Decoding the future of work with the technologies of tomorrow | Futurist | Speaker

I help executives (including C-Suite and NEDs), and marketing teams understand the impact of AI on their organizations and augment the power of their teams with AI and reimagined workflows. 

For over a decade I've helped companies do mind-bending things with new and emerging technologies by showing them how to create, monetize and scale with bleeding-edge tech when few best practices and instruction manuals exist. At Signal and Cipher, we're focused on decoding the future of work for our clients.

My mission as a futurist and speaker is to inspire people to take ownership of their role in shaping the future, participate in building the world they want to see, be the wrong person asking the right questions, and approach the future with wonder, curiosity, and hope, not fear and confusion. The future is ours to shape, but you don't win by being as a spectator. 


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Considered one of the top voices in AI and the future of work, Ian is a trusted advisor to the world's most innovative companies. His firm Signal and Cipher transforms companies into AI-ready organizations with training, workforce reengineering, design, and development, resulting in meaningful routes to innovation that impact the bottom line, inspire cultural change, and create new products and ways of working.

Previously responsible for P&Ls and innovation departments at the largest agencies in the world, Ian is known for making bleeding-edge technology understandable and monetizable. Brands he has advised over the last decade include Samsung, Intel, Coca-Cola, Google, Microsoft, Nike, and dozens more.

Ian has pioneered a digitally immersive presentation style that brings artificial intelligence and extended reality to life so audiences can understand the future of technology in actionable ways. Ian is also the co-owner of a production studio designing virtual worlds and the first person ever to host a news segment as a synthetic human, streaming to over 100 million devices around the world.

A classically trained musician, Ian understands the magnitude of AI's coming impact on human creativity. As a strategist and speaker, he strives to educate stakeholders on the real-world implications of emerging technologies so they can make informed decisions that positively shape our world and advance humanity. In a rapidly evolving world that some consider dystopian, Ian remains a steadfast optimist and offers what everyone needs now: hope.

Specialties:  AI • Machine Vision • Emerging Technology • Digital Strategy • Process Engineering • Prototyping • Systems Thinking • Team Leadership

Ian Beacraft

We built modern organizations on the premise that execution is expensive. 

But what happens when building the prototype becomes cheaper than the meeting to discuss it? Every assumption about how work gets done flips upside down.

Here's the truth: we're failing at AI. Not because the tools aren't good enough, but because we're designing for a system that's already obsolete.

The winners of the AI era won't be the fastest adopters of tools. They'll be the ones who redesign how work is organized, how value is created, and how ecosystems are navigated.

I'm excited to be speaking at the Next Generation SAP Enterprise Architect Learning Forum 2026 — joining Enterprise Architects in person in Newtown Square, PA from February 23 - 26, 2026

My session is: Architects of Change: Redesigning Work for the AI Era Tuesday, February 24, 2026 9:15 AM - 10:00 AM ET

The in-person Forum is fully sold out with over 470 Enterprise Architects attending. All 25 Auditorium sessions across three days, including my session, will be livestreamed globally with complimentary registration.

Can't attend live?

Register anyway. All sessions will be recorded and available to watch on demand. For more details on all 25 sessions on the livestream and to register: https://lnkd.in/gVbEbDpf

Looking forward to sharing and learning together as a community

Prox & Reverie

Prox & Reverie is a multi-reality experience company, innovating new ways to bridge physical, digital and imagined worlds, with funding support from XR Stories, Innovate UK and UKRI.

P&R is developing disruptive new narrative design methodologies and pipelines through it's primary innovation 'The Forge' - built to hyper-accelerate XR design exploration and production.

Responsibilities: Creative Direction, Team Leadership (Design & Developer teams), Creative strategy, Pre-visualisation, Narrative design, Spatial UX design, Presentations for business development and projects, Location and Studio directing, Post-production

Director /Co-Founder

Interchange is fully working mixed reality portal system, developed in partnership with XR Stories(UKRI) and Warner Bros. Discovery. The system leverages spatially-anchored physical infrastructure to allow fans to meet their heroes (and villains) that step through into our World and then travel back with them to incredible storyworld experiences.

INTERCHANGE: Inventor / Creative Director

Creative Concept Lead / Narrative Design & Consulting on a variety of R&D initiatives to explore new story forms in Mixed Reality

Hyper Reality R&D Director / Spatial Narrative Designer

Start Beyond

Start Beyond is a dedicated virtual reality content and production studio devoted to the creation of beautiful and immersive virtual reality experiences.

