Speakers

J. Chris Anderson Co-Founder and Chief Mobile Architect Couchbase @jchris J. Chris Anderson is a co-founder of Couchbase and Chief Architect of the company's mobile technology. Chris has a personal obsession with bending the physics of the web and giving control back to users. Couchbase's mobile efforts fulfill his long-time dream of peer-to-peer replication. Chris is co-author of "CouchDB: The Definitive Guide" (O'Reilly) and has spoken at a number of conferences including: SXSW, OSCON, MySQL, ApacheCon and the Erlang Factory.

Case Study: How Draw Something Absorbed 50 million New Users, in 50 days, with Zero App Downtime November 15, 2012 | 2:00 pm - 2:45 pm

Kieran Barr Vice President of Sales, Social Media Research Inside Network @kierobar Kieran Barr is vice president of sales, social media research, at Inside Network. Prior to joining Inside Network, Kieran was vice president of business development and sales at Constellation Research, and Director of Sales at GigaOm Pro. Kieran also serves on the Board of Directors of the Puget Sound Research Forum. Kieran earned his BA in Finance, Economics, and Information Systems from the University of Washington.

A Global Comparison of Online Game Markets: Brazil, Germany, USA and Russia November 15, 2012 | 3:15 pm - 4:00 pm

Hussein Chahine Founder and CEO Yazino @Yazino Hussein is the driving force behind Yazino, a company built on the belief that the next generation of social games will be based around real-time synchronous experiences where friends and like-minded people can play, compete, and socialise anytime, from anywhere in the world. Holding a degree in Mathematics and Computing from Kingston University, he has always been passionate about IT and innovation. In the late 1990s Hussein was part of the FICS Group, helping to build Europe’s first Internet banking service. Hussein then joined Reef, where he created enterprise CMS solutions for e-commerce. In 2003 Hussein founded Signature Technologies, a UK company that delivers innovative IT solutions for clients including UPS, the Daily Mail Group, iii.co.uk, AbsolutePoker.com and StanJames.com. Hussein’s IT innovation track record together with his experience at Signature Technologies inspired him to found Yazino in 2009.

Why Synchronous Games are the Future of iGaming November 15, 2012 | 11:15 am - 11:45 pm

Gerard Cunningham Founder and CEO, Koolbit Former President, Betfair USA @gerardc Gerard is an iGaming leader with operating experience in Europe, Asia and USA. His latest company, Koolbit is the premier, mobile, casino game company. Koolbit's flagship game, City Slots Casino, is one of the most successful casino games on Android (and soon to be on iOS). Prior to founding Koolbit, Gerard was Founder and President of Betfair USA. He led the acquisition and turnaround of TVG, the largest legal online betting business in the USA. In that role, Gerard actively campaigned at State and National levels to regulate online poker and casino gaming, successfully opening up Illinois to online wagering on horseracing. He also led Betfair’s early investment in Kabam, and sat on the board. Kabam is now the largest Social MMO game company in the world. Throughout his career with blue chip startups and corporations Gerard has focused on leveraging technology shifts to create new and durable consumer brands. Mobile is the latest, largest opportunity. Gerard lived and worked all over Europe and Asia before making Silicon Valley his home nearly 20 years ago.

One Bet to Rule Them All: Wagering the Emergence of Online Gambling November 15, 2012 | 4:45 pm - 5:30 pm

Pete Davison Professional Video Games Social Media and Tech Journalist Pete is a longtime veteran of the games industry, with stints on PC Zone, Good Old Games, IGN and GamePro to his name. He is presently Inside Network's resident reviewer, exploring the latest trends in social and mobile games every day for InsideSocialGames.com and InsideMobileApps.com.

Let's Play Together: Making Social Games Truly Social November 15, 2012 | 1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

Gloria Diez COO Mamboo Europe @globadoo Gloria Diez is the COO Europe for Mamboo.com (Wamba), which belongs to Mamboo Global dating system, the only dating system able to keep users online for 30min, counting on a net of 25.000 affiliates, including brands such us msn, yahoo and icq. Mamboo is backed by FINAM and DST Digital Sky Technologies. With the education and experience that make her an expert in the field of social networking, Gloria was a founding member of the social networking site Badoo, where she led the global marketing strategy. The site was launched in 2006, and within a year became one of the top 100 visited sites in the world, establishing as a leading social networking tool in Continental Europe and Latin America. Passionate about traveling and learning about different cultures, Gloria has been living in various cities around the world, speaks six different languages and has an MBA in Business Internationalization. As a speaker, she has joined the major international conferences on Start Ups, Social Networking and Gaming and helped to educate students and professionals about social networking and online marketing, through her real-life experiences.

