Workshops:
António Chanoca-António has been in the training and development business since 1989, from the age of 22. Starting at the University where he studied Economics António became National President of AIESEC Portugal for two years. Soon his career was geared towards people development, as he experienced a substantial amount of exposureand learning in this area. Having received a comprehensive amount of preparation in the field, António was soon involved in projects of international dimension. Having managed the Outdoor Training business unit of EGOR Portugal between 1994 to 96, António embraced a different challenge as he engaged the Experiential Learning division of Tracy International. At Tracy, as António became a specialist in Experiential Learning, he got to lead the division from 1997 to 2000. Also at Tracy International António got the opportunity to be certified in several methodologies of recognized organizations, from Sales to Leadership and several appraisal and development tools. António stepped into a higher level concerning taking his life in his hands, as he started the company where hedevelops his consultant activity to the day. Síntese Azul emerged in 2000 in the Training and Consulting arena, having performed a steady growth both in business volume and quality of partnerships (www.sinteseazul.com). A founding member of “Flow International”, based in Budapest Hungary, he is responsible for all Portuguese speaking markets and opportunities. In Africa he has worked with companies from Angola and Mozambique, where Síntese Azul has an operation established since 2006. Enthusiastic with international opportunities, over the years, António has delivered training in countries such as the United States, Spain, Brasil, Angola, Mozambique, Hungary, Turkey, Romania, Ireland, Belgium, Netherlands,Denmark, Germany, to name the most significant. Antonio has a passion for wilderness and travel, as well for kite surf and having fun with friends.
Carlos Mendes, Son of a tailor I am; But no Sailor I shall be; I’d rather love Rum than the Great wild sea; You see, dealing with the fog; Or the stormy waters; It is no easy task; As In the wild sea monsters do live; Ships do sink; Good old sailors see their minds lost; Therefore I am; On the pirates Bay; Looking at the stars, listening what they say; Routing is a craft; From all the ones I know best; I am no sailor; But ARRRR!!!! Pirate I shall be.
Carolina Enes - Carolina Enes has 29 years old and considers herself to be fortunate for having lived at the three most beautiful cities in Portugal: grew up in Viana do Castelo, studied in Porto and works in Lisbon. She holds a degree from University of Porto in Journalism and Communication Sciences (with a press office specialization). In late 2011 she has accomplished a Masters in Strategic Management of Public Relations from School of Communication and Media Studies (Lisbon Polytechnic Institute) where she studied the relationship established between public relations professionals and the Portuguese journalists. Currently she is working as the Communications Officer of the UT Austin|Portugal Program, one of the international partnerships from Foundation for Science and Technology (Ministry of Education and Science). Previously she collaborated with two of the major communication agencies in Portugal – GCI Group and YoungNetwork – having worked with various customers from different business areas: Sociedade Ponto Verde, Earth Water, European Union Eco-Label, Carris, Nestea, Norauto, Royal Canin, amongst others. In her own words, 5 years working in communication agencies have prepared her for any challenge.
Hugo Garcia is an Independent Consultant of Foresight / Futures Studies. Through the study of trends, emerging technologies, geo-strategy and methodologies he can add value to companies and organizations, creating more Robust Strategies and Disruptive Innovation. The professionals in this field are focused on knowledge transfer between the various areas of knowledge using integrative conceptual tools that help people profiles, sensitivities and different languages to cooperate.
Kristin Mendez is the Marketing Manager for Boyden Global Executive Search in Portugal. A New York native, she holds a Bachelor’s degree in Communications and Psychology from UPENN as well as an MBA with concentrations in Marketing and Management from The Lisbon MBA International – a program held in partnership with MIT, Católica and Nova. Her professional experience ranges from managing luxury health clubs in NYC (Chelsea Piers, The Sports Club/LA, Equinox) to marketing in various industries (L’Oréal, BBDO, The Lisbon MBA, Grupo Neves de Almeida). She believes that brands are like superheroes – they can have great power but along with that comes great responsibility. Brands can be born, they can die, they can evolve and all of this depends on the strategy (or lack thereof) behind the brand.
