Programme 2021

Heike Linnemann joined KIKO Milano in December 2017 as Brand General Manger to deliver the business turnaround by creating a consumer centric, digitally savvy organisation as well as by building marketing capabilities. Her responsibilities span across leading the innovation- and product lifecycle management, product- and communication design, trade marketing including commercial planning, assortment management, merchandising and in-store communication as well as Consumer- and Business Intelligence, PR, Digital Marketing, CRM, Media and the in house agency. Prior, she spent 13 years with Procter & Gamble working across different beauty categories, such as hair, skin-and personal care, with roles across different regions and across diverse channels including Mass Retail, Prestige, Salon, Pharmacy and E-commerce. Her career started in the fragrance industry working for Cosmopolitan Cosmetics, a subsidiary of Wella, first in the headquarter in Cologne and after in the London office.

Amy is a Research Analyst at Euromonitor International with a focus on Health & Beauty, based in London. Amy is involved in researching Beauty & Personal Care and Consumer Health industries in Western Europe and has extensive knowledge of regional as well as global trends in both the industries. She also produces insightful content in her area of expertise. With an interest in all things related to health and wellness, Amy advises clients across Health & Beauty with a special focus on skin care and digestive health. Her insights on skin care, hair care, men’s grooming, and ingredients has been featured in trade press such as Cosmetic Business, Cossma and Happi.

Agata Angelika Rzoska completed the MSc at SGH Warsaw School of Economics in Warsaw, Poland, in September 2020. The MSc thesis was related to problems of the Health Economics. Since October 2020, A. A. Rzoska is a Ph.D. student at the University of Economics in Katowice, Poland - in the discipline of Management and Quality Sciences. The prepared Ph.D thesis is associated with the management of innovative food and cosmetic products. She is also a certified yoga and Ayurveda teacher from 2019, leading classes and courses related to this topic. A.A Rzoska acts, as the affiliated volunteer, in the Innovation Park “UNIPRESS” Celestynów Polish Academy of Sciences, working on economic and marketing issues associated with the high-pressure processing for foods, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics innovative technology. It is also associated with the active promotion of all issues related to innovative, pro-health foods & cosmetics ‘designed & developed’ in the Innovation Park. The last year, the active participation in the promotion film on the Innovation Park “UNIPRESS” Celestynów. A. A. Rzoska is also actively interested in the management of the culture-related creative sector. This branch of the activity is associated with her passion – music. Regarding this issue, she finished BSc in the Harp class of the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music in Katowice, Poland. She is also the winner of a prestigious International Harp Competitions. Achievements: The author of two research reports in international Journals: (i) Pretransitional behavior of the nonlinear dielectric effect for the liquid-solid transition in nitrobenzene, Phys. Rev. E 93, 062131 (2016), (ii) Econo- and socio- physics based remarks on the economical growth of the world, Turk. Econ. Rev. 3, 1 (2016), supplemented by a few publications in polish. The finalist of the European Competition for Young Scientists (EUCYS, 2016). In the last years, A. A. Rzoska delivered 3 oral presentations at the national conferences and showed the poster under the title: Wellness sector and health tourism trends at the international one (Wroclaw Annual Conference on Health and Lifestyle (WAICHL-2020).

Drolma Lizcano was born in Girona, Spain, but spent most of her life living in London. Here she studied BA Business Management and holds a First Degree in MA Strategic Marketing. Her admiration for her father, Idili Lizcano and the company he had founded, ALQVIMIA, had started at a very young age, where at the age of 9 she would create her own perfumes and give them a name and a price. After her business studies in London she decided to work along her father in the family business, where she is now the CEO. Since her official involvement in the business over 8 years ago, Drolma has lead an important organizational change by implementing a Holacracy driven de-centralized management system, making it the first Spanish company to implement it throughout the whole organization. She claims: “The most important thing in business (and life) is to do things with love. When you connect your decisions and actions to your heart, as well as your mind, the outcome will almost always transform into something positive. This is how we manage our business and expect our employees and stakeholders to do the same”.

Aleksandra Drozd-Rzoska completed her PhD thesis regarding phase transitions in Liquid Crystals (University of Silesia, Department of Biophysics and Molecular Physics). Actually, the Researcher in the Institute of High-Pressure Physics PAS, Warsaw. Published more than 100 papers in high - range journals, few patents related to foods and cosmetics under high pressure. Co-Editor of four books: J. Phys.: Condens. Matt, 2008; Springer Verlag, Berlin, 2010, Lambert Academic Publ., Saarbruecken, 2015, InTech, Rijeka, 2016. Conducts research under high pressure of Soft Matter, including FOOD and COSMETICS.

