CSPS Digital Academy Events/Moving Quantum Computing from Theory to Practice - Speaker Biographies

Date and time: June 16, 2021 | 10:30 am to 4:15 pm (ET)

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Speaker Biographies

	Dr. Peter C. Mason Director, Quantum Sensors Challenge Program, National Research Council Born and raised in Nova Scotia, Dr. Mason completed a bachelors degree in mathematics at Mount Allison University in 1990, gathering medals for the top graduate in both math and physics, and intramural athletics, before moving to Guyana to do volunteer work installing emergency backup electrical systems in remote communities. After doing a masters degree at McMaster University, he spent a year travelling and volunteering in Indonesia then returned to McMaster to complete his PhD in physics. In 1998, he returned to Mount Allison as a professor in the physics department before joining the National Research Council for a post-doctoral fellowship, where he led experiments at Chalk River National Lab, the National Institute of Standards (NIST), Oak Ridge National Lab, and Cornell University’s High Energy Synchrotron Source. In 2002, after a two year stint in the photonics industry, he joined Defence Research & Development Canada (DRDC) as a defence scientist in the secure mobile networking group. He was named Group Leader in 2006 and then transitioned to Head of the Cyber Operations and Signals Warfare section in 2014. He took the role of Chief Scientist of Electromagnetic sciences in 2017 and transitioned to the position of Chief Scientist of DRDC in late 2018 where he led the effort to write the DND Quantum S&T Strategy. In February of 2020, Peter moved to the National Research Council of Canada to become the director of the NRC’s new Internet of Things: Quantum Sensors Challenge Program. He is the author of more than 70 scientific papers and reports in topics spanning materials science, cyber security, machine learning, network traffic analysis, and algorithms. Outside of work, Dr. Mason is an award-winning community cycling advocate. He has a 12 year old son Finn, whose teams he coaches in hockey, cross-country skiing, and mountain biking.
	Neil Bouwer Vice-President, Canada School of Public Service Neil Bouwer has also served as an Assistant Deputy Minister at the Treasury Board of Canada Secretariat, Natural Resources Canada, the Canadian Food Inspection Agency, and the Privy Council Office of Canada; and in executive positions at the Financial Transactions and Reports Analysis Centre of Canada, Human Resources and Social Development Canada and the Business Development Bank of Canada. He has also worked at the Department of Finance and Western Economic Diversification Canada, and has Economics degrees from McGill University and St. Thomas University. Neil actively supports the Government of Canada policy and data communities, the Advanced Policy Analyst Program and the Free Agent HR Program.
	Ghislain Lefebvre Partnership development manager, Université de Sherbrooke Ghislain Lefebvre began his career as a physics teacher in several CEGEPs that welcome grade 12 and U1 students in the province of Quebec. He then launched his own business by founding a brewery with his wife. He held the positions of brewer and president. Back in the Eastern Townships, he was director of the regional agri-food regional board and responsible for the deployment of the local food identification brand. Since January 2020, he is back in the world of physics and holds the position of Partnership Development Manager for the Institut quantique of the USherbrooke.
	Ray Wang Principal Analyst, Founder and Chairman, Constellation Research Inc. R “Ray” Wang (pronounced WAHNG) is the Founder, Chairman and Principal Analyst of Silicon Valley based Constellation Research Inc., a research and advisory firm which studies disruptive business and exponential technology trends. Ray’s the co-host and co-founder of the widely watched DisrupTV, a weekly enterprise tech and leadership webcast that averages 50,000 views per episode. He’s also the author of the popular business strategy and technology blog “A Software Insider’s Point of View” that has received millions of page views per month. Wang also serves as a non-resident Senior Fellow at The Atlantic Council's GeoTech Center. Since 2003, Ray has delivered thousands of live and virtual keynotes around the world that are inspiring and legendary. Wang has spoken at almost every major tech conference, including Salesforce’s Dreamforce, Adobe Summit, IBM, HR Tech Conference, NASSCOM, Mobile World