{"bio":"Wouter is an internet pioneer with 20+ years of industry experience. Wouter cofounded in 1997 the first carrier neutral data centre in Amsterdam - SpeedPort, modelled after AboveNet and the Palo Alto Internet Exchange in California.\r\n\r\nIn 1999, he was part of the founding team of Interxion, which became Europe\u2019s leading data centre operator 20 years later. He initiated the Swiss Internet Exchange Swiss-IX in 2001, and the French France-IX in 2009. In July 2016, whilst at Interxion, he founded PAIX to focus 100% on the data centre opportunity on the African continent. He initiated and co-founded the Africa Data Centres Association in 2018, and is currently a board member.\r\n\r\nWouter grew up in Mali and Burkina Faso and graduated from Imperial College London with a Masters in Software Engineering, and received his MBA from INSEAD.","chair":0}