Laura Wittig, CEO

Liza Moiseeva, Co-Founder

Brightly is a community-driven lifestyle brand empowering conscious consumers

Seattle, WA.

Paroma Indilo, CEO

Kaleb Wilson, Co-Founder

Datacy is a real-time consumer insights data marketplace.

San Jose, CA

Kathryn Harrrison, CEO

Jason Law, Co-Founder

FixFake makes digital authentication tools and risk-scoring to stop fraud for e-commerce marketplaces.

Bozeman, MT

Justine Barone, CEO

Gearo; an outdoor gear marketplace with 200+ retailers and thousands of products.

Denver, CO

Ashlee Wisdom, CEO

Eddwina Bright, Co-Founder

Health In Her HUE is a digital platform connecting Black women to culturally competent healthcare providers, services, and content.

New York City, NY

Akilah Releford, CEO

Mary Louise Cosmetics makes Organic personal care products.

Los Angeles, CA

Stephanie Estey, CEO

TBD Health is easy, intuitive at-home STI screening for women.

Daphne Chen, Co-Founder

New York City, NY

Gabriela Trueba, CEO

Womp: a revolutionary social and 3D creation platform.

Brooklyn, NY

Hey, there! My name is Alex Iskold and I am a Tech Entrepreneur & Investor working in New York City. Currently, I am a Co-Founder and Managing Director at 2048 Ventures. Read more about me http://startuphacks.vc/about

I write about startups and venture here: http://startuphacks.vc

What I’m working on now:
– Co-Founded and building earliest stage venture firm called 2048 Ventures
– Investing in companies differentiated through technology
– Investing in startups across US and Canada
– Co-founder 1kproject.org focused on pandemic relief
– Coaching and helping as a VC in Residence at the Arthur Rock Center for Entrepreneurship at the Harvard Business School

What I’ve worked on in the past:
– Ran Techstars NYC program for 5 years and invested in 100 startups
– Founded GetGlue – a leading social TV network. (acquired by i.tv, 2013)
– Created one of the most exciting startups in NYC, backed by Union Square Ventures, RRE
Ventures, TimeWarner Investments, Rho Ventures
– Won 2011 Mashable Breakout Startup of the Year (awesome)
– Named to Hollywood Reporter 2012 Digital Power 50 (surreal)
– Started a company called Information Laboratory (acquired by IBM, 2003)
– Built new grid computing technology at DataSynapse (acquired by TIBCO, 2009).
– Contributed hundreds of articles to influential technology blog, ReadWriteWeb.
– Invented software analysis and visualization tool called Small Worlds
– Taught award-winning undergraduate software engineering class at NYU
– Contributed to development of innovative visualization technology called Thinkmap
– Engineered large-scale financial applications for D.E.Shaw & Co. and Goldman Sachs

Global senior supply chain & operational executive with experience in Retail and Technology at Fortune 50 companies. A dynamic and strategic thinker with a record of delivering results and pushing organizations to new levels of performance. Capable of leading critical, enterprise-wide initiatives through strong collaboration, qualitative & quantitative decision-making, and engaging talent management. Passionate about solving complex business problems to meet the future of customer-obsessed fulfillment.
End to end operational experiences: business development, fulfillment & distribution operations, network strategy, capacity management, supplier compliance & collaboration, data & analytics, team leadership.

Ali founded Leadout Capital in 2018. Her career includes operating roles in technology, finance & investing and, professional sports. Ali was one Facebook’s earliest business hires where she was instrumental in driving growth and adoption of Facebook Mobile. Ali was most recently, the VP of Partnerships at Wealthfront

Ali began her career at Goldman Sachs and following GS, joined General Atlantic Partners. She was an EIR at Greylock Partners and was an active angel investor from 2011-2018 with over 30 investments in consumer software, mobile messaging and SaaS businesses.

Ali served as PAGE Fellow in President Barack Obama’s administration, and was a pro cyclist from 2008-2010. From 2011-2019, she has served on the board of AutoNation (NYSE: AN). In 2019, GLAAD honored her with the Ric Weiland Award, which recognizes an innovator in tech and new media who is advancing equality and recognition of the LGBTQ community. She lives in the Bay Area with her wife and two kids.

Alicia Dara is a nationally recognized speech and presentation coach based in Seattle. She has helped thousands of people including CEO’s, Global VPs, Executive Directors and Presidential candidates break through blocks, find their voice, and put it to work.

Her most popular group training is “Power Voice for Career Women”, which helps women strengthen their voices, clarify their messaging, and push back against workplace sexism. Corporate clients include Microsoft (where she is a vendor), WeWork (where she is a vendor), Kimpton Hotels, Planned Parenthood, The Riveter, The Rivkin Center, Carhartt, and Premera. Private clients include the National Women’s Political Caucus, the Female Founders Alliance, and members of Amazon, Merrill Lynch, Seattle Trade Commission, Windermere, and Lake Partners.

Alicia was born into a family of Grammy-award winning symphony musicians. She studied musical theater in New York City and is an AMDA grad. As a musician she has released 5 original solo records and 4 with her current band Diamondwolf. Her writings about public speaking and creativity have appeared in Lioness Magazine, Thrive Global, The Select 7, Medium, CoveyClub, The Write Life, and Daily OM.

Alicia has served on the Board of Advocates of Planned Parenthood of the Great Northwest and Hawaiian Islands, and has spoken extensively about being a feminist activist since the age of 15. In 2017 Alicia became Board President of the City Garden Community Acupuncture Clinic.

10+ years of experience within Customer Experience, Strategy, Operations and Finance. Have worked across North America, Europe, and Sub-Saharan Africa.

Recent work focus has been centered around driving operational improvements through technology and digitization.

