Matt Zelesko is currently SVP, Technology at Time Warner Cable. At the time of this panel, he was the CTO at Inform Technologies. Inform is the leading developer of automated content solutions used by some of the web's most authoritative publishers including CNN, NBC Universal, and The Economist. Inform's applications use artificial intelligence to discern meaning and context. With this enhanced understanding, Inform drives new opportunities in content creation, curation and distribution. As CTO of Inform, Zelesko oversees the company's technology and operations.
Prior to Inform, Zelesko was CEO of Joost, the online aggregator of premium video entertainment. As CEO, he led the company through a successful acquisition by Adconion Media Group. Matt previously served as senior vice president of engineering responsible for Joost's global technology organization.
Matt Zelesko is a graduate of Cornell University.
Greg Woodworth is founder and Vice President of Stony Brook Whole Hearted Foods, a company that produces and distributes culinary oil based on squash seed varietals. The squash oils are produced by cold-expeller pressing resulting in a unique, regional oil sold to the retail gourmet and natural food shop market. Founded in 2008, the company is located in Geneva, New York at the Cornell Agriculture and Food Technology Park.
Prior to starting Stony Brook, Woodworth has been involved in all aspects of food service management for more than 20 years. He obtained his Bachelor of Science in Food and Beverage Management from Cornell University at the Hotel School and an MBA from Bentley College.
John E. Little is a Senior Lecturer of Accounting at Cornell University's Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management. Jack has taught accounting for nearly 30 year at both the Community College and University level. He received his Undergraduate degree in Accounting from LeMoyne College in Syracuse, his Master's degree in Business and Public Policy from SUNY's Empire State College and is a licensed New York State Certified Public Accountant.
In addition to his teaching responsibilities, Jack coordinates the accounting program within Dyson, counseling students on academic, career and professional licensing matters. He is a longstanding member of the School's Undergraduate Studies Committee and a more recent member of the College's Academic Petitions Committee. At the end of the 2010-11 academic year Jack was awarded the Donald C. Burdett Distinguished Advisor Award.
He is a former partner of the professional service firm of Ciaschi, Dietershagen, Little and Mickelson, LLP in Ithaca, New York, where he practiced for over 25 years. He served as managing partner and led the firm's Governmental and Not-for-Profit practice. His clients have included dozens of governmental units as well as local public authorities.
Jack remains active professionally currently providing accounting and management advisory consulting services to a limited number of businesses, local governments and not-for-profit organizations.
Jack resides in Ithaca with his wife, Amy, and two daughters, Johanna and Halee. He is a member of the Tompkins County Workforce Investment Board, where he has served as President of the board as well as a member of the Executive Committee. In his free time, he is an avid outdoorsman, hunter and animal enthusiast. Each year the family raises, tags and releases over 1,000 monarch butterflies as they begin their migration to central Mexico.
Greg Woodworth and Kelly Coughlin moved their gourmet mail-order bakery, Stony Brook Cookie Company, from Boston to the Finger Lakes region in Geneva, New York. Soon after relocation, the couple was approached by a local farmer about using his butternut squash seeds, which remained from the processing of squash for the farm's ready-to-cook preparation for regional grocery stores.
Working with food scientists from Cornell University at the Food Venture Center, the team worked together to produce an all-natural, 100% expeller pressed butternut squash seed oil. The product debuted in September 2008. It is available in 187 ml and 375 ml bottles, individual or by the case. The non-GMO seeds are roasted in 10-pound batches and pressed with a yield of 20%. The resulting oil is allowed to stand to separate naturally and is then filtered and decanted into retail bottles.
Alaric Strauss works at Stony Brook WholeHearted Foods. He was part of the team that worked together to produce an all-natural, 100% expeller pressed butternut squash seed oil. The product debuted in September 2008. It is available in 187 ml and 375 ml bottles, individual or by the case. The non-GMO seeds are roasted in 10-pound batches and pressed with a yield of 20%. The resulting oil is allowed to stand to separate naturally and is then filtered and decanted into retail bottles.
David Cohn is Director, Business Informatics at IBM's T. J. Watson Research Center. He supervises a research team focused on modeling, transforming and integrating information and business structures for on demand solutions. He directs IBM's worldwide research strategy in support of on Business Design & Implementation.
Prior to his current position, Dr. Cohn was Director of IBM's Austin Research Laboratory which focuses on exploratory VLSI design, electronic CAD tools and high-productivity system design and is home of IBM's Low-Power Initiative. He also served as Director, Strategic Projects at Armonk assisting the Chairman and corporate executives in formulating and assessing IBM's worldwide business strategy. Before joining IBM, he was Professor of Computer Science & Engineering and Professor of Electrical Engineering at Notre Dame.
David Cohn received his undergraduate and PhD degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Douglas Lasdon founded the Urban Justice Center as a one-person operation in a burned-out building in East Harlem, to provide badly needed legal services to one of New York City's most underserved populations - single, homeless adults. To make his services accessible to his clients, he conducted outreach legal clinics directly in soup kitchens, making us the first organization in the country to use this approach.
Since then, Lasdon has greatly expanded the agency's size, scope, and influence, while still holding fast to its core mission - helping those at the farthest margins of society, both one at a time and collectively. In addition to leading the agency, he continues to represent individual clients and to engage in impact litigation.
Prior to founding the Urban Justice Center, Lasdon was a Fellow and Staff Attorney at Covenant House in New York City. He has been an adjunct faculty member at New York University since 1985, and has also served as a consultant to the World Bank, and as a Wasserstein Fellow at Harvard Law School.
Douglas Lasdon graduated from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania and received his law degree from Cornell University Law School.
Jeffrey Geller is vice chairman & COO of Insurent Agency Corporation. The Insurent Lease Guaranty Program was created to serve renters, landlords, condo/co-op owners, and brokers and relocation specialists by offering the first institutional guarantor of residential leases. The Insurent® Lease Guaranty Program is underwritten and issued by CastlePoint Insurance Company, a property and casualty insurance company
Jeffrey Geller is a graduate of Columbia University where he received his undergraduate degree and MBA.
Roy Daniel is the CEO of Energy Storage and Power, LLC. Energy Storage and Power has patented compressed air energy storage technology.
Daniel has more than two decades of experience in energy project development and power asset operations. His management responsibilities span power plant construction and operation, electricity transmission, generation outage management, power pool relations, power contracting and small business law.
Prior to joining Energy Storage and Power LLC, Daniel was a director of mergers and acquisitions development at Public Service Energy Group (PSEG) Services; director of development ar PSEG Global; president, COO and CFO or Energy Infrastructure and Development and vice president Asia Pacific at PSEG Asia.
Roy Daniel holds a BS degree in Nuclear Engineering and a MS degree in Industrial Engineering from North Carolina State University. He also holds a Juris Doctorate from Suffolk University Law School and completed the Advanced Management Program at the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania.