Steve Bourne

Steve Bourne is currently the chief technology officer at El Dorado Ventures. Internationally known for his work on the UNIX operating system, he designed the UNIX Command Language -– commonly called the “Bourne Shell” -– that is widely used as a scripting language in the UNIX programming environment. In 1983, Bourne published The UNIX System, one of the first widely used texts on the effective use of UNIX. Bourne has also served in senior management positions at Cisco Systems, where he was director of engineering for enterprise network management; Sun Microsystems, where he was responsible for the Solaris 2.0 release; Digital Equipment Corporation, where he developed the first RISC-based workstation for DEC; and Silicon Graphics, where he was one of the company’s first employees and served as director of software responsible for their first product to market.

Bourne has a B.Sc. in Mathematics from King’s College London, a Diploma in Computer Science from Cambridge University, and a Ph.D. in Mathematics from Trinity College in Cambridge, England. He is also a past president of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM).

John Seely Brown

John Seely Brown is currently a senior fellow at the Annenberg Center at USC. Previously, he was the chief scientist of Xerox Corporation and the director of its Palo Alto Research Center (PARC), a position he held for nearly two decades. He was a cofounder of the Institute for Research on Learning (IRL). He is a member of the National Academy of Education and a Fellow of the American Association for Artificial Intelligence and of AAAS and a Trustee of Brown University and the MacArthur Foundation. He serves on numerous public boards (Amazon, Corning, Varian Medical Systems and Polycom) and private boards of directors.

He has published over 100 papers in scientific journals and has authored and co-authored several books. His most recent book with John Hagel, The Only Sustainable Edge, is about new forms of collaborative innovation. Brown received a BA from Brown University in 1962 in mathematics and physics and a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan in 1970 in computer and communication sciences. He also has honorary degrees in Science from Brown University and the University of Michigan, in Science and Economics from London Business School, and in Humane Letters from Claremont Graduate School.

Guy Kawasaki

Guy Kawasaki is a managing director of Garage Technology Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm, a columnist for Forbes.com, and a popular blogger. Previously, he was an Apple Fellow at Apple Computer, Inc. where he was one of the individuals responsible for the success of the Macintosh computer.

Kawasaki is the author of eight books including The Art of the Start, Rules for Revolutionaries, How to Drive Your Competition Crazy, Selling the Dream, and The Macintosh Way. His latest book is entitled The Art of the Start-the Time-Tested, Battle-Hardened Guide for Anyone Starting Anything. It reflects his experiences as an evangelist, entrepreneur, investment banker, and venture capitalist.

Kawasaki has a B.A. from Stanford University and an M.B.A. from UCLA as well as an honorary doctorate from Babson College.

Ariel Poler

Ariel Poler has been involved with a number of successful Internet start-ups. He was the founder and CEO of IPRO, the first company to measure and audit web traffic. He was also founder and CEO of Topica, a leading provider of email publishing and lead management solutions. Poler was founding board member of Kana Software, a pioneering provider of CRM solutions [NASDAQ:KANA]; he was founding Chairman of LinkExchange (now Microsoft's bCentral service for small business marketing); and he was a board member of Silicon Investor (now part of InfoSpace). As CEO of TextMarks, Poler is enabling the “long tail” of SMS publishing. And as CEO of Mastil, he is making web-based database solutions accessible to small and medium organizations.

Poler currently serves on several boards of directors, including Bills.com, a provider of consumer debt resolution and lead generation services; Papilia, an innovative provider of technology to help non-profits manage their stewardship efforts; and StumbleUpon, a fast growing content discovery network. He holds a B.S. in Mathematics with Computer Science from MIT and an MBA from Stanford University.

Gerard (Rocky) Roccanova

Gerard (Rocky) Roccanova currently runs a technology company -- Rock and Nova Inc. -- that performs intellectual property consulting, system design concepts, business strategy, and technology vendor management for commercial ventures. A former vice president of technology ventures for Northrop Grumman Mission Systems, Roccanova worked to ensure advanced concepts, critical technologies and resident intellectual capital were applied to customer needs. Roccanova joined TRW (acquired by Northrop Grumman in December 2002) in 1980, launching a 26-year career in high-speed digital communications and signal processing systems, including global networks, space-based broadband communications and computer-technology-integrated systems. He launched Picture PipeLine LLC, which marked TRW’s entry into the entertainment technology industry. He also served as executive director of Futures Lab, a joint venture between TRW and Applied Minds, Inc. Previously, Roccanova served as vice president and general manager for TRW Telecommunications Products and Services and was instrumental in developing the company’s broadband digital network systems business.

Vishal Sikka

Vishal Sikka is senior vice president and general manager of SAP's architecture group with responsibility for roadmap and architecture governance for all of SAP's products and solutions. In addition, he runs SAP's technology office with responsibility for innovation and partnerships in strategic product and technology areas. Prior to joining SAP, Sikka served as area vice president of platform technologies at Peregrine Systems (Remedy) responsible for application development and integration. Sikka joined Peregrine following the acquisition of Bodha, Inc., where he served as founder and CEO. Bodha developed technology for non-invasive, service-based integration of enterprise applications and information.

Sikka holds a Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford University and his experience includes work in modeling, application development, information management and artificial intelligence at Stanford and two startups.

Martin Wegenstein

As VP and CIO of Autodesk, Martin Wegenstein is responsible for the world wide information technology infrastructure and IT based systems solutions, which support business processes and enable new business initiatives. Prior to Autodesk, Martin was VP of Operations at Slam Dunk Networks, a managed network services provider for secure, guaranteed delivery of applications to applications transaction messages. Before Slam Dunk, Wegenstein was Senior VP of Operations and Customer Service at Pilot Network Services, and previously served as CIO at Applied Materials and Raychem, following a long career at Emerson Electric Co. He was recognized with the CIO-100 Award for Best Practices in Human Resources for his work at Raychem.

Wegenstein brings broad knowledge and considerable experience in IT, the software, as well as the managed services industry. He has a degree in Mathematics from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology and a M.S. degree in Computer Science from Union College.