Rico is the Founder and Secretariat Chairman of the Deep Tech Forum and World Blockchain Centre. He Co-founded Sanctum Global Ventures(SGV) together with Dunstan Teo – a known Bitcoin OG. SGV is also an incubator & accelerator that contributes toward the development of the Global Digital Economy, Web3 & Metaverse.
As an avid tech investor, Rico believes in the power of tech as a way to develop talent, reduce inequalities, and subsequently help reduce poverty.
Rico is a serial entrepreneur, global venture builder who has over 20 years of experience in emerging markets across Supply Chain Management, Fintech & E-commerce.
Ersoy has worked 17 years in asset management for top Turkish banks & is currently a financial correspondent for Bloomberg HT in Dubai where he delivers financial market updates to investors about GCC markets & Asian markets. The topics he covers range from stock markets, currencies, commodities, and fixed income, & also include such reports as mergers & acquisitions, and business & social headlines relevant to the region. Ersoy regularly interviews distinguished guests regarding financial markets. He has a B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from Middle East Technical University & MBA from Bilkent University.
Experience in asset management, fund industry, both on the sell side and buy side, and investment consultancy for all investment products, especially equities and ETFs.
Has a strong reputation for delivering ground-breaking business results, large-scale ventures, and talented teams focused on surpassing objectives within competitive markets. Enjoyed a unique mix of professional and academic successes including attainment of billion-dollar targets as well as completion of executive programs at Cambridge University and Harvard Business School. Barclays UK’s youngest Director at 26, managing 4,000 people and 400 branches. Currently, Head of Distribution and Sales, leading and managing all channels, branches, telephony, retention, mortgages, and ATMs, as well as Islamic and Emirati banking within the Middle East’s largest bank.
An accomplished senior executive with experience driving business across new, established, and developing markets, in financial services and operations, living and working across the UK, South Africa, USA, Botswana, and UAE.
Mariquit Corcoran is a Managing Director and the Chief Innovation Officer at Barclays, based out of New York. Mariquit has spent two decades in the financial services industry, holding positions and leading teams in businesses spanning fixed income, operations, risk management, finance, and banking.
A successful entrepreneur, Kerril was previously a banking employee who identified an issue in the general Investment banking cash flow management process, conceived an idea on how to resolve it, and co-founded a company (meritsoft.com) to develop and deliver a solution to the capital markets industry. This solution was licensed by many investment banks, including 6 of the top 10 globally. Meritsoft was acquired by Cognizant. In the interim, Kerril led a team that “bootstrapped” in relation to funding but still achieved implementations in many top investment banks.
Jorge leads the areas of product strategy, design, engineering, and research at Hello Iconic. He has 20+ years of experience launching successful global products with companies like Disney, ABC, AMC, The Walking Dead, Syfy, FX, The Coca-Cola Company, SUMA Wealth, The Change Company, and Cyvatar. Jorge has also helped early-stage and venture-backed startups with their development needs. He is an MIT Technology Review Innovator under 35 (2015), Fellow of The Aspen Institute, and Alumni of the Stanford Latino Entrepreneurship Initiative / Latino Business Action Network.
Kosala Hemachandra is the founder and CEO of MEW (MyEtherWallet), the leading Ethereum wallet interface, which is free, open-source, and secure. Kosala is driven by the idea that blockchain technology will help define a new era of global finance. He has over 10 years of experience as a computer engineer and has grown MEW into a global LA based blockchain company.
Paco Suro is the General Manager of Global Payments at Tipalti. Paco brings substantial experience from his previous roles at Shopify, where he led its ‘Money’ business and served as the Head of Payments and Financial Operations for Twitter. He also brings leadership and change management experience, digital economy knowledge and passion, global payments expertise, leadership in finance and treasury, and knowledge as a user of Tipalti. Paco leads Tipalti’s Mass Payment (MP) business, which includes the gig economy, online marketplaces, internet, adtech, gaming, and burgeoning creator economy sectors. Paco holds a B.S. in Internal Business and Finance from American University.
Nadkarni has a track record of over 20 years of building and leading teams at consumer technology companies through their growth phase across product, marketing, and analytics including similar positions at Facebook and Uber.
Michele is the Managing Director of credolab’s North American business and also credolab Chief Strategy Officer. Prior to joining credolab in 2018 as Chief Product and Marketing Officer, Michele has worked on international consulting assignments, product management and business development roles with the likes of Capital One, MasterCard, Intesa Sanpaolo Bank, and Telecom Italia Mobile. He has conducted business in 47 countries and has in-depth knowledge derived from nearly 22 years in cards, payments, wallets, consumer lending, FinTech, and digital products.
