Paul Bragiel

Paul Bragiel is a co-founder and managing partner at i/o ventures, an early stage startup accelerator which operates out of a funky workspace+cafe in San Francisco. Previous he has founded and served as the CEO of 3 companies including: Lefora, a product bringing forums into the 21st century, proudly hosting over 100,000+ unique communities. Meetro, the first location based social network. Paragon Five, a game development studio specializing in console and mobile content with offices in Chicago and Krakow, Poland. He often advises governments on entrepreneurship and policy that encourages startup ecosystems.

Lisandro Bril

Lisandro Bril is the Managing Partner of Ax Ventures-Pymar Fund. An early stage venture capital fund focused in technology projects for innovative and high growth entrepreneurs based in Argentina, that targets and escalates toward regional / global markets. Pymar Fund is a USD 22 Million Fund sponsored by Fundación Empresa y Crecimiento, the Multilateral Investment Fund of IDB, CAF, Cofides, and argentine private investors. As its Manager in Argentina, he is currently screening projects in mobile applications, telemedicine, internet, clean techs, and software applications.

Lisandro is a pioneer VC and entrepreneurial development activist since the 90s. As Manager of i5 (a Hicks Muse Venture Capital) he established the firm’s presence, invested in early stage companies within a deal flow of 450 business plans and more than 1000 initiatives received in one year, achieving a highly successful exit in the software company Amtec (now NEORIS), multiplying by twenty the original Angel investment.

Ken Goldman

Ken Goldman is an accomplished executive with extensive financial, operational and business management experience and a solid track record of success. He currently serves as CFO of Fortinet Inc, a network security company, which he helped take public in November, 2009, representing the 3rd company he has taken public. Ken served as senior vice president, finance and administration, and CFO of Siebel Systems from August 2000 until the close of Oracle Corporation's acquisition in January 2006. Prior to that, he held CFO positions at Excite@Home, Sybase, Inc., Cypress Semiconductor and VLSI Technology. Additionally, his experience includes board director, audit committee chairman, and financial advisory roles at several leading public and private technology companies. Ken holds a bachelor degree from Cornell and MBA from Harvard.

Alex Gurevich

Prior to joining Javelin, Alex was a Principal at DFJ Aurora, one of the first Western ventures fund focused on high tech investments in Russia and Eastern Europe. In addition to helping lead fund formation and fundraising, Alex worked with portfolio companies in the enterprise software, consumer web services, digital media, telecommunications, consumer electronics, and e-commerce domains. Prior to DFJ Aurora, Alex was the first employee and Director of Business Development at ooma, a venture-backed company in the consumer electronics, VoIP (voice over IP) space, where he led his company's initial product roll out, customer acquisition and retail distribution strategy. Alex was also co-founder of Say-Hey-Hey.com, one of the web's first free video dating sites, where he was in charge of all product development, fundraising, and business development efforts. Alex also serves as a key advisor to several Silicon Valley early stage start-ups, as well as the Global Technology Symposium - the premier investor conference on emerging markets.

Alex holds an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, where he was co-President of the Venture Capital Club, a leader of a Global Study Trip, and a Board Fellow. He also holds a B.S. in Management Science and Engineering, a B.A. in International Relations, and an M.S. in Management Science and Engineering from Stanford. During his time at Stanford, Alex was a Mayfield Fellow and led major technology centered research projects at General Motors and IBM for Stanford's Center for Work, Technology, and Organization.

Kate Kendall

Kate Kendall is a digital thinker and doer who’s been working in the social web space since 2007. She’s writes, speaks and consults on marketing, product strategy, communications and community engagement. She's the founder of The Fetch – a what's happening guide to your city's digital, business and creative community. She's listed as one of 15 recommended-to-follow Australians by Twitter, was named as one of Brazen Careerist's Top 20 Young Professionals to Watch in 2012 and one of The Age Top 100 Influential People of 2011 in Melbourne. She can be found in Melbourne, San Francisco and her new-love Berlin.

Vanesa Kolodziej

Vanesa Kolodziej, from Argentina, has done it all. Mom to a one-year old baby, she started a number of tech companies in the last decade, for example e-commerce site Comunia. She also worked in venture capital, and is the co-founder of Palermo Valley (already mentioned in our previous story). Loving to connect with other people, she is extremely proud of this network, which has a crucial role for the Argentine startup scene. Many deals have been closed at the events it organizes, and the model has been replicated in several other Latin American countries.

Victoria Lennox

Victoria Lennox is the first Canadian and one of the youngest recipients of a Queen's Award for Enterprise Promotion. Victoria won the award for having pioneered a grassroots youth entrepreneurship movement both in the UK and globally that has taken on a momentum of its own with a membership of more than 45,000 enterprising students across over 80 universities within 12 months. As the Founder and Chair of the National Consortium of University Entrepreneurs (NACUE), Co-founder and Chair of ICUE, Co-founder of Enterprise Alliance UK, Entrepreneur in Residence at London Metropolitan Business School and former President of Oxford Entrepreneurs, Victoria has built enterprise networks, stimulated public discourse and developed meaningful political and policy inroads to further the entrepreneurship agenda.

