Panel Discussion   “Opportunity to Success”

Recognising a good opportunity, understanding and communicating the value proposition and developing the right strategy to execute are key elements in converting an opportunity to success in both new start up and established businesses. The panel discussion will focus on these 3 elements:

1. Opportunity Identification– Getting a clear understanding of a business problem whose solution offers a significant opportunity is a critical part of opportunity identification. The discussion will focus on how to understand, evaluate and communicate the opportunity such that it can be successfully solved.
2. Value Proposition– The discussion will focus on how to evaluate, document and present the value proposition of the identified opportunity. This is critical in getting the support and endorsement of stakeholders, executives and potential investors in the proposed venture.
3. Execution Strategy– The discussion will focus on the execution strategy to convert the opportunity to success.

Overview presentation and facilitation: Jordan Green
Panel members: D D Saxena, Rakesh Aggarwal and Steve Bungay.

Agenda:        Pre-session Informal Networking: 6:00 PM
Overview Presentation by Jordan Green: 6:30 PM
Panel Discussion: 7:00 PM
Q&A with the Panel: 7:30 PM

Please register via email with your name and contact phone number to mail@iitav.org.au by cob 8 April 2014. Early registration is strongly recommended.
Enquiries: Nikhil Kumar (Mob: 0417 103 795), Dr Raj Rajakumar (0432 474 385), Rachana Kaudinya (0431 388 319)

Jordan Green

Jordan is an internationally sought after thought leader, consultant and speaker on early-stage investing. He is an experienced
engineer, entrepreneur, executive, venture capitalist and Angel investor. He has over thirty-one years of experience in growing and advising technology oriented companies in Australia, USA, Asia and Europe.

A Silicon Valley software veteran, a founding partner of one of the best performing venture capital fund managers in Australia, co-founder and Chairman of the Australian Association of Angel Investors (AAAI), Founder/President of Angel investor group, Melbourne Angels Inc and a Case Manager with Commercialisation Australia. Jordan advises governments on policy and programmes for the early-stage investment and entrepreneurial space.

A Fellow of the AAAI and Graduate member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, Jordan has a degree in Electronics Engineering from RMIT and has been a Chartered Professional Engineer for more than twenty years. He has a MBA from the Melbourne Business School and post-graduate qualifications in Marketing, Strategy, Innovation and Product Development and experience as a postgraduate research fellow in biomedical engineering at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. He has been director, CEO , executive, or engineer for over a dozen technology and engineering companies since starting his career with IBM.

Dhruv Deepak Saxena (DD)

DD is the Promoter-Founder of Riverina Oils & Bio Energy Pty Ltd (ROBE). This is an investment of over AUD$150M for oil seed crushing and refining and animal feed protein products. It is the single largest food and agri investment in Australia in the last 5 years. ROBE’s plant at Wagga Wagga is the second largest integrated operation in Australia in this sector. The ROBE project is in production since March 2013 and has reached its full capacity in March 2014.DD is a Chemical Engineer from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur and a gold medallist from Indian Institute of Management, Bangalore. He started his career with Unilever and has been both their Sales and Marketing Head for their mainline divisions. DD was the Vice President of one of India’s Top Ten Groups (Thapar Group) reporting to the Chairman. He started three Greenfield projects for the company including an Agribusiness of growing and processing gherkins in 1992 which has now become a global leader (employing over 200,000 people) and the second largest export after coffee from the state of Karnataka, India. He was the International Head and Chief Executive for Bakrie International, a $15 Billion South-East Asian group.  He has set up the first Australian food joint venture in India in partnership with Unibic Biscuits. This world-class manufacturing and distribution facility exports products globally in conjunction with the Bradman Foundation. DD is a Director and a Promoter of Tree Top Plantations Pty Ltd which has the largest table olive growing and processing operation in Australia. The 1,250 acres of olive groves are located near Griffith in NSW.

Rakesh Aggarwal

Rakesh is Managing Director of the Saurin Group. He graduated as an Electrical Engineer from Indian Institute of Technology-Banaras Hindu University. He worked in India for Engineers India, Britannia and IDPL before going to Saudi Arabia. He spent three years working for a Biscuit company till 1992. He migrated to Australia along with his wife Sunita and sons Saurabh and Rohin in 1993 and found a job with a dairy company. In 1997, he left his job and started an engineering business. In 2001, he bought a sick and closed down milk powder plant from his previous employer.
The plant at Langwarry Food Park was restarted in 2005 and the business has grown from nothing to $100M in seven years. A fire in 2012 caused a significant setback to Rakesh’s business growth but it has started growing again at 30% per annum.  The business was rated as the fastest growing private business by Business Review Weekly and has also received the award of Victorian Exporter of the Year 2011.

Steve Bungay

Steve is Director, Envision I.T. Pty. Ltd., a leading software company that develops software for entrepreneurs, SMEs and leading corporate businesses. In the past 10 years, Envision IT has developed many award winning products. A recent accolade has been in making its client, Jones Lang LaSalle win its product international acclaim.

Steve completed his B.Tech. in Electrical Engineering in 1986 from IIT Delhi. His first job was in products development in a public sector company in India. He later moved to the Indian Navy as Senior Design Officer and after about 2 years, returned to the public sector. The stint in the public sector involved sales but his main contribution was to complete many major projects for Department of Defence and Indian Post. He operationalised the first LAN in the Department of Defence and installed 500+ POS terminals in Post Offices located all over India.  After a 10 year stint in the public sector, Steve moved to the private sector, joining Mastek as Business Development Manager. This started a career devoted to Software and Integrated Services business that brought him to Australia where he started Envision IT in 2002.