 |
<
From Swords to Start-Ups: The Role of Entrepreneurial Ecosystems in Reforming Post-Conflict States
A Presentation by Steven Koltai
Please join us for this presentation by Steven Koltai, one of the leading entrepreneurs in the world working to empower businessmen in post-conflict societies. The event is a part of CRDC’s new Program on Business and Conflict Resolution, which is aimed at integrating the fields of business and peacebuilding.
About the Program on Business and Conflict Resolution
Business is the path to peaceful prosperity for millions on the globe today, but business people and conflict resolution and peace activists often see each other as having nothing in common. What is needed are business people and conflict resolution practitioners who are capable of creating together much more sustainable models of nonviolent social change through new approaches to business partnerships across traditional divides of race, class, religion or other enemy divides. Through our program conflict resolution practitioners will get the business skills necessary to make peacebuilding ideas that successfully operate on a massive scale. Businesspeople, for their part, will find that there are hidden markets and cost effective opportunities throughout the value chain that they did not think were in existence or accessible because of conflict.
About Steven Koltai
Steven R. Koltai is an executive and entrepreneur with thirty years’ experience in business (entertainment, media, events), finance (investment banking), entrepreneurship (two successful start-ups) and government. Steven’s current work builds on all of his previous background. Koltai & Co. focuses on countries near the “tipping point to go entrepreneurial,” that is, those countries that have some, but not all, of the infrastructure needed to turbocharge their entrepreneurs. Through Koltai & Co., Mr. Koltai works in three main areas: Entrepreneurship Ecosystem building, Advisory Services for Venture Funds, and Business Development Services for young companies.
Mr. Koltai recently served as Senior Advisor for Entrepreneurship at the U.S. Department of State, where he created and ran the Global Entrepreneurship Program (GEP). The GEP promotes entrepreneurship as a way to further economic development, spur job creation and promote political stability in emerging market economies. The program has grown to include more than 125 partners serving over 2,500 entrepreneurs in more than half a dozen countries.
Steven also spent nine years at Warner Bros., becoming the first General Manager of Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment and Warner Bros. Online. As an entrepreneur, Steven co-founded what is today Europe’s largest television satellite company, SES/Astra, and was CEO of Event411, an online event-registration and management company. In the financial services sector, Steven has served in various capacities at the Export-Import Bank of the United States, Bankers Trust Company, Salomon Bros., and the management consultancy, McKinsey & Company.
Steven received a B.A. from Tufts University, an M.A. from Tufts University’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, and was a Fulbright scholar at Université Libre de Bruxelles. Steven has also been a member of the Council on Foreign Relations for over 25 years. Mr. Koltai has been involved with Tufts for over 30 years, and is currently serving on the boards of Tufts/Tisch College of Citizenship as well as the Tufts Entrepreneurial Leadership Program.