Export Opportunities in Brazil for California Green Companies

When: Mon, Feb 13, 2012, 8:00 a.m.-12:00 p.m.
Where: San Jose Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce, 101W. Santa Clara Street, San Jose, CA

AGENDA

8:00 a.m. – 8:30 a.m. Registration, Networking, and Continental Breakfast
8:30 a.m. – 8:45 a.m. Welcome remarks
The Honorable Chuck Reed, Mayor of the City of San Jose
Matthew Mahood, San Jose Silicon Valley Chamber of Commerce
The Honorable Eduardo Prisco Ramos, Consul General of Brazil in San Francisco
Joanne Vliet, Director, Silicon Valley Export Assistance Center

8:45 a.m. – 9:45 a.m Doing Business in Brazil – panel discussion
Speakers:
Natalie Kehle, Analyst , International, Infrastructure Department, Federation of Industries of the State of São Paulo (FIESP)
Shannon Fraser, Clean Tech Trade Specialist, Silicon Valley Export Assistance Center, U.S. Department of Commerce
KathleenMcInerney, Director, Brazil-U.S. Business Council
Moderator: Professor Michael Conniff, San Jose State University

9:45 a.m. – 10:00 a.m. Networking Break
10:00 a.m. –11:00 a.m. Local Resources and Success Stories – panel discussion
Speakers:
Calvin Lam, Commercial Banking Officer, GBC International Bank
Rob Guthrie, Business Initiatives Specialist, Office of Renewable Energy & Environmental Exports, Export-Import Bank
Jeff Lund, Vice President of Business Development, Echelon
Moderator: Margarise Correa, Founder of BayBrazil

11:00 a.m.-11:40 a.m. Keynote Presentation
Carlos Eduardo de Senna Figueiredo, Economist, National Confederation of Industry for Brazil (CNI)
11:40 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. Question and Answer
12:00 p.m. Closing Remarks

You know that 1 out of every 5 workers in Santa Clara County is employed in manufacturing. But did you know that, just in 2010, California exported $2.8 billion in manufactured goods to Brazil, now the 6^th largest economy in the world?

The San Jose Metropolitan Area, with one of the highest education level in the U.S is home to over 4,505 high technology companies employing over 182,300 people and uniquely qualified to export to Brazil.

Our panels of experts will help you learn how to take advantage of the opportunities in the Brazilian market and export your green technology to Brazil!

Resources:

Export-Import Bank Support for U.S. Exports to Brazil: http://www.exim.gov/brazil/index.cfm

Presentation of Carlos E. Senna Figueiredo, Economist, National Confederation of Industries of Brazil

BayBrazil & partner organizations GABA, Silicon French & TEC present:

Attracting the Acquirer – How to stage your company for purchase

When: Tue, Jan 24^th, 2012, 6:00pm – 9:00pm
Where: Silicon Valley Bank, Kellog Auditorium, 3003 Tasman Drive, Santa Clara, CA 95054

What are acquiring companies and private equity firms looking for?

Join us to find out how to fund your business to become a successful target, why your approach to financial and legal record keeping is important, and what to expect in the letter-of-intent in the current market.

Learn also how to make the most of an alliance with your investment banker and legal team.

Topics to be discussed:

• How to get your company on the acquirer’s radar screen
• How is your company valued?
• What pitfalls do companies encounter during due diligence?
• How to make the most of your alliance with your investment banking, legal, and financial gurus

Speakers: 
Tom Smith, Managing Director, Corporate Finance, Silicon Valley Bank
Dean ‘Kip’ Witter III, Vice President of the Brenner Group
Francois Laugier, Partner, RMKB
Mark R. Dukas, Managing Director of Eagle Partners LLC

Moderator: Jessica Holcombe, RMKB

2012 Global Projections
A panel discussion on the business & economic outlook of the U.S., EU & Emerging Markets

When: Dec 1^st, 6:00pm – 9:00pm
Where: WilmerHale, 950 Page Mill Road, Palo Alto, CA 94304
Details & Pre-registration: http://baybrazil2012global.eventbrite.com
Cost: $20 Members: $35 Non Members; $50 at the door

As we approach the end of 2011, economists around the world are on the alert for an imminent double-dip recession particularly in the U.S., the Eurozone countries and the UK.
Still, venture capital investment in the U.S. in Q2 increased 19% compared to the first quarter of 2011, representing the highest total increase in a single quarter since the second quarter of 2008, according to the National Venture Capital Association. In the third quarter, VCs invested $6.9 billion in American companies, up 30% compared to the same quarter in 2010.
Although dollars are still pouring into U.S. firms, consumer confidence plunged to the lowest level in more than two years as unemployment hits over 9% of Americans. As a result, entrepreneurs are facing faltering profits, increasing uncertainty about the short-term evolution of their business environment and a new set of challenges to navigate the ongoing crisis and to stay afloat.

