From your brainwaves to Bitcoins, your genome and your biology, the future of VC and the future of the economy, Venture Summit covers it all.
Our Keynote Speaker
“The Next Revolution”
Mark will talk about a super-cycle of growth and development that will change all of our economy. How will your business be affected? Come listen how the forces of technology, energy, and policy are going to drive growth in the coming decade.
Mark Mills
Senior Fellow of the Manhattan Institute; Founder and CEO of the Digital Power Group
Mr. Mills was formerly the co-founder and chief tech strategist for Digital Power Capital, a boutique venture fund. He co-founded and served as chairman and CTO of ICx Technologies helping take it public in a 2007 IPO. Mr. Mills is a member of the Advisory Council of the McCormick School of Engineering and Applied Science at Northwestern University, and serves on the Board of Directors of the Marshall Institute. He writes the Energy Intelligence column for Forbes and is co-author with Peter Huber of the book, The Bottomless Well, which rose to #1 in Amazon science. He has been published in various popular publications including the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times Magazine. Mr. Mills was earlier a technology advisor for Banc of America Securities, a co-author of a successful energy-tech investment newsletter, the Huber-Mills Digital Power Report, and served in the White House Science Office under President Reagan.
HOT Topic speakers include…
“Measuring the Mind: How Brain Monitoring Will Change Our Lives”
Chris Berka, Co-Founder and CEO, Advanced Brain Monitoring
Recent findings suggest that Malcolm Gladwell’s “10,000 Hours to Expertise” theory may be a myth. Join ABM Co-Founder and CEO, Chris Berka, as she takes a look at how the brain processes new information and learn how the results of DARPA funded research may facilitate accelerated learning.
Chris Berka is the CEO and Co-Founder at Advanced Brain Monitoring (ABM). She has over 25 years experience managing clinical research and developing and commercializing new technologies, is co-inventor of eleven patented and 14 patent-pending technologies, and served as the principal investigator or co-investigator for grants & contracts awarded by the National Institutes of Health, DARPA, ONR and NSF that provided more than $30 million of research funds to ABM. Prior to founding ABM, Ms. Berka played a key role in the growth of an AMEX public company. She received her BA with distinction in Psychology/Biology at Ohio State University and completed graduate studies in Neuroscience at UCSD.
“The End of Moore’s Law”
Ronald Reedy, Ph.D., Co-Founder and CTO, Peregrine Semiconductor
For over 5 decades the price and performance of integrated circuits has followed a steady logarithmic progression of improvement. Have we reached the peak, and if so, what is next?
Ron serves as Peregrine’s Chief Technology Officer managing the company’s technology activities and Intellectual Properties. From February 1990 to 2011, he held various positions with Peregrine, including President, Chairman, Chief Executive Officer, Chief Operations Officer, Vice President and Chief of Staff. Prior to joining us, Dr. Reedy led the microelectronics division at Navy Research and Development. Dr. Reedy received a B.S. and M.S.E.E. from the U.S. Naval Academy and a Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego.
“The Internet of Things”
Daniel Obodovski, Author “The Silent Intelligence”
The network is everywhere…almost. Your car talks to your house that talks to your fridge that talks to the local supermarket. Where in this revolution are we and how quickly with everything truly be connected?
With nearly 20 years of experience in the wireless and high-tech sectors, Daniel Obodovski’s passion is helping companies go to market with connected devices and machine-to-machine (M2M) technologies. Most recently, Daniel was Director of Business Development at Qualcomm, where he led the commercial launch of multiple M2M products and businesses. Prior to that, Daniel was Director of Strategic Marketing and Business Development at Motorola Germany. Daniel holds an MBA degree from the University of South Carolina and Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration, as well as a Master’s degree from the Moscow State Lomonosov University.
“The Entrepreneur in all of us”
Soraya Darabi, Co-Founder, Zady.com
How do you go from a world recognized brand, to being another of one thousand start-ups, where the hours are long and the brand is unknown? With your location, (and perhaps even your gender) working against you? Soraya will share her thoughts on how to create your own entrepreneurial eco-system.
