Rob Glaser

Richard Adler
Principal, People and Technology & Research Affiliate,

The Institute for the Future

Richard Adler has been a leader in the field of aging and technology for more than a decade. He is a pioneer in developing technology training programs and conducting research on the impact of technology on older adults.

As principal of People & Technology, a research and consulting firm in Cupertino, CA, his recent activities include serving as lead U.S. consultant to the Smart Senior Consortium, a multi-national initiative to develop business strategies for the mature market, and directing a project on “The Future of Aging” for the State of the World Forum. He also served as SVP for Education for SeniorSurfers, a start-up company that provided computer training to older adults in California and Arizona. Other clients include the Canadian Association of Retired Persons, InfoWorld, Fujitsu, the Japan Research Institute, Microsoft, Procter & Gamble, Bell Atlantic/Verizon, the Seniors Media Lab and Xerox PARC.

From 1990 to 1997, Richard was VP for Development at SeniorNet, whose mission is to provide adults aged 55 and older with access to computer and telecommunication skills. He played a key role in helping SeniorNet to grow from a small research project to a well-established national organization. While at SeniorNet, he conducted the first national survey of computer use by older adults, launched the organization’s first Web site, and directed an award-winning project that enabled older adults to participate in online discussions of important national issues.

Before joining SeniorNet, he was a director at the Institute for the Future, where he headed a research program in new information services. His clients included Aetna, American Express, Apple Computer, AT&T, Chase Manhattan, Gannett, IBM, Kodak and Verizon.

Joe Beninato

Joe Beninato is no stranger to the entrepreneurial world. Since graduating from M.I.T. with a degree in aerospace engineering, Joe has worked with a dozen start-ups, serving as founder, employee, investor or advisor.

Before founding Presto, he was Vice President of Product Marketing & Business Development at Roku, a privately-held digital media start-up company. Prior to Roku, Joe co-founded and served as Vice President of Marketing for When.com, a leading Internet calendar and event service that was acquired by America Online less than one year after incorporation. In addition, Joe has spearheaded marketing efforts for Books That Work, Integrated Systems, Inc. and S3 Inc., later known as SONICBlue.

Actively involved in the Silicon Valley start-up community, Joe is a limited partner in several venture capital funds, has served on the board of directors for When.com and eDaycare (acquired by Parentwatch), and acted as an advisor for Bigstep (acquired by Affinity Internet), Ofoto (acquired by Kodak) and Topica (private)).

Gina Bianchini
Co-founder and CEO, Ning

Gina Bianchini is the co-founder and CEO of Ning (www.ning.com), a social networking service with a twist - it empowers people to create their own social websites and social networks. Prior to Ning, she was co-founder and president of Harmonic Communications which was acquired by Dentsu. She has also held positions at CKS Group and Goldman Sachs & Co. She holds a B.A. from Stanford University and an M.B.A from Stanford Business School.

Tim Bucher
CEO and Chief Product Officer, ZING Systems, Inc.

Ever since 8th grade when Tim Bucher became his school's youngest, most entrepreneurial DJ, he’s been imagining a world where he could discover and listen to music whenever and wherever he wanted. So, after spending 20 years developing revolutionary consumer products for companies like Apple, WebTV, and 3DO, he decided to create one of his own. Today, Tim is CEO and Chief Product DJ for ZING.  

Tim’s love of music is seconded by his love of gadgets. He collects them, rethinks them, and rebuilds them — inside and out. Which is why his resumé now reads like a Top Hits chart. At Apple Computer, Inc, he headed up Macintosh Engineering, where, among many other things such as creating Mac mini, he managed the core technology groups of Apple’s iPod. He was part of the initial core team for WebTV Networks, the first company to bring the Internet to consumers through television, and later went on to help create UltimateTV. He also got Microsoft’s Xbox effort underway as VP of Microsoft’s Consumer Products. Earlier in his career Tim was part of the team that pioneered interactive gaming systems with 3DO, which shipped the first CD-ROM based gaming console. We could go on and on. But we won’t because Tim would hate it if we did.  

