Meet the Speakers

Recordings of the talks and panel discussions, along with the written proceedings will be available in our LIBRARY in early 2025

Maria Maunula / Supercell

Maria Maunula is the Senior Producer of Supercell's Hay Day, where she excels in change management, fostering a people-first culture, and driving team growth. Known for uniting cross-functional teams, Maria creates flexible processes that ensure both individual and team success while delivering fun and engaging experiences.

Lloyd Craske / Metacore

Lloyd Craske is a Producer for Merge Mansion at Metacore. With 10 years of industry experience, he presents top-notch project management skills and has a focus on data-driven development. Lloyd specializes in successfully leading cross-functional teams from concepts to global launch in free-2-play mobile game scene. He has previously also worked on games such as NERF: Superblast and Heroes of Warlord as a producer, product owner and lead artist.

Stella Vaka / Silkroad Studios

Stella is one of the three founders of Silkroad Studios and the CEO of the company. Her day-to-day involves mostly business development, marketing planning out production and events while also being responsible for narrative and storytelling for the Yokai Tales IP. She moved from Greece to Denmark in 2018 to fulfill her dream of working in the gaming industry and along with her two co-founders started Silkroad Studios in 2021.

Maria Wagner / Sustainable Games Alliance

Maria is the Managing Director of the Sustainable Games Alliance, with one goal: to make the games industry the leader in sustainability by setting ambitious and achievable standards for environmental and social responsibility. She has experience in running a refugee camp, was leading the local Berlin games association, has co-founded the non-profit Games Forest Club.

Ladina Taxer

She Got Game / Pro Helvetia

«She Got Game» is designed to break down barriers to access, qualification, networking, and visibility for women in the game industry. It offers participants one-on-one mentoring with proven experts as well as online lectures, peer-to-peer forums, and an opportunity to showcase their work. The manifold offerings enable the promotion of entrepreneurial and professional competencies and the achievement of practical objectives.

Joeli Niva

Joeli Niva is a driven games lawyer at DLA Piper, where he advises several game companies on various legal matters. With 5,500 lawyers worldwide, DLA Piper is a global law firm that maintains close ties with the games industry, most recently demonstrated by the release of the Video Games Laws of the World guide, which provides a comprehensive overview of video game laws across different jurisdictions.

Charly Harbord /

Powell Group

Charly Harbord is the Head of Business Development for The Powell Group/ Indie Game Business. She is also the Founder and CEO of Outwith Reality an innovative company focussed on preserving cultural heritage through LiDAR and drone scanning sites to create immersive VR experiences. She was previously the Director of Partnerships for Global Game Jam.

Suzanne Freyjadis / IGDA

Suzanne Freyjadis is the Director of Global Development for the International Game Developers Association (IGDA). She is a globalist, expert in diversity, inclusion and belonging and game education. Suzanne has a BA in International Relations and an MA in Women’s & Gender Studies with particular attention to diverse and thought-provoking material on humanism, where advancing equal rights, compassion, and goodwill is crucial for a better world.

Katherine Vildoso /

WLG Latam

Together with David Zuratzi leading WLG LATAM

Video Game concept artist, Art Director with a Master in Video Game Design, teacher with more than 6 years of experience, content creator with more than 50K followers, destroyer of Chinese snacks and conspiracy theorist of video game lore.

Emma Varjo /

Redhill Games

Emma Varjo is a games industry veteran with a focus on UX and production. Emma has experience in both UIUX design and engineering, with a true passion laying in interdisciplinary communication, design culture, and strategic product development. Her background in gaming and mainstream tech fields has brought UX maturity to key titles, including the Trine series, and the processes and dev tooling supporting production.

Jarory de Jesus / Coquito Games

A game developer who specializes in narrative design, implementation, and programming. Jarory inspires his colleagues and next generation developers through collaborative projects and teaching game development. He’s worked on properties such as Madden, Marvel, and Star Wars as both a Narrative and Technical Designer. As a developer of color, he seeks to amplify minority voices through inclusive design, unique perspectives in narrative, community service, and activism.

Jussi Luokiainen /

Platonic Partnership

Jussi Loukiainen wants to make sure that Finnish games industry stays the best in the world. He has been active in many associations, built a game incubator and is currently developing a new strategy for Finnish Game Development Studios association.
He has worked as a CEO of Platonic Partnership since 2017.

Maria Haykal / Rovio

Maria Haykal, a 90s baby, raised with a Game Boy in one hand and dreams of animation in her eyes.
In just two years at Rovio, with unprecedented growth and recognition she currently holds a role of Distribution and Partnership Manager

Dina Ramse / Dina Said So Studio

Dina Ramse is passionate about helping indie game companies successfully crowdfund their games. They help with all sorts of the aspects of bringing a game to life, such as social media and marketing.

Daniel Fischer / Fingersoft

Producer at Fingersoft. Has worn quite a few hats over his years and witnessed the growth and climb of the company from 30 people to over 100. Current board member of Suomen Pelinkehittäjät and former board member of IGDA Finland.

Pedro Santoro Zambon, PhD / Utrecht University

Vice Chairperson of the IGDA's Game Incubation SIG and Researcher of the Collaborative Technologies Lab at Utrecht University under a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship developing tools, methods, and solutions to support game developers.

Atte Kotiranta / Greener Grass

Atte Kotiranta is the CEO and co-founder of Greener Grass, a Tampere-based game development company with a decade of experience specializing in work-for-hire projects. With over two decades of experience in the game industry, Atte combines leadership acumen with technical skills as a capable programmer.

Erik Pöntiskoski / Dodreams

I'm a startup entrepreneur who has learned to survive - and thrive - by validating concepts early with real customer data and building the best possible team for products and services.

Elina Arponen / Quicksave

I've been 19+ years in the gaming industry and a serial entrepreneur. I'm on a mission to define the emerging gaming market on the web. This market sector includes both embedded games on super apps and web3 platforms as well as many new screens where games are played. We have our Quicksave technology that helps us and our partners to reach this market efficiently.

David Zuratzi / WLG LATAM

Co-Lead of WLG LATAM together with Katherine Vildoso

I am a Graphic Designer, I love cinema, video games, and illustration. I specialize in user experience design and interactive systems (Game Design), from simple card games to live experiences at events, and of course, video games.