Henrik Hilker, Partner and Creative Director

Training: Henrik qualified as a graphic designer in 1993 and has been working in the Internet industry since 1995. In 1994, after graduating from the Ecole Supérieure des Arts Moderns, a top art and design school in Paris, he set up 360 degrees, a graphic design agency. Key clients included Zebra Multimedia, Accetera etc. and Katz Media (distributor of Pippin); I-commerce; UNESCO; the French Ministry of Defence; the Louvre and Crédit Lyonnais.

In 1995, Henrik co-founded a new media company, Idea Net Sarl, offering web consultancy, publishing and design services. Henrik was Art and Production Director and managed the development and launch of skiin.com, the first database-driven multilingual travel website in Europe. In 1997, skiin.com received the Milia d'Or media award in Cannes. Other clients of IdeaNet included Sea France, the OECD and Lapeyre.

In 1999, Henrik was employed as Managing Director to develop and launch of ITX Market, now Europe's largest online trading floor for IT products.

In 2000, Idea Net Srl merged with a UK company complete-skier.com to create ifyoutravel.com Ltd, which received £3 million of investment finance to develop a series of specialist travel websites. Henrik kept his role in ifyoutravel.com as Art and Production Director and shareholder. He managed the design and development of five multi-lingual specialist travel websites, later acquired by Online Travel Company.

In late 2001, Henrik established metadesignwork Ltd, a web, graphic design and communications consultancy. metadesignwork has a European client base including PalmSource; Logo 2000; ITX Market; France Telecom, Sofinnova Partners, and the University of Sussex. He has also recently started working in developing countries such as Rwanda. Henrik is responsible for consultancy, graphic design, structure and architecture design, programming and implementation. He speaks English, French, Danish and Swedish.

Lyndsay McLean Hilker, Partner and Content Director
Education/training: Lyndsay has a long experience of producing high quality written material. She graduated from the University of Cambridge in 1996 with a first class honours degree in Geography and later obtained a postgraduate diploma in Economics (University of London, 1998) and a Masters in Social Research Methods (University of Sussex, 2003). She is currently writing a PHD in Development Studies part-time at the University of Sussex.

In 1996, Lyndsay joined the UK Government's Civil Service Fast Stream at the Department for International Development (DFID). During 4 years, she held a number of project management and policy development posts. Following an 18-month secondment to work for the European Union as political assistant and rapporteur to the EU Special Envoy for the Great Lakes Region in Africa, in 1998 she was promoted to Head of the Africa Policy Unit in DFID, responsible for policy development on conflict issues, governance and HIV/AIDS.

In 2000, Lyndsay left the civil service and joined ifyoutravel.com Ltd as Content Director and Editor. She was responsible for content development and editorial quality across five multi-lingual websites and personally managed the development, launch and marketing of ifyouexplore.com, an adventure travel website. Ifyoutravel.com Ltd was later bought by Online Travel Company and then lastminute.com.

In late 2001, Lyndsay founded metadesignwork Ltd, a web, graphic design and communications consultancy. metadesignwork has a European client base including PalmSource; Logo 2000; ITX Market; France Telecom, Sofinnova Partners, and the University of Sussex. Lyndsay is responsible for project management, content development and translation and speaks English, French and Italian. Lyndsay also continues to undertake occasional consultancy projects in international development as well as write a PHD on a part-time basis.