Speakers
Dwight Aspinwall '84
Co-founder, JetBoil
Dwight Aspinwall is co-founder and chairman of JetBoil, a leading manufacturer of portable cooking systems based in Guild, New Hampshire. Before JetBoil, he served as software director for Vicinity, a location services company based in Palo Alto, California. Aspinwall led Vicinity's product diversification, which took it from a single customer - Yahoo! - to more than one hundred Fortune 1000 firms. Vicinity went public in 2000 and was acquired by Microsoft in 2003. Before Vicinity, he was co-founder and president of Intermap, a business mapping software company based in New Hampshire. Intermap was acquired by PC Globe, an Arizona company, in 1991. Aspinwall received his AB from Dartmouth.
John Barrett TU'94
Managing Director, Conley & Company
John Barrett TU'94 is managing director of Conley & Company, specializing in general management retained recruiting for CEOs and other senior executives. His clients are primarily portfolio companies of private equity and venture capital investors focused on business services, consumer services and related technology, online media, and financial technology. Previously, Barrett was an executive director with Russell Reynolds Associates where he was a member of the firm's global Technology and Financial Services Practices. He has also worked for Citigroup, French strategy-consulting firm Mars & Co, and ICI Americas, the U.S. subsidiary of the British chemicals conglomerate. He received his BS in mechanical engineering magna cum laude from Tufts University and his MBA from Tuck School.
Peter Barris TU'77
Managing General Partner, New Enterprise Associates
Peter Barris TU'77 is managing general partner of New Enterprise Associates. During his tenure in the venture capital industry, he has been closely involved in the formation of more than thirty information technology companies, of which ten have participated in public offerings and ten in mergers. Barris currently serves as a director of Boingo Wireless, eCommerce Industries, Hillcrest Labs, Mkt10, Neutral Tandem, ProtoStar, and Vonage. He also serves on the Board of Trustees of Northwestern University, the Board of Overseers of the Tuck School at Dartmouth College and the boards of the National Venture Capital Association and Mid-Atlantic Venture Association. Before joining NEA, Peter was president and chief operating officer at LEGENT. He received a BS in electrical engineering from Northwestern University and an MBA from Tuck School.
John Bello TU'74
Founder and former CEO, SoBe Beverages
In 1995 John Bello TU'74 founded and served as CEO of South Beach Beverage Company, which makes nutritionally enhanced teas and juices. SoBe was sold to PepsiCo for $370 million in 2001. Bello is founded Firefighter Brands in 2003 and currently serves as its CEO. He is chairman of Soup Kitchen International, which markets the soups of the New York soup chef who inspired the famous Seinfeld "Soup Nazi" character. He is also an active venture capitalist. Before SoBe, Bello spent fourteen years at National Football League Properties and is credited with building it into a sports marketing leader. Bello achieved the rank of Lieutenant (Senior Grade) and received the Navy Commendation Medal with Combat V for meritorious service on riverboats in South Vietnam. He graduated cum laude from Tufts University in 1968 with a BA in history and received an MBA from Tuck School in 1974.
Shayan Bhattacharyya '01
Shayan Bhattacharyya '01 is a PhD student in the Center for the Evaluative Clinical Sciences at Dartmouth Medical School. His research focus is on translational research policy and issues in evaluating early-stage medical innovations - particularly diagnostic imaging - as they move from in vitro laboratory testing and development to initial clinical use. Prior to starting his PhD studies, he assisted in the development of a novel biopolymer for total knee replacement surgery at Massachusetts General Hospital that has since been licensed to Zimmer Orthopaedics. Bhattacharyya received an AB in engineering sciences modified with biology from Dartmouth.