A Global Comparison of Online Game Markets: Brazil, Germany, USA and Russia November 15, 2012 | 3:15 pm - 4:00 pm

Daniel Fiske Founder Clickfun Casino Daniel has spent more than 15 years designing and building massively scalable gaming and gambling systems. He began in 1997 as a software developer for Forwardslash, a marketing company powering one of the world’s largest online gaming groups, and in 2005 co-founded Online Skill as a multiplayer FPS tournament business that pivoted into social gaming in 2008 and (several apps later) launched Clickfun Casino in 2011. Bootstrapped entirely by the founders and without any external funding, Daniel and his team have built out proprietary infrastructure capable of supporting millions of users. This experience, together with his background in real money gaming gives Daniel a unique perspective on the rapid convergence of the social and real money sectors.

One Bet to Rule Them All: Wagering the Emergence of Online Gambling November 15, 2012 | 4:45 pm - 5:30 pm

Celia Francis CEO WeeWorld @CeliaFrancis Celia Francis, Chief Executive Officer of WeeWorld Inc., has two decades of experience leading innovative media, mobile and internet companies. Currently, Celia sets the strategic direction for WeeWorld, which offers a collection of visually distinctive online social games and mobile applications that entertain and expand creativity and self-expression. Previously, Celia was EVP of Marketing at T-Mobile. Prior to T-Mobile, Celia worked in Silicon Valley at IDEO, one of the world's leading product design consultancies. Prior to IDEO, she helped grow Xtime from five individuals to 50 employees. In addition, Celia also served as Director of Marketing for AltaVista and as Director of the Consumer Internet Division for Compaq. Celia began her career in product and graphic design and advertising. Celia earned a Bachelor of Arts from Harvard University, as well as an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Insert 50p to Continue: Getting Users to Come Back November 15, 2012 | 4:00 pm - 4:45 pm

Sebastian Funke Co-Founder & CEO sMeet Communications GmbH Sebastian Funke is Co-Founder and CEO of sMeet, Europe’s largest 3D interactive Social Game. At sMeet he coordinates the strategic and operational marketing as well as the business development including all partnerships worldwide. Furthermore, he is responsible for all financial and legal matters. Since taking over as CEO in the beginning of 2009 he was building up the team to over 110 employees, bringing Smeet to over 20 countries and grewing Smeet’s user basis to over 15 million users worldwide. Before founding Smeet he was founder and Co-CEO of a German based online and media entertainment company and was working for multinational companies such as JPMorgan, London and McKinsey & Company, Berlin. Sebastian holds an MBA from the reknown WHU – Koblenz, Germany as well as from the Universidad Comercial in Bilbao, Spain.

Let's Play Together: Making Social Games Truly Social November 15, 2012 | 1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

Harry Holmwood CEO Marvelous AQL @hholmwood A 20-year veteran of the video games and online space, Harry is European CEO of Marvelous AQL, a Japanese developer and publisher of social, mobile and console games, known for console games like No More Heroes and Harvest Moon, but now highly successful in the free-to-play mobile and web space in Japan and Asia. A games programmer before joining Sony's early PlayStation team in 1994, he then founded developer Pure Entertainment, which IPO'd and launched a free-to-play online gaming service way back in 1999. He was also a director of pioneering motion gaming start-up In2Games, which was sold to a US group in 2008. Along the way, he's been a corporate VP, troubleshooter and non-exec to a variety of companies and investors in and around the games sector.

