Tag Archives: Competition

Sanjay Sabnani – CrowdGather – Los Angeles

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Sanjay

Prior to founding and taking CrowdGather public, Sabnani was an accomplished senior executive at several dynamic public companies in the technology and medical sectors. He has extensive deal making and transactional expertise having been involved in significant equity and debt capital raises. Sabnani is also a former financier and securities principal with extensive capital market relationships.

Sanjay Sabnani has also served as Chairman of the Board for Artwallah and TiE (The Indus Entrepreneurs) Southern California, both non-profits.

He is published in two medical text book chapters as the only non M.D. or PhD contributor, and has authored and received patents based upon his understanding of the GABAa receptor complex and its implication in anxiety, addictive, and eating disorders.

On the rare occasion that he has spare time, Sabnani is focused on writing a book about his theories on the biological underpinnings of anxiety from a systems approach.

Mike Butcher – TechCrunch – World

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Mike Butcher

Mike Butcher (FRSA) is ‘Editor At Large’ of TechCrunch, the biggest breaking news site about the world’s hottest tech companies. Mike has been named one of the Top 50 most influential Britons in technology by The Daily Telegraph. As well as being a long-time Writer, Broadcaster and Editor Mike is also co-founder of TechHub (@TechHub), a project to bring European technology entrepreneurs and investors together in a club/office environment. Mike has written for UK national newspapers and magazines including The Financial Times, The Guardian, The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The New Statesman. He is a former editor of New Media Age magazine, the leading new media weekly in the UK, and the European edition of The Industry Standard magazine.

Since 1996 he has launched or re-launched numerous media web sites and in 2000 he was nominated as NetMedia’s European Internet Journalist of the Year. In 2004 he was voted ‘One of the 100 Innovators of the UK Internet Decade’ by GfK NOP, the fourth-largest custom research business in the world. In July 2008 he was put at No. 47 out of the Top 100 people in London’s creative industry by The Independent newspaper and The Hospital Club. In August 2008 TechCrunch Europe was awarded the best “Web 2.0 and business blog” in the UK, by the readers of Computer Weekly magazine. In 2009 it was named as one of the Top 10 blogs out of the UK. Also in 2009 he was named one of the Top 10 bloggers on Twitter in the UK. In October 2009 he was named one of the Top 50 most influential Britons in technology by The Daily Telegraph. In April 2010 he was in Wired UK’s Top 100 influencer list, again in 2011, in 2012 and in 2014. In April 2010 TechCrunch Europe was shortlisted in the Specialist Digital Publisher category of the prestigious UK-based Association of Online Publishers’ Digital Publishing Awards. In November 2010 he was named as one of London’s most influential people in New Media and “king of dotcom commentators ” by The Evening Standard Newspaper. He has been listed as one of the Top 100 most influential people on Twitter in the UK. He has spoken at the prestigious Monaco Media Forum and Le Web, among many other conferences. Mike is a regular commentator on the technology business, appearing on BBC News, Sky News, CNBC, Channel 4 and Bloomberg. Mike has served on the Mayor of London’s Digital Advisory Board, the ‘Smart London’ Board and is London Technology Ambassador for London. Mike’s personal blog is mbites, while he Twitters as @mikebutcher.

Natalia Kiskova – Bluewolf – Czech Republic

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Natalia

Natalia is a Growth Manager at Bluewolf, board member of Aj Ty v IT social organisation and the daughter of the President of Slovakia. Bluewolf is a global consulting agency that builds digital solutions designed to create results. Its main focus is on design, build, and innovation for customer and employee experiences on the Salesforce platform.

Prior to her current role, where Natalia is heading up the office for Bluewolf in Prague, Czech Republic to cover CEE region, her roles have switched at Bluewolf. In the past 5 years while she moved from NYC to London to Prague office covering roles from Consultant to Project Manager. She is very passionate about expanding the knowledge of IT and it’s potential in her home region.

Being the daughter of the first independent President of the Slovak Republic that has had over 80% of popularity vote and strong entrepreneurial background, has shown her that even a small country with socialistic background has potential to be innovative, bring new ideas and create space for talent. Her aim is to motivate and support more individuals from the region to join the startup community and promote the talent and innovation.

University Roadshow

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university roadshow

In the spirit of finding the next generation of entrepreneurs, the BDL Accelerate 2015 team has partnered with some of the major universities in Lebanon to inspire youths to join the startup movement and attend the conference.

The roadshow has included the following universities École supérieure des affaires, Lebanese International University, American University of Beirut, and Lebanese American University in addition to Saint Joseph University. NRJ Radio and Nostalgie have been tagging along to spread the word further and farther.

The roadshow also aims to familiarize students with hackathons and encouraging them to participate in the BDL Accelerate hackathons. Hackathons are considered as a great way to start solving real life problems, as a training session, or as a way to prepare participants and educate them on the process of solving issues. Anyone from any background or age can participate in the hackathons hosted by BDL Accelerate 2015.

BDL Accelerate 2015 is hosting two hackathons, Web & Mobile Hackathon and Wearables Hackathon, that will be tackling challenges that the public is faced with on a daily basis in Lebanon. The participants of the Web & Mobile Hackathon will be provided with a brief that will consist of a specific theme and the contestants will have to collaboratively brainstorm and work extensively to find a web or mobile solution to a specific issue that is shared with them at the start of the hackathon. This hackathon is organized by MIT Enterprise Forum Pan Arab & WDS with cash prizes of $6,000.

As for the Wearables Hackathon, it’s powered Innovo, a DNY Group company that will be providing electronic components, a whole bunch of sensors, a wearable sleeve, 3D printing capabilities, and more to the participants grouped in teams, who will dream up and hack together wearables to enhance lifestyle or sports in 36 to 48 hours. In addition to the $6,000 cash prize, the participants will also have the opportunity to pursue their project at Innovo’s lab after the hackathon is over.

Mansour Salame – Band of Angels – Silicon Valley

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Mansour Salame

Mansour Salame
Band of Angels
Member

Mansour Salame is an accomplished Silicon Valley entrepreneur who has founded and led successful startups from inception to exit. He is also a member of the Band of Angels. His first startup, NextAge Technologies, a forecasting and scheduling software company, was acquired by Alcatel in 1999. In 2004, he founded his second startup Contactual, Saas/Cloud Contact Center Technology that was acquired by 8×8 in 2011. Later in 2014, he launched his 3rd startup, FrontSpin, aimed to double the performance of Inside Sales Teams.

Mansour is a member of Silicon Valley’s oldest seed funding organization, Band of Angels, a formal group of 150 former and current high tech executives who invest in new, cutting edge startup companies. Band of Angels has seeded over 277 companies, over 55 profitable M&A exits and 10 Nasdaq IPOs.

Prior to being a serial entrepreneur, Mansour held executive and consulting positions with Genesys Telcommunications and Accenture. He enjoys building companies that convert ideas using technology to turn into products of tremendous value to customers. He also enjoys ‘debugging’ startups and turning them into successful, profitable, growing companies.

Accomplished serial entrepreneur, Mansour Salame will be speaking at BDL Accelerate 2015. If you have not registered yet, don’t miss the chance to do so and register now!