Speakers

Partner at Atomico, Mattias has been a venture investor for over a decade, focused primarily on the technology, telecoms and internet media space. Mattias joined Atomico at its inception and sits on the board of ChemistDirect, Seesmic and Playfire. Additionally, Mattias is a board observer of DECA. Mattias’ leads on investment review, negotiation, deal flow and advising portfolio companies on strategy and operations. Prior to Atomico, Mattias was the head of venture investments at CLS Holdings, PLC, a listed FTSE 250 company where he actively worked with several early stage companies in the technology sector. He also worked for the global strategy consultancy firm LEK Consulting and for fund management company Valu-Trac that had $1bn under management.

Mark Veverka is West Coast Editor and a columnist at Barron's, where he writes the weekly "Plugged In" column on technology. He joined the Dow Jones financial magazine in June 1999. He occasionally appears on CNBC and is based in San Francisco.

Before joining Barron's, Mark was a financial markets columnist for The San Francisco Chronicle. Prior to joining the Chronicle, he was a staff writer for The Wall Street Journal.

Earlier in his career, Veverka served as an associate editor at Crain's Chicago Business and was a business reporter for the Orange Country Register in Southern California. He also was a regular contributor to WBEZ-FM and WMAQ-TV while in Chicago.

Mark holds a bachelors degree in journalism from the University of Oklahoma and a masters degree from Northwestern University's Medill School of Journalism. In 1992, he was an Arthur F. Burns Fellow, reporting from Europe on German unification and international economics. He just completed the Fulbright Commission alumni program on Turkey's bid to join the European Union.

Falk is the founder and Managing Partner of Cartagena Capital. He is an experienced M&A and fundraising professional with over 15 years experience in the technology industry. He is the former leader of Durlacher’s mobile industry research and investment practice (Bonn/London) and Managing Director of its German office. At Durlacher, which is today merged into Panmure Gordon, a division of Lazard, Falk was involved in making several wireless related investments and M&A transactions.

He is one of the industry’s foremost experts on mobile internet and is very well connected throughout the European wireless and venture capital industries at executive level. Falk has earlier been a board member of a leading mobile internet company, Wapit Ltd. of Finland, and a co-founder and board member of UK-based Wanova, a mobile games technology provider. He has also been an advisory board member of Frontiers Capital, the wireless-focussed VC backed by Carphone Warehouse. He is a frequent speaker and chairman of conferences globally regarding the mobile industry.

Falk has earlier held various positions in management, consulting, marketing, business development and research for companies including Nokia, GartnerGroup and Logica Consulting. Over the years, he has advised, amongst others, Vodafone, Deutsche Telekom, KPN, Belgacom, BT, Orange, Telefonica, TeliaSonera, MobilCom, Nokia, Ericsson and a large number of smaller players. He has also been an Area Sales Manager for mobile M2M-solutions in Europe, including Germany, Belgium, the Netherlands and UK.

Falk has received a bachelor’s degree in technology management (mechanical engineering) from the Technical University of Kaiserslautern, Germany, and an MBA from CSUSB in the US. He has also studied International Business Management at the Helsinki School of Economics and Business Administration. He is fluent in German, English and Spanish.

Founder and president of the European Entrepreneurship Foundation, Peter Záboji is also member of the Executive Board Munich Network; president of Winning Angels Think Tank, and sits on the Board of a number of young European companies.

For many years, Peter was was professor of Entrepreneurship and Entrepreneur-in-Residence at INSEAD. Today he teaches Entrepreneurship at the CEU Business School. In early 2004, Peter was lead investor in acquiring European Mobile Telephone Services Germany, a company whose parent was listed on the Zurich Stock Exchange. He is also Chairman of the Board. In 2000, he was brought in by Kohlberg, Kravis and Roberts (KKR) as CEO of Bosch's communication business, renamed Tenovis; later sold to Avaya. In 1999, he founded the European Telco Exchange (IPO in 2005). In the early 90s, he was managing director of GPT Communications in the UK, and later became managing director of o.tel.o, a German telecommunications operator. Peter has had a long and distinguished career with Siemens in the US and Germany.

