Kanwal Singh Rekhi is an Indian-American businessperson. He was the first Indian-American founder and CEO to take a venture-backed company public on the Nasdaq stock exchange.
Maynard G. Webb Jr. is an American business person and is the author of the New York Times bestseller Rebooting Work: Transform How You Work in the Age of Entrepreneurship, and the national bestseller Dear Founder: Letters of Advice for Anyone who Leads, Manages, or Wants to Start a Business. A long-time technology executive and angel investor, Webb is a board member of Salesforce, Visa, and former chairman of the board of directors at Yahoo!. Webb founded Webb Investment Network in 2010 and is the former CEO of LiveOps and former COO of eBay.
The IndUS Entrepreneurs (TiE) is a non-profit organization with a mission to foster entrepreneurship through mentoring, networking, education, funding and incubation. With a focus of giving back to the community, TiE’s focus is on generating and nurturing the next generation of Entrepreneurs. By 2000, TiE-inspired startups had helped create new businesses worth more than US$50 billion in market capitalization, a number that is likely over US$100 billion by 2022.
The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation is a registered 501(c)(3) nonprofit, private foundation based in Kansas City, Missouri. It was founded in 1966 by Ewing Marion Kauffman, who had previously founded the drug company Marion Laboratories. The Kauffman Foundation works with communities to build and support programs that boost entrepreneurship, improve education, and contribute to the vibrancy of Kansas City.
Carl J. Schramm is an American economist, entrepreneur, author, former President of the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation, and University Professor at Syracuse University. He is the author of the book Burn the Business Plan: What Great Entrepreneurs Really Do, published by Simon & Schuster. The Economist named Schramm the "evangelist of entrepreneurship".
David Turner Morgenthaler was an American businessman who founded the venture capital firm Morgenthaler Ventures. He was also instrumental in helping change the U.S. capital gains tax rate from 49% to 28% in 1978 and amending ERISA legislation to allow pension funds to invest in venture capital in 1979.
Christopher M. Schroeder is an American entrepreneur, advisor, author, and investor in interactive technologies and social communications.
Trish Costello is a Silicon Valley-based entrepreneur and investor. She is the Founder and CEO of Portfolia, a collaborative equity investing platform. She was named as one of the 100 Most Intriguing Entrepreneurs of 2014 by Goldman Sachs and Top Ten Women to Watch in Tech in 2015 by Inc magazine. She is recognized internationally for her pioneering work in educating and preparing venture capital investment partners, through the Kauffman Fellows Program. As the founding CEO and CEO Emeritus of the Center for Venture Education, she led the Kauffman Fellows Program for its first ten years. Costello was on the start-up team of the Kauffman Foundation's entrepreneurship center, where for eight years she directed its efforts in venture capital, angel investing, entrepreneur support programs, and programming to accelerate high potential women entrepreneurs. She played a leading role nationally in obtaining greater financial equity investments in women's businesses and in funding initiatives supporting high-growth women entrepreneurs.
An entrepreneurial ecosystem or entrepreneurship ecosystems are peculiar systems of interdependent actors and relations directly or indirectly supporting the creation and growth of new ventures.
Tarun Khanna is an Indian-born American academic, author, and an economic strategist. He is currently the Jorge Paulo Lemann professor at Harvard Business School; where he is a member of the strategy group, and the director of Harvard University’s South Asia initiative since 2010.
Steve Guengerich is an entrepreneur, educator, and author of several books and numerous articles on information technology.
Joel Trammell is an American businessman and entrepreneur. Trammell works in CEO education and software.
Bill Aulet is the Managing Director of the Martin Trust Center for MIT Entrepreneurship at MIT and Professor of the Practice at the MIT Sloan School of Management and MIT Sloan Executive Education. He is also the author of Disciplined Entrepreneurship: 24 Steps to a Successful Startup.
Derek Lidow is a professor of practice at Princeton University, author, speaker, entrepreneur, former CEO and founder of iSuppli, and former CEO of International Rectifier. Lidow is author of three books: Startup Leadership: How Savvy Entrepreneurs Turn Their Ideas Into Successful Enterprises, What Sam Walton, Walt Disney, and Other Great Self-Made Entrepreneurs Can Teach Us About Building Valuable Companies, and THE ENTREPRENEURS: The Relentless Quest for Value. He is also a media commentator; Lidow's coverage to date includes The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, BusinessWeek, Forbes, Bloomberg, The Economist, Nikkei, Reuters, and Taipei Times as well as many top bloggers.
Jeff Aronin is an American investor, entrepreneur, and biotechnology executive. He is founder, chairman and CEO of Paragon Biosciences, LLC, a global life science company that creates, builds, and funds innovative biology-based companies.
Peter (Balazs) Záboji was an angel investor and entrepreneur. Much of the Budapest's success as a startup hub has been credited to Peter B. Záboji and his European Entrepreneurship Foundation (EEF). He has contributed significantly to the development of start up businesses in Budapest and received the highest civil recognition from the president of Hungary.
Kunal Bahl is an Indian technology entrepreneur and investor.
Sally R. Osberg an American business executive who formerly served as president and CEO of the Skoll Foundation, where she partnered with founder and chairman, Jeffrey Skoll. She was the founding executive director of the Children's Discovery Museum of San Jose.
Christine Comaford is an esteemed American businesswoman, serial entrepreneur, and New York Times bestselling author, renowned for her transformative leadership and culture coaching. With a career spanning over 35 years, she has been instrumental in guiding leaders through growth, change, and navigating the complexities of the business landscape.
Anthony J. “Tony” Luppino is an American attorney, legal scholar, and author. A law professor at the University of Missouri - Kansas City School of Law since 1991, he is the Rubey M. Hulen Professor of Law and Urban Affairs, Director of Entrepreneurship Programs, and Senior Fellow with the UMKC Regnier Institute for Entrepreneurship & Innovation. He is particularly active in the areas of entrepreneurship and business law, and cross-disciplinary studies and programs connecting them.
