Speakers

Florian Cardinaux

French Consulate in San Francisco

Bio:

Originally from Blois in the Loire Valley, near the Château de Chambord, Florian Cardinaux has just arrived in the City by the Bay to take up his role as Consul General of France in San Francisco.

Florian Cardinaux was previously one of the advisors to the Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs, Catherine Colonna, responsible for Asia, the Pacific, and consular affairs (2022-2024). Prior to that, he served as Head of Operations at the Crisis and Support Center at the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs (2020-2022), a role that led him to manage numerous international crises involving French nationals (notably Afghanistan, Ukraine, the Sahel, Sudan, and Ethiopia). In recent months, following Catherine Colonna’s departure, he resumed this activity to contribute to the management of the crisis in Gaza and its regional consequences.

It is his third posting abroad after Doha, where he served as Deputy Head of Mission of the French Embassy in Qatar (2018-2020), and Delhi, where he was a political advisor at the French Embassy in India, responsible for the franco-indian strategic partnership (2015-2018). He began his career at the Quai d’Orsay on the Near East, handling relations with Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the Syrian crisis (2012-2015).

Aged 39, Florian Cardinaux is a graduate of Sciences Po Paris. He spent a year studying at Princeton University as part of his education. He is also an alumnus of the École nationale d’administration, Jean-Jacques Rousseau class (2012).
Florian Cardinaux is married and the father of a young boy who attends the Lycée Français in San Francisco. He is passionate about rowing, mountain sports, and scuba diving.

Cyril Fellous

Head of Optics and Photonics Division, CEA-Leti

Samuel Sheng

Google

Samuel Sheng

Google

Bio:

Samuel Sheng, Ph.D. is currently Director of Sensing Technologies at Google, and an Adjunct Professor at Stanford University. A recognized expert in systems development and digital signal processing, Dr. Sheng has extensive experience in architecting and designing leading-edge CMOS ASICs for ultrasonic sensors, silicon tuners, DSL transceivers, and mobile/low-power applications.

Prior to Google, he was the co-founder and CTO of Sentons Inc., focusing on next-generation ultrasonics as a sensor medium for touch- and force-sensing applications. Sentons' technology has been found in numerous flagship smartphones, using its unique ultrasound sensing capabilities to enhance usability and user experience. He was also co-founder and CTO at Telegent Systems, which was acquired by Spreadtrum Communications in 2011. Telegent Systems was a fabless semiconductor company focused on mobile television receiver products, and the fastest semiconductor startup to achieve $200M annual revenue in history. Dr. Sheng has also served as Distinguished Engineer at LSI Corporation and at Datapath Systems, Inc.

Dr. Sheng has authored numerous papers and publications on various topics such as low-power CMOS RF wireless systems and low-power CMOS digital design and has been awarded over fifty patents. He holds a BA degree in applied mathematics and BS, MS, and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.