“<p> Do you know the biggest room in the world? ... It is the room for Improvement!</p>” - Peter Zaboji

Anil Hansjee joined Google in September 2006 as Head of Corporate Development for Europe, Middle East and Africa. He is responsible for Google's acquisitions and investments in the region as well as relationships with the early stage technology community and their backers and advisers.

Eran has been Managing Partner of Hasso Plattner Ventures since its foundation in 2005 and is mainly involved with B2C deals.

From 2002 to 2005 he served as CEO for ProSeed Capital Fund in Tel Aviv. Under his auspices the Technion Technology Incubator was taken over and privatized and went on to become the most successful technology incubator in Israel. Before that Eran served as the Managing Partner at Eurofund 2000 LP in Israel. From 1996 to 2000 he was Vice President at Inventech Industrial Ventures in Tel Aviv. ProSeed, Eurofund and Inventech are venture capital suppliers that invested in early-stage high-tech companies and most of the investments have since developed into fully mature enterprises and some are being traded on the NASDAQ and other international stock exchanges. From 1995 to 1996 Eran served as Vice President of Open Sky Ltd. and from 1991 to 1993 he headed his own law company.

Eran received a degree in Law from Tel Aviv University and holds an MBA.

As founder of the international communications agency ink Communications, Jennifer is a new world order PR warrior on the front edge of the changing communications landscape. Jennifer broke new ground in 2001 with ink as a virtual agency pioneer, operating across borders to help clients from North America to EMEA to Asia Pacific translate their publicity efforts into a competitive advantage. Whether she's blogging the highlights of the latest trade show, creating a strategic roadmap for a client to navigate market shifts, matchmaking for a seed round or illuminating the wilds of social media, Jennifer has made a name coaching startups on their communications and marketing strategies that help them find their own niche in the world. Her specialty is IPTV, mobile and web 2.0 companies.

Regular speaker, moderator, advisor and founder of Tattletech.net, you can find her on Twitter.com/jennalee or www.theinkstudio.com.

“<br />” - Jennifer Hicks

Francois Mazoudier is the UK Partner for LD&A (http://www.ldaglobal.com), a pan-European investment bank focused on high growth TMT, CleanTech and Renewable Energy.

LD&A was ranked the No1 M&A firm for small cap (under €100m transactions) in France in 2009 by Capital Finance magazine. The firm was established in 2004, employs 16 staff members and a network of venture partners. It has offices in Paris, London and Brussels, and is operational across Europe, Scandinavia and the West Coast of the US via a partner.

In 2009 LD&A successfully closed 12 transactions (3 acquisitions, 5 divestitures including 2 leverage buy-outs and 4 private equity placements), serving clients from France, the UK, the Nordics, Benelux and Germany and sold companies to Swiss, Scandinavian, French, American and one Japanese firm.  Its sector expertise spans the Mobility, Software, Internet (ecommerce) and Internet Media sectors.

Prior to joining LD&A, Francois spent 20 years in Executive management roles, building several high growth TMT companies to several successful exits. Companies include Central Point Software (sold to Symantec NASDAQ: SYMC), PictureTel, Inc (acquired by Polycom, NASDAQ: PLCM), Firefox, The Cloud Networks (WiFi) and RealNetworks (from startup to IPO, NASDAQ: RNWK).

Francois was also the co-founder of Speed Ventures AB, the early stage VC firm backed by Soros Partners and Permira.

Francois graduated in Marketing from the University of Paris, France. He lives in London with his wife and child.

Raymond F. Skoglund, Managing Director

Ray is one of the original members of the McNamee Lawrence & Co. team and has been instrumental in growing MLC from its early entrepreneurial beginnings to its present international reach. MLC delivers investment banking services to a global client base of corporations, entrepreneurs and investors and has offices in Boston, San Francisco and Copenhagen. Since inception, MLC has closed over 60 M&A and private placement transactions.