Michael Cerda

Michael Cerda co-founded Jangl with Ben Dean in 2005, after having spent 10 years with some of the world’s most innovative and successful networking and communications companies. Michael formerly direct business development efforts for Trapeze Networks, specializing in early customer engagement and forging key alliances with infrastructure, security and  VoIP companies.
Previously, he was director of business development at Procket Networks. He was also a top sales director at Redback Networks, and he held several account management roles at companies that include Lucent Technologies and Netopia.
Michael was also the founding CEO of a click-and-brick lifestyle company called The Yoga Company, which he formed to share his passion for yoga with consumers in a Web-friendly way.

Ed Colligan

As president and chief executive officer of Palm, Inc., Ed's mission is to drive the company's global leadership of the mobile computing market with innovative products such as Treo smartphones.  Prior to being named president, Ed was a SVP and general manager of the company's Wireless Business Unit.

In 2003, Palm and Handspring became one company and one of the strongest pure-play mobile computing companies in the world. Prior to this, Ed was president and chief operating officer of Handspring, Inc. where he led the development and marketing efforts for handheld computers and smartphones.

Before joining Handspring, Ed was VP of marketing for Palm, Inc., and he worked with Jeff Hawkins and Donna Dubinsky to lead the product marketing and marketing communications efforts, including the successful positioning, launch and marketing of the popular Palm product family.

Earlier in his career, Ed was VP of strategic and product marketing at Radius Corporation. During his eight years there, he helped make Radius the brand leader in Macintosh graphics, graphic imaging, and hardware development.

He holds a bachelor's degree from the University of Oregon.

Jana Eggers

At Spreadshirt, the world’s custom apparel platform, Jana serves as CEO of Spreadshirt, Inc., and on the executive board of SPRD.NET AG, the German parent company. As CEO, she is charged with growing the American market for creating, selling, and buying individualized apparel. And, for SPRD.NET, she works as part of the executive team to build a worldwide company admired by customers, stakeholders, and the industry.

Previously, Eggers led Intuit’s QuickBase to be the company’s fastest-growing business unit, and led the corporate Innovation Lab, responsible for leading and teaching innovation. Prior to Intuit, Eggers held technical and management roles at Los Alamos National Laboratory, Sabre, Lycos, and several small businesses. In addition, she founded and operates SureCruise.com, with her husband.

Eggers is a frequent invited speaker at industry and educational events. She has received various awards, including, Mass High Tech’s "Woman to Watch"; Intuit’s CEO Excellence Award; and Hendrix College’s Odyssey Award for Professional Leadership.

Joe Fantuzzi

Joe is an expert at creating well-timed, high-growth businesses in broad markets. Bringing over 20 years experience to Workshare, Joe helped create $3bn market valuation as an executive for industry leaders in document creation (Interleaf), multimedia (Macromedia), 3D graphics (Autodesk) and online CRM (Kana).

Previous to Workshare, Joe was CEO at Liquid Engines, creating the first strategic tax management application for global enterprises, and attracted the Carlyle Group as its lead investor. Prior to this, Joe was co-founder and CEO at NetDialog, a venture-backed firm sold in 1999 to Kana (US $100m). Prior to Kana, he was General Manager at Autodesk Discreet growing the company’s market share from 20% to 65%.

Joe was Worldwide Marketing VP at Macromedia from private firm through to its public offering, and International Sales and Marketing Director at Interleaf from private firm through to its public offering.

Rob Glaser
Chairman and CEO, RealNetworks, Inc.

Since founding RealNetworks in 1995, Rob Glaser has played an integral role in transforming the Internet into a mass medium. Under Mr. Glaser's direction, RealNetworks introduced the groundbreaking RealAudio product, followed quickly by RealVideo, RealPlayer and RealSystem technologies, moving television and radio from broadcast to the Internet.

Since 2001, Mr. Glaser expanded RealNetworks through a quick succession of innovative, award-winning online subscription services including: Rhapsody, the #1 ranked on-demand music service; RealArcade, the #1 ranked casual gaming service; and Starz! Ticket on Real Movies.

With the growth of broadband and mobile networks, RealNetworks is expanding beyond the PC to mobile devices and home entertainment. Close relationships with Comcast, Nokia, Ericsson, and Sony are paving the way for content to flow from the Internet to many devices - reaching consumers where and when they want.