Join us to discuss the international business climate and hear insights on what business leaders should expect in 2012.

• When can a rebound be expected?
• Which market segments will drive growth?
• Which technologies are more likely get funded? Which ones could be a bubble?

The complimentary cocktail will start at 6pm, followed by the panel discussion & Q&A.

Moderator: Mike Swift, Internet Reporter, San Jose Mercury News

Speakers:

Cynthia Ringo, Managing Partner, DBL Investors
David Blumberg, Managing Partner, Blumberg Capital
Kenny Pate, VP Product Management, eBay
Scott Hartley, Mobile & Consumer Internet team, Mohr Davidow Ventures
Steve Bengston, Director, PwC

BayBrazil & JHTC invited Brazilian entrepreneur Ron Czerny, founder & CEO of PlayPhone, to talk about one of the hottest areas for VC investment.

The “Next Big Thing” is here and it is Mobile Social Gaming – the ability to play games with other people using a mobile device like a smartphone or iPad. In less than 3 years, companies in this segment have grown to valuations of over $5 billion.

In his presentation, Ron shared his 18-year old journey as a successful entrepreneur in the games industry. A Brazilian-born visionary, Ron has played a key role in Latin America’s video game industry and is the driving force behind PlayPhone. His ability to reinvent himself has allowed him to establish PlayPhone’s dominance in the mobile social games industry and position the company to compete and thrive on global scale. Parabens, Ron!

Oct 11 Startup Expo

The expo introduced 12 entrepreneurs to an audience of investors and high tech professionals gathered in Silicon Valley.
BayBrazil supported JHTC by inviting three startups led by Brazilian entrepreneurs:

LedFace, (www.ledface.com) represented by Marcio Saito, co-founder  ((coloca hyperling em cima do nome de cada empresa))
Lemon (ww.lemon.com), represented by Isabel Pesce Mattos, co-founder
MoWaiter, (http://www.mowaiter.com/) represented by Joni Girardi and Daniel Togni, co-founders

Congratulations! Parabens!

 In the past, Brazil has been known as a difficult business environment. In the 70′s and 80′s multinational companies used to send executives South to prepare them for important assignments because “if you can survive in Brazil, you can survive anywhere”.

That is certainly changing. Brazil has opened its economy to the world and become a global player not only in the traditional raw material markets, but also in industries with more value-added. We have seen investments in manufacturing (e.g. Foxcomm transferring manufacturing of Apple products from China), emergence of companies like Embraer (regional jets), and a very exciting startup scene. An emerging middle class offers what other developing markets don’t: a huge internal market.

The upcoming Soccer World Cup (2014) and the Olympic Games (2016) promise to mark the ascendence of Brazil as a global power. Or does it?

How difficult is it to do business in Brazil?

A recent article in the Financial Times blog examines a study by the World Bank and argues that there is still work to do.

In the bank’s latest Doing Business report, Brazil has fallen six places and is now ranked 126th out of 183 countries. In other words, it’s considered the 58th most difficult place to do business in the world. That’s more difficult than Azerbaijan, Greece, Guyana and Argentina, to name but a few.

Read the article at FT.com

Does the ranking capture the recent changes in the Brazilian market in the past couple of years? Based on my experience, it is much easier to do business in Brazil today, but the table above doesn’t reflect that.

What do you think? Share some of your perpective and experience by leaving your comments below.

–

Marcio Saito is Brazilian, entrepreneur, living in the Silicon Valley since 1993. He writes about Social Media, Business, Entrepreneurship, Crowdsourcing. He can be found in Twitter @Marcio_Saito and his website MarcioSaito.com.

Presented by BayBrazil & partners GABA and SiliconFrench

When: Thu, Sep 15, 6:00pm-9:00pm
Where: SAP Labs, 3410 Hillview Ave, building 1, Palo Alto, CA 94304
Details & Pre-registration: http://baybrazilcloudcom.eventbrite.com

In an open, flexible cloud infrastructure the role of IT will undergo a huge transformation over the next few years. Will the IT Department become a trusted broker in the cloud, someone who brokers multiple cloud services for their user departments? But CIO’s are not the only ones struggling to make sense of the new functions and delivery mechanisms. Software vendors and IT service providers also have to reengineer their offerings. Join us as leading thinkers from the industry share examples of dramatic current business impact using cloud computing and debate the next areas likely to be disrupted.