Technologist with more than 20 years cross functional experience with the design, building and management of software products.

Currently advising startups working on mobile and market place solutions.

Especially interested in challenging solutions involving technologies touching every day life. Loves to grow teams and create scalable solutions that make a difference.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did. So throw off the bowlines, sail away from the safe harbor, catch the trade winds in your sails. Explore. Dream. Discover.” –Mark Twain

Arry is a 20-year industry veteran, serial founder, and strategic operator with expertise in scaling technology businesses with a consistent track record building high performing teams. Key strengths include:
1. Management/leadership organizational change, design, and strategy experience, in addition to high visibility leadership in the technology and blockchain community
2. Delivering product (both enterprise and consumer) with high quality and highly engaged customers
3. Building communities/partnerships
She is founding Chair of the Cascadia Blockchain Council and Board Member with the Washington Technology Industry Association (WTIA). She also serves as the Managing Director of Yellow Umbrella Ventures advising and investing in technology companies with six companies in their portfolio to date. Her entrepreneurial experience begins in 1999, and includes:
· As a first-time CEO and co-founder of GiftStarter, Arry raised $640,000 in angel funding in 2015, while also 8 months pregnant. She and her team of five, onboarded several partnerships like B&H Photo Video, butter London, and Providence Health. Together, they built one of the largest databases of products and brands globally, where people could go to the destination site and find/search for any product sold online to purchase it with multiple payment methods.
· Arry led the $32 mm Storm Token Initial Coin Offering (ICO), building a global crypto-community for Storm in less than six months. Co-Founder and COO/President, she took the team from original two founders to over 25 employees globally. An innovator, inventor and writer, she is widely published: Forbes, CNN Money, Huffington Post, U.S. News & World Report, Puget Sound Business Journal, Geekwire, Retailing Today, and Seattle Times. Additionally, over the years, Arry has worked regularly with both investors and development across four continents to launch the products
o In addition to investing in Tenta Browser, Arry did an analysis of their roadmap/strategy with strong recommendations to adjust focus and messaging. This led to investment by Consensus/Joe Lubin, as well as more attention to product marketing as a focus in the three months following Arry’s analysis.

Marketing leader with a proven track record of bringing category defining solutions to market. Over 18 years of experience in driving strategic go-to-market initiatives and building top performing teams with demonstrated success in accelerating revenue growth. Experienced in leading senior marketing teams for award-winning SaaS, on-premises and hybrid enterprise software solutions with responsibilities in managing go-to-market strategy, growth and demand marketing, sales and channel enablement, alliance management and product launches.

Recognized for the ability to naturally lead initiatives and start-up non-existent functions, projects and processes to fill business gaps with operational excellence. Exceptional leadership skills with the ability to clearly communicate strategy that cross-functional teams aggressively execute. Earned Master of Science degree with the highest distinction and a Director’s Award for academic excellence.

An active advocate for diversity and leadership and recognized with awards by organizations committed to the cause including Female Executive of the Year – Stevie awards for women in business and Business Leadership Award by the National Diversity Council.

Experienced technologist focused on hard problems like quantum computation, networking and distributed systems, machine learning, and leadership.

William (Bill) Bryant has had early involvement in >25 leading enterprise & consumer software and Internet companies, serving as founder, senior exec, investor & BOD member. These companies have collectively reached >$8.5B in value. Bill is currently a GP w/ Threshold Ventures (fka DFJ), serving on the BODs of Chef, Remitly, Yellowbrick, Xealth and Pro.com. Past DFJ investments include Ping Identity, Z2Live, Varolii, Azuqua, Reflect. He is an advisor to Socrata, Winshuttle, Liquid Planner, Limeade.

Other Investments: Swype,, Varolii, Banzai, Observa, Contour, Vizify, Thumb, Cascadia Capital, mInfo, SensorsinMotion, ACL, Bonanzle, Banyan Branch, Clipboard.

Previously, Bill was Partner w/ Atlas Ventures, where he originated its investment in Isilon. Prior to Atlas, Bill co-founded Qpass (acquired by Amdocs), serving as CEO & later Chmn. In mid 90s, he co-founded Netbot, acquired by Excite (1st comparison shopping agent, Jango; 1st metasearch engine, MetaCrawler), serving as President.

In early 90s, he was founding VP of WW Sales & Mktg at Visio (Microsoft). Bill was an early investor/BOD member in 15 cos that were acquired or went public: Swype (Nuance), Mpire (comScore), Loudeye (Nokia), AEI Music (Liberty Media), Shelfari (Amazon), Delve (Limelight), Jabber (Cisco), Viafone (Extended Systems), Teamplate (Captaris), Exstatic Software (Xchange Applications), Throw (Excite), Singing Fish (Thomson/AOL), NearMe (HandsOn Mobile), WebRelevance (Medio), Shelfari (Amazon). In addition, Bill consulted extensively to Microsoft, Real Networks, Getty Images & Corbis. Early in his career, he held VP Mktg/GM roles for Micrografx, Software Publishing & Traveling Software. Other recent BODs: Intrinsyc.

Senior sales, marketing & biz dev roles at four leading software companies (Visio, Micrografx, Software Publishing, Traveling SW). Consultant to Microsoft, Getty Images and Real Networks. Experienced BOD member, mentor capitalist and advisor.

SexTech Innovator, Sex Educator, Digital Marketer, and Co-Founder of Juicebox.

Redefining sexual wellness and erotica with “Slutbot” a virtual lover and sex educator.
Read about Juicebox and Slutbot in the NYTimes, Mashable, Cosmo, NYPost, VentureBeat, and more.

