Best Startup
At Best Startup US we track over 1,000,000 US startups and over 3 million people who hold key positions in these companies. We use this directory of startups to highlight top employees, founders and board members we think deserve more appreciation than they are currently getting.
This list showcases the top New York based Founder operating in the Communities space. If you think a Founder is missing from this list, feel free to contact our editor on editor@beststartup.us.
The individuals on this list have been included because of exceptional performance in one of the following categories:
- Innovation – Operating as a key part in an extremely innovative business or startup.
- Growth – Operating as a key figure in the growth and upscale of a market leading business or startup.
- Management – Showing exceptional management skills.
- Societal impact – Putting their business on the map for their positive societal or environmental impact.
Our Data – We source our data from OSINT (open source intelligence) and public directories such as Crunchbase, SemRush and many more. The data from these sources should be treated with a degree of caution and verified yourself.
Alex Chung
Co-Founder & CEO of Giphy
Alex Chung is currently the founder and CEO of GIPHY. His latest startups include Artspace, a leading ecommerce destination for contemporary art, The Fridge, a private social network acquired by Google, and General Displays a GE venture developing GE’s next generation of HDTVs. He has also directed media technology for MTV, NBC, Comcast, Charter, and managed future technologies for Paul Allen’s R&D lab. He was one of the early architects of interactive television and started his career as a hardware engineer at Intel. He was named on Business Insider’s Top 25 most influential technologists in New York and has degrees in philosophy, electrical/computer engineering, and graphic design.
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About Giphy: Giphy is an online database and search engine that allows users to search, share, and discover GIFs.
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Scott Heiferman
Co-Founder of Meetup
Scott Heiferman is a Co-Founder and CEO of [Meetup](http://www.crunchbase.com/organization/meetup), the world’s largest network of local community groups. Over 50,000 Meetups (self-organized community events) happen each week. Millions of people in over more than 100 countries “use the internet to get off the internet” using Meetup, which is built on the idea that every town needs support groups, playgroups, bookclubs, business circles, running groups, community action groups, etc. Previously, Heiferman co-founded Fotolog, a photo sharing network where over 30 million people have uploaded nearly a billion photos. He also founded i-traffic, a top online ad agency in the 90s. He then fled the ad industry and was influenced by 9/11 to start Meetup. Scott graduated from The University of Iowa. He is an angel investor in Betaworks, Founders Collective, Virgance, 20×200, and others. Scott received the Jane Addams Award from the National Conference on Citizenship and was named an MIT Technology Review “Innovator of the Year”. He’s @heif.
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About Meetup: Meetup brings people together in thousands of cities to do more of what they want to do in life.
Genevieve Ryan Bellaire
Founder & CEO of Realworld
Genevieve Ryan Bellaire is the Founder and CEO of Realworld, a company that provides a simple way to navigate adulthood and its life moments, with help from your community. Genevieve has had a broad array of professional experience across business, law, and government. An attorney by profession, she received her JD/MBA from Georgetown University, and worked on strategic partnerships at Goldman Sachs until leaving to found Real World Playbook. Genevieve received her B.A. in Politics-International Relations from Princeton University, where she held numerous campus leadership roles and graduated with Honors in her department. Beyond her work in the entrepreneurial world, Genevieve is passionate about women’s empowerment, education, and national security. She currently serves as a member of the Pencils of Promise Leadership Council, the Acumen Fund Young Professional Committee, and the Washington Institute for Business, Government, and Society.
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About Realworld: The #1 platform to navigate adulthood
Cindy Gallop
Founder & CEO of MakeLoveNotPorn
Cindy Gallop is the Founder and CEO of MakeLoveNotPorn and IfWeRanTheWorld. She is a former Board Advisor at Danoo and The Talent Business. Ms. Gallop received a master of arts in English Language and Literature at the University of Oxford.
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About MakeLoveNotPorn: Pro-sex. Pro-porn. Pro-knowing the difference.
Jamie Hodari
CEO & Co-Founder of Industrious
Jamie Hodari is the Co-Founder and CEO of Industrious. Prior to Industrious, Jamie was the CEO and Co-Founder of Kepler, a rapidly growing experimental university that Scientific American called a “daring global experiment” to bring “top-tier instruction to the neediest parts of the planet.”Jamie previously ran the education non-profit Generation Rwanda, analyzed investments at the hedge fund Birch Run Capital and was a project finance lawyer at the law firm Sullivan & Cromwell. He started his career as a journalist at the Times of India. Jamie holds a J.D. from Yale Law School, an M.P.P. from Harvard University, and a B.A. from Columbia University.
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About Industrious: Industrious is a premium flexible workspace provider that redefines the workplace experience.
Gary Tuerack
Founder and Chief Visonary of The National Society of Leadership and Success (NSLS)
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About The National Society of Leadership and Success (NSLS): The NSLS is the nation’s largest and only accredited leadership honor society with more than 1.5 million members.
Ben Anderson
Co-Founder and CEO of Amino Apps
Benjamin Anderson is a co-founder and CEO at Amino Apps.
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About Amino Apps: Amino Apps enables people to discover, develop, and express their interests and passions.
Yin Wang
Co-Founder and CTO of Amino Apps
Yin Wang is a Founder at Amino Apps company.
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About Amino Apps, Narvii: Amino Apps enables people to discover, develop, and express their interests and passions.
