AGENDA
11:30 - 12:30PM: Registration , Networking and Lunch
12:30 - 1:30PM: Panel Discussion topic: Art of Negotiation
01:30 - 3:00PM: NIT PowerConnect - Network with purpose sessions
03:00 - 3:30PM: Networking
FEATURED SPEAKERS
Raju Reddy(CEO & Founder, Sierra Atlantic)
Panel Member: Art of Negotiation
Bio
Raju is the Founder and CEO of Sierra Atlantic, a company that grew to be a best-in-class global services company over a period of 18 years and under his leadership was consistently ranked amongst the best managed companies. Sierra Atlantic was acquired by Hitachi Consulting in December 2010. Prior to founding Sierra Atlantic in 1993, he spent 10 years at Intel in software development, marketing, and general management. Reddy is a member of the BITS Pilani Board of Directors and a Charter member of TiE Silicon Valley. He served as a member of the Board of Trustees for Puente, a Wharton School non-profit program which helps under privileged communities worldwide gain access to technology. He also co-founded SIPA (Silicon Valley Indian Professional Association in 1987.
Raju serves on the boards of both Hitachi Consulting U.S. and Hitachi Consulting India entities.
Raju holds a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from BITS Pilani and a Master of Science degree in computer science from Virginia Tech.
Anil Advani(Managing Partner, Inventus Law)
Powerconnect Session Topic: Legal Issues for Startups
Abstract:
So, you have decided to start a company. There are a host of decisions you need to make as a founder like whether to bootstrap the venture- perhaps from revenues from your consulting gig- finding office space or converting your garage into an office, hiring the right team that will work well with each other and with you, and whether to offshore development of your core technology. While founders focus on these critical decision points, they often end up overlooking one of the most important areas of the venture’s development: Legal issues for Startups.
While there are a number of factors that go into the making of a successful startup, taking care of the legal set up, founder stock issuance and related formation matters correctly and in a timely manner will largely determine whether or not the founders end up making any money from the success of their ventures.
Come and listen to a leading silicon valley corporate lawyer, Anil Advani, as he discusses the various legal issues that need to be addressed by the founders and startups at an early stage like structuring of the company’s initial capitalization, issuance of founder stock, vesting and acceleration for founder stock, election of the company’s board and officers, and seed capital. This will also be a great opportunity to ask any questions on any specific issues you currently face in forming your own venture.
Bio
Mr. Advani's practice focuses on the formation, financing and general corporate counseling of emerging companies and technology businesses. He also has an active practice representing India-focused emerging companies, investment banks, financial institutions and venture funds, both in the United States and in India.
He is the principal at Inventus Law, and was most recently of counsel and Head of the India practice at Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe. Before joining Orrick, Mr. Advani was General Counsel and Vice President of SemIndia, a pioneering effort to establish semiconductor manufacturing in India. As General Counsel for SemIndia, Mr. Advani was responsible for coordinating with the Government of India in formulating a comprehensive semiconductor policy for India as well as with the State of Andhra Pradesh in structuring Fab City on the outskirts of the city of Hyderabad.
Prior to joining SemIndia, Mr. Advani was a Senior Associate in the Silicon Valley offices of Cooley Godward where his practice focused on representation of emerging companies and the venture funds and banks that finance those companies. Mr. Advani began his legal career as an attorney in India where he practiced for a number of years at the High Court of Delhi.
In the last over ten years practicing law in Silicon Valley, Mr. Advani has represented more than 230 startup companies, and numerous founders, venture capital investors, angel investors, and venture lending and leasing sources on legal issues relating to formation, founder issues, consulting and advisory arrangements, capital structuring, angel financings, venture financings, debt financings, leasing, mergers and acquisitions, and India-related issues.
Mr. Advani has a Bachelor of Commerce (with honors) from Delhi University, Bachelor of Laws from the Faculty of Law, Delhi University, and a Master of Laws from Georgetown University Law Center, Washington, D.C.
Mr. Advani is licensed to practice law in California, New York and India.
N.S. Sambamurthy, NSS Lab works LLC
Powerconnect Session Topic: The Startup Reality show:
"The Angry Birds" as a role model
Abstract:
The Reality -it is very difficult to be "successful" in this world; And if you get "lucky" to make it big, then it is even more difficult to keep it up. A candid roundtable discussion about what it takes to be an Entrepreneur based on real life experiences of two "hands-on" past startups, work in progress on a third one; And investor and advisor on three current active startups and two that shut down.
Suggested background material to read/view before the discussion:
Dave McClure's ‘Why not to do a startup’ - WARNING: Dave is famous for his extreme "language";
BIO
N.S. Sambamurthy is a Silicon Valley serial entrepreneur in the Hi-Tech industry. Incubating several prototype technologies using customer case studies to address new emerging business issues at the intersection of mobile, enterprise computing, sensors, cloud computing, location based services and Digital Identity. Focused on applicatio ns and IT usage models requiring new foundational capabilities for infrastructure protection while maintaining both personal and business secrets. Actively engaged as adviser and board member of several Hi-tech companies with focus on Social Media, Big data analytics, and Human resource management . Holds BSEE and MSEE degrees, with multiple patents on Ethernet and data communications technology.
Carl Tanner, VP Public Relations, Silicon Valley Ruby Powerconnect Session Topic: Starting up with Ruby on Rails
Abstract:
Are you interested in joining hot startup and make millions of dollars? Majority of startups are using Ruby on Rails. Ruby programming is the hottest skill required for majority of startups. 1 Ruby developer = 3 Java developers. Are you curious about what Ruby on Rails is, how it can create value for your organization, and how to create an application in the cloud? Well then, this series of sessions is for you. Starting June fifth, and over the summer, we will explore these topics in a hands-on way.
