Meet the big-name tech leaders, thought-provoking academics, talented creatives, and exceptional founders who build our future speaking at TOA23.
Tao Tao is the Co-Founder and Chief Operating Officer (COO) at GetYourGuide. He leads the company’s business operations. Under Tao’s direction, GetYourGuide has grown into the leading global online booking platform for incredible travel experiences, with more than 75.000 activities offered to date. As COO, he ensures GetYourGuide’s business runs smoothly along its entire value chain.
Co-Founder & COO
Get Your Guide
Marc-Alexander Christ is co-founder and Chief Investment Officer at SumUp. After graduating from the University of Maatricht, he started his career in Investment Banking at European Investors in New York, followed by a position as VP at JPM in London and Frankfurt. After collecting his first experience in the startup world as head of sales at CityDeal (Groupon), Marc cofounded MIOSATO, the online fashion gallery and SumUp the leading mPOS player in Europe.
Co-Founder
SumUp
Pia Mancini is a democracy activist, open source sustainer, co-founder at Open Collective and Chair of Democracy Earth Foundation. She worked in politics in Argentina and developed technology for democracy around the world. YC Alum, globe-trotter and Roma’s mum. She is now based in NYC. YC Alum, YGL (World Economic Forum).
.jpg)
Co-Founder & CEO
Open Collective
Bradley is the co-founder and CEO of Roll. Prior to Roll he was one of the founding researchers at CoinDesk, creating the company’s State of Blockchain report and serving as a product lead on the research team as the Ethereum Mainnet went live in 2015. He was previously an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at Techstars and is the best-selling author of #BreakIntoVC
.png)
Co-Founder & CEO
Roll
Ingmar founded “CureVac, the RNA people“ together with colleagues in Tübingen, Germany in 2000. His entrepreneurship was motivated by his surprising discovery during his doctoral research that naked mRNA can be expressed in vivo without the risk of rapid degradation, while exhibiting the ability to generate strong specific immune responses, in contrast to what had previously been believed.
.jpeg)
Founder
Curevac / Morpho Foundation
Dr. Emil Kendziorra is a Founder & CEO at Tomorrow Bio and President at the European Biostasis Foundation, a Swiss non-profit research institute. Prior he's was CEO at tech and medical companies, recently Medlanes (Exit to ZAVA) and onFeedback (Exit to QuestionPro). As a doctor and entrepreneur, he's a regular keynote speaker on longevity, cryopreservation, science and deep tech.
Founder & CEO
Tomorrow Bio
Jeffrey Brian "Jeff" Garner is an American fashion designer and visual artist. His designs are sold online and in luxury boutiques throughout America, Canada, the UK and China. His designs have been worn to the Academy Awards and on stage, by artists like Kings of Leon and Taylor Swift. He is best known as being the founder of sustainable label, Prophetik. Jeff was named one of the top 40 artists in the US and his works were placed permanently into the Smithsonian’s Renwick Gallery for the 40 under 40 Exhibition.
Fashion Designer & Founder
Prophetik
Joy the founder & CEO of the member-owned apparel community, Early Majority. Prior to being a founder in the Web3 space, Joy has a strong track record of building high-growth, highly innovative brands. By leading the digital transformation of Patagonia and Sonos, she accelerated the growth of their direct businesses and anchored them firmly in popular culture. She has been recognized by Forbes and Fast Company as one of the most influential and creative global business leaders and was profiled by Bloomberg for her unconventional journey to the C-suite.
Founder & CEO
Early Majority
Courtney Boyd Myers (CEO, CMO of AKUA) is an entrepreneur, environmentalist, and writer. Prior to launching AKUA, she helped build the Summit Community, a global network of founders, creatives, and innovators. Previously, she helped market companies such as Four Sigmatic and Unframed Ice Cream. She began her career as a journalist at Forbes Magazine and The Next Web.
Founder & CEO
AKUA
Ralf Wenzel is the New York-based founder and CEO of JOKR, the next generation digital grocery offering across Latin America. As CEO he is involved in every part of the business, from Operations to Product & Tech and beyond. He has a 20-year track record of building companies up from scratch, bringing their products to consumers globally, and leading diverse teams with a focus in emerging markets.
Founder & CEO
Jokr
Alain is the Founder and CEO of SYLVAIN, a strategy and design consultancy that provokes progress for companies, people and society at large. Clients include Google, American Express, Spotify, Airbnb, Blackrock, Amazon, Diageo, GM, the NBA, UBER, New York Times, Nike, Apple and others. Founded in 2010, the company is headquartered in NYC, and is a Certified B Corporation.
