TECHSAUCE GLOBAL SUMMIT

Biography

David is a serial entrepreneur who has founded three startups and been involved with two others. He is one of the original founders of Pinpoint Technologies, Inc. which is now part of ZOLL Medical Corporation and provides solutions to the emergency medical services market. He was President of the company from founding through over $50M per year in revenue and over 250 people.

David later co-founded Techstars along with David Cohen, Brad Feld, and Jared Polis. He has been an investor and advisor to Techstars since inception. In 2013, he joined Techstars in a more active role, overseeing global operations.

David has a B.Sc. degree in Mathematics and Computer Science from McGill University in Montreal, Canada. As a ski instructor in the past, David still enjoys hitting the slopes on a good powder day.

Biography

Kamran also serves as Global Innovation Advisor, 500 Startups; Founding Mentor, Unreasonable Group, and Unchartered; Advisory Member, UNICEF Innovation Fund; Advisory Member, Seedstars World; Founding Board Advisor, Harbour. Space University; Chairman, Advisory Board, Global Venture Alliance.

As an Innovation Catalyst, Kamran advises various governments on the needed transition from fossil-based economies to sustainable innovation economies. As a global high-tech entrepreneur, he co-founded ten companies, three of them failed (e.g. Momenta), six of them produced a total market cap of over $8B (e.g. Cirrus Logic). As a VC, Kamran co-founded Global Catalyst Partners with investments in the U.S., Japan, China, India, Israel, and Singapore. Underlying his vision for global philanthropy is the conviction that modern Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) can be instrumental in dissolving barriers between nations and bridging the social and political differences among people. This vision was reflected in Schools-Online, a nonprofit he co-founded in 1996 to connect the world, one school at a time (6400 schools in 36 countries were provided with computers and access to the Internet) and merged with Relief International in 2003; Global Catalyst Foundation, co-founded in 2000 to improve lives through the effective application of ICT, and UN-GAID, a United Nations global forum that promotes ICT in developing countries where he served as Co-Chairman (2009-2011).

Biography

Joseph Lubin is a co-founder of blockchain computing platform Ethereum and the founder of Consensus Systems, a blockchain venture studio.

ConsenSys is one of the largest and fastest-growing companies in the blockchain technology space, building developer tools, decentralized applications, and solutions for enterprises and governments that harness the power of Ethereum. Headquartered in New York, ConsenSys also has a global presence, employing top entrepreneurs, computer scientists, software developers, and experts in enterprise delivery worldwide.

Lubin graduated from Princeton University with a degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science. He worked in the Princeton Robotics Lab, at Tomandandy music developing an autonomous music composition tool, and at private research firm Vision Applications Inc. building autonomous mobile robots.
As a software engineer and consultant, Lubin worked with eMagine on the Identrus project and was involved in the founding and operation of a hedge fund with a partner. He held positions as Director of the New York office of Blacksmith Software Consulting, and VP of Technology in Private Wealth Management at Goldman Sachs. Through these posts, Lubin focused on the intersection of cryptography, engineering, and finance.
Switching gears, Lubin moved to Kingston, Jamaica to work on projects in the music industry. Two years into his musical endeavors, Lubin co-founded the Ethereum Project and has been working on Ethereum and ConsenSys since January, 2014.

Biography

Grace’s has over a decade of experience in investment, corporate strategy and business development across early-stage startups and Fortune 500 companies in both Silicon Valley and emerging markets in Asia. At Jungle Ventures she focuses on identifying innovative startups in Asia and cross-border investment opportunities.

Prior to joining Jungle Ventures, she was Senior Director of Corporate Strategy and Investment at Tencent. In this role, she focused on identifying strategic opportunities in emerging markets, building Tencent’s overseas product ecosystem through investments and collaborations with local partners; and overseeing the implementation of deals and capital deployment.

A Kauffman Fellow, Grace started her career as a management consultant where she advised clients in financial sectors. Grace has an MBA in strategy and decision science from Fuqua School of Business, Duke University.

Biography

Neal Cross is Managing Director and Chief Innovation Officer of DBS Bank and a strong advocate for innovative thinking and culture.

Cross is driving the bank’s innovation agenda regionally, as DBS moves to shape the future of banking, to enhance customer experience and better engage customers in the digital landscape. Cross has more than 20 years’ experience in technology, innovation, and financial services.

