Virtual Goods Summit 2010

MANNY ANEKAL oversees the development and sales of Brand Sponsorships for Zynga’s network of games. He focuses on creating high impacting ad integrations, which provide immense ROI to brands through the reach of TV, the measurability of online, and the most engaging advertising products. Before joining Zynga, Manny ran Global Ad Operations for Electronic Arts, which managed advertising across online properties, in game dynamic and static ads for Xbox 360 and PS3, mobile and social networking. Prior to that, Manny spent 2 years at Microsoft/Massive Incorporated, developing new in game advertising technology and worked with the world’s top game publishers and developers to drive advertising revenue. Manny has also held positions at The Nielsen Company, Time Warner, and Accenture. Manny holds an International Finance and Marketing degree from the University of Miami and graduated with Honors.

TERRY ANGELOS is a co-founder and the Chief Product Officer at TrialPay, where he is responsible for developing advertising and monetization solutions for TrialPay's e-commerce merchants, game publishers and social app developers. Terry was previously a director of product management for Living.com, a Benchmark Capital and Amazon.com-funded online retailer and a product manager at Trilogy Software, where he was responsible for e-commerce solutions for the Fortune 50. He holds a BS in Electrical Engineering from WITS University, an SM in Engineering Science from Harvard University and an MBA from MIT Sloan.

ATUL BAGGA is currently the Senior Equity Research Analyst covering Gaming industry at ThinkEquity. He has regularly presented at a number of gaming industry conferences and is widely quoted and interviewed on TV and print media such as Economist, New York Times, Time, Wall Street Journal, Bloomberg, CNN, and USA Today. Previously, Atul worked as Equity Research Analyst with Smith New Court (now Merrill Lynch.) Atul received his MBA from Haas School of Business at University of Berkeley, Masters in Management from University of Bombay and Bachelors in Engineering from National Institute of Technology in India. @atulbagga

MICK BOBROFF is an audit partner in Ernst & Young's Northern California Technology practice who specializes in the software, digital media and on-line games industries. He has over twenty years of experience and has been an audit partner since October 2000. Mick serves a portfolio of SEC registrants and non-public companies. His portfolio of non-public companies are involved in social games, mobile applications, online media services, wireless networking and firewall technologies. Mick is very experienced with complex revenue recognition models and is leading the firm's efforts in providing its views and guidance on revenue recognition on the sale of virtual goods. Mick spent 6 years at the Ernst & Young offices in Moscow, Russia and Singapore from 1992- 1998 where he served U.S. multinational companies in the former Soviet Union and in Southeast Asia. Mick graduated with a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of California, Berkeley.

ALAN CHEN has been with Perfect World since January 2008, assuming the role of Senior Vice President of the company and Chief Executive Officer of the company's American and European subsidiaries. Prior to joining Perfect World, Mr. Chen had held a number of executive positions in the industries of computer gaming, IT, and telecommunications, and accumulated valuable experience in product development, business management, operations, sales and marketing. From 2006 to 2007, Mr. Chen was the Chief Technology Officer of The9 Ltd., where he led game development and technical operations. Prior to that, Mr. Chen assumed the Executive Vice President role of Hewlett-Packard (China) Ltd. from 2005 to 2006, where he was responsible for the company's server and storage business; the Vice President role of Professional Services of Lucent Technologies (China) Ltd. from 2003 to 2005; and the General Manager role of Carrier Packet Solutions at Nortel Networks (China) Ltd. from 1998 to 2003. Mr. Chen received both his Bachelor's and Master's degree in telecommunications engineering from the Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, and received his Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Ottawa.

TIM CHANG brings a combination of operational, technical and international business experience to Norwest Venture Partners (NVP).He focuses on investments in mobile, gaming, digital media, and also leads NVP's investment practice in China and Asia-Pacific. Tim led NVP's investments in and joined the boards of directors of ngmoco, Lumos Labs, Brite Semiconductor and 3jam. He also led NVP's investment in Playdom, a leader in social gaming, and PCH International, a turnkey global supply chain services firm based in Shenzhen. Tim is a board observer working closely with Borqs, deCarta and Veveo. Prior to joining NVP in 2006, Tim was a principal at Gabriel Venture Partners where he was actively involved in over a dozen wireless-related deals. Tim built Gabriel's wireless sector practice and helped establish business development capabilities through strong, strategic relationships across the wireless value chain, particularly in Asia-Pacific.@timechang

BRIAN CHO is currently spearheading business development at Booyah!, the creators of mobile social games MyTown and InCrowd as well as Nightclub City on Facebook. Prior to joining Booyah! Brian headed up online business & corporate development for Ubisoft Entertainment. As the youngest manager in company history, Brian worked directly with the CFO, Head of M&A, and NCSA President on Ubi's online strategy. In addition, Brian began his career at Deloitte Consulting where he established solid business acumen engaging with top entertainment clients ranging from EA to Vivendi Universal.