Alexander Dembitzer
Founder of The Northern Charitable Foundation (NCF)
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About SKY POWER, LLC, SkyREM, The Northern Charitable Foundation (NCF): The Northern Charitable Foundation (NCF) is a tax deductible 501 C3 non-profit organization.
Julie Anne Quay
Founder and CEO of VFILES
Julie Anne Quay is VFILES Founder and CEO and has over 20 years of experience in the fashion and media industries. Quay was Executive Editor for V Magazine before founding VFILES, and has worked for VH1, Vogue Japan and Australia, style.com, Steven Meisel, Richard Avedon, and more leading industry figures.
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About VFILES: VFILES—connect, discover, collaborate, and be a part of what’s next.
Tyler Faux
Co-Founder & CEO of Supergreat
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About Supergreat: Supergreat is a beauty community of real people reviewing the beauty products that work for them.
Dan Blackman
Co-Founder of Supergreat
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About Supergreat: Supergreat is a beauty community of real people reviewing the beauty products that work for them.
Jonathan Ende
Founder of TEDx Wall Street
Jonathan Ende is Founder & CEO at BorrowersFirst.He is also Founder at TEDx Wall Street.
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About TEDx Wall Street: TEDx is part of a revolution in global education made possible by local organizers wanting to engage their communities.
Gayle Jennings O’Byrne
Founder and CEO of iNTENT Manifesto
20+ years of finance, investment banking, philanthropy and lobbying experience. Previously, executive positions in Mergers and Acquisitions, Global Philanthropy, International Government Relations at JPMorgan Chase. Media Manager at Sun Microsystems. Developed and managed investment strategy and corporate relationships. Enjoys valuation, modeling, due diligence and championing founders and startups. Graduate of Wharton School of Business and the University of Michigan School of Business. Attended National University of Singapore and City of London Polytechnic. Conducted academic consulting project in Israel.
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About iNTENT Manifesto, The Prometheus Exchange, WOCstar Fund: iNTENT Manifesto IS an educational and investment platform.
Iyah Romm
Founder and CEO of Cityblock Health
Iyah Romm is a Founder and CEO at Cityblock Health.
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About Cityblock Health: Cityblock Health is a tech-driven healthcare provider for those in underserved communities.
Bay Gross
Co-Founder, Chief Product Officer & VP Strategy of Cityblock Health
cofounder Cityblock
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About Cityblock Health: Cityblock Health is a tech-driven healthcare provider for those in underserved communities.
Deevee Kashi
Founder & CEO of Deed
Deevee Kashi is the CEO and founder of Deed. He previously worked at The Butter Group as a Director of Promotions and Marketing.
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About Deed: Deed provides a social impact platform to connect people with causes and businesses with social impact.
Jacqueline Novogratz
Founder & CEO of Acumen
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About Acumen: Acumen is a non-profit venture fund that uses entrepreneurial approaches to solve the problems of global poverty.
Caroline Ghosn
CEO & Founder of Levo
There is evidence that Caroline’s company Levo quietly closed down operations leaving invoices to vendors and creditors unpaid in 2019. As of 2019 and 2020, the company could not be reached when contacted for payment.
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About Levo: Levo is the largest and fastest-growing professional network for millennials.
Philip Camilleri
Founder of FoundersList
Philip has been tinkering with gadgets for as long as he can remember, and coding professionally for the last 20 years. He previously cofounded and was CTO at SmartAsset (YC S12, YC Top 100 Companies, $50mm+ in venture capital) before leaving in early 2019 to launch a new startup. Prior to SmartAsset, Philip was at ION Trading for 7 years, managing an international team of developers building trading solutions for top-tier investment banks.
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About FoundersList: FoundersList is a place for founders to connect, launch ideas/products, find recommended service-providers, events, cofounders, and more…
Ran Harnevo
Co Founder & CEO of Homeis
Ran is a veteran in the media and Internet industry and specializes in managing and deploying content and media assets. Ran is currently the CEO of 5min Media, the online largest video syndication platform, which he founded in 2007. Prior to starting 5min Media, Ran’s experience included working as a deputy editor at Tel-Aviv Magazine, where he managed the website and covered politics and sports. Ran earned his undergraduate degree in Philosophy and Computer Science from Tel Aviv University, after serving as a fighter pilot in the Israeli army. Ran currently resides in New York.
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About Homeis: Homeis develops a software platform that builds a better Internet for immigrants.
George Raptis
Co-Founder of Breef
George is Founder at Curated – where Humans Work Better Together. He was the first team member at Credible, responsible for Operations. He has since transitioned into an advisory role, responsible for legal, strategy and company relationships.
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About Breef: The Only Way to Agency.
Emily Bibb
Co-Founder of Breef
Emily has a history in bringing early-stage startups into culture, and is considered to be a global leader in the digital space. Having been at the forefront of digital marketing & brand strategy, she was instrumental in building several, high-growth startups including POPSUGAR, VSCO, & S’well. Emily’s background sparked her mission to change the future of work. Realizing there was no trusted solution for work ‘outside the walls’ of an organization, she is leading the way in which companies outsource their most important projects on Breef. With a ‘pass-it-on’ mentality, Emily is a strong advocate for mentorship, partnering with both the Wall Street Journal and Bigs & Littles program here in New York City. As a former swimmer — NCAA Champion and USA Olympic Team Trial qualifier — Emily’s spare time is often in a pool.
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About Breef: The Only Way to Agency.
