2023 MIT Japan Conference - Startup Exchange Lightning Talks

Stephen Conant is the Vice President for Commercial at VEIR, leading the company’s effort to introduce a new, innovative transmission technology to the market. Before joining VEIR, Steve was a Partner at Anbaric Development Partners, a developer of high voltage direct current (HVDC) transmission projects, including submarine projects to support offshore wind development. Steve has expertise in site acquisition and environmental permitting and has managed multi-discipline teams to develop electric transmission projects. Steve’s energy career includes electricity market price forecasting and environmental due diligence on major energy infrastructure projects. Earlier in his career, he worked in the public sector as an environmental regulator and as the District Director for a United States Congressman. A fourth-generation resident of Lowell, Massachusetts, Steve is the founder of the Lowell Parks & Conservation Trust, one of the few non-profit urban land trusts in the United States. In 2021 he was recognized as a Distinguished Alumni of his alma mater Lowell High School for his work in environmental conservation.

Nick Mannarino received a Bachelors in Chemical Engineering from Cooper Union and a Masters in Chemical Engineering Practice from MIT. During Nick’s time at MIT he worked on the regenerative properties of carbon capture materials at the University of Pisa in Italy, a lifecycle assessment of biomass as a carbon source for pig iron production at Tecnored (a division of Vale) in Brazil, and process modeling for the manufacturing of aluminum at Emirates Global Aluminium in the UAE.

Upon graduating from MIT, Nick spent 5 years in R&D on the Beverage Process Engineering team at PepsiCo. On this team, Nick developed new beverage processing technologies (e.g. product batching, carbonation, beverage filling) to enable innovation, productivity, sustainability, and brand stewardship within the PepsiCo portfolio. Nick was heavily involved in upgrading PepsiCo’s on-site pilot plant and managed the installation and commissioning of several pilot scale processes/production lines.

Nick joined the Strategy and Business Development team at Amogy in May 2022. His role within the S&BD is two-fold: to provide techno-economic analysis that aids Amogy's go-to-market strategy as well as to establish, develop, and maintain connections with industry partners.

Jake Guglin is CEO and founder of Foundation Alloy, where they take a materials-first approach to enabling modern engineering through faster production of better metal parts for a variety of applications. He is most excited about Foundation's broad potential to bring the best of what can be designed into reality, and make the world a safer, greener and more exciting place in the process. Jake has previous experience in business formation, supply chain, operations and strategy at companies like Blue Origin and SpaceX, and an MBA from MIT.

Daniel Oran is an artist, scientist, inventor, and entrepreneur who combines these skills to unlock the full potential of light. He earned a bachelor's degree in Natural Science and Photography from Hampshire College and later worked as a photographer and fine art printmaker. In 2016, he enrolled in the Synthetic Neurobiology group at the MIT Media Lab, where he completed his PhD. During this time, he developed a new method of nanofabrication called Implosion Fabrication, which was published in Science. This technique allows for the creation of 3D nanostructures using a variety of materials, including silver, semiconductors, dielectrics, proteins, and DNA. After earning his PhD, Daniel founded Irradiant Technologies, a company that uses Implosion Fabrication to manufacture advanced optical and photonic components that have the potential to transform the fields of computing, telecommunications, imaging, and sensing.

Paul Yang is part of the Einblick team, developing a visual & collaborative platform for data science. In current and prior roles, he also partnered directly with organizations to understand how best to make data science faster and more accessible. Ask him about building product analytics from scratch or how machine learning models should be as easy to make as bar charts.

Zack Hendlin is the CEO & co-founder of Zing Data - a platform for simple, collaborative data analysis that works anywhere. Built mobile-first to make it easy to query data in seconds on your phone, Zing has been called the ‘Figma of data' for making hard data questions a couple taps on a phone with easy collaboration functionality. The company was part of the TechCrunch Disrupt Battlefield 200, and is backed by Kindred Ventures (Uber, Coinbase, Postmates, Poshmark) and Correlation Ventures.
 
He was previously VP of Product at OneSignal, where he 10xed ARR in two years, a product leader at Facebook where he shipped their first mobile ads format and their first work in speech recognition, and a product leader at LinkedIn where he shipped major news feed improvements. Prior to that he was a management consultant at Oliver Wyman, advising major financial institutions across Japan, Singapore and the US. He holds multiple machine learning patents, and has been featured in Techcrunch, Fortune and VentureBeat. He is a graduate of UC Berkeley and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Cherif is Director of Client Operations at TechNext. After completing his Bachelor of Science at the University of California Berkeley, he worked as an Analyst, Associate and Vice President in Investment Banking in Paris, London and New York with Montety & Feral, Citigroup and Macquarie Capital. Cherif worked on sell-side and buy-side transactions, debt and equity raises and IPOs for a variety of companies. Before joining TechNext, Cherif worked in Private Equity in Shanghai on restructurings and mergers before transitioning to a SaaS Company in New York as Director of Strategy & Financial Planning directly reporting to the Board of Directors and the CEO.

Jordan is the CEO and Founder of Mobilus Labs.  As an Inventor, Engineer, and Entrepreneur, he has focused his career on developing intelligent systems to operate in extreme environments.   His experience in this field includes working with MIT and Lockheed Martin and Co-Directing the NASA Frontier Development Lab.  He’s a member of the Royal Academy of Engineers, a former TEDx speaker, and enjoys working with underrepresented youth in STEM fields. Jordan received his degrees from MIT and Stanford University in Aeronautical / Astronautical Engineering with a focus on Ocean and Space Robotics.

Ramiro Almeida is Co-Founder & CEO of Tram.Global, developing technology on Blockchain to build digital marketplaces to reduce global carbon emissions. Instructor and research scholar at the MIT Media Lab, focusing on venture studio courses at the intersection of technology and social innovation. Scholar in residence at Harvard University, where he was awarded the prestigious Loeb Fellowship at the Graduate School of Design. He was Co-Founder & President of Optimus Ride, an MIT spinout, whose mission was to build technology for safe, sustainable, and equitable autonomous mobility solutions with deployments in California, Massachusetts, Washington, DC, Virginia, and New York.

Rick Pierce is the CEO and Co-founder of Decoy Therapeutics, Inc., founded in 2020. He is a serial biotech entrepreneur with over 20 years of senior leadership and operating experience, co-founding and building successful biotech companies. Including senior management and turn-around advisory roles at several public biotech start-ups that are listed on the NASDAQ, New York Stock, and Toronto Stock Exchange. At Javelin Pharmaceuticals (NYSE:JAV), he was VP of IR and Business Development while the company raised $183M, went public, and got a non-opioid pain drug Dyloject™ approved globally before being taken over by Hospira, now Pfizer. After Javelin, he was President of US and International Operations at SemBioSys Genetics (TSE: SBS). He further served as a strategic advisor to Canada-based Cangene (TSX:CNJ), sold to Emergent BioSolutions for $222M. He advised Spring Bank Pharmaceuticals management and board of directors during and after its IPO on NASDAQ. Prior to his career in biotech, Rick worked for investment banks Merrill Lynch and Lehman Brothers and was an advisor to well-known biotech companies. He is currently a Mentor at Mass Bio, an Advisor to the Canadian Consulate of Boston/Cambridge’s Healthcare and Technology Accelerator, and a Board member of the Canadian Entrepreneurs of New England, where he is Chairman of the Life Sciences Leadership Council. Mr. Pierce has a proven track record in attracting capital, forging transformative strategic global alliances in biotech and pharmaceuticals, and working with investors to create successful outcomes for public and private healthcare companies.