Nassau Street Ventures Team

Bio: Tom is an experienced CEO and strategic consultant. He has been CEO of three different venture-backed companies, which he successfully turned around. As General Manager, he launched Iron Mountain’s award-winning Digital Record Center. He brings a global perspective to business, having lived in Europe and Asia and worked in 40 countries. Tom has an engineering degree from Princeton University and an MBA from the Yale School of Management.
Notable Deals: Mapquest, Connotate

Bio: Ayla’s career began in the early-stage investing space in Chicago. Before joining AVG, she was an Associate for the Sustainable Local Food Investment Group (SLoFIG). Ayla continues to be a part of SLoFIG’s mission to identify promising start-up and early stage companies, then provide capital, expertise and a network of contacts to help drive their success. Additionally, Ayla serves on the auxiliary board of Chicago’s chapter of the Italian-based Slow Food Movement. A proud Wildcat, she graduated with a Bachelor’s degree Cum Laude and with Honors from Northwestern University.

Bio: Prior to joining AVG, Jenna was an Investor Service Representative at Putnam Investments, where she provided customer support to both clients and brokers. Jenna is a graduate of Merrimack College, Girard School of Business, where she studied Business Administration with a dual major in Management and Marketing.

Bio: Erik is a VentureCorps Analyst II at Nassau Street Ventures. He supports the investment team with due diligence analysis on prospective portfolio companies, as well as deal sourcing and outreach to VC’s, entrepreneurs and incubators to enhance Nassau Street’s deal pipeline with prospects. Prior to joining AVG full-time, Erik held internships with AVG and Fidelity Digital Assets, the asset management firm’s custody and trading platform. Erik holds a BS in Finance from Providence College (2021).

Bio: Jill Boyce is Intel Fellow and the Chief Media Architect at Intel, where she is responsible for defining media hardware architectures for Intel’s video hardware designs. She was named an IEEE Fellow in 2019 for contributions to video coding. She represents Intel at the Joint Video Exploration Team (JVET) of ITU-T SG16 and ISO/IEC MPEG. She serves as an Associate Rapporteur of ITU-T VCEG and is an Editor of the MIV specification. She is a prolific inventor, with almost 200 granted US patents. She was formerly the Director of Algorithms at Vidyo, Inc., Hackensack, NJ, USA, where she led video and audio coding and processing algorithm development. She was formerly the Vice President of Research and Innovation Princeton for Technicolor (formerly Thomson). She was with Lucent Technologies Bell Labs, AT&T Labs and Hitachi America. She received the B.S. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Kansas, the M.S.E. degree in electrical engineering from Princeton University, and completed the Program for Leadership Development at Harvard Business School.

Bio: Ray is an experienced healthcare executive with a strong track record of value creation. He is skilled in leading commercial organizations, building teams, developing/executing strategic plans, and sourcing, negotiating and closing corporate development transactions. He currently provides consulting and advisory services for private equity organizations, while pursuing direct investment opportunities within the broader healthcare sector. Ray most recently served as Chief Commercial Officer for Revision Skincare, a physician-dispensed provider of premium over the counter skincare solutions. Prior to that Ray served as Chief Strategy Officer and Head of Commercial Operations for Renaissance Pharma, a private equity backed organization that was sold in 2016 for $1.0 billion. Earlier in his career, Ray spent 10 years in progressive management roles at the Perrigo Company. Ray has an undergraduate degree in Economics from Princeton and an MBA in Finance from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Bio: Greg Cullison is Director of Innovative Solutions at Intelligent Shift, where he is responsible for sourcing cutting-edge technology for public sector clients. Greg is an Advisory Board Member and investor at InfoSci, an encryption technology company. He previously founded ProVerity, Inc., an advisory and risk analysis firm which was acquired in 2015. He has experience in cybersecurity, management and technology consulting, and in the public sector as a naval officer and Foreign Service Officer. Greg is certified by Carnegie Mellon University as an Insider Threat Program Manager. He holds degrees from Claremont McKenna College and Princeton University. Mr. Cullison resides outside Washington, D.C.

