SaaS Interviews with CEOs, Startups, Founders

Adam Saven, Co-Founder & CEO of PeopleGrove Adam is the co-founder of PeopleGrove and has served as its Chief Executive Officer since inception. He previously worked at Google as a Business Analyst from 2013 to 2014, performing data analysis as well as informing strategic decisions for the Online Partnerships Group (OPG). Prior to Google, he served as an Investment Banking Analyst in the Global Technology Group of Credit Suisse.He holds a B.S. in Economics from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. The impetus for starting PeopleGrove came from a realization of how powerful mentors and the Penn alumni network had been in helping Adam to explore various career paths and access great opportunities. While at Google, Adam embarked on an after-work side project that would eventually become PeopleGrove. PeopleGrove has grown to reimagine mentoring for today's college students and professionals at over 120 colleges and organizations across the country.

Philip Soffer has been the CEO of test IO since May of 2016, splitting his time between Berlin and the SF Bay Area. Prior to test IO, he held senior leadership roles in product, development, and marketing at Plumtree Software, Lithium Technologies, and Piazza.

Dan Reich is the Co-Founder and CEO of Troops, a venture-backed technology company that is building artificial intelligence for work. Troops is working with hundreds of companies and has raised about $17 million in venture capital. He is also the Co-Founder and President of TULA, a health and beauty business that has created the world's first probiotic-based line of skincare products. He has been involved with companies that have raised over $100 million in venture capital and have exited for over $1 billion in mergers and acquisitions. Prior to Troops, Dan started a software company called Spinback which he sold to Buddy Media, and then to Salesforce.com for about $850mm. He has a B.S. in Electrical and Computer Engineering from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, is a contributing writer for Forbes and has been named Silicon Alley Top 100 by Business Insider.

Ian has been involved in technology businesses and start-ups for over 22 years and has built businesses in Australia, Taiwan, Silicon Valley and the UK. Ian has grown Adthena since 2012 to its current position as the premier global provider of competitive intelligence. While Adthena itself has won many major industry awards, Ian's entrepreneurial determination has also been recognized with the Developing Entrepreneur Award at the WCIT Enterprise Awards – commonly regarded as the 'Oscars for technology entrepreneurs'.

Gabriele joined Doodle in 2016 to transform it into a SaaS business. After studying physics, he went into consulting, got an MBA at London Business School and joined Doodle's mother company Tamedia. Swiss and Italian, Gabriele is a polyglot and loves the Mediterranean, the Swiss Alps, seafood and Swiss cheese.

As Riddle's co-founder, I'm a Californian who fell in love with living abroad in Europe over a decade ago. Since then, I've helped a string of start-ups and European companies (gaming companies Kabam and Marvelous AQL, Monster, and restaurant finder app CityHawk). I wear many hats - our quiz maker makes it easy for brands like the BBC and the NFL to engage their audience and collect leads with their own Buzzfeed-style quizzes, polls, and more.

In 2010, Drew Sheahan started a GPS Fleet Tracking Business from his up-stairs bedroom that would eventually rank #126 on the 2014 INC500 List. He sold that company in 2016 to pursue solving the #1 issue he encountered while scaling a business that generates website leads. That business became BirdSeed.io

Alex Bates is an angel investor and a Member of Peter Diamandis's Abundance 360 Network. He has spent the last decade bringing artificial intelligence and machine learning to the forefront of the industrial market. From leading DARPA funded research in neural networks, to applying analytics for the world's largest data warehouses at Teradata, to creating Mtell, a machine learning company acquired by Aspentech (NASDAQ: AZPN), he believes the coming wave of human-centered Al has the potential to make us superhuman and create a world of abundance.

Matthew is a seasoned growth-stage technology investor and career VC, having originated, managed and completed dozens of transactions. As General Partner at Plaza Ventures, Matt specializes in deal flow, investment transaction processing, ecosystem development and investor relations. He sits on the board of numerous companies, as well as various accelerators and charities.

Software veteran Dave Keil brings a growth-oriented leadership approach to his job as CEO of QASymphony. For more than 25 years Dave has built a strong track record of business success. Prior to QASymphony, Dave was CEO of Digistrive, a provider of e-commerce solutions to large membership based organizations. He grew and eventually sold that business to a large private company. Before joining Digistrive, Dave was CEO of Integrated Broadband Services (IBBS), a software and services company. During his tenure, the company doubled in size, completed two strategic acquisitions and established a market leadership position in the "Tier Two" broadband space. Earlier in his career, Dave served as Chief Strategy Officer and later as Senior President and General Manager at ChoicePoint, a NYSE listed global information services provider (acquired by Lexis Nexis in 2008). Dave has also held senior executive roles at Novient, and Robinson Humphrey (now part of SunTrust). He received a MBA from The Wharton School and a BS in Applied Mathematics and Economics from Brown University. He lives in Atlanta with his wife and two kids.