Jon Lowy
Co-Founder
Jon Lowy worked for Deutsche Bank, serving as Chief Architect, CIB eBusiness. Jon worked closely with CIB's executive board, IT management, and business line managers to design and implement the Bank's Internet technology roadmap, as well as perform due diligence for major Internet investments. Major global initiatives included the DB.com Client Portal, Single Sign-On, Global Hosting, e-consolidation, and CRM (Client Relationship Management).
Prior to Deutsche Bank, Jon worked at Gateway for three years, as Chief eCommerce Architect. There, Jon recruited and managed technology staff world-wide, transforming the company's Internet systems from an experiment in the global marketing department to an award-winning set of profitable consumer and b2b web properties.
Before Gateway, Jon worked for IDT. He started as a technical support agent, wore many hats, and soon moved into the product development group where he contributed to technology projects and business development.
Jon is a co-author of
Three Clicks Away: Advice from the Trenches of eCommerce (John Wiley and Sons, 2001).
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Damian Manning
Co-Founder
Damian Manning most recently served as Managing Partner for Digital Strategy Partners, a consulting firm specializing in media and entertainment technology services for clients including Yahoo!, Citigroup, The New York Times, Level 3 Communications, MediaNet Digital, Williams Communications, and divisions of Viacom.
Before founding Digital Strategy Partners, Damian was Vice President, Digital Media, for the MTVi Group. While at MTVi, Damian was responsible for leading the digital media strategy of the MTV Networks online properties, including more than sixty brands and affiliates around the world. In addition to spearheading first-of-their-kind direct to consumer initiatives, Damian built and managed record-setting operations for streaming, encoding, downloading, digital rights management, webcast and event production, content distribution and software development; resources servicing the entire Viacom family. Prior to MTVi, Damian served as Director, Interactive Technology, for MTV Networks.
Damian began his career on the front lines, as a technical support agent for IDT where he rose through the ranks to Senior Technologist, consulting on new ventures, acquisitions and development projects. He witnessed the organization grow from hundreds to hundreds of thousands of customers, from private to publicly traded company, participated in the negotiation of the first ever Netscape browser distribution deal, architected and developed the company's groundbreaking Internet access software, in addition to managing and training the technical support organization. After leaving IDT, Damian went on to assist ICES in building one of the first global business-to-business eCommerce solutions, where he served as Director, Research & Development. He also co-founded e-Save Networks, where he held the position of Director, Technology.
Damian has been recognized as a digital media pioneer, holds three patents, and has received several industry awards and accolades for his achievements.
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Andrew M. Levine
Chief Financial Officer
Andrew M. Levine worked for Cantor Fitzgerald in New York City, where he served as the Portfolio Manager for the proprietary distressed equity fund.
Prior to joining Cantor in November 2002, Mr. Levine worked as the high yield debt analyst for National Securities during 2002, and from May 2000 through September 2001 was a distressed debt analyst for Amroc Investments.
Mr. Levine graduated from Trinity College in 1994 with Honors in Economics.
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DJ Angola
Advisor
Brooklyn, NY-based DJ Angola's professional reputation stands on his diverse musical sensibility and effortless command of style. Mixing smoothly through Tribal/afrobeat/jazzy/deep/disco/electro house sounds to his own tracks and original remixes, he utilizes a vast array of music and vocals to create live remixes during his sets. In demand for his wide ranging House sets, he has moved club goers around the world.
DJ Angola has become a DJ favorite of the fashion world--DJing shows, nights, and opening parties for the hottest designers. He's been the featured DJ at numerous Cannes Film Festival parties, delighting the guests of clients such as Elle, Premiere, Moving Pictures, Urban Myth, Penthouse and Synergy House.
DJ Angola has done remixes for White Stripes, Antibalas, Outkast, Dead Prez, DJ Smash, Jungle Brothers, and others. A multi-instrumentalist, he's currently working on his new record which features collaborations with members of Fania All Stars, Sugarman 3, Zion I, as well as vocalists' Kemdi, Amayo, Jephte' Guilliome (Spiritual life), Joy Ibiayo, Sharon Jones (Dap Kings), and others. His original music have found their way into the top 10 charts of many of the world's most respected DJs.
Currently, DJ Angola is a resident DJ in NYC at Marquee (Saturdays), and Le Royale (Sundays). He also spins regularly at Boujis and Volstead (London) where he has DJed their annual Brit Award and Wimbledon Players party.
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David Beal
Advisor
David Beal is an expert on the impact of technological advancement on entertainment, and currently serves as President, National Geographic Entertainment.