Prior to founding RealNetworks, Mr. Glaser worked for Microsoft from 1983 to 1993 in a number of executive positions, including Vice President of Multimedia and Consumer Systems. Mr. Glaser has served on several non-profit boards and committees, including his appointment by President Clinton to the Advisory Committee on Public Interest Obligations of Digital Television Broadcasters.

Mr. Glaser is a graduate of Yale University, with a BA and an MA in Economics and a BS in Computer Science.

Chip Heath

Chip Heath is a Professor of Organizational Behavior in the Graduate School of Business at Stanford University. His research examines why certain ideas-- ranging from urban legends to folk medical cures, from Chicken Soup for the Soul stories to business strategy myths—survive and prosper in the social marketplace of ideas. These "naturally sticky" ideas spread without external help in the form of marketing dollars, PR assistance, or the attention of leaders.

Chip is the co-author (along with his brother Dan) of a book titled Made to Stick: Why Some Ideas Survive and Others Die. The book will be published by Random House in January 2007. Chip and his brother have taught and consulted on the topic of "making ideas stick" with audiences from Nissan, Chronicle Books, Ideo and West Point, among others.

Chip’s research has appeared in the Journal of Organizational Behavior, Quarterly Journal of Economics, Cognitive Psychology, Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Journal of Consumer Behavior, Strategic Management Journal, Psychological Science, and the Journal of Risk and Uncertainty. Popular accounts of his research have appeared in Scientific American, the Financial Times, The Washington Post, Business Week, Psychology Today, and Vanity Fair. He has appeared on NPR and National Geographic specials.

Chip has taught courses on organizational behavior, negotiation, strategy, and international strategy. Prior to joining Stanford, Professor Heath taught at the University of Chicago Graduate School of Business and the Fuqua School of Business at Duke University.

Karl Jacob

Karl Jacob, CEO and Founder of Wallop, has been building and advising companies for the last 14 years. During his career, he has raised over $200 million from prestigious investors and has built four companies, taking them from no revenue to significant revenues or to acquisition.

Most recently, Karl was CEO of anti-spam company Cloudmark . Prior to that, he joined Benchmark Capital as an entrepreneur-in-residence in July 1999, where he was charged with creating “the next big thing.” He formed Keen, and was the CEO and President until May of 2002. While at Keen, he led the company to be credited as one of the fastest growing ecommerce companies in history.

Prior to Keen, he spent two years as a Microsoft executive, following Microsoft’s acquisition of Dimension X where he founder and CEO. Karl’s first company, On Ramp Inc., created some of the first Internet sites and marketing campaigns for companies like Disney, Fox, AT&T and Reebok.

Karl has received numerous awards and distinctions, including being named one of BusinessWeek’s top ten up-and-comers.

Thor Johnson

Thor Johnson joined Eloqua in 2004 to lead marketing. With over 20 years of marketing and managerial experience, Thor brings consistency and focus to Eloqua's public face and marketing programs.

Prior to joining Eloqua, Thor headed the Boston and New York business units of AGENCY.COM, and held positions at Juno Online Services and Schlumberger.

Dr. Guido Jouret
CTO, Emerging Markets Technology Group,

Cisco Systems, Inc.  

Based in San Jose,  California, Dr. Guido Jouret is the Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Cisco’s Emerging Markets Technology Group (EMTG), which is responsible for incubating Cisco’s future billion-dollar businesses. In this role, he evaluates new product and market opportunities, ensures architectural tie-in between the emerging technologies and Cisco’s core products, and is responsible for developing and communicating Cisco’s thought leadership on new technologies.
 
Prior to his role as CTO, Guido was the global head of the Innovation Team of Cisco’s Internet Business Solutions Group (IBSG). His team was responsible for developing new methods, architectures, and business cases to help Cisco’s key customers successfully adopt Internet-based technologies.
 
Prior to this role, Guido held a similar position for the Asia Pacific region, where he worked with Asia’s leading corporations and governments, advising them on how they could best develop IT strategies to leverage the latest technologies.
 
