Mark Straub is the Co-founder and CEO of Smile Identity, the leading digital KYC and identity verification provider in Africa. He has spent much of his career trying to help people in underserved markets get access to better opportunities through technology and entrepreneurship. Mark was a venture investor for a decade, and worked with over 20 companies doing business in adtech, fintech, healthcare, and energy in markets ranging from the US and China to India and Sub-Saharan Africa. Working with Vinod Khosla at Khosla Impact, he led investments in Kopo Kopo, NeoGrowth, Milaap, Branch, and Flutterwave; and he was an investor in all three of Elon Musk’s companies during his time at DFJ.
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Marvin Liao, Global Macro Startup Investor
Marvin Liao is an Investor-Operator, executive coach and formal advisor to several large Family Offices. Marvin is a Partner at Rolling Fund Diaspora.vc, Manages the Angel Fund Sukna Global & a Board member at Game Groove Capital, an International Gaming Holding Company. He was previously a Partner at Venture Capital Fund 500 Startups, running the SF based accelerator program as well as investing in Seed stage start ups. He has invested in over 414 Pre-seed & Seed stage startups during the 6 years spent there. Marvin also spent 10.5 years at Yahoo! as an executive with extensive operating experience expanding businesses across Asia, Europe, Latin America and the United States in his career at the company. Marvin presently serves on the Investment Committees/Advisory boards of several Venture Capital funds. He also mentors at numerous accelerator programs around the world.