About Us

DVN is a tech watch specialized in the automotive industry. ​

DVN organizes international events & provides in-depth analysis, market reports, expert interviews & other relevant content for automotive specialists interested in lighting, interior vehicles or AD/ADAS innovations.​

DVN Team

JEAN-CLAUDE LEBRUN
DVN CHAIRMAN

GEOFFREY LEBRUN
DVN PRESIDENT

PAUL-HENRI MATHA
DVN CEO & LIGHTING GENERAL EDITOR

Emilie Ogor Bonnet
Marketing & Communication Director

CHRISTOPHE LAMEIRAS
BACK OFFICE MANAGER

ANN AI
CHINA MANAGER

Dante Sulli
CHINA MANAGER

EIICHI ONO
JAPAN MANAGER

Cindy Freixeda Dias
Event & Communication Coordinator

Sophie Montibus
Marketing & Communication Coordinator

Lighting Team

Daniel Stern
DVN SENIOR editor

Gerd Bahnmueller
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Jean-Paul Ravier
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Thomas Fröhlich
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Michael Hamm
DVN SENIOR Advisor

Hans Joachim Schwabe
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Eric Blusseau
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

franco marcori
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Felipe Melhado
DVN SENIOR Advisor

wolfgang Huhn
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR


Interior Team

PHILIPPE AUMONT
DVN INTERIOR GENERAL EDITOR

Carsten Befelein
DVN senior advisor

olimpia Migliore
Dvn senior advisor

Adreas Friedrich
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

sebastien Adam
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Andrew Leuchtmann
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Laurent Serezat
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Sensing & Application Team

ERIC AMIOT
DVN sensing & Application GENERAL EDITOR

Martin Booth
DVN senior advisor

Luc Bourgeois
DVN senior advisor

Alain servel
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Martin Booth
DVN senior advisor

Martin Booth is a technology executive, based in Silicon Valley. He has held a variety of engineering, marketing and business development positions at companies including Fujitsu, AMD, SanDisk and a number of start-ups in the semiconductor, software, AI and automotive markets. He is currently president of Montevena Consulting LLC and an advisor for Driving Vision News for North America. Martin holds a BSCS from the University of Bristol and an MBA from Santa Clara University. 

Laurent Serezat
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

PhD in Physics (LCPC) with over 25 years of experience in the automotive industry, I have built strong expertise in lighting (interior & exterior), rear vision, wiping systems, connectivity, and system architecture. In mid-2025, I joined Driving Vision News to lead business development for interior applications, with a specific focus on interior lighting.

Andrew Leuchtmann
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Andrew Leuchtmann, a mechanical engineer from TU Darmstadt, has 42 years of experience in the automotive industry. For 24 years, he specialized in seat development, including 13 years leading Opel’s seat engineering in Rüsselsheim. Simultaneously, as Global BOM Leader at General Motors, he shaped the strategic modularity of seat structures across all brands. Since June 2024, he has been an independent consultant, also supporting DVN. His expertise includes extensive research and an ongoing book project on automotive seat history

Sebastien Adam
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Sebastien Adam is a seasoned International Sales Manager with 25+ years of experience in negotiation, contracts closure, and program management. After completing his Engineering degree, Sebastien started his career as a Development Manager at Forvia Interior in Spain, then joined Freudenberg as a Sales Engineer. He spent over 20 years at Proseat in the Seating branch, including several years in Germany, leading a Business Development Unit for new products and managing EPP businesses for European OEMs globally. His proficiency in four languages—French, English, German, and Spanish—has enabled him to work with nearly all major OEMs worldwide.

Adreas Friedrich
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Andreas Friedrich is a Danish citizen, with 35 years of experience as a Designer and multi-talented creative problem solver. Based in Gothenburg Sweden now, he has held various positions within the Automotive design trade, mainly with focus on interiors and new technology. Currently at Volvo Trucks Advanced Design Team. Curious about all new tech and design that will do good for people and support a better experience and ideally a better world.

