François Barrault
Former CEO of BT Global Services 
and 
Board Member of BT Group PLC

Former Chief Executive Officer, François Barrault, was responsible for leading BT Global Services through the next stage of its journey to become a truly global business operator, meeting the needs of customers around the world to operate their non-core but mission critical network and IT services.  François is also a member of the BT Group Board, BT Group Operating Committee and leads BT Group CTO and BT Innovate.

BT Global Services has capability and assets that span the globe and a workforce of approximately 37,000 people world wide delivering services in 176 countries, with revenues of £7.9 billion for the 07-08 financial year.  BT also has 19,000 professional services people.

Over the last three years, BT has successfully made 31 acquisitions, each one consistent with BT’s strategy to be a business operator offering global reach and end to end service delivery totalling almost $ 4 B in stand alone revenue and $ 0.5 B in annual Ebidta.

Prior to becoming CEO of BT Global Services in April 2007, François Barrault led BT International for three years with responsibility for building up and running BT's activities outside of the UK.

This was a period of rapid expansion via strong organic growth well in excess of the market rate, and implementation of a systematic inorganic growth strategy, acquiring 13 companies and establishing 2 new joint ventures. François was also in charge of the marketing activities of BT Global Services in the UK and across the world.

François Barrault joined BT in May 2004 from Lucent Technologies Inc. where he was President of Lucent Mobility International. He had previously been President and CEO of Lucent Europe Middle East and Africa (EMEA) and, prior to that, senior vice president, international, of their InterNetworking Systems group. In Lucent, he successfully led the integration of 38 Lucent acquisitions and was responsible for a global organisation of 17,000 people and €5 billion revenue.

Before Lucent, François spent 5 years as a head of Stratus Computer. He has also held senior roles at Computervision and IBM. In the mid-Nineties François was the Chairman and co-founder of Astria, a leading European supplier of e-services. He is a current board member of eServGlobal, NETASQ and is an adviser to Quester Ventures. He is an active member of the Europe+ Foundation. He has lectured at the London Business School, Harvard University and the Ecole Nationale d'Administration (ENA).

François, 47, is a graduate of the Ecole Centrale de Nantes, with a Master's Degree (DEA) in robotics, artificial intelligence and advanced technology. A keen jazz pianist, wine collector and golf player, François is a French national. He is married with three children and lives in Brussels.

 

Marc Brown
Director of Corporate Development
Microsoft

Marc Brown is a managing director in the Corporate Development Group at Microsoft Corp., where he has been employed since January 2000. From May 1998 to December 1999, he was an associate in the Private Equity and Emerging Companies Group of the law firm Goodwin, Procter & Hoar LLP. Before that, he was an associate in the Mergers and Acquisition and Merchant Banking groups at the Union Bank of Switzerland, from 1987 to 1991.

Brown holds a doctor of jurisprudence degree from Georgetown University Law Center, an MBA in finance from New York University and a bachelor of arts in economics from Colgate University.

 

James P. Gerkis, Esq.
Partner
Proskauer Rose LLP

James Gerkis is a Partner in the Corporate Department of Proskauer Rose LLP, one of the United States’ largest law firms, providing a wide variety of legal services to major corporations, investment banks and other clients throughout the United States and around the world. Founded in 1875 in New York City, the firm employs over 700 attorneys in twelve offices worldwide.

James Gerkis has extensive experience in sophisticated domestic and international corporate, real estate, financing and securities transactions. His practice expertise includes: mergers and acquisitions, representing both acquirors and sellers, and leveraged buy-outs and spin-offs; transactions involving the sale and purchase and leveraged leasing of aircrafts; private equity and venture capital transactions, representing both investors and issuers; real estate transactions, including joint ventures, hotel and resort developments, mortgage financings, limited partnerships, leasing and acquisitions; partnership and corporate joint ventures, both domestic and international; financing transactions in areas of secured lending, leveraged leasing and letters of credit; and securities experience, representing both issuers and underwriters in public offerings, private placements, Rule 144A and Regulation S offerings and debt tender/exchange offers.

Among other clients, Mr. Gerkis represents L-3 Communications Corporation, Merrill Lynch, Town Sports International, Emaar Hotels & Resorts and Oxford Analytica.

Mr. Gerkis is Co-Chair of the Securities, Commodities and Exchanges Committee and Vice-Chair of the Homeland Security Committee of the ABA’s Section on Administrative Law and Regulatory Practice. He has made presentations relating to securities law and homeland security at several ABA conferences and is the author of many articles on various aspects of securities law, homeland security and related subjects.

Mr. Gerkis received his law degree from Columbia University School of Law in 1983 where he was a Harlan Fiske Stone Scholar and a Teaching Fellow. He did his undergraduate work at Columbia University where, having been admitted without finishing high school, he received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Political Science in 1980.

