ReVisioning Value Conference (ReVV) hosted by Springboard Innovation

Featured Speakers

Jenny Kassan of Cutting Edge Capital helps with financing startup and scale. Cutting Edge Capital provides small and mid-sized businesses with the information, tools, and expertise they need to raise capital in a way that fits with their unique business model and long-term goals. As experienced business lawyers, entrepreneurs, and finance experts, the CEC team has identified capital raising strategies that allow businesses to solicit non-traditional sources of funding. In addition to being a great way to raise capital, these strategies allow businesses to build public support and recognition at the same time they are raising funds.

To engineer is human, and, science alone will not solve our global problems. So says author Henry Petroski, Duke Professor and author of many titles addressing the role and value of design, engineering, and, most essentially, human problem solving. In his latest book, "The Essential Engineer: Why Science Alone Will Not Solve Our Global Problems" Petroski calls for us to roll up our sleeves and start building, thinking, and solving problems. He also explores a little-followed strategy--that of focusing on failure. He will keynote Day 2 of ReVV2011 where we begin to explore how to generate community innovation.

Woody Tasch is a true innovator. His idea is simple: create appropriate finance tools that meet the needs of the social change. Drawing inspiration from the Slow Food movement he focuses on the relationship between our food, farms, and finance, uncovering the fatal flaw in the funding. Where nature is in charge, finance deals must follow her lead--fast money doesn't work. In his book "Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money" Woody suggests that finance tools should match the reality, not the other way around. We're honored to have Woody be our morning keynote come March 7, 2011. Read more about him on Slow Money.

"Indispensable reading, to be placed on the same shelf as Wendell Berry and E.F. Schumacher." - Gregory Whitehead, Treasurer, The Whitehead Foundation

"It goes along with Small is Beautiful on my 'books that matter' shelf." -Joan Dye Gussow, Professor, Columbia University

REVV 2011 Featured Keynote Speakers

Woody Tasch | Author, "Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money", Founder, Slow Money.org: Inquiries into the Nature of Slow Money presents the path for bringing money back down to earth- philosophically, strategically, and pragmatically- and with an entrepreneurial spirit that is informed by decades of work by the thousands of CEOs, investors, grantmakers, food producers, and consumers who are seeding the restorative economy.

This is the path toward a financial system that serves people and place as much at it serves industry sectors and markets. To discover this path and to begin to walk down it: That is the mission of Slow Money. This mission emerges from Woody Tasch’s decades of work as a venture capitalist, foundation treasurer, and entrepreneur, whose explorations shed new light on a truer, more beautiful, more prudent kind of fiduciary responsibility that is not stuck in the industrial concepts of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, but which reflects the economic, social, and environmental realities of the twenty-first century.

Henry Petroski | Author, latest book: "The Essential Engineer: Why Science Alone Will Not Solve Our Global Problems" Professor of Civil Engineering, Duke University: Henry Petroski is a problem solver at his core. He has written over a dozen books about engineering for the general public, but it's almost unfair to say they're just about engineering. One might be tempted to think only of bridges and dams. Which would be wrong. While he does write about those things, his books are about the fascination we have with making things and solving problems. (In fact, one of his books is called "To Engineer is Human.") As social innovators create new ways of doing business and finance, we must also reach out and listen to engineers and designers as core members of our growing family of transformative disciplines as we design global solutions. Enter Henry Petroski.

In the book, Petroski lists the National Academy of Engineering’s 14 grand challenges: making solar energy affordable, preventing nuclear terror, securing cyberspace, and reverse-engineering the brain. “There will be cooperation among engineers, scientists, and medical doctors,” he writes, “but the participants will in effect all be doing engineering.” He will talk about his book, the strategy of failure, and the promise of the engineer in all of us on Day Two of ReVV2011.

Featured Conference Session Leaders:
A convergence of brilliance not to be missed!

