Steve Guengerich
Chief Learning Officer
nGenera Corporation
Steve currently serves as chief learning officer for nGenera Corporation (formerly BSG Alliance Corp.). Prior to nGenera, Steve served as director of information technology for Bridgepoint Consulting, the top accounting and finance management consulting firm in Central Texas, and as president of Perceptive Sciences Corporation, one of the country's leading UI design and research firms. Steve began his career with Accenture and Pricewaterhouse-Cooper's consulting group (now part of IBM Global Services) where he specialized in advanced technologies.
Steve graduated from Howard Payne University, receiving a BS in Economics, summa cum laude, where he was a Hatton W. Summers Scholar and the Outstanding Male Graduate of the Douglas MacArthur Academy of Freedom in 1980. He continued on to graduate school at Texas A&M University, receiving a MBA in Business Computing Science, with honors, in 1982. For the past 2 years, he has served as an officer of the central Texas chapter of AITP and chaired the selection committee for the CIO of the Year awards.
Steve is an award-winning writer, having authored or produced eight computer books and dozens of articles, for publications like Computerworld, eWeek, and NetworkWorld. He is also a frequent speaker, with past talks featured at Comdex, Networld+Interop, Internet World-Australia, as well as annual conferences for Gartner Group's Dataquest and Forrester's Meta Group.
Pete Hayes
Vice President, Corporate Marketing & Communications
Advanced Micro Devices
Pete combines his passion for technology with creative problem solving to tackle some of the most complex marketing challenges in business today. Arriving at AMD in the summer of 2006, he assumed an integrated marketing executive role, pulling AMD's interactive, brand and marketing communications disciplines into a single organization. He presently reports directly to the company CMO. Prior to AMD, Pete was vice president at SicolaMartin, where his 11 year tenure included roles from business development to general management of SicolaMartin Interactive. While there, he developed extensive brand experience with clients including 3M, AMD, Citrix, Compaq, Dell, Freescale, Motorola and Novell.
Pete is an accomplished songwriter (even a voting member of NARAS, for the Grammys), a casual sailor, plus a board member of non-profit Wonder & Worries. He's also the proud father of two beautiful daughters, Taylor and Addison. Pete and his lovely wife Cindy live in the Westlake area.
Cynthia A. Baker
President, Accolades Public Relations and Communications
Cynthia A. Baker is the Founder and
President of Accolades Public Relations, a results-oriented communications firm committed to progressive strategies in public relations and marketing. It is a new breed of PR firm where the clients' needs drive solutions - whether in media exposure or news online.
The firm's mission is to set the standard in what carefully executed public relations and communication strategies can do for sales, lead generation and the bottom line of ROI. Accolades' team of public relations specialists practice a blend of traditional public relations along with optimized PR and social media. They provide core communications solutions, including tactical internet marketing strategies designed to synch public relations initiatives to B2B agendas.
A third-generation native Austinite, Cynthia practices public relations from the beautiful Hill Country while serving both regional and national clients in the technology, financial, franchise, advertising and business sectors. She is a member of the Austin Corporate Growth and Bootstrap organizations. Cynthia is also a co-founding member of the Austin Social Media Club.
Mike Chapman
Principal and Founder, Every Dot Connects
Mike Chapman is proof that professionals from non-tech sectors can adapt and even thrive in the new media landscape. The principles of being open and genuine, considering customers as humans, remaining open to constant feedback and criticism, and being completely willing to trade old ways of thinking for new ones, have made Mike an enthusiast for social media. It may sound ironic that a former Washington lobbyist and Congressional staffer would be eager to specialize in communications based on honesty and authenticity rather than promotion, but those are the exact qualities that drew him into the field of new media and communications.
Mike is a cofounder of the Austin Social Media Club and the international Social Media Club. As a principal and founder of Every Dot Connects - a social media consortium - Mike works with clients who have an interest in governmental affairs and some who do not. In either case, Mike brings his enthusiasm for finding new and better ways to communicate, remembering that the very best communicators he has worked with were those who knew how to listen most effectively. Mike's career started with the late J.J."Jake" Pickle as part of his Washington D.C. staff, and has included stints with current U.S. Senator Tim Johnson, the National Association of Realtors, the American Medical Association, and Texas State University. His roles at Every Dot Connects include communications strategist, blogger and online community addict.
