Maryam Haque

Maryam is the Executive Director of Venture Forward, where she leads the organization in its mission to shape the future of venture capital. She previously served as SVP of Industry Advancement at the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), where she incubated several Venture Forward initiatives. At NVCA, she led research and data, education, and diversity […]

Rhianon Anderson

Rhianon Anderson is the Senior Programs Director for Venture Forward. She focuses on efforts that break down barriers to access and participation in the VC ecosystem, expand diversity, equity and inclusion, and provide members of the VC community support and resources to help them succeed. Before joining Venture Forward, Rhianon spent several years with Girls […]

Sarah Mattina

Sarah serves as the Marketing & Communications Director of Venture Forward, NVCA’s 501(c)(3) nonprofit supporting organization focused on shaping the future of venture capital. She amplifies Venture Forward’s mission through content creation, storytelling, and data to expand diversity, equity and inclusion efforts within the VC community. Prior to joining Venture Forward, Sarah led communications at […]

Christy Chin

Christy Remey Chin is focused on impact investing and venture philanthropy. She currently serves on several boards, including Benetech, Food Forward, New Story, Save The Waves, SV2, World Affairs, and Vote.org, while also serving as an advisor to Accountability Counsel, CALMatters, and Colgate University’s President Council. She is a Venture Partner and previously served as […]

Barry Eggers

A founding partner at Lightspeed, Barry is something of a Silicon Valley pioneer. After all, as a native of Sunnyvale, he remembers when the area was filled not with startups but with cherry and apricot orchards. And although he attended undergrad at UCLA, he soon returned to the valley to earn an MBA at Stanford. […]

Bobby Franklin

Bobby Franklin is the President & CEO of the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA), the venture community’s preeminent trade association focused on empowering the next generation of transformative American companies. Based in Washington, D.C., with offices in Palo Alto and San Francisco, NVCA acts as the voice of the U.S. venture capital and startup community […]

Jennifer Friel Goldstein

Jennifer Friel Goldstein is the managing partner for Life Science and Healthcare Practice at SVB Capital and is a founding member of Venture Forward, a nonprofit that provides resources and education toward developing a diverse, equitable and inclusive venture capital (VC) ecosystem. She is also an advisory board member of Springboard Enterprises and the Women’s Health Innovation Coalition. Jennifer has more than 20 […]

Samara Hernandez

Samara is the Founding Partner of an institutionally-backed pre-seed stage fund, Chingona Ventures, focusing on investing in tech and tech-enabled companies across the U.S. Before this, she was an investor at MATH Venture Partners; led new investment review, diligence, and execution. Before VC, she worked at Goldman Sachs, continually ranked top 5 in selling financial […]

Charles Hudson

Charles Hudson is the Managing Partner and Founder of Precursor Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on investing in the first institutional round of investment for the most promising software and hardware companies. Prior to founding Precursor Ventures, Charles was a Partner at SoftTech VC. In this role, he focused on identifying investment opportunities […]

Ray Leach

Ray Leach is the founding CEO of JumpStart Inc., a Cleveland, Ohio-based non-profit venture development organization that has gained a national best-in-class reputation for its innovative economic development models and its ability to leverage its experience and expertise across the U.S. Ray is considered a national thought and practice leader at the intersections of public, […]