Speakers 2026
Kolbjørn Giskeødegård
Kolbjørn is Director of the Seafood sector at Nordea Corporate Finance. He was previously a top-ranked salmon analyst at the bank and has also served as CFO of Columbi Salmon. He closely follows financing and analysis of both Norwegian and international aquaculture.
Bård Ludvig Thorheim
Bård Ludvig represents the Conservative Party (Høyre) in the Norwegian Parliament and serves as the party’s spokesperson for industry and fisheries policy. With a background from the Norwegian Foreign Service, he has worked as political advisor to two Ministers of Foreign Affairs and has been a Member of Parliament since 2021. Thorheim focuses particularly on district policy, international affairs, and business development.
Even Søfteland
Even is the Managing Director of Capmare AS, a consultancy firm specializing in aquaculture. He brings extensive leadership and board experience from breeding and fish farming companies, and has in his carrier worked a lot in the intersection of production, regulation, research and politics.
Anders Lamberg
Anders is a trained behavioural ecologist and has focused on anadromous salmonids for the past 35 years. He has published numerous scientific articles and reports on topics such as smolt outmigration timing, the effects of aquaculture on wild salmon populations, and video monitoring. His employers have included NINA for 12 years, followed by his own company Skandinavisk Naturovervåking from 2001 to 2020, then DNV in recent years. Today he has returned to running his own company: Lensman AS.
Jesse Trushenski
Jesse is the R&D Director for Nordly Holding and oversees a variety of research initiatives across the group’s interests in aquaculture. Internationally recognized for her work in fish nutrition, she dedicates much of her time to the growth and evolution of Polarfeed. Jesse has held numerous leadership roles addressing public and private aquaculture in the USA and continues to advise the American aquaculture group, Riverence, as its Chief Science Officer.
Jim-Roger Nordly
Jim-Roger started small as a feed agent and vaccinator in the late 1980s, but has gradually built up a number of aquaculture companies in nutrition, pharmaceuticals, R&D, and production. Among these are Polarfeed and ACD Pharma, in addition to STIM, in which he has retained a significant ownership stake after its sale to Summa Equity earlier this year.
Line Ellingsen
Line is a third-generation fish farmer and Managing Director of Ellingsen Seafood. She took over the leadership of the family-owned aquaculture company on Skrova in 1997 and has headed the entire group since 2007. Line is also Chair of the Board of Sjømat Norge and Vice President of NHO (the Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise)..
Cato Lyngøy
Cato is the founder and Managing Director of Ovum AS and is leading the development of the closed aquaculture facility 'Egget', which aims to achieve lower emissions and more sustainable production. Before fully committing to his own company in 2013, Cato held several senior positions at Pan Fish, later Marine Harvest, most recently as Group Manager Technology & Environment.
Bjárki Már Johannsson
Bjarki is Key Account Manager at STIM Iceland and was the company’s first local hire in Iceland. He previously held the position as Head of Business Development at the land-based salmon farming company GeoSalmo and has broad expertise in sales and business development within the Icelandic aquaculture sector.
Per-Roar Gjerde
Per-Roar serves on the board of African Aquaculture Company and brings over 25 years of operational experience in aquaculture. His impressive career includes key roles such as CEO of Mowi Chile, Global Farming Director and COO at Mowi, and CEO of Pacifico Aquaculture in Mexico.
Kasper Løberg Tangen
Kasper is a veterinarian and Head of Section for Fish Health and Fish Welfare at the Norwegian Food Safety Authority (Mattilsynet). Throughout his career, he has worked across the full spectrum from regulatory administration and practical aquaculture operations to strategic consulting and aquaculture technology. He is particularly passionate about how biological understanding, operational decisions and technology together influence fish welfare, value creation, and sustainability in aquaculture.
Richard Torrissen
Richard's background spans the intersection of biology, biotechnology, and commercial aquaculture, with key expertise in CaSR stimulation, smolt transfer strategies, freshwater management, and fish welfare in RAS and hybrid systems. He has extensively worked on leveraging CaSR knowledge to improve mineral regulation and proactively reduce the risk of nephrocalcinosis in Atlantic salmon.
Yang Shen
Yang Shen heads Research & Development at ACD Pharma and is an internationally recognized expert in bacteriophages. He has over 16 years of experience in developing bacteriophage-based antimicrobial solutions for diagnostic and therapeutic use. Previously, he worked at the University of Maryland and ETH Zurich, leading several groundbreaking projects
Lisa Furnesvik
Lisa Furnesvik is Technical Services Manager at ACD Pharma. She is a trained fish health biologist with a master’s degree in aquaculture. After spending seven years as a researcher at the Norwegian Veterinary Institute, she moved into the industry, where she now specializes in the use of bacteriophages to improve animal welfare in aquaculture.
Ivar Kramer
Ivar is a fish health biologist and Key Account Manager at STIM, based in Bergen. He has a solid practical background from Norwegian aquaculture, including as former Fish Health Manager at Firda Seafood, where he was responsible for fish health throughout the production cycle – from egg to slaughter – and led several fish health projects.
Lars Gaute Jørgensen
Lars Gaute is responsible for sales and technical support in Norway and the Nordic region for PHARMAQ (Zoetis), with a primary focus on vaccines and fish health products. He holds a degree from the Norwegian University of Life Sciences (NMBU) and works closely with fish farmers on vaccination strategies and customer support.
Jim Olaisen
Jim has a diverse background from both the food industry and tourism before entering the aquaculture sector in 2015. He quickly became a key figure at Polarfeed, the company he returned to last autumn after three years as Production Manager at Ellingsen Seafood’s smolt facility, Silver Seed.
Jørgen Berget
Jørgen is a consultant at McKinsey & Company with a background from the Norwegian School of Economics (NHH). He works extensively at the intersection of aquaculture and Private Equity, with a focus on transaction support and AI-driven sales accelerations.
Sigurd Kampevold Johanson
Sigurd is a consultant at McKinsey & Company with a background from NTNU. He works extensively with aquaculture across the entire value chain and previously wrote his master’s thesis on optimization in land-based aquaculture.
Cristian Gallardo
Cristian is a leading Chilean scientist in aquaculture genomics. As a full Professor at the University of Concepción and Director of INCAR2, his multi-omic research advances host–pathogen interactions and genome regulation. He has published in high-impact journals and led initiatives in salmon aquaculture biotechnology.