Silvio Schembri is a Maltese politician and academic currently serving for the Ministry for the Economy, Enterprise and Strategic Projects.

Previously, Hon. Schembri was the Minister responsible for the Economy and Industry, and served as Parliamentary Secretary for Financial Services, Digital Economy and Innovation.

Hon. Schembri attained a master’s degree in Economy right after graduating with a Bachelors of Honours in Economics from the University of Malta. Hon. Schembri started off his career by working in a private bank, and was later tasked with the role of Supervisor Economist within the Central Bank of Malta.

Hon. Schembri had also served as the chairperson of the Responsible Gaming Foundation Malta on a voluntary basis, set up with the aim of helping, educating and preventing problems in relation to gambling. As a Member of Parliament, Hon. Schembri also chaired the parliamentary committee for economic and financial affairs and worked as an advisor for the then Economy Affairs Ministry.

Hon. Schembri was also founding member and general manager of the Gal Xlokk foundation. During his tenure as Parliamentary Secretary for Financial Services, Digital Economy and Innovation, Hon. Schembri was behind Malta’s first Artificial Intelligence Strategy as well as the launch of the AI Certification Programme. Hon. Schembri is also pushing to see that the Esports and Videogame Development sectors continue to grow. Hon. Schembri also played a vital role in seeing that Malta was the first jurisdiction to establish a legal regulatory framework for blockchain services.

During the pandemic, Hon. Schembri played a central role in the Covid-19 economic regeneration plan which comprised of several aid packages to support individuals and businesses.

Dr Geraldine Spiteri Lucas is currently the Chief Executive Officer and Registrar Companies and other Legal Persons, within the Malta Business Registry. Dr. Spiteri Lucas is a lawyer by profession who acquired a Doctor of Laws from the University of Malta and a warrant to practice in the Maltese Courts. She also read a Masters’ Degree in European Studies and Comparative Law.

Dr. Spiteri Lucas started her career with a leading local law firm, advising local and international clients on civil, commercial, corporate, shipping and aviation law. This resulted in representing various clients in litigation procedures before Tribunals and local courts. Then she moved to the Registry of Companies as Legal Officer and, previously to her appointment as CEO, she used to Head the Legal and Enforcement Unit of the said entity and oversaw its overall function.

She is currently serving as the President of the Corporate Registers Forum, an international association of corporate registries that share best practices and promote cooperation in business registration.

Additionally, she serves as Chairperson of the National Foreign Direct Investment Screening Office. Dr. Spiteri Lucas is a visiting lecturer and a member of the Board of Examiners for the Department of Commercial Law at the University of Malta.

Ms Annalise Zammit is the Chief Operations Officer & Deputy Registrar at the Malta Business Registry and is responsible for Corporate Services: IT, HR, Finance, Administration and Communication. Also, Ms Zammit assists the Registrar in the day-to-day management and performance of the Registry. She is an ACCA qualified accountant and a Certified Public Accountant with almost 8 years’ experience in the financial services sector mainly Banking Supervision

Before joining the Malta Business Registry, Ms Zammit commenced her career at the Malta Financial Services Authority where she held a number of positions at the MFSA for the past 13 years.

She went on to become the Head of Finance and Administration at the Malta Business Registry in 2019, responsible for the overall Finance and Administration function of the Registry namely, revenue assurance, treasury, risk management, financial planning and control, management accounts and reporting, as well as procurement.

Antti Riivari has been the Director General of the Finnish Patent and Registration Office (PRH) since 2017. Apart from being the Industrial Property Office, PRH is responsible for the Finnish Trade Register, and the oversight of statutory auditors.

Before joining PRH Mr Riivari has served in various ministries since 1992. He is the President of the European Business Registry Association (EBRA). He is also a member of the Administrative Council and Chairman of the Patent Law Committee at the European Patent Organisation (EPO), as well as a member of the Management Board of the European Union Intellectual Property Office (EUIPO).

He got a master’s degree in law from the University of Helsinki in 1992.