Bio: Zeynep Dereli, the Founder and CEO of Tink is an educational innovator who has been nominated for numerous awards just one year after the launch. She and her team have developed an educational ecosystem that embeds e-learning with the classroom allowing for entrepreneurial minded teaching and peer learning. Partnerships with the largest corporations in Turkey add another layer to this ecosystem proving much needed real life experience to Tink teachers and students. Tink, Technology and Human Colleges, is the first and leading chain of applied technology mid to high schools in Turkey. Based on its uniquely designed curriculum and e-learning platform Tink has converted 21st century skills training to students’ academic curricula. Tink students are future ready with a special focus on digital competencies and personal skills.

Bio: Lee Einbinder is a Vice Chairman at Barclays, responsible for senior client relationships in the Financial Institutions Group. Mr. Einbinder has been at Barclays since the acquisition of Lehman Brother in 2008, and during this time has also been Co-Head of the Financial Institutions Group and a member of the Investment Banking Operating Committee from 2013-2018. He has long standing relationships and coverage responsibility for banks, specialty finance companies, financial technology and markets related businesses, asset managers and financial sponsors. Prior to joining Barclays, Mr. Einbinder worked at Lehman Brothers from 1996-2008, and previously worked in similar capacities at CS First Boston and Salomon Brothers. Mr. Einbinder received his MBA with Distinction from the Wharton School in 1987 and his BSE cum laude from Princeton University in 1982.

Bio: Curtis A. Glovier is the Chairman, CEO, & President of PENSCO Trust Company, a specialty custodian of alternative investments held in retirement accounts. He also serves as Opus Bank’s Senior Executive Vice President, Head of Wealth Services, and as Managing Principal of Opus Equity Partners, a growth equity investment fund. Previously, he was Managing Director at Fortress Investment Group, LLC, where he led private equity and junior capital investments in a number of industries with a focus on financial services. He orchestrated Fortress’ investment in Opus Bank in September 2010 and was a founding board member of the bank. Curtis has over 20 years of leadership experience as an investor and operator, which has included tenures in private equity and venture capital investing at Perseus LLC and Nassau Capital, and in investment banking at Goldman Sachs. He led Perseus’ middle market buyout and recapitalization activities, with a focus on business services and branded consumer products. He has served as a board member for numerous companies spanning financial services, business services, technology, manufacturing, communications , and consumer products. Curtis received a B.A., cum laude, from Princeton University, and an M.B.A. as a Palmer Scholar from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Bio: Jon Huberman is the CEO of Ooyala, a leading software provider in the video production, distribution and monetization markets. With 30 years of high-tech business leadership, he is an accomplished executive with a demonstrated track record of driving high customer satisfaction, technology innovation and greater market value for technology companies. Previously, he served as CEO of Syncplicity, Tiburon, HyperParallel and Iomega. In addition, Jon spent over a decade investing in technology companies for the Bass family and the Gores Group. Jon received an A.B. in Computer Science from Princeton University and his MBA from The Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Bio: John James is an active global investor with experience leading international institutional and family office investment organizations, most recently serving as Global Head of Alternative Investments for Arch Capital Group Ltd., a Bermuda-based insurance/reinsurance company. Today, while seeking out new business models and investing in promising entrepreneurs, he serves as a mentor and advisor to both first-time and experienced founders. His investment interests center on fintech, consumer marketplaces, and software, and also include transportation, telecom, and gaming. John holds an A.B. degree from Princeton University, an M.B.A. from Columbia Business School, and an executive certificate in Entrepreneurship from Stanford.

