James Carville

CNN Correspondent, political consultant, author, actor

James Carville is a Democratic strategist who serves as a political contributor for CNN. Carville remains active in Democratic politics and is a party fundraiser. He was formerly co-host of Crossfire, CNN’s political debate program. Carville, an outspoken Democratic political strategist and commentator, emerged onto the national political scene after his consulting firm, Carville & Begala, helped elect President Bill Clinton in 1992. For his work on the Clinton campaign, the American Association of Political Consultants named him Campaign Manager of the Year in 1993. He went on to serve as a senior political adviser to the president. Often referred to as the “Ragin’ Cajun” for his animated and colorful debating style and his roots in Louisiana, Carville began managing political campaigns in 1982. Before entering politics, he worked as a litigator at a Baton Rouge, La., law firm from 1973-1979 and also had stints in the U.S. Marines and as a high school teacher. Born and raised in Carville, La., a town named for his grandfather, he graduated from Louisiana State University with undergraduate and law degrees.

Wendell Pierce

Actor

Wendell Pierce is a Julliard-trained American actor, best known for his portrayal of Detective Bunk Moreland on the HBO drama the Wire. His latest role is in HBO’s Treme where he plays trombone player, Antoine Batiste. He was also interviewed in Spike Lee’s 2006 HBO documentary When the Levees Broke regarding the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina. His film credits include Get on the Bus, Waiting to Exhale, Sleepers, and the Oscar award-winning movie Ray. Pierce is the host of the Peabody award-winning radio program, Jazz at Lincoln Center, which features live recordings from the Center’s House of Swing. Pierce was born in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Natalia Allen

Founder, Design Futurist

Natalia Allen is a fashion designer and surfer who combines green and tech to create innovative styles using environmentally and socially responsible manufacturing processes. She is one of the World Economic Forum’s Young Global Leaders, one of Fast Company’s 100 Most Creative, and one of Utne Reader’s 25 Visionaries Who Are Changing Your World. Winner of the Young Scientist/Entrepreneur Partnership Award from the IAP Global Network of Science Academies, she is developing “clean plastics” with scientist Stephen Miller. She describes sustainability as an accelerator of new business, innovation, and competitiveness. She speaks on eco-fashion and design, championing eco-friendly fibers, textiles, production methods, garment care and disposal. Allen founded Design Futurist in 2005.

Jim Elms

EVP, Head of Global Strategy, Universal McCann

With a career spanning over 20 years, Elms has contributed to some of the most memorable advertising campaigns ever, from the inception of the “Got Milk” masterpiece to several world-renowned Nike ads and long-term strategies. He is an award winning advertiser and published poet, and he also directed a Super 8 film, “Private Moment,” discussing the rise of TV voyeurism. Prior to that, Elms was the EVP, Director of Context Planning, and directed blue-chip clients such as Procter & Gamble, Lilly, GlaxoSmithKline, Canon, and Dairy Queen. Elms previously assumed significant roles at Barkley, Kansas City; Peter Mayer, New Orleans; Wieden + Kennedy. At Wieden+Kennedy, he managed all Nike business which contributed to winning a Cannes Gold Lion in 2001.

John Besh

Chef/Owner, Besh Restaurant Group

Besh is a James-Beard Award Winning chef and native son dedicated to the culinary riches of Southern Louisiana. Each of his six acclaimed restaurants celebrates the bounty and traditions of the region. Food & Wine named him one of the “Top 10 Best New Chefs in America” and his flagship restaurant August was featured in Gourmet magazine’s “Guide to America’s Best Restaurants,” and “America’s Top 50 Restaurants.” Besh is a frequent guest on NBC’s Today Show, and has appeared on top programs on The Food Network and the Sundance Channel. Entrepreneurial projects include Besh Restaurant Group Catering; a line of gourmet products; and his cookbook, My New Orleans. A former U.S. Marine, Besh is proud to have partnered with Arkel International, for which he creates high quality ready-to-eat meals distributed to thousands of emergency response teams and sustained strategic operations in the U.S. and abroad. Besh is based in New Orleans, Louisiana.

Umair Haque

Director, Havas Media Lab

Umair Haque is the Director of the Havas Media Lab, author of The New Capitalist Manifesto: Building a Disruptively Better Business, and writes a regular blog for Harvard Business Review. He is also the founder of Bubblegeneration.com, an agenda-setting advisory boutique that shapes strategies across media and consumer industries. Formerly he worked as a writer, banker, derivatives trader, and strategist. Haque studied neuroscience at McGill, holds an MBA from London Business School, where he worked closely with Gary Hamel, and has conducted additional postgraduate work in economics, strategy, and innovation at Oxford University. He currently lives in London.

Jimmy Jellinek

Chief Content Officer, Playboy Enterprise Inc. (PEI)

Jimmy Jellinek oversees content development for all of Playboy Enterprise Inc.’s media properties including print, online, mobile, TV, film, and radio. Jellinek is a veteran of the men’s entertainment industry and new media platforms, having spent most of his career as an editor and branding expert in the general-interest men’s publishing field. PEI promoted Jellinek from Editorial Director to Chief Content Officer, a newly created position, in 2009. Before working at Playboy, Jellinek served as VP of Entertainment and Programming at Heavy Corporation (Heavy.com) where he was responsible for the creation and execution of all original content and programming. Prior, he served as editor and branding expert for the world’s largest general-interest men’s magazines including FHM, Stuff Magazine and most recently Maxim Magazine, where he was editor-in-chief. Before joining Dennis Publishing, he was the editor-in-chief of Complex Magazine. Over the past 10 years, Jellinek has written in-depth features, plus crime, service, and travel articles for Rolling Stone, Men’s Journal, The New York Times Magazine, New York Magazine, New York Post, The Face, GQ, Wired, and Time Out New York.