 

Charles Giancarlo
Managing Director 
Silver Lake

Charles Giancarlo joined Silver Lake in 2007 as a Managing Director. Mr. Giancarlo has over 25 years of experience in the communications industry. A senior executive at Cisco Systems from 1993-2007, Mr. Giancarlo most recently served as Executive Vice President and Chief Development Officer of Cisco and President of Cisco-Linksys, leading the company’s overall product development and management activities. As Chief Development Officer, Mr. Giancarlo directed the activities of half of Cisco’s employees, and was directly responsible for Cisco’s expansion into a large number of new markets and technologies. His first position at Cisco was Vice President of Business Development, where he developed Cisco’s merger and acquisition strategy and practice. Mr. Giancarlo joined Cisco when the company acquired Kalpana, Inc., the pioneer in Ethernet switching, where he was Vice President of Marketing and Corporate Development. Prior to joining Cisco, Mr. Giancarlo founded four communications equipment companies and successfully sold two of them to larger companies. Mr. Giancarlo was interim CEO of Avaya in 2008 and is currently Chairman of the Board. In addition, he serves on the board of directors of Gerson Lehrman Group, Accenture, and Netflix, Inc. Mr. Giancarlo holds a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Brown University, an M.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley, and an M.B.A. from Harvard University.

 

Jason Greenberg
Managing Director, Credit Suisse, Co-Head of Global Software Investment Banking 
Credit Suisse

Jason Greenberg is a Managing Director of Credit Suisse and Co-Head of Global Software Investment Banking based in New York.  Prior to his current role, he was Head of Global Communications Mergers and Acquisitions within Technology Investment Banking.  Mr. Greenberg originally joined CSFB in July 1998 from Deutsche Bank where he was an Assistant Vice President in the Technology group focused on the software industry.  Prior to that, he was a Director at TSG Consumer Partners, a consumer product-focused private equity firm with $1.5BN in capital under management, and a member of Wasserstein Perella's mergers & acquisitions department.

Mr. Greenberg has 16 years of investment banking and investing experience and during his career has worked as a strategic and financing advisor to leading companies in the communications, storage, security and software sectors through the many market evolutions which have occurred.  He has advised both multi-national and domestic clients on numerous complex financing and advisory assignments including mergers, acquisitions, divestitures, initial public offerings, investment and non-investment grade financings, going private transactions, joint ventures, significant equity investments, special committee assignments, proxy contests and hostile transactions. He has advised on hundreds of strategic situations and financings including more than 50 completed transactions worth over $100BN.

Mr. Greenberg received his B.A. from Duke University summa cum laude.

 

Roger Hurwitz
Partner
Fidelity Ventures

Roger focuses on growth equity investments in software and technology–enabled business services. Roger currently serves on the boards of Cortera, GeoLearning and iPipeline. Prior to joining Fidelity Ventures in 2007, he was a partner for Apax Partners, focused primarily on investments in enterprise software and technology–enabled services. Before that, he worked for GE Capital and was a vice president of GE Equity, where he played a key role in developing the technology group’s investment strategy for business–to–business electronic commerce. Earlier in his career, he worked in corporate finance at Chase Manhattan Bank, and spent six years at Arthur Andersen in accounting and corporate finance.

Roger received a bachelor of science degree in accounting from Syracuse University in 1987 and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania in 1995.

 

Habib Kairouz
Managing Partner
Rho Capital Partners

Habib Kairouz is Managing Partner of Rho Capital Partners, Inc., a New York based private equity firm with $2.5 billion under management.  Habib is a General Partner in Rho Ventures, the direct venture capital arm of Rho, focusing on multi-stage investments in information technology, new media, telecommunications, alternative energy and healthcare companies.  He is also a member of the Investment Committees of Rho Fund Investors, a private equity fund of funds as well as Rho Canada, an early stage venture capital fund focused on Canadian companies.

Habib is a member of the board of directors of a number of companies in which Rho Ventures is an investor.  His current and recent board seats include Innerwireless, Intralinks, iVillage (sold to NBC), Reach Local, Tacoda Networks (sold to Time Warner), Travel Ad Network, Tripod (sold to Lycos), Verified Person, Waterfront Media and Yantra (sold to AT&T).

Prior to joining Rho in 1993, Habib worked for five years in investment banking and leveraged buyouts with Reich & Co. and Jesup & Lamont.

Habib received a B.S. in Engineering and a B.A. in Economics from Cornell University and an M.B.A. in Finance from Columbia University.

 

