DISCUSSION: Cherie Liu Managing Partner Outpost Capital; Jeff Dorman Portfolio Manager Arca; Winston Feng CEO/CoFounder RAC Group; MODERATOR: Monette Stephens, Managing Director SF Growth Capital
Blockchain
Blockchain Competitive Advantage A 2019 Thought Experiment
Matthew Le Merle, CoFounder Fifth Era & Managing Partner Keiretsu Capital, the world’s largest angel network and most active US venture investor. Matthew is a sought-after speaker and innovation consultant having worked at McKinsey, A.T. Kearney, Monitor, Booz and Gap. Matthew has degrees from Christ Church, Oxford (MA/BA) and Stanford (MBA). He was born in London, UK and now lives in the San Francisco Bay Area with his wife, Alison Davis, and their five children.
Guest Post by Matthew Le Merle, Managing Partner Keiretsu Capital
Jeremy Almond CEO PayStand #blockchaincryptofuture
Jeremy Almond CEO PayStand Paystand is a business to business focused digital payment company. Jeremy started his career as an engineer at nanotech startup Digital Instruments, later acquired by Veeco (Nadaq: VECO). At Veeco he led the enterprise architecture, helping shrink massive computers down to devices that now fit in our pockets. Since then Jeremy has worked as an operator and investor at a number of startups & established companies to drive improvements in digital commerce, ERP, and payments. He holds a computer engineering degree from the University of California and masters from the University of Massachusetts, where he did his thesis on how technology can help drive positive change in a broken financial system.
Pierre Wolff VP Tierion #blockchaincryptofuture
Pierre Wolff VP Tierion Pierre is a 20+ year veteran of Silicon Valley as a business strategist, startup advisor/mentor, and people-connector in the tech industry. At Tierion, a company that has developed a “proof engine” leveraging a decentralized network of nodes for time-stamping and anchoring digital content on the Bitcoin Blockchain, Pierre runs business development after having been an advisor there for two years. Pierre is also a Managing Director at ExecConnect, a consultancy where he focuses on helping financial and technology companies better understand the blockchain and cryptocurrency related ecosystems. In addition to advising several startups, he is an advisor to Science Blockchain, a Santa Monica-based blockchain-focused incubator that raised a venture fund using a registered security token offering in November 2017. When not in his day job, Pierre is a regular participant at various blockchain and cryptocurrency events as a moderator or panelist, discussing regulatory, business model, and technology suitability issues.