Soraya Darabi is the co-founder of Zady, a mission-driven brand described best as “The Whole Foods of Fashion.” Soraya began her career as Manager of Digital Partnerships and Social Media at The New York Times. Following her tenure at the Times, Soraya served as Product Lead for drop.io, an online collaboration service (acquired by Facebook). She went on to co-found the application Foodspotting, named by Apple and Wired Magazine as an “App of the Year” (acquired by Open Table). She received her Bachelor of Arts degree from Georgetown University.
“Knowing Yourself, Will Change You”
Gregory T Lucier, Chairman, Sanford-Burnham Medical Research Institute
Former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Life Technologies
We are in the early stages of a genomics revolution that will change the way you think about health, medicine, and your life. How much do you want to know about your future and how will we manage science, privacy, ethics, and society in a world of genomic data?
Gregory T. Lucier served as Chairman and CEO of Life Technologies, a global biotechnology company with $4 billon revenue, from May 2003 until its sale to Thermo Fisher Scientific in 2014 for $15.6 billion. Mr. Lucier previously served as a corporate officer at General Electric, and now serves on the Board of Directors at CareFusion, NuVasive, and RainTree Oncology. He is the Board Chairman for Sanford Burnham Medical Research Institute, and serves on the Advisory Board for the Smithsonian Institute Museum of Natural History in Washington D.C. He received his bachelor’s degree in engineering from Pennsylvania State University and a master’s degree from Harvard Business School.
Tim Draper, Founder, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, “Live Via Skype”
Timothy C. Draper is the Founder Partner of DFJ. His original suggestion to use “viral marketing” in web-based e-mail to geometrically spread an Internet product to its market was instrumental to the successes of Hotmail and YahooMail, and has been adopted as a standard marketing technique by hundreds of businesses. On behalf of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Tim currently serves on the boards of DoAt, Glam, Prosper, and Miartech. DFJ’s previous successes include: Skype (EBAY), Overture.com (YHOO), Baidu (BIDU), Parametric Technology (PMTC), Hotmail (MSFT), PLX Technologies (PLXT), Preview Travel (TVLY), Digidesign (AVID), and hundreds of others.
Larry Smarr, Director, Qualcomm Institute, “The Quantified Self”
Larry Smarr is the founding Director of the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (Calit2), a UC San Diego/UC Irvinepartnership, and holds the Harry E. Gruber professorship in Computer Science and Engineering (CSE) at UCSD’s Jacobs School. At Calit2, Smarr has continued to drive major developments in information infrastructure– including the Internet, Web, scientific visualization, virtual reality, and global telepresence–begun during his previous 15 years as founding Director of the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA). Smarr served as principal investigator on NSF’s OptIPuter project and currently is principal investigator of the Moore Foundation’sCAMERA project and co-principal investigator on NSF’s GreenLight project. In October 2008 he was the Leadership Dialog Scholar in Australia.
“You Want to Pay me with WHAT?”
Brock Pierce, Vice Chairman, Affinity Media
BITCOIN: Is it the future or a fad? This pioneer of virtual goods has moved to the world of virtual currencies.
Brock Pierce is an entrepreneur best known for pioneering the market for virtual goods in online games. Pierce founded Affinity Media, formerly Internet Gaming Entertainment (IGE), in 2001. The Company raised over $100 Million from blue chip investors such as Goldman Sachs and Oak Investment Partners. During Pierce’s tenure as CEO from 2001 to 2007. Prior to founding Affinity Media, Pierce co-founded the first and most ambitious Internet television firm of the 1990s, Digital Entertainment Network (DEN), a company focused on the delivery of entertainment over broadband. DEN raised more than $88 million from investors such as Microsoft, Intel and NBC.
Prior to Pierce’s entrepreneurial career he was a successful Hollywood actor, starring or appearing in twelve major motion pictures, including The Mighty Ducks, and First Kid, as well as many commercials.
He is an active angel investor, a founding mentor of the Founder Institute’s LA Chapter, and a member of SoCal Tech and Media Entertainment Technology Alliance.