M. LEE CLANCY JR. is the Senior Vice President of Product Management and General Manager of Direct Revenue at IMVU. Lee joined IMVU in September 2008 from Yahoo!, where he was Senior Director for Community Products. At Yahoo!, Lee also led product management for Yahoo! Groups, a global community of 110 million users, and Yahoo! Personals, the most visited destination in the dating market. Prior to Yahoo!, Lee co-founded a music-focused social networking startup. Lee also worked at Broadband Office in business development and at PricewaterhouseCoopers in strategy consulting advising entertainment and media clients. Lee earned a B.A. in Spanish Literature from Amherst College, an M.B.A. from Cornell University, and an M.A. in International Relations from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. @mleeclancyjr

FREDERIC DESCAMPS is the Chief Executive Officer of A Bit Lucky. A Bit Lucky brings a new generation of high quality transplatform games to online social gaming.  Their first game, Lucky Train, is one of the fastest growing games on Facebook and has reached over 1.5M users in just a few weeks. Mr. Descamps has over thirteen years of experience in the gaming and technology industries. He served as head of  Marketing, Community Management and Analytics at Trion Worlds.  Prior to that, Mr. Descamps served as Senior Director of Marketing and Business Development at Xfire, which was acquired by MTV for $110M in 2006. Mr. Descamps is also the creator of the GAME (Gaming, Mobile And Entrepreneurship) Events, a quarterly series of meet-ups gathering several hundreds of people. Mr. Descamps holds an MA in Law from the University of Nice, France, an MA in Business Management from EDHEC Graduate School of Business, and an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business.

JOE EIBERT is the Director of Marketing at Universal Studios. Mr. Eibert is a resilient, entrepreneurial executive with over 15 years experience in all aspects of product and digital marketin g, including online media, promotions, publicity, web site design and social media. Mr. Eibert combines strong analytical skills with innovative thinking and the ability to thrive in the challenging and mercurial entertainment sector. His teams have developed and launched award-winning digital campaigns for multiple billion-dollar movie franchises, Academy Award winning films, children and television franchises (e.g., Harry Potter films, Smallvillle, Fast & Furious films, the Bourne films, Curious George, Blade Runner, Back to the Future, The Wizard of Oz and more). An MBA graduate from the Marshall School of Business at USC, he led digital marketing efforts at Warner Bros. Home Entertainment for eight years before joining Universal Studios Home Entertainment in December 2008.

DAVID ETLING has spent the past nine years at InComm, holding various management positions including Sales Engineering, Merchant Services, and Business/Product Development. Over the past four years he has been instrumental to InComm's success in product partner acquisitions and subsequent successful retail launches; specifically as it relates to prepaid digital entertainment products, including game cash cards as well as digital music and software applications.Prior to his service at InComm, Etling spent seven years at a startup consulting company and last served as VP of Engineering where he managed a team focusing on financial institution network design and implementation.

STEVEN GOH is well experienced in developing and delivering successful Internet services for consumers, having first founded Australia's first online stock brokerage company Sanford Securities Limited, prior to co-founding mig33. Steven is recognized as an authority on contemporary IT issues, with extensive private and public board experience, has served as a keynote speaker and panelists conferences throughout U.S. Australia and Asia. Steven received both a Bachelor of Commerce and an MBA from the University of Western Australia.

BILL GROSSO is the CTO and SVP of Product for Live Gamer. Mr. Grosso is responsible for the efforts of the technology and product teams, tailoring product offerings to customers' needs and delivering the right solutions to Live Gamer's global customer base. Previously, Mr. Grosso served as CTO for virtual economy platform provider Twofish, which was acquired by Live Gamer, where he headed the Twofish Elements product roadmap, platform development and engineering organizations. As an active participant in the software development community, Mr. Grosso has published two books and more than 20 journal articles. He also served as a long-time board member for SDForum, and has held various chief architect and executive engineering roles at companies including Engage, Echopass and Hipbone. He received his Masters of Mathematics from the University of California at Berkeley.

