Speakers 2019

Becky Opdyke, Chief Marketing Officer, Tiger Brands

Becky’s focus at Tiger Brands is to relentlessly drive marketing strategy based on understanding consumer needs and connecting with them through product innovation that has an uncompromising focus on quality, nutrition and food safety.  Underpinning the portfolio of iconic South African brands she is responsible for is to drive Africa’s largest FMCG food manufacturers core purpose of nourishing and nurturing more lives every day.  Becky is a committed and versatile leader with over 18 years broad marketing experience in growth-oriented international businesses.  She has held senior brand leadership roles and been responsible for several global and regional portfolios with Anheuser-Busch InBev/South African Breweries and General Mills.  She holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Tim London joined the GSB in 2014 as a full time faculty member teaching and supervising students in the areas of leadership and organizational design across the full range of existing programmes (PhD, MBA, MPhil, PGDip, and Executive Education).

His previous work in higher education includes academic and leadership roles at the University of Cambridge (Director of Programmes); Queen’s University, Belfast (Director of Education and Teaching Fellow); and Kennesaw State University (Assistant Professor).

Prior to moving into higher education, he worked in schools, a non-profit, and for one of the largest unions in the United States. He has worked in a number of US states, Northern Ireland, England, Egypt, and Saipan prior to moving to South Africa. Along with his research and teaching, Dr. London works with the Business Development Unit and Executive Education team to develop and run new courses.

His research interests are broad and multi-disciplinary which reflects his diverse experiences around the globe and his training in a variety of disciplines. He is generally interested in better understanding and developing leaders, organizations, and systems both in the public and private sector. Recently, he has published work on collaboration, crisis, triple bottom line accounting, accountability systems, and the teaching of ethics.

Gavin has deep experience in Business Process Management and Enterprise Content Management, particularly in the

financial services industry. An accredited Robotic Operating Model Architect, he is DigiBlu’s point man; in first to identify

initial candidate processes, conduct opportunity assessments and design process solutions that leverage the power of

Intelligent Automation.

Gavin holds an Honours degree in Civil Engineering (Wits)

Matthew is the founder of KHULA, a fast growing B2B marketplace for emerging farmers in Africa.

KHULA aims to create more efficient supply chains and is a convergence of food, logistics, fintech and big data.

The platform grows emerging farmers by providing them with access to markets, and further support through its growing network.
KHULA was recently awarded #1 App overall at the MTN App of the year awards, as well as one of the worlds top 10 social ventures at the Chivas Venture.

Billie-Clare, Founding Member, Director and Creator of the Bumbles brand, single-handedly built Bumbles into a national brand that offers superfood based healthy baby food in leading retailers.  Passionate and driven to create employment and develop skills in the industry she has taken Bumbles from outsourcing all packing to becoming a co-independent manufacturer with a fully owned pouch filling line, with a vision to offer affordable healthy baby food to all.  Billie-Clare has been recognised as one of South African’s TOP 100 Female Entrepreneurs but it is her vast experience with babies and with her passion for healthy food alike, that she is the driving force behind brand.

Gregory (Greg) Jackson was born on 1^st June 1980 in Johannesburg. Greg Grew up in Mayfair whilst attending EP Baumann Primary and then moved to the south of Johannesburg and attended Sir John Adamson High School. Greg Completed National Diploma Electrical Engineering Light Current in 2002 and in 2005 obtained a BTech Electrical Engineering from University of Johannesburg. Greg’s career in Electrical Control Systems started in 2002 and up until now has filled roles such as Proposals Engineer, Technical Support Engineer, Senior Systems Engineer and currently serving as Business Development Manager System Sales Engineer at ABB South Africa. Greg can be reached on twitter: jacksongreg007 or instagram:gregjackson_abb.