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They’re in! Meet the DEMO Fall 2012 Speakers
Matt Marshall
DEMO, a semiannual showcase of startups and new products, returns to Silicon Valley on Tuesday!
We’ve got a blockbuster lineup of companies — about 80 of them — set to demonstrate new products and services. This is the most the event has had since the go-go days of 2000.
We’ve also got a star lineup of investors, executives, and entrepreneurs to provide immediate feedback on each set of demonstrators, as “sages on the stage.”
Below are some of the speakers and sages. Most of the action is Wednesday and Thursday, Oct. 2 and Oct. 3, at the Hyatt Regency in Santa Clara, Calif. And no, it’s not too late to register for the event and join the thousand or so folks on hand to see the action. A host of tech press, investors, and biz and corporate development ecosystem players will be networking in the halls.
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VentureBeat coproduces the event in partnership with IDG Enterprise. It’s been the launchpad for such blockbusters as Palm, E*Trade, Salesforce, Webex, Tivo, VMware, Fusion-io, and thousands of others.
George Hu is COO of Salesforce.com. Hu owns all major shared operational functions at Salesforce.com, including information technology, employee success, facilities, and security, as well as the platform division, global marketing, strategic alliances, and corporate development. Hu joined Salesforce.com in 2002 and has served in a variety of management roles including vice president of product marketing, senior vice president of applications, executive vice president of products, and chief marketing officer. Prior to joining Salesforce.com, Hu held product management and strategic consulting roles at North Point Communications and Boston Consulting Group. Hu was named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2010.
Ray Kurzweil is one of the world’s leading inventors and futurists, with a 25-year track record of accurate predictions. Called the “restless genius” by The Wall Street Journal and “the ultimate thinking machine” by Forbes magazine, Kurzweil was selected as one of the top entrepreneurs by Inc. magazine, which described him as the “rightful heir to Thomas Edison.” At the DEMO conference, Kurzweil will reveal concepts and ideas from his next book, How to Create a Mind. In this book, Kurzweil presents a provocative exploration of the most important project in human-machine civilization: reverse engineering the brain to understand precisely how it works and using that knowledge to create even more intelligent machines.
Evan Williams is an American entrepreneur who has cofounded two of the biggest services on the Internet: Blogger (one of the first and largest blogging applications, which he ran for four years before selling to Google in 2003), and Twitter, where he was the CEO for two years and now serves on the board of directors. Evan has been recognized as one of Inc.‘s Entrepreneurs of the Decade, one of the 100 most influential people in the world, according to Time, and named a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum. Evan is currently CEO of The Obvious Corporation, which spun out of Twitter, Inc. in 2007.
Ricardo Angel is the senior vice president at GE Energy Financial Services, where he is focused on investing in emerging energy and water technology companies. Based in San Francisco, Angel joined GE Energy Financial Services from ChevronTexaco Technology Ventures. He previously worked in investment banking at Goldman Sachs and as a technology consultant with CNA Corporation.
Mike Cassidy is a director at Google. Prior to joining Google, Cassidy was the cofounder and CEO of four startups: Ruba, Xfire, Direct Hit, and Stylus Innovation. Ruba helped travelers share their favorite places and was acquired by Google. Xfire helps gamers play online with their friends and was acquired by MTV for $110 million. Direct Hit was a revolutionary search engine whose customers included MSN, Lycos, AOL, and and was acquired by Ask.com for $500 million. Stylus Innovation’s flagship product was computer telephony software Visual Voice. Artisoft acquired Stylus for $13 million.
Frank Chen is a partner at the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz. He runs the research and deal team at the firm, which systematically identifies and evaluates investment opportunities and builds knowledge about technology, people, and trends. Prior to Andreessen Horowitz, Frank was the vice president of strategy for HP Software, where he helped the company understand and act on changes resulting from the rapid enterprise adoption of virtualization technologies across servers, network, and storage. Frank joined HP Software through its acquisition of Opsware, where he was the vice president of products and user experience for a broad set of Opsware’s data center automation products.