Prior to his position in IBSG, Guido was responsible for information systems for Cisco’s sites in EMEA (Europe Middle-East and Africa), heading up a team of 600 IT specialists, with budget responsibility of 100M$. His team was responsible for delivering all IT infrastructure and applications for Cisco in EMEA. Specific areas of responsibility included: Networking & Telecoms, Datacenter, Security, Help Desk, Desktop, Operations, and applications areas (Sales, Marketing, Finance, HR).
 
Guido was in charge of defining Cisco EMEA’s IT strategy, communication, implementation and coordination of the activities of a distributed multinational team. Global application implementations included Oracle Financials, PeopleSoft, and Siebel. He also out-tasked application development, desktop services, and various other IT functions using a core vs. context analysis methodology.
 
Prior to joining Cisco, Guido was responsible for IT in the R&D division of Beaufour-Ipsen Pharmaceutical Group. Before that, Guido worked as software coordinator at the London Parallel Applications Centre, where he developed software strategy. He commenced his career as a research associate at the Imperial College for Science, Technology and Medicine, London.
 
Guido has a B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute (MA, USA) and a DIC and PhD in Computing from Imperial College (UK).

Ivan Koon
CEO, YouSendIt, Inc.

Ivan Koon is CEO of YouSendIt, Inc. a start-up delivering enterprise-level file transfer solutions to business and consumer clients. Ivan has a proven track record of over 20 years of operational and management success. Prior to coming to YouSendit, Ivan was Senior Vice President of the Acrobat Intelligent Document Business Unit at Adobe, Inc. where he more than doubled the revenue in less than three years.

Before Adobe, Ivan was president of the New Technologies Division at BEA Systems. Under Ivan's leadership, his team quickly became the fastest growing business at BEA. Earlier in his career, Ivan served in a variety of executive management roles at S2 Systems, including president and COO from 1997 to 1999.

He has also held engineering and management positions at Shared Systems, Digital Switch and Olivetti Docutel. Ivan serves on the boards of multiple Internet start-ups. He holds a B.S. in Mathematics and Computer Science from the University of Texas at Arlington.

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Yuval Koren
Co-founder and CEO, Eye-Fi, Inc.   

Yuval Koren is co-founder and CEO at Eye-Fi, Inc. Yuval brings to his current role over a decade of high-technology and leadership experience, delivering breakthrough products into the high performance computing and networking markets.

Prior to co-founding Eye-Fi, Yuval was a system architect within the Routing Technology Group at Cisco Systems. Yuval joined Cisco as part of its acquisition of Growth Networks, where he was an early employee. Prior to Growth Networks, Yuval was involved in the development of several generations of scaleable server systems at Silicon Graphics Inc.

Yuval received a BS in Computer Science from MIT, and an MS in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University. Having considered pursuing a PhD, Yuval noted that much of Stanford’s faculty was out exploring new ventures, and joined his first startup instead.

Joe Kraus
Director of Product Management, Google  

A long time entrepreneur, Joe has been involved with early-stage technology development and starting companies for more than twelve years. Upon graduation from Stanford University in 1993, he joined with five engineering friends to found the highly successful Internet company, Excite, Inc. The original president of Excite, Joe was deeply involved in product strategy, direction and vision as the company grew. He also held senior operational roles in business development, international development and content.

After leaving Excite@Home in 2000, Joe was a co-founder of Digitalconsumer.org, a non-profit grassroots consumer organization with more than 50,000 members dedicated to protecting consumers fair-use rights to digital media. Joe, along with other co-founder Graham Spencer, continues to work on these important issues and Joe now sits on the board of directors of the Electronic Frontier Foundation. In addition to his non-profit focus, he has also spent many years as an angel investor, working with numerous early-stage technology companies.

Most recently, Joe was the co-founder and CEO of JotSpot, the first application-wiki company. Joe sold JotSpot to Google in October of 2006 and is now a Product Management Director at Google.

forthcoming

Dave Mathews

Dave Mathews is the Director of Product Innovation for Sling Media where he identifies early consumer trends in order to lead the development and creation of the latest digital lifestyle products.  Dave has designed many well-known consumer devices for major electronic retailers including RadioShack and holds more than 20 US patents in networking communications, gaming and consumer products.  As a networking communication and technology expert, Dave has both hosted and been a guest on radio and television shows broadcast worldwide.  During the initial commercialization of the Internet, Dave partnered with the founders of CompUSA, creating a next generation communications superstore.  He has designed and implemented encrypted high-speed network infrastructure for corporate finance clients as well as state and local governments requiring the protection of data in motion.  As a writer, Dave is a regular contributor to PC Magazine, Make and other tech and consumer related publications.