Tim Draimin | Executive Director, Social Innovation Generator; Chair, Causeway Social Finance: As the Executive Director of Canada's Social Innovation Generator (SiG), a national collaboration addressing Canada's social and ecological challenges by creating a culture of continuous social innovation. Tim leads a network of academics and practitioners in investigating ways to improve our social, economic, and environmental systems. Tim also chairs CAUSEWAY, which acts to accelerate development of social finance capital in Canada. Tim will share strategies for city and government leaders about how policy and networks can accelerate local innovation for good.
Louise Pulford | Director, Social Innovation eXchange (SIX): Since 2009, Louise has coordinated SIX - a global community of 3,000 individuals and organisation involved in social innovation. She is responsible for running the network and its two associated websites (SIX and Social Innovator); running large international events; and supporting SIX's global community. SIX also leads a European consortium which is setting up a Social Innovation Pilot Initiative for Europe. She is also co-lead of the Young Foundation's international practice.
Ted Howard | Founder and Executive Director, The Democracy Collaborative, University of Maryland; and Steven Minter Senior Fellow for Social Justice at The Cleveland Foundation: The Democracy Collaborative is recognized as a national leader in the fast growing field of community wealth building strategies and policy development. Its "Anchor Institutions" project focuses on the role universities, hospitals, and other place-based anchors can play in fostering inclusive economic and community development. Among the Collaborative's most recent reports are "Building a Green Economy for All: From Green Jobs to Green Ownership" and "The Road Half Traveled: University Engagement at a Crossroads." (These and other reports are available as free downloads at: www.Community-Wealth.org.)