Working with internal stakeholders and external collaborators, he charts the innovation roadmap for DBS to enhance customer experience and better engages the bank’s customers in the digital landscape. On the back of our recent “World’s Best Digital Bank” accolade, Neal won the “Most Disruptive” CIO global award by impressing judges Steve Wozniak and Sir Richard Branson at the finals of the Talent Unleashed Awards 2016.

Previous to DBS, Cross was at MasterCard, where he was responsible for driving innovation as Vice President of MasterCard Labs in the company’s Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa regions.  Cross started working in the Asia time zone at Microsoft in Australia and later in Singapore as the financial services industry director.

On his weekends Neal lives in the Sumatran jungle where he has founded Hotel Orangutan, a social enterprise to help save the critically endangered Sumatran Orangutan and to give local villagers employment and education.

Biography

Nok Maneerut Anulomsombut joined our company in March 2014 and has served as our chief executive officer of Thailand since March 2016. Nok previously served as our chief operating officer of Thailand. Prior to joining our company, Nok was a management consultant at The Boston Consulting Group in Bangkok from March 2009 to February 2014.

Prior to joining The Boston Consulting Group, Nok worked at financial and fashion companies in Thailand. Nok holds an M.B.A. degree from Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business and a bachelor’s degree in Industrial Engineering from Chulalongkorn University in Thailand.

Biography

Pieter Kemps serves as an Investment Advisor at Sequoia Capital India. He is the Principal at Sequoia Capital. He was a Vice President at the firm in 2014 and focuses on investments in internet, mobile, software, and infrastructure across South East Asia. He works closely with Kfit, Sirion Labs, Gojek, Tokopedia, Zilingo and other portfolio companies. Prior to joining Sequoia, Pieter was at Amazon Web Services, where he was responsible for Amazon’s business with the leading VC’s, Accelerators, and the startup ecosystem across Asia.

Biography

Melissa is the Co-founder and Managing Partner of Arbor Ventures with more than 20 years of experience in venture capital and as an entrepreneur in Asia and Silicon Valley.  As a thought leader in the global technology community, Melissa has been recognized as Melissa has been recognized as one of the Top 200 FinTech Influencers in Asia 2018 and one of the Most Influential Women in Tech in Asia. Melissa brings with her a unique set of global experience and perspective, with deep technological and innovation prowess anchored in an extensive international network.

Melissa serves on the Board of Directors of the HKVCA and is Co-Chair of the HKVCA Venture Committee. She also serves on the Board of Innovation for the Hong Kong Securities and Commodities Commission. She is a Hopkins Fellow and participated in the Women’s Leadership Program at Harvard University.

Prior to the founding of Arbor Ventures, Melissa was Managing Director and Head of VantagePoint Asia, a $4.5 billion venture capital firm based in Silicon Valley with offices in Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong.

Melissa attended Wellesley College and received a Master’s degree in Finance from the University of Florida. She is the author of the paper “Venture Capital Returns and Public Market Performance.” She has been a panelist on the Financial Times Top 50 Women in Asia and a guest lecturer on the Venture Capital Industry at the University of Florida, Hong Kong University, Chinese University of Hong Kong and the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology.

Biography

Anix Lynch is Partner of Expara –Government Saving Bank’s fund of funds running an early stage VC investment in SEA. She is a director of Peakengine (Fintech), a senior advisor of Crypto startup, a guest lecturer at Sasin MBA, an active speaker at Slush/Rise SCG/PTT/Disrupt University/Spark and a judge at TV reality shows Star 4.0 LINE TV/True channel.

Anix was a Vice President of MQDC, Chearavanont Family Office, where she focused on investment in AgriFood Tech, Real Estate Tech and impact investment. In 2014, she originated the concept of True Digital Park (Launched 2018) and the early draft of the innovative policy for Thai government (Launched 2015)

Before returning to Thailand, Anix previously worked as an investment professional in Tokyo for 10 years at the world’s largest PE fund MGPA-BlackRock(M&A), NCC -CBRE Investor (M&A). Apple International (Tokyo Stock Exchange IPO). As a native Japanese speaker, she received BA from Kyoto Ritsumeikan University and MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Biography

Peng is an entrepreneur who invests in entrepreneurs. He does so primarily through his role as Managing Partner at Monk&’s Hill Ventures — a technology venture fund based in Southeast Asia that he co-founded.
Peng was the co-founder and CTO of Match.com (acquired by IAC). After Match.com, he was the founder and CEO of Interwoven, which went public on NASDAQ and grew to a $10B market cap, before being acquired and is now part of HP.

