This incredible group of innovators, investors, entrepreneurs, and seasoned change makers are the mentors who will be attending the Unreasonable Institute in the summer of 2010. Each mentor will spend at least one evening at the Institute and will present to, engage with, and personally mentor our Unreasonable Fellows. It is a privilege for both us and for our Fellows to work with such an outstanding group of practitioners and thought-leaders.
Bernard Amadei
Founder of Engineers Without Borders International, Faculty Director of Mortenson Center in Engineering for Developing Communities, Senior Ashoka Fellow
Dr. Amadei is Professor of Civil Engineering at the University of Colorado at Boulder. He received his PhD in 1982 from the University of California at Berkeley. Dr. Amadei is the Faculty Director of the Mortenson Center in Engineering for Developing Communities at CU Boulder and holds the Mortenson Endowed Chair in Global Engineering. He is also the Founding President of Engineers Without Borders - USA and the co-founder of the Engineers Without Borders-International network. Among other distinctions, Dr. Amadei is the 2007 co-recipient of the Heinz Award for the Environment, the recipient of the 2008 ENR Award of Excellence, a Senior Ashoka Fellow and an elected member of the U.S. National Academy of Engineering.
Joy Anderson is the founder of Criterion Ventures which incubates and scales ventures that create a better world. Since 2002, Criterion has provided consulting across disciplines to non-profits, foundations, and visionary individuals, and launches ventures internally to tackle the greatest social issues of our time. She is also one of the founders of Good Capital, an investment firm increasing the flow of capital to market-based solutions to inequality and poverty. After beginning her career in the New York City public school system, where she managed million dollar federally funded program, Joy worked for Growth Design to provide consulting to large nonprofit systems on fundraising and strategic planning. She holds a Ph.D. in American History from New York University and lives in a Connecticut apple orchard, where she enjoys pressing cider and boiling apple syrup.
Watch this video interview with Joy, in which she discusses legal structures for social ventures.
Diana Ayton-Shenker
Founding President at Fast Forward Fund, Sr Fellow at Philanthropy and Int'l Affairs at Bard College, President at Global Momenta
The birth of the Fast Forward Fund, whose mission is to transform young people in their twenties into social investors for life, is closely related to the experience of its founder, Diana Ayton-Shenker. She grew up during the movements for Soviet Jewry and Anti-Apartheid and wound up self-financing a trip to the Soviet Union in 1984, where she became inspired to pursue the promotion of human rights through international law. After obtaining her LLM from the University of Essex Law School, she lived all over the world, falling into the intersection of private sector resources and social sector causes for the next 20 years. She taught at the American University of Paris, at Hunter College, and at Bard College where she holds a Sr. Fellowship with Bard Globalization and Int'l Affairs program. She served as a consultant for various branches of the United Nations and held senior positions with Mercy Corps, PEN, and Human Rights Watch. Realizing there was a need to mobilize resources and talent for social investment, she went home and honed the idea of Fast Forward Fund in her kitchen, talking to her husband. Diana grew up in Portland, Oregon, is the mother of three children, and now lives with her husband in upstate New York. She is the author and editor of two books on the United Nations, as well as a collection of original poetry, "Tumbalalaika."
Watch the video of Diana discussing what the ideal youth investors look like on the Unreasonable Blog.
Neal Baer
Executive Producer of NBC TV Show Law and Order: SVU, Former Executive Producer of NBC series ER, Co-Founder of Institute for Photographic Empowerment, Pediatrician, M.D. from Harvard Medical School
Dr. Neal Baer is Executive Producer of the NBC television series Law and Order: Special Victims Unit. Prior to his work on SVU, Dr. Baer was Executive Producer of the NBC series ER. A member of the show’s original staff and a writer and producer on the series for seven seasons, he was nominated for five Emmys as a producer. He graduated from Harvard Medical School and completed his internship in Pediatrics at Children’s Hospital, Los Angeles. Recently, Dr. Baer co-established the Institute for Photographic Empowerment at USC’s Annenberg School of Communications, which links photographic story-telling projects around the world and makes that work available to NGOs and policymakers. He has worked in South Africa and Mozambique since 2006, teaching photography to mothers with HIV and to AIDS orphans so that they can tell the world their own stories. Dr. Baer also produced the documentary short, “Home Is Where You Find It,” directed by Alcides Soares, a seventeen-year-old Mozambican AIDS orphan, which chronicles one young man’s search to find a family after his parents have died of AIDS. The film has screened internationally at sixteen festivals and has won four awards for best documentary. Dr. Baer lives in Los Angeles with his wife, Gerrie Smith, and his son Caleb, who will be attending Williams College in the fall.
Ross Baird
Investment Analyst at First Light Ventures
Ross Baird directs First Light’s Village Capital initiative, a global experiment in seed-stage investment for social enterprises. Village Capital is a peer-selected investment fund currently being applied in pilots worldwide, including the Unreasonable Institute. He also assists the First Light team in building the FLV investment portfolio by analyzing and recommending investment opportunities. He also works closely with entrepreneurs to assist them in preparing for long-term financing by connecting them with the resources and knowledge they need to create strong business models and successful prototypes. Before starting at First Light, Ross assisted in the establishment of the Indian School Finance Company, a for-profit social enterprise financing affordable private schools in Hyderabad, India. He completed his masters in Comparative Government as a Marshall Scholar at the University of Oxford, England. He graduated from the University of Virginia, where he was a Jefferson Scholar and a Truman Scholar. He has also started two civic participation initiatives, Vote From Home, which uses technology to motivate political participation, and Georgia PACE, a civic education program.
Elmira Bayrasli
Vice President of Partnerships and Outreach at Endeavor
Elmira Bayrasli is the Vice President of Partnerships and Outreach at Endeavor, a New York-based nonprofit supporting high-impact entrepreneurship in emerging markets. Before joining Endeavor, Elmira was the Chief Spokesperson and Director of Press and Public Information at the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo. In 1994, she joined the U.S. Mission to the United Nations, working for then Ambassador Madeleine K. Albright. From 1997-2000 she was a Presidential Appointee at the Department of State, in the Secretary of State's office. She also served on the negotiating team in the Office of the Special Cyprus coordinator. She received her MA from Columbia University and BA from New York University. She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and has contributed to several books and publications, including several book reviews and op-eds. She loves the New York Mets and hates onions.
Watch this video interview in which Elmira speaks more about how Endeavor has achieved success supporting entrepreneurs around the globe.
Mekayla Ichneumon Beaver
Founder and Principal Design Researcher / Strategist at Gloworm, Former IDEO Designer
Mekayla Beaver is a design researcher and strategist who knows that developing a solution that will truly change lives requires developing a deep empathy for the people involved. She is a specialist in guiding teams towards innovation not just for the sake of innovation, but for the benefit of people and the world. Her expertise lies in asking the right questions in order to understand and uncover the factors that determine how people adopt and use products, services, and environments. She guides teams from initial user insight discovery through the translation of these insights into design opportunities and requirements. In addition to having worked in markets across the US, Mekayla has led research in countries including China, Russia, Bangladesh, New Zealand, and throughout Europe. She has worked in many industries, with a particular focus into ways to bring about change for positive social and environmental impact. Before starting her own consultancy, Mekayla worked for many years at IDEO, a world-renowned design and innovation company.
