Patricia Frishkoff founded the Family Business Program at Oregon State University in 1985 and served as its director until her retirement in 2002. The Family Business Program's mission is to foster healthy family businesses. Frishkoff was a professor of accounting in Oregon State University's College of Business and the first holder of the A.E. Coleman Chair in Family Business. In 1988, Frishkoff and her husband founded a consulting practice, Leadership In Family Enterprise, which provides consulting in the area of Family-run businesses. Patricia Frishkoff received her undergraduate degree from St. Lawrence University. She also holds a Doctorate in Business Administration from Kent State University
Theresa Mazzullo is the Chief Executive Officer at Excell Partners. Prior to joining Excell, Mazzullo spent six years as President & Principal of EPIC Advisors, Inc a 401(k) retirement plan company with $1.5 billion in retirement plan assets. As a former banker, Theresa held various positions within financial institutions, including a Senior Vice President of First National Bank, where she established and built a Trust and Investment Division while the bank was under a Consent Order by the office of the Comptroller of the Currency. She managed to grow the Trust & Investment Division to $125 million in five years and at the same time built and managed the infrastructure to support the broker-dealer business unit for the bank. Theresa Mazzullo received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Spring Hill College, Mobile, Alabama and a Graduate Degree in Banking from Stonier.
Judy Albers is the Chief Operating Officer at Excell. Albers has been instrumental in the establishment of many start-up companies based upon technologies spun out of Upstate NY universities and corporations, particularly in analyzing the commercial potential of the new technologies, developing commercialization strategies, positioning and planning early business operations, and providing seed stage capital. Her current focus is on co-managing the Excell Partners Fund and structuring equity-based deals.
Prior to joining Excell, Albers was a Vice President at Trillium Group, another Rochester-based Venture Capital firm, where she co-managed the University Technology Seed Fund, now fully invested. Albers also previously taught Environmental Chemistry at Bates College in Lewiston, Maine. Her classes were the largest in the department, teaching over a hundred non-majors every semester in lectures and laboratory. Prior to that, she served for several years at the Center for Naval Analyses in Washington, D.C. as a defense analyst. Her job was to develop and link analytical conclusions on Navy systems, tactics, and operations to practical recommendations for implementation by the Navy's top-level decision makers at the Pentagon.
Judy Albers holds a B.S. in Chemistry from Duke University, a Ph.D. in Inorganic Chemistry from Brandeis University, and completed her post-doc in Chemistry at Princeton University.
Deborah Streeter is the Bruce F. Failing, Senior Professor of Personal Enterprise in the Department of Applied Economics and Management at Cornell University.
Entrepreneurship and small business management are the focus of Streeter's research, teaching, and outreach programs. She is part of the university-wide Entrepreneurship@Cornell Program, which offers courses in entrepreneurship in almost all of Cornell's schools and colleges. Her research interests include the role of entrepreneurship and small business in economic development, with a particular focus on the effectiveness of business training and planning for start-ups.
Streeter has developed eClips, a database of digital video interviews, with entrepreneurs across the country. The in-depth interviews are digitized, cut into clips by topic, and are used in a multimedia format to teach entrepreneurship and small business management. The entrepreneurs she interviewed range from early start-ups to established companies and from high-tech Internet companies to manufacturing and service firms.
Streeter is also involved in helping to train start-up businesses in New York State. As part of the Entrepreneurial Education and Outreach Program, she is currently involved in a variety of programs aimed at helping New York entrepreneurs make informed choices about entrepreneurial ventures.
Deborah Streeter received her undergraduate degree from the University of Connecticut and her Master's and PhD from the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
Joy Kuebler is the founder of Joy Kueble Landscape Architect PC (JKLA). Her company's design projects have included one half acre community built parks, intimate gardens for small children, large university campus redevelopment and large city inter-modal transit facilities.
Joy Kuebler received her undergraduate degree in landscape architecture from Cornell University.
Andrea is the founder and president of 1-800-CTO, a consulting company that helps growth companies formulate their technology strategy and architecture.
Andrea is a seasoned dot-com entrepreneur who has directed the creation and management of over a dozen Internet properties. She is the former Co-Founder and Chief Technologist of EchoFactor.com - the web's largest repository of free XML news feeds. Prior to founding EchoFactor, she was the Director of Technology of Infonautics Corporation -- an Internet information company. Before venturing into the dot-com arena, Andrea was involved in the development of software for medical applications - first with GE and later with Picker International.
Andrea earned a Bachelor of Science in computational biology form Carnegie Mellon University and a Master of Science in computer science from Villanova University.
Teacher Created Materials is an educational publishing company that was founded in 1982 by Mary Dupuy Smith and Rachelle Cracchiolo. The company experienced tremendous growth since its inception--so much that in August 2004, the company split into two distinct businesses: a Book Company under the name Teacher Created Resources headed by Smith, and a Curriculum Company that maintains the name Teacher Created Materials headed by Cracchiolo. Prior to founding Teacher Created Materials, Rachelle taught kindergarten through sixth grade for nine years in the Fountain Valley School District. She graduated from Cal State Fullerton with a Bachelors degree in Psychology and a Masters degree in Education.
Anita P. Stephens is a General Partner of Opportunity Capital Partners ("OCP"), a private equity firm that provides equity capital to later stage companies for acquisition and expansion as well as early stage companies with leading edge technologies. The fund's investments are primarily in the areas of communications, information technology and healthcare, with a particular focus on businesses that are owned or managed by minority and women entrepreneurs. Ms. Stephens joined OCP in December 1996. Prior to joining OCP, Ms. Stephens served as President of Renaissance Capital Corporation, a Small Business Investment Company in Atlanta, Georgia. Her career has also included management positions at Manufacturers Hanover Trust, Benton & Bowles, and Prudential Insurance Company. Ms. Stephens currently serves on the board of several of the fund's portfolio companies. She is also a member of the board of directors of Pacific Community Ventures, a member of the Cornell University Entrepreneurial Advisory Council and the President's Council of Cornell Women. Ms. Stephens has an undergraduate degree in economics from Cornell University and an Executive MBA at Golden Gate University.
Linda Mason is the Chairman and Co-Founder of Bright Horizons. Bright Horizons provides high quality childcare at the work site as a benefit for employees. She founded the company in 1986 with her husband, Roger Brown, and a small team of committed parents in Cambridge, MA. Prior to founding Bright Horizons, Linda Mason managed large-scale relief operations overseas. She served as co-director of Save the Children's emergency program in Sudan, serving 400,000 famine and war victims, and directed a large feeding program for children in Cambodian refugee camps along the Thai border. She is a graduate of the Yale School of Management, Cornell University and the Sorbonne University in Paris, France.