Bill Nguyen
Co-founder, Lala.com

Bill Nguyen is the co-founder of the discovery and CD trading site Lala.com where members trade CDs they have for CDs they want (all for $1 per CD). With over 2 million album titles available for trade, lala.com boasts a music selection twice the size of Amazon and ten times more than eBay. Prior to Lala.com, Bill founded several startups, including SEVEN, a software company enabling mobile email access and Onebox, which was acquired by Openwave Systems. Under Bill, SEVEN received multiple market awards of distinction, including Network Magazine's Product of the Year and Frost & Sullivan's Mobile Communications Entrepreneurial Company of the Year. Bill has been named to Fortune's 40 Under 40 list, MIT's Technology Review 100 and Red Herring's Top 10 Entrepreneurs and belongs to the World Economic Forum's Global Leaders of Tomorrow.

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Darrel Rhea

Darrel Rhea is a Principal and CEO of Cheskin, and a passionate spokesperson for the design research industry. For over 25 years, he has been considered one of America's leading strategic design consultants and has worked closely with senior executives to rapidly transform the innovation process within their organizations.

As one of a few select authorities on customer-focused strategic design research and design innovation, he led the development of an original body of formal methods for creating best practices for all types of organizations, allowing them to foster and embrace innovation in corporate design management, brand development and product development. His work introduced methodologies that shaped contemporary design processes for more than a decade before they became popularly recognized as an effective means to marketable products.

Darrel believes that creating empathy and compassion for human beings is the key to successful innovation strategy. He has championed the development of consumer research techniques and their application to the design of products and services. With extensive experience managing industrial design and brand identity creation in addition to product development, his qualifications also include a degree in design and psychology, success in graphic design and entrepreneurial endeavors, and, since 1978, as one of the founding leaders at Cheskin.

He produces and leads professional development seminars for senior executives on design innovation, design management and design research, teaching how to use state-of-the-art methodologies with both in-house teams and outside resources. He has served over a hundred Fortune 1000 firms.

Diego Rodriguez

Director, IDEO & Associate Consulting Professor, Stanford University

Diego Rodriguez works across the domains of business, design, and technology.  He leads IDEO’s global design for business team and works with Fortune 100 firms and startups alike to create and execute pragmatic strategies to achieve organic growth.

He is also an Associate Consulting Professor at the Hasso Plattner Institute of Design at Stanford (aka “the d.school”). Diego teaches classes which employ design thinking to develop new ways to structure and market technology ventures. Earlier in 2006 he co-taught a new course with Bob Sutton called Creating Infectious Action, which focused on designing offerings to spread via word of mouth.

Diego is the voice behind Metacool, one of the leading blogs covering innovation and business.  Fast Company magazine calls Metacool “…a must-read for anyone who wants to incorporate design thinking into their work.”

Diego has an MBA with distinction from Harvard and received undergraduate degrees in engineering and humanities from Stanford with honors. He is the recipient of a Good Design Award and holds multiple patents.  Prior to IDEO he held operating positions at Nissan, Hewlett-Packard, and Intuit.

He finds cars fascinating, is bummed out by bad marketing, and loves hiking in the woods away from it all.

Philip Rosedale

Founder and CEO, Linden Lab

Philip Rosedale has an extensive background in the development and pioneering of streaming technology, having built his first computer in 4th grade, and started his first computer software company while still in high school. In 1995 he developed FreeVue, a low-bitrate video conferencing system for Internet-connected PC's, resulting in the acquisition of his company in early 1996 by RealNetworks. For 3 1/2 years, Rosedale served at RealNetworks as Vice President and CTO, where he was responsible for the development and launch of RealVideo, RealSystem 5.0, and RealSystem G2. In 1999 Rosedale returned to San Francisco, joined Accel Partners as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence, and

began the basic research that would become the technology behind Linden Lab. Rosedale holds a BS degree in Physics from the University of California at San Diego.

