Speakers | Global Startup EXPO 2025

Caroline Winnett

Berkeley SkyDeck

Executive Director

Biography: Caroline Winnett is Executive Director of Berkeley SkyDeck, UC Berkeley’s flagship startup accelerator. She led the creation of the $90M Berkeley SkyDeck Fund, a groundbreaking model that shares half of fund profits with the university. A serial entrepreneur, she co-founded NeuroFocus, the leader in neuromarketing, acquired by Nielsen. Caroline is a frequent speaker on innovation, entrepreneurship, and consumer neuroscience, and has been recognized with the Forbes 50 Over 50 and Bay Area Power 100 awards. She holds an MBA from Berkeley Haas and a Violin Performance degree from Indiana University.

Christine Tsai

500 Global

Founding Partner and CEO

Biography: Christine Tsai is Founding Partner and CEO of 500 Global. Since co-founding the firm in 2010, she has led its growth to $2.4B in AUM and investments in more than 3,000 companies in 80+ countries. She has spent her entire career building and investing in Silicon Valley. Prior to 500, she was in product marketing at Google, where she helped launch and worked on early go-to-market of products like AdSense, Analytics, YouTube APIs, and Developer Tools.
Christine serves on the venture capital committee of AAAIM and is a member of YPO. She has been recognized by Gold House’s A100 List and named as one of 10 Women of Influence in VC by Private Equity International.
Christine holds a B.A. in Cognitive Science from the University of California, Berkeley, and was a National Merit Scholar.

Dr. Felix Moesner

Swissnex in Japan, Consulate of Switzerland

Consul & CEO

Biography: Dr. Felix Moesner is the Consul of the Consulate of Switzerland & CEO of Swissnex in Japan, which is the first Consulate in Japan that focuses on Science. With a PhD in robotics, MBA and MSc from ETH Zurich, the University of Tokyo and Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dr. Moesner acquired comprehensive experience in working with professionals of governmental, private and academic sectors in the economic superpowers US, Japan & China. Swissnex is the Swiss network for education, research and innovation and is committed to the exchange of knowledge, ideas and talents. From 2003-12, Dr. Moesner worked as Science Counsellor at the Embassy of Switzerland in Tokyo, continued as CEO of Swissnex in Boston & New York from 2012-2017 and CEO of Swissnex in China from 2017-2021. He worked for Credit Suisse Life Japan, Toshiba Corp., Kanagawa Academy of S&T, Synpulse & Egon Zehnder.

Hiroyuki Suzuki

ATR

Senior Executive Vice President, Representative Director

Biography: He is responsible for corporate management, planning, and innovation co-creation at ATR and ATR Group. In addition, he is actively building a global innovation ecosystem and developing various startup support platforms in Keihanna Science City. To further strengthen startup support activities, he established XBorder Innovations (XBI) in 2021.

Jean Schmitt

Jolt Capital

President & Managing Partner

Biography: Jean is the President and Managing Partner at Jolt Capital. He has driven Jolt’s vision and led its development since 2012. The impetus behind the founding of Jolt was Jean’s realization that there is a significant pool of technology companies which passed their technology risks stage, hardware or software, and are starting to scale worldwide.
Prior to founding Jolt Capital, Jean was Managing Partner at Sofinnova Partners, running the IT practice with a focus on telecom and wireless markets. Preceding his career as an investor, Jean was the CEO and founder of 4 companies with successful exits, including SLP InfoWare, which he sold to Gemplus (now Gemalto, XPAR:GTO) in 2000 for $60m and then became VP Telecom Solutions & Applications for the larger group.
Jean graduated from Telecom ParisTech and has a post-graduate degree in Artificial Intelligence. He is a regular lecturer at Telecom ParisTech and Mines ParisTech, a mentor at HEC CDL, and a speaker at multiple international conferences on Private Equity, AI and Technology.
Jean is also the Chairman of the Baroque Orchestra La Chapelle Harmonique (led by the internationally acclaimed conductor Valentin Tournet), an independant board member of Tech Premium (a French-led Caisse des Dépôts SICAV promoting technology IPOs), a former Chairman of the International Venture Club, and a former Chairman of the e-learning trade union CHANED.
Jean is currently a board member of BioSerenity (FR), NIL Technology (DK) and Virta (FI) representing Jolt Capital. Previously, Jean was a board member of Esmertec/Myriad (SIX:MYRN), Authentec (NASDAQ:AUTH) before its acquisition by Apple in 2012 for $356m, Heptagon before its acquisition by AMS (SIX:AMS) in 2016 for close to $1b, FOGALE Sensation before its sale to a consumer electronics giant, Skill & You before its sale to Andera Partners and Verimatrix (EURONEXT:VMX) sold to One Equity Partner, where he stays as an independent board member.

