SVASE Main Event: First Mover vs. Fast Follower – which do YOU want to be? January 13, 2011

SVASE Main Event: First Mover vs. Fast Follower – which do YOU want to be?

Start: 01/13/2011 - 6:00 pm
End: 01/13/2011- 8:30 pm

Contact: Laura Weigant
Email: [email protected]

Location: Cooley LLP
3175 Hanover Street, Palo Alto, CA 94304

URL:-www.svase.org/events/main-event-first-mover-vs-fast-follower-which-do-you-want-be

Innovation drives our industry, attracts the best talent, attracts VC money, and wins fame & fortune for its leaders – think Twitter, FourSquare, Groupon.

But while Innovation leaders burst onto the scene and win early market leadership, sometimes it the fast followers who succeed, while the Innovation Leader fades into the background – think Friendster & MySpace, Napster & iTunes, Netscape & Internet Explorer.

So what’s the best strategy for success with YOUR startup? Do you want to be first out the door with your game changing technology/business model/market? Or is it better to hang back, see who else comes out in the space, learn from their mistakes, and then leapfrog them?

Our team of experienced & opinionated panelists will explore these questions, and more, to help you figure out what’s best for YOUR startup.

The Panel:

· Rick Marini, Founder & CEO, BranchOut.com
· Savinay Berry, Vice President, Granite Ventures
· Anu Nigam, President & Board Director, Sand Hill Angels

· Rajat Paharia, Founder & Chief Product Officer, Bunchball
Moderator:

When: Thursday, January 13, 2011
6:00 – 7:00 pm Networking and hors d’oeuvres
7:00 - 8:15 pm Panel discussion and Q&A
8:15 - 8:30 pm Additional networking

Location: Cooley LLP, 3175 Hanover Street, Palo Alto, CA 94304

Pre-Registered Rates (All Rates Include Hors D’oeuvres):
Members - $20; Affiliates who advertise this event - $29; General Public - $49

Pre-registration closes at 9 PM the night before the event.

Walk-In Rates: Add $10.00 to the listed price

To reserve an Exhibit Table, please contact [email protected], $350 Members, $850 Non-members (Includes exhibit table, 2 tickets to the event and 1-year corporate membership).

Seating is limited, so early registration is recommended to avoid disappointment on the day.

This event is co-sponsored by Cooley LLP, www.cooley.com.

Speaker Bios:

Savinay Berry, Vice President, Granite Ventures
Savinay joined Granite Ventures in August 2008. He focuses on software and advanced mobile services. Savinay is actively involved with and observes on the boards of HyTrust, Crowd Science, Bunchball, and Skytide.
Prior to joining Granite Ventures, Savinay held associate positions at JK&B Capital and MK Capital. From 2000 to 2006, he held various positions at Dell Inc., most recently as senior global commodity manager for wireless products. He also served as a development engineer in the data recording equipment start-up at Instrumented Sensors Technology from 1998 to 2000.
Savinay received his M.B.A. from the Kellogg School of Management and Master's in Engineering Management degree from the McCormick School of Engineering & Applied Sciences, both at Northwestern University. He holds a Master's of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from Michigan State University and a B.S. degree from University of Pune, India.

Anu Nigam, President & Board Director, Sand Hill Angels
Anurag Nigam is President of Sand Hill Angels. He is the Co-Chair of the Social Membership Committee with Andrea Zurek and he also manages the overall Sand Hill Angels membership process. He is an Electrical and Computer Engineering graduate from Carnegie Mellon University and has been part of 6 different startups. He was part of the founding teams & leading ASIC efforts at Cerent Corp (bought by Cisco) and Siara Systems (bought by Redback Networks). Anurag switched into the consumer Internet space and was an investor and founder of hi5.com, a profitable social networking site with over 20M users. He currently is the founder and CEO of BuzzBox.com, a social discovery platform that is in early alpha.

He has been an active angel investor and entrepreneur for the last 7 years putting money into 20+ companies. Anurag has spoken at events and actively helps startups understand that great technology doesn't always make a good business. His current investment interests are consumer internet, consumer product and medical devices.

Rajat Paharia, Founder & Chief Product Officer, Bunchball
Rajat Paharia is the founder and Chief Product Officer of Bunchball, pioneers in the field of gamification – using game mechanics in non-gaming contexts to drive engagement, loyalty and revenue for the world’s leading brands and media, including Bravo, Warner Bros, Comcast, USA Network, Hasbro and MySpace. Prior to Bunchball, Rajat worked at IDEO, Philips Consumer Electronics and IBM Research.

Rick Marini, Fouder & CEO, BranchOut.com
Rick Marini has been a pioneer in online social media for the past 10 years. Rick is the Founder & CEO of BranchOut.

BranchOut is a career networking platform which leverages the Facebook social graph. Users can search by company name to quickly find all of their contacts who work(ed) at the target company plus see friends-of-friends who work(ed) there too for the ultimate inside connections. BranchOut has a Job Board which allows users to search, post and share jobs with their friend network on Facebook.

Prior to founding BranchOut, Rick was the Founder & CEO of SuperFan, a social entertainment site that allowed users to become a Fan of ALL the things they love in life including music, celebs, tv/movies, sports, games, brands, books, places, schools, etc. SuperFan was also a social game where fans use a virtual currency to compete to become the “SuperFan” of their top Faves.

Prior to founding SuperFan, Rick was the Co-Founder, CFO & Chief Strategist for Tickle.com. Tickle was one of the largest social media sites on the Internet and the first site to successfully leverage viral marketing through personality tests, photo-sharing and matchmaking products. Under his leadership, Tickle operated as a profitable company with close to $40 million of annual revenue. In 2002, Tickle won the “Rising Star” Webby Award as the fastest growing site on the Web and became a top 20 global Internet site with 200 million registered users. Rick served on the Board of Directors of Tickle until 2004 when Tickle was successfully acquired by Monster Worldwide for over $100 million.

Rick currently serves on the Advisory Boards of Fwix, Lumos Labs, Founder’s Den, Stipple, Sparkseed, FIGHTER and Friendster.

Rick received a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration at the University of New Hampshire, magna cum laude, and an MBA from Harvard University Graduate School of Business Administration.

Official Website: http://www.svase.org/events/main-event-first-mover-vs-fast-follower-which-do-you-want-be