Andrea Winders

Andrea Winders is a creative Manchester-based entrepreneur and expert in tech, infrastructure, and smart cities. She is the Executive Director of Smart Cities Council, United Kingdom, and manages the organisation’s growth and drive objectives for the expansion of the smart agenda throughout the country.

The Smart Cities Council is an organisation that works to create action and impact around the key challenges and opportunities facing cities and communities today.

The organisation already counts Amazon Web Services (AWS), EY, ENE.HUB, Aurecon and GHD among its 100+ international members, and in the UK high profile organisations, such as global engineering services and digital infrastructure giant Valmont, life safety technology company Clevertronics, smart buildings dashboard provider Bueno Systems and digital transformation software innovator, Tr3dent, are foundation members of the UK Organisation, with UCLan, University of Lancaster as supporting academic partners.

At Smart Cities Council, she has played a pivotal role in the organisations’ different initiatives in the UK, like Manchester's new DiSH (Digital Security Hub), a place for collaboration between Manchester's business and entrepreneurial community, academics, public sector organisations, and the voluntary sector to identify digital security threats and innovative responses to them. This hub offers a co-working space as well as access to state-of-the-art equipment and facilities.

Prior to that, Andrea Winders held executive and managerial positions in companies like Spicers and Pink Ladies before joining Sunderland City Council as the Executive Director of Enterprise Investment. From here, she started her career working with organisations that empower cities and citizens.

She defines herself as “an entrepreneurial business leader, with a unique mixture of talents and experience, in both private and public sectors, looking to change traditional thinking and doing to achieve positive change, wherever it is needed.”