Braden Kelley

Founder, Business Strategy Innovation, Author, Speaker, Consultant

Braden Kelley is the author of the new book ‘Stoking Your Innovation Bonfire’, founder of Business Strategy Innovation, and editor of the leading innovation blog, BloggingInnovation.com. Braden writes frequently on the topic of continuous innovation and works with clients to create innovative strategies, effective customer marketing, organizational change, and improved organizational performance. He has maximized profits for companies while living and working in Germany, England, and the United States. Braden earned his MBA from top-rated London Business School. In his spare time, Braden runs the BloggingInnovation.com – home to nearly two thousand innovation articles and video interviews with luminaries like Dean Kamen, John Hagel III, Roger Martine, Dan Pink, and more.

Robbie Vitrano

Co-Founder/Chief Brand Architect, Naked Pizza

Robbie Vitrano is a brand communications expert, specializing in post-recession, post-mass media digital platforms for entrepreneurial businesses. He applies his expertise to Naked Pizza to reinvent fast food by raising awareness about nutritional health and food supply while also highlighting the social obligations and impact of a modern, profitable, and scalable business. He oversees all aspects of Naked Pizza branding platform and strategic marketing of the company. As Chairman of the Board at Trumpet Group, a venture-marketing studio and full service branding agency, as well as co-founder and board member of the IdeaVillage, an entrepreneurship think tank, Vitrano has contributed to the launch of hundreds of companies and brands. His point of view: New Orleans is the Social Innovation Silicon Valley, an urban microcosm of the economic, political, social, environmental and cultural issues being re-evaluated in the U.S. and around the world. He lives in New Orleans.

Shawn K. Kingsberry

CIO, Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board (RATB)

Shawn Kingsberry was named one of Federal Computer Week’s “2011 Federal 100 Winners” for his vision and leadership in developing and deploying all the IT used by the Recovery Accountability and Transparency Board. As a senior executive for the board, Kingsberry led the effort to launch Recovery.gov and a number of other websites in a very short time to comply with the mandates of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. In May 2010, Kingsberry was recognized by the board’s chairman and Federal CIO Vivek Kundra for making Recovery.gov the first government-wide information system to be fully migrated to the public cloud. The migration took only 22 days to complete – another federal milestone.

Joshua Fouts and Rita King

Founders, Dancing Ink Productions

Joshua Fouts is a writer, journalist, gamer and technologist who has worked at the forefront of exploring and chronicling the evolving use of emergent technology for journalism, government, academia and the private sector. In 2003, he launched and directed the first foreign policy think-tank dedicated to exploring public diplomacy, growing it into a worldwide resource center. In 2005, he was the first person to propose and direct a project illuminating how virtual worlds could be used for cultural relations. He went on to embark on a groundbreaking journey with Rita J. King to explore the value of virtual worlds, which culminated in their 2009 report published by the Carnegie Council “Digital Diplomacy: Understanding Islam through Virtual Worlds.” He is a senior fellow for Digital Media and Public Policy at the Center for the Study of the Presidency & Congress, a Next Generation Fellow at The American Assembly, and Founder/Executive Producer at Dancing Ink Productions.

Rita J. King is the Founding Director of Dancing Ink Productions, a company that works with major global clients focused on the emergence of a new global culture and economy in the Imagination Age. She is an Innovator-in-Residence at IBM’s Analytics Virtual Center, a former Senior Fellow at The Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs in New York City and a current Senior Fellow at the Center for the Study of the Presidency & Congress in Washington, DC. Her essays, various writings and works of art have been commissioned, published and exhibited globally. Rita is a frequent international speaker on the subject of productive creative collaboration and the cultural and economic implications of the Imagination Age.

Nic Perkin

Co-Founder/President, The Receivables Exchange

Former CFO and successful entrepreneur, Nic Perkin founded The Receivables Exchange to provide small and medium sized businesses with an easy and efficient way to access working capital. Prior to The Receivables Exchange, Perkin was Executive VP at EmSense Corporation, a leading next generation media measurement company. Previously, he was VP of Global Business Development for Massive, Inc., which was acquired by Microsoft Corporation in May 2006. He also held the position of Head of Strategic Business Development at Kestrel Technologies, a leading Wall Street developer of technology solutions for fixed income trading. He also worked in mergers and acquisitions at Veronis, Suhler & Company and Cowles Media Company and held various operations positions at The Black Book. Perkin holds a M.S. in Finance from the London Business School and a B.A. from Tulane University.

Mr. Perkin also serves on the Board of Directors for the Youth Rescue Initiative, a non-profit organization that aims to teach at-risk children in the greater New Orleans area how to overcome challenges, create opportunity and achieve success. He was appointed to, and serves as Vice Chairman of, the Louisiana Innovation Council. He is also a member of the New York Weill Cornell Council (NYWCC) which serves to support patient care, medical research, and education at New York Weill Cornell Medical Center. Mr. Perkin is also a member of the Board of Directors of Musicmogul.com, the world’s first online 3D music world and entertainment platform.