Founder & CEO
Sylvain
George is an entrepreneur dedicated to bringing about positive change in society with particular focus on health and wellbeing. His early training and experience was a multi-disciplinary blending of cognitive psychology, clinical psychology and computer science. In 2016, he co-founded COMPASS Pathways, a mental health care company dedicated to accelerating patient access to evidence-based innovation in mental health.
Chairman and Co-Founder
COMPASS Pathways
Roham Gharegozlou is cofounder & CEO of Dapper Labs, the Web3 company behind CryptoKitties & NBA Top Shot as well as Flow blockchain, Dapper Wallet, NFL ALL DAY, & La Liga Golazos. Previously, Roham was co-founder & CEO of Axiom Zen, an award-winning startup studio focused on emerging technology. During his 6 years as CEO, Axiom Zen spun out 3 venture-backed businesses including Dapper Labs.
CEO
Dapper Labs
Zach is a storyteller, entrepreneur, and community builder focused on projects which support a more unified, whole systems worldview. Currently, he’s the CEO of MyPlace Founder of Return and writing his first book on global community. Previously, Zach has held seed stage, executive roles at Remedy (now SGFY) and Habitas.
Founder & CEO
MyPlace
Rolf is a serial entrepreneur. His company trivago.com became within a decade, the most successful hotel search and one of the largest global consumer brands. He brought trivago public at Nasdaq in 2016. After stepping down from his role as CEO in 2020, Rolf started with brafe.space a movement to create space for entrepreneurs and activists to evolve themselves and their organizations.
Founder
brafe.space / Trivago
Malte Ubl is the CTO of Vercel, where he leads the development and delivery of the company’s suite of tools and features to enable developers to create at the moment of inspiration. Prior to joining Vercel, Malte was the Principal Engineer for Google Search Rendering and Engineering Director for Google’s Search on Laptops, Tablets, and Desktop.
CTO
Vercel
Dr. Melanie Joy is an award-winning psychologist and bestselling author. Her books include Why We Love Dogs, Eat Pigs, and Wear Cows and How to End Injustice Everywhere. She received endorsements from Yuval Harari, Matthieu Ricard, and Peter Singer. She also received the Ahimsa Award—previously given to Nelson Mandela and the Dalai Lama—for her work on nonviolence. She’s the founder of Beyond Carnism.
Founding President
Beyond Carnism
Magnus is founder of CEEZER, a platform for corporates to access and manage negative emissions credits with science-backed data. With a background and chemistry, he worked on large-scale transformation and climate strategies at BCG. Magnus fell in love with the carbon market when visiting a mangrove project in Madagascar and believes carbon should be managed with the same scrutiny as finances.
Founder & CEO
Ceezer
Eva Kaczor is a Dipl. Psychologist, Purpose Coach and as the founder of PSYCHEDELIC BREATH®, one of the worldwide leading breathwork experts. Eva guides humans into their purpose in her purpose coaching, PSYCHEDELIC BREATH® events and teacher trainings.Her work spans from working with companies such as Google, Netflix and Porsche to facilitating experiences with several thousands participants.
Founder
PSYCHEDELIC BREATH
Sarah is a Neuroscientist and "web3" entrepreneur. Currently, she is researching neurorobotics (AI + neuromorphic computing + humanoid robots). Previously she cofounded an award winning web3 consultancy. She is an Industry Affiliate at UCL's Centre for Blockchain Technologies and has been involved in the "decentralised science" movement ("DeSci") for over 2 years.
Postdoctoral Fellow
Sheffield Hallam
Chris Burniske is a partner at Placeholder, a New York venture firm that invests in decentralized information networks. Prior to Placeholder, he co-authored the best-seller, Cryptoassets: The Innovative Investor’s Guide to Bitcoin and Beyond, and spearheaded ARK Invest’s crypto efforts, including its 2015 bitcoin investment. His commentary has been featured on international media outlets, including the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Financial Times, and Bloomberg. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with a BS from Stanford University. Twitter @cburniske.
Partner
Placeholder
Florian Glatz is Vice President of the European Crypto Initiative (EUCI) and co-founder of Common Ground (commonground.cg), a user-owned social network for communities. A visionary at heart, Florian paves the way for self-sovereign identities, community-led decision-making and a user-owned data economy. Trained as a lawyer and software developer, Florian is an expert on crypto regulation.
Co-Founder
Common Ground
Anna Frebel is an MIT professor and world-renowned astronomer who studies 13 billion year-old stars to understand the origin of chemical elements and our Milky Way galaxy. Honoured with multiple awards, she has authored the book "Searching for the oldest stars" and founded LEAPS STEM leadership program.