Marc Kuipers

Kingdom of the Netherlands

Consulate General

Biography: Marc Kuipers is the Consul-General of the Kingdom of the Netherlands in Osaka as well as Commissioner General for the Netherlands participation at Expo 2025 Osaka, Kansai , Japan. He has over 30 years of experience in public administration, security, and international cooperation. Previously, he held senior leadership roles at the General Intelligence and Security Service and the Inspectorate of Social Affairs and Employment. At Expo 2025, he is focused on fostering innovation and strengthening business scientific and government ties between the Netherlands and Japan.

Mike Collins

Alumni Ventures

Founder & CEO

Biography: Mike has been involved in almost every facet of venturing, from angel investing to venture capital, new business and product launches, and innovation consulting.
He is the CEO of Alumni Ventures and launched AV’s first alumni fund, Green D Ventures, where he oversaw the portfolio as Managing Partner and is now Managing Partner Emeritus. Mike is a serial entrepreneur who has started multiple companies, including Kid Galaxy, Big Idea Group (partially owned by WPP), and RDM.
He began his career at VC firm TA Associates. He holds an undergraduate degree in Engineering Science from Dartmouth and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Mitsuru Izumo

Euglena Co., Ltd.

Founder & CEO

Biography: Mitsuru Izumo is a graduate of the University of Tokyo, having specialized in agricultural structural management. In 2005, he established Euglena Co., Ltd. to harness the properties of microalgae Euglena. Euglena Co., Ltd. became the world’s first biotechnology company that succeeded in the outdoor mass cultivation of Euglena. Currently, Euglena Co., Ltd. upholds “Sustainability First” as their philosophy and has developed the manufacture and sale of foods and cosmetics as the healthcare domain, the biofuel business, the bioinformatics business, and the social business in Bangladesh by leveraging Euglena and other advanced technologies.

Nobu Okada

Astroscale Holdings Inc.

Founder & CEO

Biography: Nobu has led Astroscale to global prominence and a successful IPO in 2024. He is an Honorary Ambassador of the International Astronautical Federation and contributes to United Nations forums that shape space sustainability. Astroscale has received numerous accolades, including the IAF Excellence in Industry (SME), the Japanese Prime Minister’s Award, and recognition as one of TIME100’s Most Influential Companies. Nobu was previously an IT entrepreneur, strategy consultant, and served in the Japanese Ministry of Finance. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Agriculture from the University of Tokyo and an MBA from the Krannert School of Business, Purdue University.

Shannon McClenaghan

StartX

CEO

Biography: As CEO of StartX, Shannon McClenaghan champions Stanford innovators, from alumni andprofessors to enrolled students, through its premier accelerator and community of over 2,700 founders. Her dedication to StartX is long-standing; she has been a mentor since 2011 and a Board Member since 2019.
Shannon's journey to the forefront of entrepreneurship began as an attorney, but her true calling emerged in 1999 when she began building businesses. For over two decades, she has been a prolific founder and entrepreneur in Silicon Valley, responsible for creating and scaling pioneering software and hardware businesses. Her impressive portfolio includes Jimmyjane, Lark, Native Union, Anova Culinary, and Companion Labs, all of which created new consumer categories and products.
Shannon earned dual B.A. degrees from the University of Washington and a J.D. from Golden Gate University.