East Meets West: Monetisation and Service Ops Best Practices from Japan November 15, 2012 | 10:45 am - 11:15 am

Ryo Katsuki Director, Customer Success, EMEA, Kontagent @Kontagent Ryo Katsuki is Director of Customer Success EMEA at Kontagent, the leading provider of user analytics to social and mobile businesses. Founded in 2007, Kontagent solves big data challenges social and mobile app marketers, developers and producers need to understand and optimize their customer lifetime value. Prior to joining Kontagent, Ryo served as the head of product and development at HopStop.com, a leading location-based application developer and publisher, after having spent 14 years in IT project management and strategic IT planning, leading very large-scale eCRM and big data projects for the largest organizations in their respective industries, including government, healthcare, manufacturing, retail, and telecom. Ryo holds BA in Computer Science from University of California Berkeley and MBA from HEC Paris.

One Bet to Rule Them All: Wagering the Emergence of Online Gambling November 15, 2012 | 4:45 pm - 5:30 pm

Raf Keustermans Co-Founder, CEO Plumbee @raf_keustermans Raf is a social games veteran with a background in gambling. He worked most recently as a strategic consultant for social and mobile game studios. Prior to that, Raf served as global marketing director for leading social game studio EA Playfish. Before Playfish, he headed up the European arm of EA's successful casual games platform Pogo.com. He also worked for advertising agencies like BBDO, Grey and Publicis and was leading the marketing teams for online gambling operator Unibet in Western Europe (2005-2008).

One Bet to Rule Them All: Wagering the Emergence of Online Gambling November 15, 2012 | 4:45 pm - 5:30 pm The Future of Social November 15, 2012 | 5:30 pm - 6:00 pm

Henning Kosmack CEO MegaZebra GmbH @megazebra Henning is the CEO of MegaZebra, one of Europe’s leading social gaming companies. MegaZebra not only develops it’s own games, but also publishes 3rd party games on Facebook. For more then 10 years, Henning has been actively involved in the fields of innovation and investments, from being on the board of software firms, co-founding other start-ups, to investing into them. He also headed up the corporate development activities at Siemens’ communication division and was one of the project leaders in the merger integration to form Nokia Siemens Networks. Prior to that, he studied Business Administration in London and Copenhagen.

A Global Comparison of Online Game Markets: Brazil, Germany, USA and Russia November 15, 2012 | 3:15 pm - 4:00 pm The Future of Social November 15, 2012 | 5:30 pm - 6:00 pm

Alexander Krug CEO SOFTGAMES GmbH @softgames Alexander Krug holds a Master of Arts in Media Management having studied in Mittweida – one of Germany´s most respected media universities. Next to SOFTGAMES Alexander has worked at Yahoo! Germany and managed to re-launch their complete gaming portal. In addition Alex has co-founded 2 successful start-ups, a role that's perfect for him given his ten-plus years of experience making big things happen. SOFTGAMES, founded in 2006 is a developer and publisher of Mobile Games & Apps which has worldwide partnerships with carriers, mobile social networks and mobile portals. Alexander possesses excellent analytical skills and is a person of proven ability to act as a strategic, results-oriented leader who collaboratively develops innovative and cost-effective solutions, spearheads change, and engages the team in creating successful outcomes.

The Future of Social November 15, 2012 | 5:30 pm - 6:00 pm

Matt Larter Senior Business Developer Betsson Matt is currently Senior Business Developer for Betsson, the leading online gambling company. Currently Matt has been examining the social gaming space as it relates to their business. Before joining Betsson, Matt joined the iGaming industry 7 years ago as CEO of an online poker business followed most recently by a stint as Head of Operations for a group of online casinos. Prior to iGaming, Matt worked as a Management Consultant for over 7 years with PwC and independently, specializing in CRM processes, procedures and systems implementations. Matt is a self-confessed geek with a passion for new technology, innovation, data and the iGaming industry but has a terrible game of poker.

The Future of Social November 15, 2012 | 5:30 pm - 6:00 pm

Arseny Lebedev Managing Director SignusLabs @signuslabs Arseny Lebedev co-founded Signus Labs, where he manages marketing and partnership strategies. Since its founding in 2009, Signus Labs grew organically to a 22-person full service development studio that delivers high quality work on multiple platforms to millions of players. Arseny follows a balanced development philosophy -- gameplay and profitability are fundamental to a successful project. Signus develops social games on Facebook, Mobile Platforms, Kindle, and HTML5. Prior to Signus, Labs Arseny worked in a marketing role at Large Animal Games. Additionally, Arseny resides on the board of a solar energy manufacturer, where he contributes to strategic decisions.

