Agenda

Senior Vice President,  CRU
Jorn P. de Linde was appointed to his current position following the merger between Resource Strategies Inc. and CRU International in April 1996. Based in the United States, Mr de Linde specialises in ferroalloys-related research, with particular emphasis on silicon-based alloys and electric power, drawing on 30 years of experience. In addition to the manganese ferroalloy cost data service, he is the principal author of CRU's silicon metal market outlook and silicon cost data service reports. Mr de Linde also is a contributor to other CRU ferroalloy-related reports, including the Bulk Ferroalloys Monitor. He earned an MSc Degree in Mineral Economics from the Pennsylvania State University in the USA and holds an MBA (Siviløkonom) from the Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration in Bergen, Norway.

Chairman,  Hoshine Silicon Industry
Luo Liguo founded Ningbo Hoshine Group in 1989. With the spirit of Success Comes from Persistence, Mr Liguo has successfully led Hoshine Silicon Industry Co. Ltd. to have initially started the development mode of Coal-Power-Silicon Integrated Circular Economy Industrial Park. Within 10 years, he has made it China’s largest silicon metal manufacturing enterprise, with the main production of silicon metal, silicone, and polysilicon. Hoshine Silicon was formally listed on the main board at the Shanghai Stock Exchange in October 2017. Mr Liguo takes the green development path of innovation & technology, attaches great importance to production, learning and research, promotes industrial upgrading, strengthens green development, unswervingly carries out the mission of Concentration on Silicon-Based Materials to Create a Better Life.

SVP Elkem Silicon Materials,  Elkem
Trond Sæterstad is Senior Vice President of Elkem Silicon Materials Division. The division includes 5 smelting plants, the quartz mines and raw material sourcing group, the Elkem Materials business unit (Elkem Microsilica®) and the global sales & market organisation. Two R&D-units for Silicon and for Microsilica R&D and innovation and technical customer service are part of division.
Until 2012, Mr Sæterstad held the position as SVP for the Elkem Solar business, and he has been former plant manager at several Elkem plants for both Silicon and for Ferroalloy.
Mr Sæterstad has more than 30 years of experience in international process- and metals and mining industries.

Senior Vice President,  CRU
Jorn P. de Linde was appointed to his current position following the merger between Resource Strategies Inc. and CRU International in April 1996. Based in the United States, Mr de Linde specialises in ferroalloys-related research, with particular emphasis on silicon-based alloys and electric power, drawing on 30 years of experience. In addition to the manganese ferroalloy cost data service, he is the principal author of CRU's silicon metal market outlook and silicon cost data service reports. Mr de Linde also is a contributor to other CRU ferroalloy-related reports, including the Bulk Ferroalloys Monitor. He earned an MSc Degree in Mineral Economics from the Pennsylvania State University in the USA and holds an MBA (Siviløkonom) from the Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration in Bergen, Norway.

Chairman and CEO,  May Global Business Group Inc.
James May has a BS/MS in Metallurgical Engineering and Materials Science and a MBA Sloan School of Business. He has worked for 10 years in GM cast iron foundries including metallurgist and supervision. Mr May spent 5 years with Foote Mineral in ferroalloys production as a superintendent plant manager. He also spent 20 years with Dow Corning in Silicon Tech as Director, Procurement Director, General Manager. Companies owned by Mr May: May Engineering Co., Midand Silicon Co. and May Global Business Group – Silicon and ferroalloys process technology, operations, sales and procurement. Partner in HiTest Sand Inc. quartz mining.

Vice President Raw Materials, Purchasing & Logistics,  Ferroglobe
Thierry Alary graduated from HEC Paris and joined Pechiney Group in the late 80's. Mr Alary worked initially in the trading of bauxite and alumina with Aluminium Pechiney and Pechiney World Trade Brazil before becoming a director of Brandeis Limited in London where he managed the ferro-alloys and base metals trading book. He joined the electro-metallurgy sector of Pechiney in the early 2000's where he participated in different development projects in Brazil and China but also occupied different positions in Ferropem's Commercial department in Europe and Asia. Mr Alary moved to Madrid 7 years ago to head the Centralized Purchasing & Logistics department of FerroAtlantica Group before taking the global position of VP Supply Chain Management at Ferroglobe. He manages all Purchasing & Logistical Operations at Ferroglobe. Mr Alary has spent most of its professional career outside France, his country of origin, and has a large knowledge of the silicon and manganese industries worldwide. 

COO,  CleanCarbon
Hilde Tellesbø has been working as COO in CleanCarbon since January this year. Ms Tellesbø came from a position as CEO of Norwegian Institute of Wood Technology, a research institute for the Norwegian Wood Industry. She has worked several years for Saint-Gobain Weber as plant manager and regional industrial manager working with optimization of production processes at several plants in Europe. One main focus area has been to stabilize production processes to increase quality and increase production capacity. An important tool in this work is Theory of Sampling. Ms Tellesbø has presented several papers and participated in expert panels reviewing papers for the World Conferences of Sampling and Blending.