In July 2010, Mr. Howard was appointed as the Steven Minter Senior Fellow for Social Justice at The Cleveland Foundation. In this position, he has been responsible for developing a comprehensive job creation and wealth building strategy which has resulted in the Evergreen Cooperative Initiative. During the past year, Evergreen has been profiled in sources ranging from the Economist and Business Week to The Nation, the Stanford Social Innovation Review, and David Brancaccio's PBS special, "Fixing the Future." For his leadership of the Evergreen Initiative, Mr. Howard was designated a CFED Innovation Award recipient in 2010. Utne Reader has named him one of "25 visionaries who are changing your world."
Michael Van Patten | Founder and CEO, Mission Markets and Mission Markets Earth, LLC: Michael is a finance innovator, applying his considerable expertise in capital markets to the social and environmental sector. Michael has over 20 years of experience on Wall Street and has been integrally involved in the design and implementation of private placement and illiquid security transactions platforms for several companies including co-founding the highly successful NYPPEX. A featured speaker at environmental and social markets conferences, he has written articles regarding environmental capital markets innovation and financial structure. Michael is involved in regional and national working groups that are developing standard metrics to measure biodiversity and habitat function and apply them to financial transactions. Michael possesses FINRA registrations 7, 63, 55, 24, 3. Michael and his team will share insights about hot to increase the social capital markets, as well as offer a session on how to get onto Mission Markets platform for investments or as an investor.
Amy Pearl | Founder and CEO, Springboard Innovation: Amy draws on extensive experience in the education, corporate, and social sectors to shape a vision of how we might address global challenges by activating a new kind of community leader. An inveterate educator and strategist, she designed unique programs such as Local Agenda and Challenge and Change that teach adults and youth social entrepreneurship skills in high-need, underserved communities. She first envisioned ChangeXchange, the first American social innovation exchange while at the Skoll World Forum; and, is leading the development of HATCH: An Innovation Incubation Lab, a unique building with a mission - to generate and bring to market community innovation. Her own career has taken her from the classroom and school district to the Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory, to managing Intel's online international education initiatives. Amy will be offering sessions on community education and leadership in social entrepreneurship, how to grow community capital, and incubation space development.
Thomas G. Loughlin | Executive Director, America Society of Mechanical Engineers: Tom became a member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers (ASME) during his days as an undergraduate student of mechanical engineering at Lafayette College. More than 25 years later, in 2008, Loughlin took the helm at ASME, becoming only the 13th executive director in the Society’s prestigious 129-year history. Since he joined the staff of ASME in 1993, Loughlin has been a significant contributor to the organization’s growth, both in the U.S. and internationally. He has led several noteworthy initiatives in areas ranging from membership development to e-commerce, from global partnerships to a major strategic reorganization that has left the Society fiscally strong and poised for growth. Tom will explain how to find and offer solutions worldwide through their new online platform: engineering for change.
Esther Park | Senior Relationship Officer, RSF Social Finance: Esther Park joined RSF Social Finance in 2005 and became Director of Lending in 2007 to oversee the growth of the organization’s lending activities to social enterprises nationally. Esther is responsible for the strategic development of the Lending Program and the expansion of its offerings along the risk spectrum, and manages a six-member team. Previously, Esther was a senior consultant for ShoreBank Advisory Services, where she provided strategic and financial planning advice for Community Development Financial Institutions (CDFIs), particularly small business and affordable-housing loan funds. She also trained lenders internationally in small business lending practices, and underwrote Program Related Investments (PRIs) for private foundation clients. Prior to joining ShoreBank, Esther lived in Nukus, Uzbekistan, teaching English and conducting program evaluation work for the United Nations. Esther received her MPP from University of Chicago and BA in Social Welfare from the University of California Berkeley. She lives in Berkeley, California with her husband, Greg, and their two children, Evangeline and Bryce.
Justin Conway | Senior Relationship Officer, Calvert Foundation: Justin Conway is the Senior Relationship Officer at Calvert Foundation, a nonprofit managing over $250 million in community development, microfinance, and social enterprise investments. He is responsible for connecting investors and financial professionals to high impact investment opportunities.
Before Calvert Foundation, Justin managed the Community Investing Program of Green America and the Social Investment Forum, and worked on human rights issues in Hong Kong and Central America. Justin serves on the Advisory Board of Envest, a microfinance investment vehicle focused on environmental sustainability. Justin will decribe how Calvert invests in social enterprise and how to be ready for social investments.
Gretchen Garth | Founder and President, 21 Acres: Community activist, philanthropist and visionary behind 21 Acres, Gretchen is a committed volunteer serving 21 Acres in many capacities. 21 Acres is an astounding new center for local food and sustainable living demonstrating technologies for long-term energy efficiency. Gretchen also serves as Board Chair of HumanLinks Foundation, which focuses on sustainable agriculture, health care and education reform. She helped create the Woodinville Farmers Market in 1994, which was her introduction to issues surrounding small family farms. Serving on a search committee to find a permanent location for the Farmers Market, actions led to the purchase of 21 Acres from King County in 2004. Gretchen will introduce Woody and share progress and the vision of 21 Acres, describing how new kinds of physical centers can grow community capacity.
Jenny Kassan | Co-Founder, Cutting Edge Capital; President, Community Ventures; Founder, Sustainable Economies Law Center; Partner, Katovitch Law: Jenny Kassan is an attorney specializing in building the capacity of socially responsible ventures. Her legal practice areas include small business start-up and financing, securities regulation, nonprofit law, business agreements, real estate development, franchising, cooperatives, and assessment districts. She is the managing director of Katovich Law Group, a law firm that serves social enterprise. She recently launched a new business with John Katovich and Michael Shuman called Cutting Edge Capital that helps small businesses raise capital without venture capitalists, angels, or banks. Jenny will be in three sessions: One concrete session on when and how to do a Direct Public Offering; she'll also share a session on strategies for increasing local investments; and, she'll participate in the session on how to launch a co-op.
Mark Hatch | CEO, TechShop: Mark is an entrepreneur with 20 years of experience in large and small organizations. Mark has worked with three of Southern California's most powerful brands: Kinkos, Health Net and Avery Dennison. Mark is the founding CEO of TechShop, a disruptive retail concept that puts the tools, information and resources needed to innovate and be creative into the hands of anyone. Democratizing invention is his objective. TechShops are spaces where citizens innovate, and he joins us to discuss the outcomes possible when the right tools and support are present for innovators to flourish.
