Overview
Between an ongoing pandemic, supply chain bottlenecks, inflation, shifting consumer behaviors, media channel convergence, and a digital media ecosystem kneecapped by privacy and platform changes, continual innovation has become a requirement for success in business.
The fifth annual IAB Brand Disruption Summit spotlit best-in-class strategies developed by executives from the world’s most innovative brands, agencies, media companies, and investment firms, along with experts in commerce and consumer trends. They shared stories of success as well as their unprecedented challenges in an era of chaos and innovation.
This two-day event, held in-person in NYC, was an inside look at how forward-thinking brands are reevaluating their media strategies for the privacy-driven digital ecosystem, engaging the post-COVID consumer, making investments in emerging tech, and fostering talent—both human and automated.
Main stage presentations are now live-streaming exclusively on IAB.com.
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Understanding The New, Permanently Changed Consumer
The last 24 months have forever changed the behaviors and attitudes of today’s consumers. What expectations do they hold now for values-driven brands? How do consumers discover, transact, and develop brand loyalty? How does GenZ play into the new landscape of brands, commerce, and retail?
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Driving Growth in an Infinitely Evolving Media and Platform Landscape
New rules and regulations have impacted every aspect of media planning and buying, from decreased addressable audiences to the rising cost of ad units. How can brands navigate this ever-changing landscape to reach and engage consumers?
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The Now, the New, and the Next
Today’s brand leader grapples with an unending onslaught of trends, hype cycles, and shiny new objects. Balancing innovation with consumer engagement can be a challenge. What’s worth investment and what’s just a distraction from real and imminent business challenges?
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Leading through Disruption: Talent Crises, Supply Chain Challenges, the Rise of AI, Automation and More…
People, resources, and new technology. These sessions will focus on discussing how business leaders are finding and retaining top talent, managing through crushing supply chain issues, and implementing new ways of doing business.
Agenda
Agenda:
Speakers & Moderators
Speakers & Moderators

Alissa Allen

ALEX BELLOS is Co-CEO of Food52, the cooking and home brand including Schoolhouse and Dansk, with a monthly reach of 30 million people. Before joining Food52 Founder Amanda Hesser at the helm, Bellos spent 14 years at Williams-Sonoma, Inc.’s West Elm and Rejuvenation brands where he scaled e-commerce and retail business across home categories and around the world. He lives in Brooklyn with his family.

Itamar Benedy

Itamar Benedy
Itamar Benedy is Co-Founder & CEO of Anzu.io, the world’s most advanced in-game advertising platform that brings the sophistication of digital advertising into video gaming and esports. Anzu, which partners with some of the biggest games and brands in the world, has raised $37 million to date from investors including NBCUniversal, HTC, WPP, and Sony Innovation Fund.
Prior to his role at Anzu, Itamar served as the CEO of Glispa, a leading advertising firm with nine international offices and more than €100M in annual revenues. As part of his tenure at Glispa, Itamar led acquisitions of JustAd, a playable ads start-up, and Relevantech, a Telecom monetization platform. Itamar also served as the VP Marketing at Sport.com and Yoga.com, where he helped the company grow into a market-leading fitness firm and led the transformation of mHealth into a business with over 40 million downloads across 30 apps. He was also nominated for Forbes Israel 30 under 30 in 2016.

Chris Bruderle

Chris Bruderle
Chris Bruderle brings over 20 years of experience in Data/Web Analytics and Media Market Research at premium Digital and Muti-Platform web publishers including The Daily Beast, Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, Conde Nast Publications and This Old House Ventures.
Most recently, Chris was VP, Analytics & Research at The Daily Beast where he spent nearly 7 years and was responsible for the tracking, analysis and reporting of The Daily Beast’s O&O site and off-platform data/analytics for Senior/Corporate Management, Editorial, Advertising Sales, Product/Engineering, Audience/Business Development, Social Media and PR. He established the company-wide Editorial Analytics and Advertising Sales data and research stacks which included, among others, Google Analytics, Parse.ly, Krux DMP, Optimizely, comScore, Kantar, Samba, Newswhip, Crowd Tangle, Buzzsumo, and CrazyEgg.
Prior to The Daily Beast, Chris spent 5 years as Associate and Acting Director at Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia where he directed the correspondence and development of all research-based strategies supporting the Advertising Sales and Marketing staffs of each of the MSLO media brands and platforms across digital, mobile/tablet, TV, print and radio.
Chris started his career at BBDO as an Assistant Media Planner where he most notably completed the “Media Training Program”.
Chris earned a Bachelor’s of Arts in English and Communications from Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut.

Michael Burke

Michael Burke
As Google’s Managing Director of Luxury, Branded Apparel & Durables, Michael Burke leads a sales team responsible for driving business growth for many of the world’s largest, most loved brands and agencies.
In his nearly two decades at Google, he’s enjoyed a front row seat to the future of commerce and marketing. Digital media, consumer privacy, AI, and seamless omnichannel engagement are the hottest trends in retail, and Michael and his team are actively supporting hundreds of brands in their own unique digital transformations.
Leveraging deep consumer insights, they are also delivering world-class digital marketing strategies and solutions to help brands engage and acquire high-value customers.
Michael has built and led high-performing teams across several industries and product areas. Prior to focusing on Brand Manufacturers, Michael managed teams in Retail and Consumer Electronics, and led business development for Google Checkout. During a year-long exit from Google, he also led business development at Clickable, a VC-backed, growth stage start-up acquired by Syncapse.
Michael is a frequent content publisher and industry speaker at events such as the Vogue Business Summit, Digiday Publishing Summit, and Ecom World. His expertise covers topics ranging from the evolving retail landscape and growth of digital goods, to the application of AI in retail and marketing.

Oliver Chen

Oliver Chen
Oliver Chen is a Managing Director and senior equity research analyst covering retail and luxury goods. Mr. Chen’s deep understanding of the consumer and his ability to forecast the latest trends and technological changes that will impact the retail space has set him apart from peers. Oliver’s broad coverage and circumspect view makes him the thought partner of retail and brand leaders. His coverage of the retail sector has led to numerous industry awards and press coverage from CNBC, Bloomberg, The New York Times, Financial Times, Barron’s, The Wall Street Journal and others. Most recently, Mr. Chen was recognized on the 2018 and 2017 Institutional Investor All-America Research team as a top analyst in the retailing/department stores & specialty softlines sector. Mr. Chen was also selected as a preeminent retail influencer as he was named to the National Retail Federation (NRF) Foundation’s “2019 List of People Shaping Retail’s Future.” Considered an “industry expert,” Mr. Chen frequently appears as a speaker/panelist at key industry events.
Prior to joining Cowen in 2014, he spent seven years at Citigroup covering a broad spectrum of the U.S. consumer retail landscape, including specialty stores, apparel, footwear & textiles, luxury retail, department stores and broadlines. Before Citigroup, he worked in the investment research division at UBS, in the global mergers and acquisitions/strategic planning group at PepsiCo International, and in JPMorgan’s consumer products/retail mergers and acquisitions group.
Mr. Chen holds a bachelor of science degree in business administration from Georgetown University, a master’s of business administration from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, and is a CFA charterholder. At the Wharton School, Mr. Chen was a recipient of the Jay H. Baker Retail Award for impact in retailing and was a co-founding president of the Wharton Retail Club. He also serves as a member of the PhD Retail Research Review Committee for the Jay H. Baker Retailing Center at the Wharton School. Mr. Chen was recognized in the Wharton School’s “40 Under 40” brightest stars alumni list in 2017.
Mr. Chen’s passion for the sector began at the age of 12 when he began working with his parents at their retail business in Natchitoches, Louisiana.