Moderator: Kris Singh, President SRII Service Research and Innovation Institute

Speakers:
Paul Hofmann, SAP Labs
Winston Bumpus, VMware
Gregory Smith, T-Systems
Srini Tanikella, Smart Modular Technologies

How Raising Capital in 2011 is Different for Entrepreneurs

Presented by BayBrazil & partners GABA, IEFF, SiliconFrench, TEC and U.S. Polish Trade Council.
When: Monday, June 20, 2011, 6:00 pm – 9:00 pm
Where: SAP Labs, Building 1, 3410 Hillview Avenue, Palo Alto 94-34
Pre-Registration: http://baybrazilraisingcapital.eventbrite.com/
Cost: Members:$20, Non-members: $30, at the door: $40.

Financing startups in Silicon Valley has changed in recent years. Entrepreneurs today don’t have to rely on only VC funding anymore, nor do they necessarily have to turn to Angels. There are other ways for them to finance their ventures nowadays.
In our panel discussion we will look at:

• Are entrepreneurs today financing their startups mainly by bootstrapping or have they found different ways to get their companies going?
• How are VCs adapting to these changes? Have they rolled out new financing models or are VCs simply being replaced?
• Have Angels and Super-Angels taken their place in getting start ups off the ground?
• Is it easier getting financing in other countries now, or do startups still have to come to the US for that?

Moderator:
Kelly Porter,  Managing Director, Woodside Capital Partners, specializes in advising internet, digital media and entertainment companies engaged in media, web 2.0/3.0, advertising and entertainment. He has extensive experience in corporate finance, corporate strategy and venture finance as a CEO, venture capitalist and private investor, having participated-in or completed dozens of transactions, including financings, acquisitions and IPOs.

Panelists:
Daniel Robin, adjunct professor of strategy and management at Monterey Institute of International Studies (MIIS), Graduate School of International Policy and Management (GSIPM), finance executive and educator, investment professional and venture catalyst
Sebastian Storfner, CAIA, is Vice President at Corporate Finance Partners where he focuses on Mergers & Acquisitions and PE/ VC transactions for technology firms. Sebastian holds a Bachelor degree in Business and Economics from Birmingham City University, UK, as well as a Master degree in Finance from Florida International University
Bjoern Herrmann, founder of blackbox – a next generation seed accelerator for technology startups. He founded and led 4 companies in Education and HR prior to that in Germany, Bangladesh, Russia and the US. His personal mission statement is to maximize the capitalization of every human individual.
Dave Gravano has 19 years of financial services experience, including 12 years of domestic and international venture debt experience. Before joining WTI in 2008, Mr Gravano held senior positions at Silicon Valley Bank, Fortress Investment Group, and Meier Mitchell/GATX Ventures in the US as well as GATX’s London-based venture lending business, GATX/ETV.
Lisa Dolev, founder and CEO of Qylur Security Systems, Inc., which is developing the first automated multi-threat checkpoint system for mass public markets .

Sponsored by BayBrazil & Silicon Valley Bank

On October 13, 2011, the workshop presented the trends in sectors such as biotech, energy, e-commerce as well as case studies of companies that started operations in Brazil recently.

Pictures at: www.facebook.com/baybrazil

On May 25 BayBrazil launched a workshop series on the economic outlook & business opportunities in Brazil.

May 25, 3:00pm – 8:00pm at Silicon Valley Bank, 3005 Tasman Drive, Santa Clara, CA 95054

Location: Silicon Valley Bank, 3005 Tasman Drive HC200, Santa Clara, CA 95054

Agenda

Brazil, China, India and Russia are projected to become the largest economies by year 2050. Together these countries hold 40% of the world’s population with an increasing affluent middle-class that is driving the greatest social-economic transformation in history.
The four BRIC countries formed a federation and have been meeting regularly. Recently, they invited another nation to join the block: South Africa. Although its economy is substantially smaller, South Africa accounts for 40 percent of sub-Saharan Africa’s economy.

Agenda:

12:30pm: Introductions & Announcements

12:45pm-2:45pm Innovation and Entrepreneuriship in Emerging Markets

Innovation in the 21^st century has no borders and is taking place at a rapid-fire pace particularly in Brazil, China, India and Russia.
Regions that in the past were known as sources of cheap labor are now enjoying a new status as sources of high quality brainpower. Every year, India produces 60,000 people with higher degrees in engineering or computer science. In China that number jumps to 75,000. With that, new entrepreneur clusters have been formed around the world, changing the landscape for global competition, bringing both opportunities and new challenges for the U.S. industry.

