The Global Startup Movement - Startup Ecosystem Leaders, Global Entrepreneurship, and Emerging Market Innovation

Leland Rice is the co-founder and CEO of Dedalus Global, an investment advisory firm focusing on emerging markets and emerging technologies. Chairment of the African Fintech Summit, is a global initiative to bring the issues, entrepreneurs, and opportunities revolutionizing finance in Africa to the world’s stage. This bi-annual event occurs each April in Washington, D.C., in conjunction with the spring meetings of the World Bank and IMF, and each November in a different African city. How niche does Leland feel a conference should be? How niche does Leland feel a conference should be? What are the biggest questions and challenges Dadalus is solving? What is the current conversation about blockchain in East Africa?

Mark Organ is the CEO and Founder of Influitive, which helps B2B companies mobilize their army of advocates for more rapid and profitable revenue growth. They leverage partners' past successes to produce massive increases in referral leads, reference calls, social media participation and more. Mark first revolutionized B2B marketing as the founding CEO of Eloqua, a world leader in marketing automation software, which was acquired by Oracle for $871M. Throughout his life, Mark has lived in Toronto, Silicon Valley, Chicago and Singapore. He has founded 6 companies, raised more than 15 rounds of financing, hired over 250 people, and built 7 offices around the world. On this episode you'll learn: What are some of the differences in starting a company the second time around? What are the differences in funding impact when obtained via angel investors vs local capital? What advice does Mark have to entrepreneurs navigating exiting a company for the first time?

Ryan Carson is the CEO & Founder of Treehouse, an online technology school that takes people from zero experience to job-ready in as little as six months. Ryan also founded Carsonified and DropSend. He graduated from Colorado State University in 2000 with a degree in Computer Science. He then moved to the United Kingdom, where he ended up meeting his wife. He and his wife and two boys now live in Portland, Oregon. On this episode you'll learn: How did Ryan and his company end up in Portland, Oregon? What has Ryan learned about creating and scaling a company culture? What is Ryan's stance on internal workforce development?

Lukonga Lindunda is co-founder and Executive Director of BongoHive, supporting the launch and growth of enterprises while making Zambia the next hotbed of innovation in Africa. His mission is to elevate Lusaka and the rest of Zambia as a top destination to live, work, learn, and play by helping entrepreneurs, startups, and growth companies to start, stay, and prosper in the local ecosystem. He has previously provided technical assistance in educational projects and programs by building sustainable and affordable ICT infrastructure and support systems. On this episode you'll learn: Back in 2011, what did Lukonga see that made him think Lusaka and Zambia needed an incubator or innovation hub? What niches are thriving locally in Lusaka? What is the sentiment towards bitcoin in Lusaka and how has it has evolved over the past year?

Quan Le is the Founder of Binkabi, a cross-border agricultural trading platform that leverages blockchain technology. Binkabi's core innovation empowers people in developing countries to trade securely and cheaply without the use of a hard currency. Quan also worked with PWC for almost 17 years in London, Sydney, and Hanoi. On this episode you'll learn: What impact can drone technologies have on farmers in emerging markets? What impact can drone technologies have on farmers in emerging markets? What was the innovation in the Barter Block protocol that Quan created? How are the challenges different between African farmers and farmers in South East Asia?

Howard A. Tullman is the former CEO of 1871 and serves as the General Managing Partner for G2T3V, LLC and for the Chicago High Tech Investors, LLC; he is a Director of SnapSheet, Keeper Security, Dibit and VEHCON. 1871 is a non-profit startup hub located in Chicago. 1871 was founded in May 2012 and is home to over 495 digital startups. On this episode you'll learn: Does Howard see Edtech as a disruptive force, or a supplementary force to the current infrastructure? As a community incubator hub, is it better to focus your resources on a select number of outperforming startups, or to deploy more of a "spray and pray" approach? Where is the future of Edtech headed?

Marcus Dantus is the CEO and Founder of Startup Mexico, a facility specially designed to host aspiring entrepreneurs, startups, professional services, seed capital funds, university initiatives and corporations in Mexico. He also founded Mexico.com, Mexico's first online community and internet portal, as well as several other successful Mexican tech companies. He is also a shark on the show "Shark Tank Mexico". On this episode you'll learn: Why have Mexican corporates been slow to become a part of the local startup ecosystem through investment and acquisitions? Are there any unique challenges in building a startup in Mexico? Marcus has said before that "in Latin America we are very creative but not innovators", what does he mean by that?

Martin Villig is co-founder of Taxify, a leading ride-hailing platform in 40 cities across Europe and Africa. Taxify has over 10M riders and 120K drivers worldwide. Martin is passionate about community initiatives to promote entrepreneurship and help people in Baltics and Estonia to build tech startups. On this episode you'll learn: Having raised just 2 Million Euro before Taxify's latest fundraise, how does Martin think about capital efficiency vs. speedy growth into international markets? What is Martin's secret sauce when it comes to launching a successful community hub for Estonia's startup ecosystem? How did Martin and Taxify approach market research when approaching their expansion strategy into Africa?

Allie Burns is the Managing Director at Village Capital and brings more than 16 years of experience working with entrepreneurs and innovators at the intersection of tech and social change. Allie works across Village Capital's program in emerging markets including Nairobi, Bangalore, and Mexico City. She previously ran Communications for Startup America, Revolution, the Case Foundation, and AOL.

On this episode you'll learn:

-Why are we seeing a resurgence of funds reentering the Cleantech market?

-Why do CEO's need to spend more time early on in recruiting top talent?

-Why does Village Capital conduct their due diligence process differently than traditional venture capital?