Ian Firth, UK (Chair)

Ian Firth is an engineer with over 40 years of experience and is recognised as one of the world’s leading bridge designers. His work encompasses a wide range from small footbridges to some of the world's longest span crossings. Ian joined Flint & Neill on graduating from Bristol University in 1979 and became a Partner in 1990. Flint & Neill joined COWI in 2008 and re-branded as COWI in 2017, and Ian has been an independent structural engineering consultant since January 2018.

He is a Past President of The Institution of Structural Engineers, Chairman of the British Group of IABSE and Trustee of the charity Bridges to Prosperity. He is also Visiting Professor in conceptual and creative structural design at the University of Warwick.

Matias Andres Valenzuela, Chile (Vice Chair)

Civil Eng. (P.E) from Universidad de Chile, Master and PhD in Construction Eng. from UPC. 15 years of professional eng. Structural Advisor for the Bridge Department of Ministry of Public Works on research areas. Advisor for the Chacao Bridge project. Head of Civil Construction Eng. Carrer in Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Valparaiso. Vice president of the Chilean Bridge Committee of PIARC.

Chair of Chilean IABSE group and vice-chair of Chilean IABMAS Group. More than 60 paper in journals and Congress in the research line of maintenance road network, cable supported bridge and climate change, among others

Hector Beade-Pereda, United Kingdom

Design Director at Knight Architects, Héctor Beade-Pereda is a bridge designer with a worldwide reputation. Creating bridges that improve the quality of the built world has been Héctor Beade-Pereda’s foremost aim as a designer during his more than 20-year long career. He has been directly and meaningfully involved in every stage of the bridge project lifecycle, from conception to construction completion. He has spent periods working as a conceptual/structural bridge designer, project director or manager, structural engineer, supervising construction works on-site or giving support to contractors. Héctor was awarded the extremely prestigious IABSE Prize 2016 in recognition of his holistic approach to bridge design.

Fernando Branco, Portugal

Fernando A. Branco is a distinguished full professor of Civil Engineering at IST-Lisbon University. He was President of the Civil Engineering Department, of the College of Civil Engineers (Portuguese Chamber), of the Portuguese Association of Structural Engineers (APEE), of the European Council of Civil Engineers (ECCE) and of the International Association for Bridge and Structural Engineering (IABSE). He has co-authored 15 books and over 500 scientific papers. He has been consultant for major Public Works in Portugal like the S. João Bridge (longest railway span in cantilever construction), Macau-Taipa Bridge (in China), International Guadiana Cable Stayed Bridge, 25th of April Suspension Bridge (upgrading) and Vasco da Gama Bridge (the longest in Europa). He received several national and international awards.

Oliver de Lautour, New Zealand

Dr. Oliver de Lautour is the Bridges and Civil Structures Practice Leader for Aurecon in New Zealand. He has 16 years’ experience in structural design and is a Chartered Professional Engineer. He has a PhD in Civil Engineering studying Structural Health Monitoring. His background is predominantly in the design and construction of bridge structures in the Australasian and South Pacific regions. His experience includes undertaking complex bridge analysis and design, seismic design, working collaboratively in multi-disciplinary design teams and bridge aesthetics. He has an in depth understanding of New Zealand and international standards, codes and best practice and is an effective communicator with clients and stakeholders. He regularly presents at bridge conferences and has been an IABSE member since 2014.

Svein Erik Jakobsen, Norway

Svein Erik Jakobsen is a national and international acknowledged bridge designer with a long record on bridges and marine structures of many kinds, specializing in long span bridges and floating bridges. Through his more than 35 year career, he has gained considerable international experience through foreign assignments and foreign bridge projects with the engineering consultant company Aas-Jakobsen in Norway, where he has been since graduation. Norway is a county with a very long coast line, many deep and long fjords as well as many rivers. The many bridge design project the last decades in order to link the country together, has therefore also given him many nice and impressing reference projects. He is a long term member of IABSE, is a fellow and also currently Chair of IABSE Norway.

Akio Kasuga, Japan

Dr. Akio Kasuga is an executive vice president and CTO of Sumitomo Mitsui Construction. He has been designing and building many bridges, and has developed many new bridge technologies.

He received fib outstanding structures in 2006 and 2018, Trophy Eugene Freyssinet 2013 and Albert Caquot Prize 2021 from AFGC. He was the President of fib from 2021 to 2022.