Greg Berry
Benevolent Dictator at W1SD0M, CXO at Business Catapult, Principal at Nuance Intelligence
Greg is the founder of W1SDØM, where he supports a world-class team with resources and connections that allow us to accomplish a significant goal; increasing the success of sustainable ventures. Greg has over 20 years experience as an entrepreneur, with a focus on creating, convening and facilitating communities of action. He started his career in publishing, quickly morphed to the Internet, and then the World Wide Web as his primary canvas. Greg has developed influential media properties in radio, TV, print, and conferences of world leaders, always in service to encouraging a particular community towards measurable impact. Personally, he is a husband, father, passionate back country telemark skier and stands firm in his belief that the bicycle is one of the most transformative pieces of technology on the planet. Greg writes: I’m an Agent of Change and a systems thinker. Since my early teens I have been a cross-cultural networker, connecting people in networks as diverse as Silicon Valley technologists, Boulder sustainability innovators, European thought leaders, Arab intellectuals, African entrepreneurs, New York City media moguls, Boston academics and globetrotting change agents.
Watch this Unreasonable Blog video interview with Greg in which he discusses W1SD0M more in-depth.
David Bornstein
Founder at Dowser, Author of "How to Change the World," Author of "The Price of a Dream: The Story of Grameen Bank," Systems Analysis at STS Systems
David Bornstein specializes in writing about social innovation. His newest book is Social Entrepreneurship: What Everyone Needs to Know, co-authored with Susan Davis. He is also the author of How to Change the World: Social Entrepreneurs and the Power of New Ideas, which has been translated into 20 languages, The Price of a Dream: The Story of the Grameen Bank, and the 2005 Hart House Lecture. He co-wrote To Our Credit, a two-hour documentary series about micro-finance, which premiered on PBS. Bornstein is the founder of Dowser.org, a new media site which covers the field of social innovation, featuring interviews, stories and news. His next book will tell stories of social entrepreneurs in Canada and the United States. He grew up in Montreal and now lives in New York with his wife and son. He enjoys painting, guitar and ice skating.
Kevin Braithwaite
Director / Co-founder of RootSpace
Kevin Braithwaite is an entrepreneur focused on ventures that tackle key global challenges such as poverty, climate change, disease and international conflict. He is a director and co-founder of RootSpace, a social venture incubator in Beirut, Lebanon, that works to foster sustainable social and economic development through innovation, technology and entrepreneurship. Kevin has founded and built multiple technology companies and advised a wide range of early stage investors, incubators, universities, multinational corporations and non-profits. For a number of years, he worked with the venture incubator at the University of Cambridge, where he mentored and supported a wide range of young entrepreneurs. Kevin is also an advisory board member for cleantech, mobile and web ventures focused on social and environmental impact in developing and emerging markets.
Bruce Campbell
Our Lawyer
Bruce founded and manages a boutique corporate law firm called the Campbell Law Group. Prior to founding Campbell Law Group, he practiced at the international law firm of Hogan & Hartson. Bruce has represented clients in corporate transactions with an aggregate value in excess of $4 billion, ranging from angel financings for start-ups to public offerings for multi-national companies. Currently, he focuses much of his time on developing more effective ways for legal professionals around the world to support social ventures. He is a member of a legislative drafting committee in Colorado that has considered legislation for both L3Cs and For Benefit Corporations, and is an advisor to the Global Social and Sustainable Enterprise program at Colorado State University.
Stephen Chen
Co-founder at GreenSoul Shoes, Former Vice President at Bear Stearns
Stephen Chen is a financial services professional and expert in creating platforms for innovation. Stephen is the former Vice President of Business Strategy at Bear Stearns where he helped launch BearXplorer™, an award-winning international hedge fund software company. BearXplorer was a macroeconomics analytics platform that helped asset managers quantify the impact of economic shifts on their portfolios. It was named Best Risk Analytics Initiative of the Year by the American Financial Technology Awards in 2006 and Buy Side Innovation of the Year by The Banker in 2007. Stephen is also the cofounder of GreenSoul Shoes, a charitable, 100% recycled shoe company. It is a platform built on public private partnerships that has created a network of local shoemakers, orphanages, and large NGOs to donate one pair of shoes for every pair sold. By identifying local shoemakers in communities of shoeless kids, GreenSoul Shoes is using a market-based restoration model to provide microfinancing opportunities for Third World entrepreneurs while shoeing their community’s youths. He has spoken at Yale, Brown, NYU, and Columbia University on topics of social entrepreneurship and technology platforms. He has been covered by the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, ABC and NBC. Stephen is a member of the International Association of Financial Engineers. He holds a Bachelor of Science from Brown University.
Lindsay Clinton
Associate Vice President at Intellecap
Lindsay Clinton leads the Publications team at Intellecap, a social investment advisory firm based in India, where she is the Managing Editor of the leading industry publications Microfinance Insights and Beyond Profit, a magazine she conceptualized. She directs publication strategy, editorial content creation, drives advertiser and subscriber outreach, and guides the direction and brand development of the magazines. Additionally, she leads the creation of surveys and data analysis for both publications. Lindsay has a Bachelor of Arts in English Literature from the University of Virginia, and is a freelance writer for the The New York Times, the Austin American Statesman, and MINT, the Indian affiliate of the Wall Street Journal. She is also a regular blogger for The New York Times travel blog, Globespotters. She has extensive knowledge of microfinance, social enterprise, brand strategy, gender and women’s leadership, publishing and multi-platform marketing.
Libby Cook
Founder of Wild Oats, Founder and Executive Director of Philanthropiece, 1998 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year, Juris Doctorate from the University of Colorado, Boulder
Libby Cook has been practicing international and general corporate law for 26 years. Ms. Cook co-founded Wild Oats Markets, the second largest natural foods supermarket chain in North America, serving as its executive Vice President and General Counsel from 1987 to 2001. In 2001 Ms. Cook subsequently co-founded Sunflower Markets, another natural foods grocery chain, serving as its President from 2001 to 2005. In 2005 Ms. Cook turned her focus to the philanthropic world where she serves as Co-Executive Director of Philanthropiece Foundation, a private operating foundation she originally founded in 1987. Ms. Cook currently serves on the board of directors of United Western Bank, Colorado State University’s Global Social and Sustainable Enterprise Masters Program and Ellie’s Home Organic Center, a division of Eco Products, Inc. She has served on the Board of Directors for various private schools in Colorado and on the Steering Committee of the Peace Jam Foundation. Ms. Cook has received numerous commendations and awards for her entrepreneurial achievements. In 2006 Ms. Cook was recognized by the Boulder History Museum as a New Pioneer, honoring her achievements and contributions to the Boulder Colorado community.
John Corbett
Co-Founder and CEO of aWhere, PhD in Agricultural Climatology
Dr. John Corbett, trained in agricultural climatology, is an expert in geo-spatial tool applications. Working closely with national and international organizations in the US, Kenya, Switzerland, and Mexico, John built and managed systems to utilize location-based analytics to deliver innovative decision-driving impacts. A co-founder of aWhere in 2007, John’s career began in a CGIAR center (CIMMYT Mexico) in 1990 as a Rockefeller funded post-doctoral staff. Three years later, he returned to Kenya to join ICRAF’s (now World Agroforestry Center) staff as the Head of the GIS laboratory. Leveraging his expertise with GIS, John identified a major need in the marketplace (the gap between specialized GIS and location based information needs) that became the framework for aWhere’s location based information products. Prior to aWhere, John’s commercial experience includes a position in Switzerland with Syngenta AG as Head of Global GIS where he managed the business operations of the GIS division of a global corporation.
