• UK Chairman, Aurora Forum

    David represented Aylesbury in the House of Commons from 1992 to 2019. He served as Minister for Europe throughout the coalition government and David Cameron’s Conservative government (2010-2016), the UK’s longest-serving holder of that post, holding responsibility for the UK’s relations with more than 50 countries in Europe and Central Asia. David has represented the UK at the EU, NATO, OSCE, Council of Europe and the UN Security Council.  

    As Minister for the Cabinet Office and Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster he served as deputy to Prime Minister Theresa May from January 2018 to July 2019, having previously served in the May governments as Leader of the House of Commons and as Justice Secretary.

    David was previously chair of the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), and currently serves as a trustee of the Institute for Government and a member of the Advisory Council of the Centre for European Reform.

  • Anders Engstrand has been Head of SEB UK since August 2020. 

    He joined SEB’s Investment Banking unit in the late 1990s after spending 5 years as a Management Consultant with Arthur Andersen.

    He held several positions within SEB’s Capital Markets franchise, before becoming Global Head of the Debt Capital Markets unit in 2012.

    Anders graduated from the University of Stockholm with a degree in Business Administration and Finance.

    In addition, he has received executive training at IMD in Switzerland and Wharton in the US.

  • A former Danish diplomat, Claus has been in the forefront of EU-policy making for the past 30 years.

    During his career Claus has held various senior foreign affairs roles in the Danish Government. He also presided over the Ambassadors Group COREPER during the Danish Presidency of the EU in 2002 and was closely involved in the handling of the Financial crisis in 2008-2009 and the Lisbon Treaty negotiations.

    His last diplomatic posting was as Denmark’s Ambassador to the UK.

    After 45 years in the public sector, Claus currently serves as a Senior Advisor to Flint Global Ltd and Seafarms Group Holding Ltd. He is also Senior Fellow at Axcel Future, Copenhagen and is an independent advisor to the Danish Parliament’s Committee for European Affairs. 

    In 2017 Claus was appointed Chamberlain to the Court of Her Majesty the Queen of Denmark and honoured as Freeman of the City of London.

  • Nordic and Baltic Chairman, Aurora Forum

    Carl Bildt is the Nordic & Baltic Chairman of the Aurora Forum. Carl is Co-Chair of the European Council on Foreign Relations, contributing columnist to Washington Post as well as columnist for Project Syndicate.

    He serves as Senior Advisor to the Wallenberg Foundations in Sweden and is on the Board of Trustees of the RAND Corporation in the US. 

    He has served as both Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Sweden. Subsequently he served in international functions with the EU and UN, primarily related to the conflicts in the Balkans. He was Co-Chairman of the Dayton peace talks on Bosnia and become the first High Representative for Bosnia and Herzogovina.

  • Elisabeth Braw is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, focusing on geopolitics and the globalised economy as well as greyzone and hybrid threats. She’s also a columnist with Foreign Policy and Politico Europe and the author of the award-winning Goodbye Globalization: The Return of a Divided World (Yale University Press). Her new book, Undersea War, will be published by John Murray Press and Basic Books in 2026. 
     

    At the Atlantic Council, Elisabeth leads the Threats to the Global Maritime Order initiative. She was previously a senior research fellow at the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI). She’s the author of God’s Spies, about the Stasi’s church division (2019) and The Defender’s Dilemma: Identifying and Deterring Gray-Zone Aggression (2022). She is also a member of M&C Saatchi World Services’advisory council, a member of GALLOS Technologies’ advisory board, an adviser to Disruptive Industries, an adviser to Willis Towers Watson’s research arm and a member of the UK National Preparedness Commission. Before joining academia, she worked in the private sector following a career as a journalist. She is a regular op-ed contributor to the Financial Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Times (of London). 

  • Andrew has worked for Saab, a full spectrum defence and security company, since 2013, as the company has expanded its presence and operations in the UK.  He is a Board member of Saab Technologies UK Ltd.  Previously, he was Head of Strategic Marketing for Saab in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. 

    Separately, he worked for one of the Big 4 professional services firms in London, in corporate finance and consulting, before moving to Saab on a full time basis. 

    In an earlier career, he served in the Royal Air Force as a fighter pilot, rising to 2* level with operational, command, management and budgetary responsibilities in the UK and abroad.

  • Matthew has been International Affairs Advisor at the law firm Squire Patton Boggs since 2018, providing advice on geo-political risk, and data, artificial intelligence and cyber developments. 

    Prior to that, he spent more than a decade at Vodafone Group, and as a member of the Group Executive Committee led Vodafone’s external affairs globally.  Before Vodafone, he was a British diplomat, and served as HM Ambassador to Finland from 2002-2006. 

    Matthew Kirk has also supported various academic institutions, including the Advisory Boards of Bath University School of Management and Royal Holloway College CyberSecurity Institute, and as Chairman of the Governors of Downe House School.  He is a member of the Königswinter Council.

    Matthew served as the inaugural UK Chairman of the Aurora Forum.

  • Idar Kreutzer serves as executive director at The Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise (NHO), overseeing international affairs, digitalization, and sustainable development initiatives. He previously held the position of CEO at Finance Norway and Storebrand. Kreutzer holds numerous board positions and serves on various advisory boards, including NHH's Advisory Board and Norway's Nature Risk Commission. Kreutzer has played key roles in green competitiveness initiatives and in producing reports on risk capital access. He also participated World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) and has Co-Chaired their Vision 2050. In 2013 he was appointed member of the Strategy Council for the Norwegian Government Pension Fund Global. Kreutzer possesses a Master of Science in Economics and Business Administration from the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH) and is a Fellow of Digital Innovation for Growth at NHH.

  • Amber was a UK MP 2010 to 2020, and a Secretary State for 5 of those years.  

    She now works in the private sector speicialsitng in the energy sector.  

    She is  a Non-Executive Director for Centrica PLC, and Ryanair plc. .  

    She is  also  a Senior Advisor for Centerview, the leading international M&A firm (https://www.centerviewpartners.com), and a Trustee for RUSI. 

  • John is a former British diplomat (1976 – 2007). His final postings were as Ambassador to Sweden (1999 – 2003) and as Permanent Representative to the EU (2003 -2007) when, in 2005, he chaired the Committee of Permanent Representatives (COREPER) during what was the last UK Presidency of the EU.    

    He left the Diplomatic Service in 2007 and worked successively for BHP Billiton (2007 – 2008), the world’s largest mining company; BG Group (2009 – 2015), a British oil and gas company, where he was a member of the Executive Committee; and Anadarko Petroleum Corporation (2015 – 2019).