FELIPE MELHADO
DVN SENIOR Advisor

Felipe Melhado is an engineering executive with 25+ years in automotive lighting and product development. He holds a graduate degree from the University of Michigan and has led multinational teams while driving innovations at Hella, Varroc, and Flex-N-Gate. Notably, he pioneered the first all-LED headlamps and excels in design, manufacturing, and quality, ensuring efficient product launches and business success. As of 2025, he serves as a Lighting Senior Advisor for DVN, based in Michigan, USA.

FRANCO MARCORI
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Graduated in electronics in 1996, has worked in Marelli Automotive Lighting for 20 years, holding various managerial roles from optics to electronic, from innovation and marketing to research and from 2004 he has been the regulatory manager for rear lamps. From 2016 he has been Operations and R&D Director of the lighting business at Gewiss (Bergamo, Italy). From 2022 he came back to automotive as R&D Engineering Senior Manager of Olsa (Magna, Turin, Italy) and in 2024 he started his Senior Consulting activity.  

Eric Blusseau
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Eric made most of his career at Valeo Lighting. He spent more than 30 years in Optics and Regulations. He started in research and developments at Bobigny for 13 years in the development of complex shape reflectors and elliptic modules. He was a key player in the development of HID lights in the ‘90s, and was appointed optical expert in 1997 and senior expert in 2000. In 2001, he moved to Angers to create the Optical Development Department. His work entailed hiring and training optical engineers; implementing design and simulation tools; creating the 25-metre dark room and the optical laboratory, and managing the approval of new lamps. In 2009, he took responsibility for the regulation and approval department of Valeo Lighting. He created and managed the regulation network inside Valeo Lighting Systems with one Regulation Manager in each development centre: Angers, France; Martos, Spain; Le Hainault, Belgium; Seymour, Indiana, USA; Wuhan, Foshan, China; Pianezza, Italy; São Paolo, Brazil; Queretaro, Mexico; Chennai, India; and Isehara, Japan. He was a French Delegation Expert at GTB, and a member of the GTB delegation at GRE. In 2017, he was appointed Chair of the GTB Front Lighting Working Group. Along all his career, he was inventor or co-inventor of 48 patents.

Michael Hamm
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Michael Hamm has 25 years Background in Automobile Lighting, He was Head of Lighting Development at Bosch/Automotive Lighting Reutlingen and was 10 years Head of Headlamp development Audi Ingolstadt. He has contributed to 76 technical papers and applied for 85 invention patents. He is Lecturer for Vehicle lighting at the Lighting Lab ALSVV at Technical University Darmstadt. With his lectures he tries to  bring students in contact with lighting functions, physiology, photometry and regulation issues all around vehicle lighting. He joined DVN in 2023, as a Senior Advisor.

Thomas Fröhlich
DVN SENIOR ADVISOR

Thomas Fröhlich started his professional career in Bosch on basic research for autonomous driving in 1989. Soon he joined the lighting division of Bosch to work on lighting electronic design. After joint venture with Magneti Marelli he took over in 2002 the worldwide responsibility for R&D and project management on lighting electronic added by body electronics. To extend the business of Automotive Lighting to new fields he built up design and management activities on new business fields like interior lighting and LiDAR sensing. Starting 2020 he took over the responsibility in Marelli for product management of lighting and exterior sensing. Since mid-2022 Thomas has retired and is now supporting DVN as consultant

Dante Sulli
CHINA MANAGER

Graduated from ESPCI Paris and an IAE MBA, Dante has over 25 years of experience managing automotive projects across Europe and China. After key roles at Renault and supporting two Chinese startups, he built A2mac1’s Chinese subsidiary from the ground up, growing it into a 125-employee center with 30% annual growth. In 2025, he joined DVN to lead its Asia expansion. Based in Shanghai since 2012, he combines deep technical expertise with strong leadership and cross-cultural skills.

Sophie Montibus
Marketing & Communication Coordinator

Sophie is currently studying International Business in English at ESCE (École Supérieure du Commerce Extérieur). She recently returned from a semester abroad in Liverpool, where she explored various aspects of marketing, including consumer behavior, digital tools, and media event management.
Her interest in marketing began during a short internship at M6 Publicité in 2020, and she later gained valuable experience in the automotive sector as a Consumer Intelligence Intern at Forvia. In her free time, Sophie enjoys sewing and crocheting – creative activities that reflect both patience and precision, qualities that she brings to her work as well.