Alex Fisher is an Associate Director for Beauty & Personal Care at Mintel. While her focus is the UK market, she searches the globe for consumer and manufacturing trends. Alex joined Mintel in 2017 as a Senior Beauty Analyst for the Beauty and Personal Care team. Prior to Mintel, she worked with numerous personal care manufacturers as a research executive, before spending 3 years in revenue management in the food & drink sector.

Laura Rudoe set up Good Ventures in 2008 as an ethical development company with the mission to creating new organic personal care brands that make a difference. A former Management Consultant and Venture Capitalist, Laura holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and was the founding employee of NUDE skincare - so was well equipped to face the challenges of starting a skincare business. Laura is a passionate advocate of ethical and environmentally friendly business as well as natural and sustainable living. Her deep appreciation for nature is at the heart of everything she does. Laura has a strong desire to help those with skin problems, having struggled with acne for many years from her late teens until her early 30s and she personally experienced the benefits of organic beauty and a natural lifestyle in resolving these issues. S5 Skincare was created to realise her vision of a range of natural beauty products that solve skin issues, and she has devoted years of research to finding the most effective natural and organic ingredients to resolve skin problems, which she has used to develop S5 Skincare. S5’s mission is to support people in their journey towards better skin, and to share Laura’s knowledge about a healthy diet and lifestyle. S5 is a range of advanced organic skincare, intelligently designed to care for skin suffering from the effects of modern living, using bioactives from plants that thrive in the most extreme ecosystems. The modular range of 11 skincare serums, creams and cleansers provides highly effective solutions for five specific skin concerns: redness/sensitivity, blemishes, pigmentation, premature ageing and dryness. Laura’s passion for learning and understanding about how to help people achieve great skin and optimal health using natural remedies led her to study for and gain a nutrition advisor diploma with the natural healthcare college. As well as her academic achievements Laura has been recognised for her entrepreneurship and has been honoured with several awards including Management Today 35 under 35, the Green Mumpreneur of the Year, and Natural Beauty Yearbook Top Personalities. Aside from setting up a business, talking at numerous inspiring, business and women’s networking events and developing 2 successful skincare brands, Laura is also a hands on mother of 3 - her most rewarding achievement yet.

Jacqueline Hudson is the CEO, Founder and owner of LUXE Digital Now. She is an award-winning visionary marketing executive with 10+ years of creative content expertise within digital marking platforms. Jacqueline was recognized by Forbes Magazine and is an AMA award nominee. She is one of the outpacing competitors and is delivering results for top-named clients in the US. Jacqueline was named among Top 40 under 40 by Top 100 Magazine for a digital marketing expertise. She was featured in Top 50 Women of 2019. Jacqueline is the winner of the Top 50 Tech Leaders Award 2020. She is one of the inspirational speakers at the BCMA (Branded Content Marketing Association), the world’s most prestigious association for content in the Public Relations industry. Jacqueline is also a digital marketing executive and AI data technology solutions, strategist and developer. As a successful leader, Jacqueline’s most prominent experience has been lecturing to 14 countries about the digital marketing industry.

Luis Carlos Chacón leads the BusinessCase team, a Boutique-Global-Firm that works with multinational FMCG's identifying emerging and future business opportunities. Also, has been a columnist for Forbes Latin America for several years, and a postgraduate student at the University of Oxford (Strategy and Innovation / Global Business), his educational background also includes studies at Stanford, The University of Manchester, and Houston University. In business, he has worked for more than twenty years for the global and regional operations of FMCG companies such as The Coca-Cola Company, Colgate-Palmolive, Diageo, Kellogg’s, Unilever, AbInbev, Sectur, among many others. Global traveler, constant student, avant-garde thinker, business consultant, writer, and researcher, related to topics such as economics, trends, storytelling, investment, retail, futures, semiotics, creativity, business competitive, globalization, innovation strategy, design thinking, and behavioral sciences.