Miguel Coelho, Prime CareerAGENT and Personal Brand Strategist. Founder of the movement “2012 – The Year of Personal Brands”. An European expert in Marketing, Personal Branding and Social Media, only works with marketingdriven professionals and companies to increase the potencial and value of their professional services. Has a degree in Economics by Nova University in Lisbon and participated in the MBA from the Rotterdam School of Management (Holland). Was later recognized as the best student in the PostGraduation courses in Services Marketing at Instituto Superior de Gestão – Lisbon, where he was invited to teach several Marketing classes. Teaches also at NOVA University (NovaForum) and EGP.
Pedro Santos, Entrepreneurship Evangelist. Chief Executive Officer at all-desk. Director at Beta-i, a NGO whos mission is to promote entrepreneurship. Author of the “European Founders at Work” book. Startupweekend Facilitator. Startupbootcamp Ambassador. RSM MBA. Love to travel.
Rui Quinta is a Communication Designer/Brand Strategist with the special focus of not being focused on anything in particular. Starting as a “classic” graphic designer he soon founded is own agency, learned about the importance of understanding the business perspective, developed interest in brand strategy and in the last years he’s been consciously applying some core “values” of what some people call “design thinking” after an intense experience at the D.School – Berlin. Basically, he loves to help people realize their beliefs, transform their motivations into images and feelings while bringing everyone into the design process. He’s not only applying what he has learned with client/agencies but also by putting in motion his own projects like “querescasarcomigo.com” or “toyno.com“.
Mentors:
Anthony Douglas is a Portuguese-American who has lived in over 8 countries and speaks 6 languages. He has international experience in Sales & Marketing having worked in large international corporations such as Sony Electronics and BMW, as well as in young start-up environments such as Tim we, Zuvinova and Actualsales. Being an entrepreneur at heart, he has taken the good & the bad from both the corporate and startup world, and decided to start his own business. He found 3 things that he was passionate about (Sports, Gadgets & Startups) and turned them into his reality! Last year he started Hole19, a mobile & web application for the world of golf that was awarded with the Prémio Nacional de Indústrias Criativas in 2011, was selected as one of the Top 7 European Mobile Startups in the Vodafone Mobile Clicks competition as well as being a semi-finalist in the MIT Venture Competition. Hole19 also represented Portugal in the Global Entrepreneurship Competition in Barcelona this June.
Celso Martinho – Celso Martinho is a co-founder of SAPO, the first Portuguese Search Engine and Web Directory. SAPO is now the biggest and leading Internet Portal and ISP in Portugal, providing ADSL broadband and dial-up Internet access services and was integrated in Portugal Telecom group. He is currently the head Director for the Product Technology department. Celso also founded the startup mail.pt. Celso has an electronics major from Aveiro University and he enjoys leading talented IT teams, exploring new technologies and being alert for the emerging.
Cristina Fonseca is a 24 year old Portuguese entrepreneur with a Masters Degree in Communications and Networks Engineering. As a student, she studied how routers and antenas work and conducted research in the field. She created her first business at the age of 21 and refused corporate jobs to become an entrepreneur. She has worked as a consultant and owned several companies. Despite some failures, she maintained her optimism and was persistent. She co-founded Talkdesk which allows any company to create a call center in less than 5 minutes without long term contracts or infrastructure costs. Talkdesk recently graduated from 500startups and launched publicly at TC Disrupt NYC.
Daniela Couto is CEO and co-founder of Cell2b: a biotechnology start-up dedicated to the development cell therapies that prevents and treats organ rejection. Daniela holds a PhD Degree in Bioengineering from the Instituto Superior Técnico, Portugal. She studied the process of technological innovation in healthcare in collaboration with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Daniela holds a M.Sc. Degree in Biomedical Engineering, Universidade do Minho, Portugal. During her studies, Daniela lived in Milan, while doing research at Politecnico di Milano, and in the greater Boston area, U.S., for about two years. She has participated and been awarded in different strategic and business plan competitions, such as the Alnylam Strategic Competition at MIT Sloan School of Management. She has also been distinguished as the Women Entrepreneur Award – Start 2011 by ANJE, the Portuguese Association for Young Entrepreneurs. Finally, Cell2B team has received the BES Innovation award 2011, a 60,000 euros award.