Moderator: Mike Swift, San Jose Mercury News
Speakers:
Anna Dvornikova, CEO Entana Corp, Managing Director, TEC – The Entrepreneur’s CLub
Anu Shukla, serial entrepreneur, CEO & Founder, Koinz Media
Nirvikar Singh, Professor of Economics, UCSC, Director of the South Asian Studies Initiative
Pumela Salela, ICT Enabled Services, World Bank
Rodrigo Schmidt, Lead Software Engineer, Facebook

2:45pm-3:00pm Break

3:00pm – 4:45pm Cleantech in Emerging Markets

The global demand for energy is pushing for unprecedented investments in clean energy sources.
According the Pew Charitable Trusts, global clean energy finance and investment grew to $243 billion in 2010, a 30 percent increase from the previous year. Energy use is expected to increase 35 percent over the next 25 years, driven primarily by developing countries’ expanding electricity use and vehicle fleets.
Who are the key players in this dynamic and competitive industry?
Are emerging markets headed to a green revolution?
What are the trends in cleantech venture finance?

Moderator: Mike Swift, San Jose Mercury News
Speakers:
Dmitry Akhanov, President, RUSNANO USA
James T. Caldwell, President, E3 Regenesis Solutions, Inc, Director, UCGEC (US-China Green Energy Council)
Pumela Salela, ICT Enabled Services, World Bank
Sonia Sousa, Director Prod. Commercialization, Solazyme

4-:45pm-5:30 Cocktail reception

Bios of Moderator & Speakers

Moderator:
Mike Swift has been a daily newspaper reporter for over 20 years, beginning his career with the Hartford Courant, where he was selected a Master Reporter in 2001 by the New England Association of Newspaper Editors. In 2005-06, Swift was a John S. Knight Fellow at Stanford University, following a course of study that included gender roles, spacecraft design and the role of development and environmental change in the spread of infectious disease. Swift joined the San Jose Mercury News in 2006, and currently covers Google, Facebook and general online trends, including search, online advertising, and social media. Over the course of his career, he has covered the business of major league sports, race and poverty, and politics. Before moving over to cover business news, Swift was the Mercury News’ lead demographics reporter; he also covered the Proposition 8 campaign on same-sex marriage in 2008. Swift has traveled to more than 30 countries by bicycle, and he and his wife Deborah Petersen bicycled 4,697 miles from Hartford to San Diego in 1996, co-writing a series of stories about the state of American community for The Courant.

Speakers:
Anna Dvornikova, CEO Entana Corp, Managing Director, TEC – The Entrepreneur’s CLub
Anna is an angel investor and Founder of Entana Corp. She serves on Advisory/Board of Directors of several technology startups, including eMazeU (acquired by Zoran), WikiMart, Manumatix, and OktoGo. She is the author of many articles on entrepreneurship, angel and venture financing. Anna is also a Managing Director of TEC (The Entrepreneurs’ Club, an international Russian-speaking network of several thousand high-tech entrepreneurs, executives and other professionals. TEC is headquartered in the Silicon Valley and holds regular meetings, seminars and events in Palo Alto, San Francisco, New York, Tel Aviv, and Moscow.
Previously, Anna served as the President of AmBAR where she organized a delegation of 20 prominent investors representing top Silicon Valley VC firms with more than $60 bln under management to Moscow in May 2010 to meet with Russian business, investment and government elite, including President Medvedev, to further ties between Silicon Valley and Russian high-tech community. She also was an organizer and a host of the Russian President in the Silicon Valley in June 2010.

Anu Shukla, a serial entrepreneur currently working on Koinz Media, her fourth venture. Prior to this, she was the Founder & CEO of Offerpal Media, a pioneer in the virtual currency markets providing monetization services to over 2000 social and casual games. Before Offerpal. Anu was the Founder & CEO of Mybuys Inc. and Founder & CEO of Rubric, Inc. Rubric was acquired in 2000 for $366 million. Prior to Rubric, Anu has held a variety of executive roles including the VP of Marketing and Product Strategy at Versata (VATA), and Vice President of Worldwide Marketing and Product Management at Compuware/Uniface Corporation (CPWR). Anu has served on the Board of Directors of the International Museum of Women (imow.org), Forum for Women Executives and Entrepreneurs (FWE&E) and the Advisory Board for the Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University. She was named to the Computer Industry “Dream Team” by Business 2.0 magazine in 2004, awarded the YSU Distinguished Alumni award in 2005, and the Entrepreneur of the Year by the Washington D.C. based Dialogue on Diversity organization in 2005. In 2007 Anu was awarded an Honorary Doctorate degree from her alma mater Youngstown State University in recognition of her business achievements.

