6:45pm – 7:30pm Cocktail reception (complimentary hors’ d’oeuvres, soft drinks and wine will be served)

 Speakers Bios

Amit Garg focuses on early to late stage venture investments across a wide range of sectors at NVP, with an emphasis on consumer Internet.
Prior to joining NVP, Amit spent four years at Google, where he was an associate product manager and a business analyst. As a product manager, he contributed to the development of Google Images, helped launch Google’s Brazil offices and internationalized several products. In his role as a business analyst, Amit supplied the business and sales teams with critical analytics to make informed business and sales decisions.

Amit was born and raised in Brazil and has lived throughout India and the U.S. He is fluent in Portuguese and Hindi and advanced in Spanish and Urdu. Since 2000, Amit has led Hospital for Hope (hospitalforhope.org), a non-profit focused on developing infrastructure in rural India. He has also scaled Mt Kilimanjaro in Africa, is on the Board of “Founders Hookup,” connecting business and technology individuals, and is a frequent speaker on startups, venture capital, and global trends. Amit holds an MBA from Harvard Business School as well as a Master of Science degree in Biomedical Informatics and a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science (major) and Biology (minor) from Stanford University.

Andre Levi has over 13 years of working experience in the financial sector and is currently the Controller for DCM,  a global venture capital firm headquartered in Silicon Valley.  He was previously an Assurance Manager with PricewaterhouseCoopers focused on venture capital funds and technology companies.  Prior to that, Mr. Levi was the Contributing Editor for the Closed-End Fund Digest, a prestigious investment newsletter subscribed by both institutional and individual investors, covering the emerging markets of Latin America and the “Asian Tigers”.  Mr. Levi received a BA in Business Economics from the University of California, Santa Barbara and is a Certified Public Accountant in the State of California.

Joanne Vliet is the Director of the United States Commercial Service’s Silicon Valley office.  The U.S. Commercial Service is the U.S. government's lead export promotion agency offering a range of programs to support the export of U.S. goods and services.  In Brazil, the U.S. Commercial Service has offices at the U.S. Embassy in Brasilia, as well as the U.S. Consulates in Belo Horizonte, Recife, Rio de Janeiro, and  São Paulo.  In addition to directing the operations of the Silicon Valley office, Joanne also manages a diverse client portfolio in the following sectors: aviation/defense; building materials/construction/architecture, electronic industry test equipment & services, franchising, financial and other professional services, robotics, and safety/security equipment. She also follows issues related to entrepreneurship, venture capital, and cross-border licensing of intellectual property.  Her office was recently profiled in the U.S. Department of Energy’s Innovation America Magazine, and the Silicon Valley Business Journal.

Michael Conniff directs the Global Studies Initiative at San José State University, a BA degree program that prepares students, residentially as well as online, to succeed as citizens and professionals in the world at large. The program also fosters faculty and staff development and exchanges with universities overseas. He also directs the Silicon Valley Center for Global Innovation and Immigration, founded in 2009.

Conniff earned degrees at UC-Berkeley and Stanford and has published a number of books on modern history, most recently A History of Modern Latin America (2005, with Lawrence Clayton), Africans in the Americas (2003, with T. J. Davis), and Panama and the United States (2001). He has lived overseas for a dozen years, has held several post-doc appointments (including three Fulbright tours), and served in the U.S. Peace Corps. He lectures often in Portuguese and Spanish. Before joining SJSU, he taught history at the University of New Mexico and helped create Latin American studies programs at Auburn University and the University of South Florida. He has won and managed more than four million dollars in grants and contracts.

Rodney Alves is a partner at Alves, Videla Business Strategies. As a business attorney, he focuses his practice on corporate, finance and business transactions with emphasis on  mergers and acquisitions and international transactions.  After practicing for several years at major law firms in Brazil and the US advising domestic and international clients, Mr. Alves launched his own office, Alves, Videla Business Strategies. With over 15 years negotiating and documenting all types of financial, commercial, corporate and administrative matters, Mr. Alves is fluent in Portuguese, English and Spanish and he has written several articles and participated in several seminars as speaker in Brazil and the US.

Robert Janssen is a managing partner for Outsource Brazil providing advisory services for business growth and market development strategies for organizations wanting to expand business in the North and South American markets, Europe and Asia. Robert is one of the most sought after speakers on Brazilian Information Technology concerns, having delivered over 300 presentations around the five continents. A dual citizen of the United States and Brazil, Robert began his career in the IT sector in 1986. He occupied several executive positions in American and Brazilian corporations, focused in international business Development until 2001.

Silicon Valley Bank - Kellogg Auditorium
3005 Tasman Drive
Santa Clara, CA 95054

Wednesday, May 25, 2011 from 3:00 PM to 7:00 PM (PDT)