Tom Blaisdell TU'89
General Partner, Doll Capital Management (DCM)
Tom Blaisdell TU'89 is general partner of DCM, focusing on software, technology-enabled services, and media. He helps DCM portfolio companies craft high growth marketing strategies, structure successful strategic partnerships, and build strong management teams. Previously, Blaisdell spent three years at two Internet startups, Encanto Networks and Fatbrain.com (formerly computerliteracy.com). He was vice president of marketing at Encanto and served as an advisor to computerliteracy.com from its inception through completion of its first venture-backed financing. Blaisdell spent six years with Intuit, worked for Bain & Co. in San Francisco and Boston. He holds a BSME with distinction from Stanford University, and an MBA with high distinction from Tuck School, where he was an Edward Tuck Scholar.
Colin Blaydon
Buchanan Professor of Management, Tuck School
Director, Tuck's Center for Private Equity and Entrepreneurship
Colin Blaydon is the founding director of Tuck's Center for Private Equity and Entrepreneurship. He is also dean emeritus at Tuck and the William and Josephine Buchanan Professor of Management, teaching entrepreneurship, corporate governance, and private equity finance. His research interests include private equity finance (both venture capital and buyout) and strategy and governance of firms providing or receiving private equity financing. Formerly on the faculties of Harvard and Duke Universities, Blaydon has also worked at the Defense Department and Federal Budget Office and as an executive, and served as a board member at a number of private-sector firms and investment funds. Blaydon received a BEE from the University of Virginia and an AM and PhD in applied mathematics from Harvard University.
Rich Brown T'93
General Partner, The Aurora Funds
Rich Brown T'93 is a general partner at The Aurora Funds, founded in 1994, which has more than $200 million under management. He focuses on Aurora's information technology investments, primarily in the areas of Internet infrastructure, software, wireless, and communications. He also serves on the boards of Covelight, Foresight, Synchris, Nextreme, Unitrends and WiDeFi and is a board observer at VetCentric Before joining Aurora, Brown was a senior associate at Safeguard Scientifics, Inc., a public venture capital holding company, where he was actively involved in conducting due diligence, structuring and closing investments in the areas of IT services, enterprise software and communications. Brown earned a BS magna cum laude in electrical engineering from Duke and an MBA from Tuck School.
Paul Danos
Dean, Tuck School of Business
Paul Danos is the ninth dean of Tuck School and the Laurence F. Whittemore Professor of Business Administration. He was appointed dean of Tuck on July 1, 1995. Before joining Tuck, he was senior associate dean and chaired professor of accounting at the University of Michigan. Danos was chairman of the accounting department at the University of Michigan from 1984-1991 and served as the director of the Paton Accounting Center from 1988-1991. A partial list of Danos's professional associations includes the board of directors of BJ's Wholesale Club, General Mills and GMAC, and the New Hampshire Governor's State Consensus Revenue Estimating Panel. He is a CPA and a member of the AICPA. Danos received his BS and MBA from the University of New Orleans and PhD from the University of Texas at Austin in 1974.
Gregg Fairbrothers '76
Founding Director, Dartmouth Entrepreneurial Network
Adjunct Professor of Business Administration, Tuck School
Gregg Fairbrothers '76 serves as the founding director of the Dartmouth Entrepreneurial Network and is an adjunct professor of business administration at Tuck School. Prior to returning to Dartmouth in 1999, he served in a variety of management and executive positions in the oil and gas industry over 22 years, managing and founding exploration and production companies on three continents. Fairbrothers received his AB in earth sciences in 1975, an MS degree in geology from Rutgers in 1977, and an MBA from the University of Tulsa in 1983.
Phil Ferneau '84, TU'96
General Partner, Borealis Ventures
Phil Ferneau '84, TU'96 is co-founder and managing director of Borealis Ventures, a Hanover-based venture capital firm that invests in seed and early stage companies in northern New England and throughout the Dartmouth network. He formerly served as the founding executive director of Tuck's Center for Private Equity and Entrepreneurship. He is now an advisory director at the center and an adjunct associate professor teaching private equity and entrepreneurship at Tuck. Prior experience includes senior operating roles with an application software company and a private legal practice specializing in international trade. He received an AB from Dartmouth, a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law, and an MBA with high distinction from Tuck School.
