Michael A. Whitehouse

President

Michael is President of Vital Venture Networks, which he founded in 2002.  During the past decade he has undertaken marketing and communications assignments for NYSE-Euronext, Archipelago (acquired by the NYSE in 2006 in a $10 billion reverse merger), BIO, The Research Triangle Institute, the New York Academy of Sciences, and a number of prestigious universities including Yale University’s School of Management, Northwestern’s Kellogg School and Stanford University’s Schools of Law, Medicine, and Engineering.  He also has held senior communications positions at the NASD (now FINRA) and NASDAQ.

Michael’s network within the venture capital community is extensive and he also manages a series of venture meetings for a VC consortium, which he built during the past 12 years.

In 2009 he co-founded and became a Managing Director of the Knowledge Economy Institute (KE2).  KE2 is a nonprofit organization comprised of business, investment, philanthropy, and university leaders who have seized upon the urgent need to focus and align institutions with a national agenda for economic recovery and sustainable growth while simultaneously addressing global challenges in energy, environment, finance and other areas.

Prior to creating VVN and KE2, Michael was President and founder of Connections Corporation, whose mission was to promote entrepreneurs, scientists, and university research beyond the academic community and to the broader marketplace, and to provide advice to start-up companies seeking to raise capital.

FINANCIAL COMMUNICATIONS

Michael’s financial communications experience spans three decades.  He began his career at the Federal Reserve Board in Washington DC as a researcher and speechwriter, and, while at the Fed, regularly contributed to Congressional testimony and published a number of articles on the US Banking System and the Origins of the Federal Reserve System.

Throughout the 1990s Michael held key communications positions at the NASD (now FINRA) and NASDAQ.  At NASDAQ he was the editor and publisher of several financial publications including the Investor Relations Report and the Financial Executive Journal.  In addition to managing the print and audio versions, Michael initiated and managed the electronic publication of the Journal, which became the nation’s first financial publication to be published on the Internet.

In 1996 Michael took a position with NASDAQ in Menlo Park, CA, as Director of International Programs and Partnerships. In that capacity he helped NASDAQ build its presence and establish its Silicon Valley office.  He was especially instrumental in helping NASDAQ to brand and grow its Biotech and Life Science practice by building an extensive network among NASDAQ-listed companies, venture capitalists, the university research community and public policy and government officials.

In 1998 he was appointed Director of Corporate Communications for the West Coast Operations of the Nasdaq Stock Market. He acted as NASDAQ's chief spokesperson on the West Coast and developed a series of press programs to help the world's largest electronic stock market promote the fastest growing sectors of the new economy: high-technology, the internet, and biotechnology.

Michael gained significant international experience having managed the NASDAQ 100 International Road shows — a series that brought top tier NASDAQ companies together with the financial communities in European money center cities.

OTHER ACTIVITIES & EDUCATION

Michael sits on the Board of Advisors of San Francisco-based One World Health, a non-profit biopharmaceutical company that develops safe, effective and affordable new medicines for people in the developing world with infectious diseases.  He has also acted as an advisor to the Paris-based Euro BIO organization and sat on the Board of Visitors of the University of Maryland Biotech Institute. (2006-2009).

Michael received his B.A. from The State University of New York and completed his course work for an M.A. in Journalism at the Pennsylvania State University.