As Moore’s Law approaches its physical limits, the race is on to discover what comes next in computing. With AI usage accelerating at an unprecedented pace, the environmental impact is becoming impossible to ignore - by 2030, AI-driven electricity consumption could hit 1,500 TWh, rivalling the total power usage of India today.
But it's not just about electricity. The broader resource demands - greenhouse gas emissions, water consumption, and thermal management - are pushing current computing models to the brink. The need for sustainable, energy-efficient alternatives is not just important; it's urgent.
Some of these solutions stay rooted in silicon, reimagining what's possible with traditional architectures. Others venture into the extraordinary - quantum computing, photonics, and hybrid approaches that promise to redefine performance, scalability, and efficiency.
In this session, held in The Guildhall on Market Square, we’ll explore the frontiers of compute innovation with leaders who are shaping its future.
Expect bold insights and real-world perspectives as we ask:
- Is it time to reinvent silicon?
- How close are we to commercial quantum computing?
- Will photonics finally deliver on its transformative promise?
Join us for a deep dive into the technologies redefining the future of computation - at the intersection of performance, power, and possibility.
Discover the Quantum & Semiconductors programme
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13:30 |
Registration and Refreshments |
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14:00 |
Fireside Chat 
Ilyas KhanIlyas Khan is the Founder, Vice Chairman, and Chief Product Officer of Quantinuum, the world’s largest quantum computing company. Ilyas served as the founding Chairman of The Stephen Hawking Foundation. He is recognized globally as a leading figure in the quantum computing industry. As the founding Chairman of the Topos Institute, a nonprofit based in Berkeley focused on advancing technology for the public good, he is a leader in public dialogues on Ai. Quantinuum is the second company Ilyas has founded. He previously founded techpacific (a ‘unicorn’ start-up). At the University of Cambridge, Ilyas serves as a Leader in Residence and Fellow at the Judge Business School, where he helped establish the prestigious Accelerate Cambridge program supporting early-stage deep-tech ventures. He is also a fellow of St Edmund’s College. 
Eric Van der KleijEric is Co-Founder and General Partner at EdenBase, a venture investment platform and ecosystem. He is a disruptive tech investor, entrepreneur and one of London’s leading tech ecosystem builders, now leading the charge in quantum by launching QBase, London’s Quantum-AI Centre of Excellence. Eric previously created and led some of the UK and Switzerland’s most prestigious technology ecosystems and hubs. This includes the world’s leading Fintech hub - Level39, the Fintech vertical of the Kickstart Accelerator for Digital Switzerland, as well as the UK’s groundbreaking Tech City/TechNation initiative, where he was appointed by the former UK Prime Minister to develop the UK tech economy. He was also instrumental in establishing the UK’s leading trade body for fintech - Innovate Finance. Prior to this he pioneered the UK Governments highly successful Global Entrepreneur Inward Investment Programme, which has attracted over 1,500 startups and $2.5Bn of investment to the UK. Together these initiatives have supported the growth of one third of the UK’s tech unicorns as well as accelerating the UK and international technology ecosystems and economies. As a Fintech entrepreneur - he previously co-founded and sold Adeptra, a fraud prevention Fintech company which was acquired by FICO in 2012. Eric is passionate about entrepreneurship and for many years served in a voluntary capacity as Honorary Chairman for the UK Government’s Global Entrepreneur Programme Advisory Group, and was a founding volunteer Advisory Board member of Tech London Advocates. |
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14:15 |
Reinventing Silicon 
Lawrence Lundy-Bryan
Lawrence is a deep tech investor. He is a Partner at Lunar Ventures, an early-stage deep tech venture fund where he focuses on semiconductors and energy. He writes a popular tech and investing newsletter State of the Future with 3000+ subscribers. He has advised the UK Government, EU Commission, and World Economic Forum on a broad set of emerging technologies. 
Ed BithellEd Bithell is Head of Strategy and Sovereign Partnerships at Fractile, a chip startup designing AI compute systems optimised for radically faster and cheaper frontier model inference. Prior to this, he worked as a UK civil servant and diplomat, and as an analyst covering trade, industrial policy and emerging technologies. 
Laura SartoriLaura's 20-year career has progressed from a technical expert to a strategic product leader in the semiconductor IP industry. As a Senior Product Manager at Codasip, she drives the product vision and automotive strategy for RISC-V CPU. Her journey began at Fermilab, the premier U.S. particle physics and accelerator laboratory, where she was a Marie Curie Postdoctoral Fellow. In this role, she led the design of custom chips for high-speed particle detection, a project that built her skills in technical leadership and project management. She then joined Imagination Technologies, first as a Senior GPU Design Engineer and later on a global application engineering team. There, she guided the successful RTL-to-silicon integration of GPU IP into systems for consumer and automotive companies. Laura’s move to product management leverages her technical knowledge and focus on customer needs to lead product roadmaps and customer engagement. Her Ph.D. and M.S. in Physics gave her the strong problem-solving and analytical skills she uses to navigate the complexities of the industry. 