Dick Green '75
Managing Director, Granite State Angels
Board Member, JetBoil
Richard L. Green is co-founder and managing director of Granite State Angels, a regional investment group located in Hanover, NH, and a director of Jetboil, Inc., a New Hampshire company producing innovative products for the outdoor recreation market.
He is president of the Grafton County Economic Development Council, one of the partners in the planned Dartmouth Regional Technology Center incubator and is also
a co-founder, director and former chairman of VoteHere, Inc., a Seattle-based producer of security systems for electronic and online voting. Green has served as a member of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center Assembly of Overseers since 1997. He received his AB from Dartmouth and was awarded the John G. Kemeny Prize in Computing in 1976.
Eric Herr
former President, Autodesk
Eric Herr retired as president and chief operating officer of Autodesk in 1999. Currently he chairs the board of directors of Workscape and the audit committee of the board of Taleo, both HR software and services firms. He also serves on two commissions for the State of New Hampshire (the Commission to Review The Comprehensive Shoreland Protection Act and the Citizens Commission on the State Courts), teaches in the graduate programs of the Whittemore School of Business and Economics at the University of New Hampshire, and works with a number of not-for-profit institutions locally and nationally. Previously, he held executive positions in hardware at Sun Microsystems, publishing at McGraw-Hill, and on Wall Street at Lionel D. Edie. Herr is an economist by training and has served on the staff of the President's Council of Economic Advisors and testified before Congress on housing and energy policy.
Dave Hodess '84
CEO/President, Gamefly.com
Dave Hodess is president and CEO of GameFly, the market leading video game subscription rental site. Since he joined GF in 2003, it has scaled subscribers and revenues twenty times, signed promotional deals with Best Buy, McDonalds, Electronic Arts, Bic, GameStop, and Del Taco, and raised three rounds of private equity led by Sequoia Capital. In 1998, he founded Cooking.com and over the next five years, as president and CEO, he recruited the entire management team and grew annual revenues to $30 million. Previously, he was a member of Disney's corporate strategic planning department and led the international business development efforts for The Disney Store. Hodess received an AB in government from Dartmouth and an MBA from Harvard in 1988.
Michael Horvath
Research Scholar and Adjunct Associate Professor of Business Administration, Tuck School
Michael Horvath is a consulting entrepreneur and economist. He provides strategic and operational consulting to emerging life sciences and information technology companies and economic consulting and litigation support to law firms, corporations, and government agencies. From 2001 to 2005 Horvath was the chief financial officer and vice president of operations of GlycoFi, Inc. He oversaw the financial and operational aspects of a growing biotech start-up and helped to shape the strategic vision of the company from inception. Previously, Horvath co-founded Kana Software, Inc, a provider of web-architected enterprise relationship management solutions, and the Economics Resource Group, an economic consulting firm. He received an AB in economics with honors from Harvard and a PhD in economics from Northwestern University.
Bob Hower TU'93
General Partner, Advanced Technology Ventures
Bob Hower TU'93 is general partner of Advanced Technology Ventures, focusing on investments in the enterprise infrastructure and software sectors. He serves on the boards of Acme Packet, Application Networks, ChannelAdvisor, and eSecurity, and is an observing board member for AppIQ. Previously, he was vice president of sales at LHS Group, where he built the company's Enhanced Services Division for the Europe, Middle East, and Africa regions and help helped grow its revenue from approximately $3.5 million to $45 million. Hower also had sales and marketing roles at Lotus Development and General Mills. and was a director at BancBoston Ventures, where he focused on the telecommunications and IT infrastructure sectors. Hower received an AB cum laude from Harvard and an MBA from Tuck School.
Rob Jevon TU'79
Partner, Boston Millennia Partners
Robert Jevon is a partner at Boston Millennia, a diversified venture capital fund with $700 million under management. He focuses on investments in health care and life sciences. Previous experience includes Watch Hill Corporation, a Boston-based private investment firm, and Bolt Beranek and Newman, where he served as controller of the Communications Division and CFO of the Airline Reservations subsidiary. Earlier he held financial management positions at General Electric and Puritan Life Insurance Company. He currently sits on the boards of Galt Associates, Athenix Corporation, Novalar, and Protein Forest. Previously he had management responsibility for Proteome, HotJobs, eMed, Netifice Corporation, and iParty. Jevon is a graduate of Haverford College with an AB in economics and has an MBA from Tuck School.
