Merriden Varrall

Dr Merriden Varrall is CEO of vantage geopol., a geopolitical strategist and insights consultant helping organisations understand how shifts in global power, state behaviour and strategic competition shape real-world operating risk.

Her work focuses on translating geopolitical dynamics into structured judgement for senior decision-makers, including scenario design, escalation pathway analysis and strategic stress-testing.

Formerly KPMG Australia’s Lead Partner on geopolitics, Merriden is now Special Advisor Geopolitics to KPMG South ASPAC and an Associate Director with the Australian Centre for International Trade and Investment. She is a sought-after analyst on geopolitics, East Asia, China’s foreign policy and the implications of great-power rivalry for regional order and economic security.

Her analysis has appeared in The New York Times, Foreign Policy, Nikkei Asia, The Quarterly, East Asia Forum and the Lowy Interpreter, among others.

From 2014 to 2018, Merriden was Director of the Lowy Institute’s East Asia Program. Prior to that, she worked as a senior UN diplomat based in China, following roles with the Australian Government Treasury and the Department of Family and Community Services.

Merriden lived and worked in China for almost a decade, including lecturing in foreign policy at the China Foreign Affairs University and conducting extensive fieldwork for her doctoral dissertation on Chinese strategic thinking and external engagement.

She holds a PhD on Chinese foreign policy from Macquarie University and the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, a Master of International Affairs from the Australian National University and an undergraduate degree in international studies, majoring in China studies, from the University of Technology Sydney.

As a AADA 2026 Main Stage panellist, Merriden brings a geopolitical perspective to the Global Challenges – Dealer Impact discussion, helping dealers understand how global power shifts, strategic competition, China’s international role and regional risk can affect automotive markets, supply chains and business decision-making.