RON GUTMAN is the founder and CEO of HealthTap. HealthTap helps consumers make data-driven health decisions. Using HealthTap's platform, consumers can make sense of their personal health data and take actions to optimize their health and well-being. Previously, Ron was the founder and CEO of Wellsphere, an influential health 2.0 website with the largest community of independent online health writers (acquired by HeathCentral). Ron is also the Curator of TEDxSilicon Valley. Ron has an MBA from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business. @HealthTap

TRIP HAWKINS, founder and CEO of Digital Chocolate, also founded and built Electronic Arts. Best known for Millionaire City, MMA Pro Fighter, Rollercoaster Rush and Tower Bloxx, Digital Chocolate led all software companies in App Store downloads in 2009 and in 2010 has been the fastest-growing maker of Facebook social games with virtual goods. Hawkins got the world's first college degree in video games and was the first game business executive named to the Hall of Fame by the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences. The inventor of three patents and the NanoStar virtual goods platform, he has also led the design and production of many hit games including John Madden Football. @DChocGames

NIREN HIRO is the CEO of CrowdStar, the creators of the social games Hello City, Happy Aquarium, Happy Island, Happy Pets and Zoo Paradise. CrowdStar games are some of the largest on Facebook and have growing popularity on the Japanese social network Mixi across both the PC and advanced mobile phone platforms. As the former Vice President Managing Director of Asia-Pacific and Latin America for AdMob, Niren was responsible for the company's strategy, partnerships and traffic acquisition, and business expansion. Niren has 20 years of start-up and leadership experience at high growth Internet, mobile, media, and entertainment companies, including AdMob, Yahoo!, CBS Sportsline, MTV Networks, Plus Channel, and BPL Mobile (a France Telecom joint venture).

TEEMU HUUHTANEN is the executive vice president, Business Development and Communications, Sulake Corporation and the president, North America, Sulake Inc. Huuhtanen is instrumental in leading the continued development and growth of Finnish-based Sulake's topproperty, Habbo, one of the world's most popular online social networking and virtual world communities for teens. Huuhtanen is responsible for cultivating relationships with major music, television and motion picture studios, as well as retail, fashion and sports industries, to generate relevant and interactive brand partnerships. His mission is to bring real-world mainstream entertainment properties and brands that are important to Habbo's teen user base into the virtual community. Huuhtanen oversees global public relations efforts for Sulake Corporation and leads the Sulake team responsible for the company's communications and PR. In 2008, The Hollywood Reporter ranked Huuhtanen on its “Digital Power 50 List” of top innovators who influence the creation and distribution of online content. In 2009, he was named one of Digital Media Wire's “25 Executives to Watch in Digital Entertainment.” American Venture Magazine appointed Huuhtanen to their list of the “Top 40 Under 40” executives to watch in the technology industry for 2007. Huuhtanen is based and oversees Sulake's North American headquarters in Southern California.

BENJAMIN JOFFE is a renowned expert on Asia's digital scene. During the past 10 years, he has been part of Japan's mobile revolution, Korea's Internet boom and the rise of China as a digital superpower. As CEO of the strategy consultancy +8* he brings the best practices from Asia's digital scene to clients worldwide (e.g. Microsoft, Adidas, China Mobile, Harvard Business School, IMVU…). Bridging technology, sociology and anthropology, his research covers virtual economies, digital third places, artificial artificial intelligence (AAI) and online social dynamics. Benjamin shared insights in over 100 talks across 16 countries, and was selected among China's Top 100 Mobile Industry Influencers in 2007 and 2008 as founder of Mobile Monday in Beijing. Last, he is an angel investor in Asia-based startups, including Cmune (www.cmune.com), maker of the first “social FPS” on social networks (www.facebook.com/paradisepaintball) and MyGengo (www.mygengo.com), a global human translation platform. @benjaminjoffe

STEPHANE KASRIEL leads Global Sales and Business Development at Zong. He joined Zong from PayPal, where he ran PayPal's Consumer Products division, launched award-winning new products and dramatically accelerated the growth of existing, mature products. Prior to this, Stephane was the Managing Director for PayPal France, where he took the business from its infancy to being a very significant contributor to PayPal's global P&L. Stephane previously founded Fireclick, a leading provider of web analytics which was acquired by Digital River in 2004. Stephane holds a MS in computer science from Stanford University and an MBA from INSEAD. @skasriel

AMY JO KIM, CEO, Shuffle Brain

ALBERT LAI is a founder of Kontagent, the leading social web analytics platform. Kontagent is a venture backed and Facebook funded company based that now tracks over 60 million monthly active users across hundreds of social games and applications. Albert sold his first internet company, the MyDesktop Network while in his teens to JupiterMedia (JUPM) for 7 digits in cash. Most recently he was the founder/CEO of BubbleShare, a photo-sharing company sold to Kaboose/Disney in 2007. He is now hard at work on Kontagent, his 5th internet startup based out of San Francisco and Toronto.