Ray draws on an extensive background in both investment banking and corporate law, and has a broad range of experience in the technology sector particularly in the software space. Areas of particular focus include enterprise software, including through a hosted or on-premise delivery model and involving SaaS based revenue models. Representative transactions while at MLC have included the divestiture by Oracle of its On Target division to the TAS Group and the sales of Propero and Thinstall to VMWare, Salesnet to RightNow Technologies, iPhrase to IBM, and MarketSoft to Unica, and the private placement funding of LogMeIn. Ray also plays a significant role in MLC's international investment banking efforts with a focus on Europe and Scandinavia (in particular). Ray currently serves on the Investor Advisory and Organizing Commitees of the annual Boston Cleantech Venture Day and on the Board of Directors for the Swedish American Chamber of Commerce of New England.

Ray joined McNamee Lawrence & Co. from JPMorgan H&Q (formerly Hambrecht & Quist) where he was part of the Technology, Media and Telecommunications Group. While at JPMorgan H&Q, Ray participated in numerous mergers & acquisitions, equity offerings and venture capital financings with various software and communications companies.

Ray received a B.A. from Connecticut College and a J.D. from Northeastern University School of Law. 

Stephen is a Managing Director of Mooreland Partners, a global investment banking firm specializing in Technology M&A, with offices in Silicon Valley, New York, Greenwich and London. Prior to joining Mooreland,
Stephen was CEO of Robertson Stephens International and responsible for the firm's investment banking and equities operations with offices in London, Munich and Tel Aviv. During the 1996-2002 period, Stephen was involved in over 40 capital markets transactions for technology and life sciences companies on most major stock exchanges in Europe. During 1998-2001, Stephen also served on the Board of Directors of EASDAQ, the pan-European stock exchange based in Brussels. Prior to Robertson Stephens in San Francisco, Stephen worked in equity research for Alex Brown & Sons and in management consulting for Booz Allen & Hamilton. Stephen is a graduate of Amherst College and the Harvard Business School and received a CEP degree from L'Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris. Bilingual in English and French, Stephen holds dual US/French citizenship.

“<br />” - Stephan Schweich

Cornelius Claudio Kreusch is the CEO and Founder of MUSICJUSTMUSIC®. A graduate of Berklee College of Music in Boston and Manhattan School of Music in New York City, he also studied engineering at Technische Universität München, as well as economics at Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. A recipient of many music awards as a pianist, his company also received the RedHerring100 Award for Best Private Tech Companies in Europe in 2009. MUSICJUSTMUSIC®'s credo is the same as Cornelius's: "It's all about music." Much of the business success resulting from technological change has been driven by music. People want to listen to music and businesses want to provide music to them. Thus Edison's Phonograph and the radio, and Sony's Walkman. Apple's iPod and iTunes, and now the smart phone, are more recent examples. Cornelius believes that music will remain one of the biggest forces driving the Internet, mobile, social as well as offline market space.

MUSICJUSTMUSIC® was formed to take advantage of that vision. Based on proprietary automation software, MUSICJUSTMUSIC® SaaS provides a global central one-stop platform hub that powers digital distribution, royalty accounting, rights management of music, media and associated data, for all music industry participants, whether it be Artists, Labels or Industry Organizations. MUSICJUSTMUSIC®'s partners are Apple/iTunes, Microsoft/Zune, RealNetworks/Rhapsody, Emusic, Spotify and a growing network of currently close to 600 partners in 80 countries, reaching about 97% of all consumers buying music legally in any digital format worldwide.

This Steinway Artist “who sounds like no one else - endlessly fascinating to hear” (Boston Globe), performed the first live internet concert on two pianos across the Atlantic together with Herbie Hancock in 1995, years before the arrival of Skype. Cornelius' goal is to unite the music people want to hear of any genre with the most advanced and effective technology. German magazine Prinz wrote: "If CCK would not have existed, the music industry would have invented him."

He is on the board of US industry organization's influential NARM Digital Think Tank and is an active member in many other music organizations, both in Europe as well as in the US. Cornelius splits his time between Munich and New York City and enjoys life with his family and three kids, who all love music.

