Nordic EV Summit

Wiebe Wakker (NL)

Sustainable Adventurer

Wiebe Wakker is a sustainable adventurer known from his journey in an electric car from the Netherlands to New Zealand. With his project ‘Plug Me In’ Wiebe wanted to educate, inspire and accelerate the transition to a low-carbon future. His journey crossed 34 countries in 1.222 days and was completely powered by strangers who offered him energy to bring him and his Blue Bandit to the other side of the world.

Wiebe will talk about how he dealt with challenges along the way, what he learned from hundreds of people he met in various parts of the world and inspires with motivating lessons learned on the road.

Baerte de Brey (NL)

ElaadNL

Baerte de Brey is the Chief International Officer within ElaadNL. ElaadNL is a knowledge and innovation centre in the field of (smart) charging infrastructure and is owned by the Dutch DSOs. Responsible for analyzing the longterm effect of electric mobility on the electricity grids, Baerte helps building a sustainable business case around this transition. This includes vehicle2grids, cyber security and customer behaviour research.

He graduated from Leiden University in 2001 with a law degree and received a MBA from Nyenrode Business University in 2006. As an expert for the International Energy Agency and the European Commission he sometimes reviews collective European programs concerning EV interoperability and smart charging. In his spare time he is a chosen member of the Provincial Council of Utrecht.

Frank Mühlon (DE)

ABB

Frank Mühlon was appointed Head of ABB’s global E-Mobility charging infrastructure business in 2017. Since 2019 this role has been amplified to represent and drive ABB’s E-Mobility solutions business across ABB’s business lines globally. Prior to this role, Frank was Global Head of the Low Voltage modular devices business in the electrification division.

Before joining ABB in 2014, Frank held senior leadership roles and led several global business units in the Automotive Division of Bosch and worked out of Germany, China and the US. The recent businesses Frank led globally in Bosch before joining ABB were the Automotive Thermal-Systems business unit and then the innovations and 2-wheeler eMobility business unit.

James Cozens (NZ)

ChargeNet NZ

James Cozens is Business Development Manager at ChargeNet NZ, New Zealand’s largest fast charging network. He works closely with the New Zealand Government through the Energy and Efficiency Conservation Authority (EECA) and many other partners on infrastructure projects, contestable funding, and reporting.

ChargeNet NZ was founded in January 2015 to directly address the lack of a coherent nationwide charging network. With over 180 managed sites as at January 2020, ChargeNet now supports the majority of public DC charging infrastructure in New Zealand.

Christina Bu (NO)

Norwegian EV Association

Christina Bu is head of the Norwegian EV Association, an NGO and consumer organisation with more than 75.000 members. This makes it the worlds’ largest EV owner organization. The organisation plays an important role both nationally and internationally, promoting the shift to electric mobility, and collaborating with governmental bodies, industry and other organisations.

With an EV market share close to 50 % Norway is leading the way. Christina became the association’s head five years ago, after working as a political adviser within mobility and environmental issues. An expert on electric mobility, she frequently meets with OEMs and advises politicians and governmental bodies from different countries.

Ellen Hiep (NL)

Dutch Electric Vehicle Drivers Association

2020 Nordic EV Summit moderator Ellen Hiep is board member of the Dutch Electric Vehicle Drivers Association (Vereniging Elektrische Rijders) and CEO of HiePRactief, a Dutch communications agency specialized in smart eMobility.

HiePRactief is an official and active partner of the S4C Smart e-Mobility Holland- Westcoast Program that promotes knowledge and innovation exchange in the field of smart eMobility between the Westcoast of the US and the Dutch government, universities and industry.

Julia Poliscanova (LV)

Transport & Environment

Julia is Director, Clean Vehicles and Emobility at Transport & Environment. She joined T&E in June 2015 and now leads the clean vehicles programme that is responsible for all cars related work. This includes policy and projects on car emissions and emobility, such as work on sustainable batteries and infrastructure for electric vehicles.

She previously worked for the Mayor of London and in the European Parliament. During her four years in the parliament, she was head of office and advisor to Fiona Hall MEP, and followed EU legislation on renewables, energy efficiency and sustainable transport in the industry, research and energy committee. Julia was born in Latvia, and speaks English, French, Latvian and Russian.

Jesper Vind (DK)

Fenris Motorcycles

Jesper Vind is founder and CEO of Fenris Motorcycles. Jesper and his co-founders started the company with the mission statement to outperform internal combustion motorcycles on all parameters. The Fenris team has since 2014 developed a fully homologated and type approved high performance electric motorcycle for serial production.

Jesper built his first motorcycle when he was only 8 years old. This long-term knowledge on motorcycle driving dynamics has influenced the development of the Fenris Motorcycles’ patented platform design, steering system and bespoke motor. Jesper’s declared goal is to improve motorcycle safety, and Fenris has actively been part of the EU funded Safe2Wheeler research group to improved motorcycle safety.

Jonas Hernqvist (SE)

NEVS

Jonas Hernqvist is head of Sales & Marketing at NEVS, the company that acquired Saab Automobile in 2012. NEVS undertakes an exciting journey from a traditional car manufacturer to a provider of mobility solutions, and, true to its automotive heritage, strives to become a global leader in a challenging landscape where cars are electric, connected, shared and autonomous.

Jonas has held various leading positions within General Motors and Saab Automobile for instance as head of the Africa, Asia, Middle East region and globally responsible for retail network development. He holds a Master degree in Mechanical Engineering from Chalmers in Gothenburg and is thrilled to be part of the biggest changes in the automotive sector in the last 100 years after having spent almost 30 years in the business.

Erik Lorentzen (NO)

Norwegian EV Association

Erik Lorentzen is head of Analysis and Consultancy at the Norwegian EV Association. He works closely with policy development and the EV market with a special focus on charging infrastructure.

Lorentzen has a master’s degree of Political Economy, and has several years of experience working with climate and transport related issues for the Ministry of the Environment, the public funding agency Transnova and for the Norwegian Directorate of Public Roads.

Awadhesh Kumar Jha (IND)

Fortum India

Mr. Awadhesh Jha is the Vice President – Charge & Drive and Sustainability, Fortum India and leading Fortum’s effort of transforming mobility in India by offering charging service to Electrical Vehicles. Starting with a pilot of 4 AC Type-2 Charging Points in October 2017, presently Fortum is operating 66 Public Charging Points in five cities in India.

While these charging point serve to 4-wheelers passenger cars, it has also launched a pilot project of Battery Swapping for 3 –wheelers. Though India has small number of electrical cars presently, by virtue of being amongst top 5 car markets of world, it has huge potential to be the leading EV market of the world in few years.