Jonathan Kola
CTO & Co- Founder of Wecyclers
Olawale is a production supervisor with 9 years of industrial experience at a US Fortune 200 company. He has deep experience in Electric Arc Furnace, Ladle Metallurgy Furnace and Casting Operations. Olawale is experienced in construction and commissioning of multimillion-dollar production facilities. He is a highly motivated individual with a proven ability to lead teams and generate results. Olawale holds an MBA from the Indiana State University, Kelly School of Business and an M.S and B.S in Chemical Engineering from Florida Institute of Technology. Wale is responsible for managing the day-to-day operations of the Wecyclers.
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About Wecyclers: Wecyclers offers convenient household recycling service using a fleet of low-cost cargo bikes.
JP Rosato
CEO & Founder of Sitehands
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About CS Technology, Sitehands: Sitehands is a global IT marketplace serving the largest global Financial Institutions and Fortune 500 companies.
Mukesh Sehgal
Founder, President & CEO of RSG Media
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About RSG Media: RSG Media is a media-tech supplier specializing in rights management, whose customers include industry-leading TV networks, studios.
Lindsey Taylor Wood
Founder, CEO & GP of The Helm
Lindsey Taylor Wood is the Founder, CEO & GP at The Helm.
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About The Helm, The Helm: The Helm is an early-stage venture firm investing in game-changing companies founded by women through our fund and investor membership.
Jeremy Frommer
Founder & CEO of Creatd
Jeremy Frommer is an American financier and entrepreneur based in New Jersey. His career includes over two decades on Wall Street, working as a hedge fund and portfolio manager, and on the sell-side of the financial industry, building and selling two financial services companies. He is CEO of Jerrick Ventures Inc., a company that acquires, develops and produces content across all forms of media. Frommer is depicted in Michael Lewis’ novel Flash Boys. In 2012, Frommer discovered the “Guccione Collection,” a large collection of unpublished works and photos owned by Bob Guccione, the founder of the Penthouse empire. Frommer graduated magna cum laude from the State University of New York at Albany, with a B.A. in philosophy, and studied at the London School of Economics.
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About Creatd, Vocal: Creatd is an IT company that provides technologies that solve problems for the creative community.
Nikhil Lakhanpal
Co-Founder of Narmi
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About Narmi: Narmi is a provider of mobile banking, online banking, and digital account opening to regional and community financial institutions.
Chris Griffin
Co-Founder of Narmi
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About Narmi: Narmi is a provider of mobile banking, online banking, and digital account opening to regional and community financial institutions.
Paul Verbinnen
Co-Founder & Co-CEO of Sard Verbinnen & Co
He co-founded Sard Verbinnen in 1992 and is actively involved with many of the firm’s clients, including public corporations, high-profile executives and educational institutions. He has worked on numerous M&A transactions and proxy contests, as well as crisis situations including product recalls, data breaches, litigation, regulatory matters and executive transitions. He works with many companies and boards on corporate positioning, scenario planning and preparedness. Previously, he was executive vice president, International for a major public relations firm and, before that, helped to start a sports marketing firm.
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About Sard Verbinnen & Co: Sard Verbinnen & Co is a leading strategic corporate and financial communications firm.
Channing Allen
Co-Founder of Indie Hackers
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About Indie Hackers, Stripe: Indie Hackers is a website and community focusing on helping entrepreneurs become profitable while remaining independent.
Georgene Huang
CEO & Co-Founder of Fairygodboss
Georgene Huang is founder of Fairygodboss.com, an employer review site and community for working women.
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About Fairygodboss: Fairygodboss is the largest career community for women. Free for women, we help employers recruit and hire women.
Romy Newman
President and Co-Founder of Fairygodboss
Romy Newman is the Co-Founder at Fairygodboss since June 2015. Previously, Romy was the Head of Strategic Partner Development at Chartbeat until April 2015. Until October 2014, Romy was Head of Digital Advertising for The Wall Street Journal, overseeing sales, marketing and operations for The Wall Street Journal Digital Network. Previously, Romy held several management roles at The Wall Street Journal including General Manager of Print, Conferences and Radio, Vice President of Multi-Media Sales and Vice President of Sales Strategy and Operations. During her tenure at The Journal, Romy was proud to be involved in several extremely successful new product development efforts, including WSJ. Magazine, WSJ Weekend, Greater New York and the original groundbreaking WSJ iPad app. Before joining The Journal, Romy held marketing positions at Google and Estee Lauder and was also a strategy consultant for a boutique media firm called Kannon Consulting, where she advised top management for Chicago Tribune, Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post. Romy graduated with a B.A. in American Studies from Yale University and an MBA in Strategy, Finance & Marketing from the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.
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About Fairygodboss: Fairygodboss is the largest career community for women. Free for women, we help employers recruit and hire women.
Yoav Hornung
Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer of VeedMe
Yoav Hornung is the Creative Verticals Group Manager at Fiverr.
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About Coverr, Fiverr, VeedMe: VeedMe is a video creation marketplace that connects businesses with reliable and talented videographer communities.
Noel Cocca
Founder & CEO of RecruitingDaily.com
Noel Cocca is the Founder & CEO at RecruitingDaily.com.
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About Novo Medical Careers, RecruitingBlogs.com, RecruitingDaily.com: RecruitingDaily and its network of sites reach a global audience ranging from entry-level sourcers to strategy-level corporate executives.
