2008 Speakers

KEYNOTE SPEAKER
Bernard Marcus
Chairman
The Marcus Foundation

Bernard Marcus is co-founder of The Home Depot, Inc., the world's largest home improvement retailer. His company revolutionized the home improvement business with its warehouse concept. He served as chairman of the board until his retirement in 2002.

Marcus's personal civic involvement has been translated into the creation of The Marcus Foundation where he serves as chairman of the board. His areas of focus include Jewish causes, children, medical research, free enterprise and the community.

A centerpiece of his desire to give back to the community is the Georgia Aquarium, the largest aquarium in the world. The $290 million dollar attraction is dedicated to the people of Georgia and the associates, customers and shareholders of The Home Depot. With a total of 550,000 square feet and 8 million gallons of water, it houses more than 125,000 animals.

In 1991, he and his wife Billi established The Marcus Institute, which provides programs for children and adolescents with disorders of the brain and their families. An additional commitment in 1998 led to a national expansion when The Marcus Institute joined forces with the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore.

Among his important philanthropies is the founding of the Israel Democracy Institute located in Jerusalem. This non-partisan and non-political think tank serves as an important resource and change agent, dealing with the complex issues facing Israeli democratic society. Former U.S. Secretary of State George Shultz serves as Honorary Chairman.

Most recently, Mr. Marcus announced the creation of Project Share in conjunction with The Shepherd Center in Atlanta, renowned for treatment of brain and spinal injuries. To ensure that members of the military and veterans get diagnosed and cared for without financial constraint, his Foundation will underwrite the housing, transportation and care costs of any military personnel with brain or spinal injuries who are sent to Shepherd. It is Marcus's hope that other similar centers across the country and, ultimately, the US government will take responsibility and have the appropriate staffing to care for "these brave men and women who put their lives on the line for our country."

He serves in numerous leadership roles including The Shepherd Center, The City of Hope, The Marcus Jewish Community Center, and Business Executives for National Security. Some of his most recent awards include: the inaugural award recipient for Inc. 500's Bernard A. Goldhirsh Award, induction into the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame, Jewish Federation of Great Atlanta's Lifetime of Achievement Award, the Golden Plate Award from the Academy of Achievement at the International Achievement Summit, and the Anti-Defamation League's America's Democratic Legacy Award.

A native of Newark, New Jersey, Mr. Marcus received his B.S. degree in Pharmacy from Rutgers University.

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Carlos Dominguez
Senior Vice President, Office of the Chairman and CEO
Cisco

Dominguez has been with Cisco since 1992. He has played a key role in multiple segments of the company's business and most recently led its service provider business. From 2004 to 2008, he led Cisco's Worldwide Service Provider Operations group, playing a key role in building the strategy for the business and doubling service provider sales from $3.7 billion to $7.7 billion. Service providers now represent approximately 46 percent of Cisco's overall business.

Before becoming a senior vice president, Dominguez was Vice President for U.S. Service Provider Sales, leading the sales teams for all U.S. communications providers. He grew the business from $500 million to over $2.5 billion. Prior to that, he led Cisco's enterprise line of business in the northeastern United States and established Cisco in a number of strategic markets such as financial services in New York City, media, government and pharmaceuticals.

Prior to joining Cisco, Dominguez held management positions at Timeplex, Inc. in Woodcliff Lake, New Jersey, and at New Jersey Bell / Bell Atlanticom in Newark, New Jersey.

Recently he was named one of the top 50 Hispanic executives in the United States by Hispanic Engineering and Information Technology magazine. He serves on the Board of Directors of Communities in Schools of New Jersey, a nonprofit organization dedicated to keeping high risk children in school; NACME (National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering); and the YMCA of Greater New York.

Dominguez was born in Cuba and attended the University of Puerto Rico in Mayaguez.

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Tom Noonan
Former Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer
Internet Security Systems, Inc.

Tom Noonan is the former chairman, president and chief executive officer of Internet Security Systems, Inc., which was recently acquired by IBM for $1.5B. Tom Noonan and Chris Klaus launched ISS in 1994 to commercialize and develop a premier network security management company. Under Noonan's leadership, ISS revenue soared from startup in 1995 to nearly $400 million dollars in its first decade. The company grew to more than 2000 employees, with operations in more than 36 countries.

Prior to co-founding ISS, Noonan held senior management positions at Dun and Bradstreet Software, where he was vice president, worldwide marketing. Before joining D&B Software, he specialized in real-time, automated control systems for computer-integrated manufacturing. Noonan founded two successful technology companies while residing in Boston: Actuation Electronics, a precision motion-control company and Leapfrog Technologies, a software development company designed for networked applications.