One of the first women in history to create a Scotch Whisky Company. SIA Scotch Whisky, a delicious blend with a 96 Points rating from the Ultimate Spirits Challenge, a Double Gold Medal in the San Francisco World Spirits Competition, and an “Outstanding!” Rating from Whisky Advocate Magazine.

SIA was the 1st Scotch Whisky to ever be Crowdfunded via Kickstarter.com and is now available across 2,000+ bars, restaurants and stores or online at www.ShopSiaScotch.com

Carolyn Fikke is an angel investor and has been a Managing Director at Golden Seeds, an early stage investment firm focused on women-led businesses, since 2012. She is the Leader of the Consumer Products and Applications (B2C and B2B2C) Sector Group. She is currently a Board member of Little Pim Corporation, a Board observer at Brainscape, and an Advisor to Cosynd.

Previously, Carolyn enjoyed an 18-year career as an investment banker. She was a Managing Director and Head of the Retail and Consumer Products Group in the Corporate Finance Department at KPMG. Prior to that, she was a Managing Director in the Retail and Consumer Products Industry Group in the Investment Banking Department at Prudential Securities.

Her product expertise was in public offerings and private placements of equity and debt financings, and financial advisory engagements, primarily for middle market companies. Carolyn received her MBA from the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business and her BA from Brown University.

I am interested in technology that furthers the whole human.

More specifically, I am intrigued and excited by companies that are solving for the impact of a multi-generational, hyperconnected society – at home, at work, and everything in between. The name of the game is mission-driven founders looking to make a deep, positive impact on the 99% and that means constantly asking the question, “How can we empower/support more people to thrive and live their best lives?”. That’s a huge part of the American dream I came here to realize many years ago.

An experienced early stage investor, Christie is a General Partner at Backstage Capital, where she evaluates new companies for investment and supports the portfolio of more than 140 companies.

In her role at Backstage, Christie built and leads the Backstage Accelerator program, with a global cohort in London, Detroit, Los Angeles and Philadelphia.

Prior to Backstage, Christie led a multi-faceted career at Verizon, where she was a manager on the Verizon Ventures team, invented a connected IoT device, and led marketing and sales operations for a $4B P+L.

Colleen Badgley practices corporate law, with a focus on all aspects of emerging company development, including corporate formation, venture capital financings and M&A.

While at the University of Michigan Law School, Colleen served as an international fellow at the World
Intellectual Property Organization in Geneva, Switzerland. She was also a member of the
Entrepreneurship Clinic.

Dan Shapiro is the CEO and cofounder of Glowforge, the iconic 3D laser printer. Starting with the biggest 30-day crowdfunding campaign on record, designers have now used their Glowforge printers to create millions of products like wallets, lamps, and furniture. Dan is also the author of Hot Seat: The Startup CEO Guidebook, published by O’Reilly.

Before founding Glowforge, Dan launched the bestselling boardgame in Kickstarter history, Robot Turtles, a game that teaches programming fundamentals to preschoolers. Before his detour as a boardgame designer, Dan served as CEO of Google Comparison, Inc, a Google subsidiary. Shapiro landed at Google when they bought his previous company, comparison shopping website Sparkbuy. Before Sparkbuy, Shapiro was founder and CEO of Photobucket Inc. (formerly Ontela).

Dan’s been featured on NPR, the Wall Street Journal, and on the front page of the New York Times. His game, Robot Turtles, as been sold everywhere from Target to MoMA. He has been awarded a dozen US patents, and received his B.S. in Engineering from Harvey Mudd College.

David is a bootstrapped founder turned angel investor turned operator. He has invested in 15+ seed-stage startups since 2015. David is the founder of TypeFrag.com, a value-added reseller of client-server based voice communication technology popular among groups of online computer game players. Bootstrapped the company to several million in recurring revenue within a few years. At its peak, TypeFrag served millions of gamers who spent a combined 9.6 billion minutes connected to our services each month.He currently serves as COO of venture-backed startup Gamesight.io.

Experienced property & casualty account executive with a demonstrated history of client satisfaction in the insurance industry.

Skilled in sales, key accounts, client relations, customer success, and risk management. Experience in program management, pricing strategy and product marketing.

Early stage tech at Grasshopper Bank.

Public speaker with a primary focus on STEM and youth.

Elisa focuses on sourcing and evaluating new investment opportunities that span the full breadth of Madrona’s investment themes, as well as working with portfolio companies to develop strategies for growth and success. Elisa is particularly interested in intelligent applications, cloud-native software, and the future of work.

Experienced C-level marketing executive helping fast-growing companies assess, position, execute, scale and improve – all with data informing decisions. Advising tech companies. Serving as a board member. Teaching at the University of Washington. Volunteering.

Having joined Tableau Software in 2007 and retired at the end of 2018, was CMO through its rise from a start-up with $5 million in annual revenue to a public company with over $1 billion in annual revenue.

Elizabeth is the founder and Managing Partner of H Venture Partners. Over the past 15 years, she’s invested in over 30 companies in seed through early growth equity all over North America.

Before founding H Venture Partners, Edwards was a partner with Maywic Select Investments, a Series A/B investor in consumer products and devices focused on consumer health, wellness, and wellbeing. Maywic’s portfolio includes Peloton (IPO), Roots (IPO), Freshly, Joy, ALOHA, ONE HOPE Wine, GoldieBlox, The Infatuation (merged: Zagat), Soma (acquired: Full Circle), and SkinnyMom (acquired: Womanista).

Edwards was previously with West Capital, a corporate venture capital manager for Fifth Third Bank, whose portfolio includes Bill.com, CardioInsight (acquired: Medtronic), ALung, OnShift (acquired), and Paydiant (acquired: Paypal).