One Bet to Rule Them All: Wagering the Emergence of Online Gambling November 15, 2012 | 4:45 pm - 5:30 pm

Gabriel Leydon CEO, Co-Founder Machine Zone, Inc. @MachineZone @GLeydon Gabriel “Gabe” Leydon is the co-founder and Chief Executive Officer of Machine Zone, Inc., a high growth, free to play, mobile, social gaming company. Under Gabriel’s leadership Machine Zone has created top-grossing hits such as iMob, iMob2, Original Gangstaz, and Global War for Apple iOS devices. Gabriel launched Machine Zone in September 2007 and joined Y Combinator in Winter 2008. Gabriel has profitably grown Machine Zone’s topline to create one of the most successful companies in the mobile games space. Most recently, Gabe guided the company to an $8 million investment from Menlo Ventures, and social games pioneer Shervin Pishevar joined Machine Zone’s board of directors. Gabe has previous expertise in arcade and game design, and social app development. His team intimately understands the perfect recipe for free-to-play mobile success - game design, virtual currency and social engagement. The company is fast becoming the leader among free-to-play mobile games for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. Gabe has been quoted on a variety of topics, including free-to-play, developing on mobile, costs of mobile user acquisition, mobile vs console, and others in many top publications such as Wired, Venturebeat, Techcrunch, 148apps, PocketGamer, GamesIndustry.biz, Gamasutra, Kotaku and others.

The Future of Social November 15, 2012 | 5:30 pm - 6:00 pm

Nicholas Lovell Founder Gamesbrief @nicholaslovell Nicholas Lovell is a former investment banker and web entrepreneur who helps games developers become publishers. He also provides strategic and online marketing advice and is a non-executive director at developer nDreams. Clients have included Atari, Channel4, Channelflip, Firefly (who recently self-published MMO Stronghold Kingdoms), IPC Media, Rebellion and Square Enix. He is the author of How to Publish a Game and blogs about the business of games at www.gamesbrief.com.

26 Minutes: 26 MORE Ways to Make Money from Your Game November 15, 2012 | 9:45 am - 10:15 am

Vicenç Martí CEO Akamon Entertainment Ltd. @olfar Vicenç Martí is currently CEO of Akamon Entertainment, an online social gaming company specialising in traditional casino-based games. His main responsibilities are to make sure that Akamon is the best company to work for in all the countries where it operates, that users love the products and service and that shareholders get a nice return above the cost of capital, all the while overseeing the company’s continued growth. Prior to Akamon, Vicenç was Chief Marketing Officer at Spanish low-cost airline Vueling, where he succeeded turning it from a startup into a cool and reputable million-euro brand. Previously, as Managing Director at Cirsa Gaming Corporation he became an expert in the specifics of the gaming industry and as CEO at fashion label Custo Barcelona he had direct responsibility over finance, marketing, sales, operations and product functions.

Let's Play Together: Making Social Games Truly Social November 15, 2012 | 1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

Diego Meller Co-Founder Jampp @diemel Diego Meller is a co-founder of Jampp, a Latin American gaming monetization and distribution platform. The company launched in 2010 as a social games studio (Atommica) and then developed Jampp which is now its main business. Before Jampp, in 1999 while at university in Buenos Aires, Diego co-founded Livra.com which became the leading online research company in Latin America and was acquired by Ipsos (one of the top market research organizations worldwide) in 2008. Diego is also a co-founder & collaborator of The Whuffie Bank (a non-profit project that was a 2009 TC50 finalist) and angel investor in several startups, including online strategy game Erepublik.

A Global Comparison of Online Game Markets: Brazil, Germany, USA and Russia November 15, 2012 | 3:15 pm - 4:00 pm

Braden Moulton President and Chief Operating Officer 5th Planet Games @5thPlanetGames Braden Moulton is the President and Chief Operating Officer of 5th Planet Games, a rising game company in the core free-to-play space. He drives strategy, revenue, and business operations. Prior to taking a leadership role at 5th Planet, his 15 years of experience span business and product efforts at other digital companies including GameHouse, Microsoft, and KPMG. His passion is gaming, and he will tell you with conviction why Archon is the greatest game ever made. He has a BA from Washington State University and an MBA from Pepperdine University.

