Michael Aronson

Co-founder & Managing Partner of MentorTech Ventures

Michael Aronson is a Co-founder and Managing Partner of MentorTech Ventures and is an internationally recognized business educator, venture investor and serial entrepreneur with substantial breadth of experience and expertise in advising and assisting early stage software and related services companies. He serves on the Board and Finance and Investment Committees of the Ben Franklin Technology Fund of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, which successfully invests in early stage software, biotech and manufacturing technology companies.

Michael was a senior lecturer and faculty member at the Wharton School for more than 20 years. He began his teaching career at the Wharton School as a teaching assistant, became a senior lecturer and moved to teaching in the Undergraduate, Graduate and Executive MBA programs. Afterwards Michael was a faculty member for numerous Senior Executive Education courses, including the Wharton Executive Development program which was based upon a simulation model of a global high technology ecosystem that he developed. Michael was also involved in the Wharton ebusiness Fellows program, teaching simulation models of internet ecommerce

Colin Evans

Founder & Managing Partner of Sandwith Ventures, LLC

Colin M. Evans is the Founder and Managing Partner of Sandwith Ventures, LLC, a San Francisco and Philadelphia based investment firm focusing on angel and early stage investments founded in January, 2007. Sandwith Ventures, LLC focuses investment in three main sectors:  1) retail and consumer oriented e-commerce  2) internet marketplaces and  3) online marketing and advertising services. Investments are concentrated in the Bay Area and Philadelphia, but SV will also look at deals on the East Coast as far south as Washington, D.C. and as far north as New York City.

Previous to launching Sandwith Ventures, Colin was a Co-Founder, member of the Executive Team and Vice President of Sales and Business Development at StubHub.com, a successful online ticket exchange founded in 2000 and sold to eBay in early 2007. Colin oversaw four main functions while at StubHub including all sports and music sponsorships, business development partnerships, corporate sales and the LargeSeller program, which aggregated and serviced all the inventory providers on StubHub.

Howard Snyder

Corporate Finance Executive

Howard Snyder is an experienced corporate finance, commercial lending and business management executive with over 20 years of diverse industry experience.  On behalf of national and regional investment banking firms, he has advised a wide range of middle market companies on corporate finance transactions such as mergers and acquisitions, private equity investments, management buyouts, strategic alternative analysis, acquisition target searches and business valuations. His experience has focused on closely held and family owned manufacturing, distribution and business service companies.  In total, he has advised on over $1 billion of corporate finance transactions.

Prior to establishing his independent advisory firm, Howard Snyder was a Vice President at Curtis Financial Group, a Philadelphia based regional investment banking firm.  Previously, he opened a Philadelphia office for Matrix Capital Markets Group, a Richmond based investment banking firm and subsidiary of The MONY Group (NYSE: MNY).  For the five prior years, Howard served as a Vice President and one of the initial members of PricewaterhouseCoopers Securities, LLC, the investment banking business of the Big Four accounting firm.

Chris Stanchak

Founder & CEO of TicketLeap

As Founder and CEO of TicketLeap.com, Chris Stanchak is responsible for the company's overall leadership, strategy and direction. He is well-versed in the design and management of large-scale eCommerce operations. Previously, he worked at GSI Commerce, a global eCommerce leader, where he managed the National Hockey League's online operations.

Prior to his eCommerce experience, Chris worked as an IBM systems integration consultant. He managed the migration of banks, hospitals and schools from Mainframe to Client/Server architectures. He has handled critical technology for several Fortune 500 companies in the Mid-Atlantic region.

Chris is an honors graduate of The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, with dual concentrations in management and marketing. He lives in Center City Philadelphia - just two blocks from TicketLeap headquarters. Chris is an active member of the tech entrepreneurship community in Philadelphia.

James Thompson

Director of Wharton Societal Wealth Program

James Thompson is Co-founder and Director of the Wharton Societal Wealth Program (WSWP). He teaches innovation, corporate growth and dynamic strategy in Wharton Executive Education programs.

Prior to joining the academic world he was divisional Director of a public South African company. James holds a BCom from the University of South Africa and an MBA from the University of Cape Town Graduate School of Business. He concluded a research fellowship in the commercialization of technology at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and is a PhD candidate in the management of technology at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland working on field research in the application of WSWP programs.