Jeff Culbertson
Creative Director, FG SQUARED
Jeff Culbertson is the Creative Director at FG SQUARED. Over the past two decades he has shaped a career that includes commercial graphic design for print and web, typeface design, digital cinematography, video editing and motion graphics. His work for clients such as Motorola, Sysco, AMD, Vignette, Compaq, CenterPoint Energy, Time Warner Cable and the Houston Film Commission has won multiple awards in a variety of mediums. He is an outspoken advocate for Web 2.0 adoption in business and life. Prior to FG SQUARED, Jeff was Creative Director at Origin Design, a top Advertising/Design firm in Houston, Texas.
Sam Decker
CMO, BazaarVoice
Sam Decker is a recognized expert in eCommerce, word of mouth marketing, and direct marketing. Decker is a frequent speaker at industry events, author of a "Top 25" marketing blog
www.deckermarketing.com and two books on word of mouth marketing. He has more than 15 years of marketing and online retailing experience, including running Dell's consumer web site ($3.5B in annual sales). As Chief Marketing Officer, Decker is responsible for leading Bazaarvoice's corporate marketing and product strategy. Bazaarvoice offers outsourced technology, services, analytics, and expertise to help companies enhance the online shopping experience with social commerce applications that drive sales.
Dave Evans
VP, Social Media, Digital Voodoo
Strategic Partner, Social Media, FG SQUARED
"If we couldn't interrupt you, how would we reach you?" That's the question that Dave starts with as a communications expert focused on social media. Dave listens to what a client's business communications needs are, then selects applicable channels to deliver an effective solution. His expertise lies in his ability to match client needs with consumer preferences as to how and when they would like to be talked to.
Dave co-founded
HearThis.com, a podcasting service firm and
Digital Voodoo, a marketing technology consultancy whose clients have included Meredith Publishing Group, Microsoft and HP. Dave's passion is the provision of strategic marketing services for clients wanting to tap the power of connected social networks through word of mouth and consumer-generated media. Dave has worked with GSD&M and clients including Southwest Airlines, AARP, Wal-Mart, PGA TOUR, Dial, and Chili's as a strategy director for integrated communications, with Progressive Insurance Company as a product manager, and a systems analyst for the Voyager deep space exploration program with Jet Propulsion Laboratories/NASA.
Dave holds a BS in Physics and Mathematics from the State University of New York/College at Brockport and has served on the Advisory Board with ad:tech and well as the Measurement and Metrics Council with the Word of Mouth Marketing Association.
Jason Fellman
Co-Founder, FG SQUARED
Jason is the co-founder of FG SQUARED Interactive Marketing and served as the firm's CEO from 1994-2004. He currently serves as a Strategic Consultant to the firm and its clients. Jason has worked with some of the world's most respected international organizations including Shell, Hitachi, Canon, Cardinal Health, Dell, Tokyo Electron, and Motorola. As an industry leader, he has been invited to speak at numerous conferences over the years on the subject of Integrated and Web-based marketing. Fellman, also a part time professional singer/songwriter/multi-instrumentalist, is a graduate of Musician's Institute in Hollywood, CA. Jason currently resides in Portland, Oregon with his wife and daughter.
Bill Fields
Former President and CEO of Walmart Stores Division
Fields Texas Limited is a consulting and investment company that is specialized in consumer, retail, and supply chain in North America and China.
Since 2003, Bill has served as Chairman and CEO of Intersource Enterprises Ltd., a sourcing and product development company based in China. Intersource represents retail and manufacturing clients in North America and Europe. Prior, Bill served as Chairman and CEO of Factory 2 U Stores, Inc as well as Chairman and CEO APEC China Asset Management Ltd, where he facilitated U.S., Canadian, Central and South American companies' entry into sales, marketing, distribution and production functions in the People's Republic of China.
In the late nineties, Bill was President and CEO of Hudson's Bay Company, which at 332 years is the oldest chartered firm in North America. Contributing to its $4.4 Billion in annual sales, its primary operating divisions include a 350-store mass merchandising chain, "Zellers", and 100-store department store chain, "The Bay," with approximately 70,000 employees.
Prior to joining Hudson's Bay, Bill served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer, Blockbuster Entertainment Group.