Matt Candler

Founder/CEO, 4.0 Schools

Matt Candler, a veteran of the charter school movement, is founder of 4.0 Schools. Candler returned to New Orleans after college to help run the main operations center for the 1996 Atlanta Olympics. After the Games he studied Decision Sciences and the emerging charter sector at the Kellogg School of Management. He then served as founding co-principal of a K-8 charter school in North Carolina and helped launch other charter schools in the Southeast. As KIPP Foundation’s VP of School Development from 2001 – 2004, Candler led a team that established 37 new schools across the U.S. He then served as the founding COO of the New York City Center for Charter School Excellence, a $41 million effort to launch high-quality charter schools. In 2006, Chandler joined New Schools for New Orleans as its first CEO and built a team whose human capital and school launch efforts are considered some of the most innovative and aggressive public school reforms in the nation. Chandler is chairman of the Louisiana Association of Public Charter Schools, board member of Building Excellent Schools, and co-founder of the New Orleans teacher support community.

Matt Galligan

Co-Founder/Chief Strategy Officer, SimpleGeo

Matt Galligan, is the Co-Founder and Chief Strategy Officer for SimpleGeo, where he oversees the strategic direction of the company. He founded SimpleGeo in 2009 with Joe Stump. He previously founded Socialthing, a service that made it easy to keep up with friends’ acitivity from multiple social networks. Socialthing.com went into private beta in March, 2008 at South by Southwest in Austin, Texas. The company was acquired five months later by AOL and currently branded as AIM Lifestream. After the acquisition, Matt worked with AOL to further develop and define their social strategy.

Daryl Williams

Director, Research and Policy, Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation

Daryl Williams is the director of Research & Policy for the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, where he supports programs to advance minority entrepreneurship. He is also the national executive director of the Urban Entrepreneur Partnership, Inc., a partnership with the National Economic Council at the White House, the Business Roundtable, the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, and other national organizations designed to help grow minority entrepreneurs around the country. Williams is the national executive director of the Urban Entrepreneur Partnership Gulf Coast, Inc., a program that connects private, public, and nonprofit sector resources to foster entrepreneurship, business development, and job creation in the areas devastated by Hurricane Katrina.

Cesar Harada

Founder and Coordinator, Open_Sailing

Cesar Harada is the Founder and Coordinator of Open_Sailing, an international community developing open-source technologies to explore, study, and intelligently inhabit the oceans. He won the ARS Electronica [Next Idea] grant and the Sustainable Art Award at BASHstudios for Open_Sailing. His films and performances have been screened internationally at renowned venues including Carnegie Mellon University and the Pompidou Center, Paris. He has lectured at the V2 Institute for the Unstable Media, Rotterdam; Barbican, London; Goldsmiths University, London; and MIT Cambridge, MA. Harada is a TED fellow and he studied at Ecole Boulle, ENSAD, Paris, Central Saint Martins, London; ENSCI; Royal College of Art, and Paris 8 University. Harada is French Japanese and currently resides in New Orleans, LA.

Julia Reed

Newsweek, contributing editor

Julia Reed is a contributing editor at Newsweek, where she writes the “food and drink” column, and creative director of taigan.com, a retail website where she also edits the site’s “magazine,” Fetch. She appears regularly on CNN and is a contributor to Garden and Gun, Conde Nast Traveler, ElleDécor, The New York Times and Vogue. From 1988 to 2008, she was senior writer at Vogue. She is chairman of the board of the Ogden Museum of Southern Art in New Orleans, where she lives with her husband John Pearce and her beagle Henry.

Tom Weldon

Co-Founder of the Innovation Factory

A co-founder of The Innovation Factory, Mr. Weldon currently serves as Chairman of The Innovation Factory as well as offspring companies including LipoSonix, NeoVista and Cellutions. He is also co-founder, Chairman and Managing Director of Accuitive Medical Ventures and Chairman of Novoste Corporation. A prolific inventor, he holds more than a dozen issued U.S. patents on medical devices. Mr. Weldon holds an MBA from Indiana University and a BS in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University.

Alex Wise

Executive Producer, Sea Change Radio

Alex Wise is the Host and Executive Producer of Sea Change Radio, a weekly program heard on over 40 radio stations across the country. His passion for the environment grew out of a concern over energy consumption and resource extraction, and a belief that innovations in technology and public policy have the potential to create a more sustainable planet. He has interviewed such luminaries as green jobs guru, Van Jones, the founder of the Whole Earth catalog, Stewart Brand, and energy expert, Vaclav Smil. Alex’s career as a media executive includes management-level positions at both start-ups and large media conglomerates like Time Warner and News Corp. He helped CREDO Mobile (Working Assets) with its 2008 election season political technology strategy, and served as a communication liaison between SEIU and media & financial communities in Japan for the 2008 SEIU delegation to Tokyo. A recording artist who’s developed a variety of musical projects, Alex is a dedicated waste vegetable oil evangelist, fluent in Japanese and holds a Master’s in International Law & Diplomacy from The Fletcher School (at Tufts and Harvard) and a B.A. from Emory University.

Colleen Flanigan

Visual/Performing/Environmental Artist

Colleen Flanigan is a visual, performing and environmental artist residing in Portland, Oregon. Raised along the Monterey Peninsula in California, she has been listening to the ocean tide for much of her life. Colleen is the first visual artist to be certified by the Global Coral Reef Alliance in Biorock mineral accretion, a technology for coral reef restoration and shore protection that shares many metallurgical, electrical and chemical principles with her early sculpture. This June she plans to install a Living Sea Sculpture: contemporary art as coral refuge in the underwater museum (MUSA) off Cancun. Combined with this direct action to rehabilitate endangered corals, she is developing an exhibition that links coral and human health. At the intersection of biology, human technological innovation, and multi-media arts lies her vision for helping corals regain their color.