Jim Emerman | Executive Vice President, Civic Ventures: Jim Emerman is Executive Vice President of Civic Ventures, a think tank on Boomers, work and social purpose. Civic Ventures is leading the call to engage millions of baby boomers as a vital workforce for change. Through an inventive program portfolio, original research, strategic alliances, and the power of people’s own life stories, Civic Ventures demonstrates the value of experience in solving serious social problems – from education to the environment and health care to homelessness. Jim will provide a how-to session on how to develop critical new partnerships that a win-win-wins for corporate citizens, nonprofits, and ready Boomers with talent to offer, growing a mission-driven enterprise ecosystem.
Heather Fleming | Co-Founder and CEO, Catapult Design: Catapult Design is a product and technology firm that serves developing world markets. Catapult Design's clients are organizations working in impoverished communities with technology needs--including rural electrification, water purification and transport, food security, and health. Before starting Catapult, she worked for several years as a product design consultant in Silicon Valley, designing products for a diverse range of clients. In 2005, she co-founded and led a volunteer group focused on social impact design through Engineers Without Borders - SFP. The team's work was featured in a variety of media and publications, including Newsweek, WIRED.com, ABC News, and PRI's The World. Heather was named a Pop!Tech Social Innovation Fellow and World Economic Forum Young Global Leader for her work with EWB and Catapult Design. She is also a Staff Writer for NextBillion.net, an Adjunct Lecturer at Stanford University, and Senior Lecturer at CCA in San Francisco. Heather has a degree in Product Design from Stanford University.
Andrew ‘Drew’ Tulchin | Founder and Managing Partner, Social Enterprise Associates: Andrew ‘Drew’ Tulchin is Founder and Managing Partner of Social Enterprise Associates, a registered ‘B Corp’ providing triple bottom line management consulting with expertise in raising socially responsible investments, measuring impact, and microfinance. He has consulted throughout the U.S. and in more than 30 countries around the world. Tulchin is a facilitator for two projects of the SEEP Network, one of the event sponsors. One is to help social enterprises connect with the capital they need to scale up and the other is to develop uniform agreement for international standards in microfinance financial reporting (www.reportingstandards.org). His previous positions include Program Officer for Grameen Foundation, where he served as lead of the Capital Markets Group. He has been Director of the U.S. microfinance organization, ECDC/Enterprise Development Group, serving immigrants and low-income people. He has written dozens of socially responsible business plans, and his efforts have led to raising more than $100 million for mission driven causes. Drew will be leading sessions on how to measure social and environmental profit, directly connected to readiness for impact investments.
Lewis Hower | Director, University Impact Fund: Lewis Hower is now the Director of a unique educational program in Utah helping inspire and grow young investors. Prior to his current role, Lewis was the Marketing Manager for the Sorenson Housing Opportunity Fund. Prior to that, he managed finance and operations for Unitus Investment Group where he worked with the founding team of Unitus Capital in their spin out from the international microfinance accelerator Unitus, Inc. Unitus Capital is a financial advisory firm specializing in arranging capital for microfinance institutions and other social enterprises benefiting those at the bottom of the economic pyramid. Lewis holds a B.S.E. in Bioengineering from Arizona State University.
Rob Wiltbank | Venture Partner, Montlake Capital; Faculty, Willamette University's Atkinson Graduate School of Management: Rob joined Montlake Capital in 2006 as the firm’s Oregon-based Venture Partner, and opened the firm’s Portland office. He leads Montlake’s Oregon activities and is a professor at the Atkinson Graduate School of Management at Willamette University.
His research focuses on strategy making under uncertainty, particularly as it relates to new venture development. His study of angel investing performance is the first empirical examination of the outcomes achieved by angel investors in the U.S. Rob and his students work with the Portland Venture Group attending meetings, sourcing deals and screening investment opportunities. He is also a Batten Institute Research Fellow with the Darden School at the University of Virginia, conducting an in depth study on organic growth in existing corporations. Rob will share his research on the strategies of successful entrepreneurs, and how to be a best fit in seeking out investment capital.
Leslie E. Christian | Chief Executive Officer, Portfolio21: Leslie has more than 35 years of experience in the investment field, including nine years in New York as a Director with Salomon Brothers Inc. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of Washington and her MBA in Finance from the University of California, Berkeley. Leslie is Chair of the Board of Upstream 21 Corporation and Portfolio 21 Investments and serves on the RSF Social Finance Investment Advisory Committee.
Stuart Cowan | Founder and Partner, Autopoiesis, LLC: Stuart has 15 years of experience in designing, planning, and financing sustainability projects in ecological design, renewable energy, and biocultural restoration. He was a founding member of Portland Family Funds, a sustainable community bank. Together with its national affiliate, United Fund Advisors, PFF has structured transactions totaling $2 billion, creating 16,000 jobs. While at Ecotrust, he led the development of the Reliable Prosperity framework for a carbon neutral bioregion. He is the co-author with Sim Van der Ryn of Ecological Design, an overview of the integration of ecology, architecture, land use planning, and product design that has been translated into three languages. He is the co-founder of Autopoiesis LLC, which uses self-organizing living systems to collaboratively create value and mobilize capital for biological + cultural resilience. He received his doctorate in Complex Systems from U.C. Berkeley.
Alistair Williamson | Consulting Capital Strategist and past Board Chair, Equal Exchange: Alistair Williamson, a Scot born in East Africa, has lived and worked in Portland for the last 20 years, most recently as capital coordinator and board chair at Equal Exchange a fair trade cooperative. An engineer by training but a designer by vocation, Alistair came to the US to design high-tech products for Tektronix where he worked for 10 years. He left to co-found and run a small software company that helped companies define and measure the goals of their web sites. During those five years he discovered how unhelpful and frustrating corporate law and conventions could be when a company aimed for more than solely making money. Seeking to understand the alternatives he joined Equal Exchange (a fair trade worker co-operative) as capital coordinator. He helped raise $7 million in equity and was board chair for three years. Alistair also spent three years as board chair of a small non-profit, and is now an independent consultant. Through all that he has firsthand experience of many different business models which he hopes will be of use at ReVV. When not otherwise occupied you might find Alistair reading, on his bike, wasting time on the internet or fixing plumbing with his grandchildren.
Mark Van Ness | Founder, Real Leaders Magazine; Sperry Van Ness Commercial Real Estate Advisors: Mark is supporting the transformation of leaders around the world by helping to remove the mental and financial obstacles to a socially, environmentally and financially sustainable way of leading.

