Cybersecurity
The Cybersecurity category honours leaders who have significantly enhanced their organisation's strategic objectives, and customer experience through cutting-edge security solutions. This award recognises the efficient management of resources to achieve these transformative goals.
The award winner will be a leader who has reduced risk exposure, protected organisational value through innovative cybersecurity strategies and installed an adaptive security culture.
Cloud & Infrastructure
This category of the CIONET Awards 2026 celebrates digital leaders who have transformed their business by strategically created a successful Cloud & Infrastructure environment in their organisations. This award recognises individuals who have delivered clearly quantified, high-impact business results and significant value to their stakeholders.
The ideal winner will be a leader who has fundamentally improved organisational agility, resilience, and cost efficiency through strategic cloud adoption and infrastructure optimisation.
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Paul is Defra’s Chief Technology Officer, leading the Architecture, Data, Information and Innovation (ADII) team, providing overall technology strategy and direction for Defra including AI strategy.
Prior to joining Defra he worked in the private sector in architecture and technology leadership roles in a variety of private sector companies such as BT, Cognizant, McKesson and HCL.
Most recently he spent the last seven years working for Astellas, a Japanese pharmaceutical company. He has also spent time living and working in Denmark and the US, and has worked in multiple sectors including defence, retail, healthcare and life sciences.
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