Online | The Future of Annual General Meetings, Virtualisation and Corporate Accountability

Professor Deirdre Ahern, Trinity College Dublin

Professor Deirdre Ahern is Director of the Technologies, Law and Society Research Group at the School of Law, Trinity College Dublin, having previously worked as a corporate lawyer and as a principal officer in the Irish Law Reform Commission. A member of the European Commission's Informal Company Law Expert Group, she sits on the editorial boards of The Company Lawyer and the Journal of Business Law and is a contributing editor to Gore-Browne on Companies. She has written extensively on the theoretical framework surrounding the duties of company directors, including a monograph, Directors' Duties: Law and Practice (Thomson Roundhall, 2009). Her recent research has explored the challenges of shareholder engagement and, as a collaborator on a research project on Artificial Intelligence and Private Law funded by the National University of Singapore, she is currently focused on exploring how artificial intelligence and machine learning will impact on corporate governance.

Dr Roger M Barker, Director of Corporate Governance, Institute of Directors and Managing Director, Governomics Ltd

Roger M. Barker is Head of Corporate Governance at the Institute of Directors (UK) and Managing Director of Governomics Ltd, a corporate governance advisory firm. He is Honorary Associate at the Centre for Ethics and Law at University College London and a visiting lecturer at numerous academic institutions. Dr. Barker is the holder of a doctorate from Oxford University and the author of numerous books and articles on corporate governance and board effectiveness, including: ‘Corporate Governance and Investment Management: The Promises and Limitations of the New Financial Economy’ (with Iris Chiu, Edward Elgar, 2017), ‘The Effective Board: Building Individual and Board Success’ (Kogan Page, 2010), and ‘Corporate Governance, Competition, and Political Parties: Explaining Corporate Governance Change in Europe’ (Oxford University Press, 2010). A former investment banker, Roger Barker spent almost 15 years in a variety of equity research and senior management roles at UBS and Bank Vontobel, both in the UK and Switzerland.

George Dallas, International Corporate Governance Network

George Dallas is Policy Director at the International Corporate Governance Network, where he coordinates ICGN’s policy development and regulatory outreach on behalf of members whose assets under management exceed $54 trillion. George is also a Visiting Lecturer at Cass Business School, University of London, where he teaches MSc and executive education courses in corporate governance.

Previously, George served as Director of Corporate Governance at F&C Investments (now BMO Global Asset Management) in London (£100 billion in assets under management), where he led F&C’s global policies relating to corporate governance, including proxy voting and engagement matters. Prior to joining F&C George was a Managing Director at Standard & Poor’s, where he held a range of senior managerial and analytical roles.

George holds a BA degree, with distinction, from Stanford University and an MBA from the Haas School of the University of California at Berkeley.

Dr Hans-Christoph Hirt, Hermes Investment Management

Dr Hans-Christoph Hirt is an executive director and board member of EOS at Federated Hermes and as head of the organisation responsible for the sustainable success of the business. In this role, he leads a multi-national team based in London and the US and oversees the global engagement programme and the quality of the services EOS provides to its clients around the world.

Prior to joining Hermes EOS, Hans worked with international law firm Ashurst. He is the author of numerous publications on corporate governance and law, responsible investment and stewardship. Hans is a member of the Corporate Governance Advisory Council of the Council of Institutional Investors in Washington and the Advisory Boards of CECP’s Strategic Investor Initiative in New York and the Corporate Governance Centre at the Institute of Directors in London.

Hans is a UK-qualified lawyer, holds degrees in Business Administration from universities in Germany and the UK, the ACCA (accounting and auditing) qualification and a PhD from the London School of Economics (LSE). He continues to be involved in academia as a Teaching Fellow at University College London. Hans speaks French, German and Mandarin.

Ms Vanessa Knapp OBE

Vanessa Knapp OBE is a Visiting Professor in the Department of Law, Queen Mary University of London and an Honorary Professor in the Brunel Law School, Brunel University London. She is the UK representative on the company law committee of the Council of Bars and Law Societies of Europe. She is a member of the company law sub-committee of the City of London Law Society and was a partner at Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer LLP for many years. She was awarded an OBE in 2007 for services to corporate law.

Professor dr Christoph van der Elst, Tilburg University

Christoph Van der Elst is Professor of Business Law and Economics at Tilburg University (The Netherlands) and at Ghent University (Belgium), lecturing in the field of corporate law (and its economic analysis), corporate governance, shareholder engagement and ESG, and commercial contracts. He has also published widely on these topics. He is the deputy chairman of the Department of Private and Business Law in Tilburg, an European Corporate Governance Institute Research Associate, a member of the Belgian Bar (Cottyn), an independent director of Aphilion and a member of the audit committee of the Ghent University Hospital.

Chair: Professor Iris H-Y Chiu, Director, Centre for Ethics and Laws, UCL

Iris Chiu is Professor of Corporate Law and Financial Regulation at University College London. She is Director of the UCL Centre of Ethics and Law and advances the public and stakeholder engagement of the Centre’s agenda in relation to issues in relation to law, regulation, governance and ethics in business and finance. She has published extensively in the areas of corporate governance and financial regulation, including The Foundations and Anatomy of Shareholder Activism (2010), Investment Management and Corporate Governance (2017), The Legal Framework for Internal Control in Banks and Financial Institutions (2015) and Banking Law and Regulation (2019). She has interests in financial regulation and governance, law and technology, corporate law and governance and the law and policy for business and finance generally. She is a Research Fellow of the European Corporate Governance Institute, and most recently, a Senior Scholar at the European Central Bank’s Legal Research Programme.