Eva Lantsoght, Ecuador

Dr. Lantsoght is a Professor of Structural Engineering at Universidad San Francisco de Quito, Ecuador and a part-time tenured assistant professor at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands. Her field of research is the design and analysis of concrete structures and analysis of existing bridges.

She has over 140 indexed publications and serves on various international technical committees and editorial boards in her field, including vice chair of the editorial board of Structural Engineering International. She is also interested in doctoral education, and runs the PhD Talk blog and is co-host of the PhD Talk podcast.

Barbara MacAulay, Denmark

Barbara MacAulay works on the New Storstrøm Bridge, Technical Project Manager, Bridge Design, and is the Chair of the Danish National Group of IABSE.

She is also member of the Danish Design Guide Group for Bridges / Structures and involved in the development of the Danish National Annexes for Euro Codes for Bridges, as well as a member of International Cable Supported Bridge Owners Association.

Dolores Pulido, Spain

M. Dolores G. Pulido is Head Scientist at the Institute for Construction Science Eduardo Torroja, belonging to the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), and Professor in the School of Civil Engineering at the Technical University of Madrid (UPM). She received her degree in Civil Engineering from the Technical University of Madrid and her PhD and a MS in Computational Mechanics at the Technical University of Catalonia (UPC). She also holds a MA from the University of Salamanca. She has previously been a Structural Engineer, specialized in bridge design, for almost 20 years and on the faculty at the Technical University of Catalonia in Barcelona and at the CEU San Pablo University in Madrid. Her research focuses on the mechanics and design of composite structures (full FRP structures), on the strengthening of structures using FRP laminates, and on computational mechanics in structural engineering.

Kristian Schellenberg, Switzerland

Kristian carried out his diploma studies and PhD at ETH Zurich with exchange and research stays in Spain, the United States, and Japan. After that, he worked in Denmark on international bridge projects and as a consultant in Switzerland, focusing on assessing existing bridges and the design of new bridges. He taught prospective civil engineers at ETH Zurich and Zurich University of Applied Sciences (ZHAW) in structural analysis on a part-time basis. Latest, as Head of Engineering Structures of a cantonal road administration, he was responsible for an asset of over 1’500 bridges in Switzerland. Kristian has been active in several IABSE Committees and founded Equi Bridges Ltd. in 2020, which provides specialized consultancy on bridge engineering and management.

Knut Stockhusen, Germany

Knut Stockhusen (born in 1974) is a structural engineer and a Board Member / Managing Director at schlaich bergermann partner (sbp), an internationally renowned structural engineering and consulting firm based in Stuttgart, Germany. Knut graduatedfrom the University of Stuttgart in 1999 and joined sbp in 2000. As a project manager and team leader, he successfully supervised numerous large-scale, long-span, high-rise and multi-functional sport projects. Knut joined the management of sbp in 2008 and founded sbp latin america in São Paulo, Brazil, expanding the international sbp network. In 2015, he was appointed partner, and in 2020 he became Managing Director of sbp’s office in Madrid, Spain. Today, Knut develops and manages diverse projects and supports design partners and clients all over the world. Maintaining a hands-on approach that goes beyond structural engineering, he likes to be involved throughout the whole project process – from the early project development phase to detailed design, site monitoring, delivery, and handover.

Mahesh Tandon, India

Prof. Tandon is an international expert in the field of Structural Engineering. Many of the structures designed by him and his firm Tandon Consultants Pvt. Ltd. have been widely acclaimed and have received recognition in India as well as internationally. He has spearheaded the development of new codes of practice and path-breaking bridge technologies suited to Indian conditions. These include pioneering work in the field of Segmental construction, Integral construction, Accelerated Bridge Construction, Long span bridges, Long span roofs and Structures for Metro (both viaducts and underground) for several cities in India .

His projects reflect the innovations in technology that were realised due to his intimate knowledge of both design and construction.

Gongyi Xu, China

Dr. Gongyi Xu is Chief Design Engineer with the China Railway Major Bridge Reconnaissance & Design Institute (BRDI). He received his Ph.D. from the Southwest Jiaotong University in 2005. Dr. Xu is one of the leading engineers designing modern cable-supported long span bridges in China. He has designed more than 70 bridges including suspension bridges, cable-stayed bridges and other bridges. He was the chief design engineer for Wuhan Yangsigang Yangtze River Suspension Bridge with a main span of 1700 m.

Dr. Xu was elected as a National Design Master of Engineering of China in 2006. He received the John A. Roebling Medal in 2018, and ICE’s International Medal in 2018.