In his former role as the President of Palm Pictures, David oversaw the creative divisions - including film, DVD, Music, interactive technologies and magazine publishing. At Palm Pictures, David worked with Chairman Chris Blackwell to implement a multi platform strategy, developing global niche brands and releasing some of the leading titles in audio/visual entertainment.
Before Palm, David was the CEO of Blue Tape where he managed products including sputnik7 (winner of the Webby for Best Music Site) and Epitonic (winner of the Webby for Best Radio Site) and the RES Media Group (RES Magazine and RESFEST). David previously served as the Head of DVD Development for Palm Pictures.
David's experience also includes film scoring, music production and performing or recording as a drummer/programmer with various acts, such as Madonna, Peter Gabriel, Joe Cocker, and Julian Lennon. In musical film production, David is best known for his collaboration with U2's Larry Mullen and Adam Clayton on the Grammy-nominated "Theme From Mission: Impossible." David's additional works include co-writing and producing the theme song for the film "Smoke Signals" (two awards at The Sundance Film Festival), a theme song for "Mortal Kombat Annihilation", and trailer music for films such as "Bad Boyz 2" and Jackie Chan's "Legend of the Drunken Master."
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Nicholas Butterworth
Advisor
Nicholas Butterworth is Diversion Media's Founder, President & CEO. He was formerly President and CEO of The MTVi Group, a joint venture of Viacom and Liberty Media, where he managed an international network of 18 music-related websites, including mtv.com, VH1.com, sonicnet.com, and all of MTV's international sites.
Prior to MTVi, he was President & CEO of SonicNet, Inc., a leading independent music site which he joined in 1994. Prior to SonicNet, Nicholas was Executive Director of Rock the Vote. He also served two terms as President of the Digital Media Association (DiMA).
Nicholas has garnered industry awards including two Webby awards, three Yahoo! Internet Life Music Awards, and the ASCAP Deems Taylor Award for music journalism.
A graduate of Brown University, Nicholas began his entertainment career offline, as a cast member of the WGBH show "Zoom" in 1976-77.
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Gennadiy M. Borisov
Advisor
Gennadiy M. Borisov is the CTO of Alpha Media Group (Maxim & Blender Magazines), and a leading industry specialist in digital media with more than 16 years of cross industry research, development and managerial experience. In his former role as Vice President, Advanced Products at MTV Networks, Gennadiy served as a key member of the IS&T (Information Systems and Technology) and Interactive Business Development organizations where he was involved in day-to-day activities at MTVN and Viacom Digital Media.
Some of Gennadiy's responsibilities included product evaluation and testing, management of the internal R&D group, management of domestic and international third-party technology and business partnerships, contract negotiations, business model analysis, design and implementation of new business models and technologies and improving existing mechanisms allowing MTV Networks to protect and monetize its their existing media assets worldwide. He was a member of the group which supports and produces projects such as various Live and On-Demand events worldwide, design and implementation of various value-added services, delivery of media to the broad range of wireless and wired devices, designing new products and services around existing and new technologies for Media and Entertainment industries as well as conducting research in the areas of Interactive Entertainment, P2P networks, Copyright Protection and Secure Content Delivery.
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Chuck F. Geiger
Advisor
Chuck F. Geiger is the CTO of Protrade.com. Previously, he served as PayPal's Vice President of Technology and Chief Technical Officer. Mr. Geiger most recently served as Vice President of Product Development, where he managed the eBay Engineering organization of ~300 employees. He also held the role of Vice President of Architecture where he drove the next generation Architecture effort (V3).
Prior to joining eBay, Mr. Geiger was CTO of Wine.com. Previously, he worked for Gateway as the Vice President of eCommerce, Travelocity as Vice President of Engineering and Product Management, and Sabre Inc. and Texas Instruments in various Engineering and Management roles. Mr. Geiger received a B.S. in Computer Engineering from the University of Kansas in Lawrence, Kansas.
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Rafael Jimenez
Advisor
Rafael Jimenez is the Founder of República Trading Company, Inc., a content and apparel production company established in 1997, that caters to the international Latino, and multi-cultural market's.
