Lehigh's Innovators Alliance and the Lehigh Professional Alliance Program
invite you to:
Lehigh's Startup Nation:
How the Lehigh community is successfully investing and developing some of the most innovative startups today
Tuesday, December 11
5:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m.
featuring
Kathleen Egan '90
COO and Co-Founder
Ecomedes
Kevin Freedman'95
Founder
NextPhase Partners
Paul Huish'05
CEO and Founder
DroneHive
and a special demonstration of DITTO by
Kati Pease '09
Director of Operations
DITTO
Join us for an evening of networking and conversation as we discuss how the Lehigh community is successfully navigating, investing, and innovating the entrepreneurial landscape. Hear how alumni are tackling the current challenges and finding the right investors to find success.
Our evening also includes a special interactive networking session for Lehigh professionals looking to connect with other successful alumni in their respective fields.
The program begins promptly at 5:30 p.m. and is immediately followed by a reception.
Cost to attend: $35/person includes light hors d'oeuvres and a hosted bar reception.
About our Speakers:
Kathleen Egan'90:
Kathleen is a serial entrepreneur focused on using data to drive solutions commerce. She is currently the COO of Ecomedes, a software platform that removes the friction from eco-procurement for the built environment thereby reducing the environmental impact of buildings.
Kathleen started her career in consulting at Accenture before moving into the fashion industry at Chanel and Calvin Klein. Next, she raised capital for an early internet service called MyTeam.com. Since 1999 she has worked for seven software start-ups in the Bay Area and has helped three to successful exits. She helped build ProfitLogic into the first Pricing Optimization provider through it's acquired by Oracle. She remained at Oracle for five years and went on to lead Sales Consulting for the Retail Global Business Unit. She was the SVP of Science and Services for Revionics, a global SaaS provider of science-based pricing, promotion, space and competitive insight for innovative retailers. Most recently, she was the VP of Customer Success and Operations for Wiser, a leader in omni-channel retail competitive intelligence.
She graduated from Lehigh University with a BS IE and from Harvard with an MBA. She has been a passionate environmental activist for over a decade, working with great organizations like Surfrider, The Five Gyres, Save the Waves. She lives in Ocean Beach, SF with her husband and three year old son where she enjoys surfing and building sand castles.
Paul Huish'05:
Paul founded DroneHive in 2016 to fill the need that corporations have for professional drone expert services. He has more than a dozen years of experience in resource management in technical contract labor and staff augmentation, most of it for multinational corporations in heavily regulated industries. At DroneHive, he is responsible for company strategy and business operations. He also oversees the sales and marketing teams.
Prior to founding DroneHive, Paul helped build a global resource management firm supporting the highly-regulated drug and medical device manufacturing companies. In his eight years at Validant, he helped build it from a start-up to more than a $100 million in annual revenue. He is an expert at helping clients manage resources and create jobs without a long-term commitment during periods of uncertain growth.
Paul holds a B.S. degree in Finance from Lehigh University and started his career as a financial analyst on Wall Street. He is a certified remote pilot and spends his free time with his wife and son enjoying the outdoors.
Kevin Freedman'95
Kevin is the founder of NextPhase Partners, a startup advisory firm focused on supporting entrepreneurs as they work to scale their companies through the roller coaster of early stage startup life. Prior to founding NextPhase, he was a partner at Khosla Ventures, a leading venture capital firm with more $5 billion under management. Kevin transitioned to the VC world after more than 15 years of operating experience, with leadership roles in both consumer and enterprise technology companies. He was the CEO of Quid, a leading SaaS business intelligence platform, which Fortune 500 companies from Intel and McKinsey to Samsung and Barclays, among others, utilize to better understand the web’s unstructured data. Prior to Quid, he was an early executive at Slide, where he built out the company’s business functions as they scaled to 150 million monthly users, and ultimately drove the acquisition by Google (GOOG) as CFO. Earlier in his career, Kevin held a variety of senior operating roles at eBay and PayPal. His initial entrée into Silicon Valley began with Half.com, which was acquired by eBay (EBAY) in July 2000.
Kevin holds a bachelor’s of science degree in accounting from Lehigh University. Growing up as a Philadelphia sports fan, Kevin remains an Eagles season ticket holder and (no longer has to) hold out hope they will one day win a Super Bowl championship.
About Kati Pease and DITTO
Kati Pease is the Director of Operations at DITTO where she leads Client Success and the Digital Asset Team. She manages client relationships across the globe and leads the charge to build the digital glasses used in the company's core technology. Kati has dedicated her career to working with passionate, diverse teams in solving complex operational challenges. Prior to joining DITTO, she was a Strategy and Operations Consultant at PwC, and before that she worked at Lockheed Martin in production, supply chain, and quality roles building fighter jets and missiles. Kati holds an MBA from the UC Berkeley Haas School of Business and an Industrial Engineering Degree from Lehigh University.
DITTO sits at the intersection of augmented reality, artificial intelligence, computer vision, machine learning, retail, and fashion. At DITTO, we are revolutionizing how people shop for glasses with our omnichannel virtual try-on, facial analysis, and frame recommendation technology platform. We license our technology platform to the world’s best eyewear retailers who integrate it into their in-store and online shopping experiences to make finding the right pair of glasses exciting, data-driven, and easy. Over 300K customers use our technology every day!
About Lehigh's Innovators Alliance:
The Lehigh Innovators Alliance is committed to connecting alumni and university partners who are focused in the areas of entrepreneurship, innovation, technology, and design. The mission of Lehigh's Innovators Alliance is to promote the advancement of all industries through innovation and to encourage diversity for all who have an entrepreneurial mindset; to enhance the opportunity for Lehigh students and alumni to enter and advance their ideas, careers, or businesses; to contribute to the academic endeavors and mission of Lehigh University; and to strengthen our reputation.
About Lehigh's Professional Alliance Program:
Lehigh’s Professional Alliance Program brings together alumni in professional communities. The professional alliance program is focused on helping the Lehigh community build their business and networks, grow contacts, and drive their career development. Through innovative events — both in-person and online — the alliances create engagement opportunities for alumni in all professional areas to connect with other alumni and to build on the educational foundation established at Lehigh University throughout every stage of their career.