Lisa Porter Kable '90
Co-founder, Artemis Woman
Lisa Porter Kable '90 is the co-founder and managing partner of Artemis Woman, LLC, a women's wellness company that sells natural home spa products to female baby-boomers via national retailers such as The Sharper Image, Bloomingdale's, and QVC. Previously, she was global marketing director for Remington Products, where she tripled the women's shaving business in two years. Prior to that, she worked for the James River Corporation, where she drove record Dixie cup sales and profits, including the successful re-launch of the famed Dixie Riddle Cups. She began her brand management career in 1990 at the Quaker Oats Company on its largest brand, Gatorade. She was credited with significantly shortening cycle times to develop, test, and launch new products. Kable received an AB in Chinese language and culture from Dartmouth.
Audrey Kania TU'90
Executive VP, World Poker Tour
Audrey Kania TU'90 is executive vice president of the World Poker Tour. A business strategy consultant, she has launched seven new business ventures for both entrepreneurial and Fortune 50 companies. While with the Walt Disney Company, Kania managed the new venture development efforts for two divisions of Disney's Consumer Products Group, launching a multi-million dollar film venture and expanding the Winnie-the-Pooh brand into a new global category. She has since consulted to major sports franchises, television broadcast companies, and a number of successful Internet-based businesses on start-up and marketing strategies. Kania earned her BS in management science and printing technology from Carnegie-Mellon University and an MBA from Tuck School. She also studied creative writing at Oxford University, England.
Robert Koski '51
Founder, Sun Hydraulics
Bob Koski '51 is the founder of Sun Hydraulics Corporation, a company widely studied by organizational behaviorists. From start-up in 1970, Sun has avoided formal hierarchies such as job titles, reporting relationships, job descriptions, and organizational charts. Sun, which manufactures proprietary pressure, flow and motion control valves for fluid power actuation, employs over 700 people at plants in the United States and overseas. Koski is an ASME Fellow, past chairman of the Fluid Power Systems and Technology Division of ASME, past president of the Sarasota Manatee Manufacturers Association, and past chairman of the National Fluid Power Association. He receive his AB from Dartmouth.
Blair LaCorte TU'90
Operating Partner, Texas Pacific Group
Blair LaCorte TU'90 is an operating partner with Texas Pacific Group. Previously, he was the executive vice president of strategy and corporate development at Savi Technology, a private, venture-backed solutions provider. Prior to Savi, LaCorte was VerticalNet's senior vice president of strategy and e-commerce and was part of the team that took the company public in 1999. He was an executive in residence and member of the original team that created Internet Capital Group, which became one of the first publicly traded venture funds. LaCorte sits on the board of the Graduate Business Foundation as well as the MBA Advisory Board at Dartmouth. LaCorte received a BA with highest distinction from the University of Maine and an MBA from Tuck School, where he received the Lebowitz Award.
Donna K. Lencki
Co-founder and CEO, ChoiceLinx
Donna K. Lencki is a co-founder of Choicelinx. In July 2005, she sold the company to CIGNA HealthCare, but continues to serve as CEO. Prior to founding Choicelinx, she was CEO for Healthsource NH and senior vice president and general manager for the Northeast Region for CIGNA HealthCare. Starting as one of Healthsource's first employees in 1985, Lencki was the driving force and visionary behind the sales and marketing organization for the company. She became CEO of Healthsource in 1994. Under her leadership, Healthsource was ranked one of the top twenty Health Plans in the country by US News and World Report, was the first HMO in the state to receive full three-year accreditation from National Committee for Quality Assurance (NCQA), and was chosen as one of the "Best Companies to Work For" by Business New Hampshire magazine.
