Alex leads strategic marketing partnerships for Cisco, currently focused on the cross-section of technology with music and entertainment. Most recently she has been finding new ways to leverage collaboration and networking solutions for artists and fan experiences, overseeing tour and festival partnerships, and telling meaningful brand stories with inclusion of social impact where possible. She has been connecting dots at Cisco for over 7 years, from developing a proprietary mobile app and leading a big data campaign to working with STEM, CSR and global innovation initiatives for the Rio 2016 Olympics and consulting on the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Prior to Cisco, Alex was at Google for 3+ years in online marketing and sales. She has mentored startups for 10 years, starting with a Silicon Valley incubator and expanding to LA. Alex completed her MBA at UCLA Anderson, specializing in emerging technology and brand strategy, and her BA in Economics and Poetry at Stanford University.

Andy has over 25 years experience in retail, ecommerce operations, marketing and entrepreneurship. Andy has been part of the Sole Society founding team since its inception within HauteLook. As part of the executive team at HauteLook, Andy served as the Senior Vice President and General Manger of Sole Society. Prior to HauteLook, Andy launched and operated a number of Internet and ecommerce related businesses. Andy began his career in sales and marketing at Xerox Corp and then PepsiCo, where he ran marketing for Taco Bell for the Western United States. Andy has a MBA from UCLA Anderson and a B.A. from Hamilton College. 

Carmen Moch is an accomplished Senior Executive and Board Member with more than 25 years of success across the retail, non-profit, and big-box retail industries. Leveraging extensive experience, strategically designing retail store setups and breaking into new markets, she is a valuable asset for businesses in need of a new market strategy or a turnaround. Her broad areas of expertise include human resources, business development, profit and loss, growth strategy, and operations management.

Throughout her career, Carmen has spent a significant portion rising in rank at Target where she held several positions, most recently Senior Group Vice President. Carmen has served as a key contributor in numerous organizational achievements such as; revenue growth, new prototype strategies, executive development, and operational processes. Carmen received her Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of North Dakota and her Master of Business Administration from UCLA Anderson School of Management.

A veteran public relations executive with 20 years of experience, Carolyn specializes in publicity for startups as well as established companies across various industries (beauty/health/wellness, tech/mobile apps, food/hospitality, arts/culture), in addition to promoting a range of special events.

Her highly respected clients have received top awards from nationally known consumer and trade publications, in addition to receiving significant venture capital funding. Beyond providing traditional PR services, she is highly involved with influencer outreach and sponsorships, and also manages external communications agencies in the US, UK and Australia. Other work includes developing strategic partnerships with charitable organizations, sponsorships of major red-carpet events and runway shows, and pursuit of cross-promotional marketing with influencers.

Her clients have been featured in prestigious national outlets like: NBC Today Show; CBS Early Morning; Good Morning America; Cheddar TV; Bloomberg TV; CNN; Extra; Univision; Fox News; Fox and Friends; The Doctors; Dr. Oz Show; The New York Times; The Wall Street Journal; USA Today; Business Insider; Fast Company; Buzzfeed; HuffPost; Yahoo; O-The Oprah Magazine; Parents; Family Circle; Good Housekeeping; Marie Claire, Elle; Vogue; and many others. Plus, she executes regional media campaigns to help grow outposts of national businesses. Between 2016-2017, she booked over 100 TV segments for her clients.

Chris is an award winning digital streaming media executive. He is a seasoned veteran of traditional & digital media experience, with a proven track record of innovation, team building, monetization, strategy and revenue creation. At CBS, true[X], and Nativo, he pioneered digital initiatives and built lasting partnerships with tier-one publishers, media companies, agencies and technology providers. Chris planned, developed, staffed & launched full stack ad tech solutions, and operations teams supporting global publishers, media companies, agencies, brands, and 3^rdparties.

Pioneering streaming media and Internet executive who has consistently gained organizational buy-in and driven businesses forward through combination of consensus-building leadership, expertise, collaboration, drive, and creativity. Passionate about digital innovation and content streaming, with extensive knowledge of existing and emerging technologies, platforms, business models, trends and best practices. Strong leader who has managed direct, matrixed, and dotted line teams of up to 90. Exceptional industry network & reputation.

