Executive Team

Bobbie Carlton
Previously, in addition to working with a number of Boston-area PR and marketing firms, she headed global PR at Cognos and PTC, both publicly-held enterprise software companies. In 2006 she switched gears, joining a startup focused on supporting self-esteem and positive role models for preteen girls through a social network and book series.
In 2008, she started her own company…the first one.
- Carlton PR & Marketing is a boutique agency servicing a wide variety of startups and small companies, providing support for PR, content creation, social media marketing and marketing programs.
- Mass Innovation Nights (MIN) is a social media powered new product showcase and networking event. MIN has launched more than 1000 new products which have received more than $2 billion in funding.
- Innovation Women is an online “visibility bureau” helping drive visibility for entrepreneurial, technical and innovative women through speaking engagements.
In 2010 she was named one of the “Ten Bostonians who have done the most for the startup community”, and in 2011 she was a recipient of a Mass High Tech All-star award. In 2015 she was named a Boston Business Journal Woman to Watch. PR News called her a Gamechanger in 2017.
Bobbie featured in articles/interviews
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-getting-social-can-help-build-your-business/
Follow Bobbie on Twitter as @BobbieC @MassInno @WomenInno or @CarltonPRM

Mary Beth Russo

Kerry Fristoe

Nat Hefferman

Kumari Swamy

Patricia Alberto
Advisory Board

Dhaya Lakshminarayanan
At Omidyar Network, $400M a mission-based, return-focused investment fund headed by eBay founder, Pierre Omidyar, Dhaya was an Investment Manager, responsible for sourcing, executing, closing, and managing both venture capital and non-profit investments. Her for-profit investments included: Innocentive, CircleLending (acquired by Virgin), Prosper, Meetup, Voxiva, Eventful, PatientsLikeMe, and Collaborative Drug Discovery on whose Board of Directors she served. Her non-profit investments include Myelin Repair Foundation, KaBoom!, Sunlight Foundation, and Guidestar. Dhaya has also been a management consultant with Booz Allen Hamilton and also worked in asset management for Parnassus Investments, a $1 billion socially responsible mutual fund where she focused on the health services sector. At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, she received a Bachelor of Science and a Master of City Planning.
She hosted the Emmy Award winning series “High School Quiz Show” during the premiere year on WGBH. She was a featured Storyteller on the PBS station, KQED, and is a regular contributor to NPR’s “Snap Judgment” a storytelling program, which Ira Glass called, “Amazing. Like a cousin of ‘This American Life’ that grew up in a wildly different neighborhood…” She hosts The Moth, a monthly storytelling event, broadcast on NPR affiliates nationwide. Dhaya Lakshminarayanan is the winner of the Liz Carpenter Political Humor Award (previously awarded to Samantha Bee, Wanda Sykes and satirist/humorist Mark Russell) presented by the National Women’s Political Caucus. KQED named her one of the twenty “Women to Watch” a series celebrating women artists, creatives and makers in the San Francisco Bay Area who are pushing boundaries. Comedy Central Asia crowned her Grand Prize Winner of “The Ultimate Comedy Challenge” filmed in Singapore. She has worked with the following: Janeane Garofalo, Norm Macdondald, Marc Maron, Jello Biafra, Dick Gregory, Maz Jobrani, and Greg Proops. She had the pleasure of introducing former Vice President Al Gore and making him laugh (there is photographic evidence). The Boston Globe, The Bay Guardian, and The San Jose Mercury News have all run profiles about her.

Jillian Vorce
Investor and Board Member

Pradeep Aradhya
Pradeep takes his experience in organic and inorganic growth strategies along with product and operational know how in multiple spaces and combines it with 12 years in digital marketing and the use of cutting edge technologies to drive businesses to “new successes”. Previously, as a senior executive he successfully led acquisitions in the mobile space where his role was to identify strategic growth areas, inorganic growth potential, candidate product companies and negotiate acquisitions. He has also led multi million dollar initiatives at Fortune 500 companies to create technology platforms for marketing. He identified and advocated the best and newest developments in various technology areas that gave brands competitive advantages in establishing lasting relationships with customers.
At Novus Laurus he builds empowered and engaged teams both internally and within client businesses. Pradeep holds a Ph.D. in Structural Dynamics from NC State University and a M.Sc in Aerospace Engg. from the Indian Institute of Science.