OPEN SV Annual Forum 2019

AAMNA KHAN

Partnership Operations, Square

Aamna graduated from UC Berkeley in 2017, where she studied Business and Media Studies. She's been working in operations since, and has worked at the NIKE World Headquarters in Oregon, and is currently working at Square in Partnership Operations. She enjoys traveling, photography, and coffee.

Partnership Operations, Square

AAREF HILALY

Partner at Sequoia Capital

I love working with talented, hungry people who have big ideas. It’s why I moved halfway across the world to Silicon Valley, and then started a company (CenterRun). When that was acquired, I tried again (Clearwell) – except better, because this time I had some relevant experience and was more able to cope with the terror and euphoria involved in leading a start-up. Looking back, at both companies I was lucky to have a lead investor (Sequoia) who helped me recover from my rookie mistakes, and who enabled me to grow from an inexperienced founder into a confident CEO. I joined Sequoia with the goal of now helping other founders do the same.

Partner at Sequoia Capital

ADAM J EPSTEIN

Founder, Third Creek Advisors

Adam J. Epstein is a former institutional investor, and, now, an advisor to CEOs and boards of small-cap companies through his firm, Third Creek Advisors, LLC. He speaks monthly at corporate governance and investor conferences and has appeared globally more than 100 times since 2012. Mr. Epstein is a key contributor to Nasdaq’s Amplify small-cap content initiative and is a teacher and mentor at the Nasdaq Entrepreneurial Center. He writes the “Entrepreneurial Governance” column for Directorship magazine, he’s the author of The Perfect Corporate Board: A Handbook for Mastering the Unique Challenges of Small-Cap Companies (McGraw Hill, 2012), and he’s a contributing author to The Handbook of Board Governance: A Comprehensive Guide for Public, Private and Not for Profit Board Members (Wiley, 2016). In June 2017, The Perfect Corporate Board was the #1 ranked corporate governance book on Amazon.com, and, in June 2016, The Handbook of Board Governance was the #1 “New Release” in corporate governance on Amazon.com. Prior to founding Third Creek, Mr. Epstein co-founded and was a principal of Enable Capital Management, LLC. During his tenure, Enable’s special situation hedge funds invested in more than 500 small-cap financings. Mr. Epstein has been featured in The Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg Businessweek, and on Nasdaq Livestream and CNN Presents, and he has testified in front of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. He earned a Juris Doctor from Boston University, and a Bachelor of Arts, cum laude, from Vassar College.

Founder, Third Creek Advisors

AHMAD ABDULKADER

CTO, Voicea

Ahmad Abdulkader is CTO of Voicea. Abdulkader is a well renowned industry expert in Machine Learning, Deep Learning, and Neural Networks. Abdulkader served as lead architect for Facebook’s applied AI efforts, producing DeepText, a text-understanding engine with near-human accuracy in over 20 languages. Prior he worked at Google building OCR engines, machine Learning systems, and computer vision systems. Abdulkader also led a teams at Microsoft Ad-Center & Bing. Ahmad built the state of the art 'Handwriting Recognition Technology' which currently powers Microsoft's touch devices including 'Surface' and 'Windows phone'.

CTO, Voicea

ALI A. MINAI

Prof, University of Cincinati

Ali A. Minai is Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, and a faculty member in the Neuroscience Graduate Program at the University of Cincinnati. He received his B.E. in Electrical Engineering from N.E.D. University of Engineering & Technology, Karachi, in 1985, and M.S. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Virginia, where he also received post-doctoral training in computational neuroscience. Dr. Minai’s research interests include neural networks, complex systems and networks, computational models of cognition, text analysis, computational neuroscience, multi-agent systems, and digital humanities. He has published more than 100 research papers in these and other areas. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation and the Air Force Research Lab. In 2012, he was the recipient of a prestigious INSPIRE grant from the National Science Foundation. Dr. Minai was President of the International Neural Network Society for 2015-16, and has served on the Society’s Executive Committee and Board of Governors for several years. He has also been a member of the Neural Networks Technical Committee of the IEEE Computational Intelligence Society. He served as the General Chair for the 2011 International Joint Conference on Neural Networks (IJCNN 2011) in San Jose, CA, the 8th International Conference on Complex Systems (ICCS 2011) in Boston, MA, the 9th International Conference on Complex Systems (ICCS 2018) in Cambridge, MA . He has been a leader in organizing several other conferences on complex systems, and has edited nine books in the area. He is an action editor for the Elsevier journals, Neural Networks and Cognitive Systems Research, and an associate editor of the IEEE Transactions on Neural Networks and Learning Systems. He is also the Series Editor for the Springer/NECSI Book Series on Complex Systems. Dr. Minai is a senior member of the IEEE and the International Neural Networks Society, and a member of AAAS and the Society for Neuroscience. In addition to his professional activities, Ali Minai is also active in several other areas. He has published two collections of Urdu poetry, and writes on-line for Three Quarks Daily (https://www.3quarksdaily.com/) and Brown Pundits (http://www.brownpundits.com/) on many topics, including history, science, artificial intelligence, and politics.

Prof, University of Cincinati

AMIR WAIN

CEO, i2c

As founder and CEO of i2c, Amir is responsible for defining a clear vision and setting strategic direction for the company. Recognized as a pioneer in the prepaid/stored value industry, Amir founded software development firm Innovative Private Limited in 1987 and led the global launch of the transaction processing platform FastCash. Propelled by the success of Innovative, he founded i2c, Inc. in 2001 to bring next-generation processing solutions to the payments industry. Contributing to the company’s expansive growth curve, under Amir’s guidance, i2c has introduced a number of industry firsts, including card-linked offers, event-driven account holder communications and gift card voice personalization. Today, as market opportunities for payments & emerging commerce continue to expand at a dramatic rate, Amir is leading i2c’s continued push to innovate the enabling infrastructure and solutions that transform commerce. Today’s consumers want choices, and Amir’s vision is to build the flexible solutions they seek in an increasingly mobile and global world.

CEO, i2c

AMRA TAREEN

Head of Innovation, Bed Bath and Beyond

As a Head of Innovation, Amra is responsible for identifying, partnering and/or prototyping emerging technologies and new high growth areas for Bed Bath and Beyond (BBBY).

Head of Innovation, Bed Bath and Beyond

ANWAR AKRAM

VP Advertising Operations at Google

Join Anwar Akram, VP Advertizing Operations at Google, and learn about his journey - how he started, the path he took, the challenges he faced and the advice he identifies as key to his success. Anwar joined Google in 2007, and since then has been involved in a variety of roles ranging from Sales Operations to his current responsibility as VP of Advertizing Operations. His talk will focus on a verity of things including the challenges he saw over the years, and what you need to keep in mind if you want to be successful. Prior to his MBA, he worked for several years in Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, and brings experience from Microsoft, McKinsey, and mortgage banking. He will also highlight the unique factors of all these organizations and the learning entailed throughout his professional career.

VP Advertising Operations at Google

ASIF ALAM

Advisor to the CEO of Crux Informatics

Asif Alam is currently Advisor to the CEO of Crux Informatics, a financial services startup with focus Data and Analytics. Prior to Crux Informatics, Asif was Senior Vice President at Thomson Reuters. During his 17 years at Thomson Reuters, Asif demonstrated a strong ability to blend technical expertise with business acumen to initiate and drive business expansion, form key alliances as well as buildout of new products and services in profitable revenue streams. Asif has inherent passion for AI and Machine Learning; while at Thomson Reuters he started a new Machine Learning initiative serving quantitative traders and then expanding the product to the entire capital markets making it a $200 million annual subscription service. Being a thought leader in SaaS, Cloud & Big Data, Asif is frequent speaker at industry events and blogs frequently. Asif has served on the technology advisory board of Amazon, Google, Cisco, and Salesforce.

Advisor to the CEO of Crux Informatics

AUDE OLIVIA DUFOUR

Serial Entrepreneur

Aude-Olivia Dufour is a French-Canadian serial entrepreneur who has won more than 15 business plan competitions, including the MassChallenge, the world's largest startup competition. She successfully launched Goodify (acquired), Lovelines (virtual storytelling with text-bots) and now Gender Bridge, whose mission is to bridge the gender gap and answer the #metoo movement with empowering and gender-neutral solutions. She has consulted for some of the world's most respected companies in Gamification and has led cutting-edge innovative practices aiming to leverage the power of user-centric design and Gamification to make Enterprise technologies as engaging as Consumer ones. She has advised multiple successful startups and has always been a key player and connector for startup communities across North America. She has written and published books and has led workshops on innovation, self-growth, and communication. Her worldly adventures keep fueling her motivation to bring more human qualities to technology so that it can serve and unite us all.

Serial Entrepreneur

AURANGZEB KHAN

President & CEO at Altia Systems, Inc.