Marco Vianello graduated in Economics and Business from the University of Venice and is Head of International Affairs at InfoCamere, the company of the Italian Chambers of Commerce responsible for digital innovation and the management of the Italian Business Register.

Throughout his career, he has played a key role in the development and evolution of the Italian Business Register, coordinating numerous projects and initiatives. He has been actively involved in fostering cross-border cooperation with neighbouring countries and promoting the exchange of best practices at the European level.

With extensive experience in digital transformation, regulatory frameworks and business data governance, he contributes to several international initiatives aimed at enhancing business transparency and supporting economic development.

He is a Board Member of the European Business Register Association (EBRA) and contributes to the activities of XBRL Europe.

Yves Gonner is the Managing Director of Luxembourg Business Registers, which manages the country’s Business Register and the Register of Beneficial Owners. He has gathered extensive experience in the banking and finance industry over the last 30 years, as an Economic counsellor at the Chamber of Commerce of Luxembourg and Secretary General to the National Export Credit Insurance Agency, as well as in different management positions at a major bank in Luxembourg. 

Yves Gonner is member of the Board and the Treasurer of EBRA and member of the Board of AFREC.

With extensive experience in digital transformation, regulatory frameworks and business data governance, he contributes to several international initiatives aimed at enhancing business transparency and supporting economic development.

Yves Gonner is also member of the national Committee for the Prevention of Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing.

Martin joined Companies House in 2021, responsible for international affairs, following a decade in charity sector public affairs, policy and communications.

He has been CRF Secretary since 2021.

A fluent French speaker, Martin has also worked at the heart of Parliaments and their governments in Wales, the UK and the EU. He holds an Honours degree in Economics, specialising in European economic integration, and a Masters in International Relations, with a specialism in climate change politics.

Thomas Denfer (41 years old), master’s degree in maritim law, obtained his professional examination of commercial court clerk in 2010.

Collaborator with the registry of the Paris commercial court from 2008 to 2011, he was then, from 2012 to 2015, legal director of Infogreffe (the IT organization managing the French business register of the 225 commercial court clerks).

Since June 2016 he is clerk of the Paris Commercial Court appointed by the Minister of Justice.

Expert in digital maters of legal professions, he was a member and treasurer of the Board of the Federation of Digital Trusted Third Parties (FNTC) from 2016 to 2020.

He was elected member of the Board of the National Council of Commercial Court Registrars (CNGTC) in 2018, then vice-president in 2020 and represented France before the FAFT in 2021 to explain the creation of the register of beneficial owners.

Elected president of the National Council in 2022, he represented his profession (2.000 agents) for two years with various reforms serving users of commercial justice : creation of an open data movable guaranties register, creation of a code of ethics for public officers, objectives agreement signed with five ministers of the French government for 3 years.

Involved in European and International issues for more than ten years, he led the creation of the European Foundation of Commercial Court Registrars and the launch of the French-speaking Alliance of Business Registers (AFREC) which he currently chairs to promote all ideas and achievements in the service of economic transparency.

Since January 2024 he is honored president of the French National Council of Commercial Court Registrars and member of the scientific council of the French Institute of Law and Justice’ studies.

In November 2024 he was appointed by the Minister of Justice as member of the steering and evaluation committee of the new experimentation named “economic activities court”.

Igor Bereza joined the EU Global Facility as Senior Expert on Beneficial Ownership in September 2025, bringing a distinguished career spanning over 15 years in Anti-Money Laundering and Countering the Financing of Terrorism. His expertise encompasses the full spectrum of AML/CFT operations, from regulatory development to practical implementation across both private and public sectors.

Igor has over 20 years of experience in the financial sector. He spent 14 years at Citibank, including 9 years as Compliance Officer and later as Chief AML/CFT Compliance Officer, where he gained extensive expertise in financial compliance and risk management. He then served 5 years as Director of the AML/CFT Department at the National Bank of Ukraine, developing expertise in regulatory oversight and policy formulation.

Over the past 4 years as an international consultant, Igor has collaborated with multiple organisations on diverse AML/CFT initiatives, including drafting beneficial ownership guidance, developing risk-based supervisory frameworks, enhancing regulatory frameworks, and conducting national risk assessments.

His international credentials include participation in two MONEYVAL mutual evaluations as a financial evaluator for the Czech Republic (2017-2018) and Georgia (2019-2020), providing extensive knowledge of international AML/CFT standards and assessment methodologies. Igor holds a PhD in Economics and is professionally certified through ACAMS.

Sarah joined Companies House as Director of Strategy, Policy and External Communications in July 2023 and was elected to the Board of EBRA in 2024.

Sarah has experience of domestic legislation, international, trade and innovation policy. In 2019 she was chair of the WIPO Standing Committee on the Law of Patents. Prior to her current role at Companies House, Sarah was Acting Director of Business and International Policy at the IPO and Deputy Director for Customer Experience within the IPO’s Business Operations Division. Sarah holds a Masters in Biochemistry from the University of Bath and a PhD from the University of Manchester.

Rebecca Prescott joined Companies House in 2024 to support the implementation of compliance and enforcement under the Economic Crime (Transparency and Enforcement) Act 2022.

She brings over 20 years experience in the legal and property sector, with a strong background in anti-money laundering and an LLB (Hons) in Law.

Rebecca leads the implementation of compliance and enforcement activity for the Register of Overseas Entities, strengthening the transparency of foreign entities that own or wish to acquire land in the UK.

Claude Bocqueraz is Deputy Head of the Financial Crime Unit in the European Commission’s Directorate-General for financial stability, financial services, and capital markets union.

She started her professional career in the private sector before joining the European Commission in 2007. She moved to DG FISMA in 2009 where she has served in various positions and been responsible for policy development in fields as asset management, insurance and pensions, corporate reporting, audit and credit rating agencies. She also worked for the international relations unit.

Claude holds a PhD in Economics and Social Sciences from the University of Geneva, Switzerland. She is also qualified as a chartered accountant.

Ms. Constanza Puentes is a lawyer and alumna of Rosario University holding a master’s degree in Personal Data Protection and New Technologies from Sergio Arboleda University. Additionally, she completed postgraduate studies in Commercial Law at the Pontifical Xavierian University of Bogota.

For the past 29 years, since 1997, she has been affiliated with the Bogotá Chamber of Commerce—a private law entity officially delegated to administer the Business Register within its jurisdiction in Colombia. During this tenure, she has held various roles related to the operation of the public registry for businesses and non-profit organizations. Having started as a junior associate in 1997, she rose to Vice President of Registry Services in 2021, and since 2024, she has served as the Executive Vice President of the Chamber.

In 2010, she contributed to the founding of ASORLAC. Since then, she has participated in every event organized by the association across various affiliated entities in Latin America and the Caribbean. The primary goal of these events is to promote best practices in the registration sector and drive innovation in the efficient administration of public registries.

Dennis Hannemann has been working for Bundesanzeiger Verlag since 2016 and is currently responsible a.o. for the introduction of digital identities and the European Business Wallet (EBW) in Germany in the context of the EUDI-Wallet initiatives as part of the eIDAS 2.0 implementation.

Previously, Dennis worked for 15 years as a strategy consultant in various client projects for national and international companies from different industries – including in China, Hong Kong and the Philippines. The business graduate studied business and computer science at the University of Cologne and started his professional career as a strategy consultant for digital business development and digital transformation in a management consultancy specializing in information and risk management. During this time, Dennis has supported a large number of startups in different industries.

