Where
Cabrillo Pavilion Arts Center1118 E. Cabrillo Blvd.
Santa Barbara, CA 93103
On-site parking: $3 (exact change only), or street parking where available.
Driving Directions
Cost
Online Pre-Registration: $30.00*
General (at door): $40.00
Student (w/ ID): $15.00
*Online registration is now closed, but we hope to see you tonight. You can always register at the walk-in registration table located in the lobby of the venue.
At door registration payment methods:
Cash
Check (made payable to MITEF-CC)
Credit card (Visa, Master Card, Discover and American Express)
Need Help with Registration?
Please contact Violet Coto, Event Coordinator, for assistance with registration at, mitcentralcoast@gmail.com.
Event Details
5:00 - 6:00 p.m.: Registration and Networking Hour
6:00 - 7:30 p.m.: Speakers and Presentations
7:30 - 8:00 p.m.: Q&A
Refreshments and light appetizers will be served, and are included in registration.
Cash bar on site (beer/wine).
Upcoming MIT Events
Wednesday, November 14, 2012
Elevator Pitch Competition
5:00 - 8:00 p.m. | UCSB Corwin Pavilion
University of California-Santa Barbara
* * * * *
Other Events
If you would like to feature your event's announcement in our emails, please contact Peter Hartman at mitcentralcoast@gmail.com for details.
Contact
If you have any questions or have any trouble registering, feel free to contact us!
Events:
Violet Coto, Event Coordinator
MIT Enterprise Forum of the Central Coast
mitcentralcoast@gmail.com
805-500-6940 (vm)
Mailing Address:
MIT Enterprise Forum of the Central Coast
Attn: David Kronen
1036 State Street
Santa Barbara, CA 93101
MIT Enterprise Forum of the Central Coast Event presents
The Board Game:
How Entrepreneurs and Investors Can Make a Difference with a Board
Wednesday, October 17, 2012 | 5:00 - 8:00 p.m.
Cabrillo Pavilion Arts Center
Program Description
Building a great board is a critical component for success for any innovative company. The experience, contacts and governance of the right board can make all the difference and give the entrepreneurial venture a significant competitive edge. Our area is a hot bed of innovation and is also the home of many current and former business leaders who can offer an enormous amount to young companies.
- For entrepreneurs: How do you think about building a board? Who do you want and how do you get them. What should they do and what should you expect?
- For prospective board members: How do you find the right fit? What should be your criteria and expectations? What are your responsibilities and how should you be compensated?
Event Speakers and Panelists
P. Levensohn J. Schraith F.H. Foster J. MacFarlane
Presenter
Pascal Levensohn, MD, Generation Advisors, Levensohn Venture Partners - former director of the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA, 2007-2011)
Panelists
Jim Schraith, President, Board Evals (eGovernance company focused on board communication and performance and former President of AST Research)
John MacFarlane, CEO, Sonos, Inc.
Moderator
Frank Foster, Managing Director, DFJ Frontier
Speaker Biographies
Pascal Levensohn
Founder and Managing Partner of Levensohn Venture Partners LLC (LVP). LVP has focused on early and development stage venture capital investments in Silicon Valley technology companies since its inception in 1996, emphasizing semiconductor, physical and cyber security, digital home, and enterprise software. LVP raised over $200 million across three main fund groups (1996, 2000, 2004 vintages), invested in over 30 companies, and returned over $400 million in capital to investors. Pascal was elected to a four-year term on the board of the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) from April 2007- April 2011, during which he chaired the NVCA’s education committee for three years; he is a faculty member of the Kauffman Fellows Program Center for Venture Education (2006-present) where he teaches best practices for VC-backed company board members; he has published widely read white papers on best practices for venture capital boards (1999, 2003, 2006, 2007), and he is the co-author of the first Chinese college textbook on venture capital: Venture Capital: Theory and Practice, with Professor Liu Manhong of Renmin University of China (2011). Mr. Levensohn has served as board chairman, audit committee chairman, and compensation committee chairman for various companies in which he has invested. He has experience as a public company director since 1993 and as a venture capital company director since 1996.