In the field of television and video production, he is currently the Consulting Producer on "Urban Latino TV." He has worked on Teen People's Top 25 under 25; Ricky Martin's Super Bowl Saturday Night for CBS; Ricky Martin Loaded Live for Sony International and MTV; The Blaze Battle World Championship for HBO; MTV's House of Style Video Music Awards Special, MTV's The Lowdown, MTV's Lyricist Lounge Special, MTV's House of Style Summer Swimsuit Edition; MTV's Countdown To Wrestlemania; MTV's Video Feuds; The MTV Video Music Awards Uncensored; MTV's Smokin' Grooves Countdown; MTV's NBA Time Out featuring Jayson Williams; MTV's NBA Slam N' Jam; MTV's All Time Top Ten Featuring Hype Williams; MTV's Biggie: A Life Story; MTV's Back In The Day a documentary look at hip hop and the 80's; MTV's The Rodman World Tour; The Brand Jordan Research Project for Nike; Russell Simmons One World Music Beat for syndication; The Enyce/Fila En Italia EPK and billboard spots for Coca-Cola. In addition, he is a partner in Urban Latino Magazine a national publication targeted to Latino urban youth.
Rafael was the National Marketing Manager for Big Life Records, a subsidiary of Polygram Records, where he worked with artists such as Lisa Stansfield, The Soup Dragons, The Orb and reggae artist Junior Reid. As Director of Promotion for DMC America, he was responsible for working with a worldwide body of over 6,000 DJ's located in 23 countries. DMC also published MixMag, and produced the World DJ Championships in England.
Rafael was born, and currently resides in the Washington Heights section of Manhattan. He is a 1996 graduate of New York University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science Degree in Mass Media and Communication.
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David Lowy
Advisor
David Lowy is the Director of Product Management with OPEN from American Express®, the division dedicated to small business. David develops and manages products for small businesses and was one of the inventors of the innovative Plum Card, launched in late 2007. He currently oversees OPEN's Premium Portfolios. Prior to American Express, he held strategic marketing positions with Siebel Systems and with Taylor Rafferty, a cross-border financial communications firm.
David graduated from Cornell University in 1997 and received his MBA from the University of Michigan's Ross School of Business in 2003. At Ross, he and his team were awarded first prize in the ‘Dare to Dream' entrepreneurial business competition, winning the largest ever grant for their new business idea and plan.
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Daniel Marovitz
Advisor
Daniel Marovitz is the COO for Technology and MIS for Deutsche Bank's Global Corporate Finance division. He also serves as a strategic advisor to the division's technology banking practice. In October of 2001, Daniel became the Chief Information Officer for the 3,500-person Corporate Finance division of the bank. Daniel joined Deutsche Bank in January 2000 as Managing Director and Chief Operating Officer of the eGCI group at Deutsche Bank, charged with developing and implementing online products for Deutsche Bank's investment and commercial bank.
In early 1999, Daniel joined iVillage, the online Women's Network and one of the 30 most trafficked sites on the Internet, as the Vice President of Commerce. His responsibilities included oversight of all of iVillage's transactional business with the mission to build eCommerce businesses that leveraged the more than 15 million active members of the iVillage network.
Before iVillage, Daniel worked for Gateway 2000 which he joined in 1994, heading the team that established Gateway Japan. With 272 employees on opening day, it was the largest foreign-capitalized start-up in the history of Japan. He managed advertising, media, public relations, and Gateway Japan's early web efforts. When he returned to the United States in 1996, Daniel became responsible for all public-facing dot-com sites, worldwide. Daniel's team sold the first PC over the Internet and grew the online channel to 34% of Gateway's sales.
A frequent speaker on the subjects of the Internet, and IT management, Daniel has addressed audiences at the United Nations, the Japanese Parliament, Shop.org, Retail.net, Economist Intelligence Unit, Financial Times Conferences, the Emirates Forum and Marcus Evans conferences. In 2001, Daniel co-authored,
Three Clicks Away: Advice from the Trenches of eCommerce, published by John Wiley. Daniel Marovitz graduated from Cornell University in 1994 with a degree in Spanish Literature and Japanese Studies.
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Gary S. Morris
Advisor
Gary Morris is the Partner-in-Charge of Townsend's Washington, DC office. Mr. Morris advises clients across a broad range of technical industries and disciplines with regard to all aspects of intellectual property law. He has particular expertise in the fields of information technology, including computer and network security, cryptography and telecommunications. Mr. Morris has also earned a postgraduate diploma in European Community Competition Law from the University of London, Kings College and specializes in issues that arise in competition law due to intellectual property. He has been retained as an intellectual property expert by the European Commission to provide advice on the concentration of patent rights by corporate acquisition.
Mr. Morris advises consumer electronics manufacturers and media companies with regard to digital rights management. He also advises computer game publishers and developers with regard to development contracts, patent licenses, employment contracts and other intellectual property-related agreements. Outside of the patent arena, he has counseled clients with regard to open source software and other technology-related copyright issues. He successfully defended the largest domain registrar in the world against claims of patent infringement.