Dennis currently leads the use case expert groups KYC/KYS/KYB and Corporate Banking in the work packages “Wallet for Business” and “Wallet for Payments & Banking” within the new EU Large Scale Pilot “WE BUILD Consortium” and is a member of the expert groups (L)PID Provider, Semantics and Trust registry infrastructure. As a representative of the German company register in the European Business Registry Association (EBRA), Dennis supports the implementation of eIDAS 2.0 in the European business register landscape and has also already contributed to the Business Register expert group of the European Wallet Consortium (EWC). In addition, Dennis leads the data space initiatives of the Bundesanzeiger Verlag at energy data-X and Manufacturing-X of the Platform Industry 4.0.

His actual work focuses in particular on the development of digital strategies using verifiable credentials along the continuously changing regulatory requirements, for example the reorganization of complex KYC/KYB processes at financial institutions due to new EU anti money laundering directives (AMLR, AMLD/6) or the implementation of DORA guidelines as part of KYS processes at large corporations.

Alessandro Bazzolo works at InfoCamere, where he is involved in digital identity and trust services, with a focus on operational governance and service management. His work includes topics such as digital identity, qualified electronic signatures, qualified electronic seals and timestamps, with particular attention to regulatory and operational aspects in the evolving European digital identity framework.

Xavier Juredieu is a veteran of the cybersecurity & identity industry now serving as the CEO of Europeum-EDIC, the Operator of European Blockchain Services Infrastructure (“EBSI”). As a management board member in the WE BUILD consortium (Europeum Business Wallet large scale pilot), he leads, on behalf of the French business registry,CNGTC-Infogreffe, , the business registries and PID providers group across Europe as well as the coordination on all Business Domain use cases. He is instrumental in developing the “Business Wallet” ecosystem and helping organizations in this new digital trust environment.

Francisco Javier Misas Tomás is a Land and Business Registrar at the Colegio de Registradores de España. He obtained his law degree at the University of Malaga in 1999 and became a Registrar in 2004. Since 2010, he has been the Land and Business Registry of Ibiza, and he is also the director of the Balearic Islands Registry Studies Centre and a lecturer for public competitions for registrars.

He actively collaborates with the European Business Registers Association (EBRA), specialising in the digitization of company law and beneficial ownership.

Dr Alessia Carbone is currently serving as the Director for Transnational Threats and Sanctions at the Ministry for Foreign Affairs and Tourism. She is a diplomat and lawyer who graduated from the University of Malta with an LL.D in 2016. After completing her legal education, she embarked on a career in diplomacy, joining the diplomatic corps in the same year. She was posted at the Permanent Representation of Malta to the European Union for almost 4 years where she worked on sanctions related matters. Since her return to the Ministry in 2021, she had been serving at the Sanctions Unit, which serves as the operational arm of the Sanctions Monitoring Board (“SMB”), the national competent authority that oversees and enforces sanctions on a national level. She also serves as the Secretary to the SMB.

Kateryna Bovsunovska is a Legal Consultant at the International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT) in Rome, Italy. She manages the Best Practices in Electronic Registry Design and Operation Project, an interdisciplinary initiative developing comprehensive frameworks on the legal, technical, and governance dimensions of modern electronic business registries. At UNIDROIT, Kateryna has also contributed to the development of the Principles on Digital Assets and Private Law, published in 2023. Prior to joining UNIDROIT, Kateryna worked with the United Nations World Food Programme on a capacity-strengthening initiative in West Africa. She holds an LLM in International and European Law from Vilnius University. Her professional interests centre on the legal frameworks that underpin digital trust and the technological solutions that enable it.

Sebastian Drosselmeier is a Policy Officer at the European Commission (DG Connect) and has been part of the Business Wallets initiative since its start. He has extensive prior experience working on the EU Digital Identity Wallets and trust services, both at the Commission and in business consulting.

Lyubomira Ruseva is a law graduate with an expert background as a Registration Official at the Registry Agency of the Republic of Bulgaria since the establishment of the country’s centralized digital business register in 2008.

Since 2022, she has been specializing in sanctions regimes implementation, primarily focusing on their impact within the business register’s legal competences.

She is the Head of the Registry Agency`s expert group on the implementation of sanctions regimes adopted by the EU.

