Momofuku and Majordomo Media founder David Chang has been named one of “the most influential people of the 21st century” by Esquire, received 6 James Beard Awards, was recognized as GQ’s Man of the Year, and is a TIME 100 honoree. He is the creator of Ugly Delicious on Netflix and Secret Chef on Hulu, as well as a culinary contributor to Amazon’s Thursday Night Football. He is the host of The Dave Chang Show and Recipe Club podcasts. His cookbooks Momofuku and Cooking At Home as well as his memoir Eat A Peach are all New York Times bestsellers.

Chang is an engaging speaker known for his insightful discussions about entrepreneurship, food sustainability, and kitchen innovation. Chang’s straightforward and often humorous delivery makes his presentations both informative and entertaining.

Five-time Grammy and Emmy-nominated Margaret Cho has always been the Agent Provocateur of entertainment. Right as she was starting her stand-up career at age 14, Cho won a comedy contest to open for Jerry Seinfeld in the early ’90s and began her meteoric rise to stardom. Cho’s socially aware, no-holds-barred type of comedy has made her both a thought leader and a tolerant teacher for those with open minds and open hearts.  An accomplished performer in all formats, Cho has conquered the worlds of film, television, books, music, and theatre. Cho’s undeniable creative spark lights up any room.

With so much success in her creative life, Margaret still finds time to support the causes that are important to her. She was the recipient of the Victory Fund’s Leadership Award, the first-ever Best Comedy Performance Award at the Asian Excellence Awards, the First Amendment Award from the ACLU of Southern California, and the Intrepid Award from the National Organization for Women (NOW). In every area of her life, Margaret is honest, adoring, passionate, uproarious, and always entertaining.

Trailblazing chef, entrepreneur, and philanthropist Melissa King is a proud Chinese American and queer chef who is also a creative entrepreneur outside of the kitchen. King (she/they) is the winner of Bravo’s Top Chef All-Stars: Los Angeles (Season 17) and the winner of All-Star’s Fan Favorite. With more challenge wins than any other competitor in the history of Top Chef, King has gone on to serve as a culinary judge on the series as well as The Food Network’s The Julia Child Challenge. Known for her technical precision and ability to blend modern California cuisine with Asian flavors, King has helmed several Michelin starred kitchens in San Francisco and has cooked for notable figures such as Oprah Winfrey and Al Gore, and curated the menu for the 2022 Met Gala alongside Anna Wintour. Called on as a creative consultant for companies around the world, Chef King is a sought-after motivational speaker supporting women’s empowerment, sustainability, food education, and entrepreneurship. 

King has been recognized as “one of the best female chefs in San Francisco,” and was named FSR Magazine’s “40 Under 40: Rising Star.” They launched a company focused on partnerships and culinary experiences, as well as a brand of small-batched sauces called King Sauce, an apparel line, and virtual cooking classes. Chef King is passionate about cultural inclusivity, media representation, environmental sustainability, and social justice – working with groups such as Stop AAPI Hate, The Trevor Project, and World Central Kitchen, among others. She is the face of IBM Research’s “5 in 5” series, focused on five innovations that will change our lives within five years. King is a featured chef in the Williams-Sonoma’s Chefs’ Collective. They have performed at food & music festivals from Coachella, Outsidelands, BottleRock, and more, and spoken for groups including Google, Facebook, Chase, and Capital One.

Emmy Award-winning journalist, documentarian, and author Laura Ling has dedicated her intrepid career to reporting from dozens of countries on the most critical issues facing the world today. As Head of Programming for Hearst Television’s Streaming Video Services, Ling oversees content development and strategy for Hearst’s new OTT platform Very Local. While Director of Development for Discovery Digital Networks, Ling produced and created original web series that received hundreds of millions of views. A consummate host and moderator, Ling helms the web series Going Off the Grid, Rituals with Laura Ling, the mini-documentary series The Power of Kindness, and her podcast Everyday Bravery, eloquently blending her principles of gratitude and perseverance. In 2009 while reporting on the trafficking of women, Ling was arrested and held captive in North Korea. She recounts her experience in a memoir written with her sister Lisa, Somewhere Inside: One Sister’s Captivity in North Korea and the Other’s Fight to Bring Her Home. Ling captivates audiences with anecdotes from her storied career and powerful lessons learned with a global perspective.

Ling has received many accolades for her work, including an Emmy Award and the prestigious Edward R. Murrow Award for her work as a correspondent for SoCal Connected and a Gracie Award. Under her leadership as Vice President of the journalism department, Current TV’s Vanguard received the prestigious Alfred I. DuPont Award and several Emmy nominations. Her work has appeared on ABC's Nightline, NBC, and PBS, and she has written editorials for the Los Angeles Times and CNN.com.

Pioneering, two-time Peabody Award-winning comedian Hasan Minhaj is the creator of Netflix's comedy show, Patriot Act with Hasan Minhaj, which brought an inclusive and nuanced perspective to global news, politics and culture. 

As Host of The Daily Show Trevor Noah wrote in TIME: "Patriot Act is the manifestation of Hasan’s whip-smart commentary, charisma and sincerity. It’s also a consistent reminder that Hasan is America. And America is Hasan.”

Named to TIME's "100 Most Influential People in the World," Minhaj originally rose to prominence as a senior correspondent on The Daily Show. He has gone on to host the White House Correspondents' Dinner and air his own critically-acclaimed one-hour Netflix comedy special, Hasan Minhaj: Homecoming King. 

A first generation American, Minhaj comes from a Muslim family originally from India. In his comedy and at speaking engagements, he draws on his personal history and the immigrant experience to explore the modern cultural and political landscape with depth and sincerity. 

Emmy-Award winning host Jeannie Mai can be seen each weekday on the nationally syndicated talk show The Real. Mai and her fellow The Real co-hosts received a Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Talk Show Host, received multiple Daytime Emmy nominations for Outstanding Talk Series, and received an NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Talk Series. Mai also serves as a sideline correspondent for ABC’s extreme mini-golf competition series Holey Moley, and competed on season 29 of the hit series Dancing with the Stars. Mai’s presentations are both inspiring and relatable, offering insight into building resilience, embracing cultural identity, and harnessing personal strength to achieve success.

Deeply committed to charities that advance women’s interests, Mai serves as a board member for various organizations, including Dress for Success and Same Sky. Mai has served as an advocate to fight human trafficking and has been an ambassador for the Pacific Links Foundation, Step Up, Nightlight International, Not For Sale, and Heartbeat Vietnam. Mai has been honored for her activism work in the AAPI community as a part of the A100 list, highlighting the most influential Asians within their respective industries. Audiences leave Mai’s talks feeling motivated to take control of their lives with renewed passion and purpose.

Academy Award and Emmy-nominated writer and critically acclaimed actor and comedian Kumail Nanjiani is an incredible storyteller, prolific creative, and inspiring speaker. While he can still be seen regularly doing stand-up shows around some of LA’s greatest comedy theaters, Nanjiani was recently featured in Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire, Migration, the Disney+ Star Wars prequel Obi-Wan, Marvel film The Eternals, and The Big Sick, which Kumail and his wife Emily V. Gordon received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Screenplay. The Big Sick was chosen as one of AFI’s “Top Ten Films of the Year.” Nanjiani recently earned an Emmy nomination for his compelling portrayal of Chippendales Founder in Hulu’s limited series, Welcome to Chippendales, which he also served as an executive producer on. Nanjiani rose to fame when he starred as ‘Dinesh’ in the Emmy Award-winning HBO comedy series Silicon Valley. Additional television credits include Bless the Harts, The Twilight Zone, The Meltdown, Portlandia, Franklin & Bash, The X-Files, and Community. Nanjiani and his wife Emily V. Gordon currently serve as executive producers on the Apple TV+ series Little America, which received nominations at the Independent Spirit Awards and BAFTA TV Awards. In engaging moderated conversations, Nanjiani shares humorous and empowering insights about his experiences in Hollywood, the creative process, and more, making an impact with audiences of all kinds.

Nanjiani was named one of TIME’s “100 Most Influential People.” For his profile, Judd Apatow wrote: “Kumail is one of our most hilarious, unique stand-up comedians (…) We’re lucky to have Kumail. We need a thousand more.” Nanjiani is a gifted speaker who brings levity and insight to moderated conversations that make a memorable impact on audiences of all kinds.

Stephanie Shepherd is an environmental advocate and social entrepreneur. Formerly the Chief Operating Officer of Kardashian West Brands, she has since established her own platform. With close to 2 million followers, Stephanie's expertise is leveraging her social influence to inspire global activism.

In addition to co-founding Future Earth, Shepherd is an ambassador for “Days For Girls International,” “The Environmental Working Group,” and a board member of Former Vice President Al Gore’s “The Climate Reality Project.” She also recently joined "World War Zero," a climate change initiative led by Former Secretary of State, John Kerry. Through her advocacy, Shepherd has generated millions of dollars and thousands of volunteer hours for organizations who, like her, relentlessly pursue human flourishing and environmental preservation.

