The World Ticket Conference

Gary Adler is the Executive Director and Counsel for the National Association of Ticket Brokers (“NATB”). He has represented the NATB for 25 years, overseeing its operations and helping to establish the NATB. Mr. Adler is the Founder of Adler Law PLLC located in the Washington DC Metropolitan Area. In addition to representing the NATB, Mr. Adler advises numerous business entities and trade associations on a wide range of issues. His legal practice also focuses on civil litigation in trial and appellate courts. Mr. Adler also has represented professional athletes and sports management in negotiations, corporate matters, and litigation.

Sheldon Bell is the Premium Sales Manager for the Las Vegas Raiders.

Brian Berry is a Founder and Managing Partner of Vision360 Partners, a Washington, DC-based strategic communications and public affairs consultancy. He has advised a wide range of clients over the past 20 years, including the National Association of Ticket Brokers (NATB), and others in the ticketing and live events industry. Brian and his team worked with NATB in creating the Protect Ticket Rights initiative, which advocates at the federal and state levels for the rights of ticketholders and a fairer, more transparent, and more competitive market for ticket sales.

Curtis Cheng has been a leader in the ticketing industry for over 20 years—from his early years as a ticket reseller, to his work over the past decade building DTI Management into a distribution powerhouse. Beyond being an innovator in the space, Curtis has a proven track record on the M&A front, beginning with DTI’s $75mm sale to CVC Capital in 2016, followed shortly thereafter by DTI’s purchase of 1Ticket, the market leader in order processing and fulfillment services.

In 2021, DTI Management and 1Ticket merged with Ticket Evolution and acquired the pricing software Ticket Vision. As CEO of this new collective group, Curtis has designed an unmatched end-to-end experience for resellers of all shapes and sizes.

Ray Clark is a key member of the B2C Supply team and is coming up on his 16th year with StubHub. Since 2010, Ray’s primary focus has been on the broker community, and he has seen the company through the very early days of ticket technology and bulk uploading all the way to today’s sophisticated API Platform and Ticket Utils platforms. Ray’s expertise is in optimizing the experience for major merchants and partners, collaborating closely with StubHub’s Top Seller teams and Operational teams.

Randy Cohen has more than 20 years of CEO experience and significant expertise in entrepreneurial ventures. He grew his current company from infancy to $50M in revenue, attaining high profitability and global prominence as a market leader.

Cohen focuses on entrepreneurs running companies from startups to $100M+ in revenue. He has particular expertise in negotiations, marketing and branding. An avid student of leadership and human motivation, Cohen is known for what he calls the “woo-woo philosophy”—that CEO stands for Chief Energizing Officer! Living what he teaches, he has parlayed his enthusiastic approach into a $50M a year business. He is now an in-demand speaker, guest lecturer, and seminar presenter.

Cohen is a dynamic and technologically savvy entrepreneur. As head of one of the most successful companies in the secondary ticket market, he has led his company, TicketCity, to become the go-to source for premium seating at any major ticketed event around the world.

Under Cohen’s guidance as CEO, TicketCity has become one of the largest and most prominent online ticket brokerages, serving 250,000 clients in 17 countries. Today this global company buys and sells tickets to all major events worldwide. It specializes in premium seating to sold-out events, including premier sports championships and tournaments such as the Super Bowl, the Final Four and the Masters. TicketCity has won numerous awards and made the Inc. 5,000 list. The Austin Business Journal has named it one of Austin’s “Fab 50” fastest growing companies six times and the best place to work in Austin twice.