.jpeg)
Professor and author
MIT
René Herzer is the founder Basebox. An entrepreneur since 1996, he has founded four companies.He has helped twenty-seven digital health teams at BIH/Charité. Innovations advised Basebox is the professional instant health tech backend. It solves the three big problems of making apps in health tech: high development cost, compliance and cyber security.
.jpg)
Founder
Basebox GmbH
Ucaneo aims to remove 1 million tons of CO2 from ambient air by 2030 by developing the world's first biomimetic Direct Air Capture approach. Carla is a visionary and ambitious female founder with 8 years of biotech, 4 years of machine learning, and 3 years of startup experience. She initiated 10+ research projects during her studies and is driven to harness technology to create a bright future.
Co-founder & CTO
Ucaneo Biotech GmbH
Florian is a serial entrepreneur and today co-founder / CEO of Greenlyte Carbon Technologies GmbH. GCT operates a low-energy DAC approach to capture CO2 from the atmosphere while generating hydrogen as a byproduct. A 100t demonstrator plant is currently under construction with expected completion in Q3 2023.
CEO and Co-Founder
Greenlyte Carbon
Michal Pěchouček is CTO of Gen, a global company dedicated to powering Digital Freedom through its trusted Cyber Safety brands including Norton, Avast, Avira, AVG, ReputationDefender and CCleaner. As CTO, Michal leads the core technology, innovation and R&D teams driving security engines, AI and cybersecurity research, and the company’s technological vision for human centered digital safety.
CTO
Gen
Currently building Dunbar - a second brain to unleash your network's potential. Previously co-founded Aware, EyeEm & BerlinPhotoWeek (both acquired). Active angel investor (>50 investments in last 4 yrs incl. Pitch, Gorillas, Kittl, Beat81) and small LP in several early funds. Public speaker (focused on AI, society, entrepreneurship) with appearances on most major stages and publications.
Founder
Dunbar GmbH
Lawrence is an entrepreneur, environmentalist and philanthropist who builds companies that prioritise climate impact. He is currently on a mission to change mobility for good with TIER Mobility. In 2020, he established Blue Impact - an evergreen fund dedicated to providing early-stage funding for companies building climate solutions. He has committed 100% of his shares in TIER to Blue Impact.
CEO and Co-founder
TIER Mobility
Praneeth is an investment partner on the founding team of Ethereal Ventures. Prior to this, he started venture investing at Consensys and started his career with product and engineering at Microsoft and Oracle. He has a bachelors in CS from IIT Bombay and a MBA from ESADE. He spends time between Berlin and India and speaks 6 languages.
Investment Partner
Ethereal Ventures
Patricia is Co-founder and creative director at Wonderfeel, a longevity biosciences company. An early architect of the house music scene, she also co-founded Mushroom Jazz and OM Records. At Wonderfeel, she works with top scientists on breakthroughs to slow aging and helps demystify cellular health for consumers through design and communication for an industry that is growing by $100B annually.
Co-founder/CWM
Wonderfeel
Amanda Cassatt is the Founder and CEO of Serotonin, a web3 native marketing and product studio. She was the Chief Marketing Officer for ConsenSys between 2016 and 2019, bringing Ethereum to market and helping to grow it into one of the largest and most robust blockchain ecosystems. She regularly speaks at global events and is featured in news outlets around the world.
Founder & CEO
Serotonin
Anna Alex is serial entrepreneur and angel investor focussing on the big challenges in climate and nature. Anna just founded her third company, NALA Earth, which is making Biodiversity and Nature measurable for Companies. Prior to this she founded Planetly and Outfittery. Anna's Foundation Wild&Free Animal Fund is supporting organizations in their fight against livestock farming.
Co-Founder
NALA Earth
Eva-Valérie Gfrerer is the General Partner and founder of Morphais VC. The early-stage VC invests in European technology founders at the pre-seed and seed stage. Eva has been a part of the startup ecosystem for 10 years and is dedicated to making the venture capital asset class more profitable, efficient, and inclusive through Morphais VC.
GP & CEO
Morphais VC
Lauren Taus is a psychedelic assisted therapist, trained to work with both psychoactive compounds and plant medicines. Lauren leads Inbodied Life, a group therapy practice that also offers immersive educational programs for clinicians to learn psychedelic assisted therapy and integration in contexts that hold personal healing as essential to effective facilitation.
Psychotherapist
Inbodied Life
Jasvin is a strategy consultant, people leader & technologist with more than a decade of global professional experience. As founder and CEO of bridge.the.NEXT( ) - a “think-and-do" tank, she envisions bridging the gap between businesses, individuals & society to foster a systemic understanding of emerging digital trends such as web3, blockchain & AI, albeit keeping a humane mindset alive.
