Efrat Kasznik is President of Foresight Valuation Group and a Lecturer at the Stanford Graduate School of Business. Ms. Kasznik is a Silicon-Valley based IP valuation and strategy expert with more than two decades of consulting experience, focusing on assisting IP holders across industries with the valuation, commercialization, and monetization of their intangible assets. She helps clients ranging in size from Fortune 100 companies to start-ups, with IP and business valuations in support of licensing deals, IP and technology acquisitions, M&A transactions, financial reporting, strategic planning, and fundraising. She frequently serves as a testifying expert in disputes involving IP and startup valuations and damages. Ms. Kasznik served as Chair of the High-Tech Sector (2019-2020) and is currently serving as Chair of the Valuation Committee of LES USA-Canada. She is also a member of the Board of the LES Silicon Valley Chapter. She has been recognized as one of the top IP strategists in the world by IAM 300 for 8 years in a row (2013-2020).
Krishna Sood is Senior IP Counsel in Microsoft’s Open Innovation team, leading the Data+IP practice to provide guidance and best practices to empower Microsoft business and engineering groups to develop and execute on a responsible data innovation strategy. Krishna leads Microsoft’s open data policy and government initiatives, developing the company’s global policy on data governance and data sharing. A published author and frequent speaker on responsible data innovation, Krishna engages with policymakers, industry, civil society and, academia on AI innovation and data governance, including Microsoft’s Open Data Campaign, and is an expert advisor to the UK’s All-Party Parliamentary Group on Artificial Intelligence.
John’s career in the automotive business spans 40 years, and his background includes experience in finance, sales, marketing, M&A and program management. He successfully completed four divestitures as a deal director during Delphi Automotive’s 2005 to 2009 restructuring effort. John joined the Delphi (now Aptiv) licensing activity in 2009, where he recently retired as the Director of the worldwide licensing and IP monetization efforts. Since 2013, under John’s direction, the Licensing and IP monetization team at Delphi/Aptiv has completed over 60 licensing and IP related sale transactions.
John holds a BA in Accounting and an MBA in Finance from Indiana University and is a Certified Licensing Professional. He is currently the Chair of the Automotive Industry Advisory Board for the Licensing Executive Society International, a professional group serving over 7500 members in 35 countries worldwide. John has participated in a variety of industry-based panels of technology convergence in the Automotive market.
Michael is an internationally recognized attorney and strategic business advisor. He is a registered patent attorney, and his practice spans all types of intellectual property (IP), business, litigation, transactional, branding, software, data, employment, and healthcare matters.
He has advised and represented clients in a variety of fields including software, medical, financial, venture capital, defense, telecommunications, and vehicles. Michael focuses on understanding and achieving client objectives such as revenue generation, IP monetization, customer/supply relationships, transaction value, risk reduction, and competitive advantage.
He has extensive experience in complex business and intellectual property matters involving trade secrets, utility patents, design patents, data rights, trademarks, copyrights, and know-how. Michael has been recognized as a Rising Star in the top 2.5% of attorneys by Super Lawyers, one of the top 30 Up and Coming Lawyers by Michigan Lawyers Weekly, and one of the top 300 IP strategists worldwide by Intellectual Asset Magazine (IAM).