David Aloisi is an experienced finance, technology and operations executive, entrepreneur and investor. He started his career at Ernst & Young, working with middle market companies on financial and operational issues and on public offerings of both equity and debt. He then joined an early stage technology finance company and, as VP Finance, was responsible for raising capital, building and managing financial and operational systems and running mergers and acquisitions as the company grew from early stage to $1 billion.

David then founded Real Software Systems, an application software provider that created a suite of systems to manage the licensing of intellectual property for Fortune 500 companies. As Founder and CEO he grew the organization to a point that it was managing over $6 billion in licensing payments and engineered a sale of the company.

He is currently an investor and advisor to early stage technology entrepreneurs and their companies, serves as Chief Strategy Officer for Deton, an early stage lower respiratory disease diagnostics company, is the Co-Founder of EyeLight, an early stage medical device company commercializing an excimer laser-based treatment for glaucoma, and is CEO of MAKuLA Ventures, investing in, mentoring and advising early stage life sciences and other technology companies. He has served as Entrepreneur-in-Residence and as a judge for both the Knapp Venture Competition and the Applied Management Research program at the UCLA Anderson School of Management.

David is a Certified Public Accountant in California and holds a BBA in Finance and Accounting from the University of Michigan Ross School of Business and an MBA through the Executive MBA program at the UCLA Anderson School of Management. He also holds a Masters Degree in Biotechnology from the Johns Hopkins University.

David Pokress is a senior marketing executive with extensive experience in both Packaged Goods and Interactive Entertainment. His career includes some of the most iconic brands in the interactive entertainment industry including Call of Duty, Skylanders, DOOM, Tony Hawk, Marvel, James Bond and Transformers. He has a proven track record of developing marketing campaigns, brand strategies and new business opportunities. Currently he oversees Publishing for the Ad Tech company AdColony, a Los Angeles based start up which was acquired by Opera Media Works in 2014. 

Debra Bar is a marketing executive specializing in financial services and technology who has developed award-winning websites and created powerful social media and content programs. Debra has successfully designed and implemented the marketing function at multiple institutions, including the front to back execution of infrastructure, brand and sales support. Debra was most recently Head of Marketing at Bank Leumi in the U.S., where she was responsible for a new visual identity, doubling website traffic and increasing LinkedIn followers by 125% in 15 months. 

Debra has also held marketing roles at UBS, Citigroup, and Morgan Stanley, along with running marketing at several technology software companies. Debra works across all marketing and communication channels, including brand, advertising, digital, social media, communications, PR, Employer Branding, sponsorships, and events. She has an MBA from UCLA Anderson and a BA from UC Berkeley.

Over the past 20+ years, Ian has built a unique and diverse background that includes management consulting with Deloitte, investment banking with RBC Capital and Roth Capital, business development with video game publisher THQ and AdColony, and start-ups, such as Playnomics and Sleepy Giant Entertainment. He has built strong expertise in successful business models and strategies, product development and feature prioritization, operational best practices, monetization strategy and go-to-market approach. His experience and perspective is global having built and managed teams in China, Korea, SE Asia and Europe which cultivated cultural and business know-how to thrive across international borders. Ian has an MBA from UCLA Anderson (’01) and BA from UCSB. He now works with Capcom, managing their esport business including Capcom Pro Tour and Street Fighter Pro League.

Jeff has four years of management consulting experience and over 12 years of direct investment experience, utilizing both growth equity as well as buyout strategies.  In his current role, he leads the evaluation of investment opportunities, structures transactions and works with management teams to develop and execute operational and growth strategies. 

He has extensive responsibilities for day-to-day portfolio company management, including crafting long-term strategy, analyzing threats & opportunities, identifying operating improvements, cash flow management, and other general management roles.  He is a current or former board member of seven different companies in a variety of industries but has particularly deep experience in business services, technology services and consumer products.  

