KEYNOTE & GUEST SPEAKERS

KEYNOTE SPEAKER

MICK EBELING

Named by Fortune Magazine as a Top 50 World’s Greatest Leaders, a recipient of the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian of the Year Award and listed as one of the world’s most influential creative people by The Creativity 50’s, Mick Ebeling has sparked a movement of pragmatic, inspirational innovation. As a career producer and filmmaker and founder and CEO of Not Impossible Labs, a multiple award-winning social innovation lab, Mick has dedicated his life to tapping into the power of innovation, technology, and story to change the world.

Mick’s mantra of “commit, then figure it out” allows for a unique problem-solving approach, bringing together a community of passionate and talented engineers, doers, makers, idea generators and storytellers to create solutions that better the world. This unconventional approach has brought to life highly acclaimed and award-winning initiatives such as the EyeWriter, Project Daniel, Don’s Voice, Project Bishop, and Music: Not Impossible. Vaccine: Not Impossible is made through a grant from Pfizer Vaccines, whose mission is to protect lives with innovative vaccines to fight serious disease worldwide. Recognizing that sometimes achieving that mission can be difficult because people live in hard to reach places, Pfizer Vaccines is supporting Not Impossible in exploring innovative ways of delivering vaccines to those in the Last Mile.

Since its inception, Not Impossible has also spun off two independent companies: Bento (gobento.com), a simple text-based service that addresses food insecurity, and Vyb Life, a wearable medical device company focused on mitigating the symptoms of Parkinson’s disease and currently in clinical trials in both the US and EU.

To date, Not Impossible is the only company to win Time Magazine’s Top Invention of the Year three times, as well as being named winner of Fast Company’s World Changing Idea twice. Named one of WIRED Magazine’s Agents of Change, a two-time SXSW Innovation of the Year award winner, a three-time Tribeca Disruptor Awards recipient, a fellow with The Nantucket Project, and recipient of every major creative and advertising award, Ebeling is on a mission to provide “Technology for the Sake of Humanity.”

Partnering with a wide array of companies and organizations, Mick not only pushes the bar on innovation, he shares the emotionally resonating story of doing so. These narratives of overcoming seemingly impossible odds through a “Help One. Help Many” approach has inspired people across the world to Empower, Achieve, and Inspire.

GUEST SPEAKER

NAYA TAPPER

USA Women’s Sevens co-captain Naya Tapper is a 2X Olympian and Bronze medalist.

The Charlotte, North Carolina, native graduated from West Mecklenburg High School, where she earned All-American honors in track and field. She found rugby her freshman year at UNC-Chapel Hill, where she majored in Exercise and Sports Science and minored in Spanish. Tapper attended a high performance camp with the USA Sevens, making her sevens series debut in Sao Paulo that same year, in 2016.

Tapper was selected to represent the USA at the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020, played the summer of 2021. She also played in the Paris 2024 games, Lima 2018 PanAmerican Games and Rugby World Cup Sevens San Francisco 2018 and Cape Town 2022.

In 2022, Tapper was named co-captain alongside Lauren Doyle, leading the team to a third-place 2022-23 sevens series finish and automatic qualification to the Olympic Games Paris 2024, winning Bronze, and gold at the Santiago 2023 PanAmerican Games.

During her time on the sevens series, Tapper became the first American woman to score 100 career tries on the series, and is current all-time try scorer for the USA women with 129 tries, garnering 645 total career points. Tapper’s chase down try-saving tackle against Ireland in Dubai Sevens 2021 was named the #1 play on ESPN’s SportsCenter Top 10 Plays.

Tapper made her USA Women’s Eagles XVs debut in July 2016 against Canada, and went on to play 12 test matches with the team, including at the Rugby World Cup Ireland 2017.

While Tapper’s work on-field will come to a close, she will remain close to rugby to help grow the sport around the world. Her namesake Naya Tapper Scholarship in partnership with OMBAC Rugby provides financial assistance to youth rugby players.