Duarte d’Eça Leal, A decade living in England defined and contextualized Duarte’s academic training (St. Clare’s International College, Oxford & City University London – CASS Business School [Ranked 15th on the Financial Times’ European Business School Ranking] BSc Business Studies, MSc European Business) as well as his first steps in the professional arena where he amassed experiences in both marketing research and in real estate, with the UK’s largest real estate promoters. Duarte returned to Portugal in 2009 to co-found and manage The House of the She-Pine Tree – a boutique Museum Guesthouse that earned praise in both the media and within Portugal’s official Tourism Agency (the project was nominated for the Portuguese Tourism Awards for Best New Private Project). Two and a half years on, the group expanded and The Independente Hostel & Suite / The Decadente Restaurante & Bar was born. Here, Duarte performs the role of General Manager as well as acting as one of the managing partners of MBD – Gestão de Investimentos Hoteleiros in planning and developing the group’s expansion which has 3 new properties on their pipe-line for 2013.
Fernando Mendes, 44 years, graduated in Communication Design and Master in Visual Culture (Studies of Photography) from IADE. Founder and Co-founder of the publishing projects of the Group Forum, Associação CAIS, Banco Alimentar, among others. Was the general coordinator of the first monthly portuguese magazine about the Internet – Cyber.net. He was director of design of the first portuguese portal, Terravista. In 2010, he founded Cowork Lisboa with Ana Dias. In 2011, he Co-founded the startup All-Desk. He is since April 2012, President of the Association of Former Students of IADE. But what he really knows about is The Velvet Underground.
Fernando Neves de Almeida is the Managing Director of Boyden Portugal, as well as an International Partner and the Lisbon Office’s Senior Partner since 1997. In addition, he also holds the position of Executive Coordinator for undergraduates, masters and doctorate programs in Human Resources and Organizational Strategy at ISLA Campus Lisboa | Laureate International Universities. He has a Degree in Hotel Management at Universidade Internacional, a Degree in Human Resources Management and Work Psychology at ISLA Campus Lisboa and a MBA and Master Degree in Management at Universidade Católica Portuguesa. Fernando began his career as a salesman of industrial products for an industrial company, working his way up to the position of Sales Manager followed by Marketing Manager. He then became the General Manager of a computer technology company. In 1991, he established Neves de Almeida Consultants, Lda., a group of consulting companies based in Lisbon where he retains the position of Non-Executive President.
Gonçalo Catarino, is a 36-new guy with an Infinite Curiosity about People, Ideas, Design and Music. A Designer at heart for the last 15 years and starting with the basic secrets of graphic and web design work in small design studios, he climbed his way into being Web Art Director and Creative Supervisor for online campaigns at Ogilvy (Advertising Agency), where he has won several awards working for global brands like Ford, Nestlé, and BP, among others. He currently runs his own Design Studio called “96 ’til Infinity” where he helps companies and startups from all over the world creating or improving their products and services, thru “The ways of” Ideation, Product Strategy, Branding and Promotion Design GōngFu. At 96 ’til Infinity he also helps individuals turning beautiful “Wouldn’t it be nice?” ideas into real “Wow. This shit is amazing!” projects. He’s also Director & Co-Founder at Weddar, a people powered weather service and a musician who loves life.
Hunter Spears Halder, suddenly 61 years old,is a graduate in History and Geography from East Carolina University, in Greenville, North Carolina (USA). He has taken a wide range of career paths over the years, from restaurant/ night club owner and concert promoter to demolition specialist and construction boss (among others) in the United States. In Portugal, after initially working as an English teacher, he became a team builder, designing and conducting many dozens of original formative and transformative teambuilding experiences – interventions focused on changing attitudes, behaviours and competencies in key populations. In 2010 he decided to the change careers yet again, this time abandoning the 2ª sector (for profit) in favor of the 3º sector (not-for-profit) with the modest ambition of changing the world. It was during the process of elaborating a number of original humanitarian projects that the idea for the Re-food Project was born. Due to favourable conditions (and increased urgency), Re-food was launched in the beginning of 2011 (leaving the other projects to be launched in due time). The Re-food Project began activity on the 9th of March, 2011 with the following objectives: to end food waste and end urban hunger while building Community Solidarity in the areas where the project is implanted. Its action is always micro-local, but its mission is to multiply planet wide. Re-food 4 Good – A non-profit, social solidarity association was formed on the 18th of July, with the mission to expand the project (and its benefits) to the largest possible number of people.The second cell is opening in Telheiras/Lumiar in September, initiating the second stage of the project: Lisboa 100%, a concentrated effort to replicate the project throughout the city, ASAP. Our intention is to make Lisbon the first city in the world to end food waste and feed its hunger people (by 2014) and then to “franchise” the project worldwide.