Edwards began her career as a strategy consultant with the Strategy & Operations practice of Deloitte Consulting, specializing in innovation, corporate strategy, and strategic acquisitions. Select clients include Johnson & Johnson (clinical and consumer) and XM Satellite Radio.

Emily Bruemmer, CIPP/US and CIPP/E, ‘counsels corporate clients across a variety of industries on compliance with intersecting international, federal, and state privacy and data protection laws including the California Consumer Privacy Act and Europe’s General Data Protection Regulation, as well as biometric information and education privacy laws. Emily works with both consumer- and business-facing clients to scope their objectives while navigating compliance challenges in a rapidly changing regulatory landscape, while understanding that each client operates in unique circumstances.

Her experience with international, federal, and state privacy laws and regulations allows Emily to assist at all stages of corporate privacy programs, including conducting due diligence, drafting privacy policies and notices, advising clients on how to operationalize best practices in information governance and cybersecurity, and counseling clients on cross-border data transfer.

Emily has a wide-ranging background in regulatory compliance, particularly in the areas of anti-corruption and financial regulation, including payments. She has participated in high-stakes investigations on behalf of corporate clients, including in connection with the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act and False Claims Act as well as privacy-related investigations. In addition to her privacy and security practice, she has represented pro bono clients in matters ranging from privacy counseling to landlord-tenant, immigration, and civil proceedings.

Francesca is a Business Development Manager at Carta. Francesca joined Carta during their Series B, and has seen magnificent growth.

She has a passion for helping companies scale and working cross-functionally to build products.

Gabby Cazeau is a Senior Associate at Harlem Capital Partners where she focuses on deal sourcing, due diligence, and building partnerships across the tech and entrepreneurship ecosystem.

Gabby received her MBA in 2020 from the Yale School of Management. At Yale, Gabby served as an Innovation Advisor at TSAI City, Yale’s startup incubator and accelerator. She interned at Microsoft where she supported the Mixed Reality (HoloLens) Strategy team as a Program Manager. Prior to Yale, Gabby worked in R&D and Innovation at General Mills where she created new products for iconic brands like Cheerios, Nature Valley, Epic, and FiberOne.

She is Haitian and originally from Maryland. She holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Washington University in St. Louis where she was a John B. Ervin Scholar. In her free time she is an avid reader and enjoys salsa dancing, especially finding a good dance spot while traveling to a new city.

Geraldine is a co-founder of 5H Values Capital which advises and invests in start up and impact-driven businesses. At the core of 5HVC’s philosophy is that leaders who are Humble, Honest, Happy, Hungry and High-Performing (in that order) will build and grow successful organisations that are a force for good. Portfolio companies include Amber Electric, Apolitical, Future Super, Give InKind, Tribute Mentorship and Sendle.

Geraldine has a particular interest in the future of work and sustainable, inclusive communities. She currently works across Seattle and Sydney and is undertaking a Master of Science in Coaching Psychology at the University of Sydney.

Geraldine has held senior leadership roles in Australian listed companies as a member of the Group Executive Committee at the Virgin Australia Group and Australian Stock Exchange with accountability for people and sustainability. She was the Australian Chief Operating Officer for global law firm Baker & McKenzie and started her career as a lawyer and strategy adviser to the CEO at Mallesons.

Geraldine is currently on the Advisory Groups for Welcoming Australia, Give InKind and the WEF’s Forum of Young Global Leaders. She has served on the Boards of the Australian National Committee for UN Women and the Refugee Advice and Casework Service, and founded the WEF’s Global Shapers Community in Sydney. She has been named a Fulbright Scholar, Frank Knox Fellow, Young Global Leader of the World Economic Forum and NSW Telstra Young Business Woman of the Year. A lawyer by training, she is a graduate of Harvard Law School and the Australian National University in Law and Science.

Giselle Rivers represents high growth companies in the technology, media, fashion, e-commerce and consumer product industries.

She advises clients throughout their lifecycle on general corporate law matters as well as complex transactions including debt and equity financings, strategic partnerships, mergers and acquisitions and public securities offerings.

Giselle also regularly represents venture capital and private equity investors in connection with their investments and acquisitions.

Tech is awesome. Geeking out over everything from elegant industrial design to bleeding edge sensor fusion to hyperscale computing infrastructure is just plain fun. I get to spend my days doing exactly that, and then putting it all in context – looking at how tech fits in our ever-changing cultural and behavior landscapes, and figuring out what we can do with it. And I get to do that across organizational boundaries, with partner organizations big and small, because no one person or company should have to go it alone. Neat.

With 25 years of finance experience as an analyst, investor, and entrepreneur, I help entrepreneurs deepen their insights into the key drivers of their business, helping them become “fluent” in understanding and discussing their financial models, and supporting clients’ fundraising efforts. My personal mission is to enable women-led businesses to raise the capital they need to scale their businesses.

Jarrid Tingle is Managing Partner of Harlem Capital Partners where he focuses on deal sourcing, organizational strategy, and due diligence efforts. Jarrid was featured on the 2019 Forbes 30 under 30 list, 2019 Inc. 30 under 30 list, and the 2018 Ebony Power 100 list.

He received his MBA from Harvard Business School (HBS) in 2019 where he was a Baker Scholar (top 5% of class). During HBS, Jarrid was a fellow in the Robert Toigo Foundation and Management Leadership for Tomorrow MBA Programs.

Previously, Jarrid was a Private Equity Investment Professional at ICV Partners. Prior to ICV, Jarrid was an Investment Banker in the Global Technology, Media & Telecommunications Group at Barclays.

Jarrid graduated cum laude from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania with a Bachelor of Science in Economics and a Concentration in Finance. Jarrid was an active member of Friars Senior Society, Onyx Senior Honor Society, and The Lantern Senior Society. Upon graduation, Jarrid received the Wharton Undergraduate Dean’s Award for Excellence (Wharton’s highest honor).