Ahead of its’ time in 2008, but absolutely of the moment in 2021, this multi-award winning business was created by Emma Heathcote-James when she questioned why UK supermarkets didn’t offer any choice of natural or organic beauty on their shelves. Starting on the kitchen table and selling handmade bars at farmers markets the business fast grew to become the first organic and natural soap to roll out nationally in all the major UK retailers and has been disrupting the soap market ever since. Little Soap Company has now made British, Cruelty Free, vegan and RSPO sustainable soap at affordable prices the norm, not the niche in all the main Grocers (Waitrose, Booths, Sainsbury, Tesco, Asda, Morrisons), chemists (Boots, Superdrug and Lloyds Pharmacy) plus online retailers including Ocado, Fetch and Amazon. Constantly pushing boundaries and bringing out innovative products that create market trends – the latest Eco Warrior range is entirely plastic-free, eradicating the need for unnecessary bottles, formulating traditionally bottled liquids, into bar form. Thrilled to have recently gained BCorp certification, and with industry awards including the Top 50 Most Ambitious Business Leaders and ‘Scale Up Business” to “Best Rural Retail Business” to ‘Entrepreneur of the Year’ - both Emma and the products feature regularly in national and international press as she is keen to share her ideas and knowledge on how all of us can make very small tweaks to develop new ways to build a more sustainable future together.

Agata Angelika Rzoska completed the MSc at SGH Warsaw School of Economics in Warsaw, Poland, in September 2020. The MSc thesis was related to problems of the Health Economics. Since October 2020, A. A. Rzoska is a Ph.D. student at the University of Economics in Katowice, Poland - in the discipline of Management and Quality Sciences. The prepared Ph.D thesis is associated with the management of innovative food and cosmetic products. She is also a certified yoga and Ayurveda teacher from 2019, leading classes and courses related to this topic. A.A Rzoska acts, as the affiliated volunteer, in the Innovation Park “UNIPRESS” Celestynów Polish Academy of Sciences, working on economic and marketing issues associated with the high-pressure processing for foods, pharmaceuticals, cosmetics innovative technology. It is also associated with the active promotion of all issues related to innovative, pro-health foods & cosmetics ‘designed & developed’ in the Innovation Park. The last year, the active participation in the promotion film on the Innovation Park “UNIPRESS” Celestynów. A. A. Rzoska is also actively interested in the management of the culture-related creative sector. This branch of the activity is associated with her passion – music. Regarding this issue, she finished BSc in the Harp class of the Karol Szymanowski Academy of Music in Katowice, Poland. She is also the winner of a prestigious International Harp Competitions. Achievements: The author of two research reports in international Journals: (i) Pretransitional behavior of the nonlinear dielectric effect for the liquid-solid transition in nitrobenzene, Phys. Rev. E 93, 062131 (2016), (ii) Econo- and socio- physics based remarks on the economical growth of the world, Turk. Econ. Rev. 3, 1 (2016), supplemented by a few publications in polish. The finalist of the European Competition for Young Scientists (EUCYS, 2016). In the last years, A. A. Rzoska delivered 3 oral presentations at the national conferences and showed the poster under the title: Wellness sector and health tourism trends at the international one (Wroclaw Annual Conference on Health and Lifestyle (WAICHL-2020).

Jo is a chemist and the Co-Founder of Beauty Kitchen, leaders in effective, natural and sustainable beauty. Widely regarded as one of the pioneers of sustainable beauty, Jo is driving the beauty industry forward with better practise approaches, always. She is Beauty Kitchen’s toughest critic, inspecting everything from the efficacy of the products, to the way ingredients are sourced, right down to the packaging sustainability for each and every product. Sustainability in packaging is a subject that is close to her heart.

Chemical engineer from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden. Master’s degree in molecular science and technology. Started master thesis project with the Royal Institute of Technology and IDUN Minerals in 2014. The purpose of the project was to study the surface of the nail, its composition and the effect from using products on it. The project resulted in IDUN Minerals nail polish collection, launched spring 2015. Since then in charge of all product development project at IDUN Minerals and from the beginning of 2018 also the director for all international sales. Aside from education in chemistry, Caroline also trained makeup artist.

Rubén Rubiales is CEO and Founder of Lesielle Adaptive Skincare, a leading personalized skincare company. After obtaining his Pharmacy degree at Seville University, Rubiales completed his formation in Formulation, production, and Management at Grenoble University and the Grenoble Management School. After a time in Gattefossé Laboratories, he returned to Spain, where he turned his local family business into the national e-commerce leader of its sector, showing his multidisciplinary formation and resolutive personality as one of its main assets. Over the last 5 years, he has created and developed the Adaptive skincare concept, an evolving personalized skincare that served Lesielle to be the winner of the Cosmoprof awards and considered by the South Summit as 1 of the best 100 startups worldwide.

Jo is a chemist and the Co-Founder of Beauty Kitchen, leaders in effective, natural and sustainable beauty. Widely regarded as one of the pioneers of sustainable beauty, Jo is driving the beauty industry forward with better practise approaches, always. She is Beauty Kitchen’s toughest critic, inspecting everything from the efficacy of the products, to the way ingredients are sourced, right down to the packaging sustainability for each and every product. Sustainability in packaging is a subject that is close to her heart.