Through Colleen’s socio-ecological alter egos, Miss Snail Pail and Amphitrite, she has joined the voices defending our natural resources and inviting creative responses to environmental issues. She is a TED Senior Fellow. With more than 20 years of arts background, she works in jewelry, steel sculptures, drawing, and interactive mixed media on conceptual and collaborative projects; she also makes ball-and-socket skeletons for stop-motion puppets. Recently she applied her metalworking expertise to the stop-motion animated feature film, Coraline. A teacher of sculpture and metalsmithing, she’s known for her large, 3-D steel “drawings,” woven with wire by children in group projects.

Rob Tompkins

Director and Sector Lead, SVB Analytics

Rob Tompkins is a director and the cleantech Sector Lead with SVB Analytics, responsible for overseeing valuation analysis and overall engagement execution for venture-backed companies and venture capital firms, with a primary focus on companies within the cleantech sector.

Prior to joining SVB Analytics in 2008, Tompkins worked with Huron Consulting Group in the firm's San Francisco valuation practice. While at Huron, Tompkins focused primarily on valuing start-up companies in the life science, internet, technology and cleantech sectors and led the group's cleantech initiatives.

Before Huron, Tompkins spent 18 months in Santiago, Chile, where he worked in sales and marketing for an Internet news organization and later as an analyst for a venture capital and private equity firm focusing on Latin American markets. Tompkins began his career with PricewaterhouseCoopers' Healthcare Consulting Practice where he was responsible for modeling and forecasting multi-billion dollar budgets for state-sponsored health programs.

Tompkins earned a bachelor's degree in government from the University of Virginia, and a master's in business administration and a master's of science in international development from Tulane University.

Jason Clark

Developer/Social Manager, Skoll Foundation’s Social Edge

At the Skoll Foundation's Social Edge, Jason Clark is responsible for developing and implementing new functionality to enable social entrepreneurs, social benefit organizations and other interested parties to connect with one another and to share their experiences and knowledge with the community at large. He also keeps a blog on Social Edge called Untangled.

Prior to joining Social Edge, Jason developed, implemented and managed a wide variety of Web sites, including Ingram Micro’s first B2B commerce extranet and the RosettaNet community’s portal site. RosettaNet.org enabled the standards body’s partners to collaborate on the development of XML-based e-business transaction standards and business processes, as well as the sharing of implementation resources and data between partners. Additionally, he built an innovative but short-lived celebrity news and biography site, PublicFigure.com, and worked with the Web development team at Arbonne International to streamline business and technical processes.

Jason’s primary area of development interest is in collaborative technologies and their impact on the creation and/or enablement of virtual communities.

In previous positions, Jason worked as a technical support specialist, graphic designer, art director, editor, and bookseller.

Michael Morrissey

Director of Engineering, Google

Morrissey runs the Android services team at Google, which includes Market, sync, and device management. Prior to Android, he built the Sidekick/Hiptop service platform at Danger and worked on mobile products at Microsoft.

Dr. Jonathan Wise, M.D.

Professor, Tulane

Dr. Jonathan Wise, MD, a Harvard and Yale educated Endocrinologist and clinical Professor at Tulane, has over 30 years of experience as a physician, treating patients in his own private practice. Originally from Boston, Mass, he left his practice and moved to New Orleans over 20 years ago, after marrying a woman from New Orleans and falling in love with the city. Already a renowned, published medical author and national speaker, he is in the process of publishing a book called "The Big Waste," discussing his views on the pitfalls of recent health care reforms, elaborating on government medical and insurance monetary "wastes" and multi-industry alliances and how they affect the quality of care and cost to the average patient and taxpayer.

Terrance Osborne

Artist

Terrance Osborne grew up in the heart of the culturally rich city of New Orleans. Inspired by his surroundings, Osborne developed an interest in visual art at a young age and studied under artist Richard Thomas. For five years, Osborne taught in New Orleans’ public school system until after Katrina when he decided to dedicate his time completely to his art. In 2007, Osborne’s Official Jazz & Heritage Festival Poster became one of the most sought after posters of the year. In 2008, Osborne partnered with Nike to design a poster and the first New Orleans Air Force One shoe. He has since designed the first official Hornets poster and received awards from New Orleans Museum of Art, New Orleans Magazine, New Orleans City Business, as well as the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival. Osborne holds a degree in Fine Arts from Xavier University in New Orleans.

Adam Karlin

Author of the Lonely Planet Guide to New Orleans

Adam Karlin is the author of the Lonely Planet guide to New Orleans. He was born in Washington DC and raised in the rural Maryland tidewater. He is a contributor to the Travel Channel, Budget Travel, Worldhum, Jane’s Intelligence Digest, the BBC and Lonely Planet, for whom he has written or co-authored some 25 guidebooks in Asia, Africa and the Americas. His favorite place, the one that holds his heart and feels most like home, is New Orleans, where he does some work as a copywriter, script doctor, screenwriter and fiction author.

Benjamin Reece

Founder of Deltree

Benjamin Reece is the founder of Deltree, a full-service HD/film production and post-production studio that focuses on high production value, rich experiences, and socially aware outcomes. Deltree strives to cultivate mass-scale ideas with focused impact for global brands. He builds Kinio, a revolutionary platform for filmmakers to sell their films online. Reece also develops and executes broadcast production models for Liveset.

