Mitch Berman

Mitch Berman is a 25 year multimedia industry executive specializing in video distribution for cable, satellite, IPTV, interactive TV, VOD and P2P. He is the former Corporate Vice President of Global Marketing for C-COR, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Marketing and Operations for the start-up and IPO of OpenTV; Senior Vice President of Strategic Business Development & General Manager for the start-up of Australia’s Galaxy Media/East Coast Pay TV Ltd (aka News Corporation’s FOXTEL); Marketing Director for the start-up of News Corporation’s Sky Network Television New Zealand; Vice President of Affiliate Sales at the start-up of E! Entertainment Television; and Regional Manager of Affiliate Operations at Home Box Office (HBO/Cinemax). Mitch is a frequently requested speaker/moderator at global industry events, such as Digital Hollywood, iTVT’s “TV Of Tomorrow Show,” NAB, IBC, CTAM Europe, Telecom ’07, and Fierce Markets IPTV Conference. Mitch holds a Master’s degree in Public Administration from USC and a B.A. in Sociology from UCLA.

Richard Laermer

Frequently-quoted authority on media culture and hype, Laermer is a former magazine and newspaper journalist, author of six bestselling books including the brand new 2011: Trendspotting and 2007’s Punk Marketing plus being cohost of TLC’s makeover show Taking Care of Business.

He is founder of RLM PR (1991) and has written books like trendSpotting and Full Frontal PR. Laermer co-runs Bad Pitch Blog and his radio show, Unspun, appears around the nation.

Vijay Nagarajan

As an engineer at Atheros, Vijay works to bring state-of-the-art wireless systems to the consumer. Previously, he was with Denver-based TensorComm, a start-up providing advanced receiver solutions for CDMA/WCDMA networks. Vijay has over 15 published patent applications and multiple technical papers/articles in mobile receiver design. His active engineering experience, along with his penchant for market research/analysis, helps provide unique perspectives and insider insights about wireless industry trends which he jots down in his analyst blog. Vijay holds an M.S(EE) degree from the University of Colorado, Boulder and a B.S degree from the College of Engineering, Guindy, India. Vijay writes regularly at his blog, Wireless Industry Analyst.

Gadi Shamia

Gadi Shamia is an accomplished Senior Executive with more than 13 years of software leadership experience, focused on the small and midsize business (SMB) market, working in both large companies and start-ups. Currently Gadi serves as VP & General Manager, SMB at Qualys, an on demand security and compliance management company. Prior to that, Gadi served as a Senior Vice President, responsible for SAP’s small business product portfolio. Other positions Gadi held were Vice President for sales, channels and field operations for SAP America’s SMB unit and a co-founder and Senior Vice President of Sales, Marketing and Business Development for TopManage, Inc., an Israeli market leader in the business management software space. TopManage was acquired by SAP in early 2002. Read more about Gadi’s interests in his blog.

Aparna Chennapragada

Aparna is a graduate student at MIT, in a joint degree program between Sloan School of Management and School of Engineering. Previously, she worked in software product development roles at Akamai technologies, a leading Internet content delivery service provider. Her interests include Technology entrepreneurship, India and Venture capital.

Gabe Zichermann

Gabe Zichermann developed the concept for New York-based rmbr in early 2007 after realizing that he had stopped enjoying the process of dealing with his friends’ online photos, and that a Funware-based approach might fix the problem. Gabe is a ten-year veteran of the games industry, with roles at CMP Media, Trymedia and Boonty as Director of Marketing, VP of Strategy and CMO. Prior to joining the games industry, Zichermann held roles with Cisco, CheckPoint Software and Nortel/Bay Networks.

Michael Kanazawa

Michael Kanazawa is CEO of Dissero Partners and co-author of BIG Ideas to BIG Results. He works with top executives on corporate transformations, strategy development, business execution and leadership. His clients have included a wide range of organizations, including Silicon Valley start-ups, private equity investors, and global corporations, such as AT&T, Anadigics, Intel, PG&E, Schlumberger, Symantec, and Verizon. Michael holds a BA in mathematics and economics from U.C. Santa Barbara and an MBA from the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California.

Carlo Maley

Carlo Maley studied computer science and psychology at Oberlin College. He then went to the University of Oxford on a Marshall Scholarship where he received a M.Sc. in evolutionary biology. He returned to the states to do a Ph.D. at MIT in computer science (really, computational biology). As a postdoc at the University of New Mexico, and later at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center he began studying the evolution of cells in cancers. Carlo is now an assistant professor at the Wistar Institute in Philadelphia where his lab uses both experimental (“wet lab”) and computational (“dry lab”) techniques to understand and prevent both carcinogenesis and therapeutic resistance.

Sudhakar Ram

Sudhakar Ram, Founder and Chairman and Managing Director of Mastek Ltd, has bagged the CNBC Asia’s India Business Leader of the Year award for 2007. Mr. Ram has been the moving force in leveraging the company’s strengths as an IT solutions company, and led its repositioning, focusing on chosen verticals like insurance and government. He has also been instrumental in identifying the futuristic ‘Third Wave’ opportunity for the Indian IT industry.

Bob Compton

Bob Compton has spent most of his career as a professional venture capital investor specializing in start-up technology companies, primarily medical tech and software. He has served on the boards of over a dozen non-profit organizations, including as a Trustee of the Kauffman Foundation, a $1.8 billion foundation dedicated to accelerating entrepreneurship. Compton’s latest endeavors include global traveler, author, record producer, photographer and film-maker. Two Million Minutes: A Global Examination is his first documentary film which was released this year. The film follows 2 high school seniors in India, China and the U.S. to compare and contrast the high school experiences in each country. How kids spend their time during high school – approximately 4 years, or two million minutes – in each culture is radically different and has profound implications for America’s economy in the decades ahead.