Tony Conrad is the cofounder & CEO of about.me (acquired by AOL in December 2010) and Sphere which (acquired by AOL in April 2008). He is also a founding venture partner at True Ventures, leading investments in WordPress, MakerBot, Typekit, and Milk, to name a few. He’s lived in Chicago, New York, New Delhi, Paris, Jakarta, and San Francisco. He’s into entrepreneurship, travel, languages, art, architecture, scuba, running, biking & swimming (KONA Rohto Ironman). Most importantly, he’s got serious parking karma to offset his unfortunate habit of rooting for the Cubs.
Don Dodge is a developer advocate at Google, helping developers build new applications on Google platforms and technologies. Prior to joining Google, Dodge was a startup evangelist at Microsoft. Dodge is also a veteran of five startups, including Forte Software, AltaVista, Napster, Bowstreet, and Groove Networks. Dodge has been in the software business for more than 25 years. He started his software career with Digital Equipment, aka DEC, in the database group.
Josh Elman joined Greylock as a principal in 2011. Over the past 15 years, Elman has worked in product and engineering roles at some of the leading companies in social, commerce, and media. Prior to Greylock, Elman was a product lead for growth and relevance at Twitter and helped Twitter grow its active user base by nearly 10 times. Before Twitter, Elman worked on the platform at Facebook and led the launch of Facebook Connect. Earlier in his career, Elman led product management for Zazzle, was part of the early team at LinkedIn, focused on growth and jobs, and led product and engineering for RealJukebox and RealPlayer at RealNetworks.
Sasan Goodarzi is Intuit’s chief information officer, responsible for the strategy and operations of the company’s technology and business infrastructure. He rejoined Intuit in 2011 after serving as CEO of Nexant Inc. From 2004-2010, Goodarzi led several major Intuit businesses, including president of Intuit Financial Services and vice president of the professional tax division. Previously, he held roles at Invensys and Honeywell and served as CEO and cofounder of Lazer Cables Inc.
Dr. Nate Gross loves working with entrepreneurs at the intersection of health and technology. He is the cofounder of Rock Health, the accelerator for digital health startups, which offers $100,000 investments and an intensive incubator curriculum to health entrepreneurs. He is also the cofounder of Doximity, the physician network and HIPAA-compliant API platform.
David Hagan is president and CEO at Boingo. Hagan is responsible for the strategic direction and day-to-day operations. He has over 20 years experience in senior management roles in the telecommunications industry and has served as division president and executive vice president for Sprint, launching both the consumer business and an ISP service in Canada under the Sprint brand. Dave was previously the CEO for FirstSource Corp. and president/chief operating officer of Ticketmaster Online CitySearch. Boingo launched at DEMO in 2002.
Tracy Isacke is Director of Investments and Business Development at Telefónica Digital. Tracy is spearheading the growth of Telefónica Digital. Tracy joined Telefónica in 2006 as the head of the Enterprise Sales Team for O2 UK, quickly winning a number of major accounts and significantly reducing churn by focusing on customer satisfaction. Tracy started her career at Xerox, becoming the first female member of the UK Board, leading a team of over 450 people. She then spent four years getting a taste of what life is like in an early stage company, working in a VC-backed start-up that went on to achieve a successful exit.
Jason Johnson is the Managing Partner of Founders Den, as well as CEO and co-founder of mobile software startup AirCover. He is also the co-founder of TEDxSF and RethinkBooks, a mentor for Founders Institute and an advisor to multiple startups. Previously he was an entrepreneur and Vice President of Dolby Laboratories (NYSE: DLB), Vice President of Global IP Solutions (acquired by Google) and was the co-founder and CEO of InterQuest Communications (acquired by Darwin Networks). He lives in San Francisco with his wife and son.
Sheila Jordan is senior vice president of Communication and Collaboration IT at Cisco Systems, reporting to CIO Rebecca Jacoby. Since joining Cisco in 2005, she has assumed increasing leadership responsibilities within the IT organization and was promoted to her current position in November 2011. Today Sheila is responsible for delivering and integrating key IT services that touch Cisco’s global workforce. Her goal is to drive productivity and a superior, holistic end-user experience for all employees through an integrated architectural approach. She oversees a worldwide team of more than 500 IT professionals.
