Vivek Sharma builds and grows businesses through technology and has two decades of experience spanning CEO & Founder, Fortune 50 GM/P&L, digital product leadership, management consulting, board member and advisor, university professor, and innovation blogger.

Vivek is the CEO of InStride, a learning services enterprise designed to achieve significant social impact through partnerships with universities and employers, providing employees the opportunity to earn the highest-quality degrees. Vivek is also an adjunct professor of data science at the University of Southern California, where he teaches business innovation to graduate and MBA students, and authors a popular blog on current business innovation themes.

Vivek founded InStride in 2019 after six years of executive leadership at The Walt Disney Company in Los Angeles. As senior vice president, Digital Guest Experience & eCommerce, Vivek led a $10 billion eCommerce business and built physical-digital guest experiences for 150 million annual guests across theme parks, resorts, cruise lines, restaurants and retail stores. Prior to Disney, he was with Yahoo for four years in Sunnyvale as general manager for Yahoo Mail & Messenger, and vice president of Yahoo Search products. Earlier in his career, Vivek was an associate partner with the technology practice of McKinsey & Company in their Chicago and Singapore offices for eight years, and a sales manager with the Aditya Birla group in Bangkok.

Vivek serves on the board of directors of ASU EdPlus and Wash Multifamily Laundry systems. He is an industrial advisor to EQT Partners, a limited partner at Kleiner Perkins, a member of the World 50 Group, and has previously served on the board of the Indian American Council.

Vivek graduated from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi and holds an MBA from INSEAD, France.

Josh Jarrett is an experienced innovator and executer at the intersection of higher education and employment. He has built products, programs, and relationships that have helped hundreds of thousands of people successfully earn degrees and secure meaningful work.

Josh is the Chief University Officer of InStride, a learning services enterprise designed to achieve significant social impact through partnerships with universities and employers, providing employees the opportunity to earn the highest-quality degrees. Josh oversees the educational product offering and the consortium of InStride university partners.

Prior to InStride, Josh was the Co-Founder and Chief Product Officer of Koru, where he developed industry-leading predictive hiring solutions for Fortune500 clients like Citigroup, Oracle, and Barclays. Josh was also a founder of the higher education program at the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. He led the higher ed innovation portfolio of investments, including learning analytics, interactive courseware, online/blended learning, and competency-based learning. Earlier in his career, Josh served as a consultant at McKinsey & Company, product manager at Enkata Technologies, and business planning consultant for the National Park Service.

Josh is a frequent author, presenter, and advisor to education and recruitment technology startups, college presidents, and senior White House and Education Department policy leaders. He serves on the board of the Monterrey Institute for Technology in Education and on the Alumni Advisory Board of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

Josh is a graduate of Dartmouth College, and he holds a graduate degree in business from the Harvard Business School.

Jonathan Lau is a catalyst that thrives in building purposeful and sustainable organizations honed through years of experience at leading technology, education, consulting and investment firms.

Jonathan is the Chief Learner Officer of InStride, a learning services enterprise designed to achieve significant social impact through partnerships with universities and employers, providing employees the opportunity to earn the highest-quality degrees. Jonathan is responsible for end-to-end learner success, from helping learners make informed decisions to advancing their career to achieving those aspirations through products, services, and technology.

Prior to InStride, Jonathan was Senior Vice President and General Manager of Skills at Cengage, the leading education and technology company built for learners. In this role, Jonathan led Cengage’s business group focused on helping learners build and enhance their careers and providing educational solutions in computing, technology, trades, healthcare, and beauty discipline areas spanning higher education, K-12, consumer, and business channels. Prior to managing the Skills group, Jonathan led Cengage’s Product & Strategy Operations team where he led the shift to focus on the learner and in driving the transformation from print to digital.

Earlier in his career, he served as Director of Technology, Media and Telecom investments at Temasek, a $200b investment firm, where he invested and managed over 20 companies totalling $1.4b in investments. Before joining Temasek, Jonathan led a team of consultants at McKinsey & Co. advising companies in the technology, media, and telecom space and served in multiple product management and planning roles at Microsoft.

Jonathan holds a Master’s and Bachelor’s in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Anne is recognized as a visionary, thought leader and accomplished executive in growing and scaling initiatives, programs and companies. Her cross-sector experience spans across technology, education, and research for higher education, K-12, corporate learning and philanthropy.

Anne is the Chief Customer Officer of InStride, a learning services enterprise designed to achieve significant social impact through partnerships with universities and employers, providing employees the opportunity to earn the highest-quality degrees. Anne will inspire and lead a team of professionals in establishing groundbreaking partnerships with employers of large organizations (Fortune 500 and government) worldwide, helping transform organizations into learning enterprises and employees into lifelong learners.