Virtual Reality is redefining education, health, business, communication and entertainment. We’re excited to be working at the frontier of a seismic technological and societal shift.

The Start Beyond team is comprised of talented and award winning technology, strategy, storytelling and creative specialists who are all passionate about creating virtual make believe.

Co-Founder / Chief Creative Officer

AWAKE VR is a character-driven interactive cinematic VR series that blurs the line between dream and reality, as you are drawn into the perplexities surrounding space, time and the human psyche in its most vulnerable state.

In Episode One, protagonist Harry, is a prisoner in his own house, obsessed with discovering the truth behind a recurring dream of his long-lost wife Rose and a strange pattern that contains a cryptic message.
Harry lives a life of process. His obsession is to dream often as way to relive a better past, unearthing the mysteries that haunt him and to correct a mistake that has cost him everything. But who is pulling the strings? An ominous voice on the phone warns Harry of his mistakes and propels him to act.

And now there is a new presence in Harry’s world. You. Your arrival signals a life-changing event that is capable of saving Harry from his darkness and unlocking the true potential of humanity’s future.

STARRING

JAKE MCDORMAN
American Sniper, Limitless, Die Hard 4.0 (IMDB)

ANALEIGH TIPTON
Crazy, Stupid, Love & Warm Bodies (IMDB)

NICHOLAS HOPE
Bad Boy Bubby & VR Noir (IMDB)

AWAKE - Series Creator / Director

Be transported back to 1918 and the battlefields of Le Hamel, France in this free and historically accurate digital experience at the Australian War Memorial. Produced with Oculus QUILL toolset and Unity for branching narrative.

* A ten-minute cinematic, interactive experience, coinciding with the centenary of WWI’s Battle of Hamel
* Synchronised theatre experience delivered to 100x VR devices simultaneously
* World-first, large-scale, synchronised VR experience for Oculus Go
250 audience members daily
* Seen by 7000 visitors at the Australian War Memorial

The Battle of Hamel VR - Concept & Narrative Director

Go off the beaten track and experience fascinating parts of the world that most people will never experience through the wonders of virtual reality. Start VR’s highly anticipated interactive cinematic virtual reality project Atlas Obscura VR is launching soon for the Samsung Gear VR.

Harnessing the latest virtual reality capture tools and using genre-defining interactive storytelling techniques, Atlas Obscura VR features incredible imagery, fascinating stories and hidden interactive gems that will transport you to some of the most amazing locations in the world.

https://startvr.co/project/atlas-obscura-vr/

Atlas Obscura VR - Series Creator / Director

Chris O’Brien Lifehouse is a state-of-the-art independent cancer treatment and research hospital based in Sydney, Australia. Their highly experienced clinicians see more than 40,000 public and private patients every year – concentrating all their efforts, learning, research and expertise into cancer care.

We collaborated with Chris O’Brien Lifehouse and Samsung Australia to develop a ground-breaking initiative to supply virtual reality technology to patients undergoing chemotherapy treatment, the goal was to help ease psychological stress and provide a form of “distraction therapy” during treatment.

VR Distraction Therapy - Concept Creator, Director

"VR NOIR IS A GREAT EXAMPLE OF HOW VIRTUAL REALITY WILL CHANGE TELEVISION" - Upload VR

VR Noir: A Day Before The Night is an interactive crime thriller available on Samsung Gear VR and Google Cardboard (iOS & Android). Audiences are invited to play the role of detective Veronica Coltrane, a burnt out private detective with mounting debts and a dark past.

Throughout the investigation, audiences are caught up in a high stakes drama, compelled to engage with local characters and virtual environments, forced to make difficult choices, solve puzzles and use their powers of observation to propel the storyline forward..

VR Noir - EP / VR Director / Co-Writer

Special Broadcasting Service (SBS) Australia

Norfolk Island is 5 miles long by 3 miles wide; or, as some would say of this close-knit community, 5 minutes long and 3 minutes wide when it comes to gossip. As one of Australia's most remote external territories, and with a local population descended from the legendary Bounty mutineers, it's no surprise they have their own way of doing things. With their own language, a blend of old seafaring English and Tahitian, and their own system of government, many don't see themselves as Australian - that it says so on their passport is merely 'a technicality'. But recent hard times have forced the island to reach out to Australia for help, and with mainland help comes mainland rules. A modern day mutiny is brewing offshore.