Congress, CES, NRF, HIMSS, Oracle, Microsoft, Wipro, ServiceNow, Google Next, SAP, Infosys, TCS, SXSW, CIO100, TEDX, and sessions at Davos for various clients. His clients include the Global 2000 companies, governments, startups, and investment firms. Wang has held executive roles at institutions such as Forrester Research, Oracle, PeopleSoft, Deloitte, Ernst & Young, and Johns Hopkins Hospital. His ground-breaking best selling book on digital transformation, Disrupting Digital Business, was published by Harvard Business Review Press in 2015. Ray's new book about Digital Giants and the future of business titled, Everybody Wants to Rule The World will be released July 2021 by Harper Collins Leadership. Wang is well quoted and frequently interviewed in media outlets such as the Wall Street Journal, Fox Business News, CNBC, Yahoo Finance, Cheddar, Bloomberg, CGTN America, Tech Crunch, ZDNet, CIO Magazine, Forbes, and Fortune. Ray frequently receives accolades and awards from various independent organizations as one of the top technology and business analysts in the world.
	Karen Eltis Law Professor, University of Ottawa Centre for Law, Technology and Society Karen Eltis is a Faculty member at the University of Ottawa Centre for Law, Technology and Society and a Full Professor of Law within the Faculty of Law, Civil Law Section. She is a past Affiliate with Princeton’s CITP (Center for Information Technology Policy) 2016-2018. A past director of the uOttawa Human Rights Centre, Karen Eltis specializes in artificial intelligence/ innovation law and policy and cybersecurity from a comparative perspective. She served as Senior Advisor to the National Judicial Institute and has taught at Columbia Law School. Fluent in French, English, Hebrew, Spanish and Romanian and proficient in German and Italian, Karen Eltis holds law degrees from McGill University, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and Columbia Law School (Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar). Prior to joining the faculty at the University of Ottawa, Karen was a litigation associate in New York City. Her research was twice cited by the Supreme Court of Canada (in the landmark case A.B. v. Bragg, 2012 and in Quebec (Attorney General) v. 9147-0732 Québec inc. 2020 SCC 32) and other Canadian and foreign courts. Karen’s latest book is titled “Courts, Litigants and the Digital Age: Second Edition” (Irwin Law, 2016) supported by the CIRA grant. Her research on Artificial Intelligence and Expression is supported by the Foundation for Legal Research.
	Chris Allison Director General, Digital Academy, Canada School of Public Service As a driven, passionate and creative leader and change agent, my career, skills and experiences span across public service, private interests and personal goals. My goal is to reimagine and revitalize the public service - transforming it into an organization that can meet and exceed the needs and expectations of Canadians. Over the past 17 years I've worked on immigration enforcement, investigated war crimes, patrolled Toronto with the Toronto Police Service, conducted surveillance and counter smuggling activities with as an RCMP officer, participated in public relations duties in Japan, managed national security activities with the Canada Border Services Agency, developed legislation, regulations and policy on import, export and cross-border law enforcement operations, contributed to the re-writing of the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act, created and lead a community of passionate managers in Public Safety Canada, worked to improve the traveler experience with the CBSA and currently lead the Government of Canada's enterprise social network and wiki - working to build a single, collaborative and high performing public service to better serve Canadians. Driven and imaginative, I've reverse mentored three Deputy Ministers, reimagined and built new ways to improve the traveler experience and acted as a catalyst for change - driving innovation in policy thinking, service delivery, information management and collaboration. An avid Python and Go developer, I've built web apps, event simulations, conducted social network analysis, graphed and analyzed social media, analyzed big data with Spark, built machine learning classifiers and used natural language analysis to directly improve my organizations. I'm a top level communicator and writer, a powerful presenter and, above all a storyteller - bringing data, business experience, curiosity and play together into a single narrative. Starting a new adventure as DG Digital Services at the CSPS.