Organizers

Vera is the CEO and Founder of MARS CITY DESIGN.

Vera comes from multidisciplinary background in master planning in various fields of art; architecture, urban design, filmmaking and storytelling, has made her specialized in conceptual strategy in technology, innovation and business development. Vera contributes her expertise in combining these fields, creating a collaborative competition platform for designing cities for Mars, our next step to settle the Red Planet. Vera is the Executive Director of Architecture and urban design for Mars, Marschitecture.

ANDREW BARTON

Andrew is from a background in the aerospace and mechanical engineering fields. He previously worked in the private space industry in Europe as a technology developer, project manager and entrepreneur. Among other roles, he worked for 4 years as a specialist at the European Space Agency in the Netherlands where he supported the development of space missions, including significant contributions to future lunar and Mars landers as well as the VEGA launch vehicle. More recently he was Director of Technical Operations for the Google Lunar XPRIZE, where he was responsible for selecting and managing the panel of independent judges, communicating technical aspects of the prize to the space industry and the general public. Andrew holds a Ph.D and bachelors degrees in aerospace engineering from the University of Sydney and a Masters degree in Space Studies from the International Space University.

NORRIS TIE

Norris Tie currently works at Northrop Grumman Aerospace Systems as an air-breathing propulsion engineer. He graduated from UCLA Class of June 2014 in aerospace engineering. He is passionate about both aerospace and entrepreneurship. He served as President of UCLA's Technical Entrepreneurial Community (TEC) and founded UCLA's Entrepreneurship Council, which now has around 20 organizations, ranging from the Law School, Anderson School of Business, Startup UCLA, and student groups like TEC. He also participated in UCLA's Rocket Project as safety officer and the UCLA ELFIN cubesat project. In his spare time, he is learning to build rockets. He is interested in anything that moves humans faster around the world and/or through space, namely rockets and high speed propulsion engines.

MONICA JAN

Monica is a managing partner at LightSpeed Innvations, an aerospace accelerator. Monica has over 22 years of experience in the technology and aerospace industries; with expertise in technology R&D, product development, strategic partnerships, and innovation strategy. She frequently advises high-tech start-ups and corporations on their business and technology strategies. As part of the steering committee for the Wharton Angel Network and Wharton Aerospace Ventures, Monica works actively with investors and entrepreneurs. Monica holds both BSEE and MSEE degrees from the University of Southern California, a Systems Engineering certificate from the California Institute of Technology, and an MBA from The Wharton School. She currently holds a faculty position at The Wharton School.

CURTIS IWATA

Curtis is an Aerospace Systems Engineer with a passion for space. He has more than 10 years experiences in designing, managing, and executing engineering projects and have both technical and management experiences. Curtis earned his Ph.D. in Aerospace Engineering at Georgia Tech, and he is ready to making ideas, people, hardware into space.
Curtis specialities: Systems Engineering, Analysis, Design, SysML, Problem Solving, Space Industry, Coding, MatLab, Python, JMP, Communicating in Japanese