Prior to Caltius Equity Partners, Jeff worked at Kayne Anderson Private Investors and Millennium Capital Partners. He began his career in the Strategy Group at A.T. Kearney where he was responsible for executing strategic and operational improvement projects across a variety of industries.  Jeff received his M.B.A. from the UCLA Anderson School of Management, where he was a Venture Fellow, and his B.A., cum laude, in Economics and Italian from Middlebury College.  While at UCLA Anderson, Jeff won the Knapp Venture Competition as well as the Draper Fisher Jurvetson business plan competition

Jim attended Northwestern University and Columbia Law School. After practicing law for a couple of years, he joined his family’s business, which owned and operated a chain of movie theaters on the East coast, a live Broadway theatre, the largest nightclub in South Beach (capacity 3,000) and produced several low budget feature films. Currently, he is a partner in his family’s real estate business. In addition, Jim is an active angel investor (having invested in almost 100 startups over the last decade), and a member of Tech Coast Angels’ LA network and sits on its Executive Committee.

Risk is inherent in every business. As a property & casualty insurance broker, Jonathan’s primary goal is to proactively work with CEOs and CFOs to identify, analyze, control and monitor risk. His clients rest assured that the company can and will continue to move forward, even in the event of unexpected loss.

Prior to his career in insurance, Jonathan spent more than 10 years providing marketing and advertising consultation to middle market and Fortune 500 businesses. With his diverse background, Jonathan’s consultative approach combines creative thinking with rigid analysis to deliver effective risk management solutions for his clients. Jonathan specializes in commercial lines of coverage, including Property & Casualty, Workers Compensation, Directors & Officers and Professional Liability Insurance.

Jonathan holds his BA from UC San Diego. He earned his MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Business and his Certified Insurance Counselor (CIC) designation from the National Alliance for Insurance. He is Past-President of Independent Brokers & Agents Association of the San Fernando Valley, is currently President of the UCLA Anderson Alumni Network and Chairman of the Board for Inner-City Arts, a non-profit art program for at-risk children in downtown Los Angeles.

Mr. Kambiz Aghili, Ph.D. has been Chief Executive Officer at BlueSky Network since March 7, 2017. Mr. Aghili currently serves as the Co-Founder of Kerwood Capital Partners, Managing Director of AFH Holding & Advisory, LLC, and a Senior Fellow for the UCLA Anderson School of Management price Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation.

Prior to co-founding Kerwood Capital, he served as a Managing Partner at Eton & Stallion Capital, offering strategy consulting, capital formation, M&A and private to public structured products to family offices and lower/middle market firms. Mr. Aghili has managed consultants and advised 100+ lower/middle market companies on growth and business strategy formation including business plan development, competitive positioning, sales/channel expansion, capital formation and post-merger integration. He has more than a decade of experience in product strategy, management consulting, market and competitive positioning, intellectual property and operational advisory services and is an adjunct professor of entrepreneurship at the UCLA Anderson School of Management.

Mr. Aghili earned executive training in Business Strategy from Harvard Business School, an M.B.A. from UCLA Anderson School of Management in Business Strategy and Finance, an M.S. and PhD in Computer Science from the University of California at Santa Barbara, on big data, pattern recognition and analytics as well as a BSE in Computer Engineering from Bilkent University.

Kwame Ulmer is a MedTech executive with nearly twenty years of experience in government and the private sector. He is currently an Angel Investor and regulatory strategy consultant with a focus on MedTech and Venture Capital firms. Mr. Ulmer previously served as Vice President, Regulatory Affairs and Quality Assurance at Implant Direct, a Danaher Corporation operating company. He led efforts to shorten global registration timelines, improved product quality by process optimization and achieve best-in-class department engagement scores. Kwame has served in progressive leadership roles at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and personally evaluated over 1,000 medical technologies.

Leon Zekaria was born and raised in Los Angeles, Ca. He attended Georgetown School of Foreign Service, majoring in International Economics and Finance. Zekaria received his Executive MBA from UCLA Anderson School of Management in 1997 and is the CEO of Windsor Fashions, a 2nd generation business with 187 stores and growing eCommerce business. Zekaria is a member and former chairman of the YPO Golden West Chapter as well as a current member of Georgetown University Board of Regents.

Luisa Romoff earned her B.S. in Finance from SDSU in 1988 and her M.B.A from the UCLA Anderson Graduate School of Management in 1994. She worked in bankruptcy consulting at PriceWaterhouseCoopers - her role involved restructuring, crisis and cash flow management and financing structures. She is currently involved in real estate investment - project evaluation, loan originations and property management for residential income investments. She has also mentored student teams from the Zahn Innovative Platform Launchpad at SDSU.