David Cohen joined IAB in April 2020 as President and was named Chief Executive Officer in September 2020. Cohen is a widely respected advertising agency leader who, prior to IAB, served as President, North America for MAGNA, Interpublic Group’s (IPG) centralized media intelligence, investment, and innovation arm. In this role, Cohen was responsible for more than $20 billion in media spend. During his tenure, Cohen structured and executed large global transactions on behalf of IPG and its clients, with such major IAB member companies as Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Spotify, Twitter, and Verizon Media.
Prior to MAGNA, Cohen served as Chief Investment Officer of UM, ensuring that digital innovation, data, and technology acumen flowed throughout the agency to drive performance. From 2001 to 2011, Cohen served in critical, transformational roles at UM during the explosive growth of digital advertising, including Chief Media Officer, Chief Digital Officer, and Executive Vice President, U.S. Director of Digital Communications. In the late 1990’s, Cohen was responsible for launching and building IPG’s digital practice.
Cohen has a long history of working with trade organizations including IAB and 4As, where he served as chairman of the Interactive Marketing Committee from 2009-2013. He has also been instrumental in initiating several vital industry-wide programs, including the Future of Television, facilitated by EY. Cohen is a Queens native, with a bachelor’s degree in communications from Adelphi University. He was recognized by Adweek as a “Media All Star” and was part of the “Adweek 50” in 2012.
In 2016, David was elected to the Board of Directors of Partnership with Children a non-profit whose mission is to strengthen the emotional, social, and cognitive skills of vulnerable children in New York City to help them succeed in school, society, and life.
David enjoys spending time with his wife and two teenage daughters. A self-described gadget-geek and sometimes fitness fanatic – he ran the NYC Marathon in 2014 and 2019 and Boston Marathon in 2016.

Erika Decker Wykes-Sneyd

Erika Decker Wykes-Sneyd
Erika became CMO for adidas originals, collaborations and basketball in January 2021 following a career across fintech, accelerated tech, gaming, sports, automotive and advertising. She is also the co-founder and global lead for the adidas metaverse strategy, PNL and operations globally. As CMO of adidas €XXB lifestyle business, she oversees strategic direction and global marketing & consumer experience across Originals, Collaborations and Basketball.
Her leadership introduced ‘The New Age of Originality’ to adidas — a multi-disciplined portfolio approach to winning a new generation spanning product, experience and services. She set the 3-year vision for the brand’s bourgeoning connection to fashion, youth and the arts. Erika’s passion for emerging culture inspired her to establish the one-adidas initiative – Into the Metaverse – with a focus on the intersection of sport-inspired tableau spanning Web3 enabled-experiences, membership and collectibles (NFTs).
Born in Palm Springs, California, Erika currently resides in Nuremberg, Germany with her daughter and partner.

Sara Fischer is a media reporter for Axios. She joined the company in 2016 as a founding staff member. She was also recently named to Forbes “30 Under 30” Media list and to the 2019 Folio 100 in their “Creator” category. Beyond her weekly newsletter, Fischer oversees Axios’ media coverage for the newsroom, and steers the company’s products and events around that topic. Her coverage spans corporate media, advertising and marketing, technology, social media, deals, entertainment, media regulation, policy and consumer habits. She frequently appears on “Axios on HBO.”

Nilufar Fowler

Nilufar Fowler
Nilufar leads WPP’s Strategic Partnerships function. The Strategic Partnerships team drive and manage WPP’s largest strategic partner relationships across martech, adtech, cloud, commerce, AI and channels, including Adobe, Sitecore, Salesforce, Google, Amazon and Microsoft. They work with operating companies and business units across WPP on complex strategic partnership implementation, new capability building, growth initiatives (organic and net new business), technology and data acquisition/licensing, and other highly-visible, industry leading projects. Prior to taking on this role in 2022, Nilufar spent 15 years with Mindshare, a WPP media agency within GroupM, fulfilling various roles, including CEO of their Thailand operation, Global Client Lead for Team Unilever, CEO of the Worldwide office, and most recently Global Chief Client Officer.

Michaela Giovengo

Michaela Giovengo
Michaela is the Vice President of Performance Marketing Sales at the Walt Disney Company responsible for Linear, Digital, Streaming, and Social revenue across the portfolio inclusive of ABC, ESPN, Hulu, Freeform, FX and National Geographic. Since joining Disney, she has further built out the sales team across all platforms resulting in double-digit growth. Prior to Disney, Michaela spent 8 years at Hulu building out the Performance Marketing team working with new Emerging and Direct to Consumer brands to help fuel their business. Prior to Hulu, Michaela spent 6 years at NBC selling across a variety of networks including USA, Oxygen, and Bravo. Michaela was born and raised in Chicago, IL and holds a bachelor’s degree in Marketing from Fordham University. She currently resides in New York with her husband and their three children, Siena, Luke and William.

Richard Glasson is global CEO of Hogarth Worldwide, the world’s leading creative content production company. Hogarth combines craft and innovation to bring work to life for clients such as Coke, Ford, Rolex and Dyson. Richard is a Brit living in New Jersey, and is never happier than when on a mountain – be that on a bike or with a pair of skis.

As the co-founder and co-CEO of Gopuff, the pioneer of the instant commerce category and go-to platform for immediate delivery of consumers’ everyday needs, Yakir Gola sets the vision for the company and leads global business operations. Yakir and Rafael Ilishayev co-founded Gopuff in 2013 as students at Drexel University and made the first several thousand deliveries themselves, deliberately building the foundation of their business on the values they learned from their entrepreneurial families. Since then, they’ve expanded the platform’s product assortment, developed and introduced new verticals including Gopuff’s Fresh Food Hall and its own private label line of snacks and home essentials, launched an advertising platform for partners, and more. Today, Yakir continues to power unprecedented innovation as he and Rafael build the rails for the future of commerce.
Yakir was named to Forbes’ 30 Under 30 list in the Retail & Ecommerce category in 2017, in 2019 received the Drexel University Founders Award, and in 2020, 2021 and 2022, Gopuff was named to CNBC’s Disruptor 50. Yakir is closely involved with Chabad serving Drexel University and spearheads many of Gopuff’s philanthropic efforts.

