Keynotes

Keynote Address (9:00 AM)

 
Rob McCord

Rob McCord

Pennsylvania State Treasurer

A respected business leader and entrepreneur, Rob McCord took office as the 45th Treasurer of Pennsylvania on January 20, 2009. Today, as chief executive of the Pennsylvania Treasury Department, Treasurer McCord helps invest more than $80 billion per year, and he oversees a broad variety of operations designed to improve the economic security of Pennsylvanians.

Treasurer McCord has brought unusual financial acumen to his elected office and works innovatively to provide strong financial returns for all Pennsylvanians. He has helped generate billions of dollars in improved returns for Pennsylvania’s pension funds and 529 college savings program.

Throughout his career, Treasurer McCord has fought for productive investments and public policies. Prior to his election as Treasurer, his work as a venture capitalist helped generate more than 2,000 jobs. From 1994 and 2007, Treasurer McCord worked as a senior executive at Safeguard Scientifics, and went on to found the Eastern Technology Fund and serve as co-founder and Managing Director of Pennsylvania Early Stage Partners. In addition, from 1996 through 2007, he led the Eastern Technology Council, a trade association that served hundreds of fast-growing companies.

Before joining the private sector, Treasurer McCord worked on Capitol Hill, where he specialized in budget and technology issues. He also served as the CEO of the bipartisan think tank Congressional Institute for the Future.

Treasurer McCord earned his undergraduate degree in Economics and History at Harvard University, and he earned his MBA from the University of Pennsylvania. He lives in Montgomery County with his wife and two sons.

Keynote Address (12:45 PM)

Drawing from his experiences as an entrepreneur and venture capitalist, Mr. Friend will share strategies for success and pitfalls to avoid when starting your own business. This interactive presentation will also draw on the experiences of three entrepreneurs who have started companies during business school or immediately after it.

 
Scott Friend

Scott Friend

Managing Director, Bain Capital Ventures
Co-Founder/Former President, ProfitLogic

Mr. Friend is the Managing Director of Bain Capital Ventures, the venture capital arm of Bain Capital, focused on seed through late-stage growth equity investing in business services, consumer, healthcare, internet & mobile, and software companies. Before joining Bain Capital, Mr. Friend was Chairman of the Executive Advisory Board and VP of Marketing & Science for Oracle Retail. Prior to its acquisition by Oracle in 2005, Mr. Friend was the President and co-founder of ProfitLogic, a Bain Capital portfolio company.

In 2005, Mr. Friend was named a winner of the Ernst & Young "Entrepreneur of the Year Award" in New England. Mr. Friend also held positions at Learning Sciences Corporation, The Parthenon Group and IBM.

Entrepreneurs:

  • Elie Seidman - Co-Founder, Epana and Oyster.com
    Elie has been an entrepreneur nearly since graduating from college in 1997. After spending his college summers interning for Microsoft and a year out of college year working for Trilogy (where he and Ajay Agarwal of Bain Capital Ventures first met), Elie moved back to the East Coast and was involved in the founding of his first company, Wired Business, a telecom services company funded by Norwest Venture Partners. In the fall of 2000, Elie founded Epana and, as its president and CEO, grew the company to more than 400 employees and two hundred million dollars per year in revenue between 2002 and the end of 2005. Elie departed Epana in the spring of 2006 and prior to co-founding Oyster.com, spent a year as a venture partner at Lime Rock Partners, a private equity fund based in Westport, Conn. Elie resides in New York City. He received his B.S.E. from the University of Pennsylvania.
  • Jennifer Fleiss - Co-Founder & President, Rent the Runway
    Jennifer Fleiss co-founded Rent the Runway with Jennifer Hyman after obtaining seed money from Bain Capital Ventures. The company applied a Netflix model to women’s dresses, allowing women to rent dresses by contemporary designers at 10% of retail price. RenttheRunway.com launched November 9, 2009 and since then has signed up more than 160,000 members to its site, shipped over 2,000 orders and raked in over $200,000 in revenue. Jennifer is responsible for the cost side of Rent the Runway including operations, technology, legal, investor relations and administration. Jennifer previously worked as a strategy consultant at Lehman Brothers and Morgan Stanley. In 2008, Jennifer founded Carter Admissions, an online essay-editing and coaching service for college applicants. Other entrepreneurial initiatives include Carter Admissions Online Essay Editing, Juice Generation and Yoga Earth. Jennifer holds a BA from Yale and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
  • Jesse Keller - Co-Founder & CTO, Magazine Radar
    Jesse Keller, co-founder and CTO of MagazineRadar. Mr. Keller is a veteran online entrepreneur and e-commerce architect. He was a founding employee and CTO of JobDirect, a leading employment site for college students; the company raised venture funding from Scripps Ventures and Canaan Partners in 1995, and was sold to Korn/Ferry International in 2000. From 2001 through 2006, Mr. Keller was the CEO of PersonalsTrainer.com, a successful online service selling dating assistance through Yahoo! Personals. Mr. Keller is a graduate of Yale University.

Keynote Address (4:15 PM)

 
Dr. Katherine Crothall

Dr. Katherine Crothall

Principal, Liberty Venture Partners
Founder/Former CEO, Animas Corporation

Dr. Kathy Crothall is a serial entrepreneur who founded and successfully exited three medical device companies.   In 1978, Dr. Crothall co-founded Laakmann Electro-Optics, Inc., a leading manufacturer of the CO2 laser utilized in medical, scientific, and industrial applications.  Laakmann Electro-Optics was sold to Johnson & Johnson Corporation in 1981.  In 1988, Dr. Crothall founded Luxar Corporation, a leading manufacturer of CO2 lasers utilized in cosmetic and oral surgery applications.  In the mid-1990’s Luxar was sold to ESC Medical.  Prior to joining Liberty Venture Partners, Ms. Crothall was Founder, President, and CEO of Animas Corporation, a leading manufacturer of insulin infusion pumps, from its inception to its acquisition by Johnson & Johnson Corporation for $518 million in February 2006.

She holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Pennsylvania and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California.

Dr. Crothall holds over 25 patents and is the recipient of several awards, including the 2009 Iris Newman Award, Greater Philadelphia Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award in 2003 and the Raymond Rafferty Entrepreneurial Excellence Award in 2004. Dr. Crothall also serves as a director of several private companies.