Aurangzeb was co-founder, President & CEO of Altia Systems through March 2019, and is now SVP, Intelligent Vision Systems at GN Jabra, following the merger1 of Altia Systems with GN Jabra. He helped grow Altia Systems’ unique PanaCast multi-camera array real-time, immersive intelligent vision system products to serve more than 1,600 companies, including 200+ universities, around the world. PanaCast is a platform which enables people and systems (machines) to see and make sense of their environment in real time. PanaCast enables modern video collaboration, edge AI data and information, education, machine learning, AR/VR content creation, professional broadcasting, and autonomous vehicle capabilities. Earlier, Aurangzeb was President & CEO at Everspin Technologies (NASD: MRAM; $100M IPO). He was co-founder, President & CEO at Altius Solutions and, immediately following the merger Simplex Solutions, contributed to the IPO in May 2001 (NASD: SPLX; $300M). Aurangzeb held senior engineering and general management positions at Cadence (CDNS), Cirrus Logic (CRUS), Tandem Computers (NYSE: TDM, now part of HP) and Fairchild. He helped deliver several industry-first systems and SoCs to market, including the Sony Computer Entertainment GS®I-32 and PlayStation®-2 Graphics Synthesizers, the Cirrus Logic 3CiTM SoC and the Tandem Computers NonStopTM, HimalayaTM and CycloneTM series of massively-parallel servers. These products received industry leadership recognition and delivered $200M - $1B in annual revenues. Aurangzeb received an M.S. in Electrical Engineering and an M.S. in Engineering Management from Stanford University, executive education at the Stanford GSB, a double-major B.S. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences and Nuclear Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley, and a B.Sc. in Physics and Mathematics from Government College, Lahore, Pakistan, where he stood first in class and received the Academic Roll of Honour.

President & CEO at Altia Systems, Inc.

BATOOL ARHAMNA HAIDER

Applied Scientist @ Amazon Artificial Intelligence

Batool is currently working as an Applied Scientist with Amazon Lex – Artificial Intelligence team. She, alongside her fellow scientists, help AWS build smarter or “more human-like” conversational machines (chatbots) using state of the art natural language understanding research. Before joining AWS, Batool worked as a Data Scientist for UnitedHealth Group’s Human Resources Research team where she initiated several machine learning projects to study the company’s massive workforce (+200K employees). Prior to that, she served as a Research Assistant at the Reservoir Simulation Research team - Energy Resources Engineering department at Stanford University, while pursuing Masters. She also served as the Lead Tutor Computation and Natural Sciences at Stanford’s Summer Session 2015. Her machine learning projects range from predicting which employees will quit in the next 2 years using human resources data, to which patients have heart defects using electrocardiogram data, and which oil wells have high potential to produce hydrocarbons using geological data. Batool aspires to become a science/technology communicator and is currently authoring a book titled ‘Machine Learning Samurai’. She is a member of Stanford's Wushu (Kung Fu) group.

Applied Scientist @ Amazon Artificial Intelligence

BILAL ZUBERI

Early stage VC. Partner at Lux Capital

Venture capital investor, advisor, entrepreneur. Passion lies in technology innovations, big ideas, andimproving peoples' lives. Learning, and sharing what I learn with others

Early stage VC. Partner at Lux Capital

BILL REICHERT

Garage Ventures

DEREK CHOY

Product Management

Derek Choy drives technical innovation and scaling a globally distributed engineering, as well as the Product Management and Professional Services teams. Choy joined Rainforest QA from Aria Systems, where he was VP of Engineering, and a similarly distributed engineering team by 10x and supported revenue growth of more than 20x. Prior to that, Derek held technical leadership positions at eBay and Accenture.

Product Management

DR. RITU LAL, PH.D

CEO and co-founder , GEn1E Lifesciences

Dr. Ritu Lal, Ph.D., M.S. is the CEO and co-founder of GEn1E Lifesciences. She is a leader in Pharmaceutical R&D with 20+ years of experience in Biotech/Pharma companies. She has taken compounds from discovery to regulatory approval and has filed 15+ IND applications with the FDA in disease areas of neurology, inflammation, virology, pain and oncology. Two of these compounds have received New Drug Application (NDA) approvals from the FDA and Ministry of Health and Welfare, Japan (Kaletra® for the treatment of HIV and Horizant® (Regnite® in Japan) for Restless Legs Syndrome (RLS) and Post Herpetic Neuralgia (PHN)). She has a doctorate in Pharmaceutical Sciences from the University of Maryland and a Master’s degree in Pharmacology from the University of Arizona. She has over 60 publications, book chapters and presentations. She is also a graduate of the Stanford University Graduate School of Business’ Master’s Degree in Management program.

CEO and co-founder , GEn1E Lifesciences

DR. ZAKIA RAHMAN

Clinical Associate Professor, Assistant Chief at the Livermore Division of the PAVAHCS and Director of the Resident Laser and Aesthetic Clinic

Zakia Rahman, M.D., is a Clinical Associate Professor, Assistant Chief at the Livermore Division of the PAVAHCS and Director of the Resident Laser and Aesthetic Clinic. Her clinical interests include geriatric dermatology, surgical dermatology, lasers, ethnic skin, fillers and neurotoxins for medical and aesthetic indications. Her research interests include lasers for medical and aesthetic indications and ethnic skin. Dr. Rahman also serves on the Stanford School of Medicine Faculty Senate and the Stanford Committee for Professional Satisfaction and Support.

Clinical Associate Professor, Assistant Chief at the Livermore Division of the PAVAHCS and Director of the Resident Laser and Aesthetic Clinic

ELIZABETH TSE

Senior Vice President of Operations, Upwork Inc.

Elizabeth oversees Operations at Upwork, the world’s largest freelancing website. She is responsible for Customer Experience, Trust & Safety, Global Payments, Freelancer Success and Talent Services – a globally distributed team of over 2000 individuals. Prior to Upwork, Elizabeth was the Chief Operating Officer at Samasource – a non-profit delivering innovative enterprise data services by employing the untapped talent of the world’s poor. Before Samasource, she was an Advisory Board Member and the first Vice President President of Customer Success for Zuora, helping to lead the organization from a small startup to the leader in delivering SaaS-based subscription billing and payment services. Prior to Zuora, Elizabeth was eBay’s Vice President, Global Billing, Payments & Collections. At eBay she led global teams in Customer Support, Product Management and Operations during the organization’s period of hyper growth. A graduate of Yale University, Elizabeth holds a BA in Psychology (Cum Laude, with Distinction in the major)

Senior Vice President of Operations, Upwork Inc.

FAHAD AZIZ

CTO Caremerge

Technology Entrepreneur with over 14 years of experience in delivering time-to-market technology solutions for Fortune 500 companies including Toyota, Stanley Black & Decker, and Hartford Insurance. In my leadership, teams have built SAAS systems, mobile/web applications, and communication platforms. I have also taken ideas and business problems from drawing boards and shaped them into successful software solutions by employing simplicity and innovation in both, design and development. I have created new models in agile methodologies to improve the communication and coordination of multiple teams working together.

CTO Caremerge

FAISAL CHEEMA

Lead hematology clinical trials program, Kaiser Permanente

Faisal graduated from Dow Medical College in 2001. Completed residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Cincinnati. Research fellowship in Geriatric Oncology at the Baylor College of Medicine. Research scholar at the Baylor College of Medicine Clinical Scientist Training Program. Oncology training at the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center and Blood and Marrow transplant fellowship at Stanford University. Currently, practicing at Kaiser Permanente since 2015 with primary focus on Leukemia and Lymphoma and leads the hematology clinical trials program at Kaiser Permanente Northern California.

Lead hematology clinical trials program, Kaiser Permanente

FARAH ALI

VP Engineering, Player and Developer Experience at Electronic Arts (EA)

I am a seasoned technology leader passionate about making an impact by building innovative products to solve compelling problems. I love working with and learning from smart people to deliver thought-leading products. I have experience leading cross functional teams and I like building great engineering teams from the ground up while providing hands-on leadership and strategic vision. I have a wide range of experience working on everything from applications, online services, large scale distributed systems to mining very large data sets to gather insights for targeting new business opportunities and a variety of machine learning problems. I am a VP of Engineering at Electronic Arts reporting to the CTO. As part of the core technology organization at EA I get to work on some innovative services and solutions to power the player network. I previously worked as a Director of Engineering in the Shipping & Logistics Science team at eBay where I worked on using massive amounts of user and behavioral data to improve the shipping experience for both buyers and sellers. I have held various roles in the Shipping domain ranging from building a common, shared platform to integrate multiple 3rd parties on core to managing cross border trade logistics and applications for sellers. Prior to working at eBay I was at Microsoft for a number of years starting as an individual contributor and growing into an engineering leader while working across several organizations. Specialties Engineering Excellence, Building and mentoring high performance teams , Software Development Process, Agile Development and Testing, Building highly performant distributed online services to scale, working with massive amounts of data at scale, Distributed systems, Information retrieval and machine learning, Product Management, Big data mining, Test strategy and vision.

VP Engineering, Player and Developer Experience at Electronic Arts (EA)

FARAZ HOODBHOY

Director, Ecosystem, Innovation & Outreach at AT&T

Faraz was the Founder & CEO of PixSense, a mobile social networking company with 40M subscribers which he started in 2005 and exited in 2011. Faraz currently leads AT&T’s Innovation Outreach & Equity programs at the AT&T Foundry. An engineer from Rensselaer, Faraz is the co-author of “Applied XML – A Toolkit for Programmers”. Faraz teaches entrepreneurship at UC Berkeley’s College of Engineering where he’s an Industry Fellow at the Sutarjda Center for Entrepreneurship & Technology and served as course mentor for the past 7 years.