Sheryl Goldstein

Sheryl Goldstein
Sheryl Goldstein is the Executive Vice President, Chief Industry Growth Officer at the IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau). In her role, she oversees engaging the IAB’s 650+ members across all of the IAB’s vast initiatives, activities and thought leadership programs. Under Sheryl’s watch are the Member Engagement, Centers of Excellence, Research and L&D teams. She also spearheads talent development, diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and runs the IAB CRO Council.
Sheryl Goldstein is a “net vet” with over 20 years of driving meaningful revenue growth through consultative selling in the dynamic digital landscape (Yahoo, AOL, About.com). She is adept at building successful teams, developing go-to-market strategies and gaining consensus across key stakeholders. Her background includes a wide variety of digital media platforms and technologies and numerous leadership roles.
In addition to her experience as a sales leader, Sheryl brings years of talent development and training to her role and is committed to making the digital media landscape a great industry for diverse talent to thrive and have a long and exciting career.
Sheryl is a current board member for 212NYC, Makers and was a past Board member of She Runs It. She serves on the Rutgers Business School Advisory Board for Marketing and is helping RBS craft a digital marketing graduate program. In addition, she has served on Boards and Committees for the NY Ad Club, Women in Communications, Inc. and the IAB and is a member of Chief. She is an award-winning sales leader (Yahoo Accelerator Award, AOL Best Media Partner presented by Verizon, AOL Presidents Club, AWNY Crystal Award Winner).
Sheryl is a graduate of Syracuse University Newhouse School and lives in New Jersey with her partner Cindy and dogs Pancho and Camden. On the weekends, you can catch her on the pickleball court or riding around the Jersey Shore on her new electric bike. Her daughter Sarah-Jaana lives in the Boston area with her husband Michael.

Marcy Greenberger

Marcy Greenberger
In her role as EVP, Managing Partner of Integrated Investment at UM, Marcy Greenberger oversees investment across a portfolio of clients led by American Express, while also acting as part of the agency’s Investment leadership team. Marcy has over 20 years of media agency experience spanning multiple clients and categories. She spent the first half of her career specializing in multicultural media before pivoting to a more holistic marketplace purview. Her background includes 17+ years combined working across P&G and The Coca-Cola Company.

Tehmina Haider is the Vice President of Harry’s Ventures. Prior to Harry’s, Tehmina was a Principal at L Catterton private equity firm and formerly, Vice President at Castanea Partners, a middle-market private equity firm focused on growth equity investments and leveraged buyouts in the consumer and retail sectors. Tehmina previously worked in Strategy and New Business Development at the Estée Lauder Companies, a global leader in prestige beauty. She began her career as a management consultant at Bain & Company.
Tehmina is a Phi Beta Kappa and summa cum laude graduate of Columbia College with a B.A. degree in Economics-Philosophy. She received an M.B.A from the Harvard Business School.

Darren Herman joined Bain Capital in October 2016 as an Operating Partner presiding over digital media, advertising, e-commerce and data. He splits his time between the Portfolio Team and Deal Teams where he uses his industry operating experience to source new opportunities for Bain Capital.
Prior to Bain Capital, Herman was on the executive leadership team of Mozilla where he was instrumental in securing and renegotiating the Firefox revenue deals from Google to Yahoo!, Yandex, Baidu, and others totaling over $2B. He ran the content and advertising team at Mozilla and under his leadership, his team concepted, executed and shipped the industries first privacy respecting advertising and content system in under 24 months.
Prior to Mozilla, Herman was a senior executive at MDC Partners’ (Nasdaq: MDCA) largest media agencies and created one of the first trading desks on Madison Avenue and launched one of the first corporate advertising venture funds. Herman was responsible for digital media, analytics, and innovation broadly across MDC and often participated in board meetings and M&A conversations.
Earlier in his career, he was a venture capital backed founder/executive having built multiple technologies in the advertising, content and media space. His investors include NBC Universal, Morgenthaler, Hakuhodo, and Presidio amongst others.
For the past 14 years, Herman also runs Silicon Alley Sports in his spare time bringing executives together outside of Manhattan to network and play sports while raising money for charity.

Danny Huynh

Danny Huynh
Danny’s expertise in CRM, adtech, programmatic, personalization, content, media, and culture has helped all of his clients achieve their business goals. His unique approach to adtech and data strategy has enabled him to enhance creative activations to be more effective and impactful to increase ROI overnight; while helping brands adapt and maintain their relevance in the age of disruption at the speed of culture.
His work in digital marketing has industry recognition. Danny was named Chicago Interactive Marketing Association’s (CIMA) Digital Person of the Year. His team has won first or gold 14 times, including 4 Cannes Lions (including the Cannes Lions Titanium Award), and 5 OMMA Awards. Additional accolades includes silver or finalist rankings for 16 other awards.
Prior to joining UM, Danny held senior leadership roles across client leadership, disciplinary & functional leadership roles across different industries such as retail, CPG, tech/teleco, travel, pharma, and auto. Further, his diverse background in web development, UX design and experience optimization (online and offline), SEO, search, programmatic, and social; has enabled him to gain a better perspective on holistic marketing.
Danny is a champion for DEI efforts both internally at UM, but also eternally with his clients, being the diversity co-AOR. He feels a sense of responsibility to support his community, being first Asian man at EVP level at UM. As a result, over the past three years, Danny has taken an active role in the AAPI community’s safe space to offer advice, support, and guidance not only to UM AAPI members, but for all Mediabrands and AKM agencies’s AAPI members. Externally, Danny is a volunteer for Cheer New York, a nonprofit organization, supporting local nonprofits and associations that support life threatening issues in the LGBTQ+ community. He is also a volunteer and former tournament direct for the GLTA organization, that supports tennis participation.
Beyond DEI efforts, Danny has a passion for staying on top of brand safety, privacy & governance, and regulatory changes.
Danny earned his MBA from the University of Notre Dame, and Bachelor’s of Science in Advertising from the University of Texas at Austin.

Rafael Ilishayev

Rafael Ilishayev
As co-founder and co-CEO of Gopuff, Rafael Ilishayev sets the vision for the instant commerce company with a focus on logistics, product and technology development. Rafael and co-founder Yakir Gola founded Gopuff in 2013 to make immediate delivery of everyday items a reality. The pair bootstrapped their early business and made the first several thousand deliveries themselves. Since then, they have expanded the platform’s product assortment, developed and introduced new verticals including Gopuff’s Fresh Food Hall and its own private label line of snacks and home essentials, launched an advertising platform for partners, and more.
Rafael was named to Forbes’ 30 Under 30 list in the Retail & Ecommerce category in 2017, in 2019 received the Drexel University Founders Award, and in 2020, 2021 and 2022, Gopuff was named to CNBC’s Disruptor 50. Rafael is closely involved with his alma mater, Drexel University, through the Charles D. Close School of Entrepreneurship and Chabad Serving Drexel University.

