Adam Riggs-Zeigen is the Chief Rocker of Rock My World, a digital music service for active people. Prior to Rock My World, he worked at Qualcomm, where he was most recently Senior Manager of Business Development working with brands such as Universal Music Group, Major League Baseball, Fox Television Networks and Disney to adopt Qualcomm technologies. Prior to Qualcomm, Adam founded Fantasy Workz, a company focused on in-venue entertainment using tablet computers, Inamed, a medical device company and was an touring club DJ playing both nationally and internationally. He specializes in the world of mobile and web technologies - both from a technical and industry perspective. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics from UC Santa Barbara and an MBA with emphasis in eCommerce and Entrepreneurship from San Diego State University. He is a fan of all things sports and never misses a Miami Dolphins game, no matter how awful they are. Adam is passionate about utilizing the emotional effects of music to inspire, excite, console, enrage and drive people to accomplish their goals. He is 2013 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego.

Fellow since

Adele Noon, M.S., J.D. is a patent attorney at Procopio, Cory Hargreaves, & Savitch, and specializes in working with early stage companies. Her practice focuses on preparing and prosecuting foreign and United States patent applications in various areas including telecommunications (signal antenna interference cancellation, OFDMA, and CDMA technology), computer software and architecture, signal processing, electronic circuits, computer security, networking architecture and software, and medical devices. Prior to joining Procopio, Ms. Noon was an associate at McDermott, Will & Emery LLP, and, prior to law school, worked as a registered patent agent with Conley Rose, P.C. in Houston, Texas where she prosecuted patent applications across a broad spectrum of industries including catalysis, petrochemical refinement, separation technology, computer hardware, acoustic lodging, drill bit technology, photonics, tissue engineering and nanotechnology. She earned her S.B. in Materials Science and Engineering in 1999 from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and both her M.S. in Electrical Engineering (2006) and her J.D. (2007) from the University of Iowa.

Fellow since

Adrienne (Abby) Rothwell, M.B.A. is a financial analyst for Life Technologies and has worked in a variety of industries including medical devices, property development, and biotechnology. She worked with Vet-Stem Inc., a rapidly growing biotechnology company in San Diego, which focused on regenerative veterinary medicine. While with Vet-Stem, she conducted, observed, and supported the research, process development and validation, and intense scientific analysis that went into developing and maintaining products, services, and procedures. Ms. Rothwell also worked with Amgen, Inc’s R&D finance team. In this position, she gained a comprehensive understanding of R&D budgeting and decision making in an extremely successful organization. Ms. Rothwell earned a B.S. in Biology from UC Santa Barbara and M.B.A. from Cornell University’s Johnson Graduate School of Management.

Fellow since

Alejandro Artola is a software engineer with a passion for technology and its applications to solve real world problems. He has more than eight years of experience working in startups and multinational software companies. He has worked in the consumer and enterprise application markets and in several areasluding business intelligence, analytics, project management, and social networking. He holds bachelor and master degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from MIT. Alex enjoys outdoor activitiesluding hiking, soccer, and sailing. He is a 2014 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego.

Fellow since

Alex Bates, CTO, Mtelligence Alex Bates is CTO at Mtelligence, applying predictive analytics to help eliminate downtime in manufacturing facilities. Early in his career Alex applied statistical techniques to the diagnostics of visual disorders, publishing several scientific papers on the topic. He was also involved in neural network modeling of spatial navigation in the nematode C. Elegans, and memory research. This background would prove invaluable in later endeavors tackling computational problems with big data. He joined a company called Inovec, where he developed yield optimization software for the forest products industry. Alex remained at Inovec until it was acquired by InVision (which was later acquired by GE). After several years consulting for Fortune 500 energy & defense companies, Alex helped launch Mtelligence. His responsibilities at Mtelligence include technical roadmap, architecture, and strategy. Alex is an active member of the ANSI/ISA SP95 committee, and serves on the Board of Directors of the MIMOSA Organization, where he is helping define the next generation of intelligent, interoperable manufacturing systems. Alex holds degrees in Computer & Information Science and Mathematics at Clark Honors College at the University of Oregon. He is 2012 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego.