Jarrid’s favorite activities include reading, weight training, traveling, and attending concerts.

Full time individual angel investor and member of different angel groups in Seattle (Grubstakes, Alliance of Angels, SWAN Venture Fund).

With a foundation in psychology, my deep passion for trying to understand the reasoning behind why we do the things that we do is what initially drew me to sales and marketing. That passion fueled me as an entrepreneur and continues to fuel me now as an investor. I’m always fascinated by the behavior of customers and thrive on exploring creative ways to listen, validate, and improve their experiences.

My leadership style:
1) Collaboration: no one really knows the answer, so let’s work together, without ego, to figure it out.
2) Transparency: shining light on dark corners is how you reject inefficiencies, so be upfront.
3) Openness: an open environment means not only being open to others’ ideas, but also sharing your own crazy ones as well.

Judith was on the founding executive team for Square 1 Bank in 2005, responsible for venture capital services globally. Square 1 successfully went public in 2014 and was later sold to Pacific Western Bank. She previously worked at Imperial and Comerica. After 35 years in banking, Judith knew it was the time to make significant changes in the commercial banking industry. Her strategy was to build a bank from scratch providing both a modern technological framework and intuitive user experience for the digital entrepreneurs Grasshopper serves.

Business Development, International Experience,E-Commerce, Retail/Manufacturing Innovation, Operations/Supply Chain, Product/Program Management, Lean/Six-Sigma/Transformation.

Kate Berry is a member of the DWT technology, privacy, and security group where she helps clients navigate and comply with the multitude of state, federal, and international privacy laws that data-driven companies face, including the GDPR, CCPA, COPPA, and FERPA.

Her experience includes counseling clients as they launch new products and services, drafting and negotiating complex commercial agreements with significant technology components, and supporting larger M&A transactions. Kate’s clients range from small startups to the world’s largest technology companies, and from enterprise services to consumer-focused retailers.

Katheryn focuses on all tasks related to the Growth initiative by supporting portfolio companies and executing all related business development and sales tasks.

#WESTERNU #ISHERWOODGEOSTRUCTURALENGINEERS

Kelley is an experienced and proven sales leader and has spent most of her career in B2B sales. At Carta, Kelley has built out the VC partnership strategy and most recently established a New England presence. Kelley also mentors for the SHE-CAN program, which helps young women in low-income countries attend college in the US.

Kirby Winfield is a seasoned startup operator and investor, and is currently the Founding General Partner at Ascend.vc, a pre-seed stage venture fund investing in marketplace, e-commerce/D2C, and B2B software startups in the Pacific Northwest.

Early in his career, Kirby was a founding team member and operating executive at back-to-back tech IPOs, with Go2Net (GNET) and Marchex (MCHX).

He is also a two-time venture capital-backed CEO, with AdXpose (DFJ, Ignition) acquired by comScore (SCOR), and Dwellable (Maveron, VersionOne) acquired by HomeAway (AWAY).

Kirby has invested in dozens of technology startups, and served as a Board Director of the real estate CRM platform Sharper Agent (sold to LEDR/Z), and the in-store customer experience platform Spectrio (sold to Bertram Capital).

He currently serves as a Board Director at Bean Box, the premier Direct to Consumer gourmet coffee gift and subscription brand, and Keepe, the leading vetted, on-demand contractor network for property managers. Other notable investments include Wrench, Crowd Cow, Dolly, Stackery and Blume.

Kirby has served as Board Chair at Special Olympics of Washington, where he helped bring the 2018 Special Olympics USA Games to Seattle. He is a member of the Board of Trustees of Seattle Preparatory School, Board Member at the University of Washington’s Haring Center Capital Campaign, and Board Advisor at the Friendship Circle of Washington. In his free time, Kirby coaches youth sports, and enjoys running, tennis, and traveling with his wife, son and daughter.

Kristen Durham is VP of Startup Initiatives at Zendesk. She previously served as the Zendesk Chief of Staff, and prior to that she spent four years at Silicon Valley Bank building its VC and technology banking practices in Latin America, China, and other emerging markets.

Kristen holds an MS in Energy & Resources from UC Berkeley.

Kristina is the founder and CEO of Integris Software Inc., a software company that helps organizations meet rigid compliance mandates with the ability to visualize where all personal information is located across the enterprise, prove adherence to regulatory standards, and empower strategic decision making.

Previously, Kristina was a principal at Ignition Partners focused on Cloud, Big Data, Security and IoT startups. She sourced and evaluated new investments, advised current and potential portfolio companies, as well as investigated technical and business matters, including market analysis and technology development issues for prospective and existing business contacts. She also provided counsel regarding technology trends and developments.

Prior to that, Kristina was SharePoint and Business Intelligence Group Product Manager at Microsoft. Her team’s mandate included core product management, product marketing, and strategic partner strategies for Sis, ISVs, resellers, and online services, as well as running global events. Prior to Microsoft she was at Business Objects SA (now part of SAP) where she was responsible for product line marketing for strategic alliances such as SAP, Oracle, and IBM. Kristina is also the founder of two companies, including the Victoria Drive-In Theatre.

Kristina graduated on the Dean’s List from the University of Victoria (Canada) business school (B.Comm) and has her Master’s in Finance (M.Sc.) from Boston University.

Laura Malcolm is the Founder and CEO of Give InKind. Laura created Give InKind after she and her husband James experienced the devastating loss of their first child, their daughter Layla, to unexplained stillbirth.

Laura combined the need her friends and family had for an easier way to give support from anywhere, with her technical background, to create a single destination for coordinating all kinds of support that are needed. Laura and James now reside in Washington State with their two sons, and continue to live their life in honor of Layla.

