Philly Tech Week 2020

Christopher Wink is the cofounder of Technical.ly, the network of local technology news sites, and one of the organizers of Philly Tech Week.

Ethan is the Data Engineer at Seer Interactive — finding new ways of automating and leveraging machine learning to move Seer into the future of digital marketing.

Some fun projects include changing PPC ad sentiment to increase click-through-rate and identifying low quality sites on paid placements to save clients money.

Previously, he was an SEO Team Lead, where he focused on providing team members with guidance on strategy and tactical implementation.

His passion lies in using the newest, latest tools to automate process and create net new business opportunities for clients.

Outside of work he loves cooking, biking, yoga, climbing, fine cocktails and Taco Tuesday.

Philadelphia native, James Lindsay, graduated from Cheyney University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Marketing. He initially developed his marketing skills while serving as a manager in the consumer products industry for Johnson Products, an ethnic hair care company, and Warner-Lambert. These experiences, and his desire to own a business, empowered him to start Rap Snacks, Inc in 1994. The initial success of Rap Snacks helped solidify a co-marketing agreement with Universal Records. The deal consisted of advertising Universal’s Artists on all Rap Snacks bags. Eventually the company grew into a five million dollar business selling mostly twenty-five cent bags of chips.

In 2001 Mr. Lindsay decided to expand his product line by purchasing a snack foods line called “Mr. G” snack foods. Mr. G was a locally owned Philly brand that was best know for its hot and barbeque cheddar flavored chips.

In 2007, Mr. Lindsay launched Soulful Foods, Inc. The mission of the company is to provide consumers with a great cultural experience through unique products and seasonings, and to partner with other ethnic brands in order to expand their product reach in the marketplace.

The first product launched under Soulful Foods, Inc was a venture between Mr. Lindsay and Sylvia Woods, the “Queen of Soul Food”. They came together to develop a nationally recognized brand of snack foods called “Sylvia’s”.

The introduction included three flavors of Kettle Cooked Potato Chips fried in Sunflower seed oil, which eliminates trans fats. The initial flavors included honey barbeque, lemon pepper, and Louisiana hot.

Mr. Lindsay has been in the consumer marketing industry over 17 years. His unique marketing concepts and flavor profiles have differentiated his products from other snack items on the shelf and helped him build the company’s loyal consumer base.

In 2010, Mr. Lindsay continued to be an big influence in the music marketing industry; guiding platinum selling recording artist, Meek Mill by connecting his brand with corporate America and securing brand deals with companies such as, PUMA, Monster Energy Drink, and Ciroc. As well as partnering with Monster Headphones to help create the Monster’s 24k Headphones. Mr. Lindsay also assisted Meek Mill in growing PUMA’s business an additional 200 million over a five year period. He’s also worked with Master P and his family.

Over the past 12 years he has been featured on “CBS Morning Show”, ABC’s “The Jimmy Kimmel Show”, BET, Fox News, People Magazine, The “Tavis Smiley” Show, Black Enterprise, Forbes, and Entrepreneur Magazine. He was also recognized by Business Philadelphia Magazine as “Top 100 People to Watch”

Lisha is a venture builder and investor, startup advisor, and business strategist and operator who has served on all sides of the business table. She is the founder of Arable Ventures LLC., a boutique innovation consulting and advisory practice helping organizations develop full scale operating models to deliver innovative solutions. Prior to launching Arable Ventures, Lisha was the founder and head of Vanguard’s Innovation Studio, where she led the vision for enterprise innovation and owned the ongoing delivery of a venture portfolio focused on addressing white spaces with the potential to transform businesses and disrupt the financial services industry.

Throughout her work, alongside crafting effective strategy and operations enabled through technology and data wherever possible, Lisha has always placed high emphasis on growing the best functioning teams and company culture. She is an active investor with 37Angels, an early growth stage women's syndicate focused on increasing representation of diverse founders and funders, and serves as mentor and advisor to startups across the consumer, enterprise, and fintech sectors. She is also an adjunct professor @ Temple's Fox School of Business, teaching on open innovation & strategic partnerships. Lisha currently lives in Brooklyn and travels often in pursuit of new adventures.