Let's Play Together: Making Social Games Truly Social November 15, 2012 | 1:15 pm - 2:00 pm

Owen O'Donoghue Gaming Marketing Solutions Facebook @facebook Owen has worked in the online and IT industry for 6 years. He began his career in Microsoft as an account manager looking after day to day dealings with Microsoft’s top business partners in the Irish market. Owen joined Facebook in September 2010 and works with leading gaming and gambling companies in Europe to drive success on the Facebook platform.

Opening Plenary Discussion: The Power of the Graph November 15, 2012 | 9:00 am - 9:45 am

Jude Ower Founder and CEO PLAYMOB I use game play to make the world a better place. Founder and CEO of PlayMob. Creating the world's first platform profitably connecting games to social good. A win win for all. Voted top 100 women in Tech in Europe, Growing Business 'Young Gun' 2012, winner of Best Start Up 2012 Launch Conference, finalist BBAA awards 2012 and Highly Commended in the Europas 2011. BAFTA games judge, member of NEXTERS, UKIE (UK Interactive Entertainment), and speaker at various events such as Iod, MADE Festival, SXSW, Women in Games, Browser Games Forum, Games for Brands and Tech@State. Also a Titan for Doug Richards School for Creative Startups.

Social Games Next Generation: Creating Player Affinity by Weaving Compelling Value into Social Game Design November 15, 2012 | 11:45 am - 12:15 pm

Tony Pearce CEO and Founder TeePee Games @teepeegames Coming from a 20 year background in senior management in the entertainment and gaming industry Tony has an excellent track record as a successful entrepreneur and CEO. Tony recently founded a games company called TeePee Games, a consumer portal that allows players to find and play games across social networks, smart phones and the web. Previously Tony was the CEO and Co-Founder of Player X and spearheaded the company from a four person start-up in 2004 and developed it into Europe's largest mobile games distributor. The company was named by Library House as the fourth fastest growing VC backed company in the UK before it was acquired by Spanish mobile content company ZED in April 2009. Tony is also the co-founder of an executive networking event called the Centurions which is aimed at the digital entertainment industry and takes place every two months in London along with events in New York, Istanbul and Munich.

Insert 50p to Continue: Getting Users to Come Back November 15, 2012 | 4:00 pm - 4:45 pm

Jas Purewal Interactive Entertainment and Digital Media Lawyer Osborne Clarke @gamerlaw Jas is an interactive entertainment and digital media lawyer at Osborne Clarke. He advises clients from start-ups to global publishers on a range of matters- in particular contracts negotiation, regulatory compliance (including interactive entertainment and gambling convergence), intellectual property and disputes. Jas writes regularly regarding developments in interactive entertainment and technology (including on his well respected blog Gamer/Law – www.gamerlaw.co.uk) and is quoted in a range of publications.

One Bet to Rule Them All: Wagering the Emergence of Online Gambling November 15, 2012 | 4:45 pm - 5:30 pm

Mark Robinson Chief Operating Officer Games Analytics @gamesanalytics Mark Robinson has been working within various sectors of the data mining industry his entire career, initially as an operational research analyst at British Gas, then as a retail consultant evaluating store performance and catchment potential with CACI. Latterly he has led the data mining consultancy Marketing Databasics that builds and hosts analytical environments to increase customer value through data-driven insight. His experience covers a wide range of sectors including Financial Services, Retail, Leisure and the Drinks industry. In 2009, Marketing Databasics (MDB) was designated a "Leader" organisation in the Forrester review of marketing services providers for its completeness of offering and its strategic vision. In the same survey, clients scored MDB with the highest net promoter score (i.e. likelihood to recommend to others). As well as being awarded several industry awards for innovative use of data, Robinson contributes to thought leadership in the industry through his membership of the Direct Marketing Association Council.