Bill began his career at Wal-Mart, rising from an Assistant Store Manager in 1971 to President and Chief Executive Officer of Wal-Mart Stores Division in 1996. At Wal-mart, Bill directed planning for stores in operations, merchandising, and marketing, overseeing over 2,000 stores and 700,000 employees. In 1988, as Executive Vice President, Merchandising and Sales Bill headed Wal-Mart's Supercenter Concept Development
Bill has a Bachelor of Science and Business from the University of Arkansas, where he graduated in 1971. He is currently on the Board of numerous organizations, including The University of Texas Pan American Foundation and Lexmark International, Inc. Bill is a former board member of both United Way of America and the National Retail Federation.
Omar Gallaga
Reporter/Blogger, Austin American-Statesman
Omar L. Gallaga covers technology culture and digital entertainment for the Austin American-Statesman, where he's been a reporter and editor for almost 11 years. He writes about tech on his work blog,
Digital Savant, and contributes technology-related interviews to NPR's "All Things Considered" and Jeff Koch's KTSA-AM radio show.
He regularly uses Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Flickr and other social networking applications at work and at play. At South by Southwest Interactive 2008, he was the first journalist to post video of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg's controversial keynote interview and followed it up a few hours later with the first online interview of journalist Sarah Lacy to appear online after the event.
Gallaga is also a staff writer for NBC/Universal's
TelevisionWithoutPity.com, and his own sites
Videogamey.com (with David T. Cole); "Space Monkeys!", an online comic (with Pablo Gallaga); and
Terribly-Happy.com. He's also written for The Wall Street Journal, Hispanic Magazine, Latino and
MSNBC.com.
Giovanni Gallucci
Social Media Evangelist with DexterityMedia.com & Viewzi.com
Giovanni is a recovering .NET programmer who provides strategy for search, community building, brand development, and online PR at Dexterity Media and viewzi.com. Giovanni architected and built online communities before social networking was cool, used a mac before the second coming of Steve Jobs, and created vertical search engines when Larry and Sergey were still undergrads.
Never one to leave any room on his plate, he blogs at TheAgencyBlog.com and is on the faculties of xTrain.com and AdobeTV providing training on podcastng, online marketing, and social media. Giovanni regularly speaks at events like ad:tech, FlashForward, PRSA, Macworld, and Search Engine Watch Live! and has been covered in a variety of media outlets including AdWeek, Clickz, The Dallas Morning News, The Houston Chronicle, Inc.com, iMediaConnection, InfoWorld, NBC, The New York Times, The London Telegraph, and USA Today.
tel: (469) 682-6978
blog:
theagencyblog.com
search:
viewzi.com
sem:
dexteritymedia.com
web:
www.gallucci.net
facebook: giovanni@gallucci.net
linkedin:
linkedin.com/in/ggallucci
twitter:
twitter.com/Giovanni
Jennifer Grogono
Co-Founder & Chief Content Officer, On Networks
Jennifer Grogono is co-founder and chief content officer for On Networks. Her main focus is defining and bringing to market new forms of original programming that engage consumers across on-demand networks. Jennifer has helped On Networks establish relationships with hundreds of professional content creators, launching more than 30 original digital series. In addition, she also leads the company's marketing team to successfully match their programming with relevant distributors and marketers interested in creating new brand experiences.
Over the past 15 years, Ms. Grogono has worked with a range of consumer companies, public service organizations and technology firms, specializing in strategic marketing and integrated communications. Before joining ON, Ms. Grogono was vice president of corporate marketing at Motive, Inc., where she oversaw PR, investor communications, marketing programs and sales enablement, pre- and post-IPO. During her tenure with Motive, Ms. Grogono also founded the telecommunications industry publication - Broadband 2.0.
Previously Ms. Grogono was vice president and co-general manager of the Austin office of Porter Novelli, an Omnicom-owned worldwide marketing and communications firm. Before joining Porter Novelli, she was the director of marketing at Austin Ventures-backed Kurion, a digital content and application syndication company which was sold to iSyndicate and, later, YellowBrix. Ms. Grogono also established the Austin office of Lois Paul & Partners, a top national technology PR firm now part of Fleishman-Hillard.
Ms. Grogono is a cum laude graduate of Boston College, and currently resides in Austin, Texas with her husband and three children.