João Alfaiate- João graduated in Industrial Design from IADE School of Design in 2004. For six years he worked as an Interaction Designer at Insituto Superior Técnico. In 2008 he co-founded Enough Pepper and developed Survs, an online survey tool. Today he works full-time at Enough Pepper / Survs as a Product Designer.
João Vasconcelos- João founded and managed several companies, from design to real estate and tourism. He always had a strong involvement in community andassociations, particularly in ANJE where he was Vice President. He supports national entrepreneurship for many years and now adds to his business life the position of Executive Director of Startup Lisboa, Lisbon City incubator, a project sponsored by the Municipality of Lisboa, Montepio Bank, IAPMEI, Portugal Telecom, Microsoft, KPGM, SAGE and several universities.
Marco de Abreu- Father of Afonso and Dinis. Degree and Master in Computer Engineering from IST. Entrepreneur. Safira (1997). Darwin (2005). darwinLabs, all-desk, homeostase, iamin, saa e allia (2010 e 2011). Beta-i associated. Subscriber of the Manifesto Movement. Co-founder of the ONE Perfect Movement (2011). Co-founder of João Sem Medo Center for Entrepreneurship (2011), a social enterprise of entrepreneurs for entrepreneurs, that believes all men can learn the entrepreneurship method and that people with their own actions can build their own future.
Marta Miraldes - Marta Miraldes is one of the founding partners and managing Partner at SBI Consulting. With more than 10 years of experience, has supported the launch and consolidation of numerous projects across several business segments, since the business model structuration to the elaboration of the business plan, further aiding in the search the most appropriate methods of financing (including bank financing, venture capital and incentives QREN). Marta is also responsible to provide support and monitoring in the development of the business process in SBI clients. Amongst the many initiatives and projects which have participated over the years, focus to the creation of the study on Venture Capital in Portugal, the launch and implementation of the Finicia Jovem Program, the economic development of the financial model Finicia-IAPMEI, the participation as a trainer in various workshops and seminars on entrepreneurship and incentive systems QREN. Was also invited for three years as Professor in entrepreneurship post-graduation at INDEG / ISCTE. More recently started to collaborate with the LISBON STARTUP, a new incubator in Lisbon, where supports the selection and monitoring of the incubated companies. Also participated as a jury evaluating projects in various initiatives (Poliempreende, Acredita Portugal, Franchising Awards), was the Vice-President of JCI International in Portugal, the largest association of Young Leaders and Entrepreneurs with presence in 115 countries, with more than 220,000 members, and cooperate in the project supported by CUPAV – História do Futuro. Marta Miraldes is formed in Management by ISCTE.
Miguel Muñoz Duarte – Miguel is Curator of Ignite Portugal, a series of inspiration events that consist in periodic gatherings to share 5 minutes talks with 5 minutes talks about innovation, creativity, technology and entrepreneurship and co-founder of iMatch – Innovation Ignition, a Business-Creativity and Innovation collaborative-consultancy company dedicated to inspire ideas/solutions and ignite the human side of innovation. Since 2008, he has helped to create inspiration and ideas, engagement and creativity skills for several brands and companies. He is a PhD student in creativity/innovation and invited entrepreneurship teacher in ISCTE-IUL University.
Nuno Rivotti - Pedagogical Director of Odd School and Art Director in a startup company associated to the school. Specialized in games, videogame development, production and team management, he’s the perfect person to guide you through several pitfalls of project development. Nuno graduated in New Media and Traditional Arts from ESAD School of Arts Design and opened his first company at the age of 18. He made his way from 3D artist to project consultant and art director in several companies. Today, besides Pedagogical Director at Odd School, and professor at the Concept Art Programme, he also takes the role of mentor of students that aspire to a successfull career in the digital entertainment industry.