Carl Tanner has had a love affair with Ruby on Rails for more than two years now. He is an officer at Silicon Valley Ruby and has teamed with fellow developers to create Ruby on Rails applications for both fun and profit. Carl loves to share how Ruby on Rails works.
Glenn Noga, Ex-CIO, Polycom
Powerconnect Session Topic: Selling to A CIO
BIO
Glenn has served as CIO/CTO for leading companies including Polycom, Handspring, Miadora.com, and Robert Half International. He also spent 16 years with Andersen Consulting, rising to Partner within the global consulting organization. While at Andersen, Glenn worked with a range of global companies in a variety of industries, including computer software, transportation, and manufacturing.
Glenn has a Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree in Industrial Engineering from Stanford University.
Dr. Shashidhar Gandham(MTS, Google & NITian)
Powerconnect Session Topic: Salary Negotiation
Abstract
Many of us dislike negotiating because we are afraid of being taken advantage of, especially when we believe that we are in a weak position. Salary negotiations provide a classic example. Has the fear of rejection – of losing the job or antagonizing your boss – kept you from putting your best foot forward in negotiating your livelihood?
Every new job - every performance review, in fact - is an opportunity to negotiate base salary, various kinds of bonuses, benefits, stock options, and other incentives that add to job satisfaction and provide financial security. Taking control of your job search before your job offer and conducting a smart search that takes into account more than just financial considerations can also lead to that elusive condition called happiness.
BIO
Shashidhar Gandham received Bachelor of Technology degree from NIT-Warangal in 1999 and Ph.D. in Computer science from University of Texas at Dallas in 2006. He worked as software engineering manager in xG Technology a wireless start-up based in Fort Lauderdale, FL and as Tech. lead at Cisco. Currently he is member technical staff at Google, Inc. His research interests are in wireless networking, distributed computing and combinatorial optimization problems. He has over 20 patent applications pending and 13 publications in peer reviewed journals and conferences.
During his tenure at xG he was instrumental in building a software engineering team of 24 members. He mentored several new graduates in handling their job search and salary negotiations. As someone who was on either side of the negotiation table he will cover why, when and how of salary negotiation.
Michael Chen(College Financial Aid & High Income Tax Planning Specialist)
Powerconnect Session Topic: How to pay for your child's 4-year college Education without spending your life's savings
Abstract:
For quite a few years, Mastermind College Funding Group has been successfully helping many families to get the college financial aid and/or big tax saving. The families can be categorized to the following group:
For more info, please visit website: www.[masked].com
BIO
Michael is the leading College Financial Aid & High Income Tax Planning expert in the Bay Area, California. With over years of experience in the Financial Services industry, He felt that there were no "true" specialists in the College Funding arena, and that there was a ton of misinformation in the media with regards to college planning that was costing familes just like yours thousands more for college! Thereafter, He decided to strictly focus his practice on this area and have become expert in College Funding Planning. He is also the author of “How To Pay For Your Child's 4-Year College Education Without Spending Your Life's Savingsâ€
Kuldip Malhotra(CEO, Mikasafunding & NITian)
Powerconnect Session Topic: How to thrive in Down real Estate Market?
Kuldip has experience in Residential, Commercial Mortgages, Buying, and Selling of properties and Investments. Savvy REO investor.
He worked in the Silicon Valley as Electrical Engineer in various engineering and management positions . Kuldip started the Real Estate Company in 2004. Being an Engineer, he understands the needs of professionals and their financial situations. Having lived in the bay area since 1976, he knows the valley well. He is diligent in conducting market research and work with his clients to match their requirements quickly. He takes pride in his negotiation skills to get the best deals. His extensive and diverse experience in financial analysis, transaction structuring and management skills enable him to provide sound guidance to his clients.
He worked in the Silicon Valley high tech for various companies including Zilog, Memorex, Adaptec and LSI(1977-2004)
He holds B.Tech(EE) , NIT Kurukshetra (1973) and M.S (E.E.) San Jose State 1977
Panel Moderator: Sridhar Muppalla
Panel Discussion Topic: Art of Negotiation
Abstract:
Most of us lack negotiating skills so we are reluctant to get into negotiations. However, for professionals it! ’s essential to be able to negotiate a fair and balanced deal, otherwise the relationship will ultimately fail. The objective of the Art of Negotiation is to help NITians understand the need for negotiating. Negotitation skills can be used to get dream salary/compensation at a new company, to get promotion at the current company, winning a business deal etc.
BIO Sridhar has 17 years of experience in software, sales, marketing, finance, business development, virtualization, cloud computing, networking, security, and mobile areas of the high-tech industry and spent the last 14 years at Sun Microsystems in various technical roles. He started his career at Wipro Systems in India after graduation and later worked at Siemens-Pyramid in the United States.
Sridhar has been part of a number of start-ups and made successful investments in various business ventures in India and abroad over the past decade. Sridhar is co-owner of Bondit Construction Chemicals (NIT Alumnus) based in India. He co-founded Convalidi, a startup by NIT Alumni that provided consulting and analytical services to mobile unit manufacturers.
Sridhar was a Membership Chair at Silicon Valley Association of Startup Entrepreneurs (SVASE). He has been on the board of SEERS (a non-profit organization for the betterment of disadvantaged Indians) since 2005 and sponsors various programs to provide capacity building support to poor and economic support to financially disadvantaged students.
Sridhar received a BS in Computer Science & Engineering from National Institute of Technology – Warangal (NITW) in 1993 and an MS in Engineering Management from Santa Clara University in 2001. Sridhar is a passionate and active member of the NIT Alumni Association and is the NIT Brand Ambassador.
Thanks,
Sridhar Muppalla(NIT Brand Ambassador)
Pradeep Chalicheemala(NIT Event Organizer)