Mariana Mazzucato , Founding Director of the UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose. Professor, University College London. Author, "Mission Economy". Dr. Mariana Mazzucato is Professor in the Economics of Innovation and Public Value at University College London, where she is Founding Director of the UCL Institute for Innovation & Public Purpose (IIPP). Her previous posts include the RM Phillips Professorial Chair at the Science Policy Research Unit at Sussex University.

She is the author of The Entrepreneurial State: Debunking Public vs. Private Sector Myths, The Value of Everything: Making and Taking in the Global Economy, Mission Economy: A Moonshot Guide to Changing Capitalism, and The Big Con: How the Consulting Industry Weakens our Businesses, Infantilizes our Governments and Warps Our Economies. Mariana advises policy makers around the world on innovation-led inclusive and sustainable growth. Her roles have included for example Chair of the World Health Organization’s Council on the Economics of Health for All, Co-Chair of the Global Commission on the Economics of Water, Co-Chair on the Council on Urban Initiatives, and a member of the South African President’s Economic Advisory Council.

Previously, through her role as Special Advisor for the EC Commissioner for Research, Science and Innovation (2017-2019), she authored the high-impact report on Mission-Oriented Research and Innovation in the European Union, turning “missions” into a crucial new instrument in the European Commission’s Horizon innovation program, and more recently, authored a report with the UN’s Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) on Transformational Change in Latin America and the Caribbean: A mission-oriented approach.