Julie Meyer, Founder of First Tuesday and Founder and CEO of Ariadne Capital
Julie Meyer has 20 years of investment and advisory experience, helping start-up businesses and industry standards to emerge and establish themselves. As Chief Executive of Ariadne Capital, she has overall general and financial management responsibility for the group which she founded in August 2000. Ariadne is an investment and advisory firm focused on the Software and Services, New Media, Communications and Life Services sectors. Julie is well-known for founding First Tuesday, the largest global network of entrepreneurs, which many credit for igniting the Internet generation in Europe. It was sold for $50 million in cash in and shares in July 2000. Julie has raised hundreds of millions of capital for start-ups in addition to overseeing another $150 million of seed capital found for start-ups through First Tuesday. Named a “Global Leader of Tomorrow” by the World Economic Forum and one of the top 30 most powerful women in Europe according to the Wall Street Journal, Julie’s mission is to back the best entrepreneurs in Europe with global ambitions. She was awarded “Entrepreneur of the Year” Award in October 2000 by Ernst & Young U.K.
Will Ghali, Marketing Director at Cobra Beer
Selling and sales are vital skills for budding entrepreneurs. Come along and learn key strategies on how to sell successfully from expert John Thompson, who was earning £100k as Will is Marketing Director at Cobra Beer worldwide. Cobra Beer is a privately owned business based in London. Prior to joining Cobra, Will was the Marketing Director for PepsiCo’s juice and smoothies business in the UK & Ireland, responsible for Tropicana and Copella among other brands. Will joined PepsiCo in April 2004 into this role. Prior to this role, Will was Marketing Director at Nutricia UK (now owned by Danone), a babyfood business with brands such as Cow & Gate and Milupa, and before that was Marketing Director at Reckitt Benckiser. Will started his marketing career back in 1992 as a graduate trainee at Unilever where he spent his first 5 years. Will graduated with a business degree from Warwick Business School in 1992. Will is married and has 2 daughters and lives in a little village just outside Bath. In his spare time Will enjoys SCUBA diving and anything to do with the sea and boats!
Ian Robin, Skype
Ian Robin was a Skype evangelist long before he joined the firm in early 2008. As European general manager of Skype partner VoSKY, Ian brought the benefits of Skype to large and small businesses. His role took in the creation of bespoke VoSKY Skype for Business solutions, and building a channel to sell and support them. He also oversaw marketing and PR.
Ian’s career before VoSKY ranged across several IT distributors and manufacturers. He began at Computer 2000, where he worked his way up to business manager. Then he joined US Robotics, stayed after its acquisition by 3Com, and became distribution sales manager. He moved to a PC peripherals maker to grow its European business, and then set up a biometric security consultancy. The sale of that company led to VoSKY and so to Skype.
Ian’s home life is as busy as his office hours. It revolves around his wife and their young son and daughter. However, he puts in enough time at the gym to be sure that he’s ready any time his rugby club calls him back to the active list. He also played cricket at county level as a schoolboy. To balance all the sporting activity, he has an extensive film collection, majoring on sci-fi and Hollywood epics.
