Sophie Hackford is on a mission to promote healthy debate amongst business leaders today about their evolving relationship with emerging technologies. Member of the Global Technology Innovation Advisory Council at John Deere since 2020, she is exploring emerging technologies that can facilitate food security, sustainability, climate change mitigation and resilience. An experienced speaker too, having delivered 220+ talks so far, Sophie is keen on using her platform to discuss topics like the metaverse, data and AI, and web3.
Having received her BSc in Geography from Durham University and an MA in Migration and Diaspora, Anthropology from SOAS University of London, she started out her career as a Sale Support staff at Sotheby’s. Since then, she has held several roles such as Researcher at William Dalrymple and Ecologist Magazine, Development Manager at Scott Prenn, Client Development Manager at the New Philanthropy Capital, and a Curatorial Consultant at the Victoria Albert Museum. A natural leader, she assumed responsibility as the Head of Development and Partnerships at the Oxford Martin School where she built teams consisting of astrophysicists, oceanographers, neuroscientists, and other experts to solve challenges plaguing the world today.
In 2013, Sophie joined Singularity University as the Director of Strategic Relations and later became the Ambassador, where she customised programming for corporate clients at NASA’s Research Facility. She also Co-Founded and Chaired 1715 Labs, an imagery, audio, and video labelling platform that branched out from the Astrophysics Department of Oxford University. Currently an Advisor at NOT JUST A LABEL, Sophie is interested in raising awareness about how technologies change nearly every aspect of our lives today.
Having been the Director of WIRED Consulting and WIRED Education, Sophie was also a regular Contributor to WIRED Magazine. She now writes a blog called Bits Atoms Neurons and Genes and her work is often featured in publications like Vogue, The Financial Times, and Evening Standard. An excellent speaker, geared to ask questions regarding how we will navigate emerging technologies, she has been invited to speak at Ernst & Young, Adobe, Bank of New York, DeepMind, and Vogue previously. If you are looking for a futurist, business builder, and impeccable speaker to address your audience, Sophie Hackford is the right choice for you. Book her today!
