw the production of over 1100 effects shots for the film, as well as all the pre production and all the live action filming. It isn't very often you get a creative challenge of this magnitude. “The World of Tomorrow,” was a rare opportunity to make something really special. The World of Tomorrow represents a whole new approach to film making. Darin Hollings’ first break as a visual effects supervisor was for a title sequence for The Wonderful World of Disney, which was later nominated  for an Emmy Award for Outstanding Main Title Design.  Next, he had the opportunity to work with his long time mentor, Hoyt Yeatman, as the Associate Visual Effects Supervisor on Kangaroo Jack. 

Lonny Kaufman; brought 20+ years of experience in the production area of features, television, commercials and music videos to the position of Entertainment Cluster Director for the State of Louisiana. In the three years he’s served as Director, Lonny has been either responsible for or involved in - Film production went from $30 million /year for the year prior to the passage of the new film and video incentives to in excess of $200 million - Developing the state investment of $5 million into Endgame Entertainment which gives the state a first look deal with a $50 million film fund - Department point person with the 2003 NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship, 2003 NFL Super Bowl and the 2003 NCAA Women’s Volleyball Championships - Recruitment, landing and structuring the successful relationship HSI and Louisianan Institute of Film (aka LIFT) to commit to spend $100 million in the production of movies, commercials and music videos in the state - Presently developing a state-of-the-art HD Studio in New Iberia which has two feature films booked to shoot at the studio next year.

Mukul Krishna is responsible for the digital media practice at Frost and Sullivan. He has written extensively on the digital asset management, video server, video streaming and encoding, and interactive kiosk markets. Apart from analyzing these markets, Mr. Krishna has also lead consulting projects in these fields for key Frost & Sullivan clients. He has spoken at various speaking engagements on his area of expertise and is widely quoted in the press including major publications such as Forbes and the Washington Post. Mr. Krishna is also on the board of editors of the International Journal of Digital Asset Management and has been recently been nominated to be a Fellow at the Royal Society for Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, London, U.K.

Rob Legato; Academy Award® winner, joined Sony Pictures Imageworks in 1999 serving as Visual Effects Supervisor on two Robert Zemeckis films, “What Lies Beneath” and “Cast Away.”   Mr. Legato was Senior Visual Effects Supervisor on “Bad Boys II,” which was nominated for a Visual Effects Society Award (VES) for Outstanding Supporting Visual Effects in a Motion Picture, and on the international phenomenon “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone,” based on the best selling books by J.K. Rowling. He most recently completed production as second unit director and visual effects supervisor on Martin Scorsese’s “The Aviator,” a biopic about legendary aviation pioneer, Howard Hughes. Prior to joining Imageworks, Mr. Legato was at Digital Domain, the visual effects company founded by James Cameron, Stan Winston and Scott Ross, where he joined as Visual Effects Supervisor, Second Unit Director and Effects Director of photography for Neil Jordan's "Interview with the Vampire." This first feature led Mr. Legato into supervising the visual effects for Ron Howard's "Apollo 13," which earned him his first Academy Award® nomination and won the British Academy Award for his effects work.

Cliff Plumer joined Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) in 1996 and is currently the Chief Technology Officer, overseeing the company’s research and development, systems support, networking operations, information systems and production software departments.  He is responsible for managing the technology requirements and direction for all of ILM.  Prior to being promoted to the position of CTO in October 2001, Mr. Plumer was the Director of Digital Technologies. Before joining ILM, he was a partner at Parallax Software, which developed software for the visual effects industry. At that time, Mr. Plumer worked in conjunction with ILM during production on "Death Becomes Her" and "Jurassic Park." Mr. Plumer also worked at Wavefront Technologies, a 3D animation software company. He began his career at NBC. He graduated from Ithaca College in New York in 1984.

Marty Shindler has 30 years experience in finance and marketing in management roles in companies including 20th Century Fox, Industrial Light & Magic, Kodak/Cinesite and Coopers & Lybrand. For the past nine years he has provided professional services to clients representing a wide range of industries, including movie production and post production, specialty theaters, TV, visual effects sophisticated software tools, wireless content and camera design and fabrication. Mr. Shindler is a keen observer of trends in entertainment and technology and their current and anticipated impact on the marketplace. These trends include the various forms of distribution currently and on the horizon such as digital cinema; the forthcoming new formats for DVDs; HDTV; industry concerns over protecting IP through digital rights management (DRM); and the trends toward digital image acquisition and image processing.

Charles S. Swartz brings more than 25 years experience in the entertainment industry, most recently as head of Charles S. Swartz Consulting, which provides strategy solutions for the entertainment industry; Director of Integrated Strategy for Media and Entertainment at Sapient, focusing on the global entertainment industry; and Director of Business Development for the entertainment industry in the Media and Entertainment business unit at Anderson Consulting (now Accenture). Prior to consulting, Mr. Swartz was Continuing Education Specialist and Program Manager for UCLA Extension's Department of Entertainment Studies and Performing Arts, where he developed the largest and most comprehensive curriculum of digital media and entertainment management courses offered by a major university.

Tom Tolles is the CEO and Co-founder of House of Moves Motion Capture Studios, Inc.  Recently, House of Moves was acquired by OMG (Oxford Metrics Group), a British manufacturer of the motion capture gear that forms the basis for HOM’s service work. House of Moves is now in its 9th year of business and has grown to be one of largest providers of motion capture studio services.  HOM’s credits include motion capture work on feature films such as “Titanic,”“Mortal Kombat:  Annihilation,”“Spider-Man,”“Pirates of the Carribbean,”“Men in Black II,”“Anger Management” and “Spider-Man 2.” 

David Wolf is a Partner in Accenture’s Media & Entertainment practice where he is responsible for Accenture’s global entertainment industry segment.  He has over 14 years experience leading and delivering large innovative technology programs.  With Mr. Wolf’s deep entertainment industry expertise, he has been on the forefront of technology changes, including eCommerce and Digital Asset Management. For the past eight years Mr. Wolf has been instrumental in helping define Accenture’s digital content services point of view, developing capabilities, establishing and managing relationships with emerging technology companies and delivering strategic engagements.

Michel Zgarka has over 30 years experience in almost every area of the entertainment industry. In the past 12 years he has acted both as Executive and Associate Producer on several Film and TV productions. Mr. Zgarka set up a full training school for technicians on film and video sets accredited by the Department of Education of the province of Quebec with partners such as KODAK, SONY and Equinoxe Films.