Jennifer Prosek
Founder & CEO of Prosek Partners
Jennifer Prosek is the founder and CEO of Prosek Partners, a leading international public relations and financial communications consultancy with offices in New York, Connecticut and London. The firm ranks among the top 20 independent public relations firms in the US and among the top five financial communications consultancies in the US and UK. The firm has been listed as an Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing Company of the Year for four years running and ranked among the Top 20 in New York Observer’s PR Power List in 2014. Prosek is a published author and frequent speaker. Her book “Army of Entrepreneurs,” published in 2011, received praise from Columbia Business School, Wharton and INSEAD. Her second book “Raising Can-Do Kids,” co-authored with Brown Ph.D. Richard Rende, was published by Penguin Random House in the summer of 2015. Prosek received her MBA from Columbia University and a BA in English literature from Miami University. She is on the board of directors of the Arthur Page Society, Institute for Public Relations, and The New York City Partnership for the Homeless. In 2015 Prosek was listed in PR Week’s Global PR Power Book.
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About Prosek Partners: Prosek Partners is a communications consultancy that delivers an unexpected level of passion, creativity and marketing savvy.
Jake Poses
Founder & CEO of Jumprope
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About Jumprope: Jumprope is a platform where users can create, discover, and share how-to videos and tutorials.
Jaden Smith
Founder of JUST Water
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About JUST Water: JUST water is responsibly sourced, produced and packaged for improved environmental and community impact.
Carolyn Childers
Co-Founder & CEO of Chief
Carolyn Childers is the Co-founder and CEO of Chief, the private network built to drive more women into positions of power and keep them there. She is an experienced leader and operator, having successfully scaled several early-stage businesses. Prior to founding Chief, Carolyn was SVP of Operations at Handy, led the launch of the site Soap.com (Quidsi) and acted as its GM through its acquisition by Amazon. Carolyn is now focusing her energy and experience on tackling the imbalance of professional power and creating lasting change from the top down, landing her on Inc.’s 2019 Female Founders 100 List.
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About Chief: Chief is the only private membership network focused on connecting and supporting women executive leaders.
Lindsay Kaplan
Co-Founder of Chief
Lindsay Kaplan, Co-Founder of Chief, is an accomplished and award-winning brand creative, marketer, and communications executive. Most recently, she was VP Communications and Brand at Casper. Kaplan began her career in publishing at Oxford University Press, Time Out New York, and ELLE magazine. She also worked on the agency side at Publicis, and brought numerous startups to market. She was named New York Times DealBook Groundbreaker, PR Week’s 40 Under 40, Business Insider Most Innovative CMOs in the World. Kaplan holds a BA in English Literature and Creative Writing from Brandeis University.
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About Chief: Chief is the only private membership network focused on connecting and supporting women executive leaders.
Naj Austin
Founder &CEO, Somewhere Good of Ethels Club
Naj Austin is the founder and CEO of Somewhere Good and Ethel’s Club. She has spent her career building digital and physical products that make the world a more intersectional and equitable space. She was named one of Inc’s 100 Female Founders transforming America, a Huffpost Culture Shifter of 2020 and Time Out New York’s 2020 list of women making NYC better.
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About Ethels Club, Somewhere Good: An immersive wellness platform centering people of color. By us, for you.
Brad Hargreaves
Founder & CEO of Common Living
Brad is the founder and CEO of Common. Common is dedicated to making housing better by providing flexible, community-minded shared homes. Previously,he co-founded General Assembly, a global education institution with campuses in more than 15 cities worldwide. As part of the General Assembly founding team, Brad led the growth of the company’s education business from its launch in 2011 into a global institution with over a dozen campuses. Most recently, he was a Venture Partner at Maveron, General Assembly’s lead investor. Brad has been named to Vanity Fair’s “The Next Establishment”, Inc Magazine’s “30 Under 30”, and Business Insider’s “Silicon Alley 100”.
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About Common Living, GoCrossCampus: Common Living is a community-driven residential company that brings community, convenience, and flexibility to housing.
Rachel Sklar
Founder & CEO of TheLi.st
Rachel Sklar is a writer and social entrepreneur based in New York. She is the co-founder of Change The Ratio, which increases visibility and opportunity for women in tech & new media, and TheLi.st (in beta), a community platform for women driven by that same mission. She is serious about diversity and will let you know if she finds you wanting. Rachel is a TechStars mentor and an advisor to several startups, including Vox Media, The Daily Muse, Gui.de, Lover.ly, Votizen (acquired by Causes) & TeachAIDS.org, and is a proud Board member at She’s The First. She is also a proud member of the Reboot, TED & Summit communities and of the Lean In Foundation launch team. Rachel’s other initiatives include founding Charitini, a social enterprise to facilitate group giving around events, and CTRComedy – an all-women comedy initiative which quadrupled the number of women performing comedy at SXSW in 2011 and 2012.
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About Change The Ratio, TheLi.st: Theli.st is a visibility platform and network for professional women from all sector.
Miriam Illions
Co-Founder of Hometalk
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About Hometalk: Hometalk empowers every person to create the home they love.
Co-Founder of Dots
Pranav Badami is a Co-Founder at Dots.
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About Dots: Dots helps companies interact with their customers through their Slack or Discord communities to increase revenue and retention.
Rahul Mahida
Co-Founder & CTO of Daivergent
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About Daivergent: The Daivergent platform allows companies to fulfill data requests at scale by matching to the best workforce: adults with autism.
Byran Dai
Co-Founder and CEO of Daivergent
CEO and Co-Founder of Daivergent Inc., a technology platform allowing companies to fulfill data requests at scale by matching to uniquely-suited adults on the autism spectrum. Our software allows autism talent to enter the remote workforce for the first time.