A Modern Mutiny - Documentary Filmmaker

Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC)

Synopsis: Over two months, three very different Australian families attempt to overcome longstanding barriers to happiness. They range from a blended family with five kids to a single mother with a 13-year-old daughter. Their problems are ones that all Australians will relate to. Poor communication, financial stress, lack of parenting skills, defiant teens.

Making Families Happy - Documentary Series Director/ Editor

Igniting Change 

Series of documentary shorts for non-profit  Igniting Change, designed to challenge the perceptions of people overcoming hardship. Featuring real people that have been helped by the community and now helping others.

Igniting Change: Short Series Director

Seven Network

Historian Neil Oliver takes viewers on a never-before-seen look inside the Australian War Memorial, bringing to life Australia's rich wartime history through the artefacts and stories housed within its walls. The series follows the War Memorial as it races to complete its renovations of the First World War Gallery in time for Remembrance Day, 2014, marking the 100th anniversary of the First World War.

THE MEMORIAL: Beyond The Anzac Legend -Post-Production Consultant / Editor 

iKandy Films

On Michelle Flowers' 35th birthday she received a bundle of letters from her younger sister Angelique. This was no humdrum correspondence; rather they were birthday wishes full of charm and wit. The letters expressed Angelique's love of nature, art and literature, and most of all her unique and joyful personality, despite suffering from a painful disease since her mid-teens. A year on, she's in the last phases of terminal illness, and is struggling to find a peaceful way to die - not in a hospice, but somewhere altogether more in tune with her spirit.

WINNER: Best Documentary at the 2014 Sydney Film Festival

Project Link: https://angeliqueflowers.wordpress.com/35-letters/

35 LETTERS (Documentary, Sydney Film Festival)/ Studio & VFX Director / Segment Editor

OUTBACK CHOIR follows the heartwarming journey of a regional children’s choir, and its founder Michelle Leonard’s personal mission to bring a desolate musical landscape back to life. Chronicling their journey from audition to stage, the film reveals the trials and tribulations of running a children’s choir in the most isolated and disadvantaged region of NSW, where sport is king and music education is non-existent. Despite vastly different lives, hopes and dreams, one thing remains the same for all these children: to believe in themselves, they all need someone to believe in them.

Project Link: https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=10154840519180543

OUTBACK CHOIR - Post Producer / Editor

Screentime

A rare snapshot of a special time in Australia’s history, Flying Miners puts a face to the men and women working at the coalface.

Over 100,000 workers currently hold a unique place in Australia’s mining industry. They’re called FIFOs: Fly In Fly Out miners.

Making money – and lots of it – can make ordinary people do extraordinary things. If the price is right, it can turn teachers into truck drivers, accountants into labourers and high school dropouts into highly skilled drillers.

Flying Miners is a rare opportunity to meet the everyday workers who are at the heart of the boom

Shooter Producer - 3 Part Series 'FLYING MINERS' (ABC)

PostBox Studios

Growing up isn’t easy, especially for Zach who is rapidly making the transition from boyhood to manhood, in both the modern world and his ancient culture. Pressures from his loving, but staunch father, the temptations of city life and the ever present spectre of racism all take their toll. Ultimately Zach must embrace the traditions and knowledge of his ancestors and awaken the warrior within.

Zach's Ceremony - Awaken the Warrior Within - Shooter Producer

Multi award-winning Creative Director, specialising in mixed reality design and production. Creating XR content since 2013 with over 130 project delivered. 

Exploring the intersection between Art,Technology and Human Story. Calm under pressure and an excellent team communicator.

Previously Co-founder and Chief Creative Officer of Sydney-based Start Beyond (2014-2019) running a team of 35 staff. Produced VR apps for Oculus, Vive Studios, Google. Partners with Microsoft Capture Studios (Seattle) and Animal Logic (Sydney)

Currently Co-founder and Chief Creative Officer of Prox & Reverie, a multi-reality experience lab. Focussed on innovating new narrative tools and methodologies for creating and delivering next-generation mixed reality experiences. 

A regular keynote speaker and panelist on the subjects of XR as an emerging narrative medium and its potential as a tool to expand the human experience.

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