Bio: Joseph C. Lane is Vice Chairman of Napier Park Global Capital and Chairman of the Management Committee. He served as CEO of GE Technology Finance, created when GE Capital acquired the business of Bay4 Capital where he was an owner and Vice Chairman. Joe was also an owner, Chairman and CEO of Hyphos360, a database management provider. Previously, Joe was president of IBM Credit Corporation, group executive – IBM Global Financing, and senior vice president of IBM. As head of the world’s largest information technology financing business, he was responsible for a $40 billion enterprise operating in over 40 countries. He was a member of IBM’s Operations Committee, Worldwide Management Council and Senior Management Group. For nearly 20 years, Joe was with GATX Capital, ultimately as Chief Executive Officer. He was Chairman of Sun Financial Corporation and of Centron, DPL, and a Director of Oxford Finance – a provider of capital to early-stage life sciences companies. He has served on boards and advisory boards in Europe, Asia and North America. Joe is currently Chairman of Adaptive Property Solutions, and Director of Eli Nutrition. He serves on the Advisory Board of InGo and Yardstick Analytics. He is former Chairman of the Board of Accruit, Chairman Emeritus of OnePak, Inc., and former Director of xagent. Joe was Director of the Mentor Network of the Yale Entrepreneurial Institute, a current member of the Western Connecticut Health Network’s Innovation and Research Council, and an associate fellow of Davenport College at Yale University where he earned his BA in American History. Joe has been director and chairman of the Equipment Leasing and Finance Association (ELFA), and chairman of the Equipment Leasing and Finance Foundation. He was elected to the Equipment Finance Hall of Fame in 2015.

Bio: Denise is the Head of Credit Global Expansion and Strategy for PayPal, responsible for driving growth of the consumer and merchant lending businesses. Denise joined PayPal in 2015 when it became an independent company from eBay and led the PayPal North America Corporate Strategy team as PayPal defined its new identity and path. Previously, Denise was Vice President of Business Development and Strategy at American Express where she led initiatives and teams in the Enterprise Growth division. Earlier in her career, Denise was a management consultant at Oliver Wyman and had experience at several startups. Passionate about ecology and conservation, she currently sits on the Board of NY/ NJ Baykeeper. She holds an MBA from the University of Pennsylvania and an AB in English from Princeton University.

Bio: Weidong Mao is currently Senior Fellow (SVP) at Comcast, one of the few highest ranking technologists and engineers. Weidong is an innovative technology leader with extensive architecture and product experience in media and technology fields including IP Streaming, Video Compression, Content Delivery Network (CDN), Advertising, Cloud, and AI/ML. Weidong co-founded MoreCom that was acquired by Liberate Technologies. Weidong also served as Director of Telecommunication Unit at Motorola and Senior Member of Research Staff at Philips Labs. Weidong is a prolific inventor with more than 50 granted patents. Weidong was awarded to IEEE Fellow in 2014 for contributions to video on demand technologies and cloud computing. Weidong earned his B.S. in electrical engineering from Peking University, and M.A. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Princeton University.

Bio: Barry Margerum, CEO of Heartrise, is an active investor and has sat on numerous boards. He started his career at IBM, then worked with Steve Jobs at Apple in the 1970s. He left to help build the groundbreaking company, GRiD Systems Corp. He went on to be CEO of MITEM and Euphonix. As chief strategy officer at Plantronix, he helped grow it from a $100 million to almost $1 billion company. Barry has a BSE from Princeton University and MBA from Stanford. He was captain of the Princeton wrestling team and has continued to coach youth wrestling and junior golfers in the Bay Area.

Bio: Dora is the Vice President of Operations at Carisma Therapeutics Inc. and enjoys wearing many hats at a young biopharmaceutical company with responsibilities ranging from fundraising and intellectual property to partnerships and leading all daily operations of the business. Prior to joining Carisma, Dora managed the therapeutics and diagnostics company portfolio at PCI Ventures at the University of Pennsylvania (Penn), where she also directed the UPstart Company Incubator. In that role, she led the launch, funding, incubation and growth of Penn intellectual property-based businesses such as CytoVas LLC, LignaMed LLC, Quantitative Radiology Solutions LLC and Linnaeus Therapeutics Inc., and the successful exit of a diagnostics company. Prior to joining PCI Ventures, Dora was a member of the Health and Life Sciences team at Battelle Ventures, LP, an early-stage technology company investor. Dora holds a PhD in Molecular Biology from Princeton University.