Paula Arriscado is Marketing & Communication Manager at Toyota Caetano Portugal (Salvador Caetano Holding) and Teacher at University IPAM – The Marketing School and at Católica University. PhD on Brand Management and Integrated Communication at Santiago de Compostela University (2008), Master in Public Relations (2001) and Journalist degree (1995). Between 1991 and 2000, worked with several Media, from which it highlights Rádio Nova and TSF Radios and Máxima Magazine. At the same time developed a large activity in the Business Communication field (Portugal Business Association – Associação Empresarial de Portugal/Exponor; Esposende and Arcos de Valdevez Municipalities; Industrial Sector Association – Associação dos Industriais Metalúrgicos, Metalomecânicos e Afins de Portugal; APCER; Porto Editora, among others).Was elected “Marketing professional of the year 2005, in automotive sector”, by Portuguese marketing association APPM.
Pedro de Albuquerque Mateus-Pedro is Co-Founder & Partner at eggNEST – SGPS SA, a Seed and Early-Stage Venture Firm – Founded 2010 Based in OEIRAS. Board Member at Galilei Saúde SGPS SA, Advisor at Jason Associates. Previous Life: 15 Years Executive Experience, Across border experience (banking, cement, services, fast growing businesses). MBA at ISCTE, Executive Education at INSEAD and Crainfield University, Economics at UCP.
Pedro Falcão has a Degree in Information Technology Engineering and MBA by UNL. He is Investment Director at Novabase Capital and was previously Investments Director at Aitec SGPS, being responsible for analyzing more than 700 projects. He worked as Marketing Director at OutSystems and TIMw.e. where he helped the company expand to more than 90 countries. He was also a Strategic Consultant at Gemini Consulting. Formerly he worked in Banking and Services as Assistant to Chairman, Project Manager and Analyst/Programmer.
Pedro Ludovice Nogueira – Pedro is a business executive with broad experience in all aspects of management, design, branding and supply chain. He has direct experience with health service providers, branding consulting and international logistics. His specialties are: Design, Design Thinking, Service Design, Branding, Digital, Entrepreneurship, Logistics and Presentations.
Penelope Abreu- Penelope is and feels like an eternal student. Passionate about almost everything she soon discovered the beauties of answering questions with new questions. Her nomadic life between various cities in Portugal, Germany and USA gave her a freedom of thought and spirit of discovery. A tremendous curiosity about all there is, from the factual explanation of science to the subjectivity of the human behaviour, she could only go one path, the creative one. As in the sum of it all. She worked as an advertising photographer for several years after taking the master degree of Photography in Stuttgart, Germany. Later on she does a post graduation in advertising at the known as best advertising school in the world, Miami Ad School, starting in Hamburg and ending up in New York City. In Portugal since the beginning of this year and after going through some other advertising agencies in both Hamburg and NYC, she’s now a creative at JWT Lisbon. And happy as a bird to be back.
Sandra Sick has worked with over 25 start-up companies in her career with a focus on the marketing strategy and execution. Having managed the marketing departments of a number of well-funded technology start-ups, she then leveraged this experience and created her own marketing consulting firm. Big Planet Marketing focuses on digital marketing strategies and getting clients in any industry “found”. Also working with non-profits, who share a lot of the same challenges as traditional start-ups, Sandra was the Digital Marketing Strategy Consultant for Stand Up To Cancer and part of the team that helped raise over $80 million for cancer research in the September 2010 telethon. She holds a Bachelor’s of Science degree in Business Administration with a focus in Marketing from S.U.N.Y. New Paltz in New York and has obtained the Inbound Marketing Certification training from Hubspot.
Sara Machado - Integrated in the Corporate Relations & Marketing Departmement since July, 2007. Sara is responsible to increase Sage Portugal brand awareness, internal and external communications, PR and Channel marketing and strategy. Before that, Sara was almost 8 years at WeDo Technologies from Sonae Group, as responsible for WeDo technologies brand worldwide consolidating its positioning as a leading provider in the revenue assurance area.