Civil rights litigator and New York Times bestselling author Qian Julie Wang uses her unique gift for storytelling to transcend the business, legal, political, and literary worlds and focus on the humanity at the heart of these issues.

Qian Julie’s debut Beautiful Country: A Memoir became an instant New York Times bestseller, and was heralded as “an incandescent debut from an astonishing new talent.” Lauded as an “essential book for our times” and named one of the New York Times Book Review’s “Notable Books of 2021,” Beautiful Country is a poignant and heartrending literary memoir that intimately retraces Qian Julie’s childhood footsteps where at age seven, she moved from China to Brooklyn, New York with her parents, and overnight went from being the daughter of professors to being deemed “illegal.” As a litigator, Qian Julie has been praised by clients as "exceptionally talented" and "exemplary.” For a decade, she has represented Fortune 500 corporations, governmental entities, and individuals in complex civil litigation. Qian Julie is now a managing partner at Gottlieb & Wang LLP and is dedicated to advocating for marginalized communities' education and discrimination rights.

Qian Julie’s writing has been featured in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Cut, Elle, Harper’s Bazaar, and she has appeared on PBS Newshour, ABC News, NPR, BBC World Outlook, C-SPAN, The TODAY Show, among many others. A highly sought-after keynote speaker, Qian Julie is in demand for events with groups like the Association of Small and Rural Libraries, Datadog, the Nantucket and Savannah Book Festivals, Sentara Healthcare, and Central Synagogue, to name a few. For her open heart and strong passion for advocacy and bringing awareness to marginalized communities, she regularly receives rave reviews, such as: “Thanks to Qian Julie for a tremendous program last night. She gave such a beautifully crafted, powerful talk that had the audience alternatively chuckling, nodding, wiping their eyes, and occasionally even startled… Qian Julie is a supremely talented writer and thinker, and I am sure she will continue to challenge the world with her sharp and nuanced insights. And she couldn’t have been nicer and more gracious to staff and guests and trustees alike." (Museum of the City of New York)

Olympic Gold Medalist, two-time World Champion, and U.S. and World Hall of Fame figure skater Kristi Yamaguchi is a powerful force of nature both on and off the ice. Yamaguchi has appeared as an NBC Olympics broadcast analyst for NBC’s Universal Sports Network, a special correspondent for the Today Show, and was the celebrity champion of ABC’s Dancing with the Stars. Throughout her career, Yamaguchi has been a highly sought-after corporate spokesperson, working with Kellogg’s and the American Lung Association, Celanese Acetate, as well as serving as the Goodwill Ambassador for the 2002 Olympic Winter Games, performing at the opening and closing ceremonies. She has been invited to speak to Marriott International, Illinois Libraries Present, Philips Oral Healthcare, and many more.  

Yamaguchi’s philanthropic passions include promoting early childhood literacy through her Always Dream, which finds innovative ways to improve access to books, technology, and family engagement strategies for children of historically and intentionally excluded communities. Yamaguchi authored the New York Times bestselling children’s books Dream Big, Little Pig! and It’s a Big World, Little Pig!, among other titles. She has received the Inspiration Award from the Asian Excellence Awards, the Women's Sports Foundation Flo Hyman Award, the Heisman Humanitarian Award, and the USPOC Jessie Owen’s Olympic Spirit Award. Yamaguchi’s commitment to excellence, clear vision, and uplifting message provide inspiration to all audiences.

Emmy Award-winning writer, director, and producer Alan Yang is a groundbreaking comedian as well as advocate for AAPI and immigrant communities. Shortly after college, where he wrote for Harvard's comedic magazine The Lampoon, he moved to LA to pursue a career as a writer. Some of his earliest jobs were writing on the late-night show Last Call with Carson Daly and the television series South Park. Those jobs eventually led to a position as staff writer on the hit series Parks and Recreation, where he met his Master of None co-creator, Aziz Ansari. Now a seasoned writer and producer who is responsible for series like Amazon Prime's Forever and Apple TV's Little America and Netflix's Free Food for Millionaires, Yang is fast becoming a household name. Yang is the writer and director of his feature film, Tigertail, loosely based on his family's immigration story from Taiwan. Yang is a powerful storyteller, usually finding the funniest way possible to connect to the heart of a narrative.

Today, Yang uses the tools of his trade to advocate for Asian Americans and immigrant communities. Audiences describe Yang as open and funny, honest, sincere, and upbeat. His past hosts include Proctor & Gamble, Latham & Watkins, and many more.

Producer, actor, director, and writer Eugene Lee Yang is one of today’s most recognizable queer Asian-American performers, with his work as a digital producer receiving billions of views, distinguishing him as a preeminent culturally influential YouTube creator. A multi-hyphenate creative in the visual space, Yang’s work is mission-driven, leveraging his colossal platform for philanthropic goals – his viral video I’m Gay raised $150,000 for The Trevor Project, and his documentary We Need to Talk About Anti-Asian Hate raised over $600K for GoFundMe’s Stop Asian Hate campaign. The expertise of Yang’s storytelling prowess enables him to dip into comedy and vulnerability, sharing insights about creativity, connection, and how telling our unique stories can change the world.

A prolific creator, Yang is known as a vital member of Buzzfeed’s comedy quartet ‘The Try Guys’, who launched an independent production company that has led to significant projects: the New York Times bestselling book The Hidden Power of F*cking Up, an international live tour, and an upcoming Food Network series. Yang has spoken to spellbound audiences at events for The Trevor Project, Korean American Story, and the Human Rights Campaign, who honored him with their Visibility Award.

Peabody and Emmy Award-winning broadcast journalist Amna Nawaz currently serves as co-anchor & co-managing editor of PBS NewsHour. Her diligent reporting and skillful moderation have shaped coverage of some of the most important events in recent history. Amna’s portfolio is broad, delving into politics, foreign affairs, education, climate change, culture, and sports to great acclaim, with her NBC News Special ‘Inside the Obama Whitehouse’ earning her an Emmy Award. From her distinguished position as NBC’s Islamabad Bureau Chief & Correspondent to her Peabody Award-winning work, Amna’s signature thoughtful and thorough analysis establish her as one of the foremost voices in journalism today.

Leading notable panels such as the Aspen Ideas Festival and the RespectAbility #ADA30 Summit 2020, Amna’s insightful moderation elevates conversations. In a ground-breaking moment, she co-moderated a 2019 Democratic Primary Debate, becoming the first Asian American and first Muslim American to do so. Amna has interviewed international newsmakers, influential voices in the arts, and travelled from border towns to Appalachia covering vital issues and enriching national and international dialogue.

Amna’s work has appeared on ABC News, Nightline, NBC News, NBC Nightly News, The Today Show, Dateline NBC, MSNBC, and MSNBC.com. Nawaz was a Fall 2021 Fellow at Georgetown University’s Institute of Politics and Public Service and she is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Asian American Journalists Association, the South Asian Journalists Association, and the Inter-American Dialogue. Amna consistently receives rave reviews for her speaking engagements, such as: “Amna was outstanding! Gracious, delightful, simply perfect. The tone of her speech hit the spot. Everyone loved it.” (Greenwich Academy)

Seven-time Emmy-winning journalist Ann Curry is a cornerstone of U.S. news and journalism. Her reporting is raw, bold, and deeply personal, fueled by human connections. She has appeared before the camera on some of America’s largest networks, including NBC News, PBS, TNT, and more. Her TED talks have been viewed around the world. Curry brings the same deep meaning, message, and sharp intellect to her speaking events as she does her iconic interviews.

Curry is recognized not only as a journalist but also as a humanitarian. Her work has garnered honors such as the Muhammad Ali Humanitarian Award for Global Citizenship, the Simon Wiesenthal Center's Medal of Valor, the NAACP's Excellence in Reporting Award, the Centre for Responsible Leadership's Truth in Media Award, the Edward R. Murrow Lifetime Achievement in Journalism Award, and more. Hosts such as Colgate University, the Holocaust Memorial Center, the National Court Reporters Association and more have been captivated by her memorable stories.

Author, cultural critic, New Yorker staff writer, and writer-at-large at The New York Times Magazine Jay Caspian Kang writes and speaks about race, identity, economics, the history of immigration, and more. He was a founding editor at Grantland and an Emmy-nominated correspondent on VICE at HBO. Kang is the author of The Loneliest Americans, which was named one of the best books of the year by NPR, Mother Jones, and TIME, which called it “provocative and sweeping.” It was also named an Editor’s Choice book by The New York Times Book Review, which raved that Kang’s “exploration of class and identity among Asian Americans will be talked about for years to come.”