Mike Del Ponte
Founder and Executive Director of Sparkseed
Mike Del Ponte has had entrepreneurship running through his veins since he ran his first national organization at the age of 18 and now currently the founder and CEO of Sparkseed. Sparkseed invests in the top social entrepreneurs of tomorrow as they lead social ventures today. He has served as a humanitarian on four continents, most recently as a microfinance consultant in Nepal. Mike received his B.A. from Boston College and an M.A.R. from the Yale University Divinity School. His interests include social entrepreneurship, public speaking, and spirituality. He currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Brook Eddy
Founder and CEO of Bhakti Chai
From its inception, Bhakti Chai has not only been profitable, but practices sustainable and socially responsible principles by offering re-usable packaging, Fair Trade and Organic ingredients, zero waste manufacturing, and supports nonprofit organizations that serve women and girls. Brook first discovered spice-laced chai traversing India studying a social justice movement based on Bhakti, or devotion through social action. When she crafted her own spicy recipe and found a following, she created Bhakti Chai with the vision of social action within enterprise and a premium brand rooted in Ayurvedic healing and a spicy flavor profile. Brook received her master’s degree from the University of Michigan in Social Policy and Non-Profit Management. Bhakti Chai now combines her background developing contribution and volunteer programs for corporations, her nonprofit sector experience raising capital and strengthening brands, and her penchant for community organizing.
Kamran Elahian
Chairman and Co-Founder of Global Catalyst Partners (Venture Fund) & Global Catalyst Foundation (Philanthropic Fund), Founder of 10 high-tech companies and 2 Non-Profits
Kamran Elahian is a serial entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and philanthropist with over 29 years of experience in the high-tech sector. He has co-founded 10 companies, 3 of which failed; 3 of which made exits, including CAE Systems, (acquired by Teletronix for $75 million), PlanetWeb, and Greenfield Network (acquired by Cisco Systems); and 3 of which went public, including Cirrus Logic (which had an IPO at a $150 million valuation and achieved a market cap of over $3.5 billion), NeoMagic (which had an IPO at a $300 million valuation and achieved a market cap of $600 million), and Centillium Communications (which had an IPO at a $700 million valuation and achieved a market cap of over $4 billion). He is currently the Chairman and Co-Founder of Global Catalyst Partners, an international, multistage, technology-oriented venture capital firm that has invested in leading-edge technology companies in the U.S., China, Japan and Israel. Mr. Kamran is also the Chairman and Co-Founder of the the Global Catalyst Foundation, a private foundation established by the principals of Global Catalyst Partners. Its mission is to improve peoples' lives through the effective application of information technologies. He serves as the Co-Chair of the Global Alliance for Information and Communication Technologies and Development (GAID), which is a United Nations global forum that comprehensively addresses cross-cutting issues related to ICT in development. He is the founder of Schools Online,, a non-profit venture bringing internet to 6,400 disadvantaged schools in over 36 countries, which merged with Relief International in 2003. In December 2006, The Dr. Morris Chang Exemplary Leadership Award was presented to Mr. Elahian in recognition for his exceptional contributions to drive the development, innovation, and growth of the fables semiconductor industry. Mr. Elahian received a BS in Computer Science and a BS in Mathematics at the age of twenty before going on to obtain a Masters of Engineering degree in Computer Graphics from the University of Utah.
Kjerstin Erickson
Founder and Executive Director of FORGE
Kjerstin Erickson is the founder and Executive Director of FORGE, an international NGO that uses a unique social entrepreneurship model to facilitate peace building and development in war-torn African countries. Kjerstin started FORGE in 2003, while a junior at Stanford University. Now she continues to manage FORGE's operations, growth and development. She has developed partnerships with UN agencies and has worked with multiple African governments to bring FORGE's work to 70,000 refugees per year. An avid blogger and pioneer of ‘radical transparency,’ Kjerstin’s social media efforts have been profiled in outlets such as the Wall Street Journal and the San Francisco Chronicle, and in 2009 FORGE was honored with the Jenzabar Foundation's "Social Media Leadership Award." Kjerstin has also been named a Public Service Fellow at Stanford, a "Top 10 College Woman" by Glamour Magazine, and a "Person You Should Know" by CNN.
Watch Kjerstin talk about how FORGE has created an impact in this Unreasonable Blog video interview.
Nick Fellers
President of The Suddes Group
Nick Fellers is an entrepreneur and technology wiz who started his first business from his college dorm room. As a student at the University of Notre Dame, he created a first-of-its kind online student community for members to share course feedback and class ratings, and to learn about campus events, books and discussions. Soon, other major universities came knocking, requesting similar portals for their schools. After building a successful enterprise as college students, Nick and his business partners eventually sold their tool to a dot com to allow time to focus on their interests in the nonprofit world. “My experience taught me the amazing power of scaled impact - what can happen when you share your system with an enormous number of people and the impact it can have on their lives,” Fellers explains. “I decided to take my expertise in technology and use it to somehow impact nonprofits, to really make a change in the world.” Nick enjoys life as a practitioner, coach and trainer. He has trained hundreds of organizations and regularly contributes to ForImpact.org. He began working with Tom Suddes and now serves as President of The Suddes Group.
Robert Fenwick-Smith
Founder of Aravaipa Ventures, Chairman at AWhere Inc. and Sunflower Corporation, Director at RavenBrick
Robert Fenwick-Smith is a true citizen of the globe, having learned three languages by the age of five and having lived seven countries. Robert and his wife Felice’s passion for green and sustainability brought them to Boulder, Colorado about two years ago. They built the second LEED Platinum home in Colorado, featuring the first Greywater Reuse system in the City of Boulder. Through his role on the Board fo Legacy Land Trust in Fort Collins, Robert also brings his passion to preserving the natural spaces and beauty of Colorado.
Watch a video interview with Robert about green venture capital in Boulder on the Unreasonable blog here.
Ryan Fix
Founder at PUREPROJECT, Co-founder at OPENHOUSE GALLERY, Co-founder at PICNICK
Ryan Fix is the founder of PURE, an organization that uses creativity and innovation to promote sustainable solutions that advance a common good in the world, which they call "PUREPROJECTS." Examples include Openhouse, a pop-up retail exhibition gallery located in SoHo/NoLiTa with a triple-bottom line considering social, environmental and financial sustainability; and Picnick, a restaurant concept launched in NYC in 2007 that serves as a mini-model of consumer and eco-conscious food service. PURE is a founding partner of the annual participatory arts festival FIGMENT*. The organization also helped catalyze PUREPLANET, an initiative aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions through reforestation programs, the first of which was launched in Peru in September 2008 (Full Disclosure: Ryan is also a member of the Unreasonable Council).
Robert Fogler
Founder and Managing Director of Thousand Hills Venture Fund, Founder of CAfrica Sports, Adjunct Professor at Graduate School of International Studies at Denver University
Robert Fogler is the Founder and Managing Director of Thousand Hills Venture Fund (THVF), the first U.S.-based, Africa-focused venture capital fund financed entirely by private money. TVHF has invested in a number of companies serving a range of industries including technology, agricultural processing, energy and housing. In 2009, Mr. Fogler was named “Investor of the Year” by the Rwanda Convention Association. He is also the founder of CAfrica Sports, a broadcast network that spans 20 African countries and reaches 300 million African consumers. They’re the largest free-to-air broadcast system in Africa.Mr. Fogler spent 10 years as a corporate finance and venture capital lawyer at several of America’s leading law firms. He is also an adjunct professor at the Joseph Korbel School of International Studies at Denver University, where he teaches a graduate-level course on capital markets in Africa. Mr. Fogler holds degrees in engineering, philosophy and law, all from the University of Michigan.
Rich Frankenheimer
Co-founder and CFO of TouchPoint Trust Group (i4c Campaign), Co-founder and CFO of 4 additional venture backed companies
Rich Frankenheimer is a seasoned entrepreneur with over 25 years of CFO and COO experience with startup ventures spanning an eclectic mix of industries and products. Having closed dozens of rounds of small to medium sized equity and debt deals, Rich has a deep understanding of what it takes to launch an idea and grow a business. His passions for the outdoors, all that is Boulder, Colorado and his family all came together for him when he co-founded TouchPoint Trust Group and its i4c Campaign concept. This high impact model combines innovative financing and marketing solutions to help grow responsible businesses and initiatives. The first of many planned i4c Campaigns has partnered with Sarah McLachlan’s 2010 Lilith Fair Tour and ABC network to fund a handful of sustainable business and to promote to millions of attendees and viewers the importance of supporting these and other responsible entrepreneurs.