Robert Lalka

Secretary of State’s Office of Global Partnerships

Rob Lalka serves in the Secretary of State’s Office of Global Partnerships, where he coordinates partner engagement to deepen ties with business leaders, foundations, and social entrepreneurs in the United States and Muslim-majority countries.  He is the State Department’s liaison to Partners for a New Beginning, a public-private partnership established by former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, Aspen Institute President Walter Isaacson, and Coca-Cola CEO Muhtar Kent.  In this role, Rob works with the coalition to engage the US private sector to promote entrepreneurship, economic development, interfaith dialogue, and educational programs.  Rob previously worked with the United Nations Office in Geneva, the World Bank headquarters in Washington, and AmeriCorps in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.

Shai Rao

VP, Business Development, Gold Run

Shailesh Rao is VP of Business Development for AR platform GoldRun. While focused on developing programming for GoldRun’s expanding list of clients that include H&M, Young & Rubicam, Esquire magazine, A&E Network and Universal Pictures, he also handles a wide variety of duties related to product development and overall brand strategy. Prior to GoldRun, Shai held key management positions with companies such as Rhapsody, where he helped launch Listen.com and Surface Magazine. As Executive Editor he refined Surface Magazine’s editorial vision and managed client relations, developing multi-platform marketing initiatives and signature brand extensions. He had been working as a strategist with renowned architecture firm Rockwell Group and experiential design studio Formavision before joining GoldRun in spring 2010. He has since cultivated an expertise in the area of mobile marketing and next generation interactive advertising.

H. Andrew Schwartz

CEO of Audubon Communities Management, LLC

Andrew Schwartz is the founder and CEO of Audubon Communities Management, LLC. He oversees the firm's acquisition and asset management activities and is responsible for directing senior personnel. Mr. Schwarz also serves as President of the firm's strategic development board. Prior to founding Audubon Communities, Mr. Schwarz was Senior Vice President and Director of Acquisitions and Asset Management for Emmes & Company - a private real estate investment firm with over $1.5 billion in assets. At Emmes, Mr. Schwarz oversaw the acquisition and strategic management of approximately one hundred domestic real estate assets. Prior to joining Emmes, he directed the leasing and marketing efforts for over 2 million square feet of office space on behalf of institutional clients in New Orleans, Louisiana. Mr. Schwarz received his MBA from Columbia Business School in 1996.

Robert Fogarty

Executive Director, Evacuteer.org

Robert X. Fogarty, 27, is the director of evacuteer.org and founder of Dear World. He started evacuteer.org after assisting the City of New Orleans evacuate 18,000 residents without cars in advance of Hurricane Gustav, the largest hurricane evacuation in U.S. history.

Evacuteer.org trains 500 volunteers each year to assist in the event of a mandatory evacuation and fills a critical component of the City of New Orleans' emergency operations plan. The non-profit organization also researches and promotes innovative hurricane preparedness strategy.

In 2011, Fogarty started Dear World, a scalable version of Dear New Orleans, his for-profit photography venture for social good. Fogarty has photographed thousands, including Super Bowl Most Valuable Player Drew Brees, Academy Award Winner Susan Sarandon and NBA All Star Chris Paul. His photos are viewed 1.5 million times every month online, and 10 percent of Dear New Orleans' revenue goes to evacuteer.org.

He graduated from the University of Oregon School of Journalism in 2005.

Jeremy Hunnewell

Founder, NOLA Startup Fund

Jeremy Hunnewell is the founder of the NOLA Startup Fund.

Perry Chen

Co-Founder and CEO, Kickstarter

Perry Chen is co-founder and CEO of Kickstarter, a new way to fund ideas and endeavors. Kickstarter allows people to offer goods, services and other unique (and frequently, whimsical) benefits in return for funding. Prior to Kickstarter, Perry worked as a day-trader, an audio engineer and a pre-school teacher. Perry also co-founded the Southfirst art gallery in Brooklyn, NY, and has been published by Warner Books and The New York Times. He graduated from Tulane University, A.B. Freeman School of Business in New Orleans.

Dominik Knoll

CEO, World Trade Center

Dominik Knoll is the CEO of World Trade Center, a non-profit business, shipping and trade organization in New Orleans aimed at increasing international trade in New Orleans. Dominik is from Italy and came to New Orleans with a diverse career in international business. He was project manager to the CEO of Kronberg International Holdings, a European real estate company and was a joint venture partner of Pirelli Real Estate in Italy. He received his MBA from Tulane University, holds a Master of Science Degree in Management from the business school at the University of Innsbruck, Austria, and has an Accreditation of Master Degree (equivalent to an Italian PhD). He is the author of "How Companies Successfully Enter Clusters."

Geoff Hingle

Co-Founder, PMOLink

Geoff Hingle is one of the founders of PMOLink, Inc. and has over 28 years of experience in systems engineering, project management and process management. His experience includes 12 years in government projects as well as 16 years in commercial-sector projects. Mr. Hingle serves in senior management advisory consultant roles for several Fortune 500 companies. He the Chairman of the Board of Directors of PMOLink LLC and serves as the President and CEO of PMOLink LLC and its subsidiary: PMOLink Government Solutions, Inc. He is currently serving as the president amerutis of the Greater New Orleans(GNO) Chapter of the Project Management Institute. Mr. Hingle also serves on the board of directors for the Louisiana Technology Council, Project Management Institute GNO Chapter and Future System Advisors LLC.