Kang’s writing has been featured in numerous publications and outlets including This American Life, The New Yorker, and The Nation, among others. He is a co-host of the beloved eclectic podcast Time to Say Goodbye, which Slate called one of the Best Chat Podcasts of 2022. A substantive speaker and insightful moderator, Kang speaks on topics as varied as city planning, the history of immigration in the U.S., education policy and Affirmative Action, and more for hosts including the Korean American Spine Surgical Society, the Collegiate School, and Ohio State University.

Award-winning Egyptian American creator, actor, producer, director, and comedian Ramy Youssef always brings his unique voice and perspective to his storytelling. Youssef created, produced, directed, and starred in the hit Hulu show Ramy, for which he won a Golden Globe and a Peabody Award. In 2020, the Television Academy nominated Youssef for two Emmy Awards in the categories of “Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series” and “Outstanding Directing for a Comedy Series” on behalf of the second season of Ramy. Youssef was also nominated for a Critics’ Choice Award and a Writers Guild Award for his one-hour HBO comedy special Ramy Youssef: Feelings. Youssef is known for his exceptional storytelling skills and ability to convey complex narratives with humor and depth.

Youssef is a co-creator and executive producer of Netflix’s new series Mo, a semi-autobiographical series that won a Gotham Award and was recognized by AFI as one of their Top Television Programs of the Year. On the feature front, Youssef starred alongside Emma Stone, Willem Dafoe, and Mark Ruffalo in Yorgos Lanthimos’ highly acclaimed film Poor Things for Searchlight, which debuted in 2023. Youssef's candid approach to discussing personal and often vulnerable topics makes him relatable and genuine, encouraging audiences to embrace authenticity in their own lives and work. 

Award-winning investigative journalist, producer, and documentarian Sahar Zand is highly regarded for her work on some of today’s most pressing topics: the Iran Nuclear Deal, mental health in Afghanistan, the refugee crisis, climate change, and many more. Zand has worked for the BBC, Channel 4, ITV, Vice News, and numerous other international media outlets, and her report “The Moroccan warrior women beating men at their own games” was chosen as one of the best reports by BBC reports in 2016. Her documentary Britain’s Virginity Clinics for ITV Exposure was nominated for many awards including the Royal Television Society Programme Awards, Amnesty Media, the BAFTAs, and a True Honour Award from the Iranian and Kurdish Women Rights Organisation, where she will also serve as their patron. Zand’s creative and disruptive style of journalism has earned her high praise within the industry, and she is a highly sought-after speaker on the nuances of major global issues of conflict and human rights.

Zand was born in Iran, fled the country to avoid political persecution, and overcame adversity once she found asylum in the U.K., which has given her an insight into marginalized communities that enables her to report from a unique perspective rarely seen in mainstream media. She has been personally affected by poverty, racism, and identity issues, and is a passionate advocate for raising awareness and championing the most marginalized. Zand is a prolific storyteller, and her immersive and impact-driven work connect with a global audience. Her insights about the role of journalism in the rising disinformation epidemic, her personal experience overcoming adversity, and finding strength and resilience are impactful for audiences of all kinds.

Award-winning and internationally bestselling author Mohsin Hamid is a radically inventive storyteller with his finger on the pulse of the world. Called “one of his generation’s most inventive and gifted writers” by The New York Times, Hamid is the author of several books including the New York Times bestsellers The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Exit West, and The Last White Man – which was named a Best Book of the Year by The New Yorker, Vogue, and NPR. Foreign Policy described him as “a master critic of the modern global condition” and named on its list of “100 Leading Global Thinkers.” Hamid transports audiences with universal themes and timeless storytelling, touching on today’s most vital issues with his wide-reaching perspective as a journalist and visionary storyteller.

Hamid has spoken at universities around the world such as Princeton University, the University of California at Berkeley, the London School of Economics, and the National University of Singapore; at festivals such as the Frankfurt Book Fair, the Jaipur Literary Festival, and the Melbourne Writers Festival; at government and intergovernmental organizations such as the United Nations, the World Bank, and the U.S. State Department; and at corporate events for firms such as GSV Ventures and Baillie Gifford.

In addition to his practice as a novelist and essayist, he studied international affairs at Princeton and law at Harvard, worked as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company in New York and at Wolff Olins in London, was involved in starting a music technology company in the UK, helped establish the Lahore Literary Festival and the Lahore Biennale, and has lectured and taught pro bono at schools and universities in Pakistan. This background shapes and informs his public appearances, and he speaks on topics ranging from literature, the arts, and culture, to migration, technology, business, and politics.

Dr. Jena is an economist, physician, and professor at Harvard. As one of a small group of physician-economists in the world, and one of the most creative and prolific social scientists in medicine, Dr. Jena is uniquely positioned to explore where the worlds of medicine and economics collide, based on his experiences as a practicing physician at Massachusetts General Hospital and his unique training as an economist. 

His creative use of natural experiments – chance occurrences that we are exposed to, but often unaware of, in our lives – help us understand how health care works, the subject of his 2020 TEDMED talk. He is the host of the popular Freakonomics, M.D. podcast, where he tackles questions at the intersection of medicine and economics, including questions from his own research on why mortality rates rise in cities on the days that they host large marathons, why cardiac patients do better when cardiologists are out of town at national cardiology conferences, and why kids with summer birthdays are more likely to be diagnosed with A.D.H.D. Dr. Jena’s book, Random Acts of Medicine: The Hidden Forces That Sway Doctors, Impact Patients, and Shape Our Health, will be published by Doubleday in the summer of 2023.

Dr. Jena’s work is frequently featured in the media, including The New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal.

Seema R. Hingorani is a Managing Director and Senior Client Advisor at Morgan Stanley Investment Management (MSIM). She is also a member of the Investment Management Operating Committee, Chair of the Senior Advisory Board of Morgan Stanley Infrastructure Partners, a Senior Sponsor of Investment Management’s Diversity Council and a member of Morgan Stanley’s Diversity and Inclusion Senior Leaders Advisory Council. As part of the MSIM senior leadership team, Seema is focused on strategic client relationships, investment talent development and diversity initiatives across the platform. Seema joined Morgan Stanley in 2019 and has 29 years of investment experience.

Seema is also the Founder and Chair of Girls Who Invest, a non-profit organization dedicated to increasing the number of women in portfolio management and executive leadership in the asset management industry. Previously, Seema was the Founder and Chief Investment Officer of SevenStep Capital, an opportunistic investment platform focused on seeding women portfolio managers. Seema served until June 30, 2014 as Chief Investment Officer for the New York City Retirement Systems which had assets of $160B. Previous to this appointment, Seema was Interim Chief Investment Officer and before that Head of Public Equities & Hedge Funds for the pension funds. Under her leadership, the pension fund was named Hedge Fund Manager of the Year - Large Public Pension Plans by Institutional Investor. Prior to Seema’s four years of public sector experience, she served as Global Director of Fundamental Research at Pyramis Global Advisors; a Partner, Portfolio Manager and Senior Equity Analyst with hedge fund Andor Capital Management; a Partner and Senior Equity Analyst at hedge fund Pequot Capital Management; Co-founder of hedge fund Mirador Capital Management; and an Equity Analyst with T. Rowe Price.

Seema has worked with several organizations focused on issues concerning women and girls and is a prolific speaker on the topic of a more robust inclusion of women in the corporate sector. In 2024, she was recognized by Forbes on its list of “50 over 50: Investment” for her industry leadership. She was awarded in 2021 the insignia of Chevalier de la Légion d’Honneur (Knight of the Legion of Honor) by France, the country’s highest civil and military award. She was also recognized in 2021 as one of the 100 most influential women in U.S. finance by Barron’s, honored as the 2019 Bloomberg 50 “Ones To Watch”, the 2016 Woman with Impact by the Connecticut Women's Business Development Council, and Wall Street Women Entrepreneur of the Year in 2015 by Traders magazine. Seema served as a member of the National Finance Committee of Secretary Clinton’s 2016 Presidential Campaign. She is a Board Director of the non-profit organization Women’s World Banking, a Senior Advisor for The Wharton School Stevens Center for Innovation in Finance Cypher Accelerator, and an active member of The Economic Club of New York.

TV Personality and New York Times bestselling cookbook author Pepper Teigen has become America’s most well-known Thai mom and Yai (grandma). Lovingly known as “Pepper Thai” for her love of spicy chiles, she is the host of the Food Network and Discovery Plus show, Getting Spicy with Pepper Teigen. Her passion for food goes back to her childhood growing up in the small town of Isaan in Thailand, where her first job was cooking and selling coconut pancakes to commuters each day before school. When Pepper married Chrissy’s dad, she moved to America and helped him operate a bar he owned in Washington, where she cooked food with Thai flavors for the bar patrons. She became an expert at improvising with American ingredients when Thai ones, like green papaya and Thai basil, were hard to find. She not only kept her love of Thai food and traditions alive — even in the small towns where she lived in Idaho, Utah and Washington — but also used food to introduce her daughters, Chrissy and Tina, to her Thai culture.