Devin Johnson is the President of The SpringHill Company (TSHC), the Sports Emmy winning media conglomerate founded by LeBron James and Maverick Carter. Here, he has P&L responsibility for all business lines including studio, brand partnerships, ecommerce and experiences. His prior role within the company included Chief Operating Officer of TSHC as well as President of UNINTERRUPTED, where he led the launch and growth of the athlete empowerment brand.
Devin also plays a vital role in original content development as an executive producer for The Shop, More Than an Athlete, Elite Youth, and many other UNINTERRUPTED original productions that reside on networks such as HBO, Fox, Netflix, and ESPN Networks.
Previously, Devin was the SVP of digital media for Tribune Media ($1B revenue) where he led all digital efforts helping transform a legacy media business into a leading digital player, and prior to that, Devin held several digital executive roles at NBCUniversal where he was instrumental in developing the global company’s digital innovation efforts. Devin began his career working in finance working for media and consumer product companies.
A Chicago native, Devin holds a bachelor’s degree in business from the University of Michigan and an MBA from Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business. In addition, Devin is the former board chair of USA Taekwondo, the national governing body recognized by the U.S. Olympic Committee and serves on the boards of University of Michigan Sport Management and the Boys and Girls Club of Metro LA.

Lex Josephs

Lex Josephs
As the GM,Vice President for Sam’s Club’s Member Access Platform [MAP], Lex is responsible for building an ads experience that is additive to the member’s experience, while simultaneously accelerating profit and growth for Sam’s Club. Lex’s focus is on the organization’s People, Proposition, Product, Processes and Profit.
Prior to Sam’s Club, Lex worked for Walmart [Sam’s Club’s parent company]. Lex was one of the original leaders at Walmart Media Group [now Walmart Connect] who helped lead the in-sourcing, restructuring, transforming and acceleration of the ad sales business within Walmart. In her time at Walmart, Lex and the Walmart Connect team grew the business by 400%. Lex’s team, which started as 18 associates in San Bruno, grew to over 400 associates in Bentonville, Hoboken, Chicago, and San Bruno. In her role as VP of Sales and Ad Tech partnerships for 3.5 years, Lex focused on several key R’s: Regaining trust. Relationship growth. Revenue achievement and acceleration. Rigor for financial accuracy/pipeline management. Reward in the construct of a new type of sales incentive compensation plan. Results for our customers. And a profitable Return for Walmart. Lex and her team have done the above with the help from many customer segments: Merchants, Marketers, Suppliers, 3P marketplace sellers, ad agencies and ad tech platforms.
As a leader who builds, Lex splits her time between Hoboken, Bentonville and the Bay Area. When she is not in the sky, Lex loves to be with her 10 year-old son [Mason], 6 year-old daughter [Jordan], and husband [Dan]. Lex loves to be on the move, write, mentor women, and be involved with both of her children’s schools & activities.

Chris Karpenko

Anthony Katsur
Anthony Katsur is a digital media veteran with more than twenty-five years of executive leadership at the intersection of technology innovation, business strategy, and growth. As Chief Executive Officer for IAB Tech Lab, Katsur is responsible for overseeing product, engineering, membership, and operations teams for the digital advertising industry’s global technical standards-setting organization.
Katsur has previously held business and technology leadership positions at companies including DoubleClick, MediaMath, Rubicon, Sonoboi, and most recently Nexstar Media Group, and more. A sought-after speaker, he has appeared at events including the National Association of Broadcasters, AdAge’s Brand Summit, and Advertising Week and has been quoted in AdAge, Adweek, AdExchanger, Digiday and The Wall Street Journal.

Kavon Kavoussi

Kavon Kavoussi
Kavon Kavoussi is the Head of Emerging Medium Products at Integral Ad Science (IAS), a global leader in digital media quality. Kavon oversees IAS’s product expansion into new channels, such as Gaming, Audio, DOOH, and more. Previously, Kavon was at Verizon for over 7 years, most recently as the Lead Product Manager of the GizmoWatch and Care Smart Wearable portfolios. Kavon is proud to be at IAS, paving the way for more trust and transparency in digital media.

Joe Keating

Joe Keating
Joe leads the analytics team for Hill’s US and has a passion for identifying how media can drive growth. Joe’s team has been building analytical expertise to analyze media investments through market mix modeling and revenue management analytics. In the three years the team has grown by adding data scientists working on retailer/media & eCommerce clean rooms to deliver lifetime value and path to purchase analysis. Joe has worked for Hill’s for 16 years in Europe and the US, having previously worked for P&G in Europe for 6 years.

Bill Kelchner

Bill Kelchner
Bill Kelchner has been in the gaming and esports media industry since the introduction of the PS1
He was ad director and publisher of the first gaming Trade Magazines, and then worked a second stint at Future Publishiing helping to bring large brands from outside the industry, into the mass market gaming audiences.
He has taken that 10+ years of industry experience to Comscore, so that the rapidly expanding gaming and esports media industries and audiences can utilize Comscore’s digital currency tools to grow their respective business. These tools can be applied to gaming companies, ad networks, esports teams, platforms, agencies, and events, to offer accurate insights and measurement for the entire gaming/esports industry.

Hi, my name is Shruti Khatod. I have worked in the Growth Marketing space for over 15yrs. My experience ranges from Fortune 500 companies to startups, growing their digital (paid and social) and omni channel (TV, Influencer and offline retail) marketing acquisition through data driven strategies. I have a strong passion for and strive to partner with my product and technology colleagues to create a unified customer experience for higher quality conversion and longer term retention. I truly enjoy the ever evolving nature of marketing, giving me an opportunity to learn and relearn constantly.

