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President

Alex Porter, Managing Director, Nasdaq's Corporate Platforms

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Alex Porter is Managing Director of Nasdaq’s Corporate Platforms business. In this role, Alex oversees Nasdaq’s corporate client relationships and business development efforts in Silicon Valley, providing strategic guidance, mission critical resources, and networking opportunities to IROs, CFOs, CEOs, GCs, and Sustainability professionals both pre and post-IPO.

With over eight years’ experience at Nasdaq, Alex brings a unique perspective on the U.S. equity capital market environment, evolution of corporate priorities, and trends in investor relations.

Alex holds a Bachelors degree in economics from Hobart and William Smith Colleges.

This is Alex's third term on the Board.

Treasurer

Katherine Chen, CFA, CFA, Head of Investor Relations, Eventbrite

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Katherine has over 10 years of experience in investor relations, corporate communications, and corporate governance. She is currently Head of Investor Relations at Eventbrite, where she joined in 2021 to lead and remake its IR program in conjunction with the company's strategic pivot.

Prior to Eventbrite, Katherine worked on award-winning investor relations teams at Flex, a global manufacturing solutions company, and at Cepheid, a medical devices company which was acquired by Danaher in 2015. She began her career as a lead proxy research analyst at Glass Lewis, where she specialized in North America corporate governance and equity compensation analysis.

Katherine received Bachelor's degrees in Economics and History from the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she was a Regents Scholar, and holds the Investor Relations Charter (IRC) designation.

This is Katherine's third term on the Board.

Programs

Charles Eveslage, Investor Relations Manager, Zoom

Mary Lai, Vice President, Investor Relations, NEXTracker

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Mary Lai is Vice President of Investor Relations for NortonLifeLock. Prior to NortonLifelock, Mary led and helped build award-winning investor relations teams at SYNNEX, Flex, and Salesforce.com. Mary brings in 15+ years of combined experience across investor relations and technology equity research, including areas in software, hardware, and services.

Mary holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from the Haas School of Business, at UC Berkeley.

This is Mary's third term on the Board.

Marketing

Susanna Chau

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[email protected]

Susanna most recently served as Director, Investor Relations at Atara Biotherapeutics. Prior to this, she held IR roles at Compugen (immuno-oncology), Coherus (biosimilars), Astex Pharmaceuticals and Exelixis (oncology) and Affymetrix (genomic testing). She practices three main tenets in IR: transparency, addressing perceived corporate shortfalls head-on, and setting investor expectations. Her war chest of experiences include: an activist challenge from a protégé of Carl Icahn; year one post-IPO; post-merger company name change and rebranding.

Susanna served on the 2015 and 2016 NIRI Annual Conference Committees, co-organizing a panel on short attacks, as well as a crisis management panel. Prior to IR, she held roles in life sciences marketing and as a bench scientist in agricultural biotechnology. Susanna holds a Bachelor of Science in Genetics and Plant Biology from University of California, Berkeley, and a minor in Business Administration from the Haas School of Business.

This is Susanna’s fifth term on the Board.

Membership

Chris Faralli, Managing Director, Russell Reynolds Associates

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Chris Faralli specializes in recruiting and assessing top talent for chief financial officer and senior investor relations roles. He currently serves as the San Francisco Deputy Area Manager for Russell Reynolds Associates.

Based in San Francisco, Chris works closely with clients across industries to build effective, forward-thinking financial leadership teams. He brings a rigorous, process-oriented approach to engagements with both public and private companies, with a particular focus on leading strategic next-generation searches.

Chris has more than 10 years of experience advising clients across a range of industries, including technology, financial services, healthcare, and nonprofit organizations. Chris began his career in New York, focused on CFO searches, broad finance mandates and investor relations.

Chris received his BA in political science from the University of Pennsylvania. He is a member of the National Investor Relations Institute (NIRI), for which he has spoken at a number of industry events.

Sponsorship

Vern Essi, Vice President of Investor Relations, Fastly

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[email protected]

Vern joined Fastly in 2022 as Vice President of Investor Relations. Vern was previously at Inphi, leading its investor relations efforts and corporate development strategy execution. Prior to joining Inphi, Vern was Director of IR and Strategic Finance at Quantenna Communications where he architected its investor relations effort and supported its strategic initiatives as a newly public company. Previously, Vern was Vice President of Business Development at Exar, where he worked on various corporate development aspects and managed the investor relations efforts. Vern started his career as a sell-side equity research analyst and brings to his corporate functions over 20 years of technology research experience at a host of investment banks, most recently at Needham & Company.

Vern graduated from Babson College with a degree in Finance & Investments and holds both the Investor Relations Charter (IRC) and Chartered Market Technician (CMT) designations.

This is Vern’s fifth term on the Board.

Director at Large

Mary Frances Turnbull, Managing Director and Head of Corporate Access, Raymond James

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[email protected]

Mary serves as Managing Director and Head of Corporate Access at Raymond James with an emphasis on collaborating with Investor Relations professionals to develop strategies for investor outreach and targeting. In this role, Mary is also responsible for partnering with Capital Markets, Investment Banking and Research professionals to develop and source content for Raymond James hosted general and sector-specific conferences, summits, symposiums, non-deal roadshows, bespoke and industry experts. Prior to joining Raymond James, Mary served in various research, sales and management roles at serval sell-side investment banks; including Lehman Brothers, Deutsche Bank and Salomon Smith Barney. An active NIRI member, she previously served on the Annual Conference Committee and President of the Central Florida chapter. She is founder and co-chair of The Women in Capital Markets Symposium (WICM), an annual event devoted to advancing the professional development of women at Raymond James.

Mary received a BA in economics from Mount Holyoke College, and an MBA in finance from Fordham University.

This is Mary’s fourth term on the Board.
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