2019 – 2023 Seppo Määttä served as Director General of the Government Strategy Department at the Prime Minister’s Office. In the period of 2011 – 2019 Määttä served as a partner and the Chairman of the Board of Directors at Broad Scope Management Consultingc Ltd.  Prior to this he worked as the Project Manager of the project establishing the University of the Arts Helsinki; Managing Director of Talent Partners Public Consulting; Advisor to the Management and Project Manager at the Ministry of Finance; and Advisor to the Secretariat of the Nordic Council of Ministers.

Renate Nikolay is now Deputy Director General in DG CNECT. From November 2014 to November 2022 she served as Head of Cabinet of Vĕra Jourová, now Vice-President for Values and Transparency and before Commissioner for Justice and Consumers. Renate Nikolay has been working on matters such as rule of law, media freedom or disinformation.  She also played a key role in the adoption of the data protection reform, the negotiations on an EU-US data transfer arrangement, the establishment of the European Public Prosecutor and the Code of Conduct with platforms on online hate speech. Between 2011 and 2014 she led the Unit of interinstitutional and international relations in DG Justice dealing with legislative files and international negotiations such as the ones with the US on data protection in law enforcement. Prior to that she was advisor in the Cabinet of the first High Representative / Vice President Cathy Ashton where she led on the relations with the European Parliament in setting up the European External Action Service and on relations with Asia, in particular China. From 2004-2009 she was member of the Cabinet of the Trade Commissioners Peter Mandelson and Baroness Cathy Ashton where she was part of the negotiating team in the trade talks in the multilateral trade round of the World Trade Organisation (the Doha Round) and the EU-South Korea Free Trade Agreement which was finalised in 2009. She started her career in the European Commission in the Directorate General for Trade in November 2003 dealing with the accession negotiations of Vietnam to the World Trade Organisation and the Trade Policy Committee with the Member States. Prior to that she was a diplomat in the German Permanent Representation in Brussels and worked as private Secretary to the German G7 Sherpa in the German Ministry of Economics. She holds a law degree (Erstes und Zweites Staatsexamen) from the Free University in Berlin and a master as a Fulbright Scholar in Washington DC. She was also an Erasmus Scholar in France/Grenoble.

Cristina MARTINEZ Deputy Head for Smart technologies for communities, European Commission Cristina Martinez started her career in the United Nations UNCTAD working on an IT track and trace software project for Africa, Asia and Latin-America. She then joined the Andersen Consulting company in 1998 as a consultant in the eCommerce group of the Technology department. She became a member of the staff of the European Commission in 2002. Her policy and managerial responsibility spans from the Enterprise Interoperability to Knowledge and Change Management areas. She helped launching the European Open Science Cloud in the 'Infrastructure and Open Science Cloud' unit and is now the deputy of the ‘Smart Technologies for Communities‘ unit in DG CONNECT dealing with Smart solutions for cities and communities, placing greater emphasis on environmental and sustainability aspects. 

Felix Sproll was elected to the city council in March 2020. Since then, his focus has been on the areas of Europe and International Affairs and digitalisation. He is active in the German section of the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR), as well as Vice-Chair of the Europe and International Affairs Commission in Munich. Felix Sproll is also a member of the Committees for Economy and Labour, Mobility, Environment and Climate Protection, and Information Technology. He is currently working for more (digital) citizen participation, for the simplification of citizens' lives through digitalisation, for cooperation between European cities on similar challenges and for any kind of shared mobility to solve the city's traffic problems.

Lluïsa Moret i Sabidó graduated in Psychology from the University of Barcelona, specialising in social psychology, with a Master's in Social Research Techniques and Gender Policies. She has been Mayor of Sant Boi de Llobregat since 2014, and President of the Department of Equality and Social Sustainability of the Barcelona Provincial Council since 2019. Equality and social justice are the values that drive her life and, therefore, those also guide her in politics: proximity, respect and attention to people, especially the most vulnerable.

Matteo Lepore is the current Mayor of Bologna and of the Metropolitan City. He took office on October 2021. His political career began in 1999, when he joined the “Democratici di Sinistra Party” (Democrats of the Left), and then joined the Democratic Party in the year of its foundation in 2007. In the 2011 local elections, he was elected Municipal Councilor of Bologna, and was appointed Deputy Mayor responsible for Institutional Affairs, Demographic Services, International Relations, Communication, Urban Marketing, Innovation and Employment. In the following administrative elections, in 2016, he was re-elected Municipal Councilor and appointed Deputy Mayor responsible for Culture, Tourism, Heritage, Sport and Civic Imagination. In 2021 he won the centre-left primary election and was elected mayor in the same year with a coalition formed by centre-left parties, civic lists and the 5 Star Movement. He has a degree in Political Science from the University of Bologna and took several Masters in Italy and abroad: in 2007 in International Relations, in 2008 in Construction and Urban Planning and in 2009 in Economics of Cooperation.

Tiit Terik (born on 15 June 1979) is a Deputy Mayor of Tallinn responsible for municipal property,municipal police and sports. He has previously been the Head of Nõmme District Administration (2013-2016) and Pirita District Administration (2007-2013). He has several times been elected to the Tallinn City Council and served as the Chairman of the City Council in 2019-21. In 2016-2019 Mr Terik was a member of the Estonian Parliament and in 2021-22 the Estonian Minister of Culture. He has been the member of the European Committee of the Regions and the Member of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe. Tiit Terik has a Masters degree in politics and government from the Tallinn University. He is in the military, where he has reached the rank of Second Lieutenant. He has earned a Defence League Medal of Merits, III class.

Ms. Delphine Jamet was elected Deputy Mayor of the City of Bordeaux in June 2020, for a six-year term.  
As Deputy Mayor of Bordeaux, Delphine Jamet oversees general administration, evaluation of public policies and data strategy.
Delphine Jamet is also Digital Councilor at Bordeaux Métropole, overseeing Bordeaux Metropole’s digital strategy. Delphine Jamet is the elective representative of Bordeaux Métropole for digital, in Living-in.EU, Coalition of Cities for Digital Rights, Enoll and European Committee of Regions. Before taking office, Delphine Jamet was an archivist specialized in World War II documents for the Gironde département (Equivalent district or county). Ms. Jamet was also behind the implementation of an electronic archiving solution for these historical documents.
She is originally from Bordeaux Metropole. And holds a master’s degree in history from the University of Bordeaux.

Constance Nebbula is the Vice-president of the Pays de la Loire Region (Western France) in charge of digital affairs and President of the regional majority (center-right). A native of Angers, she has been involved in digital issues (Digital Transition and Smart Territory) for the municipality for many years. Her responsibilities at the level of the Angers Loire Métropole include the Vice-presidency of the Smart Territory, Higher Education and Research. At the national level, she has just been appointed President of the OpenDataFrance association.

Markku Markkula is the President of the Helsinki-Uusimaa Region (Chair of the Board). He is Vice-President of the European Committee of the Regions (CoR), having been the CoR President in 2015-2017. He is the CoR rapporteur on European Missions. Markkula has been a Member of the Parliament of Finland and is the Espoo City Councillor. He has worked for years as the Advisor to the Aalto University Presidents and as the Director of Lifelong Learning Institute Dipoli at the Helsinki University of Technology. His professional experience focuses on knowledge creation, lifelong learning, societal innovations, and change management.

Federica Bordelot is head of digital transformation at Eurocities. She leads policy and advocacy work on digital transformation, and she coordinates and supervise the team’s project and knowledge sharing work in the same area. She contributes to ensuring a strong external representation of Eurocities in conferences and meetings developing an extensive network of contacts in the EU. On behalf of Eurocities she coordinates the work on wider strategic initiatives on digital transformation including the Living-in.EU, where she is co-chair of the Steering Board of the movement.

She joined Eurocities in March 2015, before she worked for five years as communication manager for a network of European region on EU space policies. She has a master’s degree in international relations with specialisation in EU policies and institutions.