Vincenzo Di Maria – Vincenzo Di Maria is a service designer currently working on projects across Europe. His work focuses on socially responsive design and innovation ranging from products to services and experiences. His approach to design is holistic, playful and people-centred. Vincenzo trained as a designer at Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design in London where he now runs the Service Design short course and collaborates with some other postgraduate courses. He has also been working as design researcher at Design Against Crime Research Centre, CSM Innovation, University of the Arts London. In 2008 Vincenzo co-founded commonground, the place where design meets positive social change. commonground works with socially minded organizations to deliver service innovation and user-driven experiences. Vincenzo is a fellow of the Royal Society for the Encouragement of Arts, Manufactures and Commerce, London.
Talks:
Ana Saramago – CEO and Founder of HARDCORE FOFO was born in Crato 47 years ago, and works in IT services since 1987, at Portugal Telecom. Restless and curious by nature, in 2010 she decided to join the internacional movement of subversive cross stitching and started to rearrange traditional patterns of Old Vintage embroidery combining them with modern design clothing that show messages with a content that reinforces her rebel side and, at the same time, her sweet personality. Enjoys photography, painting, music, design, street art, and all good things in life!!! Self-taught in life, with peculiar creativity, she believes there are such things as unicorns, blue fairies hanging on the lamps in the streets and flying carpets made in needlepoint. She believes life lasts two days and must be lived to the fullest. She likes challenges, the famous pastel de nata (custard tarts) and lying on the grass (when she can find it). Go with the flow is her favorite motto .
André Luis- The desire of being different, impact people’s lives and add value to society was always something André Luís wanted for his life. Born and raised in Setúbal he began his academic training at IADE where he studied Industrial Design. Later he post-graduated in Marketing Management at ISEG in Lisbon. André Luís began his career at a Human Resources outsourcing company where he was in charge of rebranding the company. After two years of leading and manage a department he had the opportunity, at the age of 23, to open his first company. A few months later he accepted a job as Marketing Director at the Vitória de Setúbal Soccer Team. That experience allowed him to grow and broaden his professional experience. In 2008, he opened Odd School in association with the production company ‘Até ao Fim do Mundo’, a project that aimed to develop and support the digital entertainment industry in Portugal through the training of specialized talents as well as generate mechanisms to support projects in areas such as animation, motion and games. Three years later, he co-founded Yellow Mammothwith his friend Nuno Rivotti, a creative agency specialized in animation, VFX and motion graphics. The creation of this company was a way to respond to the need of labor integration of the best students of Odd School. Currently, André Luís performs the role as Odd School Director alongside with the management of Yellow Mammoth.
André Ribeirinho is the Founder and CEO of Adegga.com, an online Wine Recommendation Service that helps people choose wine. Adegga.com has been considered one of the top online wine platforms in the world and is part of the group of companies that is changing the wine industry. Andre is also Founder and Chief Evangelist of AVIN, an ISBN for wine that helps wineries manage their data online. AVIN codes are used by over 300 wineries around the world and have been printed in over 50 million wine labels. André is a Lisbon based entrepreneur who started his first company when he was 19 years old. André believes in entrepreneurship as a powerful force for freedom, change, value creation and innovation. He is a frequent speaker on the topic of entrepreneurship and bootstrapping in international conferences.
Carlos Silva - President & Chief Operating Officer at Seedrs. Carlos is an IT development and security expert with nearly ten years of industry experience, most of them in a leading role. Most recently he served as Head of New Product Development at Sysvalue, an innovative information systems security consulting firm based in Lisbon, and he has also worked as an information security consultant to a range of leading European financial institutions. Carlos holds an MBA from the University of Oxford and a Masters in Computer Engineering from Instituto Superior Técnico, the leading Portuguese engineering university.
Dey Dos, A poet of breathes, a writer of unreadable stories, a green freak, a singer of silent songs, a warrior of passion, a lover without lover, a multicultural cook, a life worshiper, a prophet of beauty, a designer of concepts and a popcorn machine. At the end, a beautiful individual. Aren’t we all? www.deydos.com
Rute Novais, Born in Lisbon and passionate about the city, Rute enjoys learning and interacting wherever life takes her. From an early age, Rute fiercely embraced the creative industries. Her professional path started in communication agencies and matured into projects dear to her heart. And thus, Rute brought this knowledge to new adventures including art, dance and creative expression. At the same time, Rute has been involved in education and has taught communication design, and creative thinking process at Grupo ETIC, and works in event production and as freelance graphic designer. She embraces all projects that allow her to share and learn. From the subversive design of Hardcore Fofo to the time devoted to Brigada do Mar (a volunteer group involved in cleaning up beaches), one can see what moves her: people and the creative potential that can be revealed. Her moto is: learn to dance in the rain instead of waiting for the storm to pass.