Len Hause
Internetologist, MashBrain
Len Hause is the world's first Internetologist and founder of MashBrain where he consults on Internet marketing and technology strategies. He was a Fellow of the Technical Staff, Associate of the Science Advisory Board, and Marketing Director at Motorola where he spent more than 30 years in management roles and as an individual contributor. He has been recognized as a pioneer in the adoption of Internet protocols and culture within the Enterprise for collaboration and organizational learning. He is a member of the IEEE Computer Society, Association for Computing Machinery and has served on many industry, educational, corporate, and government advisory boards and consortiums. He is also an active member of Austin's musical community. Len holds a BS degree in Electrical Engineering from Lehigh University.
Deltina Hay
Owner, Social Media Power
Deltina Hay is the founder of Social Media Power, a Web 2.0 development firm and Dalton Publishing, a literary press based in Austin, Texas. She has been programming and doing Web development in one form or another for 25 years. Her love of media and publishing, coupled with her passion for open source programming led her naturally to social media and Web 2.0 consulting. She created Social Media Power to offer ways for entrepreneurs, small businesses, authors, and publishers to greatly improve their own Web presence using social media and Web 2.0 tools and technologies. Her undergraduate and graduate education includes accounting, computer science, applied mathematics, numerical analysis, fluid dynamics, and psychology. Look for Deltina's upcoming book Don't Get Caught Dead in the New, Live Web: A Survival Guide to Web 2.0 and Social Media Optimization, due out in June, 2008 from Wiggy Press.
Stacey Higginbotham
Writer, GigaOM, NewTeeVee, Earth2Tech
Stacey has over ten years of experience reporting on business and technology, most recently as reporter with top technology blog GigaOM. There she covers both the infrastructure that allows companies to deliver services via the web, as well as the services themselves. Prior to GigaOM Stacey wrote about technology and finance for The Deal, a finance publication out of New York, and launched its coverage of angel-backed and seed-stage companies. She joined The Deal from the Austin Business Journal which she wrote for after her return from New York City, where she worked at publications that included The Bond Buyer and BusinessWeek. Stacey graduated with a degree in journalism from the University of Texas at Austin.
Clint Howell
New Media Specialist, BusinessWire
Clint Howell, a nine-year veteran of the wire service industry, services companies in Austin and San Antonio and is a member of Business Wire's New Media Team, helping educate local communicators about Web 2.0 and social media.
Howell currently serves as Membership Chair on the Austin-San Antonio Board of the National Investor Relations Institute (NIRI) and is a co-founding member of Social Media Club's Austin Chapter. SMC engages thought leaders in the social media and open source arenas, assisting them in not only understanding, but defining the ever-changing social media landscape.
As an active volunteer for the City of Austin's Technology Response Team (COA-TRT), Howell is on call to assist the city of Austin's Communication and Technology Management (CTM) organization in responding to any disastrous event affecting the city.
Howell and his wife Carrie, reside in South Austin with their sons, Tanner, 8, and Tristan, 6.
Karl Krumm, Ph.D
Owner PIPO Management Consulting
Karl Krumm brings both a diverse and rich background of experience working with individuals and organizations across business sectors, industries and athletics to his consulting practice. He initially served as a psychologist with the USAF for three years, found and managed a professional services firm, and has consulted for the last twenty-five years in human performance and organizational design. His commitment is to achieving results and assisting others in achieving the outcomes they desire. In addition to coaching executives, Karl has designed and delivered numerous leadership and management training courses focused on individual development and team work. He has also designed mentoring and coaching programs with an emphasis on talent development. Several times a year he teaches at the University of Colorado EMBA Program.
On his own-time he is a pilot, and enjoys scuba diving, skiing and hiking.
Bill Leake
CEO, Apogee Search
A former McKinsey consultant and Dell veteran, Bill Leake draws on a deep expertise in both business and marketing to help increase revenues for a wide range of clients. He has been involved in driving provable revenues through internet marketing techniques since the early 1990s when, as part of the management team at Power Computing, he built the first company to sell $1 million of product over the internet. Bill has guided Apogee Search from inception to its current position as the most prominent search engine marketing firm in the SouthWest, and one of the 25 largest in the N. America.
Before founding Apogee Search, Bill was President of Journyx, the leading software provider of web-based time and expense management solutions, and one of the 500 largest software companies in the U.S.