Founder & CEO
bridge.the.NEXT( )
Daniela Gerd tom Markotten studied industrial engineering and holds a PhD in IT security, combining two passions: IT & technology. She held management positions at large companies like Daimler as well as start-ups. As Board Member at Deutsche Bahn, she has a clear mission: utilising digitalisation and technology to make DB the most popular and sustainable means of transport for customers.
Board Member
Deutsche Bahn
Roxanne Varza is Director of STATION F, the biggest startup campus in the world. She is originally from Silicon Valley. Before joining STATION F, she led Microsoft Ventures Paris and TechCrunch France. She also worked for several London-based startups and co-founded StartHer, Tech.eu and FailCon France. Roxanne is also scout for Sequoia Capital.
Director
STATION F
Billie Quinlan is the co-founder and CEO of Ferly, a sexual wellness company transforming the way women access care for their sexual difficulties. Ferly has supported over 500,000 women in 70+ countries and raised ~£2m from tier 1 investors such as Local Globe and Michael Acton Smith. Billie has delivered a TED talk, been voted a top 100 innovator and featured in major media publications.
.png)
CEO/Co-Founder
Ferly
Maxim is the Co-Founder & CEO of DeepNews — the first news platform that is trustworthy & personalized. The aim is to combat Fake News on a global scale. DeepNews is looking to partner with publishers to bring their content to younger audiences.Previously Maxim co-founded MATH 42 — a math learning app used by over 6 million students worldwide. The company was acquired by Chegg in 2017.
CEO
DeepNews
David is a founder at Lit Protocol, a distributed key management network that provides encryption and signing across 100s of web3 and cryptocurrency applications including social, wallets, DeFi, and user-owned data. Prior to Lit, David was on the founding team of a SaaS company that was acquired by LinkedIn.
Co-founder, CEO
Lit Protocol
Lisa Mandemaker designs impactful experiences exploring reproductive futures. With strategic thinking, she uses prototypes to delve into socio-cultural and ethical impacts of emerging technologies. Recognised on the BBC 100 Women List for her contribution to the speculative artificial womb prototype, Lisa challenges blind acceptance, urging thoughtful consideration of technology's implications.
Speculative designer
Lisa Mandemaker
David Bennett has over 27 years of experience in the VFX, performance capture, 3D gaming and VR industries. He has played a major role in the development of facial animation, his credits include hollywood's blockbusters and has invented new tools and techniques. He founded Mimic Productions in 2012, a leading studio that makes realistic digital characters, for all industries and imaginations.
CEO
Mimic Productions
Angel is an expert in co-creative project development. He has mentored individuals and organizations to empower people and overcome hierarchical structures. With Connected Business, he has reached over 30,000 leaders with unconventional learning models. He dedicates his life to finding sustainable solutions and combines digital concepts with Servant Leadership, Indigenous and Buddhist teachings.
Co-Founder & CEO
Connected Business
Jon von Tetzchner is co-founder and CEO of Vivaldi Technologies, the company behind the Vivaldi web browser on desktop, mobile, and in cars. An industry pioneer, Jon has been building browsers since the early days of the web, leading Opera Software for more than 16 years. A proponent of privacy, Jon is clearly setting the bar and bringing back ethical standards to the world of technology.
Co-Founder and CEO
Vivaldi Technologies
Founder of the revenue-sharing service Aslice, Zak Khutoretsky, aka DVS1, is one the world's most revered DJs and prominent voices in preserving true club culture. Known for addressing issues within the electronic scene, DVS1 launched Aslice in 2022, a community-driven platform that encourages DJs to donate a percentage of their fees to the artists whose music they play.
Founder
Aslice
Scott Chacon is the former cofounder of GitHub; now cofounder of GitButler, a next generation version control client, based in Berlin. Scott helped grow GitHub from 4 cofounders to 450 employees over 8 years, eventually being acquired by Microsoft for $7.5 billion. Scott is also the author of Pro Git, published by Apress and found online at git-scm.com.
Co-Founder & CEO
Gitbutler
Carrie is the co-CEO of Clue, the Berlin-based pioneer in femtech and digital health that is a companion for millions of people around the world who want to empower themselves through knowledge, from their first period to their last. She initially joined the company as GC, where she led Clue’s regulatory process for FDA clearance, which approved Clue Birth Control mode as a digital medical device
Co-CEO
Clue by BioWink GmbH
Rene Reinsberg is a Celo co-founder and Celo Foundation president. Celo's blockchain ecosystem is known as web3's "Home of ReFi" (or regenerative finance) with over 1,000 projects in 150+ countries. Previously, he co-founded Locu (acquired by GoDaddy) and has worked at Morgan Stanley, McKinsey, the World Bank, TechnoServe, and General Catalyst. He holds graduate degrees from Germany's WHU & MIT.