Pepper is widely featured on Chrissy’s Instagram and on the Cravings’ website, where she shares her cooking tips and Thai recipes as part of her popular “Pepper’s Corner” video series. She is the author of the New York Times bestseller, The Pepper Thai Cookbook. Teigen’s interactive cooking demonstrations make for memorable events that appeal to audiences of all kinds. Attendees cook along with Pepper as she shares her journey and recipes with wit and wisdom.

Creator, writer, director, and producer Ash Perez is a viral content creator working across mediums to tell powerful stories. He is currently developing their original series, The Youngest One, with Lionsgate and ABC. Ash was a Co-Producer on ABC’s Home Economics, a Story Editor on Freeform’s Good Trouble, and a creator for Buzzfeed. He also served as a Senior Producer on the Biden/Harris campaign, where they co-directed and co-produced “Michelle Obama’s Closing Argument.”

A queer first-generation American himself, Ash is focused on telling underrepresented stories in every genre. His passion lies in comedy, romance, and YA. Ash’s humorous and poignant memoir Read This for Inspiration: Simple Sparks to Ignite Your Life highlights their perspective that wisdom and motivation can be found everywhere. In uplifting events, Ash shares insights about storytelling that resonate with audiences of all kinds.

Radha Agrawal is the co-Founder, CEO, and Chief Community Architect of Daybreaker, bestselling author of Belong, and entrepreneurial force, co-founding and investing in multiple 9-figure businesses in the wellness space including THINX. Her global morning dance, music, and wellness movement Daybreaker has reached half a million people in 30 cities worldwide, and Radha’s team joined Oprah and WW on tour in 2020. Named one of MTV’s “8 women who will change the world,” Radha has won numerous entrepreneurship awards and accolades for disruptive and culture-shifting innovation.

An expert in science-backed strategies for building community, Radha’s keynote speeches have exhilarated audiences for events with Nike, Wisdom 2.0, Princeton University, Burning Man, and Facebook’s Global Marketing Summit. Radha is a sought-after commentator on increasing connection at work and in life, identifying opportunities for social entrepreneurship, and amplifying a 'profit with a purpose' mission.

Leroy Chiao is a former NASA astronaut and International Space Station commander. He is uniquely qualified to speak about the United States, Russian, Japanese, European and Chinese space programs, in addition to addressing motivation, leadership, and teamwork. He served as a member of the White House appointed Review of U.S. Human Spaceflight Plans Committee, and currently serves on the NASA Advisory Council and as special advisor for human spaceflight to the Space Foundation. He has worked extensively in both government and commercial space programs, and has held leadership positions in commercial ventures and NASA. 

Lydia is a 2 time major winner, a global star and has continually set records both as an amateur and professional.

She was the number 1 ranked amateur for more than 2 years before turning professional, winning 2 LPGA events in that timeframe. She reached number 5 in the professional rankings whilst an amateur, and then having turned professional held the number one position for 85 consecutive weeks, one of only three players to achieve that feat.

Despite her remarkable success, she remains an incredibly grounded and personable  individual, with a genuine passion for yoga and meditation, and prioritizes her friends and family above all else.

Tan Le is an innovator, inventor & entrepreneur, and is the Founder and CEO of EMOTIV. Born in South Vietnam, Le migrated to Australia as a refugee with her family in 1981.  In 1998, Le was named Young Australian of the Year and voted one of Australia’s 30 Most Successful Women Under 30. Le’s story was featured in the ‘Hope’ section of the Eternity Exhibition of the National Museum of Australia. Le has been featured in “Who’s Who in Australia” List since 1999, Fast Company’s Most Influential Women in Technology in 2010 and Forbes’ 50 Names You Need to Know in 2011.

Renowned for their personal documentation of their experience in gender transition, Chella Man is celebrated for their motto, "be your own representation." As a deaf, genderqueer, Chinese, and Jewish individual, Chella found they didn’t have role models to look up to, and so they became a voice and a true representation for himself and for others. With over 257K subscribers and many millions of views on their YouTube video entitled "One year on testosterone: voice updates," Chella is normalizing the conversation around gender issues for disabled and LGBTQ+ youth. 

A New York-based artist, director, and author, Chella's work features the continuums of disability, race, gender, and sexuality. They blend the genres of painting and performance art while simultaneously exploring sculpture, writing, and live workshops. They are currently a mentor and resident at Silver Art Projects located in The World Trade Center. Man has shown at institutions such as the Brooklyn Museum, Mana Contemporary, and will be exhibiting at The Pacific Design Center, and The Abrons Arts Center this coming year. They were an artist-in-residence at the Palazzo Monti in Brescia, Italy in 2020. Man published their first book, Continuum, with Penguin Publishing, highlighting how to heal from systemic oppression and the revelations they have come to growing up. 

Raghuram Govind Rajan is the Katherine Dusak Miller Distinguished Service Professor of Finance at the Booth School of Business at the University of Chicago. Raghuram Rajan also served as the 23rd Governor of the Reserve Bank of India. Dr. Rajan is a senior advisor to Booz and Co, BDT Capital, and MCAP, and on the international advisory board of Bank Itau-Unibanco. He is a director of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and on the Comptroller General of the United States’ Advisory Council, as well as a member of the Group of Thirty. Dr. Rajan was the President of the American Finance Association in 2011 and is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In January 2003, the American Finance Association awarded Dr. Rajan the inaugural Fischer Black Prize, given every two years to the financial economist under age 40 who has made the most significant contribution to the theory and practice of finance.

Tina Tchen shares hope, ideas and strategies that inspire others to recognize the power of diverse teams and keep equality on the forefront of the global agenda.

A high-powered lawyer, Tina’s career accomplishments have established her as a powerful advocate for gender equality. As the former President and CEO of TIME’S UP Now and the TIME’S UP Foundation, Tina oversaw the organizations’ efforts to change culture, companies, and laws in order to make work safe, fair, and dignified for women of all kinds. In 2017, Tina co-founded the TIME’S UP Legal Defense Fund, which has connected more than 3,600 people to legal or PR support for sexual harassment across dozens of different industries. Tina currently serves as the Executive Vice President and Chief Strategy and Policy Officer for the Obama Foundation.

During her eight years at the White House, Tina served as chief of staff to First Lady Michelle Obama, special assistant to President Barack Obama, and the executive director of the Council on Women and Girls, leading the first-ever White House Summit on Working Families and the first-ever United State of Women Summit. 

A passionate champion for women’s and children’s issues, including women in positions of leadership, Tina shares her unique perspective and insights on workforce diversity and inclusion, breaking through male-dominated industries, and ending campus assault. Energetic, authentic and engaging on stage, she empowers the next generation to raise their voices and take action now to secure a better tomorrow for women and minorities across the country and world.

Loung Ung was only 5 years old when the Khmer Rouge soldiers stormed into her native city of Phnom Penh. Four years later, in one of the bloodiest episodes of the 20th century, some two million Cambodians – out of a population of seven million – had died at the hands of the infamous Pol Pot and the Khmer Rouge regime. Among the victims were both of Loung’s parents, two sisters, and 20 other relatives. In 1980, Loung, her older brother Meng and his wife, escaped by boat to Thailand, where they spent five months in a refugee camp before relocating to the United States in Vermont.

Loung Ung is now a bestselling author, activist, and co-screenplay writer of First They Killed My Father, the critically acclaimed 2017 Netflix Original Movie produced and directed by Angelina Jolie, based on Ung's bestselling memoir, now streaming on Netflix in 190 countries. On November 5, 2017 with the start of the awards season, the film received the “Hollywood Foreign Language Film Award" at the Hollywood Film Awards.

Loung’s bestselling memoir, First They Killed My Father: A Daughter of Cambodia Remembers, was a 2001 recipient of the Asian/Pacific American Librarians’ Association award for Excellence in Adult Non-fiction Literature, is widely taught in high schools and universities across the U.S. and internationally, and has been translated into 15 languages, including Khmer, German, Dutch, Norwegian, Danish, French, Spanish, Italian, and Japanese. 

Since 1995, Loung has made over thirty trips back to Cambodia and has devoted herself to helping her native land heal from the traumas of war. She has worked as an activist to end violence against women, child soldiers, and the Campaign for a Landmine Free World, serving as its spokesperson from 1997-2005 before leaving to focus more on her writing and restaurant business.  In 2013, Loung expanded her activism reach as one of the writers for Girl Rising, a groundbreaking documentary film directed by Academy Award nominee Richard Robbins. 

The World Economic Forum selected Loung as one of the “100 Global Youth Leaders of Tomorrow.” Among the publications, television and radio shows she has been featured on are The New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, People Magazine, CNN, Nightline, the Diane Rheme Show, Fresh Air with Terry Gross, and The Today Show, among others. In addition, she has been the subject of documentary films broadcast by German ARTE, Japanese NHK, and the New England Cable Network (NECN).