Vasco Gaspar - With a degree in Psychology (Work and Organizations) by Coimbra’s University and experience in different business areas, Vasco captured the main problems that individuals and organizations face in the current contexts of constant-change and began his quest for solutions. After reading hundreds of books and making different kinds of certifications in search of a deep understanding about human performance, he gathered innovative tools and approaches that help people to work everyday for their well-being and high performance. Currently combines his non-profit ZorBuddha project with public speaking, training and colaborative creativity consulting. In his free time, Vasco likes to learn and share his knowledge, and to be a volunteer at Ignite Portugal‘s events. Vasco Gaspar strongly believes that it is possible to change the world, but that change must start inside each person: the expression of our unique potential is the true path for spirituality.
Atul Mulji, Yoga Siromani (professor de Yoga) e Bodyworker (terapeuta corporal), abraçou o desafio que a vida lhe proporciona, partilhando os ensinamentos do yoga e terapias holísticas, como a ayurvédica e tailandesa. Praticante de Yoga desde 1978 seguindo os ensinamentos do Swami Satyananda Saraswati da Bihar School of Yoga. Formou-se professor de Yoga em 2002 pela reconhecida Escola Internacional de Yoga Sivananda Vedanta. Pós-Graduação em Pranayama pelo Instituto Kaivalyadham, India, reconhecido pelo governo da India, e ministrado pelo reconhecido mestre de pranayama Shri Om Prakash Tiwari. Facilita sessões de yoga e meditação, conduz formações especiais em pranayama, mantras e mudras, cursos de ayurvedic bodywork e thai yoga bodywork. Divide o seu tempo entre a Europa e Asia, partilhando dos seus conhecimentos seguindo a sua missão de difundir e disseminar a mensagem do YOGA de porta em porta pelo mundo fora. Escreveu um livro sobre “Mudras – O poder dos gestos sagrados” publicado pela Editora Ariana e um segundo livro – sobre PRANAYAMA, foi lançado no Outono de 2010.
Cristiano Martins, Seed sown in the earth in the fertile spring of 1979 in Freiburg im Braisgau, Germany. Roots extended and flowers bloomed in Porto. Biodanza Facilitator with the Rolando Toro system, trained by the School of Biodanza SRT in Porto. Graduated in Clinical Psychology with training in Gestalt Therapy. Master of Essential Reiki. He facilitated groups on the development of personal skills, the Transactional Analysis, Relaxation groups, and Drama groups (children, adults and seniors). He was in the service of “Telephone International de la Esperanza” and He is currently Professor of Education entered into the Training of Educational Agents IEFP. He is, as one old friend said, a mutant student of living.
Sónia Malaquias, Psychologist since 1995, she discovered Tai Chi in 1999, becoming a student of Master Wu Xuan, who with, she continues to practice. She begins to teach Tai Chi in 2001 in Alentejo, by recommendation of her Master, and moved to Montemor-o-Novo. After four years, accepted the challenge of living in East Timor for two years, where she worked in the health sector and continued to teach Tai Chi. Back in Europe, decided to go back to school to better understand the links between psychology and Tai Chi: She completed a Master Degree, in Danza Movement Therapy in Barcelona, where she lived for two years and teaches Tai Chi to the blind. Back in Portugal, founded in 2010 with Master Wu Xuan, the Association Caminho Natural (Natural Way) for the dissemination of Tai Chi and Chi Kung, and assumes the direction of the association. She is grade II trainer by the Institute of Sports of Portugal. Currently she teaches Tai Chi in “Espaço Vida” and “Sou”, and in the Parish of Mártires e do Sacramento for seniors. She is a psychotherapist, that through movement and therapy sessions, works the body-mind unity.