Clay Kellogg is the Chief Revenue Officer for Chartboost. Clay is responsible for leading the sales and business development teams for Chartboost, a technology platform that powers over 4,000 mobile games. Clay previously ran the Global Mobile Platform and Partnerships team and the AdMob Application Sales team at Google. He joined Google in May 2010 as part of the company’s acquisition of AdMob where he led the Business Development and Publisher Partnership teams for North America. Before joining AdMob, Clay held various Product Management, Business Development, and Sales management roles at Qualcomm, Autodesk, InfoSpace, and Kivera.
Joe Kraus is a Partner at Google Ventures. Prior to Google Ventures, Joe was a two-time entrepreneur. In 1993, he co-founded Excite.com, an early Internet search engine, holding multiple positions in the company, including leadership roles in product, business development, and marketing. More recently, he co-founded JotSpot in 2004, a wiki company that was acquired by Google in 2006. While at Google, Joe had multiple product management roles including Blogger, Picasa, Sites, Friend Connect, and OpenSocial. In addition, Joe has been an active angel investor in multiple companies, including LinkedIn, Aardvark (sold to Google in 2010), Kongregate, and OpenCandy. Joe is also on the board of the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF.org).
Jason Krikorian is a General Partner at DCM. He is currently a board member of FiveStars, SigFig and Basis Science. Jason brings an entrepreneur’s perspective to DCM, having previously co-founded the digital media and device company Sling Media. Among its many accolades, Sling Media received an Emmy Award for the Slingbox. At Sling Media, Jason held various positions including EVP of Business Development, EVP of Marketing, and CFO during the evolution of the company. The breadth of his responsibilities there reflects the extensive expertise required of an entrepreneur and exemplifies Jason’s capacity to guide portfolio companies along in their development at DCM.
Mitch Lasky has spent more than two decades in the mobile gaming, new media and interactive entertainment business. Prior to joining Benchmark Capital, Mitch served as executive vice president of Mobile and Online at Electronic Arts. Previously, he was chairman and CEO of JAMDAT Mobile. Prior to JAMDAT, Mitch served as general manager of eCompanies Wireless LLC, a startup incubator. He also spent time at Activision and most recently as EVP of Worldwide Studios. Mitch has also practiced intellectual property law, worked at the Walt Disney Company and started a massively multiplayer online game company.
Claire Lee moved to Silicon Valley in 2011 to lead partnerships for the Emerging Business Team at Microsoft, engaging partners globally to support early stage software developers and startups. Claire formed part of the team that created the BizSpark program in 2008, with over 50,000 startups in 110 countries and 2,400 partners. BizSpark partners comprise leading incubators, accelerators, universities, entrepreneurship groups, foundations, banks, and organizations that enable early stage companies. Examples include StartX and Startup Weekend. Before Microsoft, Claire worked with Compaq at the global distributor, Ingram Micro and with Siemens at Marconi Communications. Claire began her career as a graduate with IBM Ireland.
Cindy McKenzie is responsible for developing and delivering shared application services to over 10,000 employees at more than nine Fox and News Corporation companies around the world. Areas supported include Finance, Human Resources, Payroll, Legal, Corporate Security, Content Security, Corporate Intranet, Tax, Treasury, Audit, Risk, and Royalties. Cindy joined Fox in 2001 as VP of Enterprise Technical Systems for Fox Filmed Entertainment. In 2006, her organization was migrated into the broader Fox Group where Cindy led the implementation of a shared services organization and corresponding governance model supporting all Fox companies. Since the group’s inception the number of services and companies supported has grown by over 50%.
Jason Mendelson has over a dozen years of experience in the venture capital and technology industries in a multitude of investing, operational and engineering roles. Prior to co-founding Foundry Group, Jason was a Managing Director and General Counsel for Mobius Venture Capital, where he also acted as its chief administrative partner overseeing all operations of the firm. He currently serves on the board of directors of Attachments.me, Brightleaf, Next Big Sound, Oblong, Occipital, Openspace, Organic Motion, Sifteo, Singly, Sympoz and Urban Airship for Foundry Group.