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About Daivergent: The Daivergent platform allows companies to fulfill data requests at scale by matching to the best workforce: adults with autism.
Taj English
Co-Founder & CTO of ListedB
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About ListedB: ListedB is a social booking app for beauty & wellness services within the Black community. A marketplace connecting professionals & clients.
Billy Pymm
Co-Founder of Off The Scale
Billy Pymm is the Co-Founder of Off The Scale. He is an entrepreneur with proven track record; co-founder of athletic gear brand Maverik Lacrosse sold to Bauer Performance Sports and co-founder of JCORE; partner at leading Interactive Kiosk manufacturing company; former financial analyst at Fleet; MBA.
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About Off The Scale: OffTheScale is a health platform for nutritional education, exercise classes, lifestyle change tools, and community support.
Ashley John Heather
Co-Founder, President of Off The Scale
Ashley John Heather is the Co-Founder and President of Off The Scale.
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About CLEARED4, Off The Scale: OffTheScale is a health platform for nutritional education, exercise classes, lifestyle change tools, and community support.
Carol Ruth
Founder, CEO & President of The Ruth Group
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About The Ruth Group: The Ruth Group is a leading strategic communications firm focused exclusively on the healthcare industry.
Jordan Davidovit
Co-Founder of Roomeze
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About Roomeze: Roomeze is a full-service room rental company that provides roommate matchmaking service.
Fred Pytlak
Co-Founder, Director & Chief Client Officer of Office Practicum
Fred is a Founder, Director, and original CEO of Office Practicum. He currently serves as Chief Client Officer, a position from which he plans and executes strategy for his favorite saying: “Take care of the customer, and the rest will follow.” To that end, he directs improvements in the total customer experience for our users, from their first contact as a sales prospect through implementation, training, and regular renewals of the customer relationship. Fred started in Information Technology with a mission to develop an evolutionary suite of specialty software designed to support the patient/practitioner encounter while providing a comprehensive high quality Medical Practice Management software solution. As the original Founder, he created Office Practicum and maintains his deep involvement in its design and development. Fred lives in Brooklyn with his wife, Edna.
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About Office Practicum: OP is the industry leader in pediatric-specific EHR technology and practice solutions, built by pediatricians, for pediatricians.
Drew Tunney
Co-Founder & CTO of Voro
Drew Tunney is the co-founder and CTO of Voro.
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About Voro: Voro is a developer of a doctor’s recommendation platform designed to make community healthier.
Tomas Hoyos
Co-Founder & CEO of Voro
Tomas Hoyos is the co-founder and CEO of Voro.
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About Voro: Voro is a developer of a doctor’s recommendation platform designed to make community healthier.
Matt Bruck
Co-Founder & President of Eaters Drinkers (formerly Joios)
Lots of success launching, building and running businesses in challenging environments (startups, turnarounds, new product/market launches). Core skills: bringing structure & analytics to chaotic environments; connecting strategic imperatives & implementation realities; energizing companies via branding & partnerships. Co-founder & President of Joios, a community for flavor discovery. We taste blind, gather data, filter collaboratively, make recommendations and enable acquisition of food and drink. Previously: led business development across the Americas for RICS; managed all key functions as COO of Meredith & Co.; defined strategies for Marakon. Startups: early leadership of Firefly (acquired by Microsoft), KaanBaan and Nexaweb. Advisory Boards of Argus Software (acquired by Altus), Flavorpill, GameRank, QLogiq, etc. Stanford, MIT alum. Always open to new learning, challenges and opportunities.
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About Eaters Drinkers (formerly Joios): Better strategies. Rigorous implementation. Flavor.
Derek Kleinow
Co-Founder of BarZar
Derek Kleinow founded his first company, TigerGPS, when he was in college and built it to over $20 million in sales and sold it when he was 26. Derek makes select seed investments in early stage start-up companies, and offers advice and consulting to entrepreneurs. Derek is assisting PASSO with identifying new investors and product development.
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About BarZar: BarZar is a fast, easy, and free way to get customized drink for social groups.
Anna Lindow
CEO + Co-Founder of Brave Health
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About Brave Health: Brave Health is an online platform that offers therapy and medication management for psychiatric conditions to improve mental health.
Danny Feltsman
Founder and CEO of lifeArk
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About lifeArk: lifeArk helps parents share life experience and establish meaningful, lasting, and significant relationships with their kids
Stacey Bendet
Founder of Creatively
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About Creatively: Creatively connects the creative community through best-in-class portfolios, collaborative features, and opportunities around the globe.
Joe Indriolo
Founder & Chief Product Officer of Creatively
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About Creatively: Creatively connects the creative community through best-in-class portfolios, collaborative features, and opportunities around the globe.
James Ingallinera
Founder & CEO of Tribe
James Ingallinera is the CEO at Tribe
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About Tribe: Tribe is the platform for interest-based coliving.
Gesche Haas
Founder & CEO of Dreamers & Doers
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About Dreamers & Doers, Founders Pledge: Dreamers & Doers is a private collective for extraordinary entrepreneurial womxn.