Mark leads the Running of NATRUE, lead role in all political, regulatory and scientific affairs of the association – advocacy, research and label. Mark graduated with a M.Chem (Hons.) degree in chemistry and an interdisciplinary PhD. between chemistry and genetics. Before joining NATRUE in June 2014, he developed further his research career with two positions covering biotechnology (Leeds, UK) and the biomedical/pharmaceutical sector (Montréal, Canada). Mark is a British national who has more than five years’ experience in Scientific Management. During the last ten years, he has been involved in the successful coordination of strategic and collaborative interdisciplinary projects via academic departmental and international research. Mark became Director General of NATRUE in July 2016.

Filabé of Switzerland’s products are cosmetic products based on a new delivery technology for active ingredients. In short we have replaced the cream with a highly specific microfiber tissue. The tissue is loaded with dry, liposomized active ingredients. For use, the tissues are moistened and then used to massage the (facial) skin. During use, the skin is lightly peeled, cleansed and nourished with treatment specific ingredients. As the ingredients are dry before use, there is no need for stabilizers, fragrances, preservatives and a like. Filabé is thus the only skin care without ANY additives. The technology has strong potential also for medical applications and is scientifically proven to work. Clinical studies and also customer feedback show high effectiveness and customer satisfaction. The products are sold through our webshop (https://www.filabe.ch/en/) in pharmacies and in selected practices of Dermatologists. The brand is positioned as natural, sustainable skin care for people with skin problems. The CEO, Markus studied economics at the University of Zurich and after working as an investment banker started his entrepreneurial career back in 2005. He specialised in buying companies to unhide their full potential. He acquired Filag Schweiz AG, owner of the technology in 2012 and further developed the technology before entering the Swiss market in 2014. In 2018 new patents were filed and the brand repositioned as base for the now highly successful market rollout.

Education in the US and MBA from Stockholm University. Worked in several management positions in ITT Flygt US/Sweden/Turkey, Markwins International/Europe and Letsfaceit Nordic AB. Founded IDUN Minerals together with his brother Per Agardh on March 8, 2011. Acting as CEO since 2011.

Chemical engineer from the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden. Master’s degree in molecular science and technology. Started master thesis project with the Royal Institute of Technology and IDUN Minerals in 2014. The purpose of the project was to study the surface of the nail, its composition and the effect from using products on it. The project resulted in IDUN Minerals nail polish collection, launched spring 2015. Since then in charge of all product development project at IDUN Minerals and from the beginning of 2018 also the director for all international sales. Aside from education in chemistry, Caroline also trained makeup artist.

Dr Konstantinos Gardikis is Research and Development Director in APIVITA SA. His work involves the development of innovative final products and raw materials for cosmetics and nutritional supplements, their regulatory consolidation and the management of research programs and IP. He has studied Pharmacy in the Pharmacy School of the University of Athens. He has obtained a MSc in Ιndustrial Pharmacy and a PhD in Pharmaceutical Nanotechnology focusing on physical chemistry from the University of Athens. He is inventor of 25 patents, has published 26 reviewed articles in scientific journals, 3 chapters in international scientific books and has many oral and written presentations in international congresses. He has performed postgraduate research in the scientific organizations: National Hellenic Research Foundation, Academy of Athens, Centre National de Recherche Scientifique - Grenoble, France, Universita degli Studi di Milano - Italy, University of Lodz - Poland, Universidad Complutense de Madrid – Spain, Instituto Andaluz de Investigación y Formación Agraria, Pesquera, Alimentaria y de la Producción Ecológica (IFAPA) – Cadiz, Spain, Centro de Ciências do Mar (CCMAR) – Faro, Portugal and in the industries: Fitoplancton Marino - Cadiz, Spain, Fytosan - Die, France and ELPEN, Athens, Greece. He has participated as Project coordinator or Project leader in 18 international scientific programs of a total budget of 37 million euro, among which Horizon 2020, FP7 and Leonardo da Vinci. He has been member of organizing committees of international congresses and workshops, reviewer of scientific journals, he has been awarded three innovation awards and has lectured at MSc programs of the Medical School of Athens, Pharmacy Schools of Athens, Thessaloniki and Patras, Agricultural School of Athens, at the laboratories of Pharmaceutical Technology and Cosmetology of the Pharmacy School of Athens e.t.c. He has obtained 4 national and international scholarships.