DAVID LEVY is co-founder and Vice President of SocialVibe. He manages SocialVibe's publisher relationships working with social media properties like Zynga to monetize their traffic through Fortune 1000 brand advertising. David also manages key relationships with charitable organizations and facilitates their involvement within the SocialVibe.com community. Before joining SocialVibe, David was with Bainbridge Capital, a merger and acquisition advisory firm. David was responsible for client management, business development and deal execution within the new media and technology space.

DEBORAH LIU is manager of product marketing for Facebook Credits and Games at Facebook, where she oversees initiatives related to game applications on Facebook.com and the Facebook virtual currency. Prior to Facebook, Deborah spent seven years at eBay and PayPal, where she had various roles including Director of Product Marketing Management for the eBay business at PayPal and Director of Product Management for the eBay Buyer Experience. Deborah has an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business and a bachelor's degree in civil and environmental engineering from Duke University.

KARL MEHTA is Founder & CEO of PlaySpan, Inc., a leader in monetization platform development for online games, social networks and new media. Karl brings more than 18 years of experience to PlaySpan in founding, building and funding technology start-ups in the U.S. and international markets. Prior to founding PlaySpan, Karl was part of the founding team at MobileAria Inc. (acquired by Wireless Matrix) based in Mountain View and co-founder/ CEO of OmniLabs Inc., based in Singapore and India. Prior to that, he held executive positions at Hughes, leading new business and technology development.@karlmehta

LUIS ONGIL is CEO of GameDuell USA, branch of GameDuell GmbH, Germany's largest gaming community with over 9 million players, and one of the largest in Europe. In operation since 2003, GameDuell offers skill-based multiplayer tournaments in casual games like Solitaire and Trivia. He has been involved with the company for the last 3 years, where he has helped in the international roll out of the offering while being directly responsible for the expansion in markets like Spain and Latin America, and since 2008, USA and Canada. Before joining GameDuell, Luis was responsible for the sales operations of Monster.com in the Spanish market since 2002, creating the sales structure and strategy from the ground up, and positioning Monster.com as one of the main recruitment website in that competitive market. Previously, Luis was responsible for the launch of leading European consumer portal, dooyoo.com, in the Spanish market, where he worked together with whom today are the founders and directors of GameDuell GmbH. Luis has also worked as a consultant in companies like Deloitte, McKinsey, holds Business a Marketing degrees from the University of North Texas (USA), as well as MBA from the same institution, and enjoys kite-surfing, snowboarding, soccer and reading business books.

CHRISTA QUARLES oversees Playdom's financial management and forecasting, and helps drive the company's strategic planning. Christa comes to Playdom from Thomas Weisel Partners, where she served as managing director for four years and a senior equity research analyst for almost a decade. In 2009, while covering market leaders from Google to Yahoo, Financial Times ranked Christa the #1 Internet software and services analyst for earnings estimates in the United States. Prior to joining Thomas Weisel, Christa held an assistant vice president position at Merrill Lynch. Christa graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Carnegie Mellon with degrees in economics and German, and earned an MBA from Harvard Business School. @cquarles

CHETHAN RAMACHANDRAN, CEO and Co-Founder, Turiya

ANDREW SHEPPARD is the Chief Product Officer at Kabam and is responsible for overall product strategy, product development and microtransaction revenue. Prior to Kabam, Andrew was Executive Producer at hi5 Networks where he led the company's transformation from a social network into a social entertainment destination. Andrew has extensive experience in the interactive experience industry having also worked at Outspark, Electronic Arts and CBS Interactive. Andrew has a Masters of Business Administration from the Haas School of Business at U.C. Berkeley and a Bachelor of Arts from Pomona College.

SAM SHRAUGER joined PayPal in April 2004 as a product and marketing manager for several of PayPal's small merchant products. He later oversaw PayPal's Checkout product team and drove overall acceptance across the web, in addition to leading the integration of Bill Me Later on the PayPal platform. Currently, Sam is Vice President of Global Product Strategy, where he is responsible for defining PayPal's long-term global product portfolio strategy and ensuring that PayPal's product architecture evolves to support this long-term strategy. Prior to joining PayPal Sam held management roles in technology consulting and product development at Agency.com, VerticalNet, Deloitte Consulting and Quantum Consulting.@paypal_sam

MARK SKAGGS is an award winning game developer and most recently known for creating the world-wide phenomena, "FarmVille" for Zynga. With a career spanning 17 years, 2 AIAS awards, 4 console transitions and a track record of creating games which have sold over 16 million copies at retail, Skaggs is also known for creating multi-million selling RTS games such as "Command and Conquer: Red Alert 2", "Command and Conquer: Generals" and "Lord of the Rings: Battle for Middle-earth". Skaggs joined Zynga in 2008 and is currently Vice President of Product Development, leading the charge to create new and interesting games in the social gaming space.