Watch Rich and his teammate Casey Verbeck talk about the i4c Campaign in this Unreasonable Blog video interview.
Zach Frisch
Co-founder of Raindrop Partners, Founder of PG Ventures, Served as Youngest Vice-President of KGNQwest
Zach is a serial entrepreneur. He started his first company when he was nine years old and fell in love with world travel after he went to Papua New Guinea when he was 13 years old. In 2002 Zach formed PG Ventures LLC to focus on start up and growth companies. Zach co-founded Raindrop Partners in 2006. He has been the Finance Manager of the $10M equity fund focused on sustainable investments and real estate. From 2004 to present, Zach has been engaged with real estate investment companies involved with acquisition of real property in Central America, primarily Panama and Costa Rica. He also has extensive acquisition, valuation, asset management, and finance experience in growth and start up companies. Previously, Zach worked in Amsterdam for KPNQwest as the youngest vice-president of finance and in various other positions. He also previously worked for VeloCom, a Latin America telecom start up that raised the largest private placement in Colorado history, over $2.5B. Zach worked at Trammell Crow as a financial analyst focusing on the acquisition and development of underperforming commercial properties involving over $50M in development deals. He began his career in New York City working with the International Securities Lending department for Goldman Sachs. Zach has traveled and lived abroad extensively including Argentina and Spain. He speaks Spanish and Portuguese.
Rafe Furst
Angel Investor, Co-Founder of Pick’em Sports, Co-Founder and CTO of Expert Insight, Professional Poker Player
Rafe Furst is an entrepreneur, angel investor, cancer awareness advocate and part time professional poker player. He currently works on and advises many projects that involve technology and social entrepreneurship. He regularly blogs about Complex Systems on EmergentFool. His ideas about the intersections between his different pursuits have been frequently cited on the Freakonomics blog. Furst holds an M.S. in Computer Science and B.S. in Symbolic Systems, both from Stanford University and began his career as an artificial intelligence researcher at the Kestrel Institute. He eventually left academia to co-found his first company, Pick’em Sports, in 1996. After Pick’em Sports was sold to a public company in 1999, Furst co-founded and served as Chief Technical Officer for Expert Insight, an educational media company. Furst is a technical advisor to iTripTV, a destination marketing company that helps travelers connect with destinations through rich media across multiple platforms.
Miguel Granier
Founder/Director, Invested Development
Miguel is the Founder/Director of Invested Development (ID), a Social Angel Capital intermediary firm launched in July, 2009. ID mission is to alleviate poverty and inequity by enhancing risk capital investments in innovative businesses. Miguel and his team provide seed investment support to high net-worth individuals and organizations committed to supporting innovative and empowering solutions to poverty while seeking meaningful financial returns. Before founding Invested Development Miguel was the Investment Manager for First Light Ventures. His career in social enterprise began as a loan officer for ACCION New York. Miguel holds a Master’s degree in City and Regional Planning from the Georgia Institute of Technology with a specialization in Entrepreneurship and Economic Development.
Pamela is founder and CEO of Universal Giving, a nonprofit organization whose vision is to "create a world where giving and volunteering is a natural part of everyday life" by allowing people to give and volunteer in over 70 countries with top-performing, vetted projects. Universal Giving Corporate (UGC) is a customized service that helps companies manage their global Corporate Social Responsibility Programs. After witnessing extreme poverty in Mexico at age 12, Pamela committed herself to a lifetime of international service, specifically interested in strategically addressing global poverty. She spent time working and volunteering with microfinance institutions in rural India, participated in crisis relief efforts in the El Salvador earthquake, led digital divide training in Cambodia’s killing fields, and worked on a sustainable farm in rural Guatemala. Pamela also co-founded VolunteerMatch, which has connected over two million volunteers with non-profits. She is now a guest lecturer at USC School of Business and has spoken at Business for Social Responsibility, Ethical Corporation, Forbes' Conference for Women and UCLA and Stanford Business Schools on numerous topics including corporate social responsibility; international strategy and expansion; global philanthropy and volunteerism; social entrepreneurship; and the web.
Watch the video of Pamela discussing how Universal Giving measures its impact here.
Quayle Hodek
President and CEO of Renewable Choice Energy
After breaking 150-year old sales records and being the top of 3,000 salesmen during a “summer job” at Southwestern Company, Quayle dropped out of college to found Zoom Culture, an early YouTube that turned out to be too early to make it. He then went on to found Renewable Choice Energy in 2001. Since then Quayle has built Renewable Choice into one of the largest and most respected wind power providers in the US. His sales expertise has been key in harnessing consumer demand to drive renewable energy growth around the country. In 2006 he secured two of the largest wind energy purchases ever in deals with Whole Foods and Vail Resorts. In 2008 he put together the first corporate sponsorship of a wind farm and participated in creating and honing the nation’s highest industry standards for marketing renewable energy. In addition to professional life, Quayle is passionate about writing and experiencing new cultures and countries.
Paul Hudnut
Co-Founder at Envirofit International, Co-Director Global Innovation Center for Energy, Environment and Health
Paul Hudnut is an entrepreneur, an unrepentant optimist and an educational arsonist. He helped start Envirofit International, a company that develops and commercializes environmentally friendly technologies for "Base of the Pyramid" markets. As a board member, he advises Envirofit, New Belgium Brewing Co and Inviragen. He is a Co-Director at the Global Innovation Center for Energy, Environment and Health and he teaches entrepreneurship at Colorado State University and Bainbridge Graduate Institute. Currently, he is excited to be teaching in CSU's graduate degree program in Global Social and Sustainable Enterprise.
Paul Jerde
Director of University of Colorado Leeds School of Business and The Deming Center for Entrepreneurship
Paul Jerde is the Diirector of the University of Colorado Leeds School of Business and The Deming Center for Entrepreneurship. Paul has held a number of senior general management and senior financial management positions with private and public companies in a broad variety of industries and markets. He has also served on the boards of directors of a number of public and private companies. His management experiences have included early stage start-ups and emerging growth companies, later stage established companies and companies undergoing substantial transition or turn-arounds. The companies have spanned numerous markets including consumer, medical (clinical systems, medical devices), telecommunications (paging systems and network management), biotechnology, voice recognition systems for order fulfillment and electronic commerce.
Jalak Jobanputra
Senior Vice President at New York City Investment Fund, Principal at New Venture Partners, Investment Board of NYCSeed, Social Investment Council of Echoing Green
Jalak is currently Senior Vice President at the New York City Investment Fund (NYCIF), where she oversees technology and digital media venture investments. She spearheaded the formation of NYCSeed in 2008, a seed fund dedicated to funding early stage tech entrepreneurs in NYC, and sits on its Investment Committee and Venture Advisory Board. Prior to NYCIF, she was a Principal at New Venture Partners, a $300 million early stage venture fund. Jalak has consulted for several Gates Foundation funded charter school grantees and is a member of the Executive Board of the Social Investment Council of Echoing Green, a nonprofit which funds social entrepreneurs worldwide. In 1999, she consulted with the United Nations Development Program in Tanzania to train women entrepreneurs and provide access to microfinance programs.