Prior to Journyx, he held leadership and executive positions at several public and private venture-capital backed firms, including Trusted Information Systems (TISX, now NET), Haystack Labs, Power Computing and Dell. At Dell, Bill worked in the Office of the Chairman on several key strategic initiatives.
Before Dell, Bill worked as a management consultant at McKinsey and Company, where he served clients in North America, South America, and Europe across a wide range of industries.
Bill received an MBA with honors from the University of Texas at Austin and his B.A. from Yale University. A frequent speaker at trade shows and online marketing events (including Search Engine Strategies, Online Market World, Innotech, and the e-Marketing summit), Bill has also been featured for his online marketing acumen in the Wall Street Journal, Washington Post, LA Times, and CNBC's Squawkbox.
David Lee
Web Strategist, FG SQUARED
David is currently working at FG Squared as a web strategist helping with accounts such as AMD, Shell, Premiere Global Service and Callaway Golf. Before he joined FG Squared, he worked as a senior web designer at Callaway Golf where he directed the overall front end of the company's B2C
shop.callawaygolf.com and B2B site
callawayconnect.com . During his 10 years career as a web guru, David helped build and manage four e-commerce stores with a combined revenue of more than 50 million dollars. He is a huge user experience advocate who believes in user centered design which he had been involved several user tests throughout his career. He studied Computer Science and Sports Management at the University of Texas in Austin.
Jon Lebkowsky
President, Polycot Associates
Jon Lebkowsky writes about culture, technology, media, sustainability and other topics for various publications, and has been blogging regularly since 2000. He's an acknowledged authority on social media and online community
In 1991 he cofounded the pioneering online company FringeWare, Inc., the first company to attempt e-commerce. The company published the influential magazine FringeWare Review, which had an international distribution. He was involved in online community and e-commerce projects throughout the 1990s, and worked with bOING bOING (as associate editor for the original paper zine), HotWired, The Whole Earth Catalog, Electric Minds, and many other web and cyberculture projects and endeavors during the World Wide Web's first decade. In the late 90s, I was actively involved in the creation of various e-commerce and community initiatives for Whole Foods Market (and gained quite a few pounds, for obvious reasons).
Ynema Mangum
Web 2.0 Product Line Manager, Network.com, Sun Microsystems
Ynema Mangum is an experienced social media and product management professional responsible for the next generation Web 2.0 experience for Network.com. Previously, she played a key role in bringing Web 2.0 to BMC Software, a $1.7 billion publicly traded company with 6,000 employees. Her bloggers and podcast interviewees have been quoted on Digg, Slashdot, Wired Magazine, ZDNet, Computer Business Review, LinuxToday, and Forbes as well as others.
Ynema is a change agent. She considers herself a quiet influencer and a connector whose collaborative nature ensures success in introducing new concepts and services into the mainstream -- even in the most complex environments. She thrives on doing what seems to be impossible, and enjoys taking calculated risks in her personal life -- snowboarding, skiing, SCUBA diving or wake boarding when the season is right. She is certified in ITIL v3 best practices and is an active sponsor of the Austin Social Media Club.
blog:
ynemamangum.blogspot.com
Erik McMillan
Principal Partner, PROACE Technology Services
Erik McMillan is a Principal Partner at PROACE Technology Services, Inc. with corporate headquarters in Austin, Texas. His experience spans business, technology, marketing consulting, planning, development, and management for a wide range of projects across real-estate, energy, manufacturing, retail, service, healthcare, education, and government sectors. Mr. McMillan maintains an in-depth understanding of how and why information technology advances business and marketing performance. Erik has consulted companies around the world on web-enabled, secure, ecommerce technology projects. Graduating with Honors from The University of Texas at Austin, with a degree in Management Information Systems, Erik now operates on the management team at PROACE. In addition to his significant role at PROACE, Erik also sits on the board of numerous technology businesses in Austin.
PROACE is a full service agile Web solutions firm working to help its customers solve business challenges and achieve exceptional performance online. They specialize in custom application development, project management, e-commerce portals, online community implementation, database management/reporting, and online media/marketing. For more information, visit
www.proace.com
Jason Myers
Owner and Publisher, Business District Magazine
C. Jason Myers is the owner and publisher of
Business District Magazine, a city regional business magazine distributed throughout Central Texas. Business District publishing has also established a number of email and web communications, conferences, and is currently in process of producing an internet television program to run on its website. Mr. Myers has over 14 years of industry experience in business-to-business publications, and has served in several marketing management positions for companies in high-tech industry, where he established several brand publications that led to increased sales and market awareness. Mr. Myers has a Bachelor of Science degree in Journalism from the University of Kansas.