Michael Pinkerton

COO, Metaverse Mod Squad

As COO of Metaverse Mod Squad, Michael Pinkerton leads business development, operations, and public relations for the company. He also consults on child safety, design, and engagement strategies. His experience includes over a decade of practicing law with large law firms in commercial litigation, bankruptcy, and intellectual property. He is a regular speaker for real and virtual audiences, addressing topics as diverse as engaging children in virtual worlds, using a virtual world to extend a television brand, and metagaming’s digital law issues. Michael graduated with honors in journalism from the University of Georgia’s Grady College and then obtained a JD from the LSU Law School, where he was a member of the Louisiana Law Review.

Chris Schultz

Entrepreneur and Community Leader, NOLA

Chris is an entrepreneur and community leader in New Orleans, LA.  In 2009, he opened a co-working space called Launch Pad. He is the founder of Voodoo Ventures, home to several successful technology companies he has built.  Chris is active blogger and a passionate mentor of young entrepreneurs.  He organized attended his first BarCamp in 2006 and was inspired by the openness warmth of the community. He hosted the first BarCamp in Russia and New Orleans.  In 2009, Chris spoke at the SXSW conference, hosted the first WordCamp in New Orleans. Chris loves connecting people and nurturing the New Orleans tech community.

Josh Sawislak

Director, Clip Strategies

Josh Sawislak is the Director of Clio Strategies, a firm that provides strategic consulting support to government and industry in the areas of infrastructure development, continuity and resilience planning, acquisition, and telework. Sawislak is also a senior fellow of the Telework Exchange and a member of the American Institute of Certified Planners. He has over 25 years of experience as a corporate and government project manager and executive. He has broad experience with multi-billion dollar acquisitions in construction, real estate development, international trade, telecommunications, and information technology and has negotiated and managed projects from inception to completion as both a public and private sector leader.

Watts Wacker

Lecturer, Author, Commentator

Watts Wacker is one of the most celebrated and influential minds in modern business. Mr. Wacker -- lecturer, best-selling author, political commentator and social critic -- is one of the world's most respected futurists. He has been the futurist at SRI International, the legendary Menlo Park think tank, and spent ten years as the resident futurist at the preeminent social research organization, Yankelovich Partners. Watts Wacker resides in Westport, Connecticut with his wife and partner of 31 years and one of their two children.

Eric Berlow

Scientist

Eric Berlow is an ecological networks scientist. He is a a 2010-11 TED Fellow and wrote one of the Top 20 most-cited papers in Ecology of the decade. He is currently the Station Director at the University of California Merced, Sierra Nevada Research Institute as well as a Research Scientist at USGS Yosemite Field Station and the PEaCE Laboratory in Berkeley, CA.

Monique Meche

Senior Managing Director, Global Policy and Government Affairs, Cisco Systems

Monique has responsibility for driving Cisco's public policy goals on environment and sustainability policy globally. Cisco was ranked #1 in Greenpeace’s Cool IT Leaderboard ranking of ICT companies on sustainability. Cisco has shown that investing in innovative product solutions not only has business potential but can help to slow emissions and address climate change.

Monique joined Cisco in 2004 after 12 years of work in business development, government and sales for the ICT industry in Europe, the US and Japan, nine of which were spent at Intel in senior management roles. Monique was responsible for investments in wireless technology companies for Intel Capital from 2000–2003. Monique holds a B.A. degree from Tulane and holds graduate degrees from the Institut d’Etudes Politiques in Paris and the College of Europe. Monique was born in Lafayette, grew up in Gonzales, Louisiana, has lived and worked in numerous European countries, the US and Japan and now resides in Ireland.

Evan Burfield

Chairman and CEO, Synteractive

Evan co-founded Synteractive in 2003. In his role as Chairman and CEO, he is responsible for all aspects of vision, strategy, and execution at Synteractive. He is also the Executive Chairman of Cloud Advantage, a Synteractive company. Evan holds a First Class degree in Joint Honors Philosophy, Politics and Economics from St. Catherine’s College at the University of Oxford. While at Oxford, he won the Webb Medley prize for most outstanding thesis for his work on the effects of organizational incentives on knowledge sharing. Selected as one of the Top 40 Emerging Leaders in Washington, DC by Business Forward Magazine, Evan was a Finalist for the Greater Washington Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2001 as well named a 2001 Young Lion by the Washington Post.

Jonathan Jeter

Inventor, ?What If! Innovation

Jonathan Jeter is an inventor at ?What If! Innovation, the world’s largest independent innovation company, where he works with clients across the globe to solve innovation challenges and build innovation capability. Some of Jonathan’s experience at ?What If! includes creating new strategies to launch a new pharmaceutical in Brazil, helping a major Caribbean tourism destination reposition, reorganize and build innovation capability, and building a 10 year innovation roadmap for cough and cold therapies. Prior to ?What If!, Jonathan was a Senior Strategic Planner at ad agencies in New York and Atlanta, most recently at Publicis, where he developed UBS’s “You & Us” campaign and Whirlpool’s re-launch of the Maytag Brand. Before advertising, he spent time in the world of non-profits running the Annual Giving Program for the American Junior Golf Association. A proud southerner living in New York, Jonathan grew up in Alabama and earned a BSM in Marketing and Management from Tulane University.

