CEO at SparkLabs Foundry

Scott brings over 30 years of executive sales, marketing and operational leadership experience in consumer Internet, mobile and enterprise SaaS global organizations. He has been a mentor and advisor to SparkLabs Global Ventures for 6 years and was most recently a venture partner at Blarney Ventures in Silicon Valley. His key areas of focus have been on helping early stage companies go from $0 to over $100M in revenue and helping to build A+ cross departmental teams at an operational level of excellence expected by management teams and boards of directors. He has helped these companies raise over $150MM in debt and equity financing from many of Silicon Valley's top tier VC's and continues to personally invest in many of the companies he is affiliated with.

Chief Business Officer at SparkLabs Foundry

Jaeson Ma is the founder of East West Artists (EWA), an international talent management and production company that focuses on developing and catalyzing premier global talent between the East and West across film, television, and new media. He is also the co-founder of 88Rising, a multi- platform digital media company dedicated to celebrating global Asian culture. 88Rising is the leading global destination for Asia related content through it's original, curated and licensed videos representing the most forward-thinking artists and creators from Asia and around the world. More recently, Jaeson co-founded Stampede Ventures with former President of Warner Brothers worldwide studios Greg Silverman to identify, develop and produce premium IP into global studio franchises. Jaeson is also an international speaker, artist, consultant, author and active investor in media, tech and entertainment. As an investor Jaeson is a Network Partner for GoodWater Capital based in Northern California. Jaeson's venture investments include PCA (Plan C Agency), Brain Inc, Slock.it, Musical.ly, Grab, Paris Hilton Lifestyle & is also a co founding partner of Maum Group, a members club connecting influencers across Asia and Silicon Valley.

As a film maker Jaeson was a co-producer on the feature films Birth of the Dragon, Guardians of the Tomb, & Man Up.

VP of Business Development(APAC) at SparkLabs Foundry

Iris Lim was Investor Relations manager at Institutional Investor in charge of Global Investment Conferences, including managing and gathering influential Korean pension funds, insurance companies, institutions and investment advisers.

Prior to this, she was an investment banker at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers where she worked on several landmark M&A and capital raising transactions.

She also spent time in corporate development at Nood Food, a healthy concept startup selling cold pressed juice and organic foods across Asia. Nood Food started as a single shop in 2014 but grew to 18 locations, after which the parent entity was sold to private equity firms (ie, FountainVest and Ontario Teachers)

Iris studied her M.B.A. graduate studies in finance & entrepreneurship at Wharton Business School, the University of Pennsylvania. She also holds a B.B.A. in Business from Seoul National University.

Executive in Residence at SparkLabs Foundry

David Song most recently served as General Manager of Nike Korea having grown its business to over $1 billion of revenue and 1,200 employees over the three years he was in charge. Previously, he was General Manager of Nike China's North Territory spanning across 12 provinces and 2 special cities (Beijing and Tianjin) which was the largest territory in geographical size and revenue in China responsible for over 4,000 stores. He also grew the North territory’s revenue to $1 billion before moving to Korea. Prior to serving as General Manager, he was Nike’s Strategic Planning Director for Greater China and responsible for shaping their strategy in a region that generated over $2.5 billion in revenue. He also served as the Chief of Staff for the GM of Greater China. David formerly served as Footwear Merchandising Director for Emerging Markets when he was based in Portland, OR.

David served in other numerous roles during his 21 year career at Nike with increasing responsibilities and growth in numerous roles spanning across sales, merchandising, logistics, strategy and general management. In between his two Nike tenures, David was at McKinsey & Company’s Seoul office as well as at Microsoft working on the launch plan for MSN Explorer in Redmond, WA. He earned his MBA from Harvard Business School and BA with Honors from The University of Western Ontario’s Richard Ivey School of Business.

Executive in Residence at SparkLabs Foundry

Jared Carney founded Lightdale, a global holding and strategic advisory firm, in 2012 as the natural evolution of a career spent building companies and relentlessly forging partnerships with business leaders, influential philanthropists and government officials across the globe.

A private family investment firm, Lightdale also works with sophisticated investors, family offices and large pools of capital, corporations and governments which are interested not only in generating returns, but also in effecting socially impactful and philanthropic change. Through Lightdale’s collective insights, unique partnerships and trusted network, the firm is able to connect these constituents with fresh, disruptive and transformational ideas, thereby accelerating both the investment process and a company’s speed to market / growth.