Dmitry Akhanov is the President of RUSNANO USA, Inc. Previously, Mr. Akhanov was the Head of the Russian Federal Energy Agency, implementing government policy and  managing Russian government  assets in oil & gas, coal and electricity.  As the Head of Strategy of RAO UES  Mr.  Akhanov took an active role in Russian electricity sector restructuring, managing multiple unbundlings and M&A’s, architecting new sector’s layout. He has an extensive experience in investor relations, strategy and corporate finance. (Click here for presentation).

James T. Caldwell, Ph.D., a Director of UCGEC, Chair of its Green Building Task Force, and Editor of the Conference Programs, is bilingual in Chinese and English. He is President of E3 Regenesis Solutions, Inc., where he specializes in building green energy alliances and energy systems integration for buildings and cities. He was Senior Marketing Representative for Tian Ma, at International Geosystems (H.K) Ltd. and a Tour Director in China for Lindblad Travel. He founded Pacific Rim Connections, Inc. (a multilingual prepress services company), He was the first Editor of the Unicode Standard (ISO10646),  served on the Unicode Technical Committee and later served as VP for Multilingual Computing at DAE Interactive Marketing (Ion Global, US). He worked in China for three years and in Hong Kong (one year) during the 1980s. He often travels to China on business and worked in Beijing again in 2007-8. He has taught university courses on the Politics of Energy and the Environment, Comparative Politics and World History at SUNY Binghamton and Iona College, NY. He was post-doctoral Fellow at the U.C. Berkeley Institute of East Asian Studies and Assistant Director of the Center for East Asian Studies at Stanford University.

Nirvikar Singh, is Professor of Economics at the University of California, Santa Cruz. He has served as Director of the Santa Cruz Center for International Economics, Co-Director of the Center for Global, International and Regional Studies, Director of the South Asian Studies Initiative, and Special Advisor to the Chancellor. He organized one of the first major US conferences on Indian economic reform. He received his PhD from the University of California, Berkeley, and his BSc and MSc from the London School of Economics, where he was awarded the Allyn Young Prize, Gonner Prize and Ely Devons Prize. His current research topics include information technology and development, electronic commerce, business strategy, economic growth and the Indian economy. He has authored over 100 research papers and co-authored three books: Joint Ventures, International Investment and Technology Transfer; The Political Economy of Federalism in India; andWaiting to Connect: India IT Revolution Bypasses the Domestic Industry. He has also served as an advisor for several startups and knowledge services firms in Silicon Valley and in India.

Pumela Salela, is BPO/ITeS Consultant for the World Bank, based at their headquarters in Washington D.C. She is a Board member of the Global Sourcing Council and the African Ambassador for Sustainable and Socially Responsible Outsourcing. Before the appointment she was a Director: BPO (Business Process Outsourcing) and ICT Enabled Services at the Department of Trade and Industry (the dti) in the Industrial Development Division, South Africa. Her responsibility was to draft strategies and policies that would create and enabling environment of the BPO and ICT sectors in South Africa. Prior her promotion to the Director position she was Deputy Director for Investment Promotion at Trade and Investment South Africa. She was responsible for attracting Foreign Investors into South Africa.
Pumela has made presentations in various business seminars and government events in the United States, the Middle East, Asia, Africa and Europe. Pumela has also been a lecturer and a BPO blog writer for the South African International Business Linkages (saibl) whose headquarters are in Washington DC. Having gone to study in England through the Nelson Mandela Scholarship, she is the Chairperson of the Nelson Mandela Scholarship Alumni Association and a Mentor to Graca Machel Scholars.(Innovation Presentation Cleantech Presentation)

Rodrigo Schmidt joined Facebook in 2008 and currently leads the team of engineers that develops Facebook’s chat and real time infrastructure. Before that, he was working on his own start-up in Switzerland to help Internet users communicate over their browsers. He holds a PhD in Distributed Computer Systems from EPFL, Switizerland, an M.S. degree in Computer Science from Unicamp, Brazil, and a B.S. degree in Computer Engineering from FURG, Brazil.

Sonia Sousa serves as Director of Product Commercialization in Fuels & Chemicals for Solazyme Inc. since 2010. Between 2008-2010, she was CEO of SpectroScape a start-up company with offices in the US and Switzerland. Dr. Sousa served as Business Development and Strategic MarketingDirector for the Life Science Solutions Unit at Agilent Technologies, Product Development Director at Thermo Fisher, Strategic Innovation & R&D Manager at DuPont, among other positions. Her background spans from product development, R&D management, strategic-business planning and development, strategic alliance and evaluation of potential acquisitions in the renewable energy, life science and specialty chemical industries. She is currently a member of Silicon Valley Angles, and serves in the advisory board of SECCO2 and Power Self. She also volunteers at Taproot Foundation, and Nesst. Dr. Sousa holds a MBA degree from Pepperdine University, a PhD in Chemistry – Analytical Spectroscopy from Utah State University and BS degree in Chemistry and Chemical Engineering –Oswaldo Cruz – Sao Paulo University.