Reshma Sohoni

Reshma is a Partner of SeedCamp, a new kind of incubator which aims to provide a catalyst for Europe's next generation of entrepreneurs through the provision of seed capital and a world class network of mentors. Before joining SeedCamp's executive team, Reshma was part of the Venture team at 3i. Prior to 3i, Reshma spent over 3 years at Vodafone in their Commercial Strategy team, working across the Europe and Japan footprints in marketing strategy and pricing functions. Reshma started her career in the US in investment banking (Broadview) and venture capital (Softbank).

Duane Melius

Duane began his career in London. In the noughties he founded and ran a youth media consultancy and print magazine in London. He went on to train thousands of young people in filmmaking, event organisation and publishing over nine years. In 2005 he co-founded the world’s first Commission for Youth Social Enterprise, working in conjunction with the UK’s Office of the Third Sector.

After working as a trends scout for PSFK.com he turned his focus to digital media, marketing and entrepreneurship in Asia. Now based in Singapore working in social media and events he has worked as an advisor and consultant for a range of blue-chip and governmental clients. That along with a rich experience working at the cross section of media, marketing and social enterprise has equipped him with the nous to open up new opportunities in the on and offline entrepreneurial spaces.

Mike Sigal

Mike Sigal has 15 years of success in building technology-based businesses for existing and emerging global businesses. He recently returned to the U.S. after three years of living and working in Europe, where he provided strategic trans-Atlantic marketing and business development services to technology companies. Prior to his experience in Europe, he spent nearly 10 years in the U.S., providing strategic advisory and interim management services for such companies as Daily Mail General Trust, Fresher Information Corp, IDG, Office Depot, Pacific Bell, Philips Electronics, Synoptics, and the U.S. Postal Service. As director of DASAR, producer of the annual European Technology Roundtable Exposition (ETRE) conferences, and as Co-producer and managing director of DEMOeurope for IDG Executive Forums, Sigal built communities which fostered relationships among technology industry executives and investors.

Redge Snodgrass

Head of Open API Service at Alcatel-Lucent
VP Business Development at Skout.com
Research/Blog/WorkerBee/Consultant at Dealmaker Media

Joshua Stern

Joshua Stern is the Executive Director of the technology non-profit Envaya. After graduating from Stanford with a computer science degree, Joshua served in the Peace Corps in Tanzania where he worked to build computer infrastructure and provide fundamental ICT education to local communities. Joshua co-founded Envaya in 2010 with the mission to build and deploy a software platform that provides "the last mile" of connection between grassroots activists and the larger development sector. Built to be easy-to-use and optimized to work in challenging, developing-world environments, Envaya's online and mobile tools empower community organizations to stake out an online presence, connect and coordinate with each other, and directly engage the larger international development sector. In just over a year, the Envaya platform has become the largest online network of civil society organizations in East Africa, and Envaya's supporters include Google, Twaweza, The Digital Opportunity Trust, The Peace Corps, and the Trust for Conservation Innovation. Joshua and Envaya serve as technical advisers to the Tanzanian Commission for Science and Technology's technology entrepreneurship incubator. Joshua is fluent in Kiswahili, and has extensive media, development, and governmental contacts throughout Africa.

Shaa Wasmund

From the US to the UK, a state school to a scholarship to the City of London School for Girls, from the London School of Economics to writing for Cosmo, the only female boxing manager to starting my own businesses. I've been lucky enough to work alongside some incredible people, both in the world of sport (Chris Eubank, Don King, Barry Hearn) and business: Sir Bob Geldof (as part of the founding team of Deckchair.com) and Sir James Dyson, who I am proud to have helped usurp Hoover as consumer champion. In fact, what I learned from them was more valuable than any MBA I could have done, anywhere. Life is a journey and I've found a combination of fiercely focused tenacity, spotting an opportunity and damned hard work gets you further than anything else. Born in Silicon Valley, California, you could say the "web" is in my blood. I am fanatical about the opportunities both the internet and social media make available to small businesses. People, business and the internet — that's me. It is also what has led me to my most important business role so far with Smarta.com.

Sarah Austin

With over 25 million video views to her video blogs (aka vlogs), she distributes her work in partnership with MTV Networks. She was named America's Tweetheart by Vanity Fair Magazine for her influential twitter followers, named 30 under 30 in media by Forbes Magazine and was endorsed by Lady Gaga. She has worked with brands from Ford, Intel, Nikon, Microsoft Bing, and Virgin America and has been featured in numerous magazines and publications from Fast Company to Portfolio and The New York Times and made guest appearances on shows ranging from The XFactor to Attack of the Show. Austin is often referred to as the most popular life-caster online.