Bio: Thurman retired in 2020 as Chief Executive of Progress Investment Management Company, LLC, a San Francisco, California-based employee-owned asset manager and leader in investing with diverse boutique public market investment managers across the U. S. At its peak, the firm managed over $7 billion in assets in multi-manager strategies for some of the largest and most prestigious U. S. institutional investors. As Chief Executive, Thurman provided strategic leadership in various areas during his 28-year tenure. He also chaired the Progress board of directors and continues as Managing Member of the firm’s ownership entity. Progress ended its investment advisory business effective mid-year 2020.Thurman has served on several non-profit boards – most recently eight years for Silicon Valley Community Foundation where he continues to serve on the Investment Committee (and is past IC chair). He is a licensed attorney, angel investor, and a racial justice and minority business advocate.Thurman has degrees from Princeton, Stanford and the University of California, Berkeley. Thurman is married (Eileen), lives in San Mateo, California and is the father of three sons with six grandchildren. He is a person of faith and active in his church.

Bio: Harald is head of business and strategy, Business Artificial Intelligence, at Microsoft. He’s an accomplished software executive who can effectively bridge strategy and execution. With 20 years of business leadership experience, he has a track record of identifying new market opportunities, incubating disruptive products and technologies, and creating sizable new businesses. In his current role, he focuses on the productization and business incubation of innovative AI technology; acquired both in-house and externally, with an emphasis on enterprise and industrial applications and autonomous systems. Harald is passionate about working with startups as a strategic advisor. Earlier in his career, Harald was a strategy consultant at The Boston Consulting Group. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with an A.B. in Public & International Affairs from Princeton University and received an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business where he was an Arjay Miller Scholar.

Bio: Ying Wu is General Manager of the Clean Air Catalyst business at BASF, a multi-national, diversified chemicals and materials company. In this role, she leads a global team of sales, marketing, and operations professionals to advance innovative solutions that improve air quality, both outside and indoors. She’s experienced in a broad range of industries including energy and utilities, petrochemicals, automotive, aviation, and consumer electronics. Prior to joining BASF, Ying had worked at two startup companies, held various leadership roles in product development and technical marketing. She is passionate about turning laboratory discoveries into commercial successes. Her technical expertise focus on renewable energy, advanced batteries, and heterogeneous catalysis. Ying received a B.S., cum laude, from Davidson College, an M.S. and Ph.D. from Princeton University, and an M.B.A. from Rutgers University Business School.

Bio: Luisa is the founder of LuisaZhou.com, a leading coaching and e-learning business that helps ambitious men and women start their own online business. She founded LuisaZhou.com in 2015, and within a year it had crossed over a million dollars in revenue. Luisa has been featured on Forbes, Business Insider, Entrepreneur, Money, and more. She holds a BSE in Electrical Engineering from Princeton University and currently lives in NYC.

Bio: Marilyn Agbeko is an experienced technologist, with expertise in Product Management and Product Marketing, focused on the digital health space. She is currently with 98point6, helping pioneer a new, virtual, artificial intelligence-enabled primary care delivery model. Previously, Marilyn spent the majority of her career building software that helped hospitals and physicians practice work more efficiently. Marilyn is an angel investor, serves as the chair of the Communications Committee on the Board of the Association of Black Princeton Alumni, and is a mentor with Techstars Seattle. She holds an AB from Princeton University and an MBA from Washington University in St Louis.

Bio: Kathryn Bowsher is a highly accomplished commercial strategist with deep expertise in launching and scaling innovative solutions throughout healthcare. Today, as head of Act One Healthcare, she focuses on creating winning strategies for the multi-modal era of health and leveraging digital tools to transform care. She also serves on the Board of Pocket Naloxone, where she is a co-founder. Prior to Act One Kathryn was CEO of PurThread Technologies. During her career as both an operating executive and consultant, Kathryn has driven the success of more than 40 products and initiatives spanning a wide range of therapeutic areas, sites of care, and business models, the world over. Kathryn’s extensive experience includes global leaders and start-ups such as Health Evolution, Johnson & Johnson, Stanford Health, Pelesend, and Raptor Pharmaceuticals. She began her work in new products at Goldman Sachs. She holds an AB from Princeton University and an MBA from Stanford University.