Mike Walsh is the CEO of Tomorrow, a global consultancy on designing business for the 21st century. He advises leaders on how to thrive in this era of disruptive technological change.

Rather than focusing on the distant future, Mike takes an anthropological approach – scanning the near horizon for emerging technologies and disruptive shifts in human behavior, and then translating these into pragmatic plans for business transformation. A prolific writer and commentator, Mike’s views have appeared in a wide range of international publications including BusinessWeek, Forbes and the Wall Street Journal.

Mike’s clients include many of the global Fortune 500, and as a sought-after keynote speaker he regularly shares the stage with world leaders and business icons alike.

What if you could harness the power of the free market to solve the problems of poverty, hunger, and inequality? To some, it sounds impossible. But Nobel Peace Prize winner Muhammad Yunus is doing exactly that.

As founder of Grameen Bank, Yunus pioneered microcredit, the innovative banking program that provides the poor — mainly women — with small loans they use to launch businesses and lift their families out of poverty. Muhammad Yunus’s vision is the total eradication of poverty from the world. "Grameen," he says, "is a message of hope, a program for putting homelessness and destitution in a museum so that one day our children will visit it and ask how we could have allowed such a terrible thing to go on for so long." This work is a fundamental rethink on the economic relationship between the rich and the poor, their rights and their obligations. The World Bank recently acknowledged that "this business approach to the alleviation of poverty has allowed millions of individuals to work their way out of poverty with dignity."

Muhammad Yunus believes credit is the last hope left to those faced with absolute poverty, and that the right to credit should be recognized as a fundamental human right. It is this struggle and the unique and extraordinary methods he invented to combat human despair that Muhammad Yunus recounts here with humility and conviction. It is also the view of a man familiar with both Eastern and Western cultures — on the failures and potential for good of industrial countries. It is an appeal for action: we must concentrate on promoting the will to survive and the courage to build in the first and most essential element of the economic cycle — Man.

With only 6 months to graduate, Vinh Giang left his degree in commerce and law to become an online magic teacher ultimately building a hugely successful online business, 52kards, which now serves over 800,000 students all around the world. This earned him the award of Top Young Entrepreneur in Australia.

Vinh Giang’s real magic journey began when he finally understood what Robert Houdin (an amazing magician) meant when he said: “A magician is an actor playing the part of the magician.” Once Vinh understood the meaning behind this quote, he focused all his energy on studying the art of performance and not the art of presentation. He has spent the last 15 years mastering the art of performance-enhanced communication, helping thousands of professionals worldwide to learn these skills.

Vinh is also the CEO of Luminary Productions which produces exceptional video for individuals and companies all around the globe.

Vinh’s presentation will bring out the magic in you!

After surviving a brutal upbringing of being enslaved as a female in Yemen, forced into arranged marriage twice, surviving multiple death threatening situations, and two civil wars before arriving in the U.S., Maha Bodhi, M.A. found her freedom and true self through the practice of ancient yogic and modern neuroplasticity techniques. She is a living example of the hero's journey and is dedicating her entire life to spreading the transformational techniques that saved her life.

Dr. Michio Kaku is a theoretical physicist, bestselling author, acclaimed public speaker, renowned futurist, and popularizer of science. As co-founder of String Field Theory, Dr. Kaku carries on Einstein’s quest to unite the four fundamental forces of nature into a single grand unified theory of everything.

Dr. Kaku is the author of numerous New York Times bestselling books, including Physics of the Future, Physics of the Impossible, Parallel Worlds, Einstein’s Cosmos, Visions, Beyond Einstein and Hyperspace. His most recent book, The Future of the Mind, was released in February 2014.

Deepica Mutyala is the founder & CEO of LIVE TINTED and a renowned South-Asian American beauty entrepreneur with a dedicated following. On a mission to change beauty standards, the focus of her platform aims to dismantle colorism, while encouraging her followers to advocate for and love themselves. Her effectiveness and passion have been recognized by O: The Oprah Magazine, Forbes, The New York Times, VOGUE and more. She was also a judge for the 2021 Miss Universe competition, and was named one of Entrepreneur’s 100 Powerful Women of 2020.

Since rising to the forefront of the beauty industry after her 2015 YouTube video “How to Cover Dark Under Eye Circles” (currently 10.9 million views) went viral, Deepica landed appearances on Today and Dr. Oz. Following this success, she created the multicultural digital community LIVE TINTED, bringing attention to those underrepresented in media. In the past year, Deepica has transformed LIVE TINTED into its own award-winning beauty brand, offering a growing range of multi-use products that are inclusive, clean, cruelty-free and vegan.

Chris Cheng is History Channel's Top Shot Season 4 Champion. Along with the $100,000 grand prize, Chris won a pro marksmanship contract with the show sponsor, Bass Pro Shops, and the title of, "Top Shot."

Dr. Anil K. Gupta is widely recognized as one of the world’s leading experts on strategy, globalization, and emerging markets.  Anil serves regularly as a keynote speaker at major conferences and corporate forums in the US, Europe, Asia, Latin America, and Africa – including the World Economic Forum, Economist conferences, Chief Executive magazine’s CEO2CEO Summits, and the Yale CEO Summit.

Jenn Lim wears a lot of hats — literally and figuratively. She’s a bestselling author and has been named one of the World’s Top 50 Keynote Speakers. She’s had the privilege of leading a company to the Inc. 5000 Fastest Growing List, sitting on the Global Happiness Council of Work & Wellbeing, and working with hundreds of companies — from Fortune 500s and Best Places to Work to startups and governments

Jenn’s approach to leadership is not for the faint of heart. She speaks the truth powered by a real-talk style that doesn’t shy away from tough topics, cuts through the fluff, and gets to what matters most. Her authentic approach and eons of experience in people, culture, and org design give her the street cred to back up her purpose of nurturing fulfilling lives through the work/life choices we make every day. And yet, despite her reputation as a “global workplace expert,” Jenn remains grounded, down to earth, and refreshingly weird.

Jenn’s beliefs are simple yet profound: we can be leaders at all levels, live true to our authentic selves and create workplaces rooted in happiness and humanity. She’s been named one of the World’s Top 50 Keynote Speakers and featured in publications like Inc., Forbes, Fast Company, Fortune, Entrepreneur, and Success Magazine. Jenn inspires folks around the world on ways to find meaning, grit, and joy, even in the toughest of times. She reminds us how we can all ripple an impact when we get real with ourselves first. When she’s not speaking or advising, you’ll find her spontaneously starting a dance party or meditating anytime she’s got a quiet minute. And if you need help parallel parking when you’re in a tough spot, she’s got your back (literally and figuratively)

Learn more about her at JennLim.com.

Jason Ma, Founder and CEO of ThreeEQ, is an award-winning Chief Mentor of Next Gen Leaders, high-level rainmaker, sought-after speaker, acclaimed author, and a highly regarded and well-connected strategic advisor to UHNW families, CEOs, boards, and single family offices. Ma also serves as an investor and Chief Business Officer at AdXero, a transformative incentivized media distribution technology venture with enormous industry impact and ROIC/MOIC potential.

With 40 years of deep experience spanning technology, education, finance, media, advertising, e-commerce, distribution, telecom, hospitality, and more—combined with over 2 million miles of world travel—Ma brings unparalleled strategic insights and pragmatism to his work. He has inspired and guided a “small army” of Next Gens to achieve success in Ivy League/elite college admissions, high-powered careers, personal development, and enduring family legacies. He also served as a Thiel Fellowship mentor, supporting young entrepreneurs in pursuing transformative ventures.

Ma was a Forbes Global CEO Conference by-invitation delegate for eight years, further cementing his standing in elite circles. His global impact is underscored by a decade of contributions as Silicon Valley’s leading member of the B20, the G20’s official forum with the global business community (private sector). Across ten G20 Presidencies—Australia, Turkey, China, Germany, Argentina, Italy, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, India, and Brazil—he has helped shape private sector policy recommendations on the Future of Work, Human Capital, Skills, and Education, while being an influential voice on AI & Digital Transformation and Trade & Investment. Ma is one of a select few Americans appointed annually as a B20 member since 2014.

A sought-after speaker and thought leader, Ma is the acclaimed author of Young Leaders 3.0: Stories, Insights, and Tips for Next-Generation Achievers and former Forbes contributor on Mentoring Young Leaders (~2 million views). His insights have also been featured in elite publications such as Forbes, The CEO Magazine, Impact Wealth, Family Office Magazine, Red Hot Monde Magazine, and showcased at premier Family Office, Private Wealth, Investor, CEO, AI/Tech, B20/G20, Education, and Next Gen leadership summits and shows.