Tanyaradzwa MangomaTanya is the CEO and founder of HyperCIM, a chip startup spun out of Deep Science Ventures in 2024 to address the data pipeline bottleneck beyond training and inference. She holds a PhD in AI Hardware from the University of Cambridge, specialising in neuromorphic computing, emerging memory materials, and digital manufacturing. She also holds Master’s degrees in Materials Science and Ultra-precision Engineering. |
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14:40 |
Quantum Computing 
Jonathan Legh-SmithJonathan Legh-Smith is Executive Director for UKQuantum, the association for the UK’s quantum industry. Jonathan represents the interests of UKQuantum members nationally and internationally. Jonathan is also a member of the UK National Quantum Technologies Programme Strategic Advisory Board, the National Quantum Computing Centre Strategic Advisory Committee, UK coordinator for the NATO Transatlantic Quantum Community Industry Network, NPL’s Quantum Strategy Board and co-chair of the UK’s Responsible Quantum Industry Forum. Jonathan was awarded an MBE for services to science & technology in 2024. 
Hugo SalehHugo joined Quantum Motion in January 2025 to co-lead the company’s expansion and drive commercial business. Hugo’s career has spanned across semiconductor, hardware, software, and cloud, most recently serving as the Head of HPC and Director of Product at Google. Prior to that, Hugo led the commercial operations and international expansion at Ayar Labs and had an extensive career at Intel Corporation, spanning nearly two decades in various leadership roles in the data center and silicon design organisations. 
Marco GhibaudiMarco is an expert in delivering deep-tech prototypes and products. He holds a joint CERN/SSSUP PhD in Innovative Technologies and he specialises on highly constrained systems. Marco innovation track-record comprises the first smart-city testbed in Europe, a key component in large-scale optical networks, the CERN largest electronics upgrade and the first commercial wireless VR Headset. From small scale software solutions to multi-million units per year hardware chips, Marco has always focused on quality, reliability and time to market. Marco brings Industry best-practices into Research and ingenuity into Development.
Ed WoodEd is a seasoned leader with a track-record of helping create & bring to market category-creating Products; he combines engineering sensibilities with a strong and creative product sense with business acumen. His pragmatic Market Led approach has been instrumental in successfully positioning products in both mature, highly competitive and ‘green field’ markets. Beyond Product, he has skills and experience leading Marketing, Business Development and Commercial activities. He is a passionate advocate of clear communication of the business benefits of a solution, delivered by the underlying technology He has worked to bring high-impact high-utility solutions to multiple market sectors world-wide including Banking, Finance, Manufacturing, Government and Hyperscalers. He has experience of high growth environments, from start-ups to international technology giants. Ed is fascinated by company culture and the ability of good culture to multiply productivity; he is actively involved in the nurturing and maintaining of the ambitious and productive ethos at Nu Quantum. He loves to share his business experience and is involved in multiple programs to mentor and guide technology startups.
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15:15 |
Refreshment Break |
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15:45 |
Photonics: Light-Speed Innovation as photonics 
Dr Andy SellarsAndy is Director of Strategy for CORNERSTONE, the world-leading photonics foundry at the University of Southampton. He serves on the UK Government’s Semiconductor Advisory Panel and chairs the UK Semiconductor Expert Working Group. He has given expert advice to the UK Parliament on five occasions, including the National Security and Investment Act, the Telecom Security Act and the select committee on semiconductors. He has also advised the OECD Semiconductor Informal Exchange Network, and is an Advisor to Silicon Catalyst UK. Andy was the Founder of the Compound Semiconductor Applications Catapult, securing a £54m investment from UK Government. He built a high-performance organisation of over 100 professionals; he represented the Catapult during roundtable discussions with the Prime Minister and high-level delegations to Hong Kong, India, Taiwan and the US White House. Andy holds an Executive MBA from Glasgow University, a research doctorate from Strathclyde University and is a Fellow of the IET.
Mark RushworthMark Rushworth is the CEO and co-founder of photonics startup, Finchetto. Mark holds certificates in integrated photonics chip design and is a member of the UK Government’s Optical Communications and Photonics Expert Working Group. 
Dr Gwenhivir Wyatt-MoonDr Gwenhivir Wyatt-Moon is the CEO and co-founder of Prospectral. Prior to this she worked as a Researcher in Semiconductor Manufacturing at the University of Cambridge and was a fellow at Trinty Hall, Cambridge.
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16:25 |
Closing Keynote 
Dr Andrew FitzgibbonAndrew Fitzgibbon has been closely involved in the delivery of three groundbreaking computer vision and machine learning systems over two decades. In 2000, he was computer vision lead on the Emmy-award-winning 3D camera tracker “Boujou”; in 2009 he introduced large-scale synthetic training data to Kinect for Xbox 360, and in 2019 was science lead on the team that shipped fully articulated hand tracking on HoloLens 2. His passion is bringing the power of mathematics to the crucible of real-world engineering. He has numerous research awards, including ten “best paper” prizes at leading conferences, and is a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering and of the Royal Society. |
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16:35 |
Closing Remarks |
*draft agenda, subject to change
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