Born in London and educated at Oxford, Wally Olins is the co-founder of Wolff Olins and was chairman of the company until 1997. He is now chairman of Saffron Brand Consultants and one of the world's most experienced practitioners in corporate identity and branding.

Olins's main interests are the big ideas behind organisations, including mergers and acquisitions. He has a particular interest in and experience of the branding of regions and nations and was responsible for the branding programme of Øresund, the first region between the nations Denmark, Copenhagen and Sweden's Malmö. He has also worked on the national brand image programme for Poland.

In addition, he has advised many of the world's leading organisations on identity, branding, communication and related matters. These include 3i, Akzo-Nobel, Repsol, Q8, the Portuguese Tourist Board, BT, Prudential, Renault, Volkswagen and Tata. He has worked in the public sector with the Metropolitan Police, the National Housing Federation and many other bodies and has also acted as advisor both to McKinsey and Bain, on branding and marketing.

He has written several books including the seminal work Corporate Identity. His book Trading Identities: How Countries and Companies are Taking on Each Other's Roles was published by the Foreign Policy Centre, a UK Foreign Office think tank. Wally Olins on Brand was published by Thames & Hudson in 10 countries in 2004.

In 1999, Olins was awarded a CBE and nominated for the Prince Philip Designers Prize. A year later, he received the Royal Society of Arts' Bicentenary Medal for his contribution to design and marketing. He was also given the D&AD President's Award in 2003.

He is currently visiting fellow at Said Business School in Oxford and visiting professor at Lancaster University and Copenhagen Business School. He holds regular seminars on branding and communication issues around the world.