Los Angeles, California
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2023
Good Growth Capital is an early-stage venture capital firm that provides investors with exceptional returns. We do this through our ability to source, assess and invest in transformative companies in life sciences, data sciences, and greentech/hard sciences. (Learn more: www.goodgrowthvc.com) Z scouts, invests in, and coaches innovative teams pioneering complex science and technology solutions addressing the world's most pressing needs, across broad disciplines including aerospace, advanced materials, energy, sustainability, optics and electromagnetics, plus select opportunities in medtech and data science. Investments include Orbit Fab (on-orbit energy storage and refueling), Radia (building the largest cargo plane in the world for onshore wind energy), SkyHawk Therapeutics (therapeutics through modifying RNA expression), Hoofprint Biome (eliminating methane from cows), Swift Solar (perovskite photovoltaics), Formlabs (flow batteries), Republic (crowdfunding platform, exited), Ateios (thin film batteries), Cambridge Terahertz and Spectrohm (non-ionizing imaging technologies), Obsidio (breakthrough gel material to cure aneurysms and cancer, exited), Data Bento (on-demand data brokerage), AOA (the world's first liquid biopsy for ovarian cancer), Coaptech and Venostent (best-in-class medical devices), and Tevard (tRNA therapeutics). Founders seeking capital, please reach out here: https://goodgrowthvc.com/contact.
2019 - 2023
2016 - 2019
2012
As chief instigator of At Large and Dangerous, Z is a trusted advisor to leaders at the frontier—identifying technology trends, scouting untapped innovators, and devising new business models for global scale and profitability. Working with a broad range of leading and pioneering organizations—the Obama Administration, World Economic Forum, Institutional Investor's TTI/Vanguard, Singapore's Institute for Infocomm Research, SXSW Accelerator, USC Annenberg School, DeVry University, Dalan Animal Health, and Hoofprint Biome—Z applies her decades of experience navigating organizations ranging from startups to complex enterprises to help companies balance agility and scale. She has advised hundreds of leaders, including senior-level Fortune 500 executives, faculty, creatives, and founders who collectively have raised $100Ms in capital.
2016
Z is a seasoned speaker on innovation and leadership for organizations and conferences around the world from Davos to the White House. She has spoken in venues around the world, including Marrakesh, Stockholm, Tokyo, Beijing, Singapore, and on the Semester at Sea ship in the South China Sea. For four years, she curated, hosted, and produced a weekly show—The Art of Manufacturing podcast, available on all major podcast platforms and artofmfg.com—and regular column delving into the world of founders and pioneers trying to “make it” with their next big idea. He work has appeared in publications including NASA ASK, The Economist, strategy+business, The Huffington Post, Forbes Magazine, and Science Progress.
2014 - 2020
2016 - 2020
MAKE IT IN LA is a 501(c)(3) non-profit spun out from LA Mayor Garcetti’s office and announced as part of the Obama White House's Week of Making. Z launched and built the organization, and created a grant-funded accelerator program that launched 16 new locally-made products and invested $6.7m in Los Angeles manufacturing. Hosted dozens of events and educational programming that reached 1,000 entrepreneurs in the first 18 months. Built a library of evergreen resources—checklists, videos, podcast episodes, and incentives—still available online today. Launched annual MakerWalk LA festival.
2014 - 2016
Advisor to the Mayor of Los Angeles on technology, startup, and manufacturing policy. Z created the model for an Entrepreneur-in-Residence program and joined as inaugural EIR. Developed partnerships to connect capital, entrepreneurs, producers, and policymakers to support the growth of manufacturing-related ventures in Los Angeles. Conducted a year-long study (http://makeitinla.org/study) to explore opportunities at the intersection of entrepreneurship and manufacturing, including a survey of 1,600 companies cross LA County, to understand the needs and opportunities of the manufacturing ecosystem in the LA region. Identified opportunities created by new digital fabrication tools, maker communities, and advanced manufacturing technologies in the largest manufacturing center in the country. Conceived and launched non-profit, MAKE IT IN LA.