Lightdale also has many investments and joint ventures in dynamic growth regions of the world such as the Arctic and Europe, as well as interests in real estate, life sciences, technology, industrial minerals, food, hospitality, healthcare, education and financial innovation/services. The firm was started with five founding clients: Mike Milken, Marc Rowan, Tony Ressler, Alan Howard and Stephen Cloobeck, focusing on their family and business investments. Since inception, the firm has successfully incubated, accelerated and advised numerous ventures on behalf of a broad array of investors and companies.

Prior to Lightdale, Carney served as Chief Strategy & Marketing Officer at the Milken Institute working closely with its Chairman, Michael Milken. For almost 10 years he led the annual Global Conference, the world’s largest gathering of the capital markets. During his tenure, Carney was instrumental in exponentially increasing the Institute’s programmatic and revenue growth as it became the world’s leading preeminent financial think tank. Among other accomplishments, he established the Global Capital Markets Advisory Council, the Young Leaders Circle and its Asia Center in Singapore. He also served as a senior advisor to Knowledge Universe as it became the world’s largest privately owned for-profit education company.

Before joining the Institute, Carney was a pioneer in the Internet/high-tech and media industries where he successfully founded, launched or helped build a number of disruptive companies and technologies which he helped steer to successful exits. Examples include launching Java for Sun Microsystems, establishing Fox Networks web presence (X-Files and all owned & operated TV stations), co-starting Intranets.com, an Idealab company (sold to WebEx), and Captura (sold to Concur).

Carney is on the board of directors of Brandenburg Realty, a Berlin headquartered international property company; Secured Natural Resources, a rare earth mining company and senior advisor to a number of firms, including CITIC, the Chinese state-owned investment firm; APQ (LON:APQ), an emerging markets investor; RMR Industrials, Inc. (OTCBB: RMRI), an Infrastructure company; Houlihan Lokey (NYSE: HL) the international investment bank and McKinley Capital, a $7bn AUM quantitative asset manager. Formerly a director of Microbion Corp. and MD Insider.

Serves on the Board of Advisors of The Arctic Circle; the founder of the California Fund, co-founder of the Arctic Maritime Exchange, and a senior advisor to a group of governments as well as the Milken Institute and Prostate Cancer Foundation.

He and his family are multigenerational owners and operators of hospitality, at one point owning properties in 40 states. Personal investments focus on early to mid stage technology and consumer companies where Carney’s capital, experience and relationships can accelerate entrepreneurs’ and corporate development. Jared is a return speaker at a number of many conferences, and Lightdale’s global gatherings are sought after events.

Chief Data Engineer at Paypal

Sid Anand currently serves as PayPal's Chief Data Engineer, focusing on ways to realize the value of data. Prior to joining PayPal, he held several positions including Agari's Data Architect, a Technical Lead in Search @ LinkedIn, Netflix’s Cloud Data Architect, Etsy’s VP of Engineering, and several technical roles at eBay. Sid earned his BS and MS degrees in CS from Cornell University, where he focused on Distributed Systems. In his spare time, he is a maintainer/committer on Apache Airflow, a co-chair for QCon, and a frequent speaker at conferences. When not working, Sid spends time with his wife, Shalini, and their 2 kids.

CEO at Brava

John is a long-time Silicon Valley executive and a veteran of the consumer technology industry. He was CEO of Ticketmaster and its subsidiaries from 1999-2005, as both a public company and a leading division of IAC/InterActiveCorp. After a stint as COO of Electronic Arts, he joined Brava co-founder Dan Yue at Playdom, where John served as CEO and oversaw Playdom's 2010 acquisition by Disney. There, he served as Co-President of Disney Interactive Media Group, spearheading the development and launch of Disney Infinity and achieving the division's first-ever multi-quarter profitability. He joins Brava from Samsung, where he was EVP of Media Solutions.

SVP, Head of AI & IoT Business Development at LG Uplus

Mr. Jun-yong Hyun serves as Senior Managing Director and General Manager of AI Service Business Dept. at LG Uplus Corp. Mr. Hyun serves as an Operating Advisor, Telecoms, Media and Technology and Member of Management Advisory Panel at Point Hope Pte Ltd. Mr. Hyun has been the Vice President at LG Telecom. He holds MBA from Columbia University and also studied at Seoul National University.