Laura Medina represents emerging growth companies and handles early and late-stage venture capital, growth equity, private equity and mergers and acquisitions transactions. She represents public and private company buyers and sellers in domestic and cross-border acquisition transactions, including options to buy, joint ventures and other complex transactions, across a broad range of industries, including information technologies, financial technologies, software, life sciences, medical devices and consumer products.

Lauren Creel primarily represents start ups and venture capital funds, with an emphasis on early-stage companies and financings.

She also has experience with public offerings for both domestic and foreign private issuers, SEC reporting and compliance and mergers and acquisitions.

Before joining Cooley, Lauren was an associate with Vinson & Elkins in Austin, Texas. In her former career, she worked for several economic consulting firms, supporting expert witnesses in class action litigation and qui tam lawsuits.

While at the University of Texas School of Law, Lauren was associate editor of the Texas Law Review
and a teaching assistant in the first-year writing program (or Teaching Quizmaster as the Longhorns like to call it).

Publications:
• “Why the Enforcement Agencies’ Recent Efforts Will Not Encourage Ex Ante Licensing Negotiations in Standard-Setting Organizations”, 89 TEXAS LAW REVIEW 967, 2011

I’m a Pitch Strategist, I make investors open their checkbooks for market disrupting female entrepreneur

I work with Female Entrepreneurs across the country who are at a critical point in their business’ growth. They are looking for investor $$ to accelerate momentum in their business, but they don’t know where to start, don’t know the resources available to them or how to pitch to the people in the room. And they are short on time to figure this all out because running their business is more than a full-time job.

So what I do is work with them to hone in on what makes them fundable by uncovering their secret sauce and then help them craft a powerful story that motivates investors to open their checkbooks.

As a result, my clients find the fundraising process less stressful and that they are able to more rapidly fill their round with the right investors so they can focus on the explosive growth now on the horizon.

Len joined Madrona in January 2010. He is interested in software/hardware/analytics systems that transform work and economics for big industries, and consumer products that change the way we see, hear, feel and sense life. He most enjoys working with entrepreneurs on building their teams to last and scale. “I have 16 years of experience working at companies and have made some great decisions and meaningful mistakes. It’s worth learning from both.”

PAST LIVES

Len has served on the boards of 17 early-stage companies and has been a director or executive at three companies that have completed initial public offerings. Prior to joining Madrona, Len was a partner at Frazier Technology Ventures and was involved in investments including Control4 and Docusign. Prior to his career in venture, Len spent 16 years in the software industry, including as senior vice president at RealNetworks from 1996-2001 (RNWK-Nasdaq). Len’s team released four major versions of the RealSystem software platform and generated the majority of the company’s 100%+ annual revenue growth during the period. Before joining Realnetworks Len was President of Creative Multimedia, Inc., (acquired by IHS- NYSE INFO) and started his software career in product management for Central Point Software before it was acquired by Symantec (SYMC- Nasdaq).

Lyra Correa assists clients with health information privacy and security issues and compliance. Lyra has worked with clients across a wide range of privacy and security situations, from breach response and regulatory investigations to every day counseling on health information privacy impacting their operations.

Lyra also helps clients with other privacy matters related to European privacy laws, student privacy issues, internet and mobile privacy issues, and the development and review of internal privacy and security programs.

Before joining DWT, Lyra worked at the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) Office for Civil Rights on HIPAA matters and within a hospital system compliance department on privacy issues. This experience has helped Lyra understand the perspective of both the client and regulator, giving her a unique position to better gauge how clients can minimize their risks and attain compliance with the laws that affect them.

Maria Hess has a passion for and experience in researching the customer; vetting and validating startup ideas; testing user acquisition, engagement and retention tactics; and driving outcomes to achieve growth goals. She’s led product management, product marketing, or product-led growth in big tech (Google, Amazon, and Expedia), as well as SaaS startups (Picnik, PicMonkey) and mobile recommendations startup, Likewise.

Through a series of strategic roles, she’s led the launch of new products, built a talent acquisition pipeline and process, and drove media engagement, partnerships, and social media programs.

Maryam Casbarro, CIPP/US, concentrates her practice on cybersecurity and privacy litigation. She helps her clients through counseling and advising on cybersecurity best practices, drafting incident response plans, overseeing legal response after a breach has occurred, and assisting clients with privacy litigation strategies, government investigations, and regulatory compliance.

Partnerships Manager for Venture Capital at Vouch Insurance, Matty supports the VC community and their founders.

He has over 10 years of experience in the space coming from Trinet and Yelp.

Micah brings more than twenty years of startup experience as a serial founder, mentor and ecosystem supporter. While steeped in all things startup, Micah joins us from Amazon Web Services, where he developed and operated the AWS Connections program, which helps enterprises identify and collaborate with tech startups.

Innovative product, business development, and strategic operations executive. Experienced in e-commerce, marketplaces, global expansion (APAC, EMEA, and LATAM) and leading innovation initiatives.

Nathalie is currently the CEO of Expectful, the #1 Meditation and Sleep Platform for expecting and new parents. Her mission as the CEO of Expectful is to solve the wellbeing crisis facing the 21 million women in the U.S. who are new parents, pregnant, or aspiring to conceive.

Nathalie has worked in Silicon Valley for the last decade, holding leadership roles at Google Shopping, Airbnb and eBay.

Key skills: Product development, strategic and analytical problem-solving, data analysis, cross functional collaboration, stakeholder engagement, project management, team management, change management, business development, thought leadership

Nitya is a venture capital investor at Tribeca Venture Partners, an early stage VC firm based in NYC. She sources and evaluates new investment opportunities while also supporting TVP’s portfolio companies. She was named a 40 under 40 Rising Star by Venture Capital Journal and a Rising Star in Banking & Finance by Crain’s.