Director, Ecosystem, Innovation & Outreach at AT&T

FARIHA CHAUDRY

Director, Program Management and Marketing Technology

Technology and Engineering Development Leader Fariha is an empathetic and collaborative leader who thrives in fast paced, innovation-led organizations. As an expert in Engineering, R&D and Program Management, she has led the development of innovative marketing solutions for the healthcare, insurance and consumer industries. Also, as an agile pioneer, she has increased product velocity by setting up fast-paced development programs across multiple geographies. Her career spans large companies, startups, non-profits and government organizations: • She has defined and created the development and execution capabilities for the marketing platform of a 5,000+ person healthcare technology provider • She has managed the technical implementation for registration, enrollment and access for 12,000+ public health stakeholders at one of North America’s leading government healthcare portals. • She has led the successful integration of corporate acquisitions at the technical, product and process levels. • She has started and led Program Management offices as start-ups, mid-size and global organizations. • She has successfully helped grow Skyhook from a 25 person startup to one of the premier providers of location based personalization technologies, with a successful exit to Liberty Media, a Fortune 1000 conglomerate. Previously, she led the growth of Agencyport, an innovative insurance personalization startup which was acquired by Accenture’s insurance division. • As a Director of the Board of one of the largest and most progressive faith-based non-profits in the Boston area, she has led community outreach, especially to the youth members. She also instituted processes to allow more efficient scaling of the overall organization.

Director, Program Management and Marketing Technology

FARUK BHAGANI

Senor Product Manager, Oracle

Faruk is a challenge-driven Business Professional with 25 years of experience and has been involved in projects that have generated over $350 million in revenue via sales of products and services for reputable companies. This includes a distinguished sales career with 3M, ATT, IBM, Xerox, Microsoft, Pearson and Oracle, in the US, as well as hands on leadership for startup deployments in retail, automotive and IT services across the Middle East with brands like Porsche, Audi Volkswagen, Daimler Commercial, Mango, Promod, and Lacoste. Faruk has a BBA in Marketing from the University of Houston and a Masters Diploma in Financial Strategies from Oxford University

Senor Product Manager, Oracle

FAUAD HASAN

Investor, Board Member, Entrepreneur

With background in chemical engineering, Fauad comes with more than 19 years of experience in various leadership roles in the Biopharmaceutical industry. Fauad was recently the Co-Founder, President and CEO of Bonti, which was acquired by Allergan (NASDAQ:AGN) in October 2018 for the upfront payment of $195M and subsequent milestone payments. He was instrumental in driving Bonti’s fast progress towards two Phase 2 programs, while raising $36M in multiple financing rounds over a three- year period. Previously, he was the Strategic and Technical leader in R&D group at Allergan, where he served on the Global Product Development teams of top tier neuromodulator (including Botox®) and ocular programs, establishing overall drug development strategy from discovery to commercialization. Fauad started his career as a scientist at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:REGN), where he was part of the R&D team that developed various therapeutic drugs, including a multi-billion dollar revenue ophthalmology drug, Eylea®. He moved on to Baxter International (now part of Takeda) working in roles of increasing responsibilities in the areas of process development, plant engineering, and manufacturing, catering to both internal (including anti-hemophilic FVIII products) and external biologics programs. Fauad is also one of the pioneers of single-use technology, with several patents for Single-use bioreactor (SUB) used in the manufacturing of biologic drugs. Growing up in Silicon Valley, Fauad learned leadership skills at an early age through competitive sports. He won several awards playing squash and cricket at regional and national level, and has represented United States National Cricket team. Currently, he enjoys playing squash and coaching his twin boys youth baseball team. Fauad received his graduate degrees from University of Maryland.

Investor, Board Member, Entrepreneur

GHUFRAN AHMED

VP Software Support, Oracle

Ghufran Ahmed is Oracle’s VP of Software Support, leading a large globally distributed organization focused on for Analytics and Middleware products for enterprise customers both on premise as well as on Cloud. Prior to joining Oracle, Mr. Ahmed was at eBay, Inc. as the Senior Director for the Global Services Solutions Technology group in the eBay Marketplaces division. In his nearly 15 years at eBay, Ghufran led successful transformations involving people, process and technology changes overseeing some of the most complex programs resulting in significant business growth as well as savings. He also led the work in predictive analytics using machine learning in different domains such as fraud prevention, detection and payment verification. Ghufran also led the architecture and implementation of a scalable billing system with a versatile payment gateway to the top financial clearing houses including interfaces to Paypal. Prior to eBay Ghufran was the VP of Engineering at Bluelight.com where he led the development of a highly resilient and scalable e-commerce retail website including setup of the data center infrastructure, implementation of CRM, Loyalty, Order Processing, Payments, and Logistics Integration with some of the industry’s largest retailers. Ghufran earned MS from Stanford University in Engineering and a dual BS/BA degree from California Institute of Technology and Bowdoin College.

VP Software Support, Oracle

HARIS HANIF

Software Engineer, GAP

Haris Hanif: Haris graduated from UC Santa Cruz in 2017, with a degree in Computer Science, and has been working at GAP since, where he's currently a software engineer. He has diverse engineering experience, ranging from web development, to data engineering, dev ops, etc. He is passionate about anything tech-related.

Software Engineer, GAP

HASSAN AHMED

Chairman and CEO, Affirmed Networks

https://www.affirmednetworks.com/ As CEO, Hassan Ahmed is responsible for all aspects of the company’s operations and for setting its strategic direction. Prior to starting Affirmed Networks, Hassan was most recently Senior Advisor at Charles River Ventures. Hassan served as Chairman and CEO of Sonus Networks (Nasdaq:SONS) for ten years during which time it grew from an idea into the leading public company enabling the transformation of telephony to IP. Before Sonus, he was EVP and GM of the Core Switching division of Ascend Communications and VP Engineering and Chief Technology Officer of Cascade Communications. Hassan has also held key leadership positions at Motorola and Analog Devices. He was also Associate Professor of Electrical Computer and Systems Engineering and Associate Professor of Finance at Boston University. Additionally, he has guest lectured at MIT’s Sloan School of Management.

Chairman and CEO, Affirmed Networks

HINA MOHEYUDDIN

Senior Associate, Monterey Bay Chapter for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society

Hina Moheyuddin is the Senior Associate of Advancement at the Silicon Valley and Monterey Bay Chapter for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. After graduating from UC Davis, she worked at Ray Bourhis and Associates, a law firm focused on long-term insurance disability claims. Her affinity for the law led her to Stanford Law School where she gained more insight and experience in the field. During her academic and professional career, she has been an advocate in the South Valley Islamic Community, promoting interfaith and community engagement. When she is not at work, Hina actively participates in pick-up soccer and volunteers her local library. Hina will be matriculating into law school in Fall 2019 and will embrace the ethos of giving back through her legal profession.

Senior Associate, Monterey Bay Chapter for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society

HITESH SHAH

Business Development Director

Hitesh Shah has more than 25 years of experience spanning startup through venture financing and eventual M&A exits in multiple high technology companies. He has in-depth experience in people management, finance, venture capital, business development, product management, business planning and customer service. Hitesh has raised over $100M in venture capital for four different startups. Prior to joining BDO, Hitesh has served in multiple executive roles as CFO, COO and CEO. He was the Chief Operating Officer at Solum an Andreessen Horowitz, Khosla Ventures and Google Ventures funded company which was acquired by Monsanto. Hitesh also served as CEO and COO at Fat Spaniel Technologies acquired by Power-One and CFO at iPolicy Networks which was acquired by Tech Mahindra in India. Hitesh serves as the chairman of the board of Parents Helping Parents (PHP), an organization whose mission is to empower families to build bright futures for children with special needs. He also serves as a board director of Human Needs Project (HNP), an organization focused on alleviating poverty. Hitesh holds a BSc in Industrial Engineering from Western Michigan University and an MBA from UC Berkeley Haas School of Business.

Business Development Director

IDRIS KOTHARI

VP, Vasona Systems International LLC

Idris Kothari serves as the Chief Technology Officer at Vertical Systems Inc. Mr. Kothari is a both an innovative scientist and a visionary entrepreneur, he has co-founded and held senior engineering positions at several successful high-tech start-up firms - notably VPNet Technologies, VIA Technologies, and SLI Systems - that focused on such specialized areas as PC chip-sets, Virtual Private Networks (VPNs), search engine optimization (SEO), and application-specific integrated circuits (ASICs). He is a founding member and Chairman of OPEN Silicon Valley, a non-profit organization that promotes entrepreneurship and leadership among the area’s Pakistani-American residents. He served as President of Silicon Valley. He is a board member of several other civic groups, including the NED Alumni Association of Silicon Valley and Friends of the Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS) USA. From 2002 to 2005, he served on the first global board of directors of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TiE) and helped to start TiE chapters in Karachi as well as Lahore. Mr. Kothari earned two undergraduate degrees at schools in Karachi, Pakistan - one in physics at SM Science College and the other in electrical engineering at NED Engineering University. He earned a master degree in computer science at the Illinois Institute of Technology in Chicago.

VP, Vasona Systems International LLC

IMRAN JAFFER

Founder and CEO, Total Wealth Solutions.