His activities include: Founder- Real Leaders Magazine, Inspiring Better Leaders for a Better World. Past Vice-Chair, Young President's Organization (YPO) Social Enterprise Network. Founder, YPO Corporate Social Responsibility Network. Founder, Social Enterprise Institute Leadership Forums. Founder, Social Enterprise Loan Fund at OC Community Foundation. Founder, Sperry Van Ness Commercial Real Estate Advisors. Co-Founder, Annual Social Innovation Fast Pitch at USC. Serves on Board of Impact Assets (Formerly part of Calvert Foundation).
Michelle Sandoval | Mayor, Port Townsend, WA.; Co-Founder, LION: Michelle is a founding member of LION--the Local Investing Opportunities Network--a new innovative network growing local investments toward local sustainability in Jefferson County, Washington in addition to being the Mayor! Sandoval, the owner of the local Windermere Real Estate franchise is the only person of color on the Port Townsend City Council. Recently, she was recognized as the Public Official of the Year by the Jefferson County chapter of the League of Women Voters. She is considered a "rising star in Washington politics."
Paul Osterlund | Founder and CEO, Abundance Farming Inc.: Paul Osterlund retired from Intel after a 23+ year engineering career. Upon retirement he realized the agriculture product he had invested in would solve global poverty, and his life has not been the same since. This realization left him no choice but to found Abundance Farming Project, a global social enterprise that provides emerging technical solutions to subsistence farmers to increase food crop yields. His work has expanded to Africa, Asia, and South America. He also serves as Vice Chair of the Board of Springboard Innovation where he helps develop Springboard's initiatives.
Stephanie Ryan | Senior Associate, B Lab: Stephanie Ryan currently works part-time as a Senior Associate with B Lab, a non-profit that certifies business that create beneficial social and environmental impacts. She believes the emerging sector of private companies for public benefit is a key leverage point for today's economic and social challenges. Her twenty-five years experience as a consultant has been focused on developing organizational learning capacities. In the mid 80s she worked for Innovation Associates, co- founder, Peter Senge, author of best-seller, The Fifth Discipline. She has published articles on collaborative learning practices and creating learning communities. She is the Co-Executive Producer of BeComing, a documentary featuring a cross-generational and ethnically diverse circle of ten women engaged in the deeper questions of their lives. She holds a B.A. from Trinity College, Hartford, CT with a double major in Economics and International Relations. She spent a semester studying at London School of Economic. Stephanie lives on Whidbey Island, WA with her husband and son and is frequently found near the water.
Steve Fahrer | Partner, Veris Wealth Management: Steve Fahrer is a founding principal of Veris Wealth Partners. He has been providing sustainable investment advisory and wealth management services since 1994. Steve specializes in financial consulting, charitable planned giving, and community impact investing. Prior to Veris, he co-founded the New York office of Progressive Asset Management, the first full service broker/dealer to focus on socially responsible investing.