Previously, she was an investment banker at Lazard, where she received the André Meyer Fellowship. She graduated from Georgetown University magna cum laude.

When she’s not meeting with entrepreneurs, Nitya can be found singing musical theater, reading about Ancient Rome, and rooting for the Georgetown basketball team.

Phoebe Huang practices corporate and securities laws and represents companies across a broad
spectrum of industries.

Phoebe has experience with corporate formation, venture capital financings and general counseling.

With a background as both an external advisor on privacy and security matters and corporate counsel for a global financial institution, Rachel Marmor, CIPP/E, is uniquely poised to counsel clients on a range of legal issues related to data governance and emerging technologies. Rachel prides herself on her ability to create pragmatic business solutions, allowing her clients to maximize the value of their information assets amid ever-changing global legal requirements.

Rachel helps clients assess legal obligations and risks associated with the collection and use of data in their business processes, including privacy, retention requirements, cybersecurity, defensible disposal, and use of electronic data in litigations and investigations. As a former litigator, Rachel has a wealth of knowledge regarding what can go wrong with clients’ data, which she uses to advise on contractual requirements and vendor-management programs to mitigate risk. Leveraging her deep expertise in the EU General Data Protection Regulation (“GDPR”) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (“CCPA”), Rachel advises clients on the foundational policies and consumer-facing procedures required for effective information management.

Over 25 years of experienced in venture capital fund management, clean energy technology investing, sustainability, transportation, and energy and climate policy. Built and managed teams in startups, investing, and non-profits.

Currently leading investments for Amazon’s Climate Pledge Fund, Alexa Fund and running the Alexa Accelerator and Next Stage programs. Compelled by big ideas that solve big problems.

My dream in life is to enhance the banking world by fusing the old world brick and mortar with the neo.

Currently, I’m refining the skills necessary to build that dream.

I have extensive experience in Capital Markets, Derivatives, Trading, Commercial & Retail Banking, and Asset & Liability Management.

My passions include volunteering for underserved populations and creating programs designed to lift them up.

Sandra Campos is a CEO, entrepreneur, and operating partner within the retail and consumer products sector. She has been building global fashion lifestyle brands for more than twenty years. She is the founder of Fashion Launchpad, the only digital masterclass edtech platform specifically for the fashion-retail-beauty industries.

Sandra advises startup businesses in tech, fashion/beauty, and consumer products such as Katie Kime-home and sleepwear brand, Bubble-beauty startup for GenZ, Saavitude-startup helping to design through AI, Project Verte-a comprehensive dashboard for ecommerce,Purple Dot-software that helps brands sell their inventory more profitably. In addition, she’s an investor, mentor, and board member.

As the former CEO of Diane Von Furstenberg, Sandra is known as an innovator and evolved a traditional business into one focused on global digital acceleration and the implementation of Omni-channel strategies to enhance the consumer experience. Under her leadership, the business turnaround was under way with profitable KPI improvements within each channel, created a Weekly Wrap newsletter with The Newsette, established collaborations with female founded brands such as Lingua Franca and Ashley Longshore, and promoted the “In Charge” mission throughout every consumer touchpoint. The company substantially reduced its losses through improvements in operational efficiencies, product margins, inventory management, and store rationalization.

Prior to DVF, Sandra was instrumental in restructuring Iconic brands such as Juicy Couture, Bebe, and BCBG. An executive with broad skills and experience, Sandra focuses on driving digital innovation, fueling international expansion, and leading youth culture marketing. Her international experience has included brand building in many regions with hundreds of stores in China and SE Asia, the Middle East, and Europe.

Her entrepreneurial ventures include Mobi and Cynosure Holdings-ACH, a celebrity brand management co responsible for launching Selena Gomez’s lifestyle collection.

Ms. Campos is a frequent keynote speaker, panelist, and invited guest on MSNBC, Telemundo and Bloomberg on topics ranging from innovation at retail, leadership, and diversity in the workplace. She has been named one of the top 100 Latina Leaders by Latino Leaders Magazine, was one of 2019 Top Líderes in Business by Hispanic Executive Magazine, named a 2020 Top Woman in Retail and was honored by Girls Inc.

Sandra lives in NYC and spends her time with her three kids and partner in the Hudson Valley on her rescue horse farm.

Sara Semnani counsels private and public companies at all stages on formation and financing activities, securities law compliance, public company disclosure and corporate governance matters.

She also represents companies in initial public offerings and follow-on securities offerings as well as other equity financings, primarily in the life sciences industry.

Prior to joining Cooley, Sara was an associate at Hogan Lovells US LLP.

Sarah Duran is an accomplished attorney with experience in media, commercial, and technology transactions; privacy and security; and other complex legal and business issues. Sarah has worked with multinational corporations, midsize companies, and startups to negotiate a range of business agreements, including content and software licenses; hardware purchases; joint development agreements; evaluation, marketing, maintenance and support, professional services, reseller and other agreements.

Sarah has advised on data privacy and security legal issues, including data processing and data transfer agreements (inbound and outbound), privacy notices and policies (external and internal), and strategies for complying with data protections laws and regulations worldwide, including the General Data Protection Regulation. She takes a practical approach when advising clients, and can translate complex technical concepts into plain language that is understandable to the target audience.

Sarah Imbach is an active angel investor and start-up advisor. Before locating to the northwest in 2011, Sarah was an early operating executive at three of the most well known companies to come out of the valley in the last 20 years: PayPal, LinkedIn and 23andMe. As the #2 at both LinkedIn and 23andMe her responsibilities spanned broadly across product, sales, operations, finance, and engineering.

