Brussels Forum Session: Defense as a Driver of Innovation: Ideas from GMF Transatlantic Taskforce Members and Friends

Angus (Gus) MacGregor is the general manager for defense and intelligence within Microsoft’s worldwide public sector organization.  

He was commissioned into the British Army in 1986 and served as an artillery officer, supporting training and operations in Africa, the Balkans, Canada, the Far East, the Falkland Islands, Germany, the Mediterranean, Norway, and the United Kingdom. His military career culminated in 1999, when he was part of NATO’s spearhead operations in Macedonia and Kosovo. After retiring from the army, he concentrated on IT personal markets.  

MacGregor joined SAP in 2004, initially focusing on supporting defense and public security initiatives, and working in close cooperation with the industry business unit. One year later, he assumed responsibility for coordinating the public services portfolio and managing its daily operations as chief of staff. In 2010, he became global head of the defense and security industry business unit, a position he held for a decade. He is certified as an SAP Human Capital Management consultant.

MacGregor graduated as a staff officer from the Junior Command and Staff College at the Royal Military Academy Sandhurst. He holds an MBA from ESSEC Business School and Mannheim Business School. 

Brussels Forum Session: Make China Great Again

Miriam Lexmann is a quaestor of the European Parliament, and a member of the Committee on Foreign Affairs and the Committee on International Trade. She co-chairs the Inter-Parliamentary Alliance on China and was among five members of the European Parliament sanctioned by Beijing in 2021 for standing up against human rights violations.

A former Slovak diplomat, Lexmann previously worked in civil society and with international institutions promoting freedom and democracy.

Sasha Havlicek is a social and policy entrepreneur who, for the last two decades, has incubated and scaled global initiatives to counter the rise of weaponized hate, disinformation, and extremism, online and offline. As founder of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD), she has led the expansion of its advanced digital analytics capability, which is designed to detect and mitigate information threats to democracy, public safety, and national security. Spearheading ISD’s extensive partnerships with governments, cities, businesses, and communities, she oversees the organization's global research teams, policy advisory support, training, digital literacy, and communications programming.

Havlicek has advised a range of governments at the highest levels, has testified before the US Congress and the UK Parliament, and is a regular commentator in the media. She is a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations and serves on the advisory boards of the Global Internet Forum on Counter-Terrorism, the Christchurch Call, and the Global Partnership for Action on Online Gender Based Abuse. She is a founding board member of the Forum on Information and Democracy and a member of the World Economic Forum’s Global Coalition on Internet Safety.

Brussels Forum Session: Tech Wars: Who Will Win the Innovation Race?

Heike Freund is the chief operating officer of Marvel Fusion. She focuses on building and scaling the company, professionalizing processes, and forming partnerships with industrials. She was previously a partner at McKinsey & Company and a core member of that company’s operational leadership team.  

Freund has more than 15 years of experience in leading global industrialization projects. She holds an MBA from INSEAD and a master’s degree in industrial engineering from the University of Karlsruhe. 

Philip Bednarczyk is GMF's Warsaw Office Director. He joined the organization after serving as the senior Europe adviser on the US House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee and staff director for the House Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia, and Emerging Threats for then-Ranking Member Gregory Meeks. Prior to that, he was a Bosch Foundation fellow in Germany. He also worked for an American NGO in Moscow, and for the EU in Brussels and Tallinn.

A dual Polish-American citizen, Bednarczyk studied at Fordham University and received a master’s degree from the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International Studies.