Luke Kigel

Luke Kigel
As Vice President, Media & Omni-Channel Planning at Walgreens Luke is responsible for creating customized, meaningful media experiences for customers – fueled by advanced data and technology. Luke is driving evolution from channel first to true customer fist media approaches, unlocking the power of Walgreens 1st Party Data and blending traditional and new-to-market media to deliver personalized experiences at scale. In his role Luke oversees media planning and investment across all channels, managing agency and external partnerships as well as in-house strategy and activation.
Prior to joining Walgreens Luke spent six years at Johnson & Johnson in multiple Digital and Media leadership roles. Initially Luke led Digital Innovation & Social Media in the Digital Center of Excellence, and he spent the last four years as Johnson & Johnson’s Global & North America Head of Media. In this capacity, he was responsible for global enterprise media investment, managing global media agency relationships, and leading the company’s approach to programmatic and data driven precision marketing.
Prior to Johnson & Johnson, Luke spent 15 years at agencies including Mediacom, OMD, and UM/J3 – where he led the transformation from a traditional media company into digitally-led and fully-integrated communications agency during his time as Head of Innovation.
Luke has received various forms of industry recognition, with programs under his leadership awarded the 2018 North American Effie for “Best Data Driven/Programmatic” and Gold at the 2017 Festival of Media NA for “Best Use of Data.” Luke was named to Brand Innovators list of 40 Under 40 Marketers, and to the “Next 50” leaders re-inventing marketing by The Internationalist. He is currently a member of the Association of National Advertisers’ Media Advisory Board and was recognized for his industry leadership as an honoree at the 2019 Partnership with Children Spring Gala. A native New Yorker, Luke graduated with a degree in Communications from New York University.

John Lee

John Lee
John Lee is a marketing leader with over 20 years of experience building global brands Like Kubota, Harley-Davidson, and Coors through creative integrated marketing strategy, meaningful consumer engagement, and data-driven insights across traditional and digital channels.

Jeff Lin

Jeff Lin
Jeff Lin has a long history of success at both large institutions, as well as gritty start-ups. He was founder and CEO of FANCHEST, a D2C sports business that became the 2nd Fastest Growing Retailer in America and top 50 in Inc. Magazine’s 5,000 Most Successful Companies in America. He sold the business to a private equity firm specializing in consumer products and media (2019). Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, he spent 10-years on Wall Street where he was one of the youngest executive directors at his firm. Jeff is an active advisory board member in the start-up community and has worked with over 60 companies. He sits on the Consumer Brand Council at the Interactive Advertising Bureau. He also serves as Entrepreneur-in-Residence at Morgan Stanley with a focus on investing in female and multi-cultural founders. Since 2020, Jeff has been increasingly involved in the Web3 ecosystem and holds positions at JDS Crypto, Medallion, and KOTA. He lives with his wife Ali, and their boys, Jayce and Luca, in NYC.

Anthony serves as President of thredUP and is responsible for marketplace supply and demand growth. He directs the company’s consumer-facing initiatives that are inspiring a new generation of consumers to think secondhand first. Before thredUP, Anthony spent seven years serving directly under Sir Richard Branson’s Virgin Group. He led the creation of multiple Virgin businesses, including the Virgin Hotels Group, where he served as CEO. Prior to joining Virgin, Anthony was a Principal at Venrock, where he worked closely with start-up founders to develop highly-disruptive products and scale their businesses through periods of rapid growth. Anthony earned an AB, magna cum laude, from Princeton University where he was a Rhodes Scholar national finalist, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Joel Martin

Joel Martin
Joel Martin is an experienced Marketing and Executive Sales Leader. He heads up the Programmatic Digital Out-Of-Home and partnership marketing team for Swiftmile universal Light Electric Vehicle (LEV) hubs. His first endeavor in Micromobility was importing and distributing Malaguti motorized driven scooters from Italy. Recent projects included launching the experiential advertising arm of Brightbox, a VC-backed national kiosk phone charging network. He received a BA in Political Science and Marketing from the University of Florida. Joel is active in the tech startup space as a part of CodeFirm.com. In addition, he helps with fundraising and is an active board member/advisor at RentMout.com, ChargeFuze, and Hextronics.

Natrian Maxwell

Natrian Maxwell
Natrian Maxwell is a GM of the Emerging Channels at The Trade Desk focusing on the immersive inventory channels including Gaming, Mobile App, Audio, DOOH, Retail Media, and Social. Natrian started his career 16 years ago working with mobile publishers and large advertisers at Right Media Exchange, the first programmatic exchange created. Prior to TD, Natrian spent 4 years at Amazon building a programmatic offering called Amazon Publisher Services and expanding into international regions such as APAC, LATAM and EMEA.

Daniel McCarthy

Daniel McCarthy
Daniel McCarthy is an Assistant Professor of Marketing at Emory University’s Goizueta School of Business. His research specialty is the application of leading-edge statistical methodology to contemporary empirical marketing problems. His research interests include customer lifetime value, limited data problems, and the marketing/finance interface.
He popularized customer-based corporate valuation (CBCV), a methodology that drives any traditional valuation model off of the underlying behaviors of the target company’s customers. His work has been featured in major media outlets such as the Harvard Business Review, MIT Sloan Management Review, Wall Street Journal, FT, Fortune, Barronís, Inc Magazine, The Economist, and CNBC. His research has been accepted and published in top-tier academic journals and has won numerous research awards.
In addition to his roles and responsibilities at Emory, Dan co-founded and was Chief Statistician for Zodiac, a predictive customer analytics SaaS firm. Nike acquired Zodiac in March 2018. Dan has since co-founded Theta Equity Partners (https://thetaclv.com/) to revolutionize how firms (e.g., private equity, venture capital, and operating companies directly) value companies through CBCV.

Ryan Moore

Ryan Moore
Ryan Moore is the Global Chief Revenue Officer at SuperAwesome, an Epic Games company. He leads the company’s revenue, marketing, insights & partnerships teams in helping brands and content creators have safe, meaningful interactions with audiences online. Part of Epic Games, he and his teams are focused on helping create a version of the metaverse that is designed particularly with the needs of younger audiences and families online. He also leads Epic Games’ broader Agency Partnerships team across the wider Epic portfolio.
Prior to this role, Ryan has spent 15 years at the intersection of media, entertainment and technology at companies like Quibi and Twitter and has built and run teams across US, European and Asian markets.
On the personal front, with his firsthand experience of how technology can affect behavioral change, Ryan is deeply passionate about helping non profit organizations leverage these platforms to scale and amplify the reach of their work. He is on the Board of Directors of the Google-born Search Inside Yourself Institute alongside other similar organizations that seek to use technology to make people happier, healthier and more resilient in their personal and professional lives.

Dave Morgan

Dave Morgan
Dave Morgan is the CEO and founder of Simulmedia, the leader in truly cross-channel TV advertising. He previously founded and ran both TACODA, Inc., an online advertising company that pioneered behavioral online marketing and was acquired by AOL in 2007 for $275 million, and Real Media, Inc., one of the world’s first ad serving and online ad network companies and a predecessor to 24/7 Real Media (TFSM), which was later sold to WPP for $649 million. After the sale of TACODA, Dave served as Executive Vice President, Global Advertising Strategy, at AOL, a Time Warner Company (TWX).
A lawyer by training, Dave served as General Counsel and Director of New Media Ventures at the Pennsylvania Newspaper Association in the early 1990’s.
Dave is a Political Science graduate of The Pennsylvania State University and holds a J.D. from the Dickinson School of Law. Dave, his wife Lorea Canales, and their two daughters live in Manhattan.