After Interwoven, Peng founded Encentuate (acquired by IBM). Most recently, Peng was a Partner at GSR Ventures, a leading VC in China. Peng has also served on many boards, including SingTel and YY.com. He is currently the Chairman of SolveEducation!. Peng earned a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Texas and an M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Illinois.

Biography

Akiko Naka is the founder and chief executive officer of Wantedly, a social-networking service for professionals. Following its official launch in February 2012, Wantedly grew to 2m monthly active users and 25,000 corporates and has become the leading professional social-networking service in Japan. Prior to founding Wantedly, Ms. Naka was a growth co-ordinator at Facebook Japan, where she contributed to marketing and product development for Facebook in Japan. Before joining Facebook, she worked at Goldman Sachs in equity sales. Ms. Naka graduated from Kyoto University in 2008 with a BA in economics.

Biography

Michael Lints graduated from The Hague University of Applied Science in Management and Information Science and worked briefly as a project manager in NN Group, Netherlands largest insurance, and asset management company. His entrepreneurial spirit kicked in right after and he went on to start his own IT business specializing in Microsoft environments and IT project management.

He was the former vice chairman of the Economic Development Board Rotterdam which helped him built an extensive international network. In 2007, Michael founded his own venture fund focused on Dutch’s small and medium-sized enterprise to help them with capital financing, development and relevant support and strategy.

Through his earlier Venture in the Netherlands, Michael got acquainted with Golden Gate Ventures and moved his family to Singapore to join Golden Gate Ventures, as Venture Partner in 2013 to help with fundraising, strategic partnerships, mergers, and acquisitions. Michael has helped raised over $60M USD for Golden Gate Ventures and its portfolio companies and is now a Partner at Golden Gate Ventures since 2017.

Michael graduated from Financial Analysis for Business Valuation, and Private Equity and Venture Capital Executive course in Harvard Business School in Cambridge in 2011. He is a true believer in a work-life balance lifestyle and has completed marathons, cycling and Ironman races all over the world in his spare time and was recently appointed the Singapore ambassador for the top cycling brand distributor, Treknology3

Biography

Mike Peng is a Partner at IDEO and the co-managing director and co-founder of IDEO Tokyo. In his role, Mike works with colleagues to set the strategic direction of the business in Japan, mentor designers, create new offerings, and lead client relationships and projects in Asia. Prior to Tokyo, Mike helped start-up IDEO’s New York office and lead its design research discipline. Mike has taught at New York University’s Robert F. Wagner Graduate School of Public Service and Copenhagen Institute of Interaction Design (CIID). He’s also a visiting lecture the at University of Tokyo, Keio University, and Kyushu University. Mike graduated from the University of California, Berkeley, with a degree in cognitive science and an emphasis in neuroscience.

Biography

Biography

Tiwa York is the Head Coach of Kaidee (a.k.a CEO). He is passionate about changing lives through trading second-hand goods, startups, and building great teams. Along with a team of 5 awesome people, Tiwa founded an online marketplace which is now known as Kaidee in 2011.

Today, Kaidee is a C2C online marketplace with 200 thousand monthly sellers, listing 1.8 million items for sale and reaching 7 million people per month. In 2016, 2 million items were sold via Kaidee valued at over 2.4 billion USD. Tiwa has been recognized for his passion, his leadership, and his efforts to build the team and culture at Kaidee. Prior to his the current role, he worked in digital advertising with leadership roles in Admax Network and Omnicom Media Group.

Biography

Khailee Ng is a managing partner of 500 Startups, a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm. Beyond investing in
Silicon Valley, 500 has set up more than a dozen funds in emerging markets, providing seed capital and growth
programs to countries in the Middle East, Latin America and Southeast Asia. Since 2010, the firm has invested in over
1,800 startups in 60 countries, in line with its goal of developing an inclusive and globally connected innovation
economy.

With the firm, Khailee has led 180+  investments in Southeast Asian tech startups, including Grab, Carousell, and other
regional champions. Prior to this, he was the founder of Groupsmore (acquired by Groupon) and Malaysia’s largest
online media company, Says.com (acquired by Media Prima).

As every industry continues to be disrupted by new technology and evolving consumer landscapes, Khailee and 500
Startups specialize in discovering patterns of economic opportunity and investing in the entrepreneurs who will realize
them. His investment activity and industry opinions are featured by Bloomberg, TechCrunch, Wall Street Journal, and
Fortune, and the 500 Startups portfolio of companies have collectively raised over $10Billion USD.