Andy Meadows
CEO, Live Oak 360
Andy Meadows is a 12-year veteran of the internet era, with his most recent endeavor being founder of Live Oak 360, an Austin-based Web technology services company.
Live Oak 360 specializes in customized application development, Web development, interactive consulting, conversion acceleration and social networking applications to assist companies in managing their digital landscapes. Live Oak has worked with clients such as AMD, Motorola, Buffalo Technology, Time Warner Cable Media Sales, Green Mountain Energy, and World Vision.
Prior to starting Live Oak 360 in 2002, Meadows was with Medtadot and Nortel Networks. Meadows' expertise lies in the areas of enterprise technology strategy and solutions, e-commerce, social networking and open source technologies.
Patrick Nichols
Senior Content Strategist, Avenue A/Razorfish
Patrick Nichols is an editorial consultant with 10 years of experience helping some of the world's largest organizations improve how they communicate on the web. His portfolio includes work with Dell Computer, the U.S. Air Force, AMD, State Farm Insurance, AT&T, and Southwest Airlines. Today, he is Senior Content Strategist in the Austin office of Avenue A / Razorfish, the largest interactive agency in the U.S.
Tom Parish
CEO, Tom Parish, Inc.
TOM PARISH is an authority in the realm of social media and has the background to prove it. Having worked with the Internet since its infancy, Tom has been intimately involved with the intertwined evolution of the web and business over the last two decades including 10 years at Motorola as manager of IT for the semiconductor research teams. Tom was a principle in an innovative Motorola DigitalDNA web marketing thrust in the late 90's that reached over 22 million people globally.
In 2000 Tom founded a SEO business 4webresults then created social media and social networking consultancy more than four years ago. Tom has introduced leading edge concepts for major enterprise scale business to leverage social media for business growth. Tom continues to contribute to the IT community through multiple podcast shows he produces. He currently hosts the multi-interest interview show Talking Portraits as well as the
EnterpriseLeadership.org show, designed to illustrate where business management and IT meet at the CIO level. ITConversations is host for the TalkingPortraits show.
John Rasco
Founder and President, RefreshWeb: Successful Search Marketing
As a panelist for the Putting Social Commerce to Work conference, John Rasco will be contributing from the dual perspectives of personal use of social media (LinkedIn, Ning, Twitter, Facebook, Sphinn, Digg, YouTube, Blip.tv, del.icio.us, and submitted articles) and from the challenges of using social media for B2B marketing. The changing expectations of the market include direct access to information, transparency and qualifying prospective vendors from what they find on the web, expecting to bypass the sales organization and get a quote immediately, not an easy transition for companies!
RefreshWeb, a B2B Web marketing agency, serves mid-sized corporations that desire to maximize their search engine rankings, optimize on-line sales processes, and strengthen their Internet marketing presence. RefreshWeb team members are both SEO experts and marketing masters - a rare combination. The RefreshWeb team excels at weaving SEO rules and marketing principles together into one solid Internet marketing strategy.
Specializing in technology-based companies since 1987, and active in Internet marketing since 1992, Rasco's skills as a marketer, team leader and strategist are key to successful client engagements. Founder of Brand X Austin and RefreshWeb, John has an entrepreneurial gene, a creative bent and a passion for challenging projects. He has been a client-side marketing director, a principal in a graphic design firm, president of an advertising agency, and senior vice president of the Southwest's largest business-to-business agency, responsible for Science and Technology.
Connie Reece
Principal, Reece & Company
For more than 30 years Connie Reece has been writing for publication and consulting with companies and nonprofits on their marketing and communication needs. One of the leading conversational writers in the U.S., Connie advises companies on how to "join the conversation" by incorporating social media strategies into their marketing mix. Authenticity is her hallmark: she lives online, and her social network runs the gamut from teenage "digital natives" to the graybeards of PR and marketing.
