Monday, April 27th, 2015

3:45 PM - 5:00 PM

Track IV: The Admiralty Room

CrowdFunding Update:  Exploring Innovation in the Crowdfunding Film-TV-Start-up Process

Ron Miller, CEO, StartEngine Crowdfunding, Inc.

Bryan M. Sullivan, Partner, Early Sullivan Wright Gizer & McRae LLP

Samuel S. Guzik, Founder, GUZIK & ASSOCIATES

Rafe Furst, co-founder & Chief Investment Officer, Crowdfunder

Marlon Schulman, Founder and CEO, Horror Equity Fund LLC

Ash Kumra, Co-Founder, DreamItAlive.com, Startup America California Leader, Moderator

agency DesiYou; the 2010 recipient for "Best Digital Media" company by the Irvine Entrepreneur Forum. Ash is an active Internet & Branding advisor/investor to various entrepreneurial ventures.

Ronald D. Miller is an entrepreneur’s entrepreneur having visualized, founded, built and sold five companies through management buyouts, private equity firms, private investors and public markets.  Currently, Ron is a partner in StartEngine, LA's largest tech accelerator. He is helping to find, screen and fund new technology related start-ups and build an equity crowdfunding platform company. As the CEO of StartEngine Crowdfunding Inc., Ron facilitates financial ignition for innovative tech and media companies in order to help entrepreneurs achieve the American dream.  Ron founded the San Diego Chapter of the Entrepreneurs Organization (EO) and served for 3 years as the Chapter’s Chair. He is also a member of WPO/YPO where he has served on the executive committee. Ron is also a member of the CNBC-YPO Chief Executive Network, the LA Mayor's Council on Technology and Innovation and the Advisory Council of USC Greif Center for Entrepreneurial Studies.

Rafe Furst, co-founder & Chief Investment Officer, Crowdfunder:  I'm an entrepreneur, investor and advisor, who connects ideas, people and resources to make good things happen faster.  Beginning in Silicon Valley in the mid 1990s, I founded or was a first round angel investor in over 30 startups, which collectively have generated over $1 Billion in revenue and $450 Million in liquidity to their stakeholders.  I've mentored hundreds of the top innovators, social entrepreneurs and impact investors from around the world, individually and as an Advisor or Director to dozens of incubators, fellowship programs and innovation communities, including Unreasonable Institute, Spirit of Innovation Awards and StartingBloc.  Over my life I've won a World Series of Poker Bracelet, the Congressional Families Award, several awards for video production, and earned degrees in Symbolic Systems and Computer Science from Stanford University.  I've been published in several books, spoken twice at TED, started a few viral movements, and been featured hundreds of times in the media, including the New York Times Magazine, WIRED.com, CNBC, This American Life, Sports Illustrated, and Shake The World, a book about “triple bottom line individuals—a cadre of brilliant business adventurers devoted to building a better world and, just as important, finding a better way to live in that world.”  I've been an artificial intelligence researcher, a complex systems blogger, and I've even completed every guy's fantasy of traveling around the country for an entire year in an RV with my best friend, drinking beer and attending sporting events.  But what I'm most proud of is my work with Prevent Cancer Foundation, curating Accelerating Possibilities, and pioneering Personal Investment Contracts.

Bryan M. Sullivan advises and represents his clients as a legal strategist in all their business affairs.  He assists his clients in achieving their business goals while ensuring that they receive the utmost level of protection along the way.  His experience also includes being a veteran facilitator, fundraiser and volunteer in many nationwide political campaigns, as well as co-founder, Director and CFO of Basta, Inc., a non-profit tenants’ rights group.  Representations include an entertainment management company in a dispute over commissions owed from the Spiderman movie franchise.  He has also written two crowdfunding articles with his Partner Stephen Ma for Forbes: “The Ten Commandments of Crowdfunding,” and “Crowdfunding: Potential Legal Disaster Waiting To Happen.”