Renowned for his expertise in Next Gen leadership, family legacy enhancement, Ivy League/elite college admissions, high-powered careers, family office trends, strategic investments, AI/tech company building, and geopolitics, Ma’s guidance resonates deeply with UHNW families, Family Offices, and CEOs worldwide.

A philanthropist, Ma serves as a St. Jude/ALSAC Advisory Council lead member, an SVCF partner, and is engaged in his faith community. He is an inspired father of two happy, compassionate Gen Z daughters. The Ma family (playfully nicknamed the “MAfia”) values unconditional love, humor, and high standards in what matters. Ma holds a degree in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from UC Berkeley College of Engineering.

Jessica Malaty Rivera is an infectious disease epidemiologist and internationally recognized science communicator. She earned her MS in Emerging Infectious Diseases from the Georgetown School of Medicine and has dedicated the last 15 years of her career to emerging disease surveillance, public health policy, and vaccine advocacy. Her specialty is in translating complex scientific concepts into impactful, judgment-free, and accessible information for diverse audiences. From 2020-2021, she served as the Science Communication Lead for The COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic. 

Currently, she is a Research Fellow at Boston Children's Hospital Innovation & Digital Health Accelerator, a Researcher at the Johns Hopkins University Center for Health Security, a Senior Science Communication Advisor at the deBeaumont Foundation, and an expert contributor for NBC Bay Area, CNN, PBS, BBC and more. 

In 2021, Jessica was named one of the "World’s 50 Greatest Leaders" by Fortune Magazine for her work on COVID-19 research and data communication. That same year she made the cover of Parents magazine, highlighting her work as a world-renowned science communicator from home. In 2022 she was named one of the Top 50 Leaders of Digital Health by Rock Health, and in 2023 she was named as one of Fierce Pharma's Fierce 50 for Social Impact in Health. Jessica was the host of the 2023 COVID Tracking Project podcast series which was nominated for a Peabody Award in 2024. 

Between her day jobs and being a full-time mother to three little kids, she also dedicates several hours a week to promoting science literacy and debunking misinformation on social media. 

The rise of China as a great power is one of the most important developments in the twenty-first century. But despite dramatic economic progress, China’s prospects remain uncertain. Minxin Pei examines the sustainability of the Chinese Communist Party’s reform strategy—pursuing pro-market economic policies under one-party rule. Combining powerful insights with empirical research, Minxin Pei offers a provocative assessment of China’s future as a great power.

Navi Radjou is a Silicon Valley-based innovation and leadership thinker who has advised senior executives worldwide on breakthrough growth strategies over the past 25 years. A Fellow at Cambridge Judge Business School, Navi has served on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council on Innovation & Entrepreneurship. Previously, he served as vice president at Forrester Research, a leading technology research and advisory firm. In 2013, Navi won the prestigious Thinkers50 Innovation Award – given to a management thinker who is re-shaping the way we think about and practise innovation. He delivered a talk at TED Global 2014 on frugal innovation (over 1.7 million views). Navi co-authored Frugal Innovation: How To Do Better With Less, published by The Economist in 2015, as well as the global bestseller Jugaad Innovation (over 200,000 copies sold worldwide). He is working on his next book Conscious Society: Redefining Who We Are. Reinventing How We Consume, Work, Relate, and Live. He is a sought-after keynote speaker and widely quoted in international media. Born and raised in Pondicherry, India, he holds dual French-American citizenship. He attended Ecole Centrale Paris and Yale School of Management. 

Alex Sheen is the founder of because I said I would, the international social movement and nonprofit dedicated to the betterment of humanity through the importance of a promise. Inspired by his father, Alex began sending promise cards to anyone who requested them at no cost. Since his father’s death on September 4th, 2012, because I said I would has sent over 2.4 million promises cards to over 150 different countries around the world. Through the viral nature of social media, Alex has reached millions of people by dedicating himself to philanthropy.  

Alex is a four-time TEDx Talk speaker. In 2017, he spoke at more than 130 events in over 100 cities. 

Nobuki Sugihara is the son of Chiune Sugihara, a Japanese diplomat who in 1940, in Kaunas, Lithuania, defied his government's orders to stop issuing visas to Jews trying to flee Nazi persecution. It is estimated some 6,000 Jews escaped death due to Chiune Sugihara's actions.  Nobuki Sugihara speaks to and keeps alive his father's legacy, and meets first hand with survivors and the growing community of thousands of children and grandchildren begotten since - a community sometimes called "Sugihara Jews."

Award-winning filmmaker, media founder, and author Gotham Chopra is at the forefront of the convergence of sports, science, and spirituality. As the creator and co-founder of Religion of Sports (ROS), an Emmy-winning media company based in Los Angeles, CA, Gotham has worked with some of the most elite athletes in the world including Tom Brady (Tom v Time), Kobe Bryant (Kobe Bryant’s Muse), Lebron James (Shut Up and Dribble), Stephen Curry (Stephen v The Game), Simone Biles (Simone v Herself), and many more to produce content that pushes the boundaries of non-fiction cinema and brings the mythos of sports to a broad audience outside of those that simply follow the games.

Gotham’s brand of sports storytelling leans into the essence of human potential, the dramatic peaks and valleys of competition and athletic achievement, and the heroic narratives that accompany both triumph and failure. He co-authored Walking Wisdom with his father, renowned spiritualist Deepak Chopra, and is the author of The Religion of Sports: Navigating the Trials of Life Through the Games We Love – a memoir-meets-manifesto about the overwhelming power of sports and how they provide meaning and purpose in peoples’ lives.

Nationally-recognized policy expert and leader Rohini Kosoglu has been at the forefront of driving transformative change and shaping critical policy discourse in the areas of technology, social, and economic policy. Kosoglu is a Venture Partner at Fusion Fund – focused on early-stage technology and health care investments. Kosoglu has served the last two decades as a senior White House official, chief of staff in the United States Senate, and organizational leader on multiple presidential campaigns. As the first South Asian American woman to hold the roles of both Domestic Policy Advisor to the Vice President and Chief of Staff in the U.S. Senate, Kosoglu promoted domestic policies to lift up the middle class, invest in American innovation, and strengthen our nation’s democracy. Vice President Harris praised Kosoglu as “a brilliant and trusted leader” who “brought vision, strategic judgement, and a depth of experience as our Administration has addressed some of the most urgent challenges facing our nation.”

Kosoglu is also a Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI) and Director of Innovation Policy at the Stanford Byers Center for Biodesign. Her career in Congress included over a decade of leadership positions designing policy initiatives, leading negotiations on bipartisan laws around social and economic policy, technology, and health care. Kosoglu offers unique insight on the perspectives driving politics and policy today, and reveals how the potential outcomes will effect individuals and industries.

"With a knack for trying and succeeding at new things," according to Forbes, Abigail has been described by Pop Culturist as “one of the voices of her generation.” 

Abigail is a New York Times bestselling author, a filmmaker and a woman-in-tech leader specializing in artificial intelligence, as well as a wife and mother of two. Abigail is a frequent speaker on topics of leadership, equity, representation, ethics and creative careers, including Talks at Google, the California Commonwealth Club (with Congresswoman Marilyn Strickland and Deb Liu, CEO Ancestry), META, Facebook AI, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Target, Twitch, The League of California Cities, Munger Tolle, the Barnes & Noble podcast, a virtual talk with Lea Salonga, as well as Stanford, Harvard, Columbia, Dartmouth and Berkeley among other venues.

Abigail penned the New York Times bestselling novel, Loveboat, Taipei and companion novels Loveboat Reunion and Loveboat Forever. She serves as executive producer for the film adaptation Love in Taipei, a top 10 comedy on Paramount+. She and her work have been profiled in print and tv, including Entertainment Weekly, Bloomberg TV, Forbes, Fortune, Cosmopolitan, The Hollywood Reporter, Seventeen, NBCNews, NBC Bay Area, ABC7, and the World Journal.

Abigail holds a BA from Harvard, where she took coursework in film, ethnic studies, and government. She also holds a JD from Columbia and MFA in writing from Vermont College of Fine Arts. In her career in tech, she has negotiated multibillion-dollar deals on Wall Street and in Silicon Valley, worked in venture capital, and hosted Intel’s Artificial Intelligence podcast featuring leading industry experts including Andrew Ng, Facebook's Chief AI Scientist Yann LeCun, and US Congresswoman Robin Kelly. She also served with the Partnership on AI. Forbes describes her as, “One of the most respected voices in fairness and AI.”

Former Wall Street trader-turned-expert, educator, and entrepreneur Vivian Tu is on a global mission to make the financial industry less "male, pale, and stale.” Tu is the founder and CEO of financial equity phenomenon, “Your Rich BFF” – making the rules of personal finance accessible and digestible to non-experts and marginalized communities. Tu has earned cross-platform fame and notoriety, garnering 8M followers and spots on Forbes “30 Under 30 – Social Media” and the inaugural “Top Creators” lists. Tu’s New York Times bestselling book, RICH AF: The Winning Money Mindset That Will Change Your Life, is the definitive book on personal finance for a new generation.