“<p> White Bull has created the essential gathering for venture opportunities - the place to meet the right people with the right concepts at the right time.</p>” - Cornelius Claudio Kreusch

Jörg Sievert covers Europe and Israel for SAP Ventures. Prior to joining SAP Ventures, Jörg led Business Consulting for BEA Systems for Central and Eastern Europe and provides significant experience in developing and executing solution selling strategies for SW products and is well connected in several industries. Before joining BEA, he spent several years as investment executive with 3i's global SW group, focused on investments in German speaking Europe and serving on numerous boards. Jörg also spent several years in strategy consulting with Booz-Allen Hamilton, working with clients in several industries across Europe. Sievert has lived in Germany, Austria, UK, and the United States. He holds a Master in Computer Science and received a Ph.D. in distributed systems, both from the University of Karlsruhe, and is a member of the ACM and GI.

Faisal Galaria is a member of the management team at Spotify where he is responsible for Corporate and Business Development. Previously, Mr Galaria was the International Managing Director of Kayak.com, the online travel meta search engine. Here he was responsible for expanding the service to nine countries and propelled it to become the second largest travel search engine in the UK in less than one year. Prior to Kayak.com, he built an online international movie company and was Director of Europe at Skype where he was responsible for key partnerships across Europe and the Middle East.

Mr Galaria was also a member of the Policy Executive of Britain's telecom and media regulator Ofcom. At Ofcom, he played a senior role in the high-profile negotiation and valuation of distribution rights for Premier League Football and co-authored the Telecoms Strategy Review.

Mr Galaria started his career in wireless and Internet consulting and was a member of Cluster Consulting, which was acquired by Diamond Technology Partners (NASDAQ: DTPI) for US$930 million in 2000.

Mr Galaria has been educated across Europe and graduated with honours from UMIST (University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology) with a Bachelor's in Management Sciences in the UK. He also holds an MBA from IESE in Spain.

Lukasz Gadowski is the co-founder and a partner of Team Europe Ventures. He studied in Paderborn (Business Informatics) as well as in Mannheim and at HHL Leipzig (Business), and in 2002 founded the company Spreadshirt (currently employing 300 people worldwide) and was, amongst other things, a co-founder of the social network "StudiVZ" (sold to Holtzbrinck in 2007, currently the most-viewed German internet site). At the beginning of 2008, Gadowski switched from his executive position at Spreadshirt to a seat on the supervisory board, which he now chairs. As of 2007, he has been active as an angel investor and was involved in the launch of a number of internet companies. Furthermore, Lukasz has made numerous investments, both domestically and internationally, and was distinguished as the 2007 "Internet Entrepreneur of the Year."

Lukasz has a personal blog at lukaszgadowski.com

Jon Bradford is the Founder and Managing Director of the mentor lead acceleration programme for digital start-ups, The Difference Engine.

He spent much of the last decade working with early stage technology businesses - both for advisory firms and spin outs looking to attract investment. Before setting up the Difference Engine in 2009, Jon was the investment manager for the hugely successful Design and Creative Fund. He has worked for, and advised, a successful Oxford University spin-out, including a sale to a NASDAQ listed firm.

Born in Northern Ireland, and now living in the North East of England, he began his working career as an accountant at Arthur Anderson in London and spent a number of years living and working in Australia and Silicon Valley. His experience spans funding, structuring, making profitable and selling businesses.

Whilst looking after nine start-ups simultaneously currently occupies his days fully, he still finds time to help bring up three children (all under five, one of whom seems intent on becoming the next  Olympic climber) and has recently completed a barn conversion.

Christophe Maire is CEO of txtr, a Berlin-based start up that builds tools and services for digital reading and provides a complete service software stack, supporting a multitude of vendors, applications and devices.

Christophe has 15 years of experience as founder and CEO of technology ventures. He founded and led gate5 AG, a Berlin-based pioneer in mobile mapping & community software for 7 years before selling the company to Nokia in the summer 2006. He was previously Managing Director of one of Europe’s largest digital media production and visual effect ventures, raising equity from Bertelsmann, Vivendi and Deutsche Telekom (70M Euros total funding).