Kevin Jones
Founding Principal of Good Capital
As a founding principal of Good Capital, Kevin leads market formation activities and advisor and portfolio company engagement. He has extensive private investment experience as both a limited partner and as an angel in a range of technology and social enterprises. Kevin’s former positions include CEO of Net Market Makers, an $18 million revenue online community and research and events company. As an entrepreneur, five of his previous six businesses all achieved market dominance before he left or sold them. As a joualist, Kevin has been a columnist for Forbes and Business 2.0 magazines. Furthermore, as the Co-Founder and Convener of SoCap(Social Capital Markets), Kevin thrives on creating information businesses inside emerging markets. He believes that markets emerge in conversation, as people try to explain and understand value. But this market is not like others he’s been in, and that’s what makes it more interesting and more important. Kevin believes that “The social capital market adds the dimension of impact, what your money actually does in the world before it comes back to you as a gain or loss, to the traditional risk and reward investment equation.” He is also part of the team launching the first U.S. node of the Hub, a network of more than a dozen work spaces for social entrepreneurs in cities across the world from Cairo to London.
Michael Karnjanaprakorn
Co-Founder at All Day Buffet
Michael Karnjanaprakorn is the co-founder of All Day Buffet, a company that changes the world through creativity and business. Through All Day Buffet, he has launched The Feast, By/Association, and TBD. Previously, he was the Director of Brand and Business Development at Behance, and has worked at advertising agencies Naked Communications (London) and Trumpet (New Orleans). He's a graduate of the University of Virginia and VCU Brandcenter. He's an avid poker player, HBO fanatic, New York Foodie, and Foursquare Mayor of Sweet and Vicious.
David Kyle
Founder of the Indian School Finance Company; Former Chief Investment Officer and COO of Acumen Fund
David has just moved back to the US after living in Hyderabad for the past three years where he founded the Indian School Finance Company, a for-profit finance company that provides medium term debt capital to private schools serving low-income families. The company now has 2 branches, a staff of 45 and a portfolio of well over 100 schools financed. Prior to moving to India, David spent 4 years as Chief Investment Officer and COO of New York-based Acumen Fund where he led the build out of the firm in South Asia and East Africa. Prior to joining Acumen David had served as Chief Advisor to the CEO of the London-headquartered Save the Children Alliance, responsible for establishing new, local agencies of Save the Children in Argentina and Brazil. During the first part of his career David spent 20 years with Citibank in Brazil, Hong Kong, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, 6 in Lisbon, Portugal where he built a full service commercial and investment bank followed by 3 years in London where he led the development of Citibank’s first intranet client management system in the late 1990s.
Seth Levine
Co-Founder and Partner at Foundry Group
Seth Levine is a co-founder and Partner at Boulder based Foundry Group, a nationally focused, early stage venture capital firm. At Foundry Seth focuses on investments in software and internet technologies. Prior to co-founding Foundry, Seth’s career included investment and operational roles at a number of different private and public firms. Seth is a summa cum laude graduate of Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. He is active throughout the entrepreneurial community in Colorado – as a member of the board of CU Denver’s Bard Center for Entrepreneurship, Chair of the 2009 Boulder Chamber of Commerce ESPRIT Awards, investor and mentor in the Boulder, Boston and Seattle TechStars programs and as a member of the advisory board of High Country Ventures.Seth is an avid outdoorsman and enjoys spending his free time cycling, snowboarding and mountaineering, as well as spending time with his family. He writes a blog on technology, investing and living in Colorado at www.sethlevine.com
Hunter Lovins
President and Founder of Natural Capitalism Solutions, Co-Author of Natural Capitalism with Paul Hawken, Co-Founder of Rocky Mountain Institute, Time Magazine Hero of the Planet in 2000
Hunter Lovins is President and founder of the Natural Capitalism Solutions, which educates senior decision-makers in business, government, and civil society to restore and enhance the natural and human capital while increasing prosperity and quality of life. Trained as a sociologist and lawyer (JD), Hunder co-founded the California Conservation Project (Tree People), and Rocky Mountain Institute, which she led for 20 years. She has consulted for companies like the International Finance Corporation, Clif Bar, Wal-Mart, the Pentagon, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of Energy, and the Energy Minister of the Government of Afghanistan. She was Time Magazine Hero of the Planet in 2000 and Newsweek dubbed her a “Green Business Icon” in 2009. She has co-authored nine books, including Natural Capitalism with Paul Hawken. She is currently a founding Professor of Business at Presidio Graduate School, one of the programs offering an MBA in Sustainable Management.
Graham Macmillan
Program Office at Citi Foundation, Team Member at Council on Foreign Relations, Former Senior Director at VisionSpring
Graham Macmillan is the Program Officer for Microfinance/Small and Growing Businesses at Citi Foundation where he is responsible for making and managing philanthropic investments where Citi operates. Previously, he was Senior Director of VisionSpring, an award-winning social enterprise selling consumer health products to promote economic development in 12 countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. He also served as Director of Business Development at Helen Keller International, a leading international ngo. Graham was a 2006 Fellow at the Global Social Benefit Incubator at Santa Clara University and is a Term Member of the Council on Foreign Relations. Graham received his BA in International Studies and History from Colby College, MSc in Management of International Public Service Organizations from NYU Wagner, and MBA through a joint program at NYU Stern, London School of Economics and HEC Management.
Magogodi Makhene
Co-Founder of Zenzele Circle, Co-Founder of the Society for African Innovation, Featured Social Edge Writer
Magogodi Makhene is Co-Founding Managing Director of Zenzele Circle. Zenzele helps build Africa's Missing Middleby linking start-ups in sub-Saharan Africa with global capital as well as strategic sectoral relationships. She is also co-Founder of the Society for African Innovation (SoFIA), a hub and agitator for African social enterprise. SoFIA's leadership created and launched the Africa Social Enterprise Forum in 2009, the first Africa-specific social enterprise event of its scale in the United States. Magogodi is a Catherine B. Reynolds Fellow for Social Entrepreneurship at NYU and author of the blog Africa's Moment for Skoll Foundation's Social Edge. She is proudly a Made in South Africaproduct, a Sowetan girl at heart whose earliest memories growing up at the tail-end of apartheid South Africa profoundly shaped her belief in humanity.
Marc Manara
Water Portfolio Manager at Acumen Fund
Marc Manara is the Water Portfolio Manager at Acumen Fund, a non-profit venture capital fund that invests in companies pursuing market-based approaches to the provision of basic goods and services to the world’s poor. Marc manages Acumen’s investments in the safe drinking water and sanitation (read: toilets) space globally. He joined Acumen Fund in 2006 and previously worked on Acumen Fund’s performance management and metrics efforts, having led a collaboration with engineers from Google to build a portfolio management software system known asPulse. Marc also contributed to the drafting of a set of standards for tracking impact investments – known as IRIS (Impact Reporting and Investing Standards). Prior to Acumen Fund, Marc came from the technology sector. He most recently worked at Appian Corporation in Washington, DC, serving as a technical consultant on engagements with the World Bank and the Department of Homeland Security, among others. Marc holds a BA in computer science from Harvard University.
Marc Mathieu
Founder at BeDo, Former Vice President Global Brand Marketing at The Coca-Cola Company
Marc is the founder and CEO of BeDo, a Company founded to help "inspire and free the good in all of us". Prior to founding BeDo, Marc was with the Coca-Cola Company from 1996 to 2008 and beforehand with the Danone Group, living across Europe, Asia and North America. Most recently in Coca-Cola's World Headquarters as Senior Vice President of Global Brand Marketing, Marc's work continuously broke new ground. Whether crafting the Manifesto for the Revival of an Icon, which drove the business turnaround of Coca-Cola's 120 year-old brand; conceptualizing and championing Live Positively, Coke's sustainability platform; or creating the Coca-Cola DNA, a redefinition of Coca-Cola's way of marketing as a fusion of art and science, Marc's contributions helped to redefine the company and shape it's culture.