Fellow since

Bill Lennon, Founder, Interlingua Machine Translation Bill Lennon is the co-founder of Interlingua Machine Translation, Inc.—making computers translate like human beings. Bill is a Ph.D. student in Electrical and Computer Engineering at UCSD and is interested in the intersection of neuroscience and engineering. Bill believes that understanding the functional circuitry of the mammalian brain is the key to solving problems like machine translation, computer vision and speech recognition. He holds undergraduate degrees in Mathematics and Business Administration from UC Berkeley. While an undergraduate, Bill successfully co-founded a slew of impressively unsuccessful internet ventures. He has also worked at a number of startups and technology companies in roles from ‘Assistant to the CEO’ to ‘Data Scientist’. He became an entrepreneur at age 12 when he started a black market for candy bars in middle school.

Fellow since

Courtney Titus is the Co-Founder & CMO of GIViNGtrax, a multi-user marketplace that empowers local communities in ways never before possible and provides the handshake between the members of a community who make a good cause a great success! We provide web-based & mobile-based tools for managing donations, fundraising, and GIViNG. In a way, we play "matchmaker" to local businesses, nonprofits, and individuals who otherwise may have never met. Prior to GIViNGtrax, she spent the last several years in Internet & Social Media Marketing. The last 4 years of her career were spent in the automotive industry where she led marketing operations for 7 dealerships of various brands. Courtney's well diversified experience includes launching several websites, installing CRM platforms, media buying, and internet & social marketing. Courtney has a passion for philanthropy & cause marketing and specializes in creating engaging campaigns that bring consumers, nonprofits, and businesses together! She graduated from Santa Clara University in 2007 with a BS in Marketing and is a 2013 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego.

Fellow since

Dan Knudsen is a scientist and technologist who builds things that make it easier to figure out how the world works. He's been studying the brain for the past 12 years and has designed hardware and software systems that speed up the pace of discovery in neuroscience and cognitive science. He has published many peer-reviewed research papers on topics ranging from drug addiction, to designing artificial nervous systems, to the physiology underlying auditory behavior. Dan received his PhD in Neurosciences in 2013 from UC San Diego, where he established himself as an expert in the neural basis of vocal communication behavior and auditory learning. He has a passion for spreading ideas, and has turned to entrepreneurship as a way to bring exciting scientific advances from academia to the general public. He's currently working on making it easier for pets and owners to communicate with each other by applying the science of animal behavior to automatically train and entertain pets, even when their owners aren't around. Dan Knudsen is excited to be a 2014 Fellow in the San Diego char of the Startup Leadership Program.

Fellow since

Darryl Kuhn is a 20 year veteran of the software industry and recognized thought leader in the world of e-commerce, personalization, and user experience. Mr. Kuhn holds numerous software awards, two patents, and is published in Tech News World, Internet Retailer, CRM Buyer, Quality Digest among others. Mr. Kuhn was also a featured speaker at eTail 2012. Mr. Kuhn is currently CEO and Pripal Architect at Fluid Software Solutions where he draws on his experience to deliver enterprise class e-commerce and mobile architecture. Prior to founding Fluid Software Mr. Kuhn spent seven years at Skinit as SVP, Technology and CTO where he built Skinit's technology team, and led the development of the Skinit On-Demand Personalization (ODP) platform, an e-commerce personalization solution, which was licensed by several fortune 500'sluding Microsoft, 3M, and HP. Prior to Skinit Mr. Kuhn spent 13 years in various ventures developing a range of software from one of the first app stores to complex neural networks for wireless applications to award winning new media applications for Qualcomm, Ericsson, Press Cruises, and many others. He is a 2014 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego.

Fellow since

Dave Hawkins is CEO & Founder of BioQuan Inc., a digital concierge for mHealth. With 14 years of business development and sales experience, he has successfully introduced emerging technologies and products to the market, mostly in early stage software, Internet and FDA cleared medical device ventures. As VP of Business Development & COO, Co-Founder of NuFACE, Dave was involved in growing the company to one of the leading FDA cleared at-home use aesthetic device companies. NuFACE is a nationally recognized brand, with international expansion rollout plans, that quickly gained attention by beauty consumers, dermatologic professionals, blue-chip multi-nationals, major media outlets, and major retailers including QVC’s “hi tech beauty” merchandising category. Its first device, garnered 2009 and 2010 QVC customer nomination for “best beauty tool” and its next generation device NuFACE-Trinity, as a 2012 QVC customer nomination for not only “best beauty tool” but also “breakthrough beauty product of the year” among others. Dave has earned Chairman’s Club and President’s Club sales awards earlier in his technology career, including a top revenue generator worldwide for a $500M company operating in over 20 countries. He holds a BA in Economics from the University of Arizona, is a native S. Californian and truly believes San Diego is “America’s Finest City”. Dave is a 2013 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program.