Imran Jaffer is the founder and CEO of Total Wealth Solutions. He is the Chief Wealth Strategist that focuses on building client relationships that last for generations. Recently featured in TOP 100 people in finance for 2019. Total Wealth Solutions, commonly known as TWS, has a simple but effective business model that Imran and his team of talented financial advisors have relied on since the company’s founding in 2003. It is to provide transparent, prudent, and time-tested wealth strategies which strive to ultimately result in financial security and capital retention. Imran’s career in finance dates back to 1998, when he was a certified financial manager for Merrill Lynch. As a top-ranking specialist and highly-praised, creative, strategic planner at the firm, he quickly grew an impressive roster of loyal clients and established valuable resources that would be of great benefit in his next career progression as an independent business owner. Before long, Imran had TWS up and running and it quickly gained momentum, earning the devotion of many high-net-worth individuals and influential families. Aided by a team of capable advisors, hand-selected by Imran, the firm established itself as a worthy competitor within a saturated market through its commitment to five-star service and laser-focused attention to the unique needs of each client. The core capabilities of TWS include capital growth, wealth preservation, passive income, legacy planning, and tax minimization and their clientele are almost exclusively referrals from accountants, attorneys, medical and technology professionals, business owners, and existing clients. When asked about his secret for success, Imran humbly states, “I believe in growing with my clients at every stage of their financial cycle. I make myself available to guide and educate them because as we all know, knowledge is power.” Imran has been recognized as a leading wealth strategist and has shared his experience/knowledge on global investing at events and conferences nationwide. He holds FINRA registrations, including Series 7, 24, 63, and 65 through LPL Financial; member of FINRA/SIPC, and received his degree in finance from the prestigious University of California, Berkeley Equally attentive to the community, Imran supports organizations that benefit education, health, and the impoverished. When he is not engaged with assisting a client or involved in a philanthropic endeavor, he enjoys spending time with his family.

Founder and CEO, Total Wealth Solutions.

IRFAN ESSA

Professor and Associate Dean for Research

Irfan Essa, Associate Dean, is a Professor in the School of Interactive Computing (IC) of the College of Computing (CoC), and Adjunct Professor in the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology (GA Tech), in Atlanta, Georgia, USA. For the Academic Year 2008-2009, Irfan Essa was also affiliated with the newly formed Disney Research Lab in Pittsburgh, PA as a Visiting Scientist/Consultant (a role he continues in 2009-2010). During that time, he was also an Adjunct Faculty Member at Carnegie Mellon’s Robotics Institute. Irfan Essa works in the areas of Computer Vision, Computer Graphics, Computational Perception, Robotics and Computer Animation, with potential impact on Video Analysis and Production (e.g., Computational Photography & Video, Image-based Modeling and Rendering, etc.) Human Computer Interaction, and Artificial Intelligence research. Specifically, he is interested in the analysis, interpretation, authoring, and synthesis (of video), with the goals of building aware environments, recognizing, modeling human activities, and behaviors, and developing dynamic and generative representations of time-varying streams. He has published over a 100 scholarly articles in leading journals and conference venues on these topics. He teaches classes in the areas of Computer Vision, Computational Perception, Computer Animation, Digital Video Special Effects, and Computational Journalism. At GA Tech, he is primarily affiliated with two interdepartmental centers; the Robotics & Machine Intelligence (RIM@GT) Center and the GVU Center. He founded the Computational Perception Laboratory (CPL) at GA Tech in 1996, which he now co-directs with 4 other faculty members. He is also the founding member of the Aware Home Research Initiative (AHRI) and the Collaborative Adaptive Believable Agents Lab (CABAL). He also started an effort on Digital Video Special Effects & Animation (DVFX) and Computational Journalism (CnJ). He helped establish a new BS in Computational Media (CM) Degree at GA Tech and is affiliated with the new PhD program in Human Centered Computing (HCC) and is involved with the new Initiatives in Robotics at GA Tech (including a a new PhD in Robotics). He has been awarded the NSF CAREER Award and within GA Tech, he has won the College of Computing’s Junior and Senior Research Faculty Awards, Outstanding Teacher Award, Institute’s Educational Innovation Award, and the Dean’s Award. He is also a recipient of the GVU Center’s 15 years of Impact Award. He joined GA Tech Faculty in 1996 after his earning his MS (1990), Ph.D. (1994), and holding research faculty position at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Media Lab) [1988-1996]. His Doctoral Research was in the area of Facial Recognition, Analysis, and Synthesis.

Professor and Associate Dean for Research

ISHA ABDULLAH

Medical Directors at Concentra

In 1991 after completing her medical training at Aga Khan University , Isha moved to California where she completed her residency training in Internal Medicine at Kaiser Permanente Santa Clara followed by a fellowship in nephrology at Stanford University. Isha joined The Cardiovascular Institute, a multidisciplinary group at El Camino Hospital. In 2007, after a brief hiatus from clinical work, Isha returned to Stanford University to spearhead Clinical Trials at Stanford Nephrology/ Dermatology joint project. This paved the path for her to co-found bio technology company in 2010. Organ-i. was a molecular diagnostic company that developed a PCR based blood test, using patent protected genetic markers and a proprietary algorithm to detect acute rejection for renal transplant patients. As President and CEO of Organ-i, Isha led all aspects of the company including, raising seed capital, business development, cultivating partnerships with external CLIA labs, initiating three prospective clinical trials and partnering with Bristol Myers Squibb. She stewarded the development of an outstanding scientific advisory board including Dr. Nancy Ascher chief of surgery at UCSF and Dr Henrik Ekberg, President of International Transplant Society. Organ-i was acquired by Immucor, Inc. in 2014. Isha has recently returned to clinical practice in 2017 and is currently one of the Medical Directors at Concentra. Isha has served on several Boards at various Non-Profit Organizations including: First Graduate, a San Francisco based group with the mission to educate inner city children by tutoring, mentoring and making a financial commitment for 10 yrs to take them through high school and college, making them the first in their families to graduate from college; Unicef, The Lucille Packard Children’s Hospital Foundation, Advisory Board of the Dean of Stanford University and ING (Islamic Networks Group).

Medical Directors at Concentra

JAFAR SAFDAR

Semiconductor Marketing & Management Professional

Strong product marketing and applications experience in the semiconductor, EDA and IP industry from established process nodes to 16/14/10/7-nm FinFET process nodes. Proven background in developing and maintaining strategic collaborations with top fabless companies worldwide, in tandem with key internal and external stakeholders and ecosystem partners such as TSMC, Global Foundries, Intel Custom Foundry, Samsung, SMIC and ARM; to meet sales and technical targets. Core competencies: • Proven experience of developing strategic relationships in mobile and cloud computing, automotive, IoT, Networking facilitating on-time design tapeouts and meeting Performance Power Area (PPA) and lower cost goals. • +10 Years of product marketing management experience, positioning, segmented marketing, competitive analysis/strategies, technology initiatives, customer partnerships, roadmap, tactical and strategic prioritizations to meet top 10 SoC/ASIC/FPGA customer goals and grow overall market share. • Cognizant of EDA, IP and semiconductor new technology areas such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), autonomous automobiles (ADAS, V2X), key design enablers and emerging markets. • Detailed knowledge of SoC/ASIC/FPGA design implementation platform from synthesis, design re-use, floorplanning, placement, clock tree synthesis, routing to signoff. • Strong problem solving skills, a proven track record of working across diversified teams worldwide. • Seasoned in delivering presentations, hosting panels and webinars at semiconductor / EDA industry events such as Design Automation Conference (DAC), Synopsys Users Group (SNUG) and TSMC/ARM Tech Symposiums.

Semiconductor Marketing & Management Professional

JAHANZEB SHERWANI

Entrepreneur in life

Earlier, I worked at Slack to add voice, video and screen sharing into the product. Prior to Slack, I was the CEO and co-founder of Screenhero, a screen sharing product that let teams work together like they were in the same room, which was acquired by Slack. Before that, I founded iTeleport, a remote desktop client for iPhone, iPad and Mac. For my PhD research at Carnegie Mellon, I worked on voice applications for low-literate users in the developing world. There was a point in my life where I was running user studies with low-literate female health workers in a rural field site in Pakistan by day, and doing tech support for the iPhone app by night.

Entrepreneur in life

JAMES R MAYOCK

Founding Partner

James R. Mayock is a founding partner with E&M Mayock, immigration attorneys based in San Francisco, California while serving a global roster of clients. He has practiced law for more than forty years, and has represented famous and infamous figures including Mikhail Gorbachev and Boris Yeltsin. Mr. Mayock has also handled cases of political asylum including Pavlo Lazarenko, the former Ukrainian prime minister. Mr. Mayock studied political philosophy at the University of Toronto, then returned to the United States to attend law school at Indiana University, Bloomington’s School of Law. He subsequently clerked for a prominent senator in St. Croix in the Virgin Islands and there, met Thomas Elliott, who was to become his partner in the formation of E&M Mayock. It was in the Virgin Islands that he also developed a passion for sailing. Mr. Mayock is a California State Bar Certified Specialist in Immigration Law, a member of the Bar Association San Francisco (Chair, Imm. Comm., ’88-’89), the Asia-Pacific Lawyers Ass’n. (Chair, Imm. Comm. ’90-’95), the American Immigration Lawyers Association (Co-Chair, FOIA Sub-Comm., ’89-’90), and the Inter Pacific Bar Assocation. He was also a partner with Crosland, Strand, Freeman & Mayock from 1990 – 1994. At the age of 14, Mr. Mayock attended Phillips Andover Academy boarding school, which graduated both president Bushes and Jeb Bush. He holds a Bachelor of Arts degree from the University of Toronto, and a Juris Doctor from Indiana University.

