Dr Alistair D. B. Cook is a Senior Fellow and Coordinator in the Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief Programme within the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), Nanyang Technological University. His research interests focus geographically on the Asia-Pacific and Myanmar in particular and thematically on humanitarian assistance and disaster relief (HADR), foreign policy and regional cooperation. He has taught undergraduate, graduate and professional development courses at Purdue University, University of Melbourne, Deakin University, Nanyang Technological University, Australian National University, Singapore Civil Defence Academy and SAFTI.

Ambassador Ong Keng Yong is Executive Deputy Chairman of the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS) at the Nanyang Technological University in Singapore. He is concurrently Director of the Institute of Defence and Strategic Studies (IDSS) and Head of International Centre for Political Violence and Terrorism Research (ICPVTR) at RSIS.

Mr Ong continues to hold the position of Ambassador-at-Large at the Singapore Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He is also Singapore’s Non-Resident Ambassador to Iran. Mr Ong chairs Humanity Matters, a non-profit humanitarian organisation focused on inter-faith understanding and volunteerism, and is based in Singapore.

Mr Ong was High Commissioner of Singapore to Malaysia from 2011 to 2014. He served as High Commissioner of Singapore to India and concurrently Singapore’s Ambassador to Nepal from 1996 to 1998.

Mr Ong served as the 11^th Secretary-General of ASEAN (Association of Southeast Asian Nations), based in Jakarta, Indonesia, for 5 years from January 2003.

Mr Ong started his diplomatic career in 1979 and was posted to the Singapore Embassies in Saudi Arabia, Malaysia, and the United States of America between 1984 and 1994. From September 1998 to December 2002, he was Press Secretary to the then Prime Minister of Singapore, Mr Goh Chok Tong, while holding senior appointments in the Ministry of Information, Communications and the Arts, and the People’s Association in Singapore. From 2008 to 2011, he served as Director of the Institute of Policy Studies (IPS) in the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore. Mr Ong was the Chairman of the Singapore International Foundation (SIF) from 2015 to 2023.

Mr Ong graduated from the then University of Singapore with a LLB (Hons). He studied at Georgetown University in Washington D.C., USA, and graduated with a MA in Arab Studies.

As the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Space Faculty, Lynette Tan champions the Asia deep tech ecosystem, working through her organisation to cultivate talent and technology through experimentation, learning, and leadership. Space Faculty creates pathways to spark and nurture talent, turning passion into profession. It engages youth and young adults in deepening their knowledge of sectors such as space, robotics, and artificial intelligence (AI). Space Faculty serves as the national organiser of prestigious global events like the World Robot Olympiad® and the International Space Challenge. Additionally, the organisation created and annually hosts Expand Space, a premier global platform in Singapore each November, connecting youth with opportunities in deep tech and its future possibilities.

Lynette is a Karman Fellow, an international award recognising individuals for outstanding achievements in space. She also advises various international deep tech startups, including Myelin-H, a life sciences company based in London, UK, and Openstream.ai, a rapidly growing AI company in New Jersey, USA. Actively promoting interest in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) among youth and women, Lynette’s contributions have earned her several accolades. Lynette also mentors young leaders through the Singapore Business Federation, Women in Aviation – Singapore, and the U.S. Embassy. She holds a Master of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from Stanford University.

Dr Adam C. Levine is a Professor of Emergency Medicine and International and Public Affairs at Brown University. Dr Levine currently serves as the Associate Dean of Global Health Equity within the Brown University Division of Biology and Medicine. Dr Levine received his Medical Doctorate from the University of California, San Francisco and his Masters of Public Health from the University of California, Berkeley before completing specialty training in Emergency Medicine and Humanitarian Studies at Harvard University. He has previously led research and training initiatives in East and West Africa and South and South-East Asia. His federal and foundation-funded research focuses on improving emergency care in low resource settings and during public health emergencies, while his clinical work focuses on the care of unsheltered populations in Rhode Island.

Dewi Fortuna Anwar is a Research Professor at the Research Center for Politics, National Research and Innovation Agency (PRP-BRIN), an Academician of the Social Science Commission of the Indonesian Academy of Sciences (KIS-AIPI), Chairman of the Board of Directors of The Habibie Center (THC) and Co-Founder of the Foreign Policy Community of Indonesia (FPCI). In 2001-2010 she was Deputy for Social Sciences and Humanities, Indonesian Institute of Sciences (IPSK-LIPI). In 2010-2017 Dewi was Deputy Secretary for Political Affairs to the Vice President of the Republic of Indonesia. Dewi is the 8th Pok Rafeah Chairholder at IKMAS UKM in 2025; a Distinguished Visiting Professor at the S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies (RSIS), NTU, Singapore in 2017-2018; a Distinguished Visiting Professor at SAIS, Johns Hopkins University in 2007. She has written widely on Indonesia’s foreign policy, and ASEAN regional political and security issues. Dewi sits and has sat in a number of national and international advisory boards i.e. Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD) since 2019, Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) in 2010-2020, and the UN Secretary General Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters in 2008-2012. She obtained her PhD from Monash University, Melbourne, while her M.A. and B.A. (Hons) were from SOAS, University of London.

Swathi Thotta Nagesh oversees the end-to-end management of a 24/7 intelligence-driven security function that supports regional operations across APAC. Her core responsibilities span real-time incident response, cross-functional coordination, and delivering timely, actionable intelligence to stakeholders across Legal, Comms, Risk, and Operations. But beyond execution, she also focuses deeply on strategic planning, organisational design, vendor management, and aligning the RSC with global security objectives.

Over the past year, Swathi has led a transformation of the APAC Regional Security Center from a tactical monitoring unit into a proactive, structured, and scalable program. The team have built strong analyst pipelines, redefined roles and workflows, introduced cross-regional standardisation, and embedded long-term capability planning into their operating model. Swathi believes in security as a strategic business enabler, and that with the right team structure, data, and leadership, regional centers like theirs can shape better decisions, not just respond to them.