BEN SMITH is a seasoned product leader with a focus on innovation and experience. Ben Smith leads Program Management for Xbox 360, Xbox LIVE, and Kinect Platform Software – everything from the custom-built OS to the e-commerce platform to the Xbox LIVE user experience. Ben has played a key role in defining, building, and bringing to market NXE, Avatars, Netflix, and coming this holiday: Gold Family and Kinect. Ben is a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer serving Mauritania after graduating from the University of Colorado at Boulder. After returning from the Peace Corps Ben studied business at both The Ohio State University and Harvard University.

IAN SWANSON is the co-founder and CEO of Sometrics . Ian brings together publishers, advertisers and consumers from all types of online experiences MMOs, casual and social games.Ian helps maximize revenue for publishers, drive traffic and leads for advertisers, and enhance gameplay for consumers with Sometrics technology. Under Ian's leadership, Sometrics launched the industry's first virtual currency platform in December 2008, to help publishers manage all virtual currency monetization from multiple offer providers.Today, the company's Offer Solution and Payment Manager have a global reach with more than 4,000 ads across the global network. Before launching Sometrics, Ian was business development manager for Userplane, an AOL company that provides social media applications to hundreds of thousands of online communities, supporting millions of users daily.Before Userplane, he was an executive with Sprint and helped launch two mobile web startups.Ian actively advises several successful social networking applications, Fortune 500 companies and startups with their brand and marketing strategies within the social media ecosystem. He is often invited to share his insights at industry events .

DEAN TAKAHASHI is lead writer for GamesBeat at VentureBeat. He covers video games, security, chips and a variety of other subjects. Dean previously worked at the San Jose Mercury News, the Wall Street Journal, the Red Herring, the Los Angeles Times, the Orange County Register and the Dallas Times Herald. He is the author of two books, Opening the Xbox and Xbox 360 Uncloaked. He is currently organizing the DiscoveryBeat conference on Oct. 18 in San Francisco. @deantak, @venturebeat

NICK TALARICO has successfully monetized social media applications since the Facebook platform launched in 2007. As a charter member of the incubator YouWeb (which gave rise to Aurora Feint, Sibblingz, and Crowdstar) and founding Director of Operations for Sibblingz, Inc., Nick led the development & operation of games that held positions as top applications on Facebook, MySpace, and Bebo. Nick made just about every mistake in the book, but some of the games' monetization mechanics are still industry standards. He joined Offerpal Media as Director of Publisher Development and oversaw the company's revenue operations, working with game developers to enhance long-term revenues through game mechanics, virtual economy management, & user targeting. During his time with the company, Offerpal enjoyed sharp and sustained revenue increases and significant addition of top-flight partners. Nick left Offerpal in April 2010 for his current role as Partner at Leveraged, a boutique social media firm. As President of FORGE, a non-profit organization working with refugees in southern Africa, Nick oversaw social media, online branding, and online fundraising. His work helped FORGE become a global leader and innovator in online strategies for non-profits and the organization has garnered numerous social media awards including the The Jenzabar Foundation's Social Media Leadership Award and placement as a Facebook Causes Giving Challenge winner.

CHUNG-MAN TAM is the vice president, platform and monetization at Booyah!, the creators of mobile social games MyTown and InCrowd as well as Nightclub City on Facebook. Prior to joining Booyah!, he led product development for advertising products at AdMob. Chung has over 11 years of consumer and enterprise experience in the areas of mobile, web search, and social software at Google, Yahoo!, and Homestead. Chung earned a B.S. from Stanford University in Computer Science and a M.S. in Human-Computer Interaction from Carnegie-Mellon University. @chung

ROBERT WINKLER is the Chief Operating Officer and co-founder of 5th Planet Games, where he oversees game design and business development. 5th Planet Games is an independent studio that focuses on providing a more hardcore gaming experience, along with more involved social interactions. They are the creators of Dawn of the Dragons on Facebook. Robert draws from his experience in financial planning and as a dedicated gamer to design games that are deep, engaging, and fun for players who are looking for something more in a Facebook game.

GABE ZICHERMANN is an author, highly rated public speaker and serial entrepreneur. His most recent book, Game-Based Marketing (Wiley, 4/2010) has achieved critical and industry acclaim for its detailed look at innovators who blend the power of games with brand strategy. His next book on game mechanics is a detailed technical look at architecture and implementation. A resident of NYC, Gabe is a board member of StartOut.org, advisor to a number of startups and Facilitator for the NYC chapter of the Founder Institute.