Mark Jaffe has served as head of operations and finance for VC-backed companies within the tech, media, and consumer services sectors. He was an early employee of three start-ups that exited, including Kizmeet.com, a consumer Internet company he co-founded. He began his career working in investment banking at Alex. Brown & Sons and later for the venture capital arm of Lexington Commercial Holdings. Mark graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Brown University and received an MBA from UCLA’s Anderson School, where his team won the Knapp business plan competition. Mark lives with his family in Los Angeles.

Mark is an innovative problem solver who values simplicity, efficiency, and collaboration between people and organizations. Since earning a BA in Economics from UCLA he has developed an extensive background in accounting, reporting, complex financial modeling, data analytics, and computer programming. Mark has held senior leadership positions in both finance and operations management roles for a variety of businesses and industries, including Advertising, Apparel, Automotive, Banking, Entertainment, High Tech Manufacturing, Internet Technology, Market Research, New Media, and Software Development. He understands that every business has unique opportunities and challenges, and is passionate about helping others succeed through the application of the best fit tools, services, and processes.

Matt Joseph is a technology executive with a background of launching, advising, and investing in software businesses. Currently, he is the Co-Founder and CEO of SurgeryOS, a search engine for medical implants. Prior to SurgeryOS, Matt co-founded Locent, a YCombinator backed messaging service for healthcare providers. For his work with Locent, he was named a top young executive in Los Angeles by the LA Business Journal. Before starting Locent, Matt was Director of Investments and Operations at Launchpad LA, which was named top accelerator in Southern California by Forbes during his tenure. He previously held corporate positions at Verizon and the Boston Consulting Group. He earned a B.A. from Princeton and a JD/MBA from UCLA.

Michael Gitig is a former music + entertainment industry worker turned tech intra- and entrepreneur.  He’s worked in business & strategic development, marketing, product management, and strategy for a variety of companies including Disney, Microsoft, and American Express, and was the co-founder of a music supervision company.  His obsession with the convergence of media, technology, and commerce led him to pursue an MBA at the University of Michigan, where he graduated with distinction. While at the Ross School of Business, Mike led the consumer technology team of the Frankel Fund, a pre-seed student run venture fund.  Bitten with the startup bug, Mike returned to LA, where was the co-founder and COO of Gobbler, a start-up building an open cloud platform for collaborative media creation. His work at Gobbler led him to his current position as the Studio Team lead and (this is actually my title) Intergalactic Commander of Business Development at G-Technology.  In his free time, Mike serves as an advisor and mentor for startups, and has helped companies raise over $20m to date. He is terrible at writing bios in 3rd person, but sometimes you just have to roll with the punches.

Miles has over two decades of experience working with startups and small businesses, primarily focusing on the technology and real estate sectors. Whether it’s building a multi-million dollar luxury estate or an enterprise web application, he leverages substantial project management expertise to deliver a high quality end product, on-time and on-budget.

Currently, Miles is working on his own startup, Duvara, a project management app for small to midsize contractors.  Previously, Miles was VP of Operations & Product Development at EntertainmentCareers.Net, the #1 career site for the entertainment industry. He’s also worked with a several fellow Anderson classmates in various executive roles, overseeing operations at EGC Luxury Homes and co-founding Internet Sourcing, Inc, an online B2B exchange for procuring professional services.

Miles has been strongly involved in the Anderson community since graduating in 1997. He served on the Board of Directors for the Alumni Association from 2004-2006 as well as acted in various roles for the LA Chapter of the Association. He received his BA from Duke University in 1991.

Neal Green has forty+ years of experience in healthcare management and sales. He started and operated his own medical billing and management company for seventeen years. The company grew to $9 million in revenues, a staff of 250, and offices in four states. Neal then joined a regional billing company and helped it expand into a national industry leader while tripling the company’s revenues from $8 to $25 million in five years with 500 employees operating in sixteen states. In 1995, Neal started a national coding company that currently operates in all fifty states serving hospitals, medical school faculty practice plans, integrated healthcare organizations, medical groups, and medical billing companies.