Connie is the founder of EveryDotConnects, a consortium of independent media practitioners who are passionate about using new technologies to build bridges between people and ideas and causes. She also serves as Executive Director of the international Social Media Club, a best-practices organization for users and creators of emerging media. When a friend was diagnosed with breast cancer in late 2007, Connie created the Frozen Pea Fund, now incorporated as a nonprofit organization with the mission of funding breast cancer research, education and programs.
Matt Reyes
Account Executive (Research, New Media), Mercury Mambo
Matt Reyes is the head of interactive and social media efforts at Mercury Mambo, a Hispanic experiential marketing, sales promotions, and branding agency based in Austin, Texas. Having worked in bottom-up organizations, he knows the power of word-of-mouth marketing amongst different niche groups (Hispanic, college-aged, et al.). Matt is responsible for developing Mercury Mambo's Web 2.0 efforts, which compliments their offline endeavors and ethos.
Mercury Mambo's blog, Cup O' Mambo, is one of the top Hispanic marketing blogs on the web that focuses on Hispanic marketing trends. "Cup O' Mambo" provides a daily sip for readers with regular posts relevant to the Hispanic community. Their blog launched Mambo-style with a special music series on Austin's Latino Music Month. Blog posts include pictures, video clips and the latest trends.
For more information on Mercury Mambo, visit:
www.MercuryMambo.com
Lorin Rivers
President, Mosasaur Marketing & Technology Consulting
Barry Rumac
Senior Strategist, FG SQUARED
With over 35 years of strategic and tactical marketing and marketing communications experience, Barry has worked in a variety of companies and industries, ranging from consumer goods to high tech. Barry's experience includes short and long term strategic planning, brand building, advertising and public relations for companies that sold direct and through distribution. He has worked for both advertising agencies and client companies in such diverse industries as food, drug, computers, videoconfencing, payroll services, insurance and consumer electronics. Within his business career, Barry founded strategic marketing services firms to engage with companies that require marketing and communication expertise but have neither the resources nor internal bandwidth to accomplish their marketing goals on their own.
Among the many beneficiaries of Mr. Rumac's experience are VTEL Corporation, Dell Computer Corporation, and Automatic Data Processing (ADP). Barry worked for Grey Direct Advertising as Executive Vice President where he opened an office in Raleigh, NC with IBM PC Direct as the major client. He also served as Vice President of Sales and Marketing for Target Technologies in Wilmington, NC. Barry was a co-founder and Managing Partner of Vision Edge Marketing, Inc. a strategic marketing services firm located in Austin, TX. Prominent among his clients were BMC Corporation and SicolaMartin Advertising where he was involved with such companies as Citrix Corporation, and FutureLink. a pioneer in the ASP market.. He has a Bachelor of Business Administration from Pace University.
Tony Schum
Director of Economic Development, Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce
Tony Schum is the Director of Economic Development for the Greater Austin Chamber of Commerce. The Economic Development department at the Chamber focuses on the attraction of new companies to the region and retention of existing regional companies. His responsibilities include recruiting in the digital media, wireless and automotive industries and supporting the Business Retention & Expansion program at the Chamber as it meets with existing companies to identify and resolve issues affecting the business climate.
Schum attended the University of Nevada, Las Vegas and Texas State University, San Marcos, where he received a bachelor's degree in political science. Prior to his work at the Greater Austin Chamber, he worked in Governor Perry's Office of Constituent Services. He joined the Chamber in 2004 and held three positions before assuming the Director's role. Through continuing education courses at the University of Arizona and University of Oklahoma, he will earn Economic Development Certification in 2007.
Schum was born and raised in Dallas and moved to Central Texas in 2000. He enjoys volunteering as a mentor at Fulmore Middle School through Austin Partners in Education, membership in Skillpoint Alliance's Digital Media Council, Texas Economic Development Council, Society of Automotive Engineers and is active in promoting responsible economic development in Austin. He enjoys the outdoor recreation Austin has to offer and all the environmental stewardship that goes with it.
Susan Scrupski
Chief of Applied Research, nGenera Corporation
Susan Scrupski, the Chief of Applied Research (CAR) at nGenera Corporation is responsible for keeping abreast of leading trends and technologies that impact Next Generation Enterprise customers. Ms. Scrupski relates this information to internal collaboration teams (consultants, other researchers, business development teams, project teams, etc.) for the purpose of advising clients. Functioning oftentimes as a quasi-analyst, she publishes commentary and trends analysis in the blogosphere on her ITSinsider blog, participates on the conference circuit, and engages in active conversation with the blogging community.