Since moving to Seattle, Sarah has shifted from running start-ups to investing in them. Sarah has made over forty investments in early stage companies. Her primary investing focus has been consumer, marketplaces and SaaS software companies. Sarah currently serves on three boards and advises several other companies.

Serena Glover is an independent angel investor and board advisor to start-up mobile, cloud service, and AR/VR companies. In 2004 she co-founded Twango, an innovative media sharing web site and technology platform. She negotiated Twango’s acquisition by Nokia in 2007. As Director of Communities at Nokia, Glover ran a global organization leading the effort to bring media-related web services to mobile devices. Prior to Twango, Glover spent 9 years at Microsoft in various management positions, where she led product teams, managed websites and helped complete several corporate acquisitions. During the 1980’s, Glover was part of a research team at the University of Michigan that built some of the very first database and graphical design tools. She received a B.S. in Computer Science and an MBA from the University of Michigan.

I am a computer science researcher, engineer, and angel investor in the Seattle tech industry. I have been with Microsoft Research for 15 years, working on advanced & applied research in mobile computing, networking, and cloud services.

I have advanced the state-of-the-art in several technical areas, including scalable cloud services, network traffic management, latency in multiplayer games, and geo-distributed online services. I have co-authored over 35 academic publications with over 6,000 citations, and co-invented 48 issued patents. I have served on over 60 committees for international conferences, workshops, journals and the NSF.

I have worked closely with Microsoft business groups in my research, and have impacted Microsoft products, including Windows 10 and Windows Phone 8. Together with a small team of researchers and engineers, I’ve designed, implemented and stood up a scalable service on Azure that has served over 21 million users. I was recently named an ACM Distinguished Member for outstanding engineering contributions to computing.

– Publications: https://sharadagarwal.net/research-publications/
– CS Committees: https://sharadagarwal.net/professional-activities/
– Issued patents: https://goo.gl/PsR3cB

General Partner and Co-Founder at Hustle Fund. 33% Singaporean pragmatism + 67% SF Bay Area idealism. Loves factoids and weird humans.

Sonya has over 30 years of experience counseling emerging growth companies, established technology businesses and venture capital funds. Her clients range from early stage startups to larger public companies.

Sonya advises clients on a variety of legal and business issues. Her particular expertise is in private and public financing, strategic technology transactions and mergers and acquisitions. Sonya is counsel to public and private companies in a broad range of industries, with a focus on the software, biotechnology and medical products and services industries. In the last 10 years alone, Sonya has worked on more than 500 venture capital and private equity transactions, as well as numerous public offerings, M&A structured buy-outs, spin-offs and other complex business transactions.

Sonya serves on Cooley’s board of directors. Prior to joining Cooley, she was a shareholder at Heller
Ehrman and a director and one of the founding members of the Seattle, WA office of the Venture Law Group (VLG) before the merger with Heller Ehrman. Prior to that, Sonya was an associate and VLG in Menlo Park, Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison in Palo Alto and Jones Day in Los Angeles.

Sonya is listed in The Best Lawyers in America in the category of Venture Capital Law since 2004, is
listed as a leading attorney in Chambers USA: America’s Leading Lawyers for Business from 2013 –
2018, and listed in Washington Super Lawyers from 2014 to 2018.

I like to build financial models and climb mountains.

Strengths:
– Financial Modeling
– Cash Flow Management
– Operations
– Business Development
– Fundraising
– Sales Development
– Growth Hacking

Major Accomplishments:
– Climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro (2019)
– Co-Founded Forecastr (2018-Present)
– Thru-Hiked Appalachian Trail (2017)
– Co-Founded FantasyHub (2013-2016)
– Passed Level 1 CFA Exam (2012)

Sudeshna’s professional journey is characterized by a wide diversity of experience across varied industries, domains and geographies. She has launched a variety of successful product offerings for consumers, SMBs and large enterprises, while wearing multiple hats as a product manager, engineering leader, program manager and entrepreneur.

The consistent thread across all these experiences has been her passion and track record for creating delightful products that enhance customer engagement, growing innovative businesses and assembling high performing teams.

My background in partnership building has taken me in a variety of different career directions. I’m grateful to have experiences working on legislation for the City of New York, on expanding a billion-dollar brand at Kimberly Clark and now as the first hire at a venture capital firm investing in companies with courageous visions.

Entrepreneur / Angel Investor that is looking to fund teams that are changing the world in a non-incremental way. Also looking to help aspiring entrepreneurs, especially communities that don’t have as many resources and connections.

Vrushali Paunikar is the Vice President of Product Management of the Investor Services business unit. She previously led product at Rocket Lawyer and is passionate about making the world more equitable.

Global leader and change agent in consumer goods, known for relentlessly pursuing quality P&L and market results by cutting through the noise and challenging the status quo to create more possibilities.

Deep experience in connecting strategies to plans to execution to performance management – with the objective of getting a win for our consumers, our customers, and ourselves.

Builds a “raise the bar” culture at the highest levels, with a track record of developing the next generation of leaders. On-the-ground experience in US, Asia, Europe, and LatAm.

BCG alum; INSEAD MBA

Yohei Nakajima has been supporting early-stage startups for 15 years across a variety of stages from inception to growth. He currently works at Scrum Ventures, a Bay Area based seed and Series A fund where he sits on the investment team and leads their innovation consulting arm – which works with organizations such as Nintendo, Dentsu, and Panasonic.

At Scrum, he led the investment in, and sits on the board of Misapplied Sciences, a Redmond based startup that took Keynote stage at CES this year alongside Delta.

Prior to Scrum, Yohei helped spin up the Disney Accelerator at Techstars, before leading the Techstars-wide effort to include startup recruitment, working alongside 30+ investors on finding great startups.