Founding Partner

JEREMY PALAC

Regional Director Fidelity Investments

Jeremy Palac is a regional director at Fidelity Institutional Asset Management® (FIAM®), Fidelity Investments’ distribution and client service organization dedicated to meeting the needs of consultants and institutional investors, such as defined benefit and defined contribution plans, endowments. Before joining Fidelity in 2008, Mr. Palac was a representative at Northwestern Mutual. He has been in the financial industry since 2002. Mr. Palac earned his bachelor of science degree in finance from the University of Rhode Island and his master of business administration degree from Bryant University. He also holds the Certified Investment Management Analyst (CIMA) designation and the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) Series 7 and 63 licenses.

Regional Director Fidelity Investments

JUNAID RAZZAK

Sr. Director, Professional Services at PayPal

At PayPal, we put people at the center of everything we do and through technology platforms we serve hundreds of millions of customers worldwide so they can manage their money with flexibility and peace of mind. As, an independent company we are at the forefront of digital money revolution and we are creating products and services for our merchants, partners and consumers globally for their present and future online, in app and retail payment solutions. Myself, I have spent the last 2 decades with internet software companies like Netscape, Sun, Aol, Time Warner, Bebo, eBay and PayPal where I have been deeply involved in creating, scaling and sunsetting products and services. I have had an amazing experience leading and scaling innovation, generating millions in revenue, enabling billions of page views, serving millions of customers globally, developing careers and creating a culture of empowerment and accountability where talented people have unleashed their creativity, all while delivering significant business value for the customers. I am an experienced, hands-on leader who strives to deliver customer value through technical rigor, collaboration and challenging status quo. I have scaled organizations globally, have formed partnerships and have managed tight budgets with an eye towards disrupting markets and changing the game through voice of the customer.

Sr. Director, Professional Services at PayPal

LUBNA M. AHMAD, PHD

CEO and Founder, Invoy

Lubna founded Invoy to develop affordable breath analyzers for health and medical applications. The first product was released in late 2017 to address the growing need for superior weight management technologies. Since founding Invoy, she has led its product development efforts, developed a robust intellectual property portfolio, and transferred the current product design to manufacturing. In parallel, she designed clinical validation studies and recruited key thought leaders to collaborate in addressing key clinical questions. She has been responsible for raising Invoy’s angel and VC financing and recruiting experienced medical device executives to Invoy’s board and management team. Lubna holds a Ph.D. in biomedical engineering and was a Goldwater scholar and National Science Foundation fellow.

CEO and Founder, Invoy

MATEEN SYED

Founder and CEO, Bizhance

Mateen is an experienced veteran in the Silicon Valley Ecosystem with over 20 years of entrepreneurial and professional experience advising scalable businesses. As an evangelist of entrepreneurship, he advises, mentors and speaks on entrepreneurship, innovation, connectivity and networking platforms. Mateen is the founder and CEO of Bizhance, a firm focused on helping scalable businesses with growth strategy, cross border partnerships and policies. It also works with entrepreneurial organizations, universities and government agencies to connect, leverage and build entrepreneurial vibrant hubs. Mateen is also the Managing Partner of Ann Arbor Group, an international business advisory firm focused on leveraging the economic opportunities of local regions to help build partnerships with global businesses. Mateen has served in Leadership roles in Global Entrepreneurship Program hosted by the Hoover Institute, Stanford University & the US State Department; and at the IIT Alumni Global Leadership Conferences in the US. He is the Global Strategy Advisor of TECCI – Business Chambers of the Indian State of Telangana, and serves as the Chairman of the Committee on Innovation and Entrepreneurship. Mateen actively engages with TiE, an organization renowned for fostering entrepreneurship globally. For over 15 years he has been associated with TiEcon - one of the largest entrepreneurial conferences, in leadership roles, and has been the chair of its many programs, including TiE 50 Awards, Visionary Circle, Startup Bootcamp, Media, Entertainment and Ops. He is the Global Connectivity Chair of TiE Detroit, and was the founding chair of TiE 20 Startup Awards. Mateen's zeal and passion to learn from accomplished entrepreneurial journeys reflects in his contribution to entrepreneurial research work for renowned institutions like World Economic Forum, Stanford University, UC Berkeley. As part of his continuum learning, he has interviewed more than 700 prominent World Leaders, Policy Makers, Academicians, Entrepreneurs, Global CXOs and VCs. Some of the notable names being Jack Welch, Elon Musk, Steve Wozniak, Mike Moritz, John Chambers, Marissa Mayer, George Schultz, Condoleezza Rice, Muhammad Yunus, Amartya Sen, Vicente Fox, Sal Khan, Vinod Khosla, Desh Deshpande, Vinod Dham, Shahid Khan, Ashar Aziz and more.

Founder and CEO, Bizhance

MIR AAMIR

President & CEO and member of the Board of Directors, of Quotient Technology, Inc

Mir Aamir is President & Chief Executive Officer, and member of the Board of Directors, of Quotient Technology, Inc., a leading digital commerce marketing company serving retailers and brands across US and Europe. Mir’s background includes more than 20 years of marketing, strategy and digital experience, primarily in the retail and consumer packaged goods (CPG) industries. He came to Quotient from Safeway, Inc., where he was President of Customer Loyalty and Digital Technologies. Mir helped found and lead the Just for UTM platform, Safeway’s industry-leading digital and mobile platform for loyalty and targeted marketing. Prior to Safeway, Mir was at A.T. Kearney, Inc., where he was Officer and Vice President for the strategy and management consulting firm’s consumer and retail practice. Mir holds an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and a B.B.A/M.B.A. from the Institute of Business at the University of Karachi.

President & CEO and member of the Board of Directors, of Quotient Technology, Inc

MUDASSIR SHEIKHA

CEO and Co-Founder of Careem.

He grew up in Karachi, Pakistan, before graduating from the University of Southern California with a degree in economics and computer science and then completing a masters degree in computer science at Stanford. A career in tech started with Silicon Valley startup Brience, and then as a summer associate at Venture Finance group, working with seed-stage companies in the software and consumer Internet industry. Mudassir then moved back to Pakistan and was part of the founding team of DeviceAnywhere, a company that was acquired by Keynote in 2008 before joining management consulting firm McKinsey & Company in Dubai. In 2012, he left to form a new company with ex-McKinsey colleague Magnus Olsson. The idea was not just to build a big business, but start one that would have a big impact, be meaningful, and with a mission to simplify and improve lives and create an awesome organisation that inspires. That became Careem. Today Careem is the leading technology platform for the greater Middle East and is the region’s only tech unicorn, operating in more than 120 cities across 15 countries with more than 3500 colleagues and 1 million captains. When not traveling, he is hanging out with Captains and giving engineers feedback on user interface.

CEO and Co-Founder of Careem.

NAEEM ZAFAR

CEO of TeleSense

Naeem is a seasoned executive who has led several high-tech businesses as the CEO and guided dozens as a Board member or an advisor. Naeem has taught entrepreneurship and innovation at several leading universities in the world. He is an entrepreneur, a teacher, an investor, and a mentor. Having co-founded or worked at seven startup companies, he is steeped in the Silicon Valley culture and promotes the lessons of Silicon Valley to organizations and entrepreneurs all over the world. Naeem’s specialties include raising capital for startups, corporate strategy, product positioning, marketing, business development as well as M&A. Naeem has been teaching entrepreneurship as a faculty member at the University of California, Berkeley since 2005 as a part of the Haas Business School MBA program, as well as in the College of Engineering to graduate and undergraduate students. He has consistently been one of the highest ranked professors in entrepreneurship and strategy. He has written five books on topics related to entrepreneurship, some of which are now being used as curriculum textbooks at various universities. These books can be found at www.FiveMountainPress.com. Naeem has served on the Board of Directors of several companies and as the Board Chair of OPEN Silicon Valley. He is also the Founding President of Brown University Club of Silicon Valley.

CEO of TeleSense

NAVEED ANWAR

Managing VP - Global Platform, Strategic Partnerships/Integrations, Capital One

I am visionary, transformative leader with 18+ years of experience who is highly driven and goal-oriented executive and breathes to create new product experiences. I love everything about delivering apps and services with agile development. I have experience in Product, Technology, Payments, Commerce, Operations and Professional Services. Understanding customer needs and then delivering on those requirements in a timely manner is what drives me. Be that opening platforms and exposing API's/SDK's or building out unique user experiences for consumers, merchants and developers. I am Innovative leader and strategist with demonstrated success building strong, results-oriented teams and recalibrating processes for maximum impact and effectiveness. Throughout my career I have been drawn to creating processes, platforms or products from scratch both for external customers and internal stakeholders. I am the guy in the room that will raise the hand when no one else wants to tackle a complex problem. My style? I have big ideas and I can execute on them. I work well under aggressive timelines and I don’t care about credit , I am; - Energetic and charismatic leader who cares deeply about people. - Strategic thinker with the ability to design, build, and scale large global organizations. - Consistently delivers tangible business results and operational effectiveness. - Excellent leadership, communication and presentation skills And I love helping my team grow. I encourage and support the following behaviors within my teams: - Focus Externally... and put the Customer First - Innovate and Drive Change - Win as a team...working with and through others - Seek the Truth and be Open, Honest and Direct communicators I love exploring new technology, talking about engineering and agile practices, and brainstorming creative new products. Please feel free to connect with me or contact me directly if you want to discuss.