Prior to InStride, Anne was the Founder of Quantum Thinking, a global higher education innovation advisory firm dealing with new models of educational partnerships and, most recently served as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence and Senior Fellow for Technology & Innovation for the Postsecondary Team for the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Throughout her career, Anne has held several global leadership positions such as President, Global Solutions, Americas for Kaplan Ventures; SVP of Pearson Learning Solutions & Pearson eCollege; SVP for Corporate Strategy, Innovation, New Product Development and Marketing for SCT/SunGard HE (now Ellucian) and was the early stage Executive VP of Global Sales and Client Relations at Blackboard. Prior to joining Blackboard, Anne was Vice President of HE Sales for PeopleSoft (now Oracle); Sales Director for Datatel (Ellucian) and VP of Sales & Operations for Fujitsu. She has also served as Director of Development and Alumni Relations for Prescott College in Arizona.

Anne holds a Bachelor’s in Science in English from Towson University. She has been published and speaks globally about education technology, design thinking, and academic innovation. She is passionate about improving higher education success for all learners.

Tarun Malhotra is the Chief Technology Officer of InStride, a learning services enterprise designed to achieve significant social impact through partnerships with universities and employers, providing employees the opportunity to earn the highest-quality degrees. In his role, Tarun leads the end-to-end strategy and execution of the technology, applications, infrastructure and operations that powers InStride’s offerings.

Prior to InStride, Tarun was Vice President of Technology for Disney Parks, Experiences and Products where he led the development and operations of eCommerce marketplace and supported multiple lines of business. Most recently, he was responsible for the end-to-end technology for Disney Park’s retail, food and beverage, and park operations groups which included key digital and automation initiatives for guests, employees and operations. Prior to that role, Tarun built and led the technology teams behind Disney Park’s portfolio of highly rated mobile apps that fully digitized the guest experience. In previous roles, Tarun also led Disney Park’s marketing and e-commerce teams including the rewrite of their ticketing sales website, resort sales website, search platform, and marketing platform.

Earlier in his career, Tarun led the UI Engineering team at Orbitz Worldwide, which included the development of their white label platform to support their global portfolio of travel brands. He began his career as a consultant at Deloitte Consulting in their startup and finance practice.

Tarun holds a bachelors degree from the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Betsy is General Counsel of InStride, a learning services enterprise designed to achieve significant social impact through partnerships with universities and employers, providing employees the opportunity to earn the highest-quality degrees. Betsy oversees all legal affairs for InStride.

Betsy is a seasoned legal counsel with a passion for digital innovation and complex transacting. She previously served as Associate General Counsel for The Boston Consulting Group, one of the largest multinational strategy consulting firms with more than 14,000 employees and $6 billion in annual revenue. Betsy focused her support on its BCG Digital Ventures division, which partners with clients to innovate new digital business concepts, as well as build, commercialize and scale those products.

Prior to BCG, Betsy was Principal Counsel for the Disney Parks Digital team for approximately 10 years, supporting digital efforts globally for Disney theme parks & resorts, cruise line, merchandise, and food & beverage. While at Disney, Betsy supported the launch of the Magic Band and the opening of the new Shanghai Disney theme park.

Betsy obtained a law degree from UCLA and a BBA from Idaho State with High Honors. As an undergrad, she played volleyball on full scholarship at Colorado State and Idaho State.

John James Nicoletti has a 30-plus year background in communications, public affairs, and issues management with extensive experience in sports and entertainment, local government and entrepreneurial start-ups. He has helped develop campaigns through creative and visual design and targeted messaging that has raised brand awareness and increased sales.

John is Senior Vice President, Brand Communications of InStride, a learning services enterprise designed to achieve significant social impact through partnerships with universities and employers, providing employees the opportunity to earn the highest-quality degrees. John will manage the company’s media relations, public affairs, brand development, as well as issues management, internal and executive communications.

Prior to InStride, Nicoletti worked for The Walt Disney Company for more than 11 years for both the company’s Parks and Resorts and Walt Disney Studios segments, leading various external and internal communications functions throughout his tenure. Prior to joining Disney, Nicoletti was the external affairs manager and chief spokesperson for the city of Anaheim, California’s 10th largest city. Nicoletti has been an adjunct faculty member and guest lecturer at numerous southern California universities including Pepperdine – Malibu, Chapman University, CSU-Fullerton, and the University of Southern California.

A graduate of UCLA (B.A., English) and Pepperdine University (M.A., Communications), Nicoletti is currently pursuing a doctoral degree in Organizational Leadership.