Noonan's management style and vision has been widely recognized by industry-leading publications including Forbes, Business Week and Fortune. In 1999, Ernst and Young recognized him as "Entrepreneur of the Year." Noonan was recently recognized with the "Lifetime Achievement Award" at the RSA Security conference, the world's largest conference dedicated to information security. Noonan was also elected to the National Board of Directors for the American Electronics Association (AeA), whose mission is to serve as "the voice of the American high-tech community."

In 2002, President Bush appointed Noonan to serve on the National Infrastructure Advisory Council (NIAC), a White House homeland defense initiative that protects information systems critical to the nation's infrastructure. He currently chairs the NIAC Evaluation and Enhancement of Information Sharing and Analysis Working Group.

Noonan is a frequent speaker at leading industry events and has delivered keynote addresses at such venues as the G8 Summits in Kyoto, Japan and Sea Island, Georgia, Interop Las Vegas, the RSA Conference, SUMAQ Summit, CSIA Town Hall, Japan External Trade Organization, Atlanta Rotary Club, and Forbes CEO events in the United States, Singapore and Mexico.

Noonan holds a mechanical engineering degree from Georgia Tech and a business degree from Harvard University. He is an active participant and speaker in numerous professional societies, and serves on the board of directors for Woodruff Arts Center, , Georgia Tech Foundation , Georgia Tech's College of Computing , the Carter Center's Board of Counselors, Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce and Young President's Organization. He is an active technology investor through his venture capital company, Technology Operators and serves on the boards of Manhattan Associates (NASDAQ: MANH) and a number of privately held technology companies. He is also an active philanthropist through the work of the Thomas E. Noonan Family foundation which supports education, environmental and healthcare causes locally and nationally.

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Stuart Snyder
President and Chief Operating Officer
Turner Broadcasting System, Inc.'s Animation
Young Adults & Kids Media

In this capacity, he is responsible for assets including the cable television networks Cartoon Network, Boomerang and Adult Swim; the digital businesses Cartoonnetwork.com, Adultswim.com, Toonami Jetstream, Cartoon Network Video, GameTap; and two animation production facilities, Cartoon Network Studios in Burbank and Williams Street Studios in Atlanta. Additionally, Snyder works closely with Turner Broadcasting System International on programming strategies for Cartoon Network Asia Pacific, Cartoon Network Europe, Cartoon Network Latin America & Caribbean and Cartoon Network Japan. Promoted from executive vice president/COO in January 2008, Snyder expanded his role to include executive responsibility of consumer products, domestic advertising sales & marketing of those properties, overseeing staffs based in New York City, Chicago and Los Angeles. Snyder is based in Atlanta and reports to Philip I. Kent, chairman and CEO of Turner Broadcasting System, Inc. (TBS, Inc.)

Prior to this appointment, Snyder served as senior vice president and general manager of GameTap, a Turner Broadcasting broadband entertainment network offering subscribers access to more than 900 arcade and console games, as well as original programming, interviews with gaming figures and game trailers. Snyder will continue to oversee day-to-day management of the marketing, programming, development and distribution for the network.

Snyder returned to Turner Broadcasting in 2005 from CINAR Corporation, an animation, live-action and education production/distribution company based in Montreal that he led as president and CEO. He co-founded Turnstile Entertainment, a New York-based company that creates and produces family entertainment programming featuring popular brands. Snyder was president and COO of World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc., the television and sports entertainment franchise; and president of USA Home Entertainment, where he oversaw the marketing and release of the critically acclaimed film Being John Malkovich and was part of the management team that green-lit the Academy Award¨-winning film Traffic.

Earlier in his career, Snyder was president and COO of Feld Entertainment, the world's largest producer of live family entertainment, featuring Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey and Disney on Ice. He also led Turner Broadcasting's home entertainment division as executive vice president and general manager, Domestic Home Video and Non-Theatrical Services, for Turner Home Entertainment (T.H.E.), which during his tenure distributed The Beatles Anthology Series, The Swan Princess, Ken Burns' Baseball and Gettysburg. Snyder began his professional entertainment career at MGM/UA as head of the Non-Theatrical Division and later moved to its Home Entertainment Division. He currently serves on the board of the Atlanta History Center in Atlanta, Georgia.

Turner Broadcasting System, Inc., a Time Warner company, creates and programs branded news, entertainment, animation and young adult media environments on television and other platforms for consumers around the world.

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Michael Eckert
Former CEO of The Weather Channel and Pathfire, Inc and now a Venture Fellow at Georgia Tech's VentrureLab Business Incubator Program and an Entrepreneur in Residence at ATDC.

