High-tech companies are sprouting up throughout the region, one of the driving forces in the revitalization that has taken place in our local economy. Rising Stars, a quarterly event, showcases the entrepreneurs who are building some of Rochester’s most successful technology companies. It offers an opportunity to hear their personal stories and meet the individuals behind Rochester’s “rising stars”.

As an entrepreneur is nurturing the early stages of a company's growth, funding and cash flow are never far from the forefront of his/her mind! Meet Mark Redding, President and Co-Founder of Impact Technologies, who used his best assets - his company's brilliant engineering minds - to qualify early on for government funded research grants. From this work, the team at Impact Technologies has developed a series of products and services that are used by both the public and private sector for analyzing, predicting, and managing the health of critical systems. The result? A Top 100 Company for five years in a row!

Jeff Black, CEO of Verant ID, engaged in some early work with Homeland Security for identification and security systems, but he and his team made the decision that government work wasn't the right fit for their company. They have instead focused on tuning their products to meet the needs of financial & insurance companies as well as the automotive industry. VerantID provides leading edge solutions for identity verification with biometrics-based identification & access as well as ID document authentication & validation solutions.

Uncle Sam tell us, "Under the auspices of the SBA, the government's Office of Technology helps to strengthen and expand the competitiveness of U.S. small high technology research and development businesses in the federal marketplace." Could SBIR or STTR grants fuel your company's growth? Mark and Jeff will provide words of wisdom based on their different experiences, and will share what they've done since those early days to grow two thriving businesses. It's another chance to get "up close and personal" with two of Rochester's Rising Stars!

NOTE THAT THIS WILL BE AN EVENING EVENT.

[Register below]

SPEAKERS:

• Jeff Black, CEO, Verant Identification Systems
• Mark Redding, President, Impact Technologies

5:30-6:00 pm	Refreshments and Networking
6:00-7:00 pm	Presentations
7:00-7:30 pm	Q&A and Meet the Speakers

SPONSORS:

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS:

Jeffrey Black

Jeff Black is the President, CEO and founder of VerantID, located in Rochester, NY. VerantID is an innovative provider of Biometrics based identification and access solutions marketed to Financial Insititutions and Retail Automotive Dealers. Jeff also has extensive professional management experience in software delivery and systems integration. He has been recognized as a pioneer in technology innovation including the use of Biometric Facial Recognition systems to deter DMV fraud and has worked extensively with the National Institute of Justice, the Center for Technology Commercialization (NASA) and the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories. Jeff is a graduate of the University of Colorado.

Mark L. Redding

Mark Redding is President and co-founder of Impact Technologies. The company has been named to the Rochester Top 100 in each of the last five years as one of the region’s fastest growing private companies. A leading U.S defense R&D contractor, Impact specializes in developing diagnostic and prognostic systems for equipment health management in wide-ranging applications – from helicopter engines, to Navy ship systems, to wind turbine gearboxes. The company has grown from a startup in 1999 to a 90-person company with $14 million in sales in 2007.

A 1986 Computer Science graduate from RIT, Mark was Vice President of Software Engineering at STI Technologies prior to starting Impact in 1999.