Speakers

Chris Wood is the co-founder and CEO of Tanglewood Games, a leading Unreal Engine external development studio based in his home town of Hartlepool, UK. Since 2017, Chris has grown the studio into a world-class engineering provider, contributing to major titles like Hogwarts Legacy, Sea of Thieves, and Quidditch Champions.

With over two decades in the industry, Chris has successfully navigated the commercial, technical and operational challenges of running a games studio, culminating in Tanglewood Games becoming an Unreal Engine Gold Service Partner in 2025.

Dan joined Kwalee Ltd, a video games developer and publisher, as its first General Counsel in April 2023 following nearly 13 years in private practice with Shakespeare Martineau LLP.

During his time in private practice Dan advised on a range of contentious and non-contentious IP matters, predominantly guiding clients through trade mark, designs, patents, copyright and confidential information disputes as well as advertising and domain name complaints.

Davey heads up global influencer marketing and voice casting at Kepler interactive. With over ten years' experience in the gaming industry, Davey has led influencer marketing and celebrity partnerships for a wide variety of publishers and events including: Insomnia Gaming Festival, Deep Silver, Unsigned Group and more. Davey has launched a wide variety of games from AAA - Indie titles, including Clair Obscur: Expedition 33, Rematch, Saints Row, Dead Island 2, Metro Exodus and many others.

James is Head of Community Management at Keywords Studios, leading a global team of community professionals providing services to more than 30 gaming partners. Previously he led community management at Rockstar Games and PlayStation.

John is a Senior Legal & Business Affairs Counsel at Sumo Digital. John has worked in the games industry for around 3 years, both as a Solicitor in private practice, and as in-house Legal Counsel at both Sumo Digital & everplay group plc.

Louise has worked in the games industry since 2001 and has contributed on over 30 games. Having trained as a fine artist, she worked her way up to the position of Lead Artist, and for the past five years was d3t's Head of Art where she led and grew the team to 45 artists and animators across the UK and Europe.

Louise is passionate about creating positive cultures where talented game developers are able to thrive on collaboration and creativity without egos. She won the MCV/Develop Women in Games Career Mentor award in 2023 and was shortlisted for the GamesIndustry.biz Best Boss award in both 2022 and 2023.

María has been helping games companies succeed in the digital space, build great brands, launch games and engage players for nearly two decades. After stints at Electronic Arts and CCP Games, María joined ustwo games as their CEO in 2018. ustwo games is a BAFTA-winning studio, best known for the Monument Valley series, and a pioneer gaming company in the B-Corp movement. After releasing Assemble with Care, Alba: a Wildlife Adventure and Desta: the Memories Between, the company’s latest game, the award-winning Monument Valley 3 was launched in partnership with Netflix and recently made its way to PC and consoles.

Dr Marie-Claire Isaaman is an award-winning entrepreneur, executive consultant, curator and thought leader for the gaming, tech and education sectors. Her expertise and advice is highly sought from the gaming, tech and education sectors for policy inputs, organisational design, research projects and initiatives, cultural exhibitions and global trade fairs. She is Co Director and CEO of Women in Games, a UK based not for profit, whose purpose is to empower girls and women by building a fairer, safer, more equal global gaming ecosystem. She is a Chair and Trustee for a wide range of industry, charity and education sector organisations.

Prof. Nick Poole OBE is CEO of Ukie, the trade body for the UK’s video games and interactive entertainment industry. He is a champion of the social, educational and wider economic and industrial impact of the industry, with a particular focus on partnerships, policy and public engagement.

Sam is a people and operations leader with over two decades of experience driving organizational change, culture and scalability in the gaming and legal industries. She is currently the COO & CPO at Spliced Inc., where she oversees HR, IT Services and Operations ensuring that people, processes, and technology align with the fast- paced demands of game production and live services.

Previously, Sam served as Global Director or People & Talent and held leadership roles at EA as Head of People and Culture for Playdemic Studio, and at Warner Media as HR Business Partner supporting TT Games, TT Odyssey, and Playdemic Studios. Earlier in her career she worked with MAG (Airports Group) and DWF as a trusted partner and advisor.

Sam specializes in building high performing teams and scaling organisations through periods of rapid growth. Her expertise includes organisational design, performance management, HR strategy, and talent recruitment, as well driving operational excellence across complex, fast- moving environments.

Tamsin O’Luanaigh is the Founder of Wise Cat Strategy, a consultancy dedicated to helping studios unlock the power of culture, leadership, and people strategy to drive long-term success. With over 20 years in the games industry, including as Co-Founder and Chief People Officer of award-winning VR studio nDreams, she has scaled teams from start-up through to 250+ people and built globally recognised culture frameworks.

At Wise Cat, Tamsin partners with studios and industry leaders to strengthen culture, retention, and leadership practices, ensuring businesses not only survive challenging times but thrive through them. She is a regular speaker and advocate for building inclusive, values-led workplaces that put people at the heart of games.

Tim heads up the legal function for Aonic’s gaming divisions, having previously worked in the legal teams at nDreams and Sumo Group. Before moving into the video games industry, Tim practised as an intellectual property lawyer at DLA Piper. Outside of work, Tim can be found relaxing on his sofa with his Nintendo Switch or rediscovering Pokémon with his daughters.

Viktorya is a veteran games industry leader, running companies ranging from 100 plus people to small specialist teams developing cutting-edge technologies. Her expertise has nurtured start-ups through to established businesses, to growth. After being part of the multi-million successful purchase of PopCap by EA, Viktorya has focused on growing and developing smaller indie studios, and most recently expanding the games industry into underserved regions by launching Test Tropic, enabling over 100 young people to get their first job in the games industry in the CARICOM region.