When: Tuesday, April 5, 6:30pm-9:30pm
Location: Bishop Auditorium, Graduate School of Business, 518 Memorial Way, Stanford University

The entrepreneurial guru Vivek Wadhwa is a senior research associate at Harvard Law School, advisor to several start-up companies, a columnist for BusinessWeek.com, a contributor to TechCrunch, and writes for international publications.

Vivek has been busy jetting around the world giving advice and inspiration to entrepreneurs and governments especially in Brazil,India, Russia, Chile, Japan, and the US. The discussion will cover such topics as:

• Can and should other countries recreate Silicon Valley?
• Is the brain drain really happening? And what are the consequences for the US?
• How can Silicon Valley leaders meet the challenges facing them?
• What’s the future, global significance of Silicon Valley?
• StartupVisa – new US legislation. Will it work?

Global Women’s Journey – a series on female business leaders around the world
Sponsored by Adobe Systems Inc

When: Thu, Aug 25, 6:00pm-9:00pm
Location: Adobe corporate headquarters at 345 Park Avenue, San Jose, CA 95110-2704
Free parking at Adobe visitor’s garage. Entrance at Park Ave. West Tower
Pre-registration & details: http://gwj.eventbrite.com

BayBrazil, SVForum & Adobe teamed up to celebrate the 2011 Intl. Women’s Day and launch the Global Women’s Journey series to discuss women’s path to leadership.

The second event in the series featured foreign-born young women entrepreneurs who are sparking innovation, launching companies and carving space in the Silicon Valley & around the world!

Moderator: Laura Sydell, NPR

Speakers include:
Aihui Ong, CEO, CTO & Founder of Love With Food
Beatrice Tarka, CEO & Co-Founder of Mobissimo
Michelle Zatlyn, Co-founder, Head of User Experience of CloudFlare, Inc
Poormina Vijayashanker, CEO & Founder of BizeeBee
Yin L. Yin, Intl. Bus Dev. Manager at Silver Spring Networks

Across the world, highly educated and ambitious women are pouring into the labor market.
In the next ten years, more than one billion women are expected to enter the workforce or start their own businesses.
Analysts predict that Gen Y women will outnumber men in the professional workforce.
In emerging markets, women are expected to be the dominant force taking on increased leadership and expanding their roles in upper management.
According to the Center for Women’s Business Research, 10.1 million firms in the U.S. are owned by women and one in five firms with revenue of $1 million or more is woman-owned.
Despite this progress, women share a familiar feeling: it’s lonely for fellow female leaders at the top across all industries.

• How women are shaping the world’s new workforce?
• What will be the leadership models in a workplace dominated by women?
• Who are the women promoting growth & development in the U.S. and around the world?
• What are the current challenges and opportunities facing women regardless of race and ethnicity?

A recent UC-Davis study found that in California women hold only 9.5 percent of board seats and the highest-paid executive positions at the 400 largest publicly held corporations.
This reality gets more complex when race is taken into account.
In the diverse Silicon Valley though, women are playing an increasingly important role in promoting economic growth. Many corporations have been making efforts to accelerate women’s advancement and some women have reached prominent positions both in public and private sectors. Among them, foreign-born professional women who are rising to the top as entrepreneurs, middle or upper level managers.

Read the Patch.com’s article: “Foreign-Born Women CEOs Find Common Ground in the Valley” http://patch.com/A-l24d.

Moderator Bio

Laura Sydell is the Digital Culture Correspondent for the NPR’s All Things Considered, Morning Edition, and Weekend Edition.

Laura traveled India and China to look at the impact of technology on developing nations.

Before joining NPR in 2003, Laura served as a senior technology reporter for American Public Media’s Marketplace, where she looked at the human impact of new technologies and the personalities behind the Silicon Valley boom and bust.

Before coming to San Francisco, Laura worked as a reporter for NPR Member Station in New York.

Her reporting on race relations, city politics, and arts was honored with numerous awards from organizations such as The Newswomen’s Club of New York, The New York Press Club, and The Society of Professional Journalists.

Speakers Bios

Aihui Ong is the founder, CEO/CTO of Love With Food, the easiest way to find tasty deals and free samples, curated by foodies for foodies. She began her love of technology at the National University of Singapore as a CS student. After being offered 7 jobs in the U.S., without hesitation, she began her new journey on the American shores.