Mr. Morris has been a guest lecturer at New York Law School and frequently speaks and writes on IP-related issues. He is active in a number of professional IP and legal organizations in the Washington, DC area.
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Hillel Parness
Advisor
Hillel Parness is Of Counsel to Lovells, and a member of the Adjunct Faculty of Columbia Law School. Mr. Parness focuses his practice on a wide variety of litigation matters including intellectual property and Internet law, civil and criminal securities litigation and compliance, arbitration, product liability and insurance.
In the realm of intellectual property and Internet law, Mr. Parness represents clients in legal actions involving issues of copyright infringement and registration, patent infringement, trademark/trade dress infringement and registration, trademark dilution, theft of trade secrets and cyberpiracy. He also advises clients with respect to domain name purchases and ownership disputes, Internet privacy, risk analysis of ongoing litigation, as well as contract, licensing, transactional issues and evaluation of IP assets. Mr. Parness has also had extensive experience with class action securities litigation, and interactions with the DOJ, SEC and NASD regarding securities trading issues. He has directed internal investigations of banking clients in response to allegations of misconduct, and has helped clients establish and enhance internal compliance and monitoring programs. Recently, Mr. Parness was part of the trial team that successfully defended a sales broker against criminal charges relating to mutual fund "late trading."
At Columbia Law School, Mr. Parness teaches a seminar entitled "Life, Liberty & Liability in the Digital Millennium (Secondary Liability and the Internet)." Mr. Parness regularly writes articles relating to intellectual property and the Internet, reprinted at www.hiplaw.com, and he is also on the Board of Editors of Cyberspace Lawyer. In 1995, Mr. Parness received a J.D. from Columbia Law School and a B.A. from Columbia College through the Accelerated Interdisciplinary Legal Education program.
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Neil J. Rosini
Advisor
Neil J. Rosini is a partner at the firm Franklin, Weinrib, Rudell & Vassallo, in New York. He received his J.D. degree from Yale Law School and his B.A. degree from the University of Notre Dame. His practice focuses on new media transactions; online privacy; content clearance for broadcast, publication and online distribution; counseling on copyright, rights of privacy, and defamation; literary publishing; and trademark licensing.
Neil is the author of
The Practical Guide to Libel Law, a handbook for journalists. From 1997-2003 he was an adjunct professor at New York University School of Law teaching entertainment law and is currently co-chairman of the Copyright and Trademark Committee of the New York State Bar Association's Entertainment Arts and Sports Law Section.
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Steven A. Seidman
Advisor
Steven A. Seidman is a partner in the Corporate and Financial Services Department of Willkie Farr & Gallagher in New York. Mr. Seidman specializes in mergers and acquisitions, private equity and venture capital investments, public offerings, and general corporate and securities law.
Mr. Seidman received his J.D. from University of Virginia School of Law in 1990 and a B.A. from Yale University in 1987. Following law school, Mr. Seidman served as law clerk to the Honorable Jack B. Jacobs of the Delaware Court of Chancery. Mr. Seidman is admitted to the Bar of the State of New York.
Among the clients Mr. Seidman works with on a regular basis are Warburg Pincus LLC, Merrill Lynch, Credit Suisse First Boston, Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, Inc., Eon Labs, Inc., CPA2Biz, Inc., Multex.com, Inc., Simon Property Group, Inc. and GovPX, Inc.
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Peter Shapiro
Advisor
Peter Shapiro is an award-winning film and music producer, and former owner of the internationally recognized live music venue, Wetlands Preserve. Wetlands earned acclaim as the only rock and roll club to incorporate environmental activism into the concertgoing experience. In addition to hosting some of the most prominent performers in contemporary music before they rose to fame (Pearl Jam, Dave Matthews, Phish), Wetlands ran all of its operations in a resource efficient manner.
Peter produced and served as Music Director of the IMAX concert film, ALL ACCESS, which featured performances by Sting, Santana, Sheryl Crow, and B.B. King. He is the founder and Executive Producer of the Jammy Awards, the critically acclaimed annual awards show that celebrates the best in live, improvisational music. Peter is currently producing a 3D IMAX film in partnership with NFL Films and recently served as Executive Producer of VH-1's five-hour documentary, "And You Don't Stop: 30 Years of Hip-Hop".
As a film and music producer, Peter has worked with a who's who of the top performers in music, including, Al Green, Steve Winwood, Dave Matthews, Black Crowes, Buddy Guy, The Roots, Chick Corea, Moby, Kid Rock, Ryan Adams, Macy Gray, and John Mayer.
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