Steve Lipscomb '84
Founder and CEO, World Poker Tour
Steven Lipscomb '84 is the founder and president of WPT Enterprises, Inc., the company behind the World Poker Tour. Lipscomb has extensive experience filming professional poker. In 1999, he produced and directed "On the Inside of the World Series of Poker" for the Discovery channel, the highest rated poker show in the history of television. In 2003, Lipscomb created the first professional poker tour, the first weekly televised poker series, a production company that develops concepts around poker and gaming, and a licensing arm that is aligning with manufacturers, publishers, and other organizations to bring to market WPT-branded consumer products. Formerly an attorney with Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, Lipscomb received an AB with honors from Dartmouth College, where he was president of his class. He received his JD from the University of Chicago.
Steve Lubrano TU'87
Assistant Dean, Chief Operations Officer, Tuck School
Steve Lubrano TU'87 is assistant dean and chief operations officer of Tuck School. He joined Tuck in 1993 and most recently served as director of the MBA program. Prior to that, he was director of career services, where he conceptualized and managed a strategic and tactical redesign of the Career Office to both improve student services and develop a corporate-centric approach to the market. He began his tenure at Tuck as associate director of corporate relations and director of the Tuck Associates program, which he successfully reintroduced to strengthen corporate relationships. In 1989, he founded (and later successfully sold) the Kindred Group Inc to purchase the southeastern Massachusetts franchise rights to Mailboxes Etc. He received a BA from St. Lawrence University in 1981 and an MBA from Tuck School.
Bill Martin '87
Teaching and Research Fellow, Tuck School
Bill Martin is a teaching and research fellow at Tuck School. He spent a decade working in the fixed income derivatives markets for Morgan Stanley and J.P. Morgan. His last tour of duty included running J.P. Morgan's bond options business in London. Bill retired in 1997 in order to spend more time with his young and growing family. He, his wife, and their three children currently live in Hanover. Martin's current activities include coaching local entrepreneurs, serving on nonprofit boards, instructing MBA candidates, and fly-fishing. He received his AB from Dartmouth.
Jane Martin
General Partner, Village Ventures
Jane Martin is a general partner of Village Ventures, heading the Midwest fund development effort in a five-state region. Before joining the company in 2001, Martin was acting CEO of WisdomTools (Indiana University's first technology spin-out), a general partner of U.S. Venture Partners for its first three funds, and a principal at Allstate Insurance Company's Venture Capital Division in Chicago. She has funded such companies as Callaway Golf, Avia, Mathematica, Metromail, and Equatorial Communications. She has been awarded the Torchbearer Award in Entrepreneurship by the governor of Indiana and is a past recipient of the Entrepreneur Award of Indiana University's Kelley School of Business. She received a BS in marketing and finance from Indiana University in 1971 and is a CFA.
Gordie Nye 76, TU'81
General Partner, Prism Venture Partners
Gordie Nye 76, TU'81 is a general partner at Prism Venture Partners, focusing on medical devices, specialty pharma, and breakthrough diagnostics. He currently serves as director for CoAxia and chairman of Myocor. Prior to joining the firm in 2003, Nye served as CEO of REVA Medical, Inc., the developer of a novel resorbable, drug-eluding stent for the interventional market. In 1998, Nye and colleagues at Group Outcome joined with Liberty Partners to acquire Critikon, the patient monitoring unit of Johnson & Johnson. He served as president and CEO and led a comprehensive product line overhaul. He was also president, CEO and director of "A" Company, a premier brand in the orthodontic appliance market. Nye received his AB in English magna cum laude from Dartmouth and an MBA from Tuck School.
Matt Rightmire TU'96
Venture Partner, Borealis Ventures
Matt Rightmire T'96 is a venture partner with Borealis Ventures. He was a founding member of the product development team at Yahoo!, joining the company in 1995. As the organization matured, he became vice president and general manager of Media and Entertainment. In 2003. Rightmire joined the founders of Efficient Frontier. During his tenure, the company grew from three employees to more than thirty, from no revenue to $5 million annual run rate, and from four customers to thirty, including eBay and Amazon. He is currently collaborating with Borealis Ventures in Hanover as a Venture Partner, focusing on portfolio companies oriented toward the intersection of technology and media. Rightmire holds a BS in industrial engineering from Stanford and an MBA from Tuck School.
