Chris Gruwell
Chris is the Co-Owner of Platinum Advisors, California’s largest public affairs firm, advising over 100 companies including, Zynga, Microsoft, AT&T, Boston Properties, AECOM, Webcor Builders, Zipcar and the Hearst Corporation.
Chris served as Gavin Newsom’s first mayoral campaign Finance Director and as the Chairman of the Mayor’s re-election and extensively volunteered with the Newsom administration.
Chris is a founding partner of Storefront Political Media and worked with the San Francisco Police Officers Association, San Francisco Firefighters Union, the “Save Hetch-Hetchy” bond campaign and the “Care Not Cash” Initiative.
Chris also worked with former Secretary of State Kevin Shelley as well as the Office of the Vice President and traveled extensively with Vice President Al Gore as part of his advance staff.
Chris served in the U.S. Army and is currently a Veterans Commissioner for the City and County of San Francisco. He earned his Bachelor’s degree from UCLA.
Richard Goldman
Richie is the co-Founder of Men’s Wearhouse (now retired). He is widely recognized as the marketing mastermind of MW, from his insistence on using TV as the main form of advertising as far back as 1975, to his careful nurturing and managing of the MW brand and image as the company expanded from one part of the country to another.
In January of 2009, Richie released his book, Luck by Design…Certain Success in an Uncertain World. The book, aimed at the children of Baby Boomers, received praise from educators, fellow authors, and reviewers. It won “Best General Non-Fiction” at the San Francisco Book Festival in 2009 and was a Finalist in the “Self-Help: Motivational category at the National Best Books 2009.
Richie graduated from Rutgers University with a B.A. in English.
Laurence Pelosi
Laurence Pelosi has been involved in real estate investment and development for the past 16 years, including positions at Morgan Stanley Real Estate and Lennar. In these capacities, he was involved in the investment of over $1Bn in residential and mixed use projects. Laurence has also been an active investor in start-ups, including Perfect Fitness, Tribal Crossing and New Avenue Homes, among others.
Laurence attended U.C Berkeley and Georgetown Law and serves on the boards of the Institute for Governmental Studies at UC Berkeley and Family House at UCSF.
Rahul Prakash
Rahul is a serial entrepreneur and technology executive. He is currently Chief Operating Officer at Earth Aid, the leading platform for online home energy management. Prior to Earth Aid, Rahul was a Founding Executive of 1 Block off the Grid (1BOG), the nation’s leading solar group purchasing program, which is currently in over 20 cities. Before 1BOG, Rahul served as VP of Operations & Marketing for Spock, where he helped build the world's largest people search engine with 50 million monthly searches. Spock was successfully acquired by Intelius in 2009.
Rahul is an advisor to several leading technology companies in the Bay area; Co-Founded The Clean Economy Network, and was Appointed by Mayor Gavin Newsom to the San Francisco Commission of the Environment.
Rahul received a B.A. from the University of Pennsylvania.
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