Claudia Fan Munce has been Managing Director of the IBM Venture Capital Group since 2004. In addition to this role, she is Vice President of IBM Corporate Strategy. Ms. Munce joined IBM’s Research Division in 1985 and she’s held many technical and business leadership positions within IBM. Externally, Ms. Munce serves on the board of directors of US National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) where she served previously as the chairwoman of its Corporate Advisory Board. She also served on the board of directors of Latin America Venture Capital Association (LAVCA) as well as many other venture advisory boards around the globe.
Adam Nash is an entrepreneurial executive at Greylock Partners with a passion for product and deep experience with mobile and social platforms. He joined Greylock Partners in 2011 as an Executive in Residence, where he advises the leadership teams of the firm’s existing consumer technology companies as well as evaluating new investment opportunities. Prior to joining Greylock, Adam was Vice President of Product Management at LinkedIn. Most recently, Adam led LinkedIn’s Platform & Mobile products, including the launch of LinkedIn’s open developer platform and their highly successful native applications and mobile web experiences.
Steph Palmeri is a Principal with SoftTech VC, where she invests in early stage consumer internet companies including next generation commerce, mobile services, and SaaS. She has over a decade of experience working at the intersection of marketing and technology. At SoftTech VC, Steph’s work includes opportunity reviews, due diligence, market analysis, and dealflow management, in addition to active involvement with SoftTech VC portfolio companies. Prior to joining SoftTech VC, Steph was an active member in New York City’s emergent VC and entrepreneurial community where she was an Associate with early-stage venture fund NYC Seed and launched the NYC SeedStart incubator.
Will Price is the CEO of Flite, an online advertising technology company. Flite pioneered the category of cloud-based advertising, helping brands and publishers deliver ads, powered by the real-time web, that outperform traditional display by 10+ times. Today, the company powers advertising solutions for P&G, LinkedIn, IDG, CBS, L’Oreal, Schwab, and other leading companies. Prior to joining Flite, Will was Managing Director at Hummer Winblad Venture Partners. Previously, Will served as CEO and COO of several software startups.
Adeo Ressi is CEO of the Founder Institute, an idea-stage incubator for high-tech entrepreneurs with chapters in over 26 cities worldwide. The Institute plans to help launch 1,000 companies per year worldwide. Adeo serves as the Founding Member of TheFunded.com, an online resource for CEO’s to research, rate, and review venture firms worldwide. TheFunded.com has two goals: streamline the fundraising process and encourage more innovation through venture investment.
Harshul Sanghi is the managing partner of American Express Ventures at American Express, with extensive corporate venture and mobile experience and relationships. He’s focused on forging partnerships with the technology and venture community to continue strengthening American Express’ leadership position. Harshul oversaw the opening of and runs American Express’ first Silicon Valley office. He is also leading American Express’ $100 million Digital Commerce Initiative, working with his team to invest in innovative, digital commerce start-ups.
Tom Soderstrom is the IT CTO at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. He leads a collaborative, practical, and hands-on approach with JPL and industry to investigate and infuse emerging IT technology trends that are relevant to JPL, NASA, and large enterprises. Tom has led remote teams and large scale IT best practices and tools development and change efforts in small startups, large commercial companies, in international venues, and in the US Government arena. Tom is a frequent speaker on the future of IT. He is currently consulting with industry and government leaders on what we can do about on cloud computing, big data, mobility, consumerization and how to transform IT into Innovating Together.
Pete Sonsini joined NEA in 2005 and focuses on early-stage enterprise software and consumer companies. He is currently co-head of NEA’s enterprise software practice group. Pete also serves on the board of the Silicon Valley Forum and in 2011 was named as a “Rising Star” of the next generation of venture capital general partners by Dow Jones Private Equity Analyst. Prior to joining NEA, Pete was Senior Director of Strategic Alliances at VMware.
Seth Sternberg is the Product Management Director for Platform on the Google+ team. Seth joined Google through its acquisition of Meebo, where he was the Co-Founder and CEO. Meebo, a consumer Internet company, reached more than half of the U.S. internet population, working to make sites more social and engaging. Sternberg, along with college friends Elaine Wherry and Sandy Jen, started Meebo in 2005. The flagship product, the Meebo Bar, has been integrated by more than 8,000 websites including Entertainment Weekly, TV Guide, Dilbert, The Washington Examiner.
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