KEYNOTES
We have some exciting Keynotes planned for PLATE2025. For this year, we have planned four highly relevant keynotes related to Product Lifetimes and the Environment. The keynotes are:
- Henrik Mathiassen, CEO and Founder of DesignPeople (Keynote on Wednesday, July 2nd)
- Laetitia Vasseur, HOP Executive Officer and expert on Circular Economy (Keynote on Wednesday, July 2nd)
- Wojtek Sitarz, Policy Officer at the Directorate-General for Environment in the European Commission (Keynote on Thursday, July 3rd)*
- Jeroen van Laer, Policy Officer at the European Commission (Keynote on Thursday, July 3rd)
*Matjaz Malgaj unfortunately had to cancel due to unforseen circumstances
Read more below! We will update the descriptions as we get closer to the conference.
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Wojtek Sitarz
Policy Officer, Sustainable Products, European Comission
Bio
Wojtek Sitarz is a Policy Officer at the Directorate-General for Environment in the European Commission. He is currently focused on shaping the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR), where he leads efforts on an upcoming delegated act specifically targeting product repairability. This initiative aims to enhance the sustainability of products within the EU by establishing requirements that promote easier repair and extending product lifetimes, thus contributing to a circular economy and reducing environmental impacts. He also coordinates work on Digital Product Passports within DG Environment.
Wojtek's academic credentials include degrees in engineering from École Polytechnique and UC Berkeley, which provide him with a solid technical foundation to address complex environmental policy issues effectively. Before his current role, Wojtek worked on negotiating environmental aspects of Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) strategic plans and contributed to open data initiatives with Etalab as part of a French task force. He also has experience as a reliability engineer, focusing on predictive maintenance in an industrial setting.
Keynote: ECODESIGN (r)evolution: boosting sustainable products in the EU
Thursday, July 3rd
How can products become more sustainable over their full life cycle?
With the Ecodesign for sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR), the EU has recently revamped its existing framework on ecodesign in two ways:
Firstly, ESPR now covers virtually all physical products (with few exemptions such as food or pharmaceuticals), not only energy-consuming ones. Secondly, the ESPR widens the scope of ecodesign requirements – beyond energy efficiency – now ranging from durability, circularity and the overall reduction of the environmental and carbon footprint of products, amongst many others.
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Laetitia Vasseur
HOP Executive Officer
Bio
Laetitia Vasseur is the General Delegate and co-founder of the HOP association, Halte à l'obsolescence programmée (Stop Planned Obsolescence), since 2015. She also directs the Durability Club. A graduate of two master's degrees in political science from the University of Paris 1 Panthéon Sorbonne, she worked as a parliamentary assistant in the Senate, then as a consultant and teacher. She was a member of the Acte committee (Let's Accelerate the Ecological Transition) for the Minister of Ecological Transition. She is also the author of the book "From Disposable to Durable" (Gallimard, 2017) and a columnist for the newspaper Alternatives économiques. In 2023, she was named one of the 35 positive leaders under 35 by Positive Planet-Les Echos, and was awarded an Ashoka fellowship, an international network of social entrepreneurs. Finally, she has served on the Board of Directors of ADEME ( (public environmental agency) since March 2023.
Keynote: Empowering Citizens Against Planned Obsolescence – Policy Innovations and Civic Engagement for Product Longevity
Wednesday, July 2nd
How can citizens, policymakers, and researchers collaborate to foster sustainable consumption?
In her keynote, Laëtitia Vasseur, Executive Director and co-founder of the French NGO HOP (Halte à l’Obsolescence Programmée), will present the key policy tools developed in France to promote product durability and repairability, including the Repairability and Durability Indexes, and the national Repair Bonus scheme. Drawing on HOP’s experience at the intersection of civic mobilisation, legal action, and policy advocacy, she will highlight how civil society has shaped and accompanied these instruments, ensuring they remain robust, transparent, and grounded in scientific evidence.
The presentation will also explore the critical role of cross-sectoral collaboration, notably the synergies between NGOs, researchers, and public authorities, in designing and implementing effective measures against premature obsolescence. In light of the new EU directives on empowering consumers and promoting repair, Laëtitia Vasseur will reflect on how national innovations and civil society initiatives can inform and support their implementation across Europe.
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Jeroen van Laer
Policy Officer, European Comission
Bio
Jeroen Van Laer is Policy Officer in the Directorate-General for Justice and Consumers of the European Commission, where he works since 2010 on various EU sustainable consumption policies, in recent years on the ‘greening’ of EU consumer laws with the new Directive adopted in 2024 on Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition. Prior to this period, he was working in the economist unit at the European Commission’s Directorate General for the Environment and at the environmental reporting team from the Flanders Environment Agency in Belgium. He is an economist by training from the Catholic University of Leuven and has an advanced master degree in international relations and European integration from the University of Liège.
Keynote: New EU consumer laws to empower consumers for the green transition
Thursday, July 3rd
How can we ensure that consumers are better empowered to contribute to the green transition?
In his presentation, Jeroen Van Laer Policy Officer at the European Commission, will elaborate on the new EU consumer laws that were adopted in 2024 and will come into application next year to support the green transition. The new Directive on Empowering Consumers for the Green Transition will ensure that consumers are provided with better information at the point of sale on the durability and reparability of goods and the consumer’s legal guarantee rights. It will also strengthen consumer protection rules against greenwashing and early obsolescence practices. The new Directive on common rules promoting the repair of goods aims at promoting more sustainable consumption by increasing repair and reuse of goods both within and outside the legal guarantee.
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Henrik Mathiassen
CEO, Founder of DesignPeople
Bio
Henrik Mathiassen is CEO and Co-Founder of Design-People, an award-winning Danish design consultancy specializing in the development of advanced industrial and digital products. Since its founding in 2005, Henrik and his team have collaborated with various global brands— including Kenwood, LG Electronics, Ambu, Nilfisk, Kamstrup, and Danfoss, creating strategically strong and future-proof products.
With extensive experience in complex B2B product design, the work of Henrik and his team often integrates sophisticated electronics, mechanics, and digital user interfaces. The team's holistic approach combines user research, exploratory insight generation, iterative prototyping and concept development, ensuring solutions are deeply aligned with real human behaviors and securing relevant longevity for the products.
Henrik emphasizes teamwork and advocates "propriety” integrity, thoroughness, and responsibility towards people, products, and the planet. Guided by "People, Planet, Prosperity," the team today strives to create impactful product experiences that positively influence society and the environment.
Henrik holds a master’s degree in industrial design from Aarhus School of Architecture, studied at the renowned Umeå Institute of Design (1999-2000), and also completed a Mini MBA in Sustainability Management in 2022.
Keynote: Long-lasting products: A designer’s perspective through real cases
Wednesday, July 2nd
Does people-driven design improve the longevity of products?
Is it possible to build a successful business with long-lasting product designs?
...and how does aesthetics play into the agenda?
In this keynote, Henrik Mathiassen brings a practitioner’s perspective on the challenges and opportunities of designing durable and more sustainable products for the manufacturing industry. Drawing from real-world cases - from styling short-lived consumer electronics to developing professional-grade industrial products - Henrik shares concrete experiences from Design-People’s work, focusing on the obstacles they’ve encountered and the choices that have led to better solutions for both business and the environment.