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Chicago Venture Capital and Angel Investor Event, April 25, 2013

Las Vegas Venture Capital and Angel Investor Event, May 2, 2013

Stamford CT VC and Angel Investor Event, May 21, 2013

Here are the Investor speakers from our Sold-Out Vegas VC & Angel Event, sponsored by Entrepreneuria, UNLV, Tracky, The Soho Loft, Social Radius. This event was in Las Vegas on Thursday, May 2, 2013.

Dominic Marrocco Founder Entrepreneuria Read the full profile for Dominic here!

Dominic can best be described as a serial entrepreneur. 38 year old Dominic, who is originally from Leeds, England, now divides his time between the UK and US where he runs businesses in property, IT, his own venture capital fund as well as supporting multiple charities. His own story of success (he became a millionaire before he was 21) is one of inspiration for budding entrepreneurs and future business leaders.

Having graduated from Harvard Business School awarded the status of Visiting Fellow of Bournemouth University’s Business School (BU)l and Honorary Fellow of University of Nevada Las Vegas (UNLV), Dominic sees his relationship within academia as pivotal in enabling students to follow in his footsteps. He regards the role of education in addition to developing business acumen as invaluable; crucial to underpinning sustainability. This is his key motivation for funding and establishing the BU Dominic Marrocco Centre for Entrepreneurship and multiple scholarships, teaching both undergraduate and graduate classes globally.

Dominic has provided the venue (former Mike Tyson mansion) free of charge to help catalyst entrepreneurial endeavors within the region and is widely recognized by congress and state level officials as “a shining light to the future of applied entrepreneurship”. Full time philanthropist and Entrepreneur-in-Residence of multiple initiations including the American Red Cross and UNLV. Title sponsor of the Sothern Nevada Business Plan Competition and Grand Prize sponsor of Senior Design Competition.

Patrick Armstrong Analyst Canal Partners Read the full profile for Patrick here!

Patrick Armstrong is an Analyst for Canal Partners. In this role Mr. Armstrong is responsible for evaluating potential investments, performing industry and financial analysis, due diligence, and providing additional support for internal operations and portfolio companies.

In addition to his role with Canal Partners, Mr. Armstrong is Vice President and Co-Founder of JDA Investments (US), Inc., which was formed in 2008 to manage his family’s partnership. Prior to his role at JDA Investments, Mr. Armstrong founded and operated Armstrong IT Services, in 2005. Armstrong IT Services acted as an Information Technology consultant for several small and medium-sized companies with focuses on health-care, digital media, accounting, education, and IT Services. Prior to that, Mr. Armstrong was a Support Specialist at Sungard Availability Systems. He began his career in the Information Technology Services department at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Mr. Armstrong works with both of his family’s foundations – the Armstrong Family Foundation and the Kiita Foundation - is a member of the Arizona Technology Investors Forum, and is a member of Social Venture Partners of Arizona, serving as Chair of the Fast Pitch Steering Committee and as the Vice-Chair of Finance on the Board of Directors. Additionally, he serves on the Board of Directors for SEEDspot, an incubator for innovative social enterprises in downtown Phoenix and, along with his wife, Amy Armstrong, founded and serves on the Board of Directors for Next Generation Philanthropists, a 501(c)3 organization that provides programs and experiences that promote lifelong engagement and philanthropy.

Mr. Armstrong earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Economics from the University of Colorado at Boulder. Additionally, he received a certificate from the Venture Capital Executive Program at the University of California at Berkeley and is a Microsoft Certified Professional. He has 2 children and resides in Phoenix, AZ.

Jack Porter Founder & Managing Director Forward Accelerator Read the full profile for Jack here!

Mr. Porter is a 7-time CEO and is passionate about working with founders and startups. He has extensive experience in social networking and social media. Three of his companies have provided advanced computing technology into the Pharmaceutical industry and in 2007 was recognized as “One of the Top 100 Most Influential People in the Life Science Industry” by Pharmavoice Magazine. Mr. Porter is an industry speaker and author. He has written 3 books on advanced web development and is a frequent contributor to magazines such as eWeek, Information Week, and CIO Magazine. His popular blog hightechexec is one of the top blogs on MSNBCs Newsvine. Mr. Porter enjoys flying, scuba, skiing, horseback riding and backpacking. He is also a martial arts enthusiast and studies Kempo, Akita, Brazilian Jiu Jutsu, and boxing. He has been very happily married to Susie Porter for 28 years and has two daughters, Becky and Katie

Ian McNeil Angel Investor Vegas Valley Angels Read the full profile for Ian here!