Managing VP - Global Platform, Strategic Partnerships/Integrations, Capital One

NAVEED SHERWANI

CEO, SiFive

NICHOLAS DAVIDOV

Co-Founder at Gagarin Capital

I am now working on Cherry Home — a home security solution whose best-in-class AI provides  your family with the safest, smartest  and most-private home possible. Cherry Home wassparked by a simple idea:  we wanted to feel completely safe at home.  That meant protectingfrom the outside world, creating a safer home inside, and not being  spied on anywhere.

Co-Founder at Gagarin Capital

NIDA NIZAM

Chief Creativity Officer, Meseekna

Nida is a creative problem solving specialist currently responsible for product development and marketing at Meseekna, where she is spearheading the launch of an interactive leadership and decision-making skills development platform. She also serves as the co-founder of Greenlight, a Los Angeles artist consulting firm championing automation as a tool for artist success, and Impakt, a non-profit online shopping companion promoting ethical decision making. Prior to joining Meseekna, Nida served as a digital consultant for various Democratic candidates and was stationed in Pennsylvania for the 2012 Barack Obama presidential campaign. Nida received her Bachelor’s in International Development & Communications Studies at McGill University, where she graduated class valedictorian.

Chief Creativity Officer, Meseekna

OMAR A. SIDDIQUI

Attorney/ Founding Partner @ Siddiqui Law + FBI National Director (CAAA) +CIA Partner + 2018 U.S. Congressional Candidate (CA48)

A trial lawyer and an engineer, high-profile Attorney OMAR A. SIDDIQUI is a founding partner of the law firm SIDDIQUI LAW, a Prof. Corp. (fka Ulwelling Siddiqui LLP). Mr. Siddiqui and his high-profile cases consistently appear in prominent media circuits including television, radio and newspapers. A powerful courtroom advocate, Mr. Siddiqui is admitted to practice before the U.S. Supreme Court, and has been selected as "Super Lawyer" numerous times, including 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018 & 2019. Primary focuses of Mr. Siddiqui's practice include trial advocacy & litigation in state and federal courts throughout the country. Mr. Siddiqui's diverse practice includes civil & business litigation, corporate law, criminal defense, entertainment, sports & media law, intellectual property (copyrights (c), trademarks (r), patents), labor & employment, cyber law (computer, internet & e-commerce), science & technology law, environmental law, tort & personal injury, construction law (architect & engineer), as well as professional liability. On the front lines of national defense, Mr. Siddiqui also serves as an advisor and consultant to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) on issues of national security and counter-terrorism and is an advisor and partner with the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). Mr. Siddiqui is presently FBI National Director of Special Projects (CAAA) and was formerly Chairman of the Board of the FBI Los Angeles CAAA. An active member of the FBI InfraGard Alliance, he serves as an advisor to several law enforcement agencies throughout the nation. For his efforts as a first line of defense in national security matters, Mr. Siddiqui has been bestowed with numerous honors and awards. He is a recipient of several Certificates of Congressional Recognition from the U.S. House of Representatives, the California State Assembly, the CIA, and the Department of Justice and the FBI, including the prestigious FBI Director's Leadership Award presented by FBI Director James Comey at FBI Headquarters in Washington DC on April 2016. Mr. Siddiqui has met President Barack Obama on numerous occasions, including at the White House, and was amiably referred to by the President as "The Lawyer". Mr. Siddiqui obtained a Juris Doctor (J.D.) from Loyola Law School, Loyola Marymount University, where he currently serves on the Loyola Law School Board of Directors. Mr. Siddiqui's legal experience includes serving as a senior litigation associate at a prominent law firm. He also served as a judicial clerk for the United States District Court and the Superior Court of California (Orange County) where he garnered extensive knowledge of both the federal and state court systems. Mr. Siddiqui is a civil, computer, and environmental engineer and holds Master of Science (M.S.) and Bachelor of Science (B.S.) degrees in Engineering from the University of Southern California (USC). As Co-founder and former President of a computer manufacturing and consulting firm, Mr. Siddiqui gained extensive computer engineering experience in hardware, software, and technology development. He has also gained extensive engineering experience as a Civil & Environmental Engineer at a well-known engineering firm where he worked on numerous design projects. In 2017 & 2018, Mr. Siddiqui was a U.S. Congressional Candidate running for the House of Representatives for California's 48th District. (www.OmarInTheHouse.com). In the top two-jungle primary, Mr. Siddiqui ranked #5 out of 16 candidates in his first-ever election. From simple transactions to complex high-stakes litigation to working with the FBI and the CIA, he is known for his innovative solutions, investigations, and case strategies. Trial Lawyer + Engineer + Scientist = Problem Solver. "You [Omar Siddiqui] have done extraordinary good across communities in this country and have made a lasting difference. Thank you for that good, thank you for what you represent, and thank you for inspiring not just the FBI but this entire country." - FBI Director James Comey (April 2016)

Attorney/ Founding Partner @ Siddiqui Law + FBI National Director (CAAA) +CIA Partner + 2018 U.S. Congressional Candidate (CA48)

OMAR TAWAKOL

Founder and CEO at Voicea

Omar Tawakol is the Chief Executive Officer of Voicera the company that offers Eva, the world’s leading in-meeting AI assistant to take notes and organize follow up. Voicera started in 2017 and is backed by a variety of corporate investors including Google, Microsoft, Cisco and Salesforce. Prior to Voicera, Omar Tawakol was the founder and CEO of BlueKai which was the leading Data Exchange and Data Management Platform company in the advertising industry. Oracle acquired BlueKai in 2014 for $420M. At Oracle, Omar was the SVP & GM of the Oracle Data Cloud (ODC). Through organic growth and acquisition, the ODC became the largest Data-as-a-Service business in the marketing industry serving 98 of the top 100 US digital marketers. Omar earned an MS in CS from Stanford University and a BS from MIT. He has been a keynote speaker at several media events including the IAB the Cannes Lions Festival, Innovation Summit as well as a guest lecturer at the Stanford MBA program.

Founder and CEO at Voicea

PHIL JABER

Man Behind Philz Coffee

Philz Coffee founder Phil Jaber (pronounced “jah-ber”) is conquering the world one Philz location at a time with love, faith, and truth as his anthem. There are 14 Northern California locations with plans to launch several more this year including in Southern California starting with Santa Monica. The Philz client roster includes Facebook, Google, and Twitter to name a few. Those not familiar with Philz may assume it is another mass produced coffee chain. “The beauty about our shop is each one has its own culture, its own community. I’m not a cookie cutter. I will never be a cookie cutter,” said Jaber emphatically. Born in Palestine before 1967 and a native of Northern California’s East Bay, Jaber became passionate about coffee as a child when he stole sips of the dark potion at family gatherings. “Coffee made me active and alert. They didn’t have liquor. They had a cup of coffee or tea. You were lucky to have a cookie with it. They used to tell me, ‘Don’t drink coffee. You’re too young,’” chuckled Jaber. Jaber became an entrepreneur as an eight-year-old when he would sell coffee to passersby from his family’s front yard and candy at a bus stop for a family friend who owned a local supermarket. “I like to make my own living. I know how to make money. I don’t ask anyone for help,” said Jaber.

Man Behind Philz Coffee

POUYA TAAGHOL PHD

CEO, BigDataFederation

Pouya Taaghol is the founder of Big Data Federation, a technology company that predicts business fundamentals, economies, industry inflections and secular shifts using big data and AI. Pouya was the CTO of Cisco’s Video and Collaboration Group and Intel’s of Mobile Wireless Group where led a team of 150+ of wireless and networking experts located in 3 continents. He was involved in over $2B of M&A, investment due diligence, IP acquisition, and business sell-offs. He led global technology partnership, investment and acquisition strategies, converged architectures, and technology roadmap. Pouya has created and led large industry initiatives in wireless such as WiGig, WiDi, WiMAX, and All-IP LTE core networks. Pouya was a founding member of a Silicon Valley startup (Azaire Networks), a WiFi offloading technology company (acquired by Ruckus Wireless). Pouya has also held senior positions at Motorola and NEC on 3G network development and deployments. Pouya holds over 25 issued and pending patents in wireless/networking/security/big data, and 150+ publications and contributions to standards bodies. Pouya holds a BSc from Sharif University of Technologies (Iran) and a PhD from University of Surrey (UK).

CEO, BigDataFederation

RAHEEL BODLA

Success Coach

Raheel Bodla completed his Masters in Management from MIT, a program that selects top 40 professionals from all around the world. As Tesla Global Supply Manager, he led supply chain management of Model X assembly line. As a Tesla supplier, he grew sales of a local manufacturing firm 4x times. With an overall 20 years of work experience, he served initially in Pakistan Air Force as a Squadron Leader, Aerospace Engineer. As a success coach, he mentored 54 professionals achieve success in getting their jobs, internships and admissions in last one and a half year. Raheel is part of executive team at OPEN Silicon Valley and Founding VP of Mentorship at Nustian USA. Raheel is a lifelong learner. He loves to connect and help others in their career development and overall success. Based on his learnings from MIT, Harvard and world’s top success coaches, Raheel is passionate and effective in delivering successful results.

