Opening Keynote: Adam Bly, CEO and Editor-in-Chief, Seed Media Group

At the age of 16, Adam became the youngest researcher at the National Research Council of Canada, where he spent three years working with a team studying cell adhesion and cancer. While at NRC, Adam identified a cultural shift in the making: science is transforming business, politics, the arts and current affairs unlike ever before; today, science affects every single person on the planet and science literacy is essential to modern society. Adam set out to launch a new type of magazine that captured the ideas, issues and icons shaping this global science culture. With the receipt of the 2006 Independent Press Award for Best Science and Technology Coverage, it was noted that “the best comparison for Seed is the early years of Rolling Stone, when music was less a subject than a lens for viewing culture.” Under Adam’s leadership, the magazine received two National Magazine Award nominations in 2007, for Best Design and for General Excellence, the magazine industry’s highest honor. Seed is now the flagship division of Seed Media Group, a science media and technology company Adam founded in 2005 to extend the magazine’s mission to other platforms and markets.

Adam is the recipient of numerous international prizes. In 2007, he was selected as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. He is a recipient of the Golden Jubilee Medal from Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II and his achievements have been highlighted by former Canadian Prime Minister Jean ChrEtien, “for showing people the scope and power of science not just as an object of study but as a key to understanding the world around us.”

Adam has spoken around the world on the relationship between science and society in the 21st century, most notably at the World Economic Forum (Davos), STS Forum (Kyoto), DLD (Munich), OECD-MOST Conference (Beijing), ideaCity (Toronto), TWAS The Academy of Sciences for the Developing World (Mexico City), Chicago Humanities Festival (Chicago), National Academy of Sciences (Washington, DC), and The Museum of Modern Art (New York), and at universities including MIT, Harvard, Columbia, McGill, and Peking. He sits on the Executive Committee of the American Committee for Israel’s Weizmann Institute of Science, the Communications Advisory Board of the US National Academy of Sciences, and the World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Council on the Future of Innovation.