Lauren Kassan
COO & Co-Founder of The Wing
Lauren Kassan is the co-founder and COO of The Wing, a coworking space-meets-social club for women in New York that offers living room-style work space, a locker room, a library, and on-demand blowouts. It’s meant to be both flexible space for professional women about town as well as a community hub for its 600 members. Kassan’s background is in fitness startups. She was the first employee at the New York boutique fitness studio SLT, which now has 12 locations, and rose to become the director of business development. She then worked at ClassPass, where she helped grow the startup’s studio network. Now, Kassan runs day to day operations for The Wing, which has been in-demand since it opened in October 2016, with 3,000 women now on the waiting list, and countless more in other major cities clamoring for their own version.
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About The Wing: The Wing is a network of work and community spaces designed for women.
Tina Roth Eisenberg
Founder / CEO of CreativeMornings
Tina Roth Eisenberg is a Swiss born designer working and living in Brooklyn, New York. Tina is the author of the popular design blog SwissMiss, organizes a monthly lecture/breakfast series called CreativeMornings, runs a co-working space called FRIENDS (formerly Studiomates), is the force behind the simple, browser-based to-do app called TeuxDeux and the founder of Tattly, a designy temporary tattoo shop.
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About CreativeMornings, FRIENDS WORK HERE, Swissmiss Blog, Tattly, TeuxDeux: CreativeMornings is a free, monthly breakfast lecture series for the creative community.
Brandon Maier
Founder of WestWave Ventures
Brandon Maier has past experience in finance, marketing, and entrepreneurship, and holds a degree in Communications from NYU. His most recent startup endeavor, Jozii.com, is a student based job matching service which amassed over 100,000 student users in the US. Other startup experiences include serving as a Financial Controller for a Bitcoin Exchange and a marketing consultant for companies building out campus brand marketing campaigns. In addition to launching his own startups, Brandon has taken the time to participate in various accelerator programs, including NYU’s Summer Launchpad. Even with his various commitments, Brandon has been dedicated to giving back to the University Entrepreneurship community, regularly speaking on Entrepreneurship as a guest lecturer at NYU, Pace, Penn State, and USC as well as serving as a judge for college pitch competitions which include Princeton’s Tiger Launch, Global Entrepreneurship week and many more. As a member of the Quake team, Brandon handles University Relations, Deal Flow Generation, and Partnerships. To date, Brandon is connected with over 80 University Entrepreneurship programs across the country including Columbia, MIT, and other top tier institutions, all of whom have participated in Quake’s University Investor Series Program.
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About WestWave Ventures: WestWave Ventures is a Los Angeles based company focused on fostering community and innovation in Southern California.
Ralph Kartzman
CEO and CO Founder of Konnectgolf
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About Konnectgolf: Konnectgolf is NYC’s inclusive, indoor golf club.
Magdalena Sartori
Co-Founder, Managing Director & Chief Creative Officer of The Assemblage
Magdalena Sartori was born in Uruguay, and spent her childhood between Paris and Geneva. As an architect, she worked on projects in Hong Kong, Paris, and Dubai. A desire for a personal and professional shift led to her role as a founder and now chief creative officer at the Assemblage, a collaborative coworking and coliving wellness space. Sartori holds degrees from the École Polytechnique in Switzerland and a master’s degree from Columbia University.
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About The Assemblage: The Assemblage is a community of individuals who believe the world is on the verge of a collective conscious evolution.
Marc Lara
Co-Founder & Chief Scientist of MicroHealth
I am the scientist at MicroHealth.I conducted mobile health clinical trials at Columbia University Medical Center and co-founded MicroHealth to help patients in the real world.
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About la Caixa, MicroHealth, The Aspen Institute: MicroHealth is a clinical-grade digital health company helping patients and healthcare professionals succeed in hemophilia treatment.
Miguel Lara
Co-Founder & CEO of MicroHealth
Hello, I co-founded MicroHealth to help people live healthier lives. I focus on driving growth and serving as the connector between our team and the market. In a former life I used to be a healthcare investment banker.
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About MicroHealth: MicroHealth is a clinical-grade digital health company helping patients and healthcare professionals succeed in hemophilia treatment.
Javier Gonzalo
Co-Founder & CTO of MicroHealth
Hi, I’m passionate about MicroHealth because I believe in products that help people and are a joy to use; from discovery, to experience, to business model. Past work includes leading global R&D teams at Vodafone.
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About MicroHealth: MicroHealth is a clinical-grade digital health company helping patients and healthcare professionals succeed in hemophilia treatment.
Jenna Sands
Co-Founder of HelloWellness
Jenna Sands co-founded HelloWellness in 2016, an event-hosting company that fosters in-person connections between brands, bloggers, and wellness enthusiasts.
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About HelloWellness: HelloWellness is an event-hosting company that fosters in-person connections between brands, bloggers, and wellness enthusiasts.
Rachael Chong
CEO & Founder of Catchafire
The one quote that Rachael hangs by her desk says, “Be truthful, gentle, and fearless.” She wants to leave this earth known as a leader who empowers others to be better than her. Rachael is described by others as gritty, hungry to learn, humble and visionary — but her passion is what truly defines and elevates her. Whether she’s talking about how amazing the spoken-word artist she saw last week was or a new social enterprise she just heard about, she can’t help but gush. She’s one of the lucky ones to be born with fire, and she works daily to channel it for good.
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About Catchafire: Catchafire is an online platform connecting professionally-skilled volunteers with non-profits and social enterprises.
Sarah Robb O’Hagan
Founder, Author and Chief Extremer of ExtremeYOU
Sarah Robb O’Hagan leads the company’s management and strategy. She has served as the global president of Gatorade and Equinox as well as CEO of Flywheel Sports, and she’s held leadership positions at Nike and Virgin Atlantic Airways. Named one of Forbes’ “Most Powerful Women in Sports,” she is also the author of “Extreme You: Step Up. Stand Out. Kick Ass. Repeat.”
