Martin Walker, CTO at A2M, has been involved in commercial software development in Montreal since the mid 80's. He has spent most of his career in the multimedia arena, working for companies like Matrox Electronics, Softimage and others. He has been a key player in building tools and environments for video productions including special effects and 3D computer graphics. His venture in the gaming industry has evolved into the creation of A2M's multiplatform game engine and the elaboration of an optimized production pipeline to produce good quality console video games fast.

Jason is the executive director of the International Game Developers Association (IGDA), a professional society committed to advancing the careers and enhancing the lives of game developers. Jason and the IGDA focus on connecting developers with their peers, promoting professional development, and advocating on issues that affect the developer community -- such as quality of life, creative freedoms, workforce diversity and credit standards. As the spokesperson for the IGDA, Jason has appeared in countless news ou tlets and has spoken at conferences around the world.

Noémie is a founding partner of Wave Generation as well as the company's Director of Operations. Prior to co-founding Wave Generation Noémie amassed extensive experience as a producer working in Paris for MCM Euromusique, in New York City at ATC Management and 3 years as the director of audio/video and localization for French based video game Publisher Ubisoft. At Wave Generation, Noémie is responsible for the development and launch of Wave Generation Music, a new division created to capitalize on future trends within the interactive and video game industries.

Paul has worked in the gaming industry for the past 8 years. He was responsible for the turn-key delivery of games within budget and with the correct resource and capital equipment in place at Beenox, Jamdat and Strategy First. He worked on more than 25 projects, GUN being the most recent. He acquired a solid experience as a video game producer, managing milestone deliverables from internal and external developers, working closely with quality assurance departments, and acting as the point of contact for publishers and/or distributors. Today, he is supervising the development of an original console title that will be published by Activision.

Heather Kelley is a Game Designer at Artificial Mind & Movement and Chair of the IGDA's Women in Game Development Special Interest Group. Her previous work includes game and story design on Star Wars: Lethal Alliance and level design on Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory at Ubisoft, design on Thief: Deadly Shadows at Ion Storm Austin, and producer-designer at Human Code, creating the award-winning Redbeard's Pirate Quest among other titles.

Alex Hyder started his career doing graphics and physics programming at the NASA Johnson Space Center, developing simulation tools for the analysis of the robotic systems on the Space Shuttle and Space Station. That was followed by several years of real-time software development and project management in the telecom industry. Alex has worked in the video game industry since 2002, managing game teams developing for consoles and PC. His most recent projects include Medal of Honor European Assault and SSX On Tour. He is currently responsible for NHL '07.

For the last 10 years, David Lightbown has been working professionally in computer graphics, with the last five dedicated to the video games industry. He has been involved in the creation of several games for all major consoles, with the main responsibility of implementing and supporting the artistic pipeline. He has been a presenter at GDC 2005 and 2006, the Montreal International Game Summit since its inception and the P_4_Play tour in Vancouver, Seattle and Chicago. He has been actively involved in beta testing Maya and 3ds Max, and has written several freelance reviews for CG Channel. He currently holds the title of Artistic Technical Director at Artificial Mind and Movement in Montreal, Canada.

With studies in graphic arts & design, Remi works in the game and animation industry as an art director. Joining Sarbakan in 1999, he works on the studio's key game titles, and other licensed IP games for clients such as Warner Bros, Cartoon Network, THQ and Disney. Remi also works actively in improving production processes at Sarbakan.

A founding member of Gameloft's Montreal studio, Alex joined after finishing his degree in computer science. During his five years with Gameloft, Alex has assumed a range of responsibilities, ranging from lead programmer on projects such as Splinter Cell - DS, to helping establish the NYC studio.Currently a Technical Manager, Alex is responsible for overseeing daily operations and defining technical tasks for over 100 programmers.

Eric Plante (M.Sc. computer science, Université de Montréal) started his career as a researcher for a film production company, and then moved on to discreet as a programmer. He is now a graphics programmer at EA where he has worked on 5 titles (three shipped) including one next-gen project. He is currently pursuing a certificate in project management at HEC Montréal, and has been admitted to the MBA in September 2006.

Dominique Roussy currently holds the position of Producer at Ubisoft's Montréal Studio. He has 10 years of experience in 3D, 7 of which are in Game Development. He has participated in the production of more than 20 titles for such notable publishers as: Konami, Disney, THQ, Majesco and Ubisoft.

For the past two years, Dany Savard has held the position of Producer at EA Mobile, a company that specializes in the development of cell phone games. He is responsible for game design projects, up to and including quality control, and plays an active role in the deployment phase. His long tenure as lead programmer provided him with solid experience in the creation and development of software and games on several platforms, including PC, Pocket PC, Brew and J2me. Over the past ten years he has helped develop several titles, including Lemonade Tycoon, Worms World Party and Jamdat Mahjong.

After finishing a degree in film in his native England, Oliver started working as a designer for Sony, London, then moved to Ubisoft, where he eventually became Creative Director and manager of their UK development studio. Oliver has been working for DC Studios for almost 4 years now, and has over 30 published titles to his name. He also teaches several courses in games design and games culture at the National Animation and Design Center in Montreal.