As the SVP, Chief Strategy Officer, Libby oversees thought leadership and content development for IAB, including the IAB Centers of Excellence. These include The Experience Center, Programmatic and Data Center, Media Center, and research functions. Additionally, Libby is responsible for editorial and content strategies for all IAB events and programming.
Most recently, Libby served as the Global President of MRM Commerce, where she launched their Strategy, Consulting, and Digital Transformation practice. Previous positions include President of The Born Group, where she focused on Digital Marketing, Commerce and Content, as well as Managing Director of iCrossing (part of Hearst). Throughout her career, Libby has partnered with clients such as Nestle, General Motors, Anheuser Busch, American Express, and Geico, among others, to help them achieve their business goals through innovative digital solutions.

Michelle Morris

Michelle Morris
Michelle Morris is Vice President of Global Marketing Solutions across Meta’s US Automotive, Financial Services, Insurance, Real Estate, Restaurants and Travel business. Michelle leads a national team transforming the way industries connect, communicate, and drive business in a mobile first and personal world. She helps clients and agencies use Meta to build brands, acquire new customers and craft owner advocacy strategies. Michelle leads with an entrepreneurial passion fueled by her knowledge of both traditional and digital mediums and is a champion for Franchisee/Local marketing efforts.
Prior to Meta, Michelle built Google’s North American automotive manufacturing and dealerships
business as Managing Director responsible for creative, direct response and strategic brand activation. For nearly 8 years, she led teams across multiple coasts and notable contributions included the launch of custom research, creation of new sub-verticals to drive focused growth and the establishment of Google’s bankruptcy policy which kept accounts active while recovering 100% of spend. Michelle’s industry and marketing expertise helped deepen Google’s Automotive relationships beyond advertising for Google Maps, Android and in-vehicle integrations.
Before joining Google, Michelle served as Group Senior Vice President and Account Director of the Chrysler brand at Chrysler’s ad agency BBDO, responsible for all aspects of Chrysler’s advertising, CRM, event partnerships and product placement efforts. At BBDO for over 8 years, Michelle held executive leadership roles in the agency’s corporate marketing, dealer/franchise training and human resource departments. Never one to turn down a challenge, Michelle’s teams improved agency turnaround times while launching new mediums to help their clients reach customers. A people first leader highly capable of navigating ambiguity, Michelle began her career in Human Resources as an Executive Director in the innovative partnered staffing division of Kelly Services, managing branches embedded within key client locations.
Michelle has shared her integrated marketing experience at industry conferences conducted by J.D. Power, the National Automobile Dealers Association (NADA), Mobile World Congress and the Direct Marketing Association. She was honored as a Crain’s 40 under 40 professional in 2010, one of Vista Maria’s 2012 Celebrating Women award winners and a 2015 Rising Star by The Automotive News. Michelle is a founding board member of the Cassie Hines Shoes Cancer foundation, a 501(c)(3) that helps young adults diagnosed with cancer, founder of the Scott Stephenson Eastern Echo Scholarship and an advocate for Suicide Prevention and Awareness.
Michelle earned a bachelor’s degree in psychology from Michigan State University and lives in the Greater Detroit Area with her husband, two children, gecko and 3 cats.

Lesa Nikolai
Lesa joined Ampersand as Head of Client Partnerships, Midwest in January of 2019, focusing on building client partnerships with leading marketers, to help solve market challenges and build effective media strategies for brands navigating a fractured viewership segment. Lesa previously served as VP, South West Region, for NBC Universal Network Sales with a focus on Multicultural and Portfolio sales. She worked directly with Fortune 500 clients to develop marketing strategies and audience strategies. She began her career in local TV Sales before moving into National, Network TV and Digital Ad Sales, and now currently into TV, Digital and Technology.

Jessica Peltz-Zatulove is a Founding Partner at Hannah Grey, an early stage venture capital fund investing in visionary founders redefining everyday experiences. Prior to founding Hannah Grey, Jessica was the Senior Managing Partner at MDC Ventures, the corporate VC fund of Stagwell Group (formerly MDC Partners). She’s a known thought leader and was recognized on the Global Corporate VC PowerList for top CVC fund managers in 2019 and 2020. Jessica has led investments in Subject, August, Catch & Release, Floor, Upstream, Lively (acquired by Wacoal), Mezzobit (acquired by OpenX), Gradient.io (acquired by Criteo), Netomi, Veritonic, Perksy, Bennie, Alleyoop, among others.
Before transitioning to VC, Jessica specialized in connecting marketers with emerging tech and spent 10+ years as an operator working with brands including Verizon, Kraft, PUMA, 20th Century Fox, Jim Beam Brands, H&M, and others. She was the second employee at innovation consultancy Evol8tion, where she was instrumental in scaling the business while helping startups secure their first customers through brand partnerships. Her deep understanding of the intersection between customer needs, branding, and technology has enabled her to guide countless startups on positioning and commercializing their business effectively.
Jessica is an outspoken advocate for gender diversity and inclusion in the venture community. She’s also the co-founder of Women in VC, the world’s largest community for women investors which now includes 4,200+ women spanning 2,400+ venture funds across 200+ cities and 65+ countries. She is also an active mentor in the tech community at Techstars, ERA, and 500 Startups, as well as being a builder in several web3 communities, including JPEG Morgan, MetaCollective, JoanDAO, and led the recent NFT project for Women in VC to raise money for financial literacy organizations for Womens History Month..
Jessica lives in New York City with her husband and two spunky daughters.

Mike Piner is a highly collaborative personality with 23 years of agency investment experience. He pioneered the development of Mediahub’s data-driven TV capabilities and is one of the leading industry voices when it comes to the new TV model. He was named Ad Age’s 2020 Media Planner of Year for using next-gen data, tech, partnerships, and ad products to break TV investment boundaries. He has extensive experience working across the majority of top national ad-categories including several of the largest multi and single brand advertisers. Prior to joining Mediahub, Mike served as MAGNA’s SVP of strategic investment, and he currently represents Mediahub, one of the three major IPG media companies, on the MAGNA Investment Council.