Mr. Levensohn is also the founding CEO of Generation Strategic Advisors LLC (GSA). GSA advises institutional investors (including corporate and international venture capital funds), family offices, high net worth individuals, and their trusted advisors on specific projects related to investments in illiquid alternative assets that fall outside of our clients’ normal expertise. GSA specializes in actively managing direct venture capital and private equity investments, including optimizing the governance structure and management of closely held operating companies. Working specifically with family offices, GSA specializes in developing the next generation of family leaders and applies process discipline to a family’s philanthropic efforts.
Mr. Levensohn has lectured on board governance topics at universities in the U.S. (Harvard Law School, Stanford School of Engineering), China, and Singapore. He is frequently quoted in the media on venture capital topics, including capital markets, board governance, and innovation issues relating to America’s slipping global competitiveness.
Mr. Levensohn holds an AB in government, cum laude, from Harvard University. He is a life member of the Council on Foreign Relations, a former co-chairman of the Socrates Society Forum of the Aspen Institute (2007-2009), and he served as co-chairman of the Aspen Institute’s endowment campaign for the benefit of the Socrates Society (2010-2012).
Jim Schraith
Jim Schraith is the founder and CEO of BoardEvals, LLC. Jim’s career spans 30 years and includes significant experience in senior operating roles at both large, public companies and small, venture backed private companies. Jim has experience as the Chairman & CEO of both public and private companies. As the leader of Compaq's North American operations, he was responsible for over $10 billion in annual revenues and a team of over 6,000 people. At AST Research, Jim was President & COO and a member of the team that took AST to the Fortune 500 list in 1992. Over the past 18 years, Jim has served on 25 public, private and nonprofit boards of directors. He is currently a member of the National Association of Corporate Directors and holds a Certificate of Director Education. Jim is also a venture partner in the DFJ Frontier fund and sits on the boards of several private companies.
John MacFarlane
John MacFarlane founded Sonos, Inc. in 2002, a parent company of Sonos Europe B.v. and serves as its Chief Executive Officer. Sonos, a Santa Barbara, Caflifornia-based company produces electronic products, particularly their main product, the Sonos Multi-Room Music System, which is a modular set of digital appliances that works with end-user supplied or built-in speakers to form a zoned audio system in which different zones may play the same or different audio.
Frank H. Foster is a Managing Director of DFJ Frontier, a Draper Fisher Jurvetson affiliated venture capital fund with $80M under management focused on seed and early stage technology companies on the west coast. Frank also manages the Gideon Hixon Fund, the venture capital investment vehicle for the Hixon Family. The group's venture capital investments include Apple Computer and Dell as well as more recent successes including CORSolutions (acquired by Matria), Sensitech (acquired by Carrier), Medior (acquired by AOL), Security Dynamics (acquired by RSA), WebCal (acquired by Yahoo) and Xiotech (acquired by Seagate). Prior to that, he was a General Partner of Allen & Buckeridge PTY LTD, a leading Australian venture capital firm with approximately A $250 million under management. At Allen & Buckeridge he led investment efforts into Hitwise (acquired by Experian), eKit (acquired by Jersey Telecom), Wishlist (acquired by Qantas) and Next Generation Entertainment.
Frank also has extensive operational experience through his roles at Virtual Music Entertainment (acquired by NAMCO), Contexture Systems and Prophecy Development Corporation. More recently, he acted as the CEO and Executive Chairman of Prolacta Bioscience, leading the company through its successful turn around and funding. Previously, he acted as an executive director for YellowPages.com where he helped guide the company through its successful sale to SBC Communications (NYSE: SBC) and Bell South (NYSE: BLS) in November 2004. He was also a director of Cogent Data technologies through its successful sale to Adaptec Inc (NASDAQ: ADPT) in June 1996.
Frank is currently a director of Prolacta Bioscience, HydraDx (Chairman), Hixon Properties, DX Biosciences, Marval Biosciences, Buyology, Predixion Software, Swink (Chairman) and Zadspace (Chairman). He also serves as a venture partner for Southern Cross Venture Partners a $150M International venture capital fund focused on bringing Australia/NZ technology to the US. He is currently a member of the Board of Trustees of the Cancer Center of Santa Barbara and the Pacer Foundation. Frank received his MBA from The Harvard Business School and a BA cum laude from Harvard University.
He regularly presents and teaches classes in entrepreneurship and family business at UCSB, Cal Poly, Stanford GSB and Portland State University.
Premiere Sponsors
Supporting Sponsors