Takuko Sawada

Vice-Chair, Kansai Economic Federation
Chairperson of Startup Ecosystem Committee
Vice-Chair, Shionogi & Co., Ltd.

Biography: Following her graduation from Kyoto University, Ms. Takuko Sawada joined Shionogi & Co., Ltd. in 1977. Since then, she has served for over 30 years, leading a number of pharmaceutical development projects and corporate strategy planning. Ms. Sawada successively held various posts in the company including the senior vice president of Global Pharmaceutical Development Division, the senior vice president of Corporate Strategy Division and Corporate Planning Department, and board director. She has served in her current position, Vice-Chair, since 2025.
As the vice-chair of Kansai Economic Federation, she promotes the startup ecosystem in the Kansai region.

Tomoko Namba

Keidanren

Chair, Committee on Startups

Biography: Founder & Executive Chairman, DeNA Co., Ltd. (Chair, Committee on Startups,
Keidanren) Tomoko Namba is the Founder and Executive Chairman of DeNA. Namba served as the company’s CEO since its founding in 1999 until June 2011. She became owner of the Yokohama DeNA BayStars baseball club in 2015. In 2019 she founded Delight Ventures, a venture capital firm, where she is Managing Partner. Prior to founding DeNA, she was a partner at McKinsey & Co. She obtained an MBA at Harvard Business School in 1990.

Tsuneaki Sakata, Ph.D.

Biocommunity Kansai/The University of Osaka

Vice Chairperson and Exective Supervisor/Specially Appointed Professor

Biography: Education
1973.04-1977.03 Faculty of Science, Osaka University,
1977.04-1979.03 Department of Physiology, Graduate School of Science Osaka University,
Work Experience
1979.04-2021.03 Shionogi Research Laboratories, Shionogi & Co., Ltd.,
2019.04-present Specially appointed professor at Co-Creation Bureau, Osaka University,
2014.04-present Visiting professor, Department of Industry-Academia-Government Collaboration, Tokushima University
Life Science Specially Appointed Fellow, Research and Development Strategy Center (CRDS), Japan Science and Technology Agency (JST) Advisor, Biomedical Research Institute, National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology Vice Chairman, Life Science Promotion Committee, Osaka Chamber of Commerce and Industry Chairman, Kinki Bioindustry Development Organization Advisor, Urban Innovation Research Institute Councilor of the for-profit corporation Computational Chemistry and Biology Society (CBI Society) advisor of the Japan Society of Omics Medicine.

Winter Mead

Coolwater Capital

Founder & Managing Member

Biography: Winter Mead is the Founder and Managing Member of Coolwater Capital, an investment firm and academy focused on training and scaling emerging managers. Coolwater has supported over 300 emerging managers and made 90+ investments, building a strong community of founder-investors and technology innovators. Winter is the author of How To Raise A Venture Capital Fund and How To Set Up A Venture Capital Fund. His prior experience includes roles in private equity, venture capital, and fund investments at Hall Capital Partners (acquired by Pathstone) and SAP, where he helped run an evergreen fund. He also co-founded the #OpenLP movement to promote transparency among LPs and has taught at Stanford GSB. Winter holds degrees from Oxford and Harvard.

Yuka Hata

Japan Investment Corporation

Senior Managing Director and Head of Fund Investments

Biography: Ms. Hata joined JIC in July 2020 in order to build and support Japan’ private equity / venture capital ecosystem as well as to provide the risk capital with the investment funds which bring Japan’s industry to the next stage. Prior to joining JIC, as a co-head of private equity, Ms. Hata worked for Nissay Asset Management where she was mainly responsible for European small-mid buyout, GP stake investments, secondary and Japan’s VC funds. She also worked for Nomura Asset Management (or Nomura Private Equity Capital) and managed fund of funds focused on Asia market as a member of Investment Committee.
Ms. Hata is a Chartered Member of the Security Analysts Association of Japan., and received a B.A. in Environmental Information from Keio University and an M.B.A. from Ecole des Hautes Etudes Commerciales-HEC in Paris.