Success Coach

REHAN JALIL

President & CEO, Elastica

RESHMA HYDER

Co-Founder MiFam Inc

Reshma is a startup mentor and investor in various global initiatives including lifestyle apps and real estate investments. She is a Co-Founder of MiFam Inc., a technology online publishing serving families of digital natives since 2014. At OPEN SV, her role is of a Charter member, Women Initiative Co Chair and Advisor to the OPEN SV Youth Board. She has been a mentor for youth for career and academic guidance since 2011. With her vast network, she helps design the Youth Sessions at the Annual OPEN FORUM. Reshma also leads the communication outreach for CERT-City Emergency Rescue Team for Saratoga and is certified in CPR and AED. She is a STEM instructor for Science Olympiad at her local public school where she is on the working committee for CSE. She has an extensive academic background in Finance with a career in financial services industry as a licensed professional with New York Life. Reshma served on PTA Executive Board and chaired Synopsis sponsored science fairs for 15 years at her local public school. She has founded HIKMA in 2010, the first peer to peer academic and career mentoring for youth, a co-founder of NISA helpline for families in distress due to domestic violence, an elected board member of WVMA Saratoga mosque and has been a speaker at ING from 2000-2015. She is a American-Muslim having roots in Middle east and Asia. She prides in calling herself a Global Citizen and master networker connecting people of interest worldwide. Reshma is married to her husband Jamal Haider and they are parents of six children and just welcomed two daughter in laws. In her spare time, Reshma grows organic date trees from seeds, plays traditional folk percussion and harmonium and enjoys cooking gourmet halal food. @ammaof6 on twitter or on LinkedIn www.linkedin.com/in/reshmahyder/

Co-Founder MiFam Inc

RIAZ KARAMALI

Corporate Partner at PillsburyWinthrop Shaw Pittman LLP -- Counselor and Cross-Border Dealmaker

Riaz Karamali is a counselor and deal-maker who assists clients with negotiating and closing domestic and international venture finance, private equity, M&A and technology transactions. Riaz has worked with hundreds of startup and emerging companies, guiding them from their pre-founding stages through their seed and venture capital financing rounds, significant commercial contracts and strategic alliances to their ultimate exit transactions. He has acted as outside general counsel to many such privately held companies in a wide range of industries, including the blockchain/cryptocurrency, video game, SaaS, FinTech, food tech, biotechnology, semiconductor, energy and medical device sectors. Riaz also regularly represents investors in such companies.

Corporate Partner at PillsburyWinthrop Shaw Pittman LLP -- Counselor and Cross-Border Dealmaker

SAFWAN SHAH

Founder and CEO of PayActiv

An engineer by training, payments expert by experience and entrepreneur by accident, Safwan is the Founder and CEO of PayActiv. After selling a previous company and entering retirement, Safwan’s commitment to leveling the playing field for the financially vulnerable drove him to launch PayActiv. His work connects the dots between math, economics, history and music. Safwan's forthcoming book, It’s About TIME: How Businesses Can Save the World (One Worker at a Time), turns conventional wisdom on its head and calls for businesses to embrace the mantle of saving the world.

Founder and CEO of PayActiv

SAMEEHAH HUSSAIN

Santa Clara University’s Leavey School of Business

Sameehah is a sophomore at Santa Clara University’s Leavey School of Business, studying business administration and computer science. Aside from her role as Co-Chair of Youth Programs at OPEN Silicon Valley, Sameehah is a currently research assistant at SCU, a third degree black belt in Taekwondo, and former Editor-in-Chief of her high school newspaper. Sameehah is passionate about empowering youth and minorities to write their own narratives and challenge the status quo. In her free time she enjoys journaling, learning new languages, and spending time with her family and friends.

Santa Clara University’s Leavey School of Business

SANIA BAQAI

Accenture

Sania graduated from Santa Clara University in 2016, with a degree in Economics. Since then, she's been working at Accenture, in consulting, where she is currently a management consultant. She is also on the executive board of two nonprofits focusing on economic empowerment and enjoys hiking, camping, and anything outdoors.

Accenture

SHAHLA ALY

Managing Director, Google LLC

Senior business executive with 25+ years of outstanding results managing all aspects of technology; leads teams to solve complex problems and drive business results while staying on the leading edge of the technology landscape. A break-through thinker known for extracting core issues underneath complexity and ambiguity. Highly accomplished, charismatic and entertaining public speaker who can influence large audiences through her ability to translate technical complexity. Passionate advocate of women in the workplace, recognized for contributions multiple times. An inspirational leader, mentor and visionary communicator who values inclusiveness and diversity and has a natural talent for aligning a large workforce around a common goal and creating an environment that empowers team members to achieve their maximum potential. Acknowledged thought leader and strategic thinker who is recognized for bold ideas, realistic planning and business acumen and is adept at developing strong relationships and earning high respect across the enterprise.

Managing Director, Google LLC

SOHAIL SYED

VP Engineering/Operations; Corigine Inc

https://www.corigine.com/ Sohail is VP Engineering at Corigine Inc. He is in working on the next generation of TCAM ASICs and has established a entire Design/Verification/Validation team in Nanjing China. Before this he was senior direcdtor at Marvell Semiconductor. Sohail was Founder and CEO of Questarium, which was bought by Marvell in 2012.

VP Engineering/Operations; Corigine Inc

TAHIR MAHMOOD

CEO & Co-founder, Applied Molecular Transport and MiNDERA

Life Sciences Company Creation Tahir is co-founder and CEO at Applied Molecular Transport, a South San Francisco-based venture-backed biotech that has taken novel scientific concepts in mucosal immunology from hypothesis to clinical trials in immunological and inflammatory disease, as well as building pipeline of drugs with applications across autoimmune, liver and metabolic diseases. With a career that has straddled science and business, he previously led the US West Coast Life Sciences consulting practice at Booz Allen Hamilton and was Managing Director at Lake Sherwood Partners. As a consultant, he advised executives across the spectrum of life sciences, healthcare provider, private and public equity investment, and global health organizations. Tahir is also co-founder and board director of MiNDERA, a non-invasive skin genomics and large-scale analytics company building clinical and consumer-focused products based on a technology platform he co-invented and developed as investigator at The Scripps Research Institute (La Jolla, CA). He previously served as Principal Business Analyst at Amgen, supporting business development, M&A and strategic venture fund transactions. Earlier, he was at Chienna (acquired by OctoPlus) and IsoTis S.A. (acquired by Integra Life Sciences). Tahir has authored numerous peer-reviewed publications and is inventor on multiple issued and pending patents.

CEO & Co-founder, Applied Molecular Transport and MiNDERA

TASNEEM MANJARA

Head of Network Development, Volvo Tech Fund

For the past fifteen years, Tasneem has played an integral role in developing and executing marketing and communications for startups and Fortune 500 companies, alike. She currently holds the role of Head of Network Development for the Volvo Tech Fund, where she leads marketing and strategy initiatives geared at increasing the visibility of the fund and accelerating startup discovery. Prior, she was the Head of Marketing and PR at Poynt, where she executed partner marketing with leading financial institutions worldwide and developed and launched many product firsts including a formal Beta Testing Program and Real-Time On-Terminal NPS Alternative (Poynt Mood Profile). In her “spare” time, Tasneem advises startup founders on sales, marketing, and strategy as a mentor at Alchemist Accelerator. Tasneem benefitted from clean air, free health care, and poutine in Canada when she completed her Bachelor of Science at the University of Toronto. She also holds an MBA from Pepperdine University. Tasneem, her husband, and two children currently reside in Apple Country AKA Cupertino -- but LA will always have her heart. Recent Speaking Experiences Mar 2019: Moderator, “How I Got Here”, International Women’s Day Panel at Volvo Cars Silicon Valley Tech Center Feb 2019: Guest lecturer, The Spirit of Entrepreneurship, Automotive Class, Management Science & Engineering School, Stanford Feb 2019: Mobile Venture Summit | Venture Fireside Chat January 2019: Moderator: Volvo Cars Tech Fund VC Panel | Investing in an Age of Change Sep 2018: Mobile World Congress | Women Innovating Technology | Blog Post

Head of Network Development, Volvo Tech Fund

TIM BRUGH

Partner, Pillsbury Silicon Valley

Tim Brugh counsels individuals and families with substantial wealth regarding taxes, estate planning and philanthropy. Tim has particular experience advising founders, investors and executives of successful private and public companies on issues including planning for interests in venture and private equity, anticipated IPO and M&A transactions, and restricted and control securities. He also represents individuals and corporate fiduciaries in trust and estate administration and litigation matters.

