Mr. Marty Kaszubowski – Chair
Marty Kaszubowski has over 30 years of experience with a broad spectrum of public- and private-sector organizations promoting new venture formation, early-stage investment, technology commercialization, and innovation-led economic development. Marty is an effective, widely recognized advocate for innovation-led economic development and entrepreneurship at the local, state, and national levels, and has served on the Governor’s Small Business Advisory Board, the Board of the Virginia Business Incubation Association, and supported Virginia’s Department of Business Assistance in realigning Virginia’s small-business programs to better support early-stage, high-growth, entrepreneurial ventures. Marty is often tapped by the US State Department and related Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) to provide entrepreneurship training and mentoring, and has led start-up seminars and judged Business Plan contests in Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Georgia, and Ukraine.
Marty recently joined Old Dominion University (ODU) as Executive Director of the new Center for Enterprise Innovation, which offers a collection of integrated services for existing and new businesses. Until taking the new position at ODU, Marty was President of General Ideas, a technology venture consultancy working with US and European start-ups and early-stage companies seeking to establish viable business models and prepare for initial investment. Prior to his stint as a private consultant, Marty was Director of the Innovation Strategies Practice at Kaufman & Canoles Consulting, and served as Vice President for Strategic Development at the Earl Technology Group (ETG), where he helped rapidly expand ETG via acquisition of several early-stage technology-based companies. In the late-1990s, Marty was the founding Director of the Hampton Roads Technology Incubator (HRTI), later served as Executive Director of the Hampton Roads Technology Council (HRTC). He is a member of several startup company Boards and is currently a member of the Board of Advisors of the Launch Place Seed Fund, a member of the Board of Advisors for 757Angels, and Chairman of the Board of the Norfolk State University Research and Innovation Foundation.
Marty holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Michigan, and a Master’s Degree in Technology Management from the George Washington University.