Circular Innovation and the Future of Sexy Tech
Join us in Manchester on 24th April 2025, for a deep dive into the world of sexy tech - the tech that’s not just innovative but captivating, exciting and driving real-world transformation in commerce.
Discover how Manchester is leading the charge as a global hub for these emerging technologies and explore how sexy tech is transforming commerce.
Speakers include:
Agenda:
📅 Date: Thursday 24th April 2025
🕒 Time: 10am-5pm
📍 Location: Sister, Manchester
💷 Price: Manchester Digital members - Free (4 x tickets per company)
Early Bird - £40 (book before 28th February)
General Admission - £50
Manchester Digital members: For your special code to access free tickets, please check your emails/newsletters or speak to your Community Manager.
Who Should Attend?
This event is tailored for leaders and innovators from commerce, tech, and sustainability, including:
- Founders, CEOs, and decision-makers eager to adopt cutting-edge technologies and future-proof their businesses.
- Ecommerce professionals seek to harness the latest in AI-driven personalisation and immersive customer experiences.
- Supply chain leaders focused on sustainability and transparency through blockchain and AI innovations.
- Investors and venture capitalists are scouting the next wave of commerce disruptors.
- Tech innovators and developers wanting to explore how immersive technologies like AR/VR revolutionise commerce.
Meet Our Speakers
Rich Statham
Country Sales Manager UK & Ireland
Patagonia
Rich is responsible for supporting and coordinating Patagonia’s environmental mission across the UK and Ireland through the delivery of their wholesale strategy. Rich has been with Patagonia since 2017 having not really understood the company’s responsible approach to business until a future colleague gave him a copy of ‘Let My People Go Surfing’. Having read Yvon Chouinard’s seminal work Rich realised that Patagonia was not just another brand trying to sell more stuff and that the company’s approach aligned with his shifting personal beliefs.
Prior to this Rich gained experience in brand management along with wholesale and retail strategies for companies including The North Face and O’Neill. Rich’s determination and stubborn nature have seen him participate (he hesitates to use the word ‘race’) in ultra-marathons where he is sure to make maximum use of the time available to complete the course. A love of the mountains and all things snow related have also seen Rich work as a ski instructor in the Alps and Pyrenees.
Emily Oliver-King
Head of Digital Product & UX
musicMagpie
Emily Oliver-King is Head of Digital Product & UX at musicMagpie looking after the team (or more, they look after her) which sit between stakeholders, customers and the business to create the business roadmap which ensures that new and current experiences meet the expectations of all 3 of those groups.
Em has a passion for Product, Customers and User Experience having started in Customer service, doing a short stint in Marketing, progressing to UX & Experimentation and finally, finding a home in Product. musicMagpie, founded in a garage in Stockport in 2007, has successfully pivoted over time from CDs and DVDs recycling to become the UK’s leading mobile phone recycler. The business aims to take unwanted items from consumers and businesses, give them a new life and resell for a fraction of a new price contributing what it can to the circular economy. The Group has also been trading in the US since 2013 under the ‘decluttr’ brand and is the world’s biggest re-seller in the history of both Amazon and eBay. Having floated on the London Stock Exchange for an initial market cap of over £200m in April 2021, the Group was sold to AO.com in December 2024.
Tim Ainsworth
Executive Director of Brand Experience
McCann Manchester
Tim has over 20 years’ experience in digital transformation, brand development, performance marketing and media; highly-skilled in comms planning, direct marketing, brand experience design and associated data, digital, production and technology-driven marketing practices and platforms, including extensive knowledge of effectiveness analytics.
Ryan Atkins
Co-Founder & CEO
Supercycle
Co-founder of Supercycle, a circular commerce platform that is allowing merchants to operate circular business models from their existing ecommerce and POS systems.
David Edmundson-Bird FRSA CMBE SFHEA
Principal Lecturer in Digital Marketing, Faculty Lead for AI & Digital Enhanced Learning
Manchester Metropolitan University Business School
David Edmundson-Bird is Principal Lecturer in Digital Marketing, Faculty Lead for AI & Digital Enhanced Learning at Manchester Met Business School, responsible for developing policy and good practice embedding the use of Digital and AI in teaching, research and business development engagement. He delivers training in digital and AI practice for SMEs as part of the Centre for Enterprise, and core taught modules in SEO, digital strategy and E-Commerce at degree apprentice, undergraduate, and postgraduate level.
David has worked in senior management roles in the digital sector (opening Manchester’s 2nd web design agency (Sozo) in 1995 and taking on his first E-commerce client in 1996) as well as spells in academia. He is co-author of editions 7 and 8 of Pearson’s Digital Business & E-commerce Management with Dave Chaffey and Tanya Hemphill.
More speaker profiles coming soon.
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Ecommerce Conference 2025 is sponsored by CyberLab and PushON.
CyberLab is a specialist cyber security company that provides a wide range of security solutions and services.
Your one-stop cyber security advisor, the CyberLab team is equipped with the right technology, knowledge, and expertise to help businesses of all sizes, including large public sector organisations.
PushON is an award-winning, full-service eCommerce agency in Manchester, Bristol and Edinburgh. Specialising in Magento web design, SEO, PPC and strategy.
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At Manchester Digital, we believe in creating an inclusive and diverse community where everyone feels welcome and valued. We are committed to ensuring that all our event attendees have a safe, enjoyable experience that meets their needs.
We invite all attendees to contact us if they have any dietary requirements, accessibility needs, or neurodiversity requirements, or if they require accommodations to respect their cultural or religious needs during their visit. We believe that by working together, we can create an environment that is welcoming to all and allows everyone to fully participate in our events.
If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact us. We are always happy to hear from you and to work with you to ensure that our events are accessible and inclusive for everyone.
Please flag any special dietary or accessibility requirements to ellie@manchesterdigital.com as soon as possible.