Jim Stedman
Senior Project Manager, FG SQUARED
Jim Stedman is a Senior Project Manager at FG SQUARED. His twelve years of experience have garnered over 160 awards including being named to AV Video Multimedia Producer magazine's Top 100 Producers for three years in a row. He has managed projects for FG SQUARED clients such as AMD, Canon, Compaq, Dell, Hitachi, Shell, Texas Association of Community Health Centers, Tivoli, Varco and Vignette.
Jim is also a Writer, Director and Editor whose work has ranged from video, CD-ROM, web and tradeshows to radio, television and film. Jim's projects have aired on the Independent Film Channel, screened at the Directors Guild of America in Los Angeles and New York and been accepted into festivals/competitions such as Project Greenlight, SXSW, the Chrysler/Hypnotic/Universal Studios Million Dollar Film Festival, the Texas Filmmaker's Showcase, the San Francisco DocFest, Slamdunk, and the Austin Film Festival. Jim holds a B.B.A. in Marketing from the University of Texas at Austin and has been with FG SQUARED for over ten years.
Evan Torchin
Senior Design Analyst, frog design
Evan Torchin works as a senior design analyst at frog design, an international creative consultancy specializing in industrial design and convergent mobile, desktop and Web application design. While at frog, Evan has led efforts for clients such as HP, Bell Mobility, Major League Baseball, and Yahoo!, with whom he was worked closely to develop their next generation instant messaging application. As a senior design analyst, Evan drives the research, strategy, information architecture and interaction design that communicates both the business requirements of their clients and the emotional desires of the end-users.
Brad Warren
Director of Technology, FG SQUARED
Brad Warren is Technology Director for FG SQUARED interactive marketing, where he is responsible for the overall quality of technical work. He brings knowledge and experience from his 12 years in the web and IT technology industry. His experience is broad and deep, ranging from interactive Flash interfaces to sophisticated social networks. Brad is passionate about social media technology and its impact on culture and the future of how individuals and businesses communicate and collaborate.
Prior to joining FG SQUARED Brad served as Technical Director for Origin Design, a Houston-based graphic design firm, where his technology experience allowed the company to expand from a print design business to an interactive web applications provider. Brad's interest in interactive web technology began early in his career while at IBM, where he developed and maintained web-based groupware applications. He holds a B.S. in Computer Science from the University of Texas at Austin.
Adam Weinroth
Director of Product Marketing, Pluck
Leading product marketing for Pluck, Adam plays a central role in formulating the vision, definition and delivery of the company's syndication and publisher software services including the groundbreaking BlogBurst syndication network and SiteLife Social Media Suite. Adam joined the company in 2005 when Pluck acquired Easyjournal, a community blog publishing platform which Adam founded and grew to more than 100,000 registered users. Prior to creating Easyjournal in 2002, Adam held leadership roles in new product development and technology marketing with Mediatruck and IntelliQuest. Adam has a BBA in Marketing and an MBA focusing on Technology Marketing Strategy from The University of Texas at Austin.
Michael Wilson
Founder and CEO, Small World Labs
Michael Wilson is the founder and CEO of Small World Labs, which provides a social networking and online community platform for enterprises to enterprises, such as British Telecom, Dallas Morning News, Scottrade, Save The Children, and the American Cancer Society. Small World Labs combines its technology and community building expertise to help its customers better understand, engage, and serve their key constituents.
Prior to founding Small World Labs, Michael served as the Director of Product Management at Coremetrics, a leading provider of web analytics solutions. As head of the group, Michael's responsibilities included delivering new products and services, evaluating new markets, and assessing partner technologies. Before Coremetrics, Michael founded Wilson & Company, a return on investment consulting company. Prior to that, Michael was a management consultant for R. B. Webber & Company (a spin-off of McKinsey and Boston Consulting Group associates) where he led projects for high-tech companies, including Hewlett-Packard, Sprint, FedEx, and several start ups that were later acquired by larger companies, such as Cisco and Vignette.
Michael holds a B.A. in economics with summa cum laude and departmental honors from Yale University, and has also completed studies at Oxford University.