It all began with the idea of replacing disposable cotton pads with reusable microfibre cleansing wipes. This simple but ingenious idea was launched by Laëtitia Van de Walle in 2010, and consumers loved it! With a diploma in communication, Laëtitia always had the wish to create her own company. She created Lamazuna in April 2010 and had her first employee in 2015. Nowadays the company has a staff of more than 50 people and continues to grow. During her path, she leads and works on several projects that evolve sustainability and ethics in cosmetics but also in fashion. In January 2018 she cofounded Green Coast, an organic cosmetics raw material importing company. It aims to finance research on a bio-labelled surfactant that can be used in solid cosmetics. In April 2018, she founded KABANES, an ethical fashion e-commerce. It merged with Lamazuna in November 2019 and became Lamazuna mode (“Lamazuna fashion”). Nowadays, she’s the administrator at Réseau Vrac, an interprofessional association that has the goal to structure and accelerate the development of bulk sales around the world. She makes part of the supervisory board of La Nef, a known ethical bank which provides savings and credit solutions geared exclusively towards projects of ecological, social and cultural utility.

Circulove was born out of a desire to do good for people and the planet in a sustainable way. We wanted to create a company that’s dedicated to a true circular lifestyle, with clean skincare and no compromises. Sustainability, circular economy, well-being and doing good sits at the heart of everything that we do.We want to bring salon level, clean natural skincare available to everyone with the least possible environmental impact. Circulove was founded 2020 by a group of Scandinavian designers, natural cosmetics chemists, beauticians; nurses, lifestyle professionals for whom sustainable thinking, and acting responsibly is paramount. Having worked with leading Scandinavian beauty, design and fashion brands for 20+ years, Circulove’s founder Päivi Paltola became increasingly concerned with the high levels of ineffective, non-traceable ingredients packed with superfluous packages she found in almost every product –this prompted her to start investigating how to use circular design principles in skincare to create more meaningful beauty. The fact is that more than 80% of the environmental footprint of a product is often decided right from the beginning of the design phase. “Our values are based on concrete actions:using ocean waste plastic, by-products, biodegradable raw materials, and promoting circular loops, less usage and transparent supplier networks We are supporting local fishermen, women cooperative and small entrepreneurs while making clean, probiotic skincare that truly works” says founder Päivi Paltola. Päivi Paltola holds a M.Sc. in Economics from the Aalto University Helsinki and is CIDESCO Beauty Therapist.

With a Masters Degree in Geophysics from University College London (UCL), five-time published scientific author, and JooMo Co-Founder Kit published a peer-reviewed paper in 2017 that describes the first mechanism to determine whether skin is healthy or not. As director of the Pavane Research Centre (the R&D arm behind JooMo), he discovered that microbial biodiversity is an indicator of healthy skin. This was following a lack of evidence linking the presence and abundance of specific microbes to a sliding scale of the health of skin. This meant that Kit can start to research which things in our western environment are causing a large decline in the biodiversity of our microbiome.

Founder and celebrity hairstylist Helen has always been passionate about clean haircare that works, she couldn't find any for her clients and so decided to create Act+Acre: The world’s first Cold Processed® hair wellness brand that focuses on your scalp. Originally from Ireland, Helen and her husband Colm created and patented the Cold Processed® technique to create their plant-based products. This avoids the traditional heat-based production, which can lessen the potency of nutrients in seed oils. Sustainability is key to the brand, through the packaging we use, the ingredients we include, the use of 90% less energy to create our products, and the wind farms we fund in Mumbai. Act+Acre is a reaction to an existing category and a promise of what it can become.

Dr. Alain Mavon, Senior Director of Science & Innovation, heading Skin Research Institute, Innovation and Clinical Evalaution & Scientific Communication Units. Alain owns a MSc. in Biochemistry and physico-chemistry and a Ph.D degree, with honours from Dermatology Unit at University Hospital of Besancon, FR. Prior to joining Oriflame, Alain worked for 12 years at Pierre Fabre Dermo-Cosmétique, Toulouse, in the field of skin delivery & Metabolism & new active ingredients discovery. In 2009, Alain joined Oriflame, Stockholm, SW and had various roles within R&D, notably establishing the Oriflame Skin Research Institute in Stockholm. With almost 25 years of expertise in Cosmetic research, more than 50 scientific publications and several patents, Alain is passionate about skin and skin ageing and how to improve skin health and to enhance Beauty, by exploring the latest scientific and technological innovations and further translate them into consumers solutions. In addition, he is supporting sale through communicating the Science behind the products to our Oriflame network leaders and consultants, as well as via an 9K followers IG account @alainmavon.