Partner, Pillsbury Silicon Valley

TING O'CONNOR

Managing Director, Merrill lynch

Ting O'Connor, is a Managing Director at Merrill lynch wealth management services. Ting joined Merrill Lynch in 2000 focuses on delivering a comprehensive approach to managing wealth supported by the global resources of Merrill lynch. The community that she serves includes individuals, families, corporations, endowments and foundations. Ting’s experience and commitment to her work was recognized by Forbes in 2019, when she was named one of “America’s Top State-by-State Advisors.” Ting received her bachelor's degree in Bio Chemical Engineering from National Huaqiao University in 1992 and her MBA with focuses on Financial Management and International Business from University of San Diego in 1998

Managing Director, Merrill lynch

UMAIR KHAN

CEO, Secretbuilders

Umair Khan is founder and managing partner of Mentors Fund, a seed stage venture fund investing in tech startups transforming traditional verticals. He is the founder and chairman of Folio3, a mobile software technology firm delivering Innovation as a Service (IaaS) to large companies and small. He is also the founder of SecretBuilders, an education technology company that creates engaging and enriching apps for children. He previously served as a venture partner at The Entrepreneur's Fund, a venture firm whose investments included CommerceOne, Sybase, and Avantgo. Umair co-founded Clickmarks, a mobile enterprise software company which he grew with $27 million in venture funding to profitability and eventual acquisition by Semotus. He has over 20 industry patents, including four from his work at Intel (where he started his career). He is a co-founder of OPEN Silicon Valley. Umair received an SB in Mathematics (1992) and an SM in Computer Engineering (1995) from MIT. He is a 2008 Henry Crown Fellow of the Aspen Institute and a member of the Aspen Global Leadership Network.

CEO, Secretbuilders

VIVEK MEHRA

Partner Emeritus at August Capital

Vivek Mehra is a Partner Emeritus at August Capital, a venture capital firm that invests in innovative technology companies. Previously Vivek was General Partner till 2018. Vivek's areas of interest include data center technologies, infrastructure software, SaaS, networking, security, and storage. Prior to joining August Capital, Vivek co-founded Cobalt Networks in 1996. As CTO & VP of Product Development, Vivek developed the first successful server appliance products culminating in a successful IPO and acquisition by Sun Microsystems for $2B.

Partner Emeritus at August Capital

WAQAS KHAN

Founder, Goalslop

Waqas Khan is AGM at TowerJazz. Waqas has lived and worked in the Silicon Valley for the last 31 years with companies like IBM, Via technologies, Opti, and Tower Semiconductor in various Technology and Executive capacities. In addition, Waqas has been an inveterate Entrepreneur and has been the CEO and Founder of many Startups - Infonox, eTrango, and Cricinfo amongst them. Waqas has a Bachelor’s degree from UET, Lahore in Electrical Engineering and a Master’s degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering from The University of Texas (Austin). Waqas Lives in Fremont, California with his wife and three children.

Founder, Goalslop

ZARINA KHAN

Manager, Sales Enablement + Interim Marketing Lead - Intelligent Vision Systems Group at Jabra (GN Audio)

Zarina is currently the Sales Enablement Manager and Interim Marketing Lead at Altia Systems (recently acquired by GN Audio/Jabra in March 2019). Through creativity and grit, she built out Altia Systems’ inaugural two-tier distribution system, North American channel sales ecosystem and partner portal, contributing to 390% revenue growth from 2016 – 2018. This contribution helped put Zarina began her tech career at LinkedIn as an Engineering Recruiter where she was nominated to join the “Project 100-in-100” task force: a cross-functional engineering and recruiting group tasked with “hiring 100 engineers in 100 days”. In this role, she crafted an unprecedented, streamlined global Employee Referral program for Engineering Recruiting at LinkedIn, contributing to a 180%+ increase in number of referrals. The system built via this project remains in place at LinkedIn to this day. Her experience “closing candidates” fueled her desire to pivot into sales where she was promoted ahead of schedule in the LinkedIn Global Sales Organization (GSO). During her time in the GSO, Zarina was part of LinkedIn's Global Strategic Accounts Development pilot program (a team of 6 out of 200 reps globally). Later, as a Sales Development Team Lead, she led the top-performing, highest quota carrying and overall largest Sales Development team. Eager to jump into full-cycle sales, she worked in sales for two startups that encountered major challenges. She took those learnings with her to Altia Systems, where her sales and marketing knowledge proved instrumental to the firm’s successful exit. In her cross-functional role at Altia Systems, Zarina leads Sales Enablement, and has been credited both internally and externally for “putting Altia Systems’ brand on the map”. Her efforts spearheading the company’s domestic channel sales ecosystem and 2018 corporate rebrand helped generate $6.5M in annual revenue in two years from scratch, such that several multi-billion dollar public companies competed to acquire Altia Systems at a massive multiple in 2018. Zarina received an B.A. in Political Economy and a B.A. in Political Science from the University of California, Berkeley. She is the founder and ex-Team Captain of Berkeley’s first Women’s Squash team in the university’s 140+ year legacy; the team is now a decade old and competes on the regional and national level. She also was nominated as an Associated Students of the University of California (ASUC) Senate candidate – an achievement reserved for < .09% of UC Berkeley undergraduates based on demonstrated leadership and personal brand on campus. Eager to benefit from all that UC Berkeley had to offer, she tutored English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) students in English Composition at the Student Learning Center and served as an Undergraduate Researcher at The Walter A. Haas School of Business. Zarina was also involved in Greek Life on campus and is a proud Chi Omega alumna. She now resides in San Francisco.

Manager, Sales Enablement + Interim Marketing Lead - Intelligent Vision Systems Group at Jabra (GN Audio)

ZIA HASNAIN

CEO and founder Innowi

An entrepreneur with 2 decades of experience in designing, managing and delivering complex, iconic Mobile products. Determined to bring MOBILE solutions in Payments Industry, creating the next level of customer experience in Retail, Hospitality, Airlines and others. Successfully launched Nvidia Tegra Products and Mobile Platforms; Motorola Droid Smartphones, CDMA power amplifiers, GSM base stations; and Shure UHF wireless microphone systems to customers worldwide. Led multicultural and geographically-dispersed teams to deliver novel solutions quickly and with high quality.

CEO and founder Innowi

ZIA SYED

CTO and Head of Product Engineering for Advanced Industries, Ericsson

Zia Syed is the Chief Technology Officer and Head of Product Engineering for Advanced Industries at Ericsson. Based out of Silicon Valley California, Zia leads a global team that is creating wireless connectivity solutions for industries. Entrepreneur at heart, Zia is a full stack technologist with an extensive background in building distributed systems. Previously, Zia has led innovation initiatives at AT&T Foundry and Panasonic Silicon Valley. Zia spent his early career building mobile and embedded products at startups and large technology enterprises. Zia holds a Master’s degree in Software Engineering from University of York and Bachelor's degree in Computer Engineering from NED University.

CTO and Head of Product Engineering for Advanced Industries, Ericsson

ZULKI KHAN

President, NexLogic

Zulki Khan is the President and Founder of NexLogic Technologies www.nexlogic.com with customer names like Apple, Google, IBM, NASA, General Motors, Intel, Samsung, and Microsoft. NexLogic Technologies is based in San Jose, CA, and is an ISO 9001:2008 Certified Company, ISO 13485 certified for medical electronics, and a RoHS compliant EMS provider since 1995.Prior to NexLogic, Zulki was General Manager for Imagineering, Inc., Schaumburg, IL where he was responsible for the P&L for a division of over 25 people. Zulki holds Electrical Engineering from N.E.D University, Karachi and M.B.A from University of Iowa in Iowa City. Zulki is a published author of over 35 white papers and articles in the electronic magazines worldwide and a frequent speaker and panelist in dozens of conferences and seminars as a subject matter expert in circuit designs and PCB manufacturing.

President, NexLogic

OPEN SV Annual Forum 2019

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Speakers for this event

AAMNA KHAN

AAMNA KHAN

AAREF HILALY

AAREF HILALY

ADAM J EPSTEIN

ADAM J EPSTEIN

AHMAD ABDULKADER

AHMAD ABDULKADER

ALI A. MINAI

ALI A. MINAI

AMIR WAIN

AMIR WAIN

AMRA TAREEN

AMRA TAREEN

ANWAR AKRAM

ANWAR AKRAM

ASIF ALAM

ASIF ALAM

AUDE OLIVIA DUFOUR

AUDE OLIVIA DUFOUR

AURANGZEB KHAN

AURANGZEB KHAN

BATOOL ARHAMNA HAIDER

BATOOL ARHAMNA HAIDER

BILAL ZUBERI

BILAL ZUBERI

BILL REICHERT

BILL REICHERT

DEREK CHOY

DEREK CHOY

DR. RITU LAL, PH.D

DR. RITU LAL, PH.D

DR. ZAKIA RAHMAN

DR. ZAKIA RAHMAN

ELIZABETH TSE

ELIZABETH TSE

FAHAD AZIZ

FAHAD AZIZ

FAISAL CHEEMA

FAISAL CHEEMA

FARAH ALI

FARAH ALI

FARAZ HOODBHOY

FARAZ HOODBHOY

FARIHA CHAUDRY

FARIHA CHAUDRY

FARUK BHAGANI

FARUK BHAGANI

FAUAD HASAN

FAUAD HASAN

GHUFRAN AHMED

GHUFRAN AHMED

HARIS HANIF

HARIS HANIF

HASSAN AHMED

HASSAN AHMED

HINA MOHEYUDDIN

HINA MOHEYUDDIN

HITESH SHAH

HITESH SHAH

IDRIS KOTHARI

IDRIS KOTHARI

IMRAN JAFFER

IMRAN JAFFER

IRFAN ESSA

IRFAN ESSA

ISHA ABDULLAH

ISHA ABDULLAH

JAFAR SAFDAR

JAFAR SAFDAR

JAHANZEB SHERWANI

JAHANZEB SHERWANI