Jim is Commercial Director, Supply Chain, at the Ministry of Defence responsible for the overall supplier and market interface. He leads a Supplier Management team and is responsible for delivering and embedding a new Strategic Supplier Management approach across Defence and transforming supplier relationships. Prior to this he was Transformation Director in the Cabinet Office Government Commercial Function, helping improve the capacity and capability of Commercial Specialists across Government, wining Best People Development Initiative at the CIPs Awards 2018. He’s had a 20 year Commercial career including Commercial Director at Network Rail, the UK’s rail infrastructure provider, where his team procured and managed categories as diverse as ballast to business consultancy. For his transformation work at Network Rail Jim won the CIPS Procurement and Supply Chain Professional of the Year Award in 2013.

Lucy joined the Defence and Security Accelerator (DASA) in March 2017 and is responsible for providing leadership and direction to the Accelerator. Lucy will be driving its success by building strong relationships between defence and security departments within the UK Government, industry, academia and other partners.
Launched in December 2016, DASA finds and exploits game-changing ideas providing competitive advantage to our front line forces. The service funds and fast tracks their development into tangible solutions solving some of the most challenging defence and security problems whilst generating economic value for the UK.

Hosted by Dstl, it provides innovation as a service to departments across Government; DASA allows them to rapidly access innovation and new capabilities to address their defence and security needs.
Since joining the civil service in 2009 Lucy has held roles in the Department of Business, Innovation and Skills, Government Office for Science, Cabinet Office, Department for Health, and the Home Office.
Lucy joined DASA from the Home Office where she led the science and technology, and private sector engagement work strands for the review of the Government’s counter-terrorism strategy. Lucy has expertise in security and policing and her interest in technology and innovation, digital ethics and identity, social and behavioural science, and horizon scanning give her the perfect background for this role.
Lucy was Home Office lead on the Internet of Things (IoT) and a Board member for the PETRAS IoT Research Hub, and was formerly Deputy Head of Foresight in the Government Office for Science.
Prior to joining the civil service Lucy was Risk and Business Continuity Manager for Thames Valley Police and staff officer to the Chief Constable.
Lucy has a doctorate in Archaeological Science from Oxford University.

Trevor is the Head of the Centre for Defence Management and Leadership at Cranfield University. He has a wide interest in security related organisations in the public, private commercial and not-for-profit sectors.
In the last ten years, Trevor has been responsible for specific modules on Defence Acquisition, Comparative International Acquisition, and the Organisation of Defence Acquisition at Cranfield. He is also a regular contributor to courses on defence management in security, which the department operates in support of the UK’s Defence Diplomacy activities.
He is presently exploring the implementation of the Defence Industrial Strategy and the Through Life Capability Management initiative. Between 2001 and 2007 he was an elected member of the Council of the Defence Manufacturers Association and is currently a member of the Acquisition Focus Group at the Royal United Services Institute.

Tracy Buckingham joined the Ministry of Defence in 1985. Her early career was spent working closely with the Royal Navy on a variety of issues, including managing the impact on Naval operations of commercial activities in UK waters. In 1994 she became Assistant Private Secretary to MOD’s Permanent Under Secretary, working closely with the Department’s most senior civilian and military officers and gaining a sound knowledge of both internal MOD structures and functions and wider Government and Parliamentary business. After nearly 4 years as APS/PUS, Tracy moved on to work with a number of teams tasked with developing and implementing new ways of working in the MOD, including the ‘Policy for People’, which became one of the key strands of the 1998 Strategic Defence Review; and new performance management and corporate governance regimes based on use of the Balanced Scorecard. In 2003 she joined the operationally focused Counter Terrorism and UK Operations Directorate where she was responsible for military operations in support of UK’s civil emergency services, and in 2006 she moved to the Defence Equipment and Support organisation where she helped to set up the Future Submarines Project.
Tracy joined the Defence and Security Organisation (DSO) in 2011 as Assistant Director responsible for North America, Australia and New Zealand. She became Deputy Head of Operations within DSO in 2014, and is currently acting as interim Deputy Director Operations and Head of Security Exports.