McArthur
Partner at Free Range Studios
McArthur has worked in design and communications for fifteen years and loves to create smart blends of aesthetics and effective ideas. Along the way she has fundraised, organized, and developed on behalf of hundreds of non-profits and favorite causes. At Free Range, she managed the organizational growth from a small, two-person design studio to a highly prestigious, 28-person strategic communications firm with offices in two cities. Currently, as one of the firm's owners, McArthur leads Free Range's business development and client relations team. Her communications background, business acumen and non-profit experience combine to make her a valuable asset to any communications project and a sought-after consultant and speaker. Among other venues, she has spoken at Harvard Medical School's New Media Forum, American University's "Filmmakers for Conservation" event on new media and environmental issues, AIGA’s Design Unbound, University of Michigan's Penny W. Stamp's Distinguished Visitors Program, and The BYU Marriott School of Management. Driven by her passion for real world change, McArthur continues to push Free Range's level of service and commitment to quality.
Pawan Mehra
Managing Director at cKinetics, Executive Director of GIVE Foundation, Board Director at Intellecap, Vice President of Parsec Interact
Pawan Mehra has been involved in building and scaling early-stage ventures: first as a venture capital investor in his early career with GVFL and McKenna Capital and, since then as an entrepreneur with Parsec Interact, Intellecap, and cKinetics. He serves on many boards, including Global Impact Investing Network which represents global investors looking to make socially relevant investments, and continues to advise a number of companies in Asia and the US. He is also actively involved with and serving on the US board of the Give Foundation, the largest online non-profit exchange connecting donors with projects in India. Pawan has a Bachelors Degree in Electronics and Communications Engineering from Delhi College of Engineering and a Master of Business Administration from the Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad. Pawan enjoys long-distance running and meeting real-world heroes. His most precious moments are spent re-learning the finer truths of life from his children.
Gregory Miller
Former managing Director at Google.org, Former CFO/Treasurer and General Counsel of the Google Foundation, Closed more than 100 significant corporate finance transactions totaling over $19.8, Avid adventurist
From early 2006 through August 2009, Gregory Miller was Managing Director at Google.org leading its philanthropic investments, grants and legal teams. Alongside Executive Director Dr. Larry Brilliant, Greg helped initiate and develop Google.org's programs and funding initiatives addressing global economic development, global public health and climate change. During that 3+ year tenure, Google.org grew to 42 persons, awarded approximately $100 million with 120 grants, led 11 philanthropic investments, and was recognized in widespread news articles, blogs and conferences recognizing its data-driven, outcome-based approaches. Prior to Google, Greg worked with and represented with start-up companies, principally with businesses competing in the Internet, networking, communications, and software markets, including as an equity partner with Silicon Valley's Gunderson Dettmer law firm and Of Counsel with Latham and Watkins. Greg lives in San Francisco, has a JD from University of Virginia Law School and has a BA in Economics and Philosophy from Colgate.
Kimbal Musk
CEO at OneRiot, CEO at Medium, Owner at The Kitchen
Kimbal Musk is the CEO of OneRiot, the leading realtime search engine and the first marketplace for advertising on the realtime web. He is responsible for the company's business and technological initiatives, as well as heading the day-to-day activities for the company. In 1995, Kimbal started his first company along with his brother, Zip2. Zip2, was an early content management company for the Internet and was the first to provide maps and door-to-door directions on the Internet. Zip2 built online content management systems for over 100 media companies, including the New York Times. The company was sold in 1999 to Compaq for $307 million in cash, one of the largest transactions of its kind in the Internet industry. After selling Zip2, Kimbal helped to found, advise and invest in several young software and technology companies. He currently sits on the board of directors for SpaceX Corp. and Tesla Motors.??Kimbal also owns a restaurant, The Kitchen in Boulder Colorado, which has been named one of, "America's Top Restaurants" according to Food and Wine, Zagat's, Gourmet, and the James Beard Foundation. A graduate of Queen's University in Canada with a degree in Business Communication and the French Culinary Institute in New York City. Kimbal has also served as an Adjunct Professor at New York University.
Thomas D. Nastas
Founder of Innovative Ventures, Inc; Former Senior Advisor to the Russian Venture Company, the Russian government’s $1 billion Fund of Funds
Thomas D. Nastas is the founder of Innovative Ventures, Inc., a venture fund investing on US-based technology companies. His investment experience is extensive and includes the creation of venture funds in the US, Canada, Europe, Africa, CEE and the CIS with total capitalization of $750 million. In 2008, he completed a senior advisory assignment for the Russian Venture Company, the Russian Government's $1 billion fund-of-funds located in Moscow.
Mr. Nastas works actively in the Russian community to develop future leaders and help place talented Russians in companies he is involved with. From January 2002-May 2009, Mr. Nastas served as Professor of Marketing at the American Institute of Business and Economics in Moscow, an evening MBA program for Russians, teaching courses including “Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital,” “Intro to Marketing” and “Sales Management." Mr. Nastas is an avid writer with articles on venture capital, technology and innovation published in the Harvard Business Review, Russian Investment Review, African Technology Development Forum Journal, Development Outreach (publication of the World Bank), Asian, Canadian, European and US Venture Capital Journals. His profile can be viewed by clicking here.
Sara Olsen
Founder of Social Venture Technology Group, Co-founder of Global Social Venture Competition, Social Edge Blogger
Markets internalize environmental and social impact if they can see it, so Sara started the Social Venture Technology Group in 2001 to develop tools that both businesses and nonprofits can use to measure and manage impact as a strategic asset. SVT-designed systems today reveal the impact of @$2Bn in 23+ countries. Sara became obsessed with systemic solutions to poverty after living and working in the Mississippi Delta, where she woke up to the third world within the United States. With MBA and MASW degrees, her most valuable education comes from teaching public high school in Mississippi, helping start a social enterprise at Shorebank Corporation, cofounding the Global Social Venture Competition, and her relationships, in particular with a number of the people whom she has loved.
Bob Pattillo
Founder, Gray Ghost Ventures; CEO, First Light Ventures; board member of Catalyst, ASA Foundation, PFNC, MIT-Legatum Center for Social Entrepreneurship, Racemi
Bob is an entrepreneur. He likes to start stuff. Some folks find him permanently outside the box. He began work in microfinance in 1998 and sold his real-estate business in 2003 to focus solely on social investment and enterprise development. He founded Gray Ghost Ventures in 2003 as a regional microfinance equity fund incubator. The success of Gray Ghost has led to investment in enterprises serving low-income customers in developing countries. Current investments within the Gray Ghost family include Cell Bazaar, a mobile-phone “Craig’s List” service for farmers in Bangladesh, D.Light, the inventor and distributor of solar-powered LED lamps in rural India; and the Indian School Finance Company, a lender to schools serving low-income families. Day-to-day, he serves as the CEO of First Light Ventures, a sister enterprise to Gray Ghost Ventures that invests in social entrepreneurs at the idea and pilot stage. First Light is also executing the Village Bank, a global pilot of entrepreneurs selecting their peers for investment (Full Disclosure: First Light Ventures partnered with the Unreasonable Institute to establish the Unreasonable Village Fund as part of their global pilot).
Paul Polak
Founder of International Development Enterprises; Founder of D-Rev: Design for the Other 90%; Founder of Windhorse International, Enabled 17 million people to move out of poverty.