Beatrice Tarka is CEO and co-founder of Mobissimo, the travel search engine that helps travelers to find the best travel options across the Web.
A serial entrepreneur, Beatrice brings a blend of Internet, leisure travel industry and consumer products experience to Mobissimo.
Prior to Mobissimo, Beatrice was co-founder and CEO of Axall Media and co-founded France Portage, a press distribution database provider acquired by France Telecom. Beatrice was born in Poland, and is part Italian. She studied in France, has French nationality and makes her home in San Francisco.

Michelle Zatlyn Co-founder, Head of User Experience of CloudFlare
Growing up in Canada, she earned a degree in Chemistry and now applies the scientific method to improving businesses as the Head of User Experience of CloudFlare.
Prior to CloudFlare, she worked at Google and Toshiba, and launched two successful startups. Michelle holds her MBA from Harvard Business School and was awarded the Dubliner Prize for Entrepreneurship.

Poornima Vijayashanker was born in India and moved to the U.S. as a child. She graduated from Duke University with a double degree in Electrical and Computer Engineering and Computer Science. She worked for Synopsys as an R&D Engineer. In 2006 she joined Mint.com as the third employee. In 2010 she left Mint.com to start BizeeBee.com, where she serve as CEO. Aside from being a coder, entrepreneur, speaker, and mentor to junior engineers, Poornima blogs on Femgineer.com, is an avid traveler and foodie.

Yin L. Yin was born in Beijing, raised in Germany, US-educated Canadian citizen
She is Asia Business Development Manager at Silver Spring Networks and is instrumental in the firm’s expansion into new markets.
Prior to her switch into cleantech, she was a Project Leader at The Boston Consulting Group, based in Berlin and Beijing. While at BCG, Yin founded the Greater China Social Impact team, which organizes local community service events that include a mentorship program.
Yin is an alumna of Penn/Wharton’s MBA Program – and co-founded PennYo, the first collegiate Chinese a cappella group, which has released three albums and completed two international tours.

We launched our series last March with an inspiring panel discussion with five female executives moderated by BBC’s Maggie Shiels.

When: Tue, March 29, 6:00pm-8:30pm
Location: Adobe corporate headquarters at 345 Park Avenue, San Jose, CA 95110-2704
Free parking at Adobe visitor’s garage. Entrance at Park Ave. West Tower

Speakers included:
Ana Paula Fernandes, VP Sales, Mettler-Toledo
Anu Shukla, serial entrepreneur, CEO & Founder, Koinz Media
Kirsti Kierulf, Nordic Director of Innovation, Technology and Learning, Accenture
Mei Lin Fung, Chairman, Institute for Service Organization Excellence
Whitney Tidmarsh, CMO, EMC
Moderator: Maggie Shiels, BBC

It was an informative, exciting and provocative discussion! Thank you all for making our kick-off event a success!
Check out event pictures and speakers Bios below.

March 29 Global Women’s Journey Guest Speakers & Moderator:

Ana Paula Fernandes, VP Sales, RAININ, Mettler-Toledo
Ana-Paula is the VP of Sales at RAININ, the Life Sciences Division of Mettler-Toledo, since December 2010. Prior to joining RAININ, Ana Paula led the Applied Biosystems (ABI) and Invitrogen business integration for the Molecular Biosystems Division since November 2009 and as Senior Sales Manager for ABI for the West Region from May 2006 to November 2009. Ana Paula joined ABI in São Paulo, Brazil, in April 1993, as a Sr. Product Specialist. In 1994,  she set up the local branch office for Applied Biosystems in São Paulo, building business capabilities for commercial operations, accounting and finance, applications support, service, training center and research labs. Prior to joining ABI, Ana Paula served as Product Specialist for Fisions Instruments, VG LabSystems for LIMS products in Latin America. Ana Paula has more than 19 years of experience in sales, commercial operations, applications, service and training management experience in the life sciences and research market. She holds an M.B.A. from Fundação Getúlio Vargas (Rio de Janeiro, Brazil) and bachelor of Business Administration degree from Universidade Paulista (São Paulo, Brazil).