Jarett T. Rodriguez

Entrepreneur, Innovator, Builder

Jarett Rodriguez is the Associate Director of the Stephenson Entrepreneurship Institute at Louisiana State University. He is also the Co-Director & creator of the Entrepreneurship Fellows program and the LSU100 program. Rodriguez teaches Innovation & Creativity to a multidisciplinary class of undergraduate students as part of the Entrepreneurship Minor at LSU. He is also a member of the Executive Education faculty at LSU where he teaches entrepreneurship, innovation and strategy.

Rodriguez has personally founded or co-founded numerous companies including a health club in Florida, a construction company with operations in Mississippi, Louisiana, & Colorado, an IT consulting firm in Texas and a furniture manufacturing company in Texas & Arkansas.

Rodriguez has spent most of his career in various technology roles. He has been a Microsoft trainer for corporate and private clients, an Avaya Partner implementing digital and voice over IP solutions for businesses, a certified Cisco network administrator, an interim-CIO, and a consultant to a venture capital firm in Dallas, TX.

He earned his MBA through the executive program of the Flores MBA at LSU. He also holds a Master of Education with emphasis in human physiology from the University of Louisiana at Monroe and a BS in Business Management and Entrepreneurship from Louisiana Tech.

Rodriguez serves on the board of directors and advisory boards of several privately held firms. He is also a member of the 2011 class of Leadership Louisiana.

David Kearney

Vice President, The Kearney Companies

David is currently a Vice President at The Kearney Companies, a New Orleans based third party Logistics Company that serves the supply chain needs of many large importers and exporters in the Port of New Orleans. David oversees the company's business development efforts and helps manage the company's third party logistics solutions that include warehousing services, inland freight management, and import and export freight forwarding services. In most cases, The Kearney Companies works with its customers to implement tailored solutions that are unique to each customer’s supply chain requirements. The Kearney Companies, Inc. current operates over 750,000 square feet of warehouse capacity with over 60 acres of yard capacity in the Port of New Orleans area.

David attended Southern Methodist University where he earned a BBA in General Business. While at SMU, David participated in the university’s international Studies program in Copenhagen, Denmark. David recently earned his MBA from Tulane’s A.B. Freeman School of Business. David is a native of New Orleans and has lived previously in New York, San Francisco and Los Angeles where he worked for two of the world’s largest container shipping lines (APL Ltd and Maersk Line). David has experience in marine terminal operations in Los Angeles, Oakland, and New Orleans. David is currently the president elect of the World Trade Center of New Orleans and member of the WTC Board of Directors and Executive Committee. David also server on the Board of Directors member of the New Orleans Board of Trade (NOBOT) as well as the Board of Directors of the Tulane Association of Business Alumni (TABA).

John Elstrott

Executive Director, Levy-Rosenblum Intitute for Entrepreneurship

As Executive Director of the Levy-Rosenblum Institute for Entrepreneurship, Dr. Elstrott manages entrepreneurship research projects and programs designed to train and inspire entrepreneurs. The institute also contributes to regional economic development through the coordination of joint academic, government, and business initiatives that stimulate private enterprise.

Dr. Elstrott is a consultant to family businesses and profit and not-for-profit corporations. He is the Founder and Director of the Tulane Family Business Center. He has also served as an economic development and strategic planning consultant for state and municipal governments.

David Crais

Founder, Crais Management Group

David Crais is a long time technology entrepreneur and executive. Beginning in 1992, he has held sales and management positions and led engagements with many leading medical technology and information technology companies including i-Stat, Hewlett Packard, Abbot Diagnostics, Quest Diagnostics, Instrumentation Labs, and others. He has led and participated in fundraising rounds with startup and emerging growth companies including IPO’s and PIPE offerings with Careside where he served as Vice President of Sales and Marketing and as a member of the senior management team assisted in raising over $75,000,000 in venture capital and public funds from 1997-2002. He led a direct and distributor sales force of 1100 with PSS, Fischer Scientific, Henry Schein, and others and also led a joint venture with Roche Diagnostic in Canada in 2002. He has worked with the commercialization and monetization of innovations in surgery, pathology, diabetes, orthopedics, geriatrics, neonatal, nephrology, cardiac care, and other specialties and sub-specialties.

Crais currently leads a consulting firm he founded in 2004 and, through his firm, has assisted over 30 companies primarily in the medical field, but also has had as clients MTV, Viacom, Nickelodeon, Emerald Bayou Studios, Nova Pictures, the Koovoom gaming platform, and he currently serves as Acting CEO for two of his client companies: Physicians Proviso, a physician owned co-op implementing electronic medical record platforms, and TCA Cellular Therapy, and adult stem cell R & D company with 7 current clinical trials in Phase 1 and Phase 2 FDA approval. He holds board seats with several emerging growth companies and is a senior advisor to The Sheehan Center for Diabetes Management in Sioux Falls, South Dakota and New York City.

Anselm v. Seherr-Thoss

Incendii VFX

Anselm worked in the visual effects industry in Europe and the US for the last six years and is author of several training DVDs. He also co-produces the highly acclaimed digital destruction plugin “RayFire” for 3DS Max. Incendii VFX is a visual effects and 3Dimensional design house based in New Orleans and Los Angeles. They deliver computer generated effects with an emphasis on particle effects. Anselm credit list includes James Cameron's "AVATAR", The A-Team, Priest, G.I. Joe – Rise of Cobra, Dragonball:Evolution, among others.

