Fireside Chats with Prominent Leaders from Chicago’s Business Community

Hosted by Tim Schumm

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With over 20 years of executive and financial leadership experience, Mike has operated, advised and invested in companies across a broad range of industries and stages from startups to mature enterprises. Prior to co-founding Jump Capital, he was a senior partner for Excelar Group LLC, a provider of strategic execution and advisory services. He also served as President of SIRVA, a Clayton, Dubilier & Rice portfolio company.

Mike spent sixteen years with GE and GE Capital in a breadth of financial, operating and global assignments and is an honors graduate from GE’s Financial Management and Leadership Development programs.

 Samara is Founding Partner of a pre-seed/seed stage fund, Chingona Ventures, focusing on investing in technology and technology-enabled companies all over the U.S.

Rahul Khare, MD, is the CEO and founder of Innovative Care, a group of medical practices that are changing the way healthcare is delivered in Chicago. Khare completed his Master of Science in Clinical Investigation from Northwestern University, and did his emergency medicine residency at the University of Michigan before taking a position at Northwestern Medicine in Chicago. Khare spent twelve years as an emergency medicine physician and associate professor at Northwestern. During his tenure, he received several federally funded grants, and published more than 20 peer-reviewed articles on how to improve healthcare. Khare’s research inspired his vision for Innovative Care.

Michael is a serial entrepreneur who has co-founded five high growth businesses over his twenty-year career. Currently, Michael is the CEO, co-founder, board director of UrbanBound and is a co-founder and board director at Hireology. Michael’s first business, Versity.com, grew rapidly over a 3 year period and was successfully sold in 2000. During his time with Versity, Michael held several roles which included CFO, VP of Product Development and Board Member. Prior to these ventures, Michael was a financial analyst at the investment bank Donaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette in New York (acquired by Credit Suisse).

He graduated with High Honors from the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business with a Bachelor of Business Administration. Michael is an active member and past President of the
Entrepreneurs Organization of Chicago, a global organization with over 14,000 members worldwide.In his spare time, Michael enjoys listening to music, playing piano, cooking, watching Michigan football and spending quality time with his family and friends. He lives in Chicago with his wife, two children, and their dog, Brandy. 

IDx Technologies is a cutting edge technology-based startup that is the first FDA approved AI-based diagnostic platform that can identify a range of common diseases and is changing the way Dr.’s work with patients.

We’re speaking with their CEO, John Bertrand, about a range of topics affecting our healthcare system and how IDx is looking to be a part of the future of healthcare.

Brent Sopel is the Founder/CEO of The Brent Sopel Foundation. Brent is also a former National Hockey League (NHL) defenseman who played for multiple NHL teams from his initial draft in 1996 through his final NHL season in 2011. He was a key defensive part of the 2010 Stanley Cup-winning Chicago Blackhawks  The Foundation is dedicated to providing financial assistance & education to help students with dyslexia reach their full potential through early detection & intervention.  He discovered he had the affliction when his daughter was diagnosed with dyslexia. Dyslexia is a language-based learning disability or disorder that includes poor word reading, word decoding, oral reading fluency, and spelling.