Devra Prywes

Devra Prywes
Devra Prywes is the Global Head of Marketing & Insights at SuperAwesome, the company leading the charge in building a safer internet for the next generation. Used by hundreds of brands and content owners, SuperAwesome’s award-winning technology provides the tools for safe, responsible digital engagement with almost half a billion kids and teens every month.Throughout her career in media, Devra has helped brands connect with audiences across gaming, online video, and OTT, working with brands such as A+E Networks, Major League Baseball, BBC, Monty Python, P&G, Unilever, The Emmy Awards, BarcaTV+, ProSieben.Sat1, and Mary-Kate and Ashley.
Devra was named a “Top Woman in Digital” by Cynopsis Media and a “Top Leader in Technology” by Parks & Associates, and has served as a media expert for outlets including Forbes, Fox, NBC, MediaPost, AdWeek, New York University, and Rutgers University. Devra has an MBA from the NYU Stern School of Business in Entertainment/Media/Technology and Marketing, and studied Cognitive Science with concentrations in Artificial Intelligence and Learning Science at Northwestern University

Larissa Pschenica

Larissa Pschenica
Larissa leads strategy and operations for Gap Inc’s Strategic Growth Office (SGO), a unit of the company charged with thinking beyond its day-to-day business in order to meet the consumer and industry demands of the future. The SGO seeks out investments that fuel growth and accelerate new capabilities at Gap Inc. and across its portfolio of purpose-led brands. Larissa’s team accelerates new business pursuits, drives the go-to-market strategies, and objectively governs status and progress. Under her leadership, the SGO has acquired two technology companies – 3D fit statup Drapr and AI/ML software maker CB4 – and stood up three new B2B services focused on media & advertising, custom apparel, and supply chain & logistics.

Priya Rao

Priya Rao
Priya Rao is a journalist, editor and podcast host. She is the Executive Editor at Glossy, and host of the Glossy Beauty Podcast and Unfair, an Apple-recommended narrative podcast series that delves into the global skin whitening industry. She has held senior positions at Harper’s Bazaar and Vanity Fair and written for Vogue and New York Magazine.

Randall Rothenberg is the Executive Chair of the Interactive Advertising Bureau, the trade association for digital media and marketing in the United States. Among the IAB’s 750 member companies are such major platforms as Google, Facebook, Microsoft, and Snap; the nation’s most important ad-supported media companies, including The New York Times, Walt Disney Co., NBC Universal, ViacomCBS, Hearst Magazines, Spotify, Verizon Media, Hulu, Warner Media, LinkedIn, and Meredith; incumbent and disruptor brands, including Coca-Cola, Walmart, Procter & Gamble, Hubble Contacts, ThirdLove, General Motors, Johnson & Johnson, and Citigroup; and scores of technology and data companies, among them Mediamath, LiveRamp, Quantcast, and Pubmatic.
With these members and its 47 affiliate associations on every inhabited continent, the IAB and its sister technology-standards group, the IAB Tech Lab, serve as the digital marketing industry’s public policy and lobbying organization, market and consumer research center, training and development base, and hub for the development of standards and best practices.
Mr. Rothenberg joined the IAB in January 2007 as President and Chief Executive Officer, and led the organization until becoming Executive Chair in September 2020. During his tenure, the organization became one of the largest and most influential media and marketing trade bodies in the world, helping to develop technical standards, self-regulation, government regulation, market and consumer research, and professional development programs to protect consumer privacy, foster brand and media revenue growth, improve data security, and reduce supply chain friction in the digital marketing industry.
Prior to his IAB role, Mr. Rothenberg was the Chief Marketing Officer and Senior Director of Intellectual Capital at Booz Allen Hamilton, the international strategy and technology consulting firm, where he oversaw business development, knowledge management, and thought leadership activities, and directed the award-winning quarterly business magazine strategy+business, Strategy+Business Books, www.strategy-business.com, and other electronic and print publications for senior business executives.
Earlier in his career, Mr. Rothenberg spent six years at The New York Times, where he was the technology editor and politics editor of the Sunday magazine, the daily advertising columnist, and a media and marketing reporter. For 10 years, he was a marketing and media columnist for Advertising Age. Mr. Rothenberg has written for a score of major national magazines, among them Esquire, GQ, The Nation, The New York Times Magazine, and New York Magazine. He is the author of four books, including Where the Suckers Moon: An Advertising Story (Alfred A. Knopf, 1994), a critically-acclaimed chronicle of the birth, evolution, and death of a single advertising campaign.
Mr. Rothenberg, an avid nature, urban, and portrait photographer, serves on the Board of Directors of the International Center of Photography and the Board of Overseers of the Columbia Journalism Review. He received an undergraduate degree in Classics from Princeton and lives in New York City.

Sarmad Saghir

Sarmad Saghir
At PetPlate Sarmad is responsible for new customer acquisition and LTV optimization. Sarmad started his career at Audible and was there for about 10 years. He started in a strategy role before moving over to marketing. Outside of Audible he has held growth roles at many leading D2C companies like Helix Sleep, AdoreMe and Hungryroot. In these roles he has led customer acquisition, retention, data and product teams.

Randy Saperstone

Randy Saperstone
Randy Saperstone is the Vice President of Media Sales and Brand Partnerships at Realtor.com®. Prior to Randy’s experience at Realtor.com he held senior level positions with Trusted Media Brands and Time Inc. He also served as a sales director at Realtor.com and HGTV in past positions. He’s currently obsessed with leveraging data to create the ultimate user and brand partner experience. Most importantly he’s a South Jersey native who will always be known for over scrutinizing the quality of diners, cheesesteaks, and convenience stores.

Phil Schraeder is an executive and recognized thought leader in digital advertising and contextual technologies. As Chief Executive Officer, Schraeder is responsible for GumGum’s success in leading the industry in privacy-first, contextual intelligence solutions based on a consumer’s mindset, and not their personal data. As CEO of the leading contextual platform in the market, Phil is passionate about making advertising experiences better for consumers by ushering the industry into mindset-first, privacy-forward solutions in an exciting and fast-moving digital ecosystem.

David Seals

David Seals
David Seals (Director, Strategic Growth) works in Accenture’s strategy activation hub, which helps clients bring their strategies to life using visual artists, filmmakers and writers. Built on a belief that one-way communication doesn’t change humans, this hub (formerly Root Inc.) carefully crafts experiences that change the conversations employees are having. Before joining Accenture, David worked at Center for Creative Leadership helping transform the lives of leaders in Global 2000 companies. He spent his early career at TRG Arts, starting new projects with arts organizations across the US, Canada and UK. Through TRG, David launched Audience 360, a marketing cooperative among the largest performing arts organizations here in New York City.

Eric Benjamin Seufert is a media strategist, quantitative marketer, and author who spent his career working for transformative consumer technology and media companies before launching Heracles Capital, an early-stage venture capital fund focused on the mobile ecosystem. Eric is also the author of the book Freemium Economics, published by Elsevier in 2014, and he developed Theseus, an open source Python library for marketing cohort analysis.
Eric started his career at Skype and subsequently held strategy and marketing roles at a number of consumer technology start-ups, including Wooga (acquired by Playtika) and Rovio, the developer of Angry Birds. Eric founded Agamemnon, a start-up that built a mobile marketing analytics platform, which was acquired in 2017.
Eric runs Mobile Dev Memo, a mobile advertising and freemium monetization trade blog, and QuantMar, a knowledge-sharing platform for quantitative marketers. Eric’s writing has been featured in The Information, Business Insider, and the Harvard Business Review, and he has been quoted in The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The New Yorker, The Sunday Times, and The Financial Times, among others.