Lisa is Seer’s Data Strategy Lead based in Philadelphia. She harnessed a passion for data and her tenure within digital marketing and business operations to focus on pushing Seer forward in utilizing data-driven strategies. Her favorite thing to do is dig deep into data to help clients solve complex business questions. Her second favorite thing to do is convince Wil of the virtues of bridge tables & ngrams.

Before Seer, Lisa worked in roles across the board in digital marketing and software with positions at TIG Global, MICROS Systems, and Oracle. Recently hitting ten years in the industry, Lisa started her career in PPC before branching into SEO, product management, program management, R&D, and finally Data Strategy. She has experience with clients at all levels and across most major industries. In her role as Data Strategy Lead, Lisa gets to touch a ton of Seer’s clients in one way or another, which is one reason she loves what she does.

Lisa is a graduate of the University of Delaware. In her free time, she enjoys eating at every new restaurant in the city and doing all things outdoors with her husband Bernard, kids George and Annie, and their too-energetic pup Deacon.

Three Times Dope was a hip hop/rap group from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania consisting of EST (Robert Waller), Chuck Nice (Walter Griggs) and Woody Wood (Duerwood Beale). 3xD, as they were called for short, were a part of the Hilltop Hustlers Crew (which also included Steady B, Cool C, Da Youngsta's, Mentally Gifted, and others). At first, they recorded under the name 3-D.

Their debut LP, Original Stylin' was well-received, peaking at #122 on the Billboard 200 Album Chart and the group became well known for the terminology they created, such as “Acknickulous” and “The Giddy Up”.

EST would eventually go on to become an award-winning songwriter for top-tier acts, most notably a Grammy nomination in 2005 for Destiny's Child's "Cater 2 U".

Shamique Thompson is a front end software engineer at AWeber. Endlessly curious and relentlessly motivated, she has dedicated herself to being a master of all things software. A graduate of Brown University, Shamique decided to embark upon her journey to master the art of Software Engineering after receiving her certification from Penn's Coding Bootcamp.

Mr. Robert A. Celestin, Esq. has practiced entertainment law in New York City for over 25 years. A graduate of Yale University and Columbia Law School, Mr. Celestin started his legal career as an associate at the corporate law firm, Kaye, Scholer, Fierman, Hays & Handler in New York. He then went on to work in the legal department of Clive Davis’ Arista Records before becoming the VP/GM of Uptown Records, Inc., (“Uptown”), the label responsible for merging hip-hop and R&B and launching the careers of “Mary J. Blige”, “Jodeci”, “Guy” and others. At Uptown, Mr. Celestin worked alongside Andre Harrell and Sean “P-Diddy” Combs. He later went on to work for Untouchables Entertainment, Inc., as VP/GM and was instrumental in the success of rappers “Pete Rock and CL Smooth”; R&B trio “Intro”; and R&B vocalist “Donnell Jones”. Mr. Celestin went to work with his mentor, entertainment attorney Louise West, Esq., in representing “Timbaland”, “Missy Elliot” and “Ginuwine”. Mr. Celestin also managed the Grammy nominated and platinum selling Pop/R&B group “City High”. Presently, Mr. Celestin’s law firm, the “Law Offices of Robert A. Celestin”, represents and provides strategic advice and counsel to independent record label start-ups and production companies, recording artists, music producers, songwriters, reality TV stars, DJ’s and others. Present clients Include “Desiigner”, “6ix9ine”, the Estate of the late “Xxxtentacion”, “Fatboy SSE”, “Dj Self”, “Ezinma”, “Winners Circle Publishing”, “Anthony Flammia”, “JTK Pro Beats” and many more.