Tu is the host of her top-charting podcast Networth and Chill – a first-of-its-kind podcast offering accessible advice and lessons in finance, featuring Vivian alongside notable experts, professionals, and famous faces to break down the economics of our lives. Her affinity for turning finance into an approachable topic has transformed her into one of today’s most desirable public speakers, and she has given panels and keynote presentations at events including SXSW, Snapchat’s Financial Seminar, Forbes’ Top Creator event, BuzzFeed’s Content Creators Showcase, Glow Recipe’s Empowerment Summit, NextShark’s AAPI College Readiness Conference, and Her Campus Media’s Her Conference, to name just a few.

Grammy-nominated music producer, artist, fashion designer, entrepreneur, and NFT visionary Steve Aoki brings a sense of community to all his work – offering shared space and connection. His new album, HiROQUEST: Genesis, is an epic, multi-genre collection of songs with a world-building story that extends beyond the music itself to a new collectible trading card game Aoki co-created with MetaZoo Games in 2021. Aoki boasts 17.2M monthly listeners on Spotify, with a 77M average monthly reach across all his platforms. In sought-after talks and moderated conversations, Aoki shares his insights about entrepreneurship, music, and technology – inspiring his audiences to embrace new frontiers and invest in community.

In 2022, Aoki launched A0K1VERSE, an NFT metaverse membership community, powered by the Passport, that welcomes his fans to both virtual and real-world experiences. For Aoki, it’s essential to remain forward-thinking as he continues to grow his brand. Steve is the subject of the Netflix documentary I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead, which focuses on the driving force behind his career: his ambitious father, Benihana founder and perennial daredevil Rocky Aoki. He is also the author of the critically acclaimed memoir BLUE: The Color of Noise and the founder of THE AOKI FOUNDATION, which supports organizations in the brain science and research areas with a focus on regenerative medicine and brain preservation. In every space he enters, Aoki offers a community for those who need it most.

Entertainment entrepreneur, YouTube personality, and viral storyteller Steven Lim offers uplifting and entertaining talks about following your dreams, AAPI representation, and the power of food to create world peace. Lim is a former chemical engineer who worked at Procter & Gamble and went home from work to create virally popular YouTube videos. He was tapped by Buzzfeed to join their staff, and worked his way up to become an Executive Producer. Lim is known for creating and hosting Buzzfeed’s biggest food show, Worth It – a Webby winner and three-time Streamy Winner that has racked up billions of views and reshaped food criticism.

Lim is the CEO and co-Founder of Watcher Entertainment, a digital media studio that creates television-caliber, unscripted series that aim to bring joy, inspire curiosity, and genuinely connect with our audience. An advocate for diverse representation in media, Lim is passionate about amplifying diverse voices and creating a space where all stories – and storytellers – matter. Sought after for uplifting and relevant conversations with groups like Georgia Tech, SMU, University of Michigan, and more, Lim’s presentations, keynotes, and moderated conversations leave audiences with a feeling of connection and hope.

Serena Poon, CN, CHC, CHN is a globally recognized longevity expert and entrepreneur who has run successful businesses for over two decades in the wellness and longevity spaces. She is the CEO of Serena Loves LLC, a lifestyle brand and wellness product company, founder of Just Add Water®, a line of super nutrient foods and supplements, and President and co-founder of Fully Aligned Co. LLC, a company focused on services and consumer products in the longevity space.

Serena is known for her method of Culinary Alchemy®, a combination of education, integrative nutrition and healing energy. In 2022, she co-founded Fully Aligned Co, LLC with Dr. David Sinclair, a conscious company backed by research, with the intentions of “Bridging the Science and Soul of Well-being™." She sits on the advisory boards of EdenRoc Sciences, Delavie Sciences, and Ziva Health and has been featured in Forbes, Vogue, Elle, The Wall Street Journal, TODAY, The New York Times, Health Magazine, The Doctors, and NBC and is a regular health and wellness contributor on KTLA News.

Founder, entrepreneur, and mentorship expert Denise Woodard is the groundbreaking Founder and CEO of Partake Foods – a natural food company inspired by her daughter’s experience with food allergies. Launched in 2017, Partake’s delicious, allergy-friendly products can now be found in more than 9,000 retailers including Target, Kroger, and Whole Foods Market. Denise is the first Black woman to raise more than $1M publicly for a consumer-packaged goods (CPG) food startup, and the company has raised over $19M to date from investors including HER, Rihanna, Cleveland Ave, FF2032, and Marcy Ventures Partners. Partake was recently named #45 on the 2022 Inc. 5000 list, and Denise was named on Inc.’s “100 Female Founders” list for building a fast-growing snacking brand that everyone can enjoy. After winning a pitch competition with just the idea, Denise conducted hundreds of demos, leveraged her supply chain expertise, and created a product and company that has attracted the attention of major funders and publications alike. She delivers actionable, no-nonsense insights with optimism, creating an uplifting and memorable event for groups including Microsoft, Victoria’s Secret, Danone, Carta, and Target, to name a few.

Denise serves on the board of Naturally New York, the advisory board for the UNC Shuford Center for Entrepreneurship, and on the WP Carey School of Business Dean’s Council. Prior to launching Partake, Denise spent a decade in CPGs at various Fortune 100 companies. A mentorship expert, she has participated as a mentoring founder-in-residence for three cohorts of Target’s Forward Founder’s program supporting 30 founders in that time. Denise is also the Founder of Black Futures in Food & Beverage, a fellowship program that offers mentorship, internships, and job opportunities within the food and beverage industries for active HBCU students. From her commitment to excellence in branding, to growing a strong team that exceeds goals, Denise shares her leadership perspective that resonates with everyone from entrepreneurs looking to make their mark to C-suite executives looking to inspire their teams around a unified vision.

Actor and media entrepreneur Ryan Bergara is a self-described “ghost hunter,” known for creating beloved viral content across platforms for years. Bergara is the co-Founder of Watcher Entertainment, a digital media studio that creates television-caliber, unscripted series that aim to bring joy, inspire curiosity, and genuinely connect with our audience. Bergara hosts shows such as Ghost Files, Mystery Files, Puppet History, and Are You Scared. He is the creator and host of the BuzzFeed Unsolved franchise – which has amassed over 998M views and 187M hours (over 2,140 decades) watched. Bergara leverages a wealth of experience at every level in the media industry to share insights on creativity, creating viral content, and how to connect with your ideal audience.

Bergara is a sought-after speaker for groups including University of Pittsburgh, Chapman University, Virginia Tech, Syracuse, University of California – San Diego, University of California – Riverside, University of California – Irvine, and more. Bergara brings star power and entertaining insights to any audience.

Creator, screenwriter, producer, and showrunner Lee Sung Jin is known for the hit series Beef for Netflix and A24 starring Ali Wong and Steven Yeun, which currently sits at 99% on Rotten Tomatoes. Beef received immediate critical acclaim as a visceral dark comedy that is also profoundly contemplative about the way people relate to one another through extreme emotions and ultimately shared experiences. A brilliant creative and storyteller, Lee speaks to the creative process and celebrating authentic voices in his uplifting and insightful events.

Lee’s past credits include FX’s Dave, Amazon's Undone, HBO’s Silicon Valley, and more. On the feature side, Lee is currently writing Thunderbolts for Marvel, among other projects. Beyond his numerous successful onscreen projects, Lee is an advocate for mental health and wellbeing, spiritual and personal growth, and speaks to shared human experiences that resonate across class and culture.

Founder and CEO of Jubilee Media Jason Y. Lee is a leader on the business side of the creator economy, with a focus on empathy and making a positive impact on the world. After graduating from The Wharton School at UPenn, Jason worked as a consultant at Bain & Company. He also previously worked on the 2007 Obama Campaign and for the Clinton Health Access Initiative in Zambia. But Jason stepped away from his successful consulting career to follow his purpose, founding Jubilee Media first as a non-profit, then transitioning to a digital media startup. Jubilee Media creates experiences to promote understanding and create human connection. Known for the viral series Middle Ground, Spectrum, and Odd One Out, Jubilee has developed an audience of more than 7.5M subscribers and garnered more than 3B views.

As the world becomes more divided and media more divisive than ever, Jubilee swims against the current – bridging people together to create empathy, discourse, and love. Jason is a proud Korean-American, and recently received the Digital Influencer Award at Character Media’s Unforgettable Gala. He shared his incredible career journey in a TEDx Talk, and has been sought-after for events with groups including Spotify Space, Boston College, Wharton Asia Exchange, Bain Alumni Speaker series, and more.