In 1991, after fifteen years leading a nonprofit housing and community development organization, Steve developed a national network of community foundations. He came to believe that the failure of governmental programs to provide social services and raise the global standard of living would require another path. He saw that by engaging more directly with project funding sources and the capital markets, he could generate greater social impact. This led him to Progressive Asset Management and socially responsible investing. Steve serves on the Board of Directors and is the former Co-Chair of the Jewish Funds for Justice. He is the former chair of the Shefa Fund and Grassroots International, a global aid organization. Steve is a Certified Investment Management Analyst (CIMA). He graduated from the University of Florida with a B.A. in Political Science. He is a voracious reader and enjoys kayaking. Steve lives with his family in Brooklyn, NY.
Gregg Semler | Managing Partner, Pivotal Investments: Pivotal Investments is focused on early stage venture capital with the goal of delivering superior financial returns through investments in companies,
primarily in the Northwest, that will be leaders in the emerging sustainable economy, characterized by a dramatic shift in the demand for clean energy, safe water, clean air, “green” materials and sustainable agriculture. Pivotal Investments is the first early stage venture fund in the Northwest to target this opportunity. Gregg is a clean technology entrepreneur with over 20 years of experience. His experience includes successfully financing high-growth companies, executive recruitment, management of product development efforts, acquisitions, strategic alliances, OEM partnerships and direct-to-consumer marketing and distribution. Gregg earned a Master of Business Administration from The Amos Tuck School, Dartmouth College and a Bachelor of Arts from Columbia University in New York.
Stanley Florek | Co-Founder and CEO, Tangerine Power: Stanley is CEO & co-founder of Tangerine Power. He is applying his wide-angle lens to emerging opportunities in distributed energy finance and deployment. He has delivered technology solutions for hundreds of organizations, including Microsoft, Corbis, Airborne Express, John Deere, Aon Insurance, the US Air Force, the US Army, and the University of Washington Medical Center. He earned an MBA at Bainbridge Graduate Institute for Sustainable Business, with a concentration in Sustainable Energy. Stanley is a global networker with hundreds of connections to clean energy entrepreneurs and activists worldwide. He is actively involved in distributed energy policymaking at the state and federal levels, and co-founded the trade association Washington Local Energy Alliance. Stanley previously served as Chief Operating Officer of Advantive, an energy information management firm he co-founded. Tangerine Power is Stanley's 4th venture.
Karen Shimada | Executive Director, Life by Design NW: Karen's leadership at Life by Design NW is a testament to cross-sector partnerships and creativity. Karen has worked in the areas of nonprofit management and gerontology in the U.S. and internationally for over 25 years. She has a BS in Older Adult Education and a MPH from University of Hawaii. Karen's passion for social change and entrepreneurship brought her to Springboard Innovation's educational program Local Agenda three years ago, where she envisioned a social enterprise that has since launched (though by someone else!). She is dedicated to bringing creative opportunities for Boomers to engage their passion for the benefit of a better world through social innovation. Besides being named to the Oregon Commission for Women, Karen serves on the Board of Directors of the JFR Foundation and is Board Chair for The Global Kitchen.
James Frazier | Financial Advisor, Natural Investments: James Frazier is a financial advisor specializing in socially and environmentally responsible investing with Natural Investments, LLC, a charter member of the Local Investing Opportunities Network (LION) of East Jefferson County, WA, and a member of Team Jefferson, the economic development council for Jefferson County. His 17 years of experience in the investment industry includes a stint trading options on the floor of the American Stock Exchange, and eight years as co-founder and general manager of Forza Capital Management, an investment firm that manages portfolios for hedge funds and high-net-worth individuals. He earned a Bachelor's degree of science in economics, specializing in finance, from the Wharton School of Business of the University of Pennsylvania. His mission is to help grow the pool of "Intentional Money" that is dedicated to building a better world for all.
Ian Fisk | Executive Director, William James Foundation: Executive Director Ian Fisk was a founding board member of the William James Foundation, and joined the staff in 2005. Mr. Fisk is also the CEO of ITF Consulting, Inc. He helped to launch the AmeriCorps*VISTA Entrepreneur Corps. He helped to found more than a dozen ventures, some non-profit, some for-profit. Mr. Fisk has an MBA from the Yale School of Management, where he was selected by his professors as a super-tutor. He has been an active champion of Net Impact, leading both the student chapter at Yale and the Washington, DC Professional Chapter. He was twice part of the leadership of a Net Impact Professional Chapter of the Year.