Dr. Paul Polak isn’t your everyday global poverty fighter. A 77-year old former psychiatrist, Dr. Polak has spoken to over 3,000 people earning less than $1/day a day. These conversations taught him that these impoverished people are actually viable entrepreneurs and consumers. Based on this principle, he founded International Development Enterprises (IDE), which has provided over 17 million people affordable agricultural technologies and enabled them to move out of poverty. After 25 years at the helm of IDE, Dr. Polak turned over leadership of the organization and is now focusing on fomenting two revolutions to end poverty: one in design and one in big business. The first, executed by his non-profit D-Rev: Design for the Other 90%, aims to reverse the fact that the world’s best designers spend 90% of their time serving the interests of the richest 10% of customers. The second, led by his new for-profit venture Windhorse International, aims to demonstrate how big businesses can profitably design and market their products and services to $1-$2/day customers. Practical solutions that work as well as stories about $1/day farmers are outlined in his book Out of Poverty: What Works When Traditional Approaches Fail. His work has been recognized by the likes of the Scientific American Top Fifty Award (2003) and the Ernst and Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” Award (2004).
Watch this video interview with Paul Polak, in which he discusses his approach to poverty alleviation.
Laura Probst
Founder of Do Good. Make Money.
Laura is the Founder and Principal at Do Good. Make Money., a cause marketing consulting services firm that helps companies maximize returns on their philanthropic investments. By forging win-win partnerships between for-profit and nonprofit brands, Laura ensures her clients can measure both the social impact their support is making, and how their support of a great cause is helping to grow the bottom line. Over the past 14 years, Laura has produced philanthropic strategies and programs for a variety of organizations, including Hasbro, Kraft, Seventh Generation, Hearst, The Container Store, Kirkland and Ellis LLP, Nestle, Sony, Merck, Step Up Women’s Network, New York Women in Communications, American Cancer Society and Susan G. Komen for the Cure. Her most recent client, WebMD, saw incredible results – more than $20M in new business and a 30% increase in viewership – in just two years. She got her start in South Africa, building a women’s empowerment organization that helped women in Diepsloot Informal Settlement start small businesses. Laura received her J.D. from UCLA School of Law and graduated with honors from the University of Virginia. She loves taking trips to new places with her young son, Dashiell, and eats chocolate at least once every day.
Elnor Rozenrot
Director at Innosight Ventures
Elnor Rozenrot is a Venture Director at Innosight Ventures, a venture building and investing company with offices in Singapore, Mumbai, and Baltimore. Since joining Innosight, Elnor has worked with ventures in the US and Asia to bring to market new disruptive products and develop growth strategies. Elnor’s primary focus is on the incubation and early-stage business development for Innosight Ventures' portfolio companies. Prior to joining Innosight, Elnor has lived and worked in the United States and abroad. His most recent experience includes being Owner’s Agent at a telecommunications firm, where he managed turnaround efforts for select companies in the corporate holding portfolio. Prior to that he led two IT companies, one of which he founded, grew and merged with an ERP services firm. He received a Bachelors Degree in Law from the Academic College of Law in Tel Aviv and an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth, where he was awarded the Arnold F. Adams Jr. Entrepreneurship Award for Excellence in Entrepreneurship.
Watch the video of Elnor discussing Innosight Ventures’ Disruptive Innovation on the Unreasonable Blog here.
Scott Sherman
Founder of Transformative Action Institute, National Society of Collegiate Scholars' Faculty of the Year
Scott Sherman is a writer and researcher on the most effective methods of social change. He has worked on nonviolence and social justice projects from the war-torn island of Sri Lanka to the inner city ghettoes of America. He is an expert on the most effective ways that citizens succeed in creating social progress and innovation. Sherman's work on nonviolent social change projects has been praised by such Nobel Peace Prize Laureates as the Dalai Lama and the late Mother Teresa and eventually leading him to found the Transformative Action Institute. He is also a nationally recognized speaker on environmental regeneration. He has won the outstanding teaching award from the University of California at Berkeley. In 2004, he was nominated for the National Society of Collegiate Scholars' Faculty of the Year award for the entire U.S. Sherman earned his undergraduate and law degrees from U.C. Berkeley, as well as his Ph.D. in environmental studies from the University of Michigan. Besides his work as a grassroots community organizer, lecturer, and author, Sherman has worked with the Natural Resources Defense Council and the Environmental Law Foundation. He is currently an adjunct faculty member in UCLA's School of Public Affairs.
Manoj Sinha
Co-Founder of Husk Power Systems
Manoj Sinha is the Co-Founder of Husk Power Systems, an organization’s whose objective is to electrify rural India. Husk Power Systems converts rice husks, an abundant waste product for Indian villagers, into biogas. This biogas can then be captured to produce affordable electricity. By the end of 2010, Husk Power Systems will have successfully electrified 125 villages and hopes to expand its services to over 5,000 villages, providing electricity for over 20 million people. He received an MS in Electrical and Computer Engineering from Amherst and completed his MBA at the University of Virgina. Manoj and his founding team were named “social entrepreneurs of the year” by Fast Company and Husk Power Systems was named “top student innovation” by the New York Times in December 2008. Manoj has secured investment from the Acumen Fund and the Shell Foundation and won the Draper Fisher Jurvetson – Cisco Global Business Plan Competition. He is an alumus of the Global Social Benefit Incubator program, previously served as a microprocessor designer at Intel, and holds 10 U.S. patents.
Benita Singh
Co-Founder and COO of Source4Style, co-founded Mercado Global
Benita Singh is a fair trade entrepreneur with a passion for connecting artisan groups around the world to wholesale markets. She is the Co-Founder and COO of Source4Style, the first online ethical sourcing platform connecting fashion and interior designers directly to sustainable textiles and raw materials suppliers around the globe. While a student at Yale University, she co-founded Mercado Global - a non-profit fair trade organization working with women's coops throughout Guatemala. As the organization's president, she built marketing partnerships with companies from Whole Foods. She went on to work with artisan collectives across India, consulting on product development, supply chain management and marketing to ultimately build partnerships with ABC Carpet and Home and Barnes and Noble. Benita has served on the boards of the International Youth Foundation, South Asian Young Women Entrepreneurs' Network, and Nest. Together with her mom, she has a fair trade toys company called Fig Toys that supports workers' collectives in southern India maintaining the art of hand-painted lacware toys. Her work in the fields of fair trade and sustainable development has been recognized by Newsweek Magazine, Echoing Green and the Social Enterprise Alliance. She graduated with degrees in Comparative Literature and International Relations, and speaks French, Spanish and Hindi.
Kevin Starr
Founder and Director of the Mulago Foundation, Founder and Director of the Rainer Arnhold Fellows Program
Kevin Starr directs the Mulago Foundation and is the founder and director of the Rainer Arnhold Fellows Program. Mulago spends its money to drive forward the most promising ideas in health, development, and conservation in poor countries. The Foundation is unabashedly obsessed with impact: designing for it, measuring it, investing in it, and taking it to scale. The Rainer Arnhold Fellows program is an outgrowth of the Foundation, and works with the best emerging social entrepreneurs with solutions for the less-than-$2-a-day world. The Program uses a clear understanding of impact and behavior change as the raw material to drive a systematic process of design for maximum scalability (see www.rainerfellows.org). Kevin’s stint in Cambodian refugee camps at age 19 propelled him on the path to his current work. He had a perfectly good career in medicine and international health when he stumbled into philanthropy in the early 1990’s. Since then he’s gotten deep into dozens of projects ranging from forest conservation by monks in Tibet to micro-franchise clinics in Kenya to one-acre farming in Burma. He still practices medicine (very) part-time.
Revi Sterling
Faculty Director, ICTD Graduate Programs at the ATLAS Institute, High-level Panel of Advisors, UN-GAID
Revi Sterling, Ph.D., is the founding director of the only master’s degree program in the U.S. that trains what she calls “academic practitioners” in the field of Information and Communication Technology for Development (ICTD) at the ATLAS Institute at the University of Colorado. An active ICTD researcher and practitioner herself, she is focused on developing and deploying appropriate, sustainable and equitable technologies to enable other development efforts worldwide. She serves on several ICTD, gender, and development boards, and is a member of the High-Level Panel of Advisors to UN-GAID. She has active projects in Africa, South America and India, and when she’s not teaching one of her 5 courses in ICTD and “guerilla fieldwork methods,” she tries to be out in the field as much as possible. Prior to ATLAS, she was at Microsoft Research for a decade.