Ian is the cofounder of Brennan Capital Partners and has a long history in finance and entrepreneurship. He has been a financier and operator in multiple industries. Ian has built several startups and understands the risks entrepreneurs face, the courage it takes to start a new venture and the process of growing a successful organization. His passion for young businesses, growth opportunities and helping entrepreneurs succeed has paved the way for many years of success in early stage ventures and investment management.

Jens Horstmann Managing Partner Crestlight Read the full profile for Jens here!

As a founder, Managing Partner at Crestlight, Jens directs investor relations, fundraising, and portfolio development. Crestlight challenges the investment status quo, as does Jens, through first-hand involvement advising, engaging, and creating technology driven ventures in the US and Internationally. Crestlight has richly benefited from his direction engrained in strategic planning, execution, and with investment and exit strategy. His involvement in Silicon Valley and Global high-tech industries, supported by unsurpassed leadership and passion, have enabled Jens to empower numerous startup teams to generate fun, profitable and impactful companies for decades. As executive sponsor of Crestlight relations, Jens and his teams generate strong business results and enterprise value through focus, momentum and intellectual property. Current and former portfolio companies that have benefited from his direct involvement include, AeroQuestUSA, BrainRewards, Executive Mindshare, Flyngo, iKlick, intelli-Pharma/Elytix, Kachingle, MinuteKey, Secure Data Logic, and VyyCore. Currently, he also is an investor and Venture Partner in The Entrepreneurs Fund, TEF III. In addition to this, he has presided over MXGO Technologies as CEO, since 2006. MXGO owns, maintains and monetizes a patent portfolio on key mobile messaging technologies that were developed in partnership with Motorola. Additionally, he has channeled strategy and technology for NCR Corporation, a fortune 500 company, serving as VP of Entertainment Technology, which later acquired DVDPlay (the original technology behind Redbox Kiosks). He served as CTO and previously as a founding President and CEO. Prior to DVDPlay, he was President of OpenGrid, after it acquired Ensemble Solutions, which Jens founded in 1996. Ensemble Solutions was one of the pioneers in B2B solutions on the Internet. His prior practices include senior engineering, research and development positions at Sun Microsystems, Siemens, LSI Logic Systems Research Laboratory, and X1 Corporation. Jens holds more than 12 patents, has taught classes for UC Berkeley, and is frequent keynote speaker, addressing audiences on business opportunities of new technologies, funding, venture capital and startup experience. He serves on the board of Acceleware (TSX-V: AXE), BrainRewards, SecureDataLogic, Flyngo, and is Chairman of Kachingle. Jens holds an MSEE/CS from the University of Braunschweig, with continued education at Stanford. He’s an avid pilot and photographer.

Dr. David W. Rolston Ph.D. Angel Investor Read the full profile for Dr. David W. here!

Dr. David W. Rolston, Ph.D. has been the Chief Executive Officer of SiPort, Inc. since March 2010. Dr. Rolston served as the Chief Executive Officer of Forterra Systems, Inc. Dr. Rolston served as Vice President for Engineering of ATI Research, a subsidiary of ATI Technologies Inc. and also served as Vice President and General Manager of Workstation and Embedded Business Unit. He has more than 35 years of experience in the high technology industry. His experience spans a broad spectrum of industries, applications, and technologies including extensive involvement in simulation and training, graphics applications, imagery, gaming, artificial intelligence, entertainment, and early versions of the Internet. Dr. Rolston was Chief Executive Officer of Webtelecom, Inc. until June 2001 and prior to December 2000, served as Chief Executive Officer of MultiGen-Paradigm Incorporated. After Multigen-Paradigm was acquired by Computer Associates, he served as a Senior Vice President in which he managed Multigen-Paradigm, Viewpoint, and several other content-development organizations. Before Multigen-Paradigm he worked for Silicon Graphics where he started as the Director of Marketing and completed his work there as the General Manager of the Advanced Graphics Division. Prior to SGI he served as General Manager of a division of ESL, a subsidiary of TRW, that developed software applications for the defense and intelligence community as well as commercial organizations. Before ESL he was one of 95 engineering fellows at Honeywell, Inc. He had responsible for all corporate activity in artificial intelligence. During his career he has also performed in a broad spectrum of roles - including a variety of technical, business, operational, and general management assignments. He is a registered professional engineer and has been involved in a variety of activities in the engineering community including teaching at several universities and serving with several industry consortiums. He serves as Chairman and Director of Forterra Systems, Inc. He has been Chairman of Image Metrics, Inc. since August 2008 and Director since March 2008. He holds several patents, has published a large number of technical papers and a best-selling book on Artificial Intelligence. He has a BSE in civil engineering from Northern Arizona University, an MS in systems engineering from Arizona State University, and a PhD in computer science with an emphasis in simulation and artificial intelligence. from Arizona State University.