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About EXOS, ExtremeYOU: EXTREMEYOU is a company of passionate people inspired to fight “Everyone’s a Winner” Culture to drive change and progress in the world.
PJ Hagerty
Founder/Chief Community Officer of DevRelate.io LLC
Developer, writer, speaker, musician, and Community Advocate, PJ is the founder of DevRelate.io. He is known to travel the world speaking about programming and the way people think and interact.
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About : Developer and Community Relations as a Service
Robert Hammond
Founder & Interim Executive Director of Friends of the High Line
Robert Hammond is Founder & Interim Executive Director at Friends of the High Line.
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About Friends of the High Line: Friends of the High Line is a non-profit, private organization that funds virtually all the High Line’s operations by raising contributions.
Keren Sachs
Founder & CEO of The Luupe
Founder, CEO of The Luupe
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About The Luupe: The Luupe is a one-stop production platform for professional creators and brands to seamlessly collaborate and make great work together.
Ben Halpern
Founder of DEV
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About DEV: Dev is a community of software developers getting together to help one another out.
Peter Frank
Co-Founder & Co-CEO of DEV
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About DEV: Dev is a community of software developers getting together to help one another out.
Jess Lee
Co-Founder of DEV
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About DEV: Dev is a community of software developers getting together to help one another out.
Shelli Trung
Founder of FForward
Founder at FForward
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About FForward: The events guide for professionals
Christian Koch
Founder of New York Network Operators Group
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About Digital Realty, New York Network Operators Group: Connecting New York network operators and technology professionals by providing educational events and programs.
Reshma Chabria
Founder and CEO of T3: The Tutor Theories
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About T3: The Tutor Theories: T3: The Tutor Theories is more than a tutoring company. We are a knowledge-producing, epiphany-inducing community. Our team makes educatio
Adam Berk
Co-Founder of Neighborrow
Adam is a lean entrepreneur, lean teacher, and lean investor. He is a faculty member with Lean Startup Co. and a lead mentor and external board member of Google Launchpad Accelerator. He also coaches enterprise product teams at Spinnaker, a boutique innovation transformation consultancy. An intrepid experimenter, he is the resident troublemaker at The Entrepreneurial Science Foundation.
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About Lean Startup Co., Neighborrow: Neighborrow is an online platform that offers offline access to things people need to use but don’t need to own.
Alex Ragir
Co-Founder & Chief Community Officer of Storyhunter
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About Storyhunter: The video production marketplace and freelancer management platform
John Kiehl
Founder of Kiehl’s
Founder at Kiehl’s
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About Kiehl’s: Since 1851, Kiehl’s has been committed to the betterment of the communities.
Hugh Evans
Co-Founder of Global Citizen
Through the Global Citizen platform, humanitarian Hugh Evans has created an online community of millions of people — all driven to eradicate extreme poverty by the year 2030. At 14, Hugh Evans spent the night in a Manila slum. The harsh realities of his hosts’ lives motivated Evans to challenge the status quo of extreme poverty. Following a trip to South Africa in 2002 as World Vision’s inaugural Youth Ambassador, Evans worked on the Make Poverty History campaign and helped stage the Make Poverty History Concert, fronted by Pearl Jam and Bono. In 2012, under the mantle of the Global Poverty Project (launched 2008), Evans co-founded Global Citizen, and with it, the Global Citizen Festival — a free, ticketed event requiring fans to perform anti-poverty actions in exchange for entry, recruiting millions into the war against global poverty. In 2015 alone, Global Citizens took 2.3 million actions, helping to secure commitments from governments around the world that are set to affect more than 210 million lives.
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About Global Citizen, Oaktree: Global Citizen is a community of people like you.
Radha Agrawal
CEO and Co-Founder of DAYBREAKER
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About DAYBREAKER: Daybreaker is an early morning dance movement in 23 cities around the world and growing.
Aaron Foss
Founder of Telephone Science
Aaron Foss is the Co-Founder of SideTour, which he started with Mark Webster, Minesh Mistry and Vipin Goyal. Foss was the chief software architect of the platform and was responsible for leading all technical development. A respected leader in the development community, he regularly speaks at user group meetings and conferences. Foss has received awards for his Disrupt Hackathon projects, won numerous programming competitions and personally holds 2 U.S. patents.
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About Hofstra University, Hofstra University, Telephone Science: Telephone Science Corporation
Brian Anderson
Founder and Co-CEO of beastcoast
Brian Anderson is a Co-founder and CEO at Beastcoast.
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About beastcoast: Beastcoast is an online esports game organizer that specializes in organizing games and tournaments based on players’ interests.