Paul Pastor is the former EVP Network Strategy, Revenue and Operations for the Discovery, Science and Animal Planet channels where he was responsible for defining the multiplatform content strategy, establishing new business models and partnerships with producers, distributors, platforms and advertisers, and managing the channels’ ~$500M in content investment. He also previously served as SVP Strategy and Consumer Analytics for the Disney/ABC Television Group. Paul is currently working to build out a new, broadcaster driven European OTT service. Paul holds a B.A. degree in economics from the University of Virginia and a MBA from the UCLA Anderson School of Business.

As a seasoned marketing professional with over ten years of experience in the consumer-packaged goods industry, including food & beverage, household products and personal care, Mevasse has a proven track record of launching new brands into the marketplace and revitalizing mature brands to make them relevant again. Coupled with a keen sense of marketing and sales expertise, offering a unique understanding of consumer and retailer dynamics, Mevasse is known for developing high performing teams and building a culture of engagement in organizations both big and small.

Roman Reyhani is a tech, media and startup attorney, strategist and entrepreneur. His clients include, startups, investors, content creators, production companies, and media and entertainment personalities.

Formerly, Roman worked for IAC where he provided legal advice for a number of highly trafficked sites. Prior to this he worked in the entertainment industry negotiating film, television and new media deals. Additionally, Roman consults on strategy with various technology and media companies, including in artificial intelligence, crypto-assets, and digital media. He also participates in startups as a core team member and advisor, one of which was focused on utilizing machine learning to quantify geopolitical risk and which was recently acquired.

Roman’s experience with tech, law and strategy gives him a deep insight into the complex issues his client’s face. Born in Germany and raised in New Zealand, Roman is fluent in German. He represents clients across the United States, Europe, China and Australia.

Sajid Mohamedy is an experienced strategy professional and entrepreneur, with a demonstrated history of creating and scaling businesses. Ranging from tech to renewables and real estate, Sajid has served as founder or senior leader of 4 high growth ventures. Among his current roles, Sajid spends most of his time as Chief Strategy Officer for NoiseGrasp, an AI-based marketing analytics company. Sajid started his career in management consulting with EY and Mercer, and received both undergraduate & MBA degrees from UCLA.

Scott Bushman is a digital media executive with 20+ years experience working at the intersection of technology, media/entertainment and sports.  Scott has held a number of senior roles at companies including Yahoo, Disney/ESPN and Metacafe.

Scott is currently VP, Digital at Magid, a leading boutique strategy and market research firm. He is responsible for building the firm’s business with digital-first companies and has developed relationships with companies including Facebook, Google/YouTube, Amazon, Otter Media and others. Scott joined Magid after running his own consulting practice where he supported start-ups and private companies, providing strategic advice, business modeling, operations and business development support to companies including Immersv, LiveU, WiZR and DDC. Scott started his career as an investment banker with Goldman, Sachs & Co. Scott earned his MBA from UCLA’s Anderson Graduate School of Management, and holds a bachelor’s degree from Harvard College.

Scott has 8+ years of marketing experience across digital marketing, brand strategy, product marketing, and eCommerce. He currently leads marketing at Fernish, a rising startup focused on subscription furniture, and described by Fast Company as "Rent-the-Runway, but for sofas." As Fernish grows into a nationally-recognized brand, Scott is working to build consumer awareness, digital acquisition, and strategic partnerships.

After getting his MBA from UCLA Anderson, he spent 5 years at Yahoo launching products, driving acquisition, and leading customer engagement. He then joined LA's startup community, and has more recently led marketing for brands like Wolf & Shepherd and Recess. He graduated from Anderson in 2012, and has B.S. in marketing from Lehigh University.

Steve Borochoff is a strategic advisor to emerging stage software and hardware developers providing both guidance and execution in business development, go-to-market strategies, and building global sales organizations.  Product breadth has included enterprise level software, software development and engineering services, and hardware spanning semiconductors, sensors, boards, and systems.

Prior to his advisor roles, Steve was an award winning, client facing sales and business development leader at the VP level who has built successful businesses from start-ups to new business units of mature organizations by building, mentoring, and leading teams focused on developing strategic, executive level, trusted relationships that address client issues and needs.   He holds a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology.