Fellow since

Galen Beers, M.B.A. is a recent transplant into San Diego and MBA graduate from the Johnson School at Cornell University. He also earned a bachelor’s degree from Cornell University in 2002 in Applied Economics and Management. After his undergraduate studies, Mr. Beers worked as a professional lacrosse player in Boston, a primary school teacher in Manchester, England, a software/strategy consultant in Baltimore, and a government funded venture capital intern in Dublin, Ireland. After working in the venture capital industry, his excitement for entrepreneurship and early stage companies was born. He currently works with the sport and social club of San Diego called VAVi as an Event Manager. He has also founded the Sport and Social Industry Association in San Diego and currently works as Director there. He is also currently working on Enterprise Account Management at Adobe.

Fellow since

Gordon Fletcher is the President of Digital Storage Solutions, a company that archives data onto USB Flash Drives through automated kiosks. Prior to founding Digital Storage Solutions, Gordon worked as a Senior Project Manager at Hewlett Packard. Gordon is an expert in Technical Marketing and Post-Sales Operations. Gordon has an MBA and Electrical Engineering Degree. Gordon is passionate about solving the problem of liberating memories trapped in mobile devices. He is a 2014 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego.

Fellow since

Jean Pierre LeBlanc is the Founder and CEO of Infinity Kiosk , the cash portal for money and e-commerce services. He has held executive positions in a broad range of public (Sun, SCO, Borland, Nokia, and Alcatel-Lucent) and private companies (Cellon, Esmertec, VirtualLogix, QIWI, and Skinit) in the software and mobile marketplaces. Jean Pierre has been an innovator and change agent throughout his career having delivered many first-of-kind and market leading commercial products. He has expertise in leading small and global teams in delivering great quality software and products. He is a global strategic thinker with proven start-up experience in the US, China, Switzerland, Finland, and France. Jean Pierre is a passionate leader who thrives on creating compelling product vision and driving teams to deliver on it. He holds a Master’s degree in Computer Engineering and Bachelor’s degree in Engineering Management from the Royal Military College of Canada (RMC). He served as an Assistant Professor in the Computer Engineering department at RMC and was a lecturer in the Information System department of UCSC. An avid sportsman, Jean Pierre loves playing hockey, triathlon, biking, tennis, golfing and skiing. He’s proud to be a 2014 Fellow in the San Diego Char of the Startup Leadership Program.

Fellow since

Jono Slade, a driven entrepreneur, is the co-founder of Lolonga Beauty and the co-creator of the Best In Business training program. Jonathon received a Bachelors Degree in Political Science from San Diego State University which allowed him to hone a unique leadership style, leaning on the power of real life experience and diverse perspectives to find innovative solutions. His extensive background working within different cultures allows Jonathon to bring a thinking outside the boxâ€_x009d_ approach to everything he does, striving to find the best and most fluid solution to any situation. He has a strong passion for using all mediums; video, audio, or text to produce the most engaging material possible. Coming from a family of educators, Jono has a passion for education which pushed him to create more effective educational platforms that better engage students and propel them forward to reach their goals. He is a 2014 fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego.

Fellow since

In college, Joslyn O’Grady was selected as one of two freshmen into The Sales Centre at Ohio University where she helped to build the undergraduate, highly selective sales program from 20 students to 250 students by her senior year. The Sales Centre allowed Joslyn to build a network of C-suite and senior-level mentors throughout many different industries. Since college, Joslyn has worked with medical device company, CareFusion in sales and marketing roles. She has had swift advancement from sales representative to director of marketing for CareFusion’s minimally invasive surgical instrument division. In this role, she is responsible for innovation, product launches, sales training, and driving clinical adoption. Currently, she is also working researching and validating a medical device and information technology company that focuses on improving patient experiences in medical facilities while providing the hospitals with increased efficiencies. She is a graduate of Ohio University in Athens, Ohio with a degree in marketing and recipient of The Sales Certificate. She is 2012 Fellow in the Startup Leadership Program in San Diego. She currently works as executive recruiter at Accordance Search Group in San Diego.

Fellow since