Thomas Anderson

Director of Corporate and Strategic Development
Stephenson Disaster Management Institute at Louisiana State University

Anderson spent over 20 years in the private sector specializing in entrepreneurial business development and strategic development. He lived in New York City during September 11and became a lead volunteer and organizer for relief services (ESF-6 Mass Care) at the World Trade Center working with the Seaman’s Church Institute and the Episcopal Church USA relief mission at St. Paul's Chapel at Ground Zero. Anderson received a special commendation from Mayor-elect Michael Bloomberg on behalf of the Seaman’s Church Institute for recognition of his outstanding volunteer service during the World Trade Center Emergency Relief Effort of 2001. Anderson later worked with the East Baton Rouge Office of Emergency Management before, during and after hurricanes Katrina, Rita, Gustav and Ike and with the Governor’s Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management during the recent Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill. Anderson was a guest of the 2010 U.S. Senate Homeland Security Staff Delegation from Louisiana to Kobe and Tokyo, Japan where he attended the 15 year memorial of the Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, theUnited Nations World Conference on Disaster Reduction (WCDR) and to participate in a working session as a panelist for the International Recovery Platform (IRP) which is part of theInternational Strategy for Disaster Reduction (ISDR).

Prior to joining LSU, Anderson was the Chief Operating Officer of the fifth start-up company of his career, First Responder Systems and Technology, Inc. He has served as a panelist for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security’s Project Responder, assisting in identifying priorities for core capabilities in the nation’s public safety effort. He currently serves as a subject matter expert on the Department of Defense's and the Department of Justice's Federal Interagency Board (IAB) to their Interoperable Communications and Information Systems Sub-Committee in Washington, DC. In his private sector duties he was a corporate partner of the International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC) where he was a member of the IAFC Manufacturer’s Roundtable for 5 years; the Congressional Fire Services Institute (CFSI); the National Emergency Management Association (NEMA), the International Association of Emergency Managers (IAEM) as well as a member of the Louisiana Emergency Preparedness Association (LEPA) among others. Anderson holds a BA in Cultural Anthropology with studies in Human Communications (Intercultural/Interracial), from Ithaca College in Ithaca, New York. He was a national Meadows Scholar and earned an MFA from Southern Methodist University in Dallas, TX.

Robert Evan

President and CEO, ConTech International

Happy Johnson

Founder, TeamHappy.org

Following Hurricane Katrina, Happy Johnson served with the K44 Disaster Relief Unit of the American Red Cross Chapter of Southeast Louisiana, driving Emergency Response Vehicle #1081.

At the conclusion of his service as a first responder in 2005, Johnson founded a non-profit/non-governmental organization which provided direct volunteer assistance and served as a leading national advocate for the comprehensive recovery of the Gulf Coast.

Johnson is a former White House intern with a B.A. in International Relations and American History from Georgetown University.

The NGO he directs is called TEAMHAPPY.ORG, which provides relief blankets to those in need and innovative educational leadership in the realm of disaster preparedness and coastal restoration. He is also the author of a children’s book teaching emergency readiness through teamwork.

Jesse M. Lapierre

Commercial Officer

Jesse M Lapierre began his international career in the private sector with Telos Corporation of Washington, DC, where he quickly moved from inside sales to head of the $29 million Western European account in Heidelberg, Germany. In 2004, he entered government service with the US Department of Commerce, serving first with the Office of Strategic Planning, and then as Director of Global Market Research.

In September of 2007, he began his first tour as a Diplomat in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia as Commercial Attaché and served until September 2008. He was then promoted to Commercial Consul for Jeddah and the Western Provinces and served from September 2008 to September 2009. His primary responsibility was assisting US companies in entering the Saudi market.

He is currently assigned to the New Orleans Export Assistance Center, and is charged with assisting Louisiana companies in Jefferson, St. Bernard and Plaquemines Parishes with their export assistance needs. He is also the office lead responsible for the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Environmental Technology sectors in Louisiana.

Mr. Lapierre is a native of Massachusetts, and earned his B.A. in English Literature from Saint Anselm College in Manchester, NH and his M.A. in International Commerce and Policy from George Mason University in Arlington, VA. He has a certificate in Developmental Economics from Universitiet van Pretoria in Pretoria, South Africa and he currently holds several professional certifications in International Business and Training Design and Presentation. Mr. Lapierre is a former professional rugby player, competing in South Africa and Australia, and in his spare time enjoys athletics, art, and travel.

Charles Smith

Vice-President and COO for Silocaf of New Orleans and S3 Pacorini Logistics

Charles Smith is a graduate of the University of Notre Dame, class of 1992 in Aerospace Engineering. He is currently the Vice- President and COO for Silocaf of New Orleans and S3 Pacorini Logistics.

Company Information
Silocaf of New Orleans Inc.

Founded in 1992, Private owned and part of the larger international Pacorini Group. Worlds largest Coffee processing facility. Receives all green coffee in North America for Folger, Millstone and Duncan Donut coffees. Currently Employees over 100 in New Orleans and 20 in Kansas City. The company operates at the Nashville ave terminal in a renovated grain silo.

Silocaf receives over 1000 containers of coffee a month from the Port of New Orleans. The coffee is weighed, sampled, cleaned and stored in one of 203 large concrete silos. This coffee is then blended and shipped to the roaster creating a just in time delivery system.

Silocaf has developed a state of the art computer system to track all of the coffee from source country to roaster.

S3 Pacorini Logistics is involved with Transportation, Warehousing, Transloading and Logistics for all commodities. The company is rapidly expanding in New Orleans and is creating new business for imports and exports through the Port.