Matthew Sanchez
CEO, VideoEgg, Inc.

Matthew Sanchez began his entrepreneurial career as a junior in high school when he founded a computer consulting group in his hometown of Pendleton, OR. Sanchez later spent several summers while at Yale working as a technical account manager for Intel’s Mobile Product Group. Before VideoEgg, Sanchez was co-founder and COO of MediaLiquid.  Matt received a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Yale University in 2003. 

David L Sifry
Founder and CEO, Technorati

David Sifry is a serial entrepreneur with over 20 years of software development and industry experience. Before founding Technorati, which is now widely considered the leading portal to the world of citizen-generated media, Dave was co-founder and CTO of Sputnik, a Wi-Fi gateway company, and prior to that was cofounder of Linuxcare, where he served as CTO and VP of Engineering. Dave also served as a founding member of the board of Linux International and on the technical advisory board of the National Cybercrime Training Partnership for law enforcement. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science from Johns Hopkins University. Dave can often be found speaking on panels and giving lectures on a variety of technology issues, ranging from wireless spectrum policy and Wi-Fi, to Weblogs and Open Source software.  Dave’s blog is Sifry’s Alerts (sifry.com/alerts).

David Thompson

As CEO of Genius.com Inc., David Thompson is responsible for creating and executing on the company’s overall vision, overseeing all business operations and working closely with customers to grow the business. He also provides the roadmap for Genius.com Inc.’s marketing and product strategy and directs the company’s financial growth and business development efforts.

David started Genius after his tenure at WebEx Communications, serving from 1998 through late 2004 as VP of Product Marketing and then Chief Marketing Officer. While at WebEx, he shipped award-winning web conferencing products that reinvigorated the category, named the company and directed legendary marketing campaigns that vaulted WebEx to #1 in on-demand software. By 2004, WebEx had acquired more than 12,000 customers and generated $250M in revenues with posted operating margins of 20 percent.

For the past three years, Forbes magazine has named WebEx one of “Top 25 Fastest Growing Technology Companies,” and in 2005 IDC Research ranked WebEx as the largest on-demand software company, thanks to its rapid growth in revenues and customer acquisition.

In addition to his success at WebEx, David is a veteran of Silicon Valley and has held various senior management positions in products, technical strategy and marketing for such notable companies as Quarterdeck, Microsoft, Genentech, Pacific Bell, and his first startup, StarNine Technologies.

Sharon Whiteley

A seasoned entrepreneur, Sharon is CEO of ThirdAge Inc. Earlier, she was president of Contempo Colours, a $50 million manufacturer of partyware, which was preceded by her founding of Peacock Papers, an innovative manufacturer of stationery and contemporary gifts. Peacock's product line featured motivational and celebratory messages, many around milestone aging.

Prior to her 14-year career in consumer products, she spent 12 years in the specialty shopping center development industry, where she was highly regarded as a pioneer.

A recipient of numerous leadership and business awards, Sharon was one of the first 15 women to receive the regional Entrepreneur of the Year Award sponsored by Ernst & Young. She is co-author of “The Old Girls Network: Insider Advice for Women Building Businesses in a Mans World” and was recently featured in “Enlightened Power: How Women Are Transforming the Practice of Leadership.”

Sharon is on the Board of Directors of The Committee of 200, a member and former Director of the World Presidents' Organization (WPO), and on the board of the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra.

Hjalmar Winbladh
CEO, Rebtel Networks AB

Hjalmar co-founded Rebtel to use his mobile Internet expertise to start a revolution in international mobile calling.

Prior to Rebtel, Hjalmar was a strategy consultant and entrepreneur-in-residence at Investor AB, providing counsel for investments in the mobile/fixed convergence arena.

Hjalmar’s stint at Investor came after a three-year sabbatical that included sailing across the Pacific and Indian oceans.

His sabbatical followed seven years leading Sendit AB, a mobile Internet company he co-founded and took public before being acquired by Microsoft, and two years as GM of Microsoft’s Mobile Internet Business Unit.

Hjalmar began his career with the founding of Pedal AB in 1990.