Cindy Freixeda Dias
Event & Communication Coordinator

With a Bachelor’s degree in Fashion and Digital Marketing, she is currently pursuing a Master’s in Event Strategy and Production at Sup de Pub Paris while working in a work-study program. As our Event & Communication Coordinator, she manages event logistics, booth setups, and LinkedIn communications, ensuring the successful execution of each project.

Eiichi Ono
Japan Manager

Since starting at Nissan Motor Co., Ltd., Product Development Division, most of the time I’ve been working in Automotive Industry with more than 40 years experience, through having engaged in several Japanese and Foreign-affiliated Global Companies for Exterior components especially Lighting System and Interior and Electric/Electronics products fields.

Since 2019, I have been working as a Representative of DVN Japan.

Jean-Claude Lebrun
DVN President

Multi serial entrepreneur, Jean Claude Lebrun was the founder of 2 IT consulting company in France and made the acquisition of SWISSVOICE in 2006 , spin off of ASCOM Terminals Division, one of the European leader in the Telecommunication industry.
Since December 2015, Jean Claude Lebrun has been the founder and the President of BSCA Group, managing BSCA Partners, a PLM integrator company and President of ELITE Industrial Engineering after the takeover of ELITE Industrial Engineering .
Since 2020, he has been President of Driving Vision News, DVN, a news pipeline dedicated to keeping the lighting and driver assistance community informed of the latest progress and development in the industry.Jean Claude Lebrun also acts as Business Angels and is an active investor in several start-ups.

Eric Amiot
DVN Lidar General Editor

Eric Amiot, after graduating Supelec-Paris, has a long experience in managing high tech
innovations incl.
ADAS systems (27 years at Valeo, an automotive supplier) such as Blind Spot Detection radar (2008) and Automotive Lidar for Autonomous Driving (2018).
At Valeo, he held several positions of R&D director, Business Development director for radar (Worldwide) and ADAS systems.

Paul-Henri Matha
DVN CEO & General Editor Lighting

Graduated from Ecole des Mines Saint Etienne in 2000. 18 years’ experience in Renault France in the lighting department, from project leader position to lighting expert. 5 years’ experience in Volvo cars Sweden as exterior lighting, technical leader. Member of SAE lighting expert group. Former Member of GTB, chairman of working Group installation and co-chair of working group Strategy. President of SIA VISION Congress. Member of IFAL organization committee. Member of ISAL organization committee. Paul Henri joined DVN in August 2023 and has been appointed CEO in august 2024.

Ann Ai
China Manager

Living in Shenzhen China, she is quite proficient in English Language, after 12 years international marketing working experience in general LED lighting, she joined DVN since 2021 as representative basing China, supporting DVN China operation for Lighting, Interior and Sensing.

Emilie Ogor Bonnet
Marketing & Communication Director

Emilie entire career has been in event organization, content management, and craf[1]ting 360° marketing strategies across all communication channels to enhance brand visibility. Emilie started in 2007 at Valeo in the the communication department, then joined the SIA as manager for all event and communication for 10y. Building on this experience, Emilie shifted her focus to digital solutions, leading the digital marketing departments of several startups. In 2024, she joined DVN as Marketing and Communication Director.

Christophe Lameiras
Back Office Manager

Christophe has extensive experience in finance with several successful internships in accounting firms. He joined a major business school and was able to study in Paris, San Francisco, and Shanghai. He joined DVN in March 2021 for his end-of-study internship alongside Salomon Berner and since September 2021, he’s the Back Office & Finance Manager of DVN.

Geoffrey Lebrun
Financial & Operations Director

Geoffrey has a long-standing experience in Finance. He started his career in Private Equity specialized in infrastructure & renewable energy and then shifted to the advi­sory world, to join Capstone Finance a M&A firm based in Paris.
Geoffrey joined the DVN team in 2021, and he will oversee the Operation and the development of all future DVN events.

Carsten Befelein
DVN Senior Advisor

Carsten Befelein is an expert for automotive lighting with enthusiasm for styling aspects. He likes to work out cognitive and connected lighting innovations and concepts with feasibility and economic studies for a successful serial implementation. Carsten Befelein started his professional career as soldier, teacher for Physics and Sports and worked from 1987 to 2009 at BMW as Dipl. Physicist in the departments for lighting, electronics, interior components and styling. In 2010 Carsten Befelein founded his own engineering office “CB-Lichtdesign” to create styling and customer relevant lighting solutions for automotive and general lighting. From 2012 to 2019 he additionally worked at Toyota Boshoku Europe and Techniplas-Weidplas to develop “smart trim parts” with innovative lighting and electronic integrations in plastic components. As pensioner he continues working at “CB-Lichtdesign” for different companies and DVN & DVN-I on the latest lighting technologies, trends and innovations.

Gerd Bahnmueller
DVN Senior Advisor

Gerd began his career in 1987 with six years in technical IT at Robert Bosch GmbH. He then spent 21 years at Bosch and Automotive Lighting in R&D for front lighting, holding managerial and director-level positions with global responsibilities. Following that, he served for six years at Automotive Lighting and Marelli as Vice President of R&D for Lighting and Electronics, until the end of 2020. He is currently working as an independent consultant and serves as a Senior Advisor at DVN.

Jean-Paul Ravier
DVN Senior Advisor

Jean-Paul Ravier graduated from ISAE SUPAERO and IAE Paris. He worked for over 41 years at Valeo, including 29 years at Valeo Lighting. He retired from Valeo in 2013 and was appointed chair of the ELS program (Embedded Lighting Systems) holding that position through the end of 2017 and is now Senior Advisor for DVN

Wolfgang Huhn
DVN Senior Advisor

From 1987 to 2000, Wolfgang Huhn worked at BMW as head of lighting development then as Head of Production Planning Electrics / Electronics. In 1999, he got the PHD at TU Darmstadt. From 2001 to 2005 in Audi AG, Dr.Huhn was Head of Development Lighting and Switches. From 2006 until the beginning of 2021, he was Head of Development Lighting and Vision Systems at Audi. Wolfgang acts now as DVN Senior Advisor and he is still GTB Strategy WG Chairman. Dr Huhn is one of the foremost worldwide experts in automotive lighting and has greatly influenced the evolution of lighting technologies.

Alain Servel
DVN Lidar General Editor

Since 1992, Alain has been a Research and Innovation Engineer at PSA Peugeot Citroën, in the area of Autono­mous Driving Assist and Cooperative Intelligent Transport Systems. In this position, he has been directly involved in the developments of several innovations and ADAS applications like Distance Alert, Adaptive Cruise Control or Lane Change As­sist.
Since 2000’s he was recognized internally and externally as an Expert on ADAS sensors, with a particular experience and knowledge on automotive Ra­dars and Lidars. He has been also acting for PSA Groupe in different European or national projects like RESPONSE, ADASE 2, UDC, PREVENT, DRIVE-C2X, ARPOD, RASSUR79, and in standardization organizations like ETSI-ITS or ISO TC204.
Since 2019 he is acting as consultant for several research institutes and for DVN.

Philippe Aumont
DVN Interior General Editor

Philippe Aumont is an experienced executive with more than 40 years in the auto-motive interior supplier industry. He’s an engineering and business graduate and has completed many general management programs. He acted as Chief Technology Officer at Faurecia Seating between 2011 and 2017. Previously he worked at Roth Frères, Johnson Controls, and Faurecia in various positions including R&D, marketing, strategy, new product development, open innovation, startups, university; his earlier experience was in JIT, production, program management, costing, and sales.

Daniel Stern
Chief Editor

Daniel Stern, DVN’s Chief Editor based in Vancouver, BC, Canada, is considered by DVN President Hector Fratty as one of the five greatest lighting experts in North America. He is an appointed member of the US transportation Research Board Visibility Committee, which steers North America research on matters related to automotive conspicuity, lighting performance and regulation. He is an active member of the SAE Lighting Systems Group, and attends and participates in the world’s automotive symposia and technical conferences.

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