Taryn Miller-Stevens
Chief Connecting Officer at StartingBloc
Taryn knew when she walked into the first day of StartingBloc's London 2007 Institute for Social Innovation she had found her village. Taryn's role as Chief Connecting Officer (CCO) focuses on building relationships that breed blended value creation. Specifically Taryn leads strategic program and partnership development at StartingBloc. Taryn graduated from Tufts University, geeking out in inter-disciplinary education through the American Studies and Entrepreneurial Leadership Studies programs. While at Tufts, Taryn felt the pulse of a variety of organizations and businesses through the Tisch College of Citizenship and Public Service Scholars Program. One of her first tribes, Taryn was inspired by the power of bringing together diverse individuals who have a shared passion and vision for a better world - one where people can do what they love, make money and change the world. Prior to StartingBloc, Taryn worked in the Human Rights department at Reebok International, where she experienced Reebok's acquisition by The Adidas Group and saw multi-national CSR program expansion firsthand.
Tom Suddes
Founder of Suddes Group, Co-Founder of ForImpact.org, Founded 19 companies, Raised $1 Billion
Tom Suddes has made a name for himself as a thought leader, coach, consultant, speaker and writer. He has been labeled contrarian, radical, whacky, and is widely known as a maverick and an agent of change. He has founded 19 businesses and was the first Entrepreneur-In-Residence at the Gigot Center for Entrepreneurial Studies at Notre Dame. In 1996, Tom won a trip around the world when Success Magazine and Opportunity International awarded him a chance to share his social entrepreneurial experiences with third world micro-entreprenuers in Russia, Poland, India, the Philippines and Australia. In 1983, he founded The Suddes Group, which has managed over 300 campaigns, raised over $1 Billion, and helped generate 3 million new jobs in their work with 125 economic development organizations around the country. He is the author of “Take the Quantum Leap, The Change Manifesto” and the forthcoming “Just Ask!” Tom has also authored the content for the ForImpact.org website, where Tom and Nick Fellers have created a powerful ‘Open Source’ tool designed to help all ‘Nonprofit’/For Impact leaders to fund their vision. Tom served in the U.S. Army as an Infantry Officer, Airborne and Pathfinder; was a two-time welterweight boxing champion at Notre Dame; and has been the boxing coach at Notre Dame for 35 years. Throughout his crazy, eclectic, eccentric life, Tom has been anchored by his wife Trudy and his five wonderful children. Now, his six grandchildren, Savannah, Keegan, Calvin, Thomas, Tatum and Roscoe are the centerpiece of life.
Watch an Unreasonable Blog video interview with Tom on how he raised $2 Billion on the here.
Kerry Suddes
Director of Training at For Impact | The Suddes Group
Kerry Suddes started her career 16 years ago in the for profit training world where she built and facilitated ‘World Class Teams’ programs for thousands, including dozens of Fortune 500 companies like JP Morgan Chase, Nationwide Insurance, Medtronic, Merck, KeyCorp, General Motors and Sherwin-Williams. In 2005, Kerry joined the For Impact Team and has since coached and trained hundreds of organizations through successful funding efforts ranging from $100k to $15M. Kerry has worked closely with The American Cancer Society, The American Lung Association, and many private schools and social service agencies. Kerry Suddes leads the team in designing and delivering the Funding Boot Camp experience as well as working in the field with clients on funding initiatives. At the Funding Boot Camp, Kerry leads attendees through a Funding Road Map and incorporates experiential learning activities to accelerate the learning process and help raise millions of dollars. Kerry completed her degree Communications and Leadership Studies at the University of San Diego.
Zenia Tata
International Development Advisor, Former Executive Director of International Development Enterprises
With over 17 years of experience, Zenia Tata is an International Development Advisor specializing in developing and funding innovative high-impact initiatives to combat social threats facing our planet. Recently, Ms. Tata served as the Executive Director of International Development Enterprises (IDE) USA, a non-profit focused on poverty alleviation and livelihood enhancements of poor rural farmers in Asia, Africa and Central America that has enabled over 19 million farmers to lift themselves out of poverty. Previously, she was the Executive Director of The Link, a 24-hour crisis center for juveniles where she designed collaborative programs with multi-tiered interventions for youth in crisis. She also spent five years in Alaska where she worked with victims of severe abuse in both urban and remote rural areas. Ms. Tata is originally from Mumbai India, where she worked in the slums with issues ranging from poverty, sex-trafficking, substance abuse and illiteracy. She has also volunteered in multiple disaster relief missions, most recently in assisting victims of the Asian tsunami. In her free time, she enjoys scuba diving, hiking, and living in the mountains of Colorado.
Jamie Van Leeuwen
Project Manager of Denver's Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness, Policy Director of John Hickenlooper's gubernatorial campaign
Jamie Van Leeuwen currently works as the Policy Director for the Hickenlooper for Colorado gubernatorial campaign. In 2006, Jamie was appointed by Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper to head up Denver’s Road Home, the city’s Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness. In this role, he oversaw leadership staff, fundraising, public relations and evaluation for Denver’s Ten Year Plan to End Homelessness. In the first five years of the initiative, Denver’s Road Home generated over $50 million in new resources for the homeless, developed over 2,000 new units of affordable housing, prevented over 3,500 families from becoming homeless, reduced chronic homelessness by 70 percent and was recognized by HUD as one of the top six homeless programs in the country. For the past five years he has worked closely with Come Let’s Dance, a non-government organization in Uganda to develop a research and learning institute for students working in the slums of Kampala. He is the recipient of the 2009 “Judy Kaufman Civic Entrepreneurship Award” from the Denver Foundation. Jamie completed his PhD in Public Policy at the Graduate School of Public Affairs at the University of Colorado Denver with an emphasis on affordable housing and homelessness. His career focus is on domestic and international work related to poverty alleviation, specifically targeting homeless and vulnerable youth in developed and developing countries. Jamie has extensive international experience with travel to over 60 countries.
Casey Verbeck
Founder and CEO of Touchpoint Trust Group, Former Founder and CEO of Partners in Music
As a successful entrepreneur, Casey has spent the last 15 years founding, running and advising new business ventures. Casey was the Founder and CEO of Partners in Music and now Touchpoint Trust Group – home of the i4c Campaign. Casey’s major transition out of the music business came in order to follow his passion for building out of the Triple Bottom Line business sector (TBL businesses are committed to people, planet, and profits). Today, Casey has launched the i4c Campaign, a multi-tier platform driving awareness and dollars in support of the Triple Bottom Line business sector. He has partnered with Sarah McLachlan and the Lilith Fair in support of the launch of the campaign. Over the past four years, Casey has been raising capital and providing go-to-market strategies for a handful of clients associated with the TBL sector, acting as Senior Advisor to Renewal2 (well regarded mission-driven private equity fund), Act Now Productions (now Saatchi & Saatchi S) United Media Partners, Colorado Green Roofs and The Real News Network.
Nathaniel Whittemore
Founder at Assetmap Strategies, Advisor and Editor of Social Entrepreneurship at Change.org
Nathaniel is the founding Director of the Center for Global Engagement at Northwestern University, which works annually with hundreds of students in dozens of countries around the world through curricular programs and student project incubation. He is also the Founding Principle for Do Good Well, Inc, a consultancy focused on fusing business and philanthropy to advance social change. Most recently Nathaniel co-founded AssetMap, a web-based startup to help individuals and organizations better harness their assets for collaborative social change. You may also recognize him as the voice behind Change.org’s highly popular social entrepreneurship blog.