Jeff Shapiro '83
President/CEO, Great Eastern Radio LLC
Jeff Shapiro '83 is president and CEO of Great Eastern Radio LLC. He has founded or co-founded ten companies that have owned and operated more than fifty radio stations. Shapiro currently owns and operates radio stations in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Nebraska, and Virginia through closely held corporate entities including Great Eastern, Force 5 Communications, Community Radio, and Nantucket Public Radio. He also serves as chairman and partner of POP Radio LLC, which is one of the largest in store audio advertising providers in the United States. Previously, he was co-managing partner of Vox Radio Group, which was begun in 2000 and divested its station portfolio in 2004 and 2005, generating substantial returns for investors. Shapiro served as general manager of Dartmouth's AM and FM stations before graduating cum laude with an AB in economics.
Mark Stein '83
Partner, McDermott Will and Emery
Mark Stein '83 is a partner in the corporate department in McDermott Will & Emery LLP's Boston office. He concentrates his practice in securities, mergers and acquisitions and general representation of start-ups, including companies in the information technology and health fields. Stein advises on the issuance of equity and debt securities in private and public offerings, portfolio investment and buy-out transactions, and investments in private equity funds. He currently is outside general counsel to companies in such industries as software, computer peripherals, internet infrastructure systems, and health information systems. Previously, he was acting executive director of the Massachusetts Office of International Trade and Investment. Stein received his AB from Dartmouth and a JD from Harvard, where he was a member of the Harvard Law Review.
James W. Varnum '62
President, Mary Hitchcock Hospital
Jim Varnum '62 has been president of Mary Hitchcock Memorial Hospital since 1978 and president of the Dartmouth-Hitchcock Alliance since 1983. He serves on several health-care boards of trustees including Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center; Cooley Dickinson Health Care Corporation in Northampton, Massachusetts; Central Vermont Medical Center in Barre, Vermont; and North Country Health System in Newport, Vermont. Varnum also serves on the boards of VHA, Inc. in Dallas, Ledyard National Bank in Hanover, New Hampshire Charitable Foundation in Concord, and the Vermont Institute of Natural Sciences in Woodstock. Previously, Varnum was CEO of the University of Washington Hospital in Seattle and the University of Wisconsin Hospitals and Clinics in Madison. He received an AB in economics from Dartmouth and graduated with honors from the University of Michigan with an MA in hospital administration.
Fred Wainwright TU'02
Executive Director, Tuck's Center for Private Equity & Entrepreneurship
Fred Wainwright TU'02 is executive director of the Center for Private Equity and Entrepreneurship at the Tuck School. He is also an adjunct associate professor at Tuck and teaches MBA and executive education courses in private equity and entrepreneurship. He has authored and co-authored a book, reports, cases, and articles on finance and strategy topics, and has fifteen years experience in financial services and entrepreneurship. Wainwright is an investor and board member in growth companies. He is on the board of advisors of North Atlantic Capital, a late stage venture capital firm, and is executive director of North Country Angels and Granite State Angels. Wainwright also serves on the editorial board of the Journal of Entrepreneurial Finance and Business Ventures. He earned a BA in economics and BS in engineering from Stanford and an MBA from Tuck School.
Amy Wang de Rham TU'86
Partner, Rhodes Associates
Amy Wang de Rham T'86 is a partner, global head of asset management and West Coast head of financial services at Rhodes Associates. Her clients include global financial services companies, commercial and investment banks, money management firms (traditional and alternatives), endowments and foundations, fund of funds, private equity and venture capital firms. Previously, she was a senior client partner Korn Ferry International and a member of the firm's global financial services practice. de Rham began her search career at Spencer Stuart where she gained the majority of her search experience. Prior to Spencer Stuart, de Rham was a managing director and senior research analyst at Banc of America Securities, LLC, in San Francisco. She has an AB from Princeton University, and an MBA from Tuck School.