Marlon W. Schulman’s leadership in creating targeted, revenue-producing communities within the entertainment industry is enhanced by his intuition and passion. As an entrepreneurial producer and attorney, his specialty is the creation of diverse profit-driven entertainment products and services through innovatively conceived integration of proven strategies with new technologies. He has successfully completed numerous and profitable entrepreneurial initiatives, both within major entertainment companies (Bandai Entertainment, Orion Pictures, AECG), as well as in his independent and partnership entities (Wednesday Morning Productions, Realbuzz Studios, Libertas Law Group). Those projects were created to serve de-centralized, under-served and in certain cases un-recognized interest groups, resulting in new audiences and on-going revenue centers. Early recognition of voids in the marketplace is key to his approach. Before anime was widely recognized in the US, he formed an on-line, global community of avid fans with Anime Village for Bandai; with ground-breaking, value-reinforcement series of manga graphic novels, he addressed the otherwise-ignored concerns of young, mostly female, faith-based readers; by shepherding Opus 1 Music Library’s entry into new mobile technology, he led a generation-old business into the digital age.  His active, strategic stance at the crossroads of new technology, law, business and the creative arts has led to the generation of hundreds of million of dollars in fresh revenue and the establishment of long-running revenue streams in the entertainment industry. Mr. Schulman has been a contributor and panelist at Digital Hollywood; PitchFest; Nashville Film Con; Comic-Con; NYC Comic Con; Boston University (LA Campus); and numerous other venues.

Samuel S. Guzik, Founder, GUZIK & ASSOCIATES: Samuel S. Guzik has more than 35 years of experience as a corporate and securities attorney and business advisor in private practice in New York and Los Angeles, including as an associate at Willkie Farr and Gallagher, a major New York based international law firm, a partner at the law firm of Ervin, Cohen and Jessup, in Los Angeles, and in the firm he founded in 1993, Guzik & Associates.  Mr. Guzik has represented public and privately held companies and entrepreneurs on a broad range of business and financing transactions, both public and private.  Guzik has represented businesses in a diverse range of industries, including digital media, apparel, health care and numerous high technology based businesses. He is a recognized authority and thought leader on matters relating to the JOBS Act of 2012 and the ongoing SEC rulemaking, including Regulation D Rule 506 private placements, Regulation A+, and investment crowdfinance. He has been consulted by Congressional members, state legislators and the U.S. Small Business Administration Office of Advocacy on matters relating to the JOBS Act and state securities matters. He has also been cited by SEC Commissioner Daniel M. Gallagher on two occasions in public statements, both for his advocacy on behalf of SME’s and his thought leadership on SEC rulemaking and post-JOBS Act reforms.  Mr. Guzik is also a prolific writer on JOBS Act issues affecting entrepreneurs, small and emerging companies, investors and Internet-based funding portals. He is a frequent blogger on his blog, The Corporate Securities Lawyer Blog, addressing developing corporate and securities laws issues.  In 2014 he published two major commentaries on JOBS Act rulemaking in The Harvard Law School Forum on Corporate Governance and Financial Regulation: the first article, entitled “Regulation A+ Offerings – a New Era at the SEC,” discussing the SEC’s proposed regulations implementing JOBS Act Title IV Regulation A+;  the second article entitled “SEC Crowdfunding Rulemaking under the JOBS Act – An Opportunity Lost?” addressing deficiencies in the SEC’s proposed Title III investment crowdfunding regulations.  His articles have also been cited in national business publications on issues relating to federal securities regulation, including, Forbes, Bloomberg’s BusinessWeek, Compliance Weekly and Equities.com. Mr. Guzik is also a regular speaker on federal securities matters, including JOBS Act legislation.

Mr. Guzik is also a founding member of The Heritage Foundation Securities Regulation Working Group, focusing on federal regulatory issues affecting small businesses and emerging growth companies, including ongoing JOBS Act and Dodd-Frank SEC rulemaking. He also serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the Crowdfunding Professional Association (CfPA). He received a B.S. degree in Industrial and Labor relations from Cornell University and is a graduate of Stanford University Law School.  He is admitted to practice in both New York and California.