Ian is Managing Partner and Founder of Second Quarter VC. Ian was formerly a family office investor in Australian and European technology ecosystems and former founder himself. Ian’s experience spans fund management, multi asset-class investing, particularly venture investing, alongside operational experience in technology startups

Leigh co-founded Aconex, the world’s most widely used cloud collaboration platform for managing construction projects. As CEO, he led the company from founding, through multiple capital raisings, to an Initial Public Offering (IPO) and company sale to Oracle Ltd for $1.6 billion in 2018.

Leigh grew Aconex to over $200 million in revenue, employing 850 staff across operations in 50 cities around the world, in Australia, Asia, the Middle East, Europe, South America and North America. Leigh worked in the Melbourne, San Francisco and Paris offices of Aconex.

Prior to founding Aconex, Leigh worked in management consulting with McKinsey and Company.

Leigh is the Chair of LaunchVic and a Director of Buildxact, SEEK Ltd, Salta Properties, Zuuse and the Burnet Institute.

Erik is responsible for driving strategy, business development, and corporate development for NPM. Along with the Capital Markets team and the Private Company team, he helps issuers, investors, and brokers to access the NPM platform for all of their secondary liquidity needs.

Prior to NPM, Erik was the Head of Corporate Development for Silicon Valley Bank where he was responsible for M&A, strategic investments, and partnerships.

Sara Rona is a director of Startup Banking for Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and is the market lead for Australia & New Zealand, where she manages SVB’s portfolio of technology startups and venture capital funds based in the region. She is also leading global channel partnerships in Latin America, India, Australia and New Zealand, and Middle East North Africa (MENA) countries.

Sara joined SVB in 2018 as a director of business planning, covering Technology and Healthcare banking. There, she helped drive go to market strategy, objectives and key results for the commercial bank. She partnered closely with the leadership team to execute and operationalize communication strategy, roadmaps and division-wide initiatives. Earlier in her career, she held various roles in corporate strategy, product management and business development at various organizations like HSBC, IFC-World Bank and Deutsche Bank.

Karthi Sepulohniam is Managing Director at Partners for Growth (PFG), a leading global venture debt provider. PFG provides less dilutive funding to growth companies, primarily in the software and tech-enabled sectors. Karthi is based in PFG’s Sydney office and oversees PFG’s venture debt investments in Australia, New Zealand and the broader Asia Pacific region. PFG is the largest venture debt provider to growing Australian and New Zealand companies, and has provided over AUD 300 million in debt commitments to more than 50 businesses since 2007.