Neha Singh

Neha Singh
Neha Singh is the CEO & Founder of Obsess, an experiential e-commerce platform enabling brands and retailers to create visual, immersive, 3D virtual stores on their websites and on metaverse platforms. She was previously the Head of Product at Vogue, where she was responsible for the product strategy and technology execution of Vogue’s digital business including content products, ad products and distribution platforms. Prior to that, Neha was VP of Product and Engineering at AHAlife, an e-commerce startup for luxury lifestyle products. Neha began her career at Google, where she was a Software Engineer and Tech Lead for 5 years and worked on Google AdWords and Google News. She holds an undergraduate Computer Science degree from The University of Texas at Austin and a graduate Computer Science degree from MIT.

Aaron Sobol

Aaron Sobol
Aaron leads media investment at Unilever and has a wealth of investment and partnership experience across all channels. Aaron’s 16+ years in media spans a range of categories and marketers, from Coke and Microsoft to Fiat Chrysler.

Hunter Thurman

Hunter Thurman
Hunter Thurman is Founder and CEO of Alpha-Diver, the market research firm that applies neuroscience to more deeply understand marketplace behavior. The firm’s neuroscientists and strategists work with leading brands, retailers and the Wall Street analyst community to explain, measure, and predict consumer behavior.

Cary Tilds

Cary Tilds
Cary Tilds is the Chief Strategy and Operations Officer for Frameplay. At Frameplay, Cary is responsible for leading Strategic Planning, Marketing and Operations.
Prior to Frameplay, Cary was the SVP, Corporate Strategy for FordDirect where she led Emerging Strategy, OEM Account Strategy and Analytics/Business Intelligence/Data Strategy teams.
For six years Cary was GroupM’s Chief Innovation Officer, responsible for identifying consumer technologies impacting digital media platform strategies, ensuring GroupM agencies continuously led with world-class expertise and solutions.
Cary led Digital Media Operations for Mindshare North America for two years, creating macro digital strategies for clients like Unilever, Target and KimberlyClark.
She led Digital Media Operations for Team Detroit for three years, where she combined digital media capabilities from the six original Team Detroit agencies into one digital media approach for Ford and Lincoln, tier one and tier two.
Prior to that, Cary founded the search practice at PHD where she was the Director of Search for PHDiQ, PHD’s centralized digital buying groups.
Cary’s earlier career included 10 years at Entertainment Publications, an Interactive Corporation Company.
Cary holds a BA from the University of Michigan in Western European Studies and an MBA from Wayne State University.

Recently named Forbes 2022 Most Entrepreneurial CMO, and CMO to Watch by Business Insider, Angélic Vendette has been creating award winning campaigns on the brand, retailer, and agency sides for the past 15 years. Prior to joining Alo Yoga as chief marketer, Angélic has held marketing strategy and leadership roles at LVMH, Sephora, Holt Renfrew, and Stitch Fix.
Curious and entrepreneurial at heart, Angelic is currently focused on shaping conversations around the future of Retail. Innovation, web3, emerging platforms, and community drive her.

Brian Wallach

Brian Wallach
Brian Wallach is VP and Head of Revenue for AudienceXpress, a Comcast company that provides market-leading media solutions to allow advertisers to buy premium TV advertising on an audience basis. With 20+ years of leadership experience in the dynamic media and tech space, including at The Walt Disney Company and AOL in addition to Comcast, Brian is focused on empowering clients across the buy- and sell-sides to maximize their linear and CTV advertising. With extensive experience in establishing, growing and leading high-performance teams, Brian’s expertise spans business development, sales and operations in the media and ad tech ecosystem. Brian is recognized as a creative and strategic thought leader with a passion for innovation and delivering best-in-class service to his clients.

Melanie brings 15 years of brand marketing and legal experience to MediaLink. As a Senior Vice President and leader of MediaLink’s contract optimization practice, Melanie helps Fortune 100 and Fortune 500 brands enhance operational governance, reenvision agency ecosystems, and adopt modern approaches to global contract design.
Melanie began her career in brand marketing and achieved several years of success as the Vice President of Marketing at BMF Media, and later, United Entertainment Group. There, she led an energetic team of practitioners and executed award-winning and revenue-generating B2C initiatives for clients including: Heineken, Nike, Ebay, Bose, ASICS, The North Face, Smuckers, REVOLT TV, and more. She also worked in collaboration with legal affairs; fully-immersed in structuring content, brand partnership, and retainer deals.
Prior to joining MediaLink, Melanie worked as a consultant, guiding the business and legal strategies for early-stage marketing agencies and lifestyle brands.
Melanie graduated from Northwestern University with a B.A. in Communications and Business Institutions, holds a J.D. from New York Law School and is a member of the California State Bar.

Renaldo Webb is Founder and Chief Product Officer at PetPlate. Inspired by his first dog Winston, Renaldo founded PetPlate after realizing that he did not want to feed his dog anything less than real food. After making hundreds of batches of home-cooked dog food for Winston and his pup pals, Renaldo decided to launch a pet food brand that he could proudly call his own. Since making the first delicious fresh-cooked meal in his kitchen, PetPlate has delivered over 18 million healthy meals and organic treats to tens of thousands of dogs across America and continues to innovate and delight pet parents with its direct-to-consumer service and retail products.
Renaldo graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology with a degree in Physics. Prior to starting PetPlate, he worked at L Catterton and McKinsey & Company. He launched PetPlate as a nationwide subscription service in early 2017, following an appearance on the hit TV show Shark Tank, and has attracted a loyal following both online and at retail. Renaldo lives in Brooklyn, NY, with his wife Suzanne and their Berna doodle Cooper.

Melanie Zimmermann

Melanie Zimmermann
Melanie Zimmermann is Vice President of Macy’s Media Network, an in-house media agency for the iconic retailer. Tapping into cross-category consumer insights, Macy’s Media Network connects brands to shoppers through relevant and personalized advertising cultivating greater engagement. Melanie has 15 years of experience creating and executing growth strategies at the intersection of marketing and digital. As the Head of Macy’s Media Network, Melanie is responsible for developing and executing strategy and leading all retail media functions inclusive of Advertising Sales, Account Management, Media Planning, Campaign Management, and Analytics. In her previous roles at Macy’s, Inc., Melanie led the Strategy & Innovation and Customer Analytics function. Before that, Melanie worked as Strategy Consultant at Bain & Company.
About the Venue

New York, New York
For more information about this venue, visit the Convene website.