Our judges are entrepreneurs, investors and industry leaders who will travel from across North America to judge our Finalists‘ live pitches on stage at Shea’s Performing Arts Center on October 30th.
On October 29th, nearly 40 Qualifying Judges will narrow down our group of Finalists to 10. Then, in the evening on October 30th, our Finals Judges will be tasked with the challenge of deciding which eight companies will win a share of $5 million, including our top investment of $1 million.
Meet Our Finals Judges:
David Brown
Co-Founder & Co-CEO | Techstars
David is a serial entrepreneur who has founded three startups and been involved with two others. He is one of the original founders of Pinpoint Technologies, Inc. which is now part of ZOLL Medical Corporation and provides solutions to the emergency medical services market. He was President of the company from founding through over $50M per year in revenue and over 250 people.
David later co-founded Techstars along with David Cohen, Brad Feld, and Jared Polis. He has been an investor and advisor to Techstars since inception. In 2013, he joined Techstars in a more active role.
David has a B.Sc. degree in Mathematics and Computer Science from McGill University in Montreal, Canada. As a ski instructor in the past, David still enjoys hitting the slopes on a good powder day.
Marissa Campise
Founder | Rucker Park
Marissa Campise is the Founder of Rucker Park, a venture firm focused on early stage and opportunistic growth stage investments. Prior to starting Rucker Park, Ms. Campise served as a founding member of SoftBank Group’s global investing team in Silicon Valley and as a Partner with the predecessor SoftBank Capital in New York where she co-led early-stage investing.
Ms. Campise holds a B.A. in History with honors distinction from Yale University.
Heidi Diamond
Content, Distribution, Syndication, Partnerships, Licensing | HealthiNation
Diamond leads Content, Partnerships, Distribution, Syndication, Licensing, Growth for HealthiNation, a leading digital media publisher and production company focused on health video content. Prior, Diamond served as Chief Executive Officer of Frederique’s Choice, a lifestyle e-commerce business launched nationally. She’s an advisor and mentor to startups and consults for a variety of IOT (Internet of Things) entities, a healthcare digital video enterprise, real estate brokerage and developers, ecommerce retailers, plus additional assorted additional business enterprises.
Currently, Diamond serves as adjunct professor teaching graduate-level courses in retail management and global marketing at LIM College. She is on the Board of Directors for Moving For Life, Integral Board Group, Framework TV, former board member of Ikobo and Academic Advisors and a board adviser for Bottlenotes. Diamond is an MBA candidate from American University International and holds a B.S. from the University of Maryland.
Oren Frank
Co-Founder & CEO | TalkSpace
Oren Frank is a Co-Founder and the CEO of Talkspace, the leading online and mobile psychotherapy company that has made therapy accessible and affordable to people across the globe. In a day and age when mental health care is recognized as a global societal crisis, the effectiveness and convenience Talkspace provides to those seeking to improve their mental health and well-being stands out. Under Oren’s leadership, Talkspace has so far helped more than one million people connect with licensed therapists — the vast majority of whom did not have access to help prior to using Talkspace.
Prior to Talkspace, Oren was a successful senior marketing and advertising executive, mostly with McCann Erickson WorldWide, where he was recognized as a progressive creative strategist, and one of the leading voices in the new media-marketing world. Oren maintains that Talkspace helps him redeem and repent for his years spent in advertising.
Denmark West
Founding Partner & Chief Investment Officer | Connectivity Ventures
Denmark West is a Founding Partner and Chief Investment Officer of Connectivity Ventures, an early stage and mission oriented fund that invests to support a future that is more female, colorful, conscious and connected. The firm invests in the future of work so the future will actually work for everyone.
Prior to Connectivity, Denmark was a President at BET, an EVP at Viacom Media Networks, and chief of staff of Windows at Microsoft. He has helped to incubate new businesses, notably Xbox and Windows Media at Microsoft as well as both the first vertical ad network and the first webisode series at Viacom. He also led strategy teams and initiatives at Microsoft around software as a service and open source software, and at Viacom focused on social media and video games. He is an advisor to private equity fund K1 Investment Management ($1B AUM), the National Basketball Players Association, and the USO. He is also on the board of Forbes Impact, Culture Shift Labs, and the I.D.E.A. Initiative.
Meet Our Qualifying Judges:
- Matt Blomstedt
- Dan Bragiel
- Todd Breeden
- Lisa Burton
- Somak Chattopadhyay
- Jo Ann Corkran
- Brian Cummings
- Lauren DeLuca
- Maggie Dorn
- Erica Duignan
- Chinedu Enekwe
- Chris Gage
- Adam Greenberger
- Laurent Grill
- Rohit Gupta
- Mike Hoeksema
- Del Johnson
- Mike Jurek
- Warren Katz
- Theresa Mazzullo
- James Murray
- Ha Nguyen
- Lorine Pendleton
- Steve Perricone
- Josh Porter
- Sharon Rutter
- Aia Sarycheva
- Scott Savitz
- Ryan Sullivan
- Shaun Walker
- Jon Watson
Meet Our First Round & Semifinals Judges:
- Alan Alpert
- Stuart Angert
- Stephanie Argentine
- Jeff Arywitz
- Pete Augustine
- Mark Branden
- Joanna Brougher
- Paul Buckley
- Dr. Helen Cappuccino
- Dr. Samuel Cloud
- David Colligan
- Lauren DeLuca
- Peter Demakos
- Robert Duggan
- Robert Evans
- Jonathan Fentzke
- Robert Fritzinger
- Stephan Gamard
- Tom Godin
- Jack Greco
- Jim Hatem
- Kevin Kerl
- John Lopinski
- Nathaniel Lucek
- Keith Lukasik
- Maddy Martin
- Jack McGowan
- Robert Neubert
- Deb O’Shea
- Lynn Oswald
- Mary Owusu
- John Pacilio
- Jamel Perkins
- Pete Petrella
- Brian Pusch
- Thomas Quinn
- David Richardson
- Paris Roselli
- Sam Russo
- Sanwal Sarraf
- Dr. Steve Schwaitzberg
- Bradley Sparks
- Mike Springer
- Scott Stenclik
- Josephine Theal
- David Thiemecke
- David Thompson
- Nicole Tzetzo
- Annmarie Vanini
- Mark Wagner
- Matthew Wagner
- Bob Willer