Bio: Mr. Heinecke is an experienced business and legal advisor to growing life sciences companies.  He most recently served as Chief Business Officer and General Counsel at BioElectron Technology Corporation, which was purchased acquired by PTC Therapeutics.  Prior to that he led the product development team at Aimmune Therapeutics and served as General Counsel during and after the company’s highly successful initial public offering.  He has been a founder and executive at several venture backed life sciences companies and currently serves on the board of a private medical imaging company.  Earlier in his career, he was an associate at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati and a financial analyst at Morgan Stanley & Company.  He holds an AB from Princeton University and a JDA and MBA from the University of Chicago.

Bio: Rika is an entrepreneur, investor, keynote speaker, and international consultant. She is currently the Principal of Eurika Global, where she works with clients – from Frotune 1000 to startups – to apply innovation in a way that is at once practical and transformative. She is also the CEO and Founder of BoardSeatMeet, Inc. an NPO focusing on gender-balancing corporate board rooms by empowering women to build and leverage social capital with modern technology – essentially delivering the “High-Performance Board Room of Tomorrow”. Trilingual in Japanese, German and English, Rika immigrated from Japan to attend Princeton University. Rika has since worked internationally over two decades in senior executive roles in strategy, business development, and marketing with Fortune 500 companies – NVIDIA, Sony, Accenture, American Express- and Silicon Valley startups. She is a technology industry veteran and serves on Advisory Boards to ventures in Next-gen Computing (VR/AR/MR) and Artificial Intelligence ecosystems. Throughout her career, Rika has been an avid advocate for advancing women’s leadership in technology and business across industry verticals and global lines. Rika is also the only woman on the Dean’s Council for Embry-Riddle Aeronautics University, where she addresses the matter of gender parity in STEM Higher Education. Rika is passionate about deepening intersection of the human, the digital, and the physical through the challenge of value-driven innovation and the reward of purpose-driven collaboration.

Bio: Sara Anjum is currently a second-year PhD student in Materials Science at Caltech. Prior to Caltech, she earned a Bachelor of Arts in physics at Princeton with a minor in materials science and engineering, having graduated in 2019. Her research has focused on renewable energy and sustainability, specifically on solar cells of different materials. She has also worked with the Plug and Play Tech Center on doing due diligence to evaluate startups in the biotech sector. She is excited to learn as much as possible about the venture capital world, meet people working in the field, and contribute her expertise and skills to the work being done in this space.

Bio: Grace is a strategy consultant at Galt & Company with experience in manufacturing, financial services, and technology industries. Previously, she held roles in the SaaS space at Qualtrics and Landit. She graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University in 2019 with a BA in history.

Bio: Jitendra Kanodia is an engineer/scientist who is passionate about utilizing quantitative methods for accelerating drug development.  Jitendra is a Chemical and Biological Engineer by training with an undergraduate degree from IIT Madras and a PhD from Princeton University. He currently works as a Director of Translational Medicine and a Project Team Leader for a late stage research program at Theravance Biopharma Inc., a mid-size pharmaceutical company based in San Francisco, CA. His goal for the AVG fellow program is to bolster his ability to convert his technical expertise into viable business proposals and learn how to identify high impact problems that can be solved using contemporary knowledge and present a favorable commercial opportunity.

Bio: Laura is a Senior Product Manager at HelloFresh with over seven years of experience in building technology that spans a variety of domains, such as: e-commerce, health tech, Blockchain, machine learning, and Ag tech. Throughout her career, she has launched both enterprise and consumer products, working through the entire product life cycle from MVP to launch. Laura received her Bachelor’s degree in Political Science at Princeton University.

Bio: Nancy is a Business Analyst at Yext, where she focuses on go-to-market strategy and revenue operations. Previously, she held roles at early-stage SaaS startups in the adtech and fintech spaces. She graduated cum laude from Princeton University in 2018 with a BA in Economics.