Ms. Ruseva is also a Member of the National Coordination Group on the implementation of sanctions regimes, established by ordinance of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Bulgaria.

Kersti Rätsep is the Head of the Client Support of the Centre of Registers and Information Systems (RIK). Her division advises clients on the use of various systems including e-Business Register, e-Land Register, e-File, Criminal Records Database etc. For more than 15 years in the agency, she has been involved in training and consultation activities, participated in several large-scale projects mainly regarding e-Business Register but also other systems in the e-Justice domain.

She is Estonian representative in the European Business Registry Association (EBRA) and a member of the Business Registry Insights (BRI) working group.

Joost Fleuren, Programme Manager, Netherlands Chamber of Commerce, Department of Strategy, Policy & Legal Affairs, Team InnovationLab. Focus on Digital Identity for the last 9 years, currently Coordinator of WE BUILD Consortium (www.webuildconsortium.eu)

Roberta Solis is the Deputy Coordinator of the UNODC Global Operational Network of Anti-Corruption Law Enforcement Authorities (GlobE Network) since July 2025. She joined the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime – UNODC in 2016 as the Judicial Integrity Team Leader and was responsible for the launch of the Global Judicial Integrity Network, a platform “of judges and for judges” to strengthen judicial integrity and prevent corruption in justice systems. In 2021, she became the Deputy Coordinator of the joint UNODC and World Bank Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative (StAR Initiative), supporting countries in their international asset recovery efforts and working to end safe havens for corrupt funds.

Ms. Solis holds a bachelor’s degree in law from the University of the State of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and a post-graduate degree in International Relations from the University of Brasilia, Brazil.

Before joining UNODC, Ms. Solis was a career Federal Attorney in Brazil since 2005 and worked for eight years in Brazil’s Anti-Corruption Agency, where she held the position of Chief International Affairs Advisor.

During this time, Ms. Solis was involved in various national and international activities, such as the negotiations of the Implementation Review Mechanism of the United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC), and the creation of the Open Government Partnership (OGP) and the Global Initiative for Fiscal Transparency (GIFT). From 2012 to 2016, Ms. Solis was the Chair of the Criteria and Standards Sub-Committee of the Open Government Partnership.

David O’Sullivan was appointed as EU’s Sanctions Envoy in December 2022 and formally took up his role in the second half of January 2023.

Prior to his appointment as Sanctions Envoy, he was a Director General of the Institute for International and European Affairs, a leading Irish think tank. Prior to that, he joined the Brussels office of the law firm of Steptoe and Johnson LLP as a Senior Counsellor (2019-2022).

David O’Sullivan served as Ambassador of the European Union Delegation to the United States from November 2014 until February 2019.

Prior to his appointment as Ambassador, he was the Chief Operating Officer of the EU’s new diplomatic service, the ‘European External Action Service’. He had previously held a number senior positions within the European Commission including Director General for Trade (2005-2010); Secretary General of the European Commission (2000-2005); and Chief of Staff to Commission President Romano Prodi (1999-2000). Before joining the Commission, he started his career with the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs (1977-1979).

He is a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin and the College of Europe (Bruges), and holds Honorary Doctorates from the Dublin Institute of Technology and Trinity College Dublin. He was awarded the EU Transatlantic Business Award by the American Chamber of Commerce in 2014. In 2019, he was awarded the Légion D’Honneur by France and made a Grand Officier de l’Orde de Léopold by Belgium. He is Member of the Governing Board of the King Baudouin Foundation.

Ulf Krause studied law in Cologne. After founding a legal tech startup, he joined the Bundesanzeiger Verlag GmbH in 2017 as the office keeping the German beneficial ownership register (Transparenzregister) and the German Commercial Register (Unternehmensregister). Since then, he is among other things responsible for the implementation of the German beneficial ownership register and head of the responsible department.

Since 2018 he is the Chair of the EBRA Beneficial Ownership Working Group and took part in different activities of the EU AML/CFT Global Facility.