Philly Tech Week 2020

Jordan DiPietro has been working in the financial industry for 15 years and spent the last decade as a marketing and growth specialist at The Motley Fool. He has a passion for creating quality content and building digital products that focus on individuals, entrepreneurs, and business owners. He loves copywriting, his two young kids, skimming old swipe files, and all-things-Philadelphia.

Josh is a founding Partner at First Round Capital, a seed-stage technology venture fund. Josh has been an active entrepreneur and investor in the Internet industry since its commercialization.

In 1992, while he was a student at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, Josh co-founded Infonautics Corporation – and took it public on the NASDAQ stock exchange in 1996. Josh founded Half.com in July of 1999, and led it to become one of the largest sellers of used books, movies and music in the world. Half.com was acquired by eBay in July 2000 — and Josh remained with eBay for three years, running the Half.com business unit and growing eBay’s Media marketplace to almost half a billion dollars in annual gross merchandise sales. In late 2003 Josh helped to found TurnTide, an anti-spam company that created the world's first anti-spam router. TurnTide was acquired by Symantec just six months later.

Josh founded First Round Capital in 2004 to reinvent seed-stage investing. Since that time the firm has invested in over 300 emerging technology startups – becoming one of the most active venture capital firms in the country. Josh has consistently ranked on the Forbes “Midas List” of the top 100 tech investors. He has been named as one of the top ten ‘angel investors’ in the United States by Newsweek magazine, one of "Tech's New Kingmakers" by Business 2.0 magazine and a "Rising VC Star" by Fortune magazine. Josh also is the proud winner of a second place ribbon in the 2011 Nantucket Watermelon Eating competition.

Josh is an inventor on thirteen U.S. Patents for his work in Internet technology. In June 2000, he was awarded Ernst and Young’s prestigious “Entrepreneur of the Year” award for the Greater Philadelphia region.

Josh earned a Bachelor of Science degree cum laude in Entrepreneurial Management and Marketing from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Cerron was confirmed as the Secretary of Labor on January 24, 2018 where he leads state efforts to connect Delaware businesses with talented workers, and develop relevant workforce development and training programs.

Prior to that he was Acting Director of the Delaware Economic Development Office (DEDO), Cerron managed the dissolution of DEDO and the creation of the new Division of Small Business, Development, and Tourism within the Delaware Department of State. He served as the Division’s Director, leading a team responsible for providing key services to Delaware businesses, administration of the Delaware Strategic Fund, and marketing Delaware as a premier tourist destination.

During his time at DEDO and the newly-created division, Cerron had led the state’s efforts to attract businesses and good-paying jobs to Delaware, keep them here, and ensure that Delaware remains a leading state for businesses to grow and thrive.

Cerron grew up in Washington D.C. and moved to Delaware to study Political Science and Law Studies at Delaware State University. Driven by a desire to make a positive impact and following his passion for public service,

Cerron has worked as a Legislative Aide for the Delaware State House of Representatives, New Castle County Deputy Director for U.S. Senator Tom Carper and State Projects Director for then-Congressman John Carney, and Legislative Liaison for Governor Jack Markell.

Cade lives in Wilmington with his wife, Kasmira, and two daughters, Jonnie and Toni.

Tiffany is a dedicated leader passionate about creating sustainable social impact through social entrepreneurship and more importantly, empowering people. She's been nominated for the Greater Philadelphia Social Innovation Award and also recognized by Generocity, Social Innovation Journal, Philadelphia Citizen, Wharton Business Radio, and Penn News as a leader of social entrepreneurship. Tiffany is the Founder & CEO of Fulphil, which she created to empower the youth to pursue their passions through entrepreneurship on the micro scale within cities to create a collectively broader effect. She is also the Founder and Executive Director of Hult Prize Ivy.

She is a current graduate student at the University of Pennsylvania, pursuing a dual degree in M.S. Nonprofit Leadership (Cl ‘19) while holding her B.A. in Sociology, concentrating in Health and Medicine (Cl ‘18). She has also worked for City of Philadelphia's Office of Innovation and Technology.