.jpg)
Co-Founder
Celo
Jenny Fielding is one of the most active global pre-seed investors, having invested in 300+ companies as the first money in. As the cofounder and Managing Partner of Everywhere Ventures, Jenny has built a thriving community of 500+ founders and operators who help source, diligence, and invest in the next generation of startups across 3 core verticals: money, health, and work.
Managing Partner
Everywhere Ventures
Friederike, a physics PhD, is the cofounder of Gnosis and host of the Epicenter podcast. Gnosis DAO has created numerous essential infrastructure solutions for the Ethereum blockchain, including the widely used Gnosis Safe wallet and Gnosis Chain, a community-run, credibility-neutral public blockchain ecosystem.
Co-Founder
Gnosis
Futurist and entrepreneur, fusing blockchain, design and technology. Trained in architecture and design, Marjorie is recognized as a thought leader and disrupter by co-founding industry-shaping ventures that remain on the forefront of fashion, technology and design including the first web3 market space for digital goods, The Dematerialised; and LUKSO, a Blockchain for the New Creative Economy.
CEO and co-founder
LUKSO
William Pelton is the Co-founder and CEO of pioneering Phytoform, a UK/US company utilizing AI and genome editing to develop genetic solutions for crop enhancement and to promote a sustainable food system. With a PhD in crop genetics from Imperial College London, his passion for applied research sparked the inception of Phytoform, fuelled by his fascination with unlocking the opportunities of plant genetic diversity.
CEO
Phytoform
Philipp Zentner is a technical serial entrepreneur who's built B2B SaaS companies in gaming, biotech, and marketplace intelligence. With LI.FI, he's built a blockchain infrastructure company that has raised $23 Mio. USD within 18 months and grown to above 40 people. LI.FI aggregates crucial DeFi infrastructure, has processed over $1.5bn USD and serves the largest companies in the space.
Founder & CEO
LI.FI
Markus holds a PhD in organic chemistry with studies in Marburg and Edinburgh. He joined BASF in 2001 and gathered experiences in research, controlling, innovation management, asset management and M&A, thereof 3 years in material research for the electronic industry and 8 years in various roles in crop protection. Since 5 years now Markus is leading the successful business incubator of BASF SE.
Managing Director
Chemovator / BASF SE
Niklas Östberg, Co-Founder & CEO of Delivery Hero, began his journey of building the world’s leading local delivery platform back in Sweden in 2007 when he co-founded Pizza.nu. Delivery Hero is the largest global platform for food ordering outside of China, operating in over 70 markets, partnering with hundreds of thousands local restaurants and processing millions of orders a day.
CEO & Co-Founder
Delivery Hero
David Nothacker is the Co-founder and CEO of Sennder, Europe’s leading digital freight-forwarder platform. David co-founded Sennder during his MBA studies at INSEAD. Under his leadership, over 40,000 connected trucks completed more than 1,000,000 FTL shipments. With headquarters in Berlin, the company has more than 1,000 employees across 11 European offices.
.jpg)
Co-founder and CEO
Sennder
Brett Leve is the Co-Founder of Summit, a next-gen community building organization best known for hosting a global ideas festival Forbes called "Davos of Generation Y". He is the Co-Owner of Powder Mountain, America's largest ski resort. Brett is the Co-director of Summit Action Fund and an investor in companies like Uber, Warby Parker, Lyft, Space-X, Liquid Death and Classpass.
Co-founder
Summit
Marissa Giustina, Staff Research Scientist, joined Google’s quantum computing effort in 2016. A hybrid "quantum applied philosopher" and passionate engineer of efficient systems, Giustina’s many hats span the full stack, from device packaging team lead to developer of tools and hardware to make quantum computers more performant. Giustina is a highly-sought speaker for technical and lay audiences.
Research Scientist
Audrey is currently the Co-CEO at Clue, the female health app that helps millions of people better understand their menstrual cycle so they can live full and healthy lives. In this role, she leads product, design, data science, and growth. Before joining Clue, she was Product Lead of the Pinterest Home Feed, Director of Mobile at HotelTonight (acquired by Airbnb), and the first Product Manager at Yelp. She also co-founded, pivoted, navigated the business and emotional roller coaster, and shuttered a photo-sharing startup called Waddle.
Co-CEO
Clue by BioWink GmbH
-min.JPG)
