Philly Tech Week 2018

Timothy Wenhold is equal parts entrepreneur technologist. Wenhold turned down a scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania to begin his journey as an entrepreneur. He founded his third company, Sintaks, in 1985, sold it to Canon in 1998, and then started and grew three more companies. In 2007, Power became a client of Wenhold’s systems innovation company, Data in Motion. Wenhold learned every intricacy of the company in order to architect the best, most relevant technology, impressing Power leadership every step of the way. In 2012, Wenhold joined Power full time as their Chief Innovation Officer and in 2017 became a partner.

In his role, Wenhold is responsible for all aspects of technology, including NITRO, Power’s unique, state-of-the-art collaborative intelligence platform that enables seamless, real-time communication across Power’s 21 states and thousands of employees. Wenhold is focused on innovating for the future, continuously developing the technical strategy and human capital to support Power’s rapid growth. He oversees an international team of creators, including developers, engineers, and designers. Under Wenhold’s leadership, technology has been integrated into Power’s cultural fabric, creating a true digital identity across the entire company.

Timothy's educational background doesn't start in a top university. In spite of having a scholarship to the University of Pennsylvania, Timothy decided to tackle life first—going on the road with a band and financing the tour himself. After a year of truly experiencing life, Timothy returned home in debt and needed to figure out his next move. After a series of jobs in varying industries from aerospace to engineering, he found his home in computers, technology and innovation. In 1985 he founded Sintaks, a regional systems integrator working with clients such as ARAMARK, GMAC, SEI, etc. After growing the company for more than 10 years, Timothy sold Sintaks to Cannon in 1996 as Cannon viewed this acquisition as strategic to their goal of connected devices. The entrepreneur bug had taken hold of Timothy, so he went on to start, grow and sell multiple technology companies, laying the groundwork for the creation of Data In Motion, a systems innovation company. Power became a customer of the company in 2007 before finally integrating the company fully into the technology division of Power in 2012. Timothy currently resides in Collegeville, PA.

Morgan is a Principal with Genacast Ventures where his responsibilities include evaluating investment opportunities, sourcing new deals, and managing the growth of existing portfolio companies.

Prior to joining Genacast, Morgan worked at Bloomberg Beta, the venture firm backed by Bloomberg. He also spent time as a software engineer at Tapad and Market-Based Management instructor at the Charles Koch Institute. Morgan earned his BS from Northeastern University.

As Vice President of Institutional Advancement and Strategic Partnerships at Peirce College, a higher education institution that has been educating working adults for over 150 years, Uva Coles is leading the way for strengthening and diversifying Philadelphia's workforce. Throughout her career Coles has focused on creating inclusive and equitable workforce collaborations that align education, skills, and purpose. Coles has played a key role in the workforce steering committee, which designed the city’s new workforce initiative, “Fueling Philadelphia’s Talent Engine,” officially launched in February. As an Afro-Latina immigrant, Coles also focuses on and speaks to immigrant and Afro-Latinx issues and the intersectionality of gender and race.

Joseph C. Guagliardo is a partner at Pepper Hamilton LLP resident in the Philadelphia and New York offices, where he co- leads the Technology Group and is Chair of the Blockchain Practice. His practice focuses on technology transactions and general counseling around technology and intellectual property commercialization. Prior to practicing law, Joe spent more than a decade at an international venture-backed Fintech company, where he served in various technical and business roles in the design and implementation of capital markets trading and settlement software for banks around the world. He is a technology enthusiast and avid follower of the technology industry and related legal trends. Joe is a sought-after speaker and author on emerging technology- related topics, including the far-reaching applications of blockchain and smart contract technology in government, the private sector and law. In 2017, he was named a “Top Author” in the JD Supra Readers' Choice Awards for his thought leadership on the emerging topic of blockchain.

Ellen is responsible for managing and leading the development and implementation of the City’s first smart city strategy for the City of Philadelphia’s SmartCityPHL initiative. She is driving the creation of the City’s first smart city roadmap that will provide guidance on how the city will build its next generation and future technology infrastructure. This work includes the establishment of: a project prioritization model; investment strategies; a collaborative governance model; diverse cross-departmental and cross-sector relationships; flexible standards for interoperable technology adoption and data integration; and stronger community and university partnerships to spur research and innovation in service delivery, economic development, environmental stewardship, and digital inclusion. She supports the work of the innovation strategy portfolio which is aimed in increasing internal capacity for innovation in municipal government. As a Temple University alum, she received her Bachelor of Arts degree in English and Master of Science degree in City and Regional Planning.

Pavel Veller serves as EPAM’s CTO, Digital Engagement Practice, where he brings nearly 20 years of diverse experience building and releasing complex software systems and digital products using Java, C#, Ruby, JavaScript and more. Over the course of his 13-year career at EPAM, Mr. Veller has successfully led large global teams on end-to-end implementations for leading consumer products, hospitality, retail and healthcare companies. A few highlights of his work include building customer engagement, eCommerce and customer support bots with Microsoft, Amazon Alexa and AWS Lambda; integrating, customizing and extending digital products, such as Adobe AEM and Marketing Cloud, SAP Hybris, Sitecore, SDL Tridion/Web, Salesforce, for companies in North America and Europe; and migrating a large, complex loyalty system off of a DB2 mainframe and onto a modern Java-based micro/macro-services architecture.

David Dylan Thomas serves as Principal, Content Strategy at Think Company and is the creator and host of the Cognitive Bias Podcast. He has developed digital strategies for major clients in entertainment, healthcare, publishing, finance, and retail. A co-organizer of Content Strategy Philly, he previously consulted at the Corzo Center for the Creative Economy and is the creator, director, and co-producer of Developing Philly, a web series about the rise of the Philadelphia tech community. He has given standing-room-only presentations at TEDNYC, SXSW Interactive, UX Copenhagen, and the Wharton Web Conference on content strategy and emerging content trends.

Dr. Cat McManus has had a lifelong interest in differential educational opportunities and issues of equity. She spent nine years in college admissions at Princeton and Penn, where she ran a partnership with a nonprofit focused on increasing access for low-income students, led staff training, and contributed to the Access Team. Her research interests include college access, educational equity, social impact and strategic organizational partnerships. While on Penn GSE’s Academic Innovation team, she focused on communications and social media, community building, and cheerleading the edtech and social impact startup community. She received her doctorate from Penn in Educational Leadership and her AB from Dartmouth College in Anthropology.