Christian is the Global Director for Savings Groups at CARE and the Founder and CEO of Chomoka, a start-up social enterprise unlocking economic opportunity for savings groups and their members through digital innovation. Currently live in Tanzania, Chomoka combines an Android-based record-keeping system with a digital marketplace to help people engage with the rapidly evolving digital economy. Over 10 years with CARE, Christian has served in a range of roles focused on program design, management, measurement and learning to support CARE’s efforts to eliminate hunger and food insecurity, increase access to finance and promote economic development. Christian has worked in the international development arena for 20 years across Asia, Africa and Latin America. He began his career as a US Peace Corps Volunteer in Uzbekistan. Christian holds degrees from Boston College and the George Washington University. He lives with his wife and two young sons in Narberth, PA.

Michael Winslow picked up his love for programming when he was 10 years old writing GW-Basic code on his Tandy-1000. With his passion for designing simple solutions to complex problems, Michael has played key roles at companies like Aramark, Ortho-McNeil, Oracle and Xfinity Mobile. He is a seasoned, international public speaker who enjoys using his platform to uplift engineers and create powerfully diverse teams in technology. Michael is currently a DevOps advocate, Agile enthusiast, and dedicated people-leader for the Software Strategy and Transformation group at Comcast.

Gavin Roy is currently the Interim CTO at AWeber. With over 25 years of experience in the Internet industry, Gavin is responsible for the technical architecture and operational stability of several large-scale web properties. He is the author of “RabbitMQ in Depth,” and actively contributes to several open source projects and communities, including Erlang, Python, PostgreSQL, and RabbitMQ. Gavin is a member of several professional organizations, including the Erlang Ecosystem Foundation (EEF), Python Software Foundation (PSF), and the IEEE.

Philadelphia native, Charles “Charlie Mack” Alston, an entertainment giant has a long standing track record in the entertainment business, dating back to 1978 when he hosted his first house party for 250 youth in the basement of his mother’s home, subsequently becoming a concert promoter for well known Hip Hop Artists Doug E. Fresh, Roxanne Shante, Biz Markie, Big Daddy Kane and Stetsasonic. In 1979, Charlie Mack became a Record Promoter/A&R Director for the independent label, “April Records”. During the early 80’s, Mack began his professional career as security for Galaxy 5, road manager and security for and MC Breeze.

In 1987, Mack elevated from bodyguard to Executive Personal Assistant for his star friends Mega Star Will “Fresh Prince” Smith and Jeff “Jazzy Jeff” Townes. In 1997, Charlie Mack relocated to Los Angeles for several years and initially assisted Smith on the set of the blockbuster hit, “Enemy of The State” along with several of his subsequent major films. Known for unselfishly lending his professional relationships to aid aspiring talent and basically anyone in need, Charlie Mack played an integral role in discovering talent like Boyz II Men and others in the industry. Despite a lucrative and rewarding career working side by side with Will Smith, Charlie Mack chose to relocate back to his native Philadelphia in 2003 to be closer to his children and fulfill his dream of reigniting the entertainment and social vigor in the city of Philadelphia.

40 years in the entertainment industry, Charlie Mack has consulted with various companies such as Electric Factory Concerts, East Coast Express, Clear Channel and Live Nation; to name a few. He has provided both diverse and quality entertainment locally as well as nationally. Over the years, 215 Aphillyated and its subsidiaries have presented concerts featuring Gospel, Jazz, Hip-Hop, and R&B artists, such as: Beyoncé, Jamie Foxx, Gerald Levert, George Clinton and Hezekiah Walker; Comedians Chris Tucker, D.L.Hughley and Steve Harvey; Jazz Artists Najee and Larry Carlton; and Hip Hop Artists Notorious B.I.G., Jay Z, Mary J. Blige, Missy Elliott and DMX have headlined the billboards. Charlie Mack promoted and hosted Tupac Shakur’s very last concert in the city of Philadelphia and the only concert with Lil Kim and Foxy Brown on the same bill. Celebrity galas for Boyz II Men and N’SYNC are also part of his credentials. Mack added to his efforts, Film Producer, co-producing the block buster hit, “Atl,” starring Rapper T.I. Mack co-created and produced the VH1 Special – “Bridging The Gap”, which featured Queen Latifah, Eve, Snoop and The Game. Currently, Charlie Mack is lending his talents to produce the biopic of R&B Legend and Crooner Teddy Pendergrass.