2006 - 2012
2006 - 2012
The University of Southern California is a top-25 research university enrolling 46,000 students within the College and 22 professional schools. As member of Provost's cabinet, Z advised on policy and supported new innovation efforts across the university. Launched numerous innovation experiments which have expanded beyond USC and continue today: the first ever TEDx (TEDxUSC), spawning more than 40,000 events globally; FirstLook, now hosted annually by the Alliance of SoCal Innovation; and Social Innovation Fast Pitch, now run by Social Venture Partners in 16 cities across the country. Established and led a new university-wide institute, the USC Stevens Institute for Innovation.
2006 - 2012
USC Stevens is an institute to help USC faculty and students maximize the impact of their research and ideas. Z founded and led the institute with a P&L of $12m and staff of 35. Raised $5.5m Ideas Empowered fund for investing in early stage innovations. Oversaw USC's IP portfolio, launched 30 venture-backed companies based on USC research, and increased licensing revenues more than five-fold within the first five years. Expanded the innovation ecosystem in Los Angeles and worked with faculty and students across every school at the university, reimagining the potential of university innovation beyond technology and science.
2008 - 2012
2008 - 2012
TEDx is a licensing program for independently organized TED events. Z and her team partnered with TED to conceive and host the first-ever TEDx event (TEDxUSC) and develop a series of best practices and a licensing model that have been the basis of 40,000+ events around the world. Curated and hosted the event for an audience of 1,200, bringing together leading thinkers and doers for a day of mind-expanding talks, performances, films, and interactive media. Scouted and coached nearly 100 speakers, 10 of whom have been featured on TED.com and have garnered more than 14 million views online. Since then, TEDx events have spread around the world tens of thousands of times, and the model has become one of the most prominent examples of platforms that scale through community and thoughtful replication.
2002 - 2006
2002 - 2006
The Deshpande Center bridges the gap between research at MIT and the marketplace. Z founded the center with a $20M gift from Desh Deshpande, and pioneered a new model for cultivating early stage ideas from academia that has since been replicated at universities around the world. Invested $6M in early stage technologies. Nine startups raised more than $40M in follow-on venture capital within the first three years. Led all strategy and operations of this new center, which provides proof of concept funding, mentoring, events, and partnerships with the business community. Engaged a community of experienced entrepreneurs, VCs, and alumni ("Catalysts") who helped hundreds of academics move their research from proof of concept toward commercialization.
2000 - 2002
2000 - 2002
Ask.com (Nasdaq: ASK) is an early internet business. Z joined as part of Ask's acquisition of Direct Hit. As senior product manager of Jeeves Solutions, she led a cross-functional company-wide initiative that transformed Ask Jeeves' natural language processing capabilities into a new enterprise product, JeevesOne, expanding enterprise revenues to $34M by 2001. Jeeves Solutions attracted prominent clients such as Nike, Novartis, and Ford and was later acquired by Kanisa. She also oversaw sponsored search and launched and managed P&L for Jeeves Shopping, an early consumer e-commerce shopping engine.
1999 - 2000
1999 - 2000
Direct Hit Technologies was a search engine company that provided search engine services to major web portals. Z and the marketing team executed $17M marketing plan to build a public-facing search engine at directhit.com from zero to more than a million hits per day within four months. Acquired by Ask Jeeves for $500m.
1996 - 1999
1996 - 1999
River Run was a documentary production company founded by Executive Producer of Nova, Frontline, and Scientific American Frontiers. Z was the first full-time employee and helped develop television programs and films on science, math, innovation, education, human performance, and business topics. She was deeply involved in several series from pre-production through post-production, including sound engineering and video editing (Avid Media Composer). Clients included Harvard Business School, National Science Foundation, and the Smithsonian.
1990 - 1996
1990 - 1996
Stylus Innovation was a pioneering e-commerce and computer telephony technology company. Z co-founded the company and led various core functions through two pivots and $5.5M in annual revenues before being acquired by Artisoft, Inc. for $13M. Designed and built the hardware behind Stylus' initial innovation—a pioneering home shopping and delivery system—and licensed it to Direct Data Systems before Stylus launched its second groundbreaking product, software tool Visual Voice. As the first Windows-based computer telephony development tool on the market, Visual Voice democratized Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and surpassed competitor IBM's sales volume within 18 months of launch. The company expanded its product line and won numerous awards, such as Byte Best of Comdex runner-up, Computer Telephony Award of the Year, Teleconnect Editors Choice, and others.