Insert 50p to Continue: Getting Users to Come Back November 15, 2012 | 4:00 pm - 4:45 pm

James Salins VP Business Development, Brand Advertising, Global SupersonicAds @supersonicads James started his career in Hong Kong and Dubai where he held a couple of posts within ad agencies working on accounts as diverse as IKEA and Toyota. He then spent time on the client side at Disney within the Gulf region. On returning to the UK James has spent the majority of his career on the media owner side at senior posts within the Outdoor and TV industry. For the last 4 ½ years James has been working exclusively within the gaming space. First as Sales Director Europe for IGA, working across prestigious brands such as Playstation and EA Games, selling a variety of formats from game sponsorship and brand integration through to more standard online formats. James joined SupersonicAds early this year as VP Business Development, Brand Advertising, Global. He is in charge of Europe and the US markets. He is a lead member of the IAB, set up to promote a deeper understanding of gaming as a medium to both clients and agencies. SupersonicAds is a market leading provider of in-game brand and direct response advertising solutions both on and off Facebook and on mobile. We are a global Facebook partner and the only company in the world that runs both CPA and video brand engagement campaigns in across Facebook games.

Insert 50p to Continue: Getting Users to Come Back November 15, 2012 | 4:00 pm - 4:45 pm

Tom Sente CEO HoneyTracks GmbH @HoneyTracks Tom is CEO of Munich based HoneyTracks, an innovative game analytics company that helps global clients to increase game monetization, to optimize game play and to manage their player relationship. In total he has over 14 years of senior management experience, ranging from business intelligence giants as SAP, where he worked directly for the executive board during SAP’s first SaaS development, to New Economy startups building first social communities back in the web 1.0 era. Tom holds a double degree in Computer Science and an international executive MBA from ESSEC Paris and Mannheim Business School, where he graduated as best-of-class.

Insert 50p to Continue: Getting Users to Come Back November 15, 2012 | 4:00 pm - 4:45 pm

Bret Terrill Blogger and Consultant Bret on Social Games Bret is a pioneer in social gaming, founding one of the first social gaming companies in early 2007 with a focus on real-time multiplayer games. It failed. He took those lessons and shared them via a blog and became the first social gaming industry analyst. He took that expertise to Zynga, joining in 2008 as Director of Business Development and then transitioning to Senior Director of Corporate Development. He now consults for companies applying social game mechanics to non-gaming verticals.

Insert 50p to Continue: Getting Users to Come Back November 15, 2012 | 4:00 pm - 4:45 pm The Future of Social November 15, 2012 | 5:30 pm - 6:00 pm

Joost van Dreunen Managing Director SuperData Research, Inc. @_SuperData Joost is Managing Director at SuperData, the leading provider of market intelligence on paying online gamers. He has over fifteen years of commercial research experience in interactive entertainment and technology industries, and held senior positions at Nielsen Online and DFC Intelligence, prior to founding SuperData. Joost also teaches at New York University (on video games, of course), and regularly speaks at both academic and industry conferences, including GDC Online, Casual Connect and Social Game Summit. He holds a doctorate from Columbia University.

A Global Comparison of Online Game Markets: Brazil, Germany, USA and Russia November 15, 2012 | 3:15 pm - 4:00 pm

Martin Williams Director of Content & Business Development Mentez @martingwilliams Martin is responsible for producing and sourcing high quality social network, web browser and mobile/tablet games from around the world and bringing these to Latin America and other countries in the Mentez network. He also design games and leads the free2play game design process at Mentez. His specialist skills include social gaming consulting (inc. design, strategy, quality, projects), game design analysis, evaluation, testing and review, business model design and implementation, project management and budget planning/management and game technology and architecture. Prior to joining Mentez martin was a senior consultant at PricewaterhouseCoopers for more than 11 years and played lead consulting and business development roles for many international clients.

Social Games Next Generation: Creating Player Affinity by Weaving Compelling Value into Social Game Design November 15, 2012 | 11:45 am - 12:15 pm

Submit a Speaker

To submit a speaker for consideration, please email the following materials to stewart@mediabistro.com:

Biography and headshot of proposed speaker
The event you are submitting the speaker for, and reason why he/she is a good fit
Links to any appearances, previous speaking gigs, video, podcasts, or press
Appropriate contact information

Speakers should be submitted 90+ days prior to the event.

Please note that, due to the overwhelming number of submissions we receive, only individuals who are selected to speak will receive a reply. Although we truly appreciate all your ideas and proposals, it is simply not feasible for us to respond personally to every submission.