Anu Shukla, serial entrepreneur, CEO & Founder, Koinz Media
Anu is a serial entrepreneur currently working on Koinz Media, her fourth venture. Prior to this, she was the Founder & CEO of Offerpal Media, a pioneer in the virtual currency markets providing monetization services to over 2000 social and casual games. Before Offerpal. Anu was the Founder & CEO of Mybuys Inc. and Founder & CEO of Rubric, Inc. Rubric was acquired in 2000 for $366 million. Prior to Rubric, Anu has held a variety of executive roles including the VP of Marketing and Product Strategy at Versata (VATA), and Vice President of Worldwide Marketing and Product Management at Compuware/Uniface Corporation (CPWR). Anu has served on the Board of Directors of the International Museum of Women (imow.org), Forum for Women Executives and Entrepreneurs (FWE&E) and the Advisory Board for the Leavey School of Business, Santa Clara University. She was named to the Computer Industry “Dream Team” by Business 2.0 magazine in 2004, awarded the YSU Distinguished Alumni award in 2005, and the Entrepreneur of the Year by the Washington D.C. based Dialogue on Diversity organization in 2005. In 2007 Anu was awarded an Honorary Doctorate degree from her alma mater Youngstown State University in recognition of her business achievements.

Kirsti Kierulf, Nordic Director of Innovation, Technology and Learning, Accenture
Kirsti has worked in  Accenture since  2006. She is an experienced project manager with special skill in media, entertainment and technology focusing on management, transformation and innovation.  She also has academic experience. Kirsti has a passion for women in technology and science, has started a number of programs targeting this from the first network in the industry to tecno camps and is a high level advisor to the European Center for Women and Technology.  She is currently the Nordic Director of Innovation, technology and learning in Accenture where she established the Nordic Innovation Lab and was project lead of innovation projects targeting search and media-clients in Norway. Prior to Accenture, Kirsti was a CEO at a content management company and President of Womens University, and has held positions in various technology companies. She started her career as a sales consultant for IBM.

Mei Lin Fung, Chairman, Institute for Service Organization Excellence
Mei Lin has lived on 4 continents, worked in Australia and the US, and has visited over 100 cities in Asia, Europe, Australia and South America, including Bogota Colombia, Islamabad Pakistan and Dubrovnik, Croatia. After working at Shell Australia, she earned her MS at MIT studying under future Nobel Economics laureates Franco Modigliani and Robert before she joined Intel and then Oracle as one of the Customer Relationship Management pioneers in the Silicon Valley. She left corporate life to start her own consulting company MLF Associates Inc. She serves as Communications Chair with future-based Agile Thinking, an initiative for Health in the future which started in the US Air Force under the leadership of the Air Force Surgeon General. She co-founded BayStart, the Xtreme Internet conference, Silicon Valley Netmarketmakers,  SALI, the Southeast Asia Leadership Initiative, www.TEDxBayArea.com which produced TEDWomen Bay Area in December 2010, www.ProgramfortheFuture.org, www.Futuretalk.net and the Institute for Service Organization Excellence, www.isoe.com where she currently serves as Chairman.

Whitney Tidmarsh, CMO, EMC
Whitney is the Chief Marketing Officer of Information Intelligence Group of EMC. In this role, she is responsible for the division’s global marketing strategy, branding, thought leadership, product marketing and lead generation for the division’s products and solutions, including EMC Documentum, EMC Captiva and EMC SourceOne. Tidmarsh also has leadership experience in social media and community marketing, competitive intelligence, field enablement, pricing and marketing communications. During the eight years she spent at Documentum prior the acquisition, Tidmarsh held a variety of technical and marketing management positions. From 2002-2004, she served as Vice President and General Manager of the electronic document and Web content management businesses where she managed a worldwide team of engineers, product managers and product marketing managers responsible for nearly half of Documentum’s license revenues. Tidmarsh was a recipient of the Silicon Valley Women of Influence award in 2009 and the Top 40 Under 40 award in 2003. Tidmarsh holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy, politics and economics from Claremont McKenna College. She was born in Berkeley, California to parents who are both Norwegian by descent.

Moderator: Maggie Shiels, reporter, BBC
Maggie is the BBC’s first official appointee covering Silicon Valley for the world’s biggest broadcasting organisation.
Throughout her years in journalism she has anchored a number of radio shows back in the UK, worked in television, newspapers and magazines.  She has interviewed everyone from leading technology players like Douglas Engelbart and Gordon Moore to top politicians like Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair, and from world class entertainers like Audrey Hepburn and Spinal Tap to sporting stars like leading female golfer Annika Sorenstam and soccer legends Sir Alex Ferguson and Kenny Dalgleish.
Her job over the years has taken her from drug dens and prison cells to palaces and parliaments, and from riots and bombing campaigns to red carpet events and boardrooms.
She is one of six children and hails from Scotland.  She has one son and a partner who works as a golf correspondent but lays claim a past that includes rock and roll.  Her inspirations include Doris Day, Jean Valjean the hero of Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables and her mum who strived to provide for her family and give them more than she could afford.