Ben Levitan
Partner
In-Q-Tel

Ben Levitan is a Partner at In-Q-Tel, the strategic, not-for-profit investment firm that works to identify, adapt, and deliver innovative technology solutions to support the mission of the U.S. Intelligence Community. Since joining IQT in April 2008, he has completed investments in several companies and currently serves on the Boards of Directors (Observer) of Corestreet, QD Vision, febit GmbH, and Veracode. Previously he served as CEO of EnvoyWorldWide, managing significant market share growth and the subsequent sale to Varolii. Prior to joining EnvoyWorldWide, Mr. Levitan was Chief Operating Officer at Viant Corporation (NASDAQ:VIAN), where he led the Internet services firm to unprecedented growth. Previously, Mr. Levitan served as Chief Executive Officer at James Martin & Co. (now Headstrong) and was responsible for leading the company to profitability while growing annual revenues from $65MM to $125MM. Mr. Levitan has also served as Senior Vice President of Operations at Cambridge Technology Partners (NASDAQ:CATP), where he built the organization’s first Internet-focused practice, headed the company’s Customer Management and Financial Services Industry practices, and was instrumental in facilitating merger and acquisition activities. Mr. Levitan serves as a Director and Chairman of the Audit Committee of StockerYale (NASDAQ:STKR) and served ten years as a Director of Primavera Systems until its recent sale to Oracle (NASDAQ:ORCL). In addition, he serves as an advisor to Vitality, a healthcare start-up. He is a member of YPO. Mr. Levitan received his Bachelor degree from Union College in Schenectady, New York, and studied International Development at the London School of Economics.

 

John Raveret
Senior Vice President - Corporate Development
Cognizant Technology Solutions

Since 1999, John Raveret has led all aspects of Cognizant’s global activities related to acquisitions, investments, and strategic alliances. Cognizant is a high-growth, public (NASDAQ: CTSH), leading provider of information technology, consulting and business process outsourcing services, with 2007 revenue of $2.1 billion, over 58,000 employees and more than 40 global development centers.  During his tenure, Cognizant implemented a disciplined acquisition strategy focused on small-medium-sized targets; this strategy has produced nine strategic transactions, representing $250 million in consideration and over $300 million in revenue, and delivered over $1 billion of value creation.  From 1991 to 1999, John held a number of corporate development, finance and strategy positions at The Dun & Bradstreet Corporation (D&B) and two spin-offs of D&B, Cognizant Corporation and IMS Health.  Over the last 17 years, John has executed over 35 strategic transactions and over 50 partnerships within the information, software and business services industries, representing approximately $600 million in aggregate value and over $1 billion in revenue.   

John received an MBA in finance from The Wharton School and has an AB in economics and public policy studies from Duke University.

 

Brett Rochkind
Principal
General Atlantic

Brett Rochkind is a Principal at General Atlantic, where he has worked since 2002.  Brett is based in the firm's New York City office, where he heads GA's global Business Services & Technology sector.   Brett has extensive experience with software and technology-enabled services companies and has specific expertise in working with business process outsourcing, transaction processing, information services, government services, supply chain-logistics services and enterprise software businesses.

Prior to joining General Atlantic, Brett was an investment banker with Morgan Stanley & Co. in their Mergers & Acquisitions department in New York and Menlo Park, and helped to establish Morgan Stanley's Israel office based in Tel Aviv.

Mr. Rochkind graduated magna cum laude and as a University Scholar from the Stern School of Business at New York University and earned his M.B.A. from the Columbia University Graduate School of Business.

Brett is an active member in the community and is involved in a number of educational and non-profit organizations, including New York University, where he is an Executive Board member of the NYU Alumni Association and Co-Founder of the Young Alumni Leadership Circle and member of the Israel Venture Network and AIPAC Manhattan Club

 

Paul Taylor
Personal Technology Columnist & US Telecommunications Editor
Financial Times

Paul Taylor is the Personal Technology Columnist and US Telecommunications Editor for the Financial Times.  Taylor’s weekly Friday column focuses on new developments in software, hardware and IT services.  His beat covers all aspects of personal technology and telecommunications.

Taylor also writes and moderates the Gadget Guru Q&A blog, which appears on the FT-IT website, part of the FT.com subscription package and is a frequent contributor to the FT’s Digital Business technology section.

Taylor joined the FT in 1978 and has since served as local government correspondent, assistant news editor, Americas page editor, New York correspondent, foreign news editor, SE Asia business correspondent and management writer.  He was the FT's UK-based IT correspondent for most of the 1990s.

Taylor left the FT briefly in 2000 to help found a web-based technology analysis start-up and moved back to New York, where he is now based.

Taylor speaks regularly at conferences on personal technology and the Internet.  He has also appeared on CNBC, MSNBC, CNN, BBC TV and others.

Taylor received a post-graduate degree from Cardiff University, Wales, and a Bachelor’s degree with Honors from Oxford University.

 

Bruce Upbin
Managing Editor
Forbes

Bruce Upbin is a Managing Editor at Forbes Media in charge of new editorial product development across all platforms. Prior to that he was an Assistant Managing Editor running the magazine's technology and health coverage as well as special sections on innovation and creativity. Mr. Upbin joined Forbes magazine as a Reporter in 1995 and served as deputy chief of the reporting staff before moving to Chicago as Midwest bureau chief in 1997. In 2000, he returned to New York as a Senior Editor, helping to manage technology and health coverage. Since early 2005, Mr. Upbin has launched five new sections and, in 2006, became one of the youngest Forbes editors to be named Assistant Managing Editor. He has written a dozen cover stories and regularly provides business commentary on CNN, NPR, CNBC, the BBC, Forbes on Radio and the Fox News Channel. Mr. Upbin earned a B.A. in English from Northwestern University and earned an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from the University of Arizona.