Senior Consultant,  CRU
Will Ayre has a background in mining geology and joined CRU Consulting in April 2015. Before this, Mr Ayre worked as an Exploration Geologist at Cleveland Potash in north east England, where he was responsible for running several exploration drill rigs in addition to assisting with the planning and directing of day-to-day mining activities. He has also worked at Skorpion Zinc mine during his MSc degree thesis, studying the economic potential of copper mineralisation at the deposit. Mr Ayre graduated from Durham University in 2012 with a BSc in Geology and also holds an MSc in Mining Geology from the Camborne School of Mines, Exeter University.

Senior Analyst,  CRU
Li Wang is a senior analyst based in CRU Beijing covering Si metal and steel. Ms Wang holds a MSc in metallurgical engineering and has 15 years’ experience dedicating to industrial metal market analysis. She joined CRU in 2013 after seven years’ steel consulting work in HATCH Beddows. Ms Wang also worked on strategy development and risk management at Ping An bank in China. The rich work experience as well as technical education background enabled her to interpret Chinese market pertinently, precisely and predicatively.

Partner,  Sidley Austin
Sven de Knop is a litigator focused on International Trade Law and European Union law. Mr de Knop represents clients in trade defense and other investigations, and in judicial proceedings before the EU and Member State courts. He also regularly advises on compliance matters and internal investigations, including as regards EU economic sanctions and export controls issues.  In addition, Mr de Knop has extensive experience with EU regulatory issues in the areas of chemicals, steel, and life sciences. He is recognized as a Leading Individual by Chambers and Who’s Who.

Aluminium Analyst,  CRU
Euan Sadden is an Analyst in the Non Ferrous Unit based in London. Mr Sadden holds an MSc in Environmental Governance from Oxford University and a BA (Hons) in International Relations from the University of Victoria, Wellington. He currently works in the Aluminium Team specialising in downstream markets, contributing to multiple reports, including Aluminium Monitor, Aluminium Market Outlook, Aluminium Products Monitor and Aluminium Rolled Products Market Outlook.

Senior Silicon Consultant,  SilBuCam SL
Javier Bullon is an Industrial Engineer from the Politechnical Madrid High School. Before Mr Bullon's retirement in 2015, he was working for 41 years within Ferroalloys and more specifically within Silicon metal for 10 years as Plant Manager and 20 years as R&D General Manager in the Ferroatlantica Group. In this period, the technology of the composite electrode was developed and sold in the five continents and also participated in the important project, solar silicon. Since 2015, Mr Bullon is a consultant and professor in the Santiago de Compostela University.

Senior Project Manager – Silicon Division,  VENTUS
Gabriel Esteves studied Chemical Engineering, joined VENTUS in 2019 and is responsible by the Silicon Division for the development of a Silicon Greenfield Project in Uruguay.
Mr Esteves worked for 11 years in the Metallurgical Silicon Industry, where he gathered vast experience in equipment and process auditing, lean six sigma process and operation optimization, provides technical know-how and training, management of cold start, warm start and ramp up services, prefeasibility Study of a Greenfield Silicon Plant and registering patent of alternative electrode low iron contamination.

Senior Project Manager,  Tenova Pyromet
Mark Giese has a Bachelor's degree in Electrical and Electronics Engineering from University of Johannesburg and holds a Project Management Professional (PMP®) certification with the PMI organisation. Mr Giese joined Tenova in 2005 and has been involved the design and commissioning of automation systems for new greenfields smelter plants as well as various furnace plant modernisation projects. He has many years of experience in technical sales for various smelter plant applications such as ferrochrome, manganese alloys, silicon metal, mineral wool and ilmenite smelting. Mr Giese is currently a Project Manager for smelter plant projects for Tenova Pyromet, based in Johannesburg, South Africa.

CTO,  Höganäs Borgestad
Dr Sankar Kannabiran received his Ph.D. (IIT Madras, India, 2002) and worked as a post-doctoral researcher (École Polytechnique, Montréal, Canada) in Refractroies until 2007. After his study in Canada, Dr Kannabiran worked as a Senior Research Engineer in Calderys Refractories, Lyon, France, and Group R and D Manager in Monocon Refractories, UK till 2013. Currently, he is working as CTO for Höganäs Borgestad Holdings, Sweden, dedicated to technological and research activities on refractories for ferroalloy and other industries. Dr Kannabiran has more than 40 publications in various international journals and conference proceedings. He is an accomplished senior manager over 20 years of demonstrated career success in developing and executing technology strategies to promote organizational growth and optimal utilization of emerging technologies in multi-national and multi-cultural business environments. Results-oriented professional recognized for taking on major initiatives adapting to a rapidly changing environment resolving mission-critical issues to ensure bottom-line success.   

Commercial Director,  Ecotop
Vladimir Arkhipov joined PF Ecotop in 2013 and is the Commercial Director of the plant. Mr Arkhipov has a master's degree in technological engineering, graduated from the Saratov State Technical University in 2005. He took part in the modernization of the assets of the oldest plant in Russia (Amzinsky Woodworking Factory) for the production of chemical products, including charcoal, ethyl acetate, tar, activated carbon, heading the department of technical innovations.