Arkansas Venture Forum Announces Speakers

The Arkansas Venture Forum’s fifth annual Venture Conference will present three nationally-known entrepreneurs: Konnin Tam, vice president of Goldman Sachs Asset Management; Dan Sanker, CEO and founder of CaseStack; and Tom Szaky, CEO and founder of TerraCycle.
The conference will be held Nov. 16-17 at the John Q. Hammons Center in Rogers.
“Our speakers bring to the conference highly-respected knowledge, insight and experience valuable for Arkansans seeking greater understanding for how we build sustainable, high-value, Arkansas-based enterprises prepared to compete in the 21st century economy,” said Tim McFarland, an organizer of the AVF.
Tam’s presentation is titled “Perspectives on Private Equity Investing in the Global Energy and Alternative Energy Sector,” Sanker’s will be “Commercialization – the Journey from $0 to $65 million in six years,” and Szaky’s will be “How I started my business, capitalized it initially through winning business plan competitions and advanced it to the cover of Inc. magazine.”
Kay Palmer, executive vice president of technical services and chief information officer at J.B. Hunt Transport Services Inc. and Chancellor John White of the University of Arkansas are the 2006 conference co-chairs.
In addition to the featured speakers, the conference will highlight several Arkansas companies that have been screened and are seeking growth capital, panels that focus on emerging clusters capable of producing substantial economic activity including sustainability, bio technology, service innovation, and supply chain and logistics technology.
Several hundred attendees are anticipated at the conference, including venture capital firms and angel investors from surrounding states. The 2005 conference had venture capital firm attendees representing more than $700 million in capital. t
The AVF seeks to provide a supportive environment for entrepreneurs to create and build high-value businesses. AVF is managed by the Arkansas Economic Acceleration Foundation, a non-profit affiliate of the Arkansas Capital Corporation Group.