Investors
William J. Benedict, Jr.
William J. Benedict, Jr. is founder and CEO of Alpine Meridian, an advisory and investment firm that focuses on digital media, financial services, healthcare and electronic payments. He is also Managing Partner of Resource Ventures, a venture capital fund and Chairman of Reach Financial, a specialty finance company. Mr. Benedict is a director of Formtek and Good Health Advertising and has been a member of the board of directors or advisory board of numerous other companies. Investments have included Delphi Systems (sold to AT&T), Telephia (sold to Nielsen), IndustryBrains (sold to Marchex), Orbit Commerce (sold to Digital River), Zinio (sold to Gilvest), Tranvia, Inc (sold to Comdata), VerticalNet (IPO), and AmericanWholeHealth (sold to Axia Health). Advisory clients have included major media, publishing, educational, and Internet infrastructure corporations, as well as many smaller businesses. Alpine Meridian has also created and operated technology-based joint ventures with Time Warner and The Tribune Company. Previously Mr. Benedict was responsible for Societe Generale’s U.S. National Banking Department and futures trading business and was also with Chase Manhattan Bank in New York and Tokyo.
He holds a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of Denver and is a member of the Alumni Board of Governors of The Hotchkiss School.
Lewis Gersh
Lewis, Managing Partner of Gersh Venture Partners (GVP), has been venture investing since 2002 and prior to that was an entrepreneur since 1996. Lewis founded GVP in 2005 based on his start up investment portfolio from 2002. Lewis is actively involved with the portfolio companies, including making direct investments, fundraising, capitalization, M&A, operational strategy, and board management. Lewis graduated from San Diego State University in 1989 with a BA in English & Political Science and seven years later, received his JD and Masters in Intellectual Property Law from Pierce Law in 1996. During the interim, Lewis was an accomplished athlete, competing in Ironman triathlons, marathons and ultra-marathons worldwide while writing freelance articles on the events and doing computer work to pay the bills.
Lewis is a member of the bar of the State of New York as well as the American Intellectual Property Law Association. Lewis is also a trustee of the Franklin Pierce Law Center, an internationally recognized leader in intellectual property education.
Mike Perlis
Mr. Perlis joined SoftBank Capital in 2000 from SoftBank's former subsidiary, Ziff-Davis. He has served as a media industry CEO with over 20 years experience managing a wide range of content and multi-media brands. Until its sale in 2000, Mr. Perlis was President and CEO of Ziff-Davis Publishing. He was responsible for the worldwide management of these pre-eminent technology publishing properties and related products worldwide. Mr. Perlis dramatically repositioned the core Ziff Davis brands from a PC focus to an Internet-centric position. He also directed the partner relationship for content and brand development with ZDNet.
Before joining Ziff-Davis, Mr. Perlis was President and COO at TVSM from 1996 to 1998, the largest publisher of customized television listings and guidance in print and on-line. He directed all strategy and operations, culminating in the sale of the company to NewsCorp.
From 1989 to 1994, Mr. Perlis was the President of the Playboy Publishing Group, overseeing all publishing and related product activity worldwide. The Playboy brand was actively exported overseas during these years, resulting in operations in 17 countries. He also was responsible for the launch of the Playboy new media initiative (playboy.com) and managed the company's direct marketing businesses.
Mr. Perlis was previously the President and CEO of IDG Peterborough, publisher of Gentlemen's Quarterly and built the Rodale Active Sports Network (including the founding of Men's Health and the acquisition of Runner's World). He began his career in media as the co-founder of New England Publications in Camden, Maine.
He serves on the boards of several public and private companies, including Webhire, GSI Commerce, A.V.M. Software, Viacore, Enpocket, World Publishing and Zinio. Mr. Perlis is highly respected as an organizational and marketing professional and is a regular speaker at media and related industry gatherings.
Mr. Perlis graduated from Syracuse University with a BA. He also serves on the board of the Newhouse School of Public Communications and is a trustee of Outward Bound.
Geoff Judge
Geoff Judge is an investor in early stage companies and an active member of The NY Angels. He often works directly with his investments on business strategy and business development. Recently he was the Chief Revenue Officer of Piczo Inc, www.piczo.com, He lead the original angel round of funding for Piczo. Recently he helped Collective Media, a leading online ad network, raise their first round of institutional capital.
Previously Geoff was the COO of Preclick, a Digital Photography software firm with industry leading clients such as Hewlett Packard, Wal-Mart, Costco, and Sandisk.
Geoff is an investor in IndustryBrains (sold to Marchex: MCHX), Collective Media, Preclick, Precision Prospects, Payoneer, Hyperquality, JiWire, Zerve, Good Health Advertising, SchoolLoop, ReImage, & Transactis to name a(NYSE: GCA) Prior to Preclick Mr. Judge was the Chief Operating Officer of Media Solution Services, a subsidiary of Havas (Nasdaq: HAVS).
Prior to Havas Mr. Judge was Senior Vice President & General Manager of the Media Division at 24/7 Real Media, and a co-founder of the company. He was formerly the President and COO of Interactive Imaginations (II), one of the 3 companies that merged to form 24/7 Media in 1997.
Prior to joining II, Mr. Judge was Vice President, Marketing for iMarket Inc., a venture-backed software company, ranked #27 on the Inc. 500 in 1996. Before iMarket, Mr. Judge spent 9 years at American Express in the Card Division in several roles including VP and General Manager, Travel & Corporate Insurance Group and VP Marketing, New Cardmember Group.