Formula 1 racing driver Alex Albon is one of the most exciting drivers in a sport that is heading into a new era. Albon made his Formula 1 debut at the 2019 Australian Grand Prix for Scuderia Toro Rosso, representing Thailand. Following an increasingly impressive Rookie season, he was promoted to Aston Martin Red Bull Racing for the Belgian Grand Prix and onwards – before being retained for the 2020 season after a strong end to his debut season in F1. 2020 saw Albon take his maiden podium in Mugello, before doubling his podium tally at the Bahrain Grand Prix later that season. He has joined Williams Racing for the 2022 and 2023 season. In engaging talks, Albon shares his journey to the top of the world of Formula 1 racing, the mental fortitude and dedication it took to get there, and inspirational lessons about mental strength for audiences of all kinds.

Kelly Yang is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of over 14 books for children, teens and adults, including The Take, the Front Desk series (Front Desk, Three Keys, Room to Dream, Key Player, Top Story, and Chef’s Secret), New From Here, Finally Seen, Finally Heard, Parachutes, Private Label, as well as the picture books Yes We Will: Asian Americans Who Shaped This Country and Little Bird Laila.

With over 2 million copies sold to date, the Front Desk series has changed the landscape of children’s literature. Based on Kelly’s childhood experience living and working in a motel as a first-generation immigrant child from China, the Front Desk series authentically describes the immigrant experience through its heart-warming, spunky protagonist, 10-year-old Mia Tang. Named “one of the 30 most influential children’s books of all time,” Front Desk has won some of the most prestigious awards in literature, including the 2019 Asian Pacific American Award for Literature, the Parents' Choice Gold Medal, was the 2019 Global Read Aloud, and many other honors.

Kelly immigrated to America when she was 6 years old and grew up in Southern California, where she and her parents worked in three different motels. She went on to attend college at the age of 13 and law school at the age of 17. She is a graduate of UC Berkeley and Harvard Law School, where she was one of the youngest women ever to graduate. Her experience going to school early provided Kelly a unique perspective on aging, which she used to write The Take, her adult debut novel, forthcoming in Spring 2026 from Berkley/Penguin in the US, and Little, Brown in the UK. The Take is about two women, a young Asian American writer in her 20s, struggling to be taken seriously, and a white powerful Hollywood producer in her 50s, clinging to relevancy. Both are tired of being judged by society for their age. They make a deal that upends their lives. The Take interrogates not just the way we look at aging, but how it intersects with power, privilege and race. 

Kelly is the founder of The Kelly Yang Project in Hong Kong, the leading writing and debating program for kids in Asia. She’s written op-eds for The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Atlantic. In addition to being a novelist, she is also a screenwriter. She has written screenplays and television pilots for Netflix, CBS Studios, and the CW. She has three children and lives in Los Angeles. In 2023, she served as the Honorary Chair of the American Library Association for National Library Week.

A passionate and dynamic speaker, Kelly has appeared on Good Morning America, NPR, NBC, ABC, and frequently gives interviews to The New York Times, Oprah Magazine, as well as many other publications.

Jessica Chen Weiss is the Michael J. Zak Professor for China and Asia-Pacific Studies in the Department of Government at Cornell University. From August 2021 to July 2022, she served as senior advisor to the Secretary's Policy Planning Staff at the U.S. State Department on a Council on Foreign Relations Fellowship for Tenured International Relations Scholars (IAF-TIRS). Weiss is the author of Powerful Patriots: Nationalist Protest in China’s Foreign Relations (Oxford University Press, 2014). Her research appears in International Organization, China Quarterly, International Studies Quarterly, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Security Studies, Journal of Contemporary China, and Review of International Political Economy. 

With commentary in the New York Times, Washington Post, Foreign Affairs, Los Angeles Times, and the Ezra Klein show, Weiss was profiled by the New Yorker and named one of Prospect Magazine's "Top Thinkers for 2024." Weiss was previously an assistant professor at Yale University and founded FACES, the Forum for American/Chinese Exchange at Stanford University. Born and raised in Seattle, Washington, she received her Ph.D. from the University of California, San Diego.  

Denise was born and raised at Travis Air Force Base in Fairfield, California. Her mother is a Chinese immigrant who escaped communism in 1949, as the daughter of a two-star general who served under the command of President Chiang Kai-Shek. Her father is a Canadian immigrant who enlisted and served 20 years in the U.S. Air Force. As a member of a proud military family, Denise has a special appreciation for the liberties that enabled her parents to achieve the American Dream. She also recognizes the personal significance of her favorite Bible verse: To whom much is given, much is required. This verse underlies Denise’s life-long commitment to public service.

Denise is a graduate of Bowdoin College and the Georgetown University Law Center. Prior to starting her own public affairs consulting firm, she practiced law at K&L Gates; worked for a San Diego-based renewable energy company; and served as a presidential appointee at the White House and the U.S. Department of Justice, as well as a law clerk in the U.S. Senate. In 2016, Denise ran for Congress, and as a first-time candidate, earned the designation of an NRCC “Young Gun,” along with 43% of the vote in California’s then-52^nd Congressional District.

Denise writes and speaks on topics ranging from business to leadership, politics and faith. In 2018, Denise spoke as part of a six-city tour with Propel Activate, a national faith-based conference focused on developing leadership skills in women. She has spoken on the main stage at CPAC, delivered keynote addresses at political, religious, and business conferences, and written op-eds that have been published by local, national, and faith-based media outlets.

Denise is a regular contributor to Propel Women, an online outlet which reaches over 1,000,000 women. She is a political contributor for NewsNation. This fall, Baker Publishing Group will release her first book, titled Politics for People Who Hate Politics: How to Engage without Losing your Friends or Selling your Soul.

Ms. Liu is an accomplished entrepreneur, business leader and journalist with unmatched access to C-suite executives across a variety of industries, particularly in Asia. She is also author of two books including Work Smarts: What CEOs Say You Need to Know to Get Ahead. 

She most recently served as the Executive Vice Chairman of the New York Stock Exchange and Chief Experience Officer for NYSE’s parent company, ICE (NYSE:ICE). While at the exchange, Ms. Liu was actively involved in more than 25 initial public offerings, including some of the largest listings in recent history like Uber, Pinterest and Tencent Music Entertainment. She also founded the NYSE Board Advisory Council which brought together CEOs of companies like Coca-Cola, Delta Air Lines, Procter & Gamble, and Goldman Sachs to advance diversity in the boardroom. The Council is still going strong and has placed multiple women and minorities on major public company boards.

Ms. Liu also has extensive experience raising public and private capital. She founded the special purpose acquisition company D and Z Media Acquisition, whose IPO was ten times oversubscribed and was traded on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE:DNZ). Ms Liu also founded the ed-tech company Radiate, which raised two rounds of venture capital before being bought in 18 months by ICE in 2018.

Prior to her business career, Ms. Liu was an award-winning journalist for over 25 years, and is best known for serving as a leading anchor and editor-at-large at Bloomberg Television and Bloomberg Radio in New York City. Ms. Liu hosted “In the Loop” and developed several franchises including “Titans at the Table,” which featured leaders in finance, capital markets, entertainment, and business, reaching over 340 million viewers globally. 

Ashish J. Thakkar is the Executive Chairman of Mara Sokoni, an African e-commerce platform with a focus on B2C marketplace for general merchandise. He is also the Founder of Mara Group and Mara Foundation. Ashish has driven the growth of the Mara Group from a small IT business in Uganda to the globally recognized multi-sector investment group that exists today. Through its investments, Mara Group now employs over 11,000 people across 25 African countries in sectors spanning technology, banking, real estate and infrastructure. Ashish serves as Chair of the United Nations Foundation, Global Entrepreneurs Council and is the author of The Lion Awakes: Adventures in Africa’s Economic Miracle.

Jane Coaston is an expert on American conservatism. Her current podcast, What A Day, is a 20-minute morning overview of "what truly matters," bringing on experts to discuss the big stories shaping today. She is a Fall 2024 Fellow at USC Center for the Political Future, where she leads students in a close study of cultural and political movements. Coaston also is an on-air contributor for the Chris Wallace Show and other CNN shows. She was previously a contributing opinion writer at The New York Times and former senior politics reporter at VOX. She hosted the popular New York Times podcast, The Argument, which offered context, analysis, and good-faith engagement on current political debates. Her work has appeared on MSNBC, CNN, ABC News, NPR, The Ringer, Buzzfeed, and The Washington Post, and she has written for publications ranging from ESPN Magazine to The National Review. Coaston’s compelling perspectives and commentary challenge conventional thinking, offering fresh insights into today’s most important debates.

As a foremost expert on the American Conservative movement, Coaston is highly sought-out among top political institutions for her thought leadership. She is a current resident at the USC Center for the Political Future former resident fellow at the University of Chicago’s Institute of Politics. Coaston has spoken to the Texas Tribune Festival, SXSW, Hauenstein Center for Presidential Studies, Stony Brook University, University of Virginia, University of Southern California, University of Michigan.