Mike Eckert was on the start up team of The Weather Channel and was its CEO for 14 years. Under Mike's aegis The Weather Channel grew into one of the leading media brand names in America; and from its analog cable television network roots into a distributor of weather information via digital technologies including weather.com and wireless technologies. Mike and his team expanded The Weather Channel concept to Canada, many countries in Europe and Latin America. Mike was also CEO of Pathfire, Inc., and Atlanta technology start up which provided software services related to the digitization and distribution of video for Hollywood studio and television news organizations. Currently, Mike is a Venture Fellow at Georgia Tech's VentureLab business incubator program, an Entrepreneur in Residence at ATDC, an angel investor and advisor to many start up companies.

Mr. Eckert received his Bachelor of Science degree from Northern Illinois University. He has also participated in various Post Graduate Classes/Professional Programs at: Northern Illinois, DePaul University, Harvard, Ohio State, University of Virginia, University of Georgia, University of South Carolina, and the Center for Creative Leadership.

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Braxton Jarratt
CEO
Clearleap

Braxton has driven innovation and growth in senior management roles with technology and media companies large and small, most recently as Senior Vice President of Marketing and Business Development at Tandberg Television (an Ericsson Company), the world's largest supplier of digital television systems. At Tandberg, he led the rapid expansion of the company into the North American television market and video on demand (VOD) software business, building a world-class customer base of leading television operators and programmers. He launched and secured the initial key customers for Tandberg's pioneering dynamic VOD advertising system and led the complete overhaul of Tandberg Television's brand after completing three key acquisitions in less than a year. Braxton joined Tandberg through their $120 million acquisition of N2 Broadband, a venture-backed television software startup, where he was responsible for product management, marketing and business development. There, he helped win deployments of the company's on-demand software products in more than 100 cities and in nearly every VOD site in North America.

Braxton previously worked at Cox Enterprises as director of product strategy for the cable division and GM in the interactive media division, where he launched the first broadband internet content service in partnership with @Home. His first tech startup experience was as the head of commercial services at Primenet, an internet startup purchased by GlobalCenter. Braxton graduated from Dartmouth College with a bachelor's degree in engineering.

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Jeff Bussgang
General Partner
Flybridge Capital Partners

Jeff's popular blog on helping demystify the venture business for entrepreneurs, "Seeing Both Sides", can be found at www.bostonvcblog.com. Jeff is also currently a guest blogger for Businessweek.com's Business at Work: Staying Entrepreneurial website.

Prior to joining the firm in January 2003, Jeff co-founded Upromise (acquired by Sallie Mae), a loyalty marketing and financial services firm that currently manages $20 billion in college savings assets, where he served as President, Chief Operating Officer and Board Director. Prior to Upromise, Jeff was an executive at Open Market, an Internet commerce software leader that went public in 1996 and grew to nearly $100 million in revenues. During his five-year tenure, he served as Vice President of Worldwide Marketing and Business Development, Vice President of Worldwide Professional Services and head of Product Management. Prior to Open Market, Jeff was with the strategy consulting firm, The Boston Consulting Group, and served on the executive team of Athena Design, an object-oriented software start-up.

Jeff holds a BA in Computer Science from Harvard University where he graduated magna cum laude and an MBA from Harvard Business School where he was a Baker Scholar and a Ford Scholar.

Jeff is an active community member, serving as co-chair of the Progressive Business Leaders Network, vice chairman of the board of educational non-profit, Facing History and Ourselves, and has been appointed by Governor Deval Patrick to the Readiness Finance Commission to make funding recommendations for education reform. Jeff also serves on the board of MITX, the Massachusetts Innovation and Technology Exchange. Jeff is the author of "Ruling The Net", a 1996 Harvard Business Review article predicting the development of Internet commerce.

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Greg Foster
General Partner
Noro-Moseley Partners

Greg Foster is a General Partner at Noro-Moseley Partners, an early stage venture capital firm based in Atlanta, GA. He joined the firm in 2008 and has focused his investment activities in technology with an emphasis on digital media. Greg is active with several portfolio companies and currently serves as a board observer for Clearleap.

Prior to joining Noro-Moseley, Greg served as Vice-President of Corporate Development for Turner Broadcasting, where he was responsible for Turner New Media Investments, the company's early stage strategic investment arm, as well as M&A activities. Greg joined Turner after it acquired his company, Southern Direct, a business focused on building branded e-commerce extensions to linear cable channels. In addition to founding Southern Direct, Greg has been a member of the management team of two other successful start-ups, serving as SVP of Corporate Development at iXL Enterprises and VP of Business and Corporate Development at Silverpop Systems. He began his career as a consultant at Deloitte Consulting, where his efforts were focused on building internet strategies for clients including Prudential Insurance, Sonoco Products and the New York City Transit Authority.

Greg is the chairman-elect of NVCA's Corporate Venture Group Advisory Board and is a member of the Board of Trustees for the Georgia Council on Economic Education. He holds a Bachelors Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Georgia Tech, where he was a President's Scholar, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

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