Steve Columbaro is a senior credit analyst and portfolio manager for the Leveraged Debt Group at Columbia Threadneedle Investments. He is responsible for analyzing and monitoring investments in the leveraged loan and high yield bond markets. Mr. Columbaro joined one of the Columbia Threadneedle Investments legacy firms in 2006. Previously, Mr. Columbaro was employed as a Senior Vice President at Four Corners Capital Management where he was responsible for analyzing and monitoring leveraged loan and high yield bond issuers in a variety of industries.

Prior to that, Mr. Columbaro was a vice president at Wachovia Capital Partners, the direct private equity investing arm of Wachovia, analyzing leveraged buyouts, growth equity investments, and mezzanine transactions. Mr. Columbaro began his finance career at Wachovia Securities in the fixed-income sales, trading, and research department. He has been in the financial services industry since 1997. Mr. Columbaro received a B.A. from Duke University and an MBA from the Anderson School at University of California, Los Angeles. In addition, he holds the Chartered Financial Analyst® designation.

Steve has nearly 30 years of experience in senior executive positions. In his capacity as an owner of Huntley, Mullaney, Spargo, & Sullivan, Inc. (HMS), a real estate and financial restructuring firm he co-founded in 1993 (and that was recently acquired by Jones Lang LaSalle, Inc.), he has overseen the restructuring of more than $10 billion in client assets through debt and lease restructuring and Chapter 11 planning, including more than $4 billion in lease and loan modifications, discounted loan payoffs, and deficiency settlements that he has negotiated with more than 50 lenders.

Prior to founding HMS, Steve was the president and CEO of the Cook Company, an office and land development company whose $120 million real estate portfolio he turned around through an aggressive restructuring of loans with GE Capital and Bank of America. He also served as the turnaround CEO of Princeton Real Estate Group, an $80 million retail and apartment development company. His experience additionally includes a five-year period in which, as the president of Triton National – a $400 million private real estate and development company with more than 500 employees – he oversaw acquisitions as well as the financing of asset management and joint ventures for the company. While at Triton, Steve also served as president of several separate real estate joint ventures, including a joint ventures with Crocker Bank, American Savings, and Wells Fargo Bank.

Steve has also taught commercial real estate investment at the University of California, Berkeley, and authored several influential publications on the topic of commercial real estate debt restructuring.

Steve has an MBA from UCLA.

Tom Shapiro has founded multiple companies in a variety of backgrounds. Companies he has founded are: Academy Tent and Canvas, Inc., Academy Awning, Inc., Event Technical Services, Inc., and TAS Investments, Inc. Most recently, after selling Trade Supplies, Inc., Tom joined Sole Source Capital as Operating Partner. Tom holds a BS from USC.

Yelena Blank is a media and entertainment executive with extensive expertise across content distribution, streaming media services and brand management. In her most recent role as Director of Global Distribution at Sony Pictures, Yelena drove content strategy and maximized television distribution revenue through deal analysis, content acquisitions and innovative content packaging. Yelena joined Sony Pictures in June 2014 as Senior Manager of Emerging Platforms and Partnerships where she developed digital business strategies and distribution partnerships in emerging markets.

Prior to joining Sony, Yelena worked in strategic planning in Disney’s Media Networks division, which includes ABC Television, Disney Channel, ABC Family and ESPN. As part of her role, Yelena developed growth strategies and evaluated new business opportunities across Disney's portfolio of broadcast, cable, and digital media segments. During her tenure at Disney, Yelena also worked as Global Franchise Manager of Disney Channels Worldwide where she led product development for Disney’s flagship preschool TV network Disney Junior. In that role, Yelena’s key focus was driving brand success and maximizing company revenue across key Disney verticals, including Consumer Products, Digital Media, Theme Parks, Publishing, Disney Records, and Home Entertainment.

Yelena began her career in Finance in Disney's Theme Parks and Resorts division after completing her B.A. in Business Economics at UCLA in 2005. Yelena completed her MBA in 2013 at the Anderson School of Management Fully-Employed program. When not working, Yelena is training for her next marathon.