Speaker Series

Thursday, September 25, 2025 – Nationwide Trends in Venture Capital event was standing room only!

The second Springboard Speaker Series event was held in Buffalo, NY and featured a discussion among seven (7) national venture capital leaders to share insights, trends, and strategies shaping the future of venture capital and entrepreneurship across the country. The free, in-person program was designed for business professionals, founders, investors, and entrepreneurs who want to deepen their understanding of venture capital and connect with key players in the ecosystem.

This event was moderated by Jack Greco, Co-Founder of ACV Auctions, and featured unique and inspiring conversations with venture capitalists including:

Lauren DeLuca Managing Partner, Motivate VC
Katelynn Donnelly Managing Partner, Avalanche VC
Rohit Gupta Managing Director, Future Communities Capital
Victor Gutwein Managing Partner, M25
Cat Middleton General Partner, The Venture Collective
Jamie Rosenblatt Partner, Golden Ventures
Zak Schwarzman General Partner, MetaProp

Check out the videos from the event:

May 19, 2025 — Ray Leach, Co-Founder and President of The O.H.I.O. Fund

The Springboard Speaker Series featured Ray Leach, president and CFO of the O.H.I.O (Ohio High-growth Investment Opportunities Fund) Fund, a private investment fund dedicated to accelerating economic growth across Ohio. Ray is also recognized for his pivotal role as founding CEO of Jumpstart.

On May 19, 2025, Ray spoke to individuals engaged in the WNY ecosystem about his work in Ohio, his observations about building an ecosystem, and some ideas to think about for Western New York.

Click here to watch the full replay of the discussion, moderated by Victor Hwang.

About the Speaker Series

Springboard’s Speaker Series is an ongoing programmatic effort for the WNY entrepreneurial ecosystem.

In the first event of 2025, Springboard partnered with Global Corporate Venturing (GCV) to host a virtual discussion on corporate venture capital. GCV provides the global corporate venturing community and their ecosystem partners with information, insights and access needed to drive impactful open innovation.

GCV members George Hoyem, EVP of In-Q-Tel; Austin Noronha, Managing Director of Sony Innovation Fund; Reese Shrider, Managing Director of Allstate Venture Capital; and Dave Stevenson, Managing Director of Merck Global Healthcare Fund joined in a conversation about corporate venture capital with WNY companies Constellation Brands, Delaware North, M&T Bank, and Rich Products in what we hope is the first of many discussions on this topic within this group and throughout WNY.

Special thanks to Christina Riboldi and her team at GCV as well as all the participants from WNY and beyond for their leadership in corporate venture capital and for participating in this discussion.

We plan on hosting three additional speaker series sessions in 2025, which will be open to our entire ecosystem. To learn more about future Speaker Series events and other Springboard activities, join our eNews list.

Visit the Global Corporate Venturing website.

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