David Drake Founder The Soho Loft Read the full profile for David here!

David Drake, founder of The Soho Loft, a subsidiary of the VC division of the Private Equity firm LDJ Capital based in New York USA, is the founder of the US Crowdfund Intermediary Regulatory Advocates (CFIRA) and US CrowdFunding Professional Association (CfPA). Fluent in 6 languages and born in Sweden, he lobbied for the JOBS Act (Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act) in both the US and at the EU Commission and was a U.S. Commerce Department delegate at the Transatlantic Economic Council forum in Brussels and Rome on July 2012 where he met with European Ministers and national legislators. David presents regularly as an expert on financial innovation and impact investing at 150+ annual and international events. He writes for a number of online publications including forbes.com, equities.com and Thomson Reuters’ pehub.com. David Drake also hosted the HBS Club NY, Trail Blazers and Best Buddies Carnegie Hall Charity events for many years.

Scott Purcell Founder Arctic Island Read the full profile for Scott here!

In 2011 Mr. Purcell founded the securities based crowdfunding platform Arctic Island, which will operate pursuant to Title II and Title III of the JOBS Act. He is an active Board member of the Crowdfunding Intermediary Regulatory Association (CFIRA), a founding member of the Crowdfunding Professionals Association, and the author of the “Best Practices for Funding Portals”, which sets policies for operations, fraud and security. He is also the author of CFIRA’s position on “BD and Registered Portal Regulatory Mechanics” and has been an active editor of numerous other industry positions. As the nascent crowdfunding industry takes shape, Mr. Purcell brings considerable experience in both securities and internet technology. In 1988 he founded a trust company that managed fixed income instruments for institutional investors, which he sold to a regional bank. Mr. Purcell also started a bond trading desk, a clearing firm for institutional investors, and published a book “The Guide to Fixed Income Investing”. In 1994 he founded Epoch Networks, one of the world’s first ISP’s, and raised over $60 million in venture capital. As an initial Board member of the Commercial Internet eXchange (CIX), he often represented the nascent industry before Congress and the FCC. In 1999 Mr. Purcell founded OnAir Networks, raised over $40 million in venture capital and built the first music storage, streaming and downloading services for Sony and Universal. During this time he was retained by the Recording Industry Association of America to advise them on internet technology issues and copyright matters, and to represent the industry before Congress. Since selling OnAir in 2001, Mr. Purcell has started several ventures, including a search engine wholesale business, a family tree and journaling website, and a niche social network.

Joseph Barizonsi Founder CommunityLeader Read the full profile for Joseph here!

Mr. Barisonzi launched CommunityLeader in March 2012 as an integrated equity crowdfunding platform. Since then CommunityLeader has emerged as one of the most innovative crowdfunding platform with products for businesses, investors and intermediaries. CommunityLeader’s portfolio includes: ● CampaignLeader, a business due diligence and management application; and ● CommunityInvestor, for investor qualification, education, and portfolio management ; and ● Apicista: A complete portal backoffice. All of which are sold as white­labeled solutions and available as application on the iTUnes and Google Play stores. Mr. Barisonzi has published several widely read whitepapers including “Community Sourced Funding” and “Crowdfunding: Why Start Now?” Mr. Barisonzi has been the featured speaker and lead training at the CommunityLeader Live educational events being held around the country to educate, inform and train business leaders on how to safely engage their community in equity crowdfunding. Mr Barisonzi is an accomplished executive with eighteen years of experience and a verifiable record increasing organizational value, enhancing productivity, streamlining operations and improving sales performance. Dynamic and inspirational leader with a strong entrepreneurial spirit and talent for grasping innovative ideas, developing comprehensive strategies and implementing actionable plans. He was a principle of the management consulting firm Strategic Growth Initiative where he managed a client profile which included EB­5 Regional Centers, emerging growth technology companies, and social entrepreneurial endeavors. Mr. Barisonzi launched his career in community economic development, serving as the Executive Coordinator of the Award­winning Lyndale Neighborhood. In 1997 Mr. Barisonzi was named the top community leader under the age of 30 by the Do Something Foundation.