Mark J. Ahn | Principal, Pukana Partners: Mark J. Ahn, Ph.D. is Associate Professor, Global Management at Atkinson Graduate School of Management, Willamette University; and Principal at Pukana Partners, Ltd. which provides strategic consulting to life science companies. Mark has over twenty years of experience in the life sciences industry, and was responsible for Secure the Future a $100 million initiative launched by Bristol-Myers Squibb Company for women and children with HIV/AIDS in Africa. Mark was also founder, President, and Chief Executive Officer of Hana Biosciences. Prior to Hana, he served as Vice President, Hematology and corporate officer at Genentech, Inc., as well as held positions of increasing responsibility at Amgen and Bristol-Myers Squibb Company. Dr. Ahn also serves on public and venture capital-backed Board of Directors for RXi Pharmaceuticals, Access Pharmaceuticals, Periocyte, and Mesynthes.
Katie McMillan | MBA 2012, Willamette University: Katie McMillan is a first year student at Willamette's Atkinson Graduate School of Management. She received her Bachelor's degree from the University of Puget Sound in International Political Economy. Katie spent time in South America doing research on the yerba mate and soybean industries followed by working in an advertisement agency in Buenos Aires. She hopes to pursue a career in Global Human Resources.
Franklin Jones | Co-Founder and CEO, B-Line PDX: Who knows where it all really began, perhaps somewhere in that lofty call to serve the Common Good instilled upon all Bowdoin College grads. A formal genealogy of B-Line began with Franklin's first "real" job out of school as a bicycle and pedestrian planner in Bend, OR for David Evans and Associates. The concept silently percolated over a thirteen-month, 10K bicycle trip from Japan to Ireland and then had some time to rest as Franklin entered a rewarding career in education as a sixth grade teacher in the SF Bay Area. In 2008, his entrepreneurial and adventurous spirit took over and Franklin departed sunny San Francisco for the greener pastures of Portland, OR. Never short on ideas to enhance the community around him, Franklin combined his interest in seeing how business can be a catalyst for social and environmental change with his love of cycling and founded B-Line. Franklin loves how when the right tool for the job is used, the right team steps up, and a day-to-day commitment towards a sustainable future is embedded in the culture of a company all stakeholders benefit-everybody wins. You can catch him on the trikes working to enhance the fabric of our cities one pedal stroke at a time.
Skip Sponsel | President, EmergingTech Accelerator: Prior to founding Emerging Tech Accelerator, Skip Sponsel created and directed the business development group at Intel Capital. His programs selectively matched thousands of entrepreneurial innovations with Global 2000 requirements, leading to consistent wins for both buyers and seller. Prior to Intel, Mr. Sponsel established the interactive products group at BellSouth. He has held senior sales and marketing positions with telecom equipment manufacturer, selling to both enterprise and service providers, and participating in an IPO. He built a regional sports cable network for the Minnesota Twins and Minnesota Northstars, and founded a sports promotion firm producing events for Fortune 500 sponsors.
Abigail Sarmac | Program Officer, Lemelson Foundation: Abby joined the Foundation in April 2005 after living and working in Senegal, Ecuador, Italy and the US with several international environmental organizations, including the World Conservation Union, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, and the Wildlife Conservation Society. Abby earned her M.Sc. in Environmental Science from Yale University's School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. She also holds a B.Sc. in International Politics from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. Abby is fluent in English, Spanish and speaks - though is not necessarily understood - French, Italian, Portuguese, Wolof, and Tagalog.
Brooke Randall | Equilibrium Capital: Building on a career focused on impact investing, Brooke joined Equilibrium Capital Group in 2009. Previously, Brooke was a founding team member of Unitus Capital, one of the first boutique investment banks focused on the microfinance and social enterprise sectors, based in Bangalore, India. In this role, Brooke contributed to the development of the initial business plan, raising of venture capital and spin-out of the team from Unitus, Inc. In addition, while at Unitus, Brooke advised microfinance institution management teams regarding their financing needs, and raised both debt and equity capital. He was also integral in the development of an innovative debt facility established by Unitus and OPIC, lending to microfinance institutions across the world.
Prior to Unitus Brooke was a member of the initial team that built Quellos Private Capital (acquired by BlackRock, Inc.) where he was responsible for identifying and evaluating investments in private equity, venture capital and real assets funds. Brooke is a graduate of the Honors College at Washington State University, where he serves on the advisory boards of both the College of Business and Honors College.