Chief Investment Officer at Major League Baseball

Jonathan Mariner was appointed Chief Investment Officer of Major League Baseball by Commissioner Robert D. Manfred, Jr. on December 4, 2014. In this capacity, Mariner will manage the industry's Baseball Endowment fund, its pension assets and potential new strategic investments.

Mariner served as MLB's Chief Financial Officer from 2002 until taking on his new role. On January 1, 2004, he was promoted from Senior Vice President to Executive Vice President, Finance by Commissioner Allan H. (Bud) Selig. Mariner upgraded MLB's financial function, created a league-wide risk management program to insure all property and casualty risks across the league through a new captive insurance company; improved the budgeting and financial reporting of MLB's Central Offices; and implemented an improved club financial reporting and long range forecasting process. He also negotiated the industry's $2 billion line of credit and helped Clubs transition to new debt-service rules.

Before joining MLB, Mariner served as Executive Vice President and CFO of the Florida Marlins. He was responsible for directing all of the Club's day-to-day financial and administrative operations, including financial reporting, budgeting, payroll, and cash management, as well as human resources, information technology and risk management functions. He also served the franchise as President of the Marlins Ballpark Development Corporation, which worked on a new ballpark proposal in South Florida. Immediately before joining MLB, Mariner served as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer of Charter Schools USA, one of the nation's leading charter school development and management companies.

Mariner earned a B.S. degree in accounting from the University of Virginia, and received an MBA from Harvard Business School. Mariner has three adult sons.

Former CTO of Procter & Gamble

Mr Bruce Brown retired from Procter & Gamble in August 2014 after 34 years of service, including six years of service as Chief Technology Officer (CTO). As CTO, he was responsible for the company’s Innovation & Technology Programs, its $2-billion annual investment in R&D, and its R&D organization of approximately 9,000 global employees. During Mr Brown’s 3 to 4year tenure in industry, he helmed the largest Consumer Packaged Goods R&D budget in the world, drove organic growth and new business creation globally, and created an ecosystem for sustainable innovation. Before his tenure as CTO, he worked in Europe & Asia driving international business expansions. He was also a critical leader in resurrecting two of P&G’s largest categories before his role as CTO.

Mr Brown is globally recognized as an innovation thought leader. He has presented to the President of the United States, participated in Presidential Advisory Panels on Manufacturing and Innovation, and presented to members of the European Union parliament. Mr Brown has also been published as a feature author in Harvard Business Review and Research-Technology Management and was named a Business Week Top 35 Master of Innovation in 2010.

While at P&G, he was inducted into the Victor Mills Society, an elite society of P&G’s most critical innovators as an Innovation Catalyst. During his tenure as CTO, P&G received at least 30-40% of IRI’s annual Top 10 New Product Pacesetter Awards, and P&G was named to BCG’s, Forbes, Fortune’s, and Booz Allen’s list of most innovative companies.

Mr Brown has served on the Board of Directors for Nokia since May 2012. He and the Board drove the successful rejuvenation of Nokia as the company transformed itself back to a shareholder value creating enterprise through several strategic acquisitions & divestitures, operational discipline, and sound strategy work.

In September 2014, Mr Brown joined the Board of Directors at P.H. Glatfelter. He and the Board are working with management to pivot the company away from the structurally unattractive commodity paper businesses into a B2B engineered fiber-based products company. He is also a member of the Audit, and Nominating and Governance Committees.

Mr Brown recently joined the Board of Medpace and is working with Management to continue to drive profitable growth and create Public Company Governance Systems post the successful IPO in October 2016. He is a member of the Audit and Compensation Committees.

He has also served on the Board of Directors of Xavier University in Cincinnati since 2010, and as a Board Member of the University of Cincinnati Research Institute during its creation.

CTO & VP of Quantum Computing at IBM

Scott Crowder is currently Chief Technical Officer and Vice President, Quantum Computing, Technical Strategy and Transformation for IBM Systems. His responsibilities include leading the commercialization effort for quantum computers, driving the strategic direction across the hardware and software-defined systems portfolio, leading the agile and Design Thinking transformation, and accelerating innovation within development through special projects.

