General Peter Cosgrove AC MC ( Retired)

General Peter Cosgrove retired from the army in 2005. Four yeqars earlier, he had been Australian of the year: "In every respect Peter Cosgrove demonstrated that he is a role model. The man at the top displayed those charactoristics we value most in Australians - strength, determination, intelligence, compassion and humour.

The son of a soldier, he graduated from the Royal Military College, Duntroon, in 1968. He was sent to Malaysia as a lieutenant in the 1st Battalion, Royal Australian Regiment (RAR). During his next posting in Vietnam he commanded an infantry platoon and was awarded the Military Cross for his performance during an assault on enemy positions. In 1999 Peter Cosgrove became a national figure following his appointment as Commander of the International Forces East Timor (Interfet).  He was responsible for overseeing East Timor’s transition to independence during, what was to become, a tense and uncertain period.   He shone as both a soldier and diplomat. Always in his slouch hat, Peter Cosgrove was a strong and reassuring figure, appearing regularly in all forms of the media. Following his achievements and the international respect that he had achieved, he was promoted and made Chief of the Army.  He went on to be promoted to General and was appointed Chief of the Defence Force.  

John Rothwell AO -
Chairman (formerly Managing Director)
Austal Ships Pty Ltd

Over the past two and a half decades, John Rothwell has played a major role in the development of the Australian aluminium shipbuilding industry. In 1988 he founded Austal Ships, together with four partners and the company is now one of the world’s leading aluminium shipyards. Austal listed on the Australian Stock Exchange in December 1998 and the group has grown with the acquisitions of Western Australian shipbuilding companies, Image Marine and Oceanfast and the establishment of Austal USA in late 1999. In 2007 the group employed more than 2500 people.  

Primavera - The Road Ahead

Richard K Faris
Executive Vice President
Primavera Systems, Inc.

Richard K. Faris is co-founder, co-owner, and Chief Technology Officer of Primavera Systems, Inc. Mr. Faris has led new product development (design, programming, quality assurance, and documentation) for more than 22 years. As a result of his technical product vision, Primavera has successfully kept pace with the innovations in computer hardware and software by developing more 70 releases of twelve distinct project management products. Current products take advantage of both Windows and Web-based user interfaces, client/server architecture, and relational databases.

Before founding Primavera, Mr. Faris spent more than 13 years planning, designing, managing, and controlling capital projects in the transportation industry and developing transportation network simulation systems. Mr. Faris was Vice President at Transportation Distribution Associates, an engineering consulting firm headquartered in Philadelphia, and was also employed at Booz, Allen & Hamilton as Senior Consultant. Professional assignments included working as project manager for the City of Philadelphia, managing numerous transportation simulation studies and responsible for power-demand analysis, operations planning, and project scheduling, planning, management, and control.

Mr. Faris is a registered professional engineer and is an active member of several professional societies. He has delivered technical papers at PMI, AACE, ASCE, CIFE ( Stanford University), and A/E/C Systems, and is a guest lecturer at several universities.

Mr. Faris earned bachelor of science and master of science degrees in civil engineering from Villanova University.