Mr. Judge received an M.B.A. from Columbia University and a B.A. in Economics from Northwestern. He is a founding board member of Children for Children and a Trustee for the Sacred Heart School in Manhattan. He lives in NYC with his wife and 3 children.
Mark Walsh
Mr. Walsh is the Chief Technology Advisor for the Democratic National Committee. He is the first person to have that job, and is responsible for bringing the Party and its tactics into the 21st Century. He has been in the interactive services/internet industry for 16 years.
Previously, Mark was the Chairman and Chief Strategy Officer of VerticalNet, Inc. Mark joined VerticalNet in August 1997 as President and CEO, and was appointed to Chairman in July 2000. VerticalNet is an enterprise software and services company that uses the Internet to help companies transact and collaborate.
Previously, he was a Senior VP and Corporate Officer at America Online. He ran AOL Enterprise, the business-to-business division of AOL. He founded the group. He also was President of GE's interactive services division.
He is currently the Chairman of Impulse Radio, a software and services company in the growing field of Digital Radio. The company services a number of Broadcast Radio stations and hardware/receiver manufacturers.
Mark serves or has served as a board member of the Software and Information Industry Association, the President's Advisory Group of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, and the Standard for Internet Commerce. He also serves or has served on a number of corporate and not for profit boards, including Union College, New York Times Digital, Blackboard Inc., and the Philadelphia Orchestra, amongst others. He graduated from Harvard Business School with an MBA, where he was editor in chief of the student newspaper, and received his undergraduate degree from Union College in Schenectady NY. In 2000, Mark was named one of Business Week's e.biz 25, and was recently named by Upside Magazine to the Elite 100, the hundred most influential people in technology. He has been interviewed or quoted in a wide variety of national and international publications, and has appeared on a number of national and global business television programs.
Ivan Inerfeld
In addition to participating in the organization of Internet Capital Group ("ICG") and seeking investors, Mr. Inerfeld was responsible for establishing ICG's strategy in the area of business-to-business, and content and all it facilitates (i.e. advertising, e-commerce and transactions). He is the Creator of one of the ICG portfolio companies, VerticalNet, Inc., and was its Chairman and CEO. ICG was founded in March 1996 to invest exclusively in Internet related companies and bring a new vision of partnership and collaboration to the marriage of capital and innovation. The firm's investment philosophy is long-term and its investment model stresses integration and cross-fertilization among Internet software, content and service organizations in its portfolio.
Prior to joining Internet Capital Group, Mr. Inerfeld served as an advisor to numerous national and international companies in the media industry for over twenty-five years. Mr. Inerfeld sDirector of Media and a Director of Mergers and Acquisitions for two of the "big six" public accounting firms. He was also an Executive Vice President of International Thomson Business Press, Inc., assisting foreign management with their U.S. acquisition strategy, and directing the assimilation and operation of seventeen subsidiaries having fifty-five trade/consumer magazines and twenty newsletters. Mr. Inerfeld served as President and Chief Operating Officer of Regal Communications Corporation where he managed the strategic restructuring of this publicly held, financially troubled, $200-millon direct-response electronic-marketing company. As President of Tiger Direct, Inc., a publicly held $100 million catalog publisher of computer and software products, he organized its operations and successfully positioned the Company as an acquisition candidate.
Mr. Inerfeld knows the Media Industry. He has written numerous articles and chapters in key industry publications and reference books. Additionally, he has given many speeches and presentations at Stanford University, industry seminars and industry trade groups. Mr. Inerfeld is a CPA and holds a degree in Business Administration from Pace University, and has completed advanced management courses at both Harvard University and The Wharton School.
Erik Matlick - CEO
Mr. Matlick oversees all of Madison Logic's business operations. He has over 15 years of strategic leadership and management experience in media & e-businesses. Prior to founding Madison Logic, Mr. Matlick founded IndustryBrains, which was acquired by Marchex, Inc. Prior to founding IndustryBrains, Mr. Matlick was the President and Founder of MediaBrains where he is responsible for the vision, leadership, growth, and fund raising. He created over 100 partnerships with media companies including McGraw-Hill, Time Inc., Ziff-Davis Media, and American Express. Prior to MediaBrains, he served as an Ad Sales Manager for Ziff-Davis Publishing where he was responsible for ad sales at PC Computing and Windows Sources Magazines. Mr. Matlick is also on the Board of Advisors for Fetchback, an innovative behavioral targeting technology company. He holds a B.S. in Marketing from the Syracuse University School of Management. He has presented at many industry conferences and is frequently quoted in major media publications including Newsweek, Cnet and MediaPost.
Elke Wong
Ms. Wong is an experienced online media executive with over 10 years of demonstrated success in both start-up and established business environments. She has a diverse background of sales, operations, marketing and technical product management with particular strength in understanding customer needs, developing market requirements, and ensuring that high value products get built.
Ms. Wong was one of the co-founders of IndustryBrains which was acquired by Marchex in July 2005. There, she was responsible for the overall vision, planning and marketing for IndustryBrains' different product lines. Prior to IndustryBrains, Ms. Wong was an Account Manager and Product Manager at MediaBrains, managing buyers guide platforms for business publishers. She left MediaBrains to start up IndustryBrains with Erik Matlick. Prior to MediaBrains, Ms. Wong was a Sponsorship Sales Specialist at DoubleClick, creating integrated ad programs for clients such as Loreal, SONY, BMG and Random House. She holds a B.A. in Anthropology from the State University of New York, Binghamton.