Previously, Scott was Vice President, Technical Strategy within IBM Corporate Strategy. In this role, he helped define the cross-IBM technical strategy for cloud infrastructure, workload optimized systems, Big Data and Analytics, composable services, software-defined infrastructure and cognitive solutions.

Scott joined IBM in 1995 and was the lead engineer on the industry's first logic-based embedded DRAM technology before serving in a variety of executive management roles within the semiconductor research and development organization.

Scott received A.B./Sc.B. degrees in Electrical Engineering and International Relations from Brown University and a M.A. in Economics and M.Sc./Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.

Creator of SAP Hana

Sang Kyun Cha is a professor, an innovator, and an entrepreneur. He worked on three generations of commercialized in-memory database technology since he joined Seoul National University in 1992. In 2000, he founded Transact In Memory, Inc. with his vision of developing an enterprise in-memory database system called P*TIME (Parallel* Transact-In-Memory Engine). The company was quietly acquired by SAP in late 2005.

By early 2006, Prof. Cha’s team completed P*TIME development with an innovative OLTP scalability architecture: parallel logging and recovery, MVCC, optimistic latch-free index concurrency control, and support of seamless two-tier access resilient to application crash as well as three-tier access. His team also tightly integrated P*TIME with SAP’s middleware and application stack and demonstrated its extreme scalability.

With SAP’s in-house column store TREX, P*TIME served as a corner stone of developing SAP HANA, the first distributed enterprise in-memory database system enabling real-time analytics over transactionally integrated row and column stores. Today, SAP and many other companies run ERP, CRM, business warehouse on HANA. By SAP’s request, Prof. Cha led SAP’s Korean HANA development.

In April 2014, Prof. Cha launched Seoul National University’s Big Data Institute to lead trans-disciplinary big data research involving almost all academic disciplines including computer science, engineering, natural and social science, and medicine. He has been on the board of trustees of Seoul National University since December 2014. He has been on the board of Korea Telecom since March 2012, and is providing strategic advice to central and local governments on big data and software industry issues. He is on the editorial board of VLDB Journal since 2009 and was elected as a member of IEEE ICDE Steering committee in 2015.

Prof. Cha received his BS and MS from Seoul National University and his Ph.D. from Stanford University.

Former Chief Marketing Officer, Adobes Systems, and former CEO, Ella Health

Melissa Dyrdahl is an internationally recognized marketing executive who helped build the brands of some of the world’s leading technology companies, including Adobe, Apple and Hewlett-Packard. In a career spanning more than 30 years, Melissa developed a unique blend of market insight and functional expertise that she has successfully applied in various leadership positions across a range of public and private businesses and non-profits.

In her role as Adobe’s chief marketing officer, Melissa led a global team of more than 500 people who established the company as one of the world’s most recognized technology and consumer brands. During her 12-year tenure, she also had P&L responsibility for the company’s $350 million education business.

In 2007, Melissa left Adobe to pursue new opportunities in the non-profit sector, becoming CEO and co-founder of Bring Light, a pioneering web service connecting donors and charities for more effective fundraising. She also served as board chair for Humane Society Silicon Valley.

Most recently, Melissa was recruited into the health care industry, becoming president and CEO of Ella Health, an innovative venture-backed women’s health care provider. She is currently a board member for Dignity Health Foundation, a leading philanthropy supporting the nation’s fourth largest non-profit health care system.

Melissa has received numerous awards and accolades, including: Distinguished Alumni, San Jose State University; Best Marketing Executive, American Business Awards; and the 100 Most Influential Women in Silicon Valley. She is also featured in the book, “Earning It: Hard Won Lessons from Trailblazing Women at the top of the Business World.”

Former Specialist on Digital Innovation group at Kimberly-Clark

Beti Cung focuses on emerging technology and innovation in service of business value. She is a recognized thought leader and advisor in corporate venture investing and venture market trends and analytics. Most recently Beti worked on digital transformation and innovation for Kimberly-Clark, steering investment for key use cases and piloting new tech and business models. She drove startup strategy and investment at Microsoft for Strategic and Emerging Business. In the past her work has included re-platforming of large-scale web properties for Williams-Sonoma Inc. and next-gen reporting for Qualcomm’s Subscriber Business Systems. She was part of the founding team and served as Technology Director at eStyle, a VC-backed multi-channel retail pioneer. Beti earned a bachelor with honors in Economics from Harvard University and an MBA from INSEAD in France.