Dan Zaitsev
CEO, Founder of Catchar
Dan Zaitsev is an entrepreneur and product manager with 10+ yrs experience. He started his IT life in early 90s at the age of 7 years with PC 486, VFX 3D (btw VFX was his first VR experience), Nintendo and Playstation. From 18 until 25, he worked for a number of large web-studios as a project manager building web-sites, social widgets and applications. At the age of 25, he worked for a couple of big IT companies as a product owner being involved in development of social and e-commerce mobile applications and websites that generated net revenue exceeding $200,000 per month. Also at this period, he first time visited Silicon Valley and he was really excited how IT technologies can disrupt whole industries. Soon thereafter, he gained his first experience with Augmented Reality technology — Google Glass. At the age of 28 years he was part of the Looksery (Augmented Reality product based on realtime face recognition), Looksery was sold to Snapchat in the biggest ever deal for Ukraine valued at $150M. In 2015 he started to build ROAR Augmented Reality Platform. The key idea is an AR for Consumer Packaged Goods (CPG), where consumers are able to see AR content such as commercial video, price comparison, nutrition information, etc. directly on the packages. In 2018, I started working on Catchar — the world’s largest Augmented and Mixed Reality community…
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About Catchar: A web-community and marketplace for Augmented Reality developers
Nancy Spears
CEO & Founder of genconnectU
Nancy Spears in 2008 founded genConnect, a digital media company that engages audiences with world-class experts and their wisdom. The mission of genConnect, which has a media presence at such high-profile events as the Aspen Food & Wine Classic, Aspen Ideas Festival, SXSW and Sundance Film Festival, is to link audiences directly to experts on everything that matters through short-form video, online chats and eCommerce.
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About genconnectU: genConnectU is an EdTech eLearning platform which creates and distributes world-class expert video courses, targeting a female audience.
Yali Harari
Co-Founder and CEO of Innovesta
Yali Harari is the CEO of 3i-MIND since the company’s inception in October, 2009. Yali has extensive management background in the technology space. In her last position Yali served as Corporate VP, Global Services for NICE systems, a global leader in solutions for the security and enterprise markets. During her tenure at NICE Yali led the services organization to increased revenue, while improving customer satisfaction. Prior to that position, Yali was CEO of Kamoon Inc. a knowledge management profiling and collaboration technology provider. Her first role as CEO was at Tescom, a Q &A testing services company.
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About Innovesta: Innovesta is a cutting-edge digital crowd diligence platform creating an online community.
Ron D’vari
Executive Chairman, Chief Investment Officer, Co-Founder & Chief Executive Officer of NewOak
Ron D’Vari is NewOak’s Chairman, Chief Investment Officer & Co-Founder. He is responsible for advising NewOak clients in matters throughout the structured products and fixed-income asset lifecycle. In this role, Mr. D’Vari leads the analyses concerning portfolio construction, structuring, securitization, reps and warrants, portfolio management, valuation, credit and market risks and trading management. Mr. D’Vari is a member of NewOak’s executive committee. Prior to co-founding NewOak in 2008, Mr. D’Vari served as head of structured finance at BlackRock, where he co-managed $90 billion in fixed-income assets. At Blackrock, he developed the reality-based loan-level approach to valuation of structured securities transactions, was instrumental in establishing BlackRock Mortgage Investors and setting up the BlackRock distressed mortgage fund, PennyMAC. Prior to this, Mr. D’Vari worked at State Street Research for 12 years, ultimately heading the MBS/ABS/CMBS Portfolio Management and Trading team. He was one of three members of the firm’s Bond Policy Committee that managed $27 billion of fixed-income assets, and he established and led State Street’s collateralized debt obligation business and quantitative research team.
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About Black Tulip Asset Management, Boston University, FuturePay, NewOak, OrbisPay, PRMIA – Professional Risk Managers’ International Association, Tufts University: NewOak is a financial services advisory firm based in New York.
Tony Hammel
Co-Founder & Owner of ELD Properties
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About ELD Properties: ELD Properties is a consortium of integrated companies that invest, develop and manage real estate properties.
John Green
Founder of Subbable
John Green’s experience in television news media, and in the area of morning shows in particular, have helped him develop a reputation as one of the most creative producers working in network news today. A 13-year veteran of “Good Morning America,” ABC television network’s flagship morning show, Green has become known for his ability to produce everything from hard news to soft news and entertainment, in formats ranging from taped specials to very intricate live broadcasts. John Green began his television career as a freelance news writer at a Boston CBS affiliate, and over the next decade and a half gradually attracted attention and acclaim for his work as a producer. Green ascended the career ladder at ABC News as a young producer, eventually earning executive producer titles on hour-long news and feature specials for ABC Magazine Shows “20/20” and “Primetime,” including a recent breaking news special, “California Burning” anchored by Charles Gibson, which aired during the 2007 California wildfires. “Planet Earth”, another special executive produced by Green, was an unprecedented hour-long April 2007 special anchored by Diane Sawyer which featured environmental reports from all seven continents. As Executive Producer of Special Programming and Development for ABC News, John Green is responsible for the creation and launch of new news programming to be aired on the ABC television network. John Green is also the creator (and Executive in Charge) of “Good Morning America’s Weekend Edition.” Green’s creation airs nationally every Saturday and Sunday morning on ABC. John Green’s production work has been recognized by his peers, and he is an Emmy, Peabody, DuPont, and National Headliner Award-winner.
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About 10/10 Twins Productions, ABC News, ABC News, Rock’n Robin Productions, Subbable, Veyl Ventures: Subbable is a video subscription service that allows audiences to connect with and fund the content creators they like.
Nat Gelb
Founder & Chief Executive Officer of Tasting Collective
Nat Gelb is Founder and Chief Executive Officer at Tasting Collective .
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About Tasting Collective: Tasting Collective is a roving community of food lovers on a mission to create a more meaningful restaurant experience.
Steve Meszaros
Founder of Golfie
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About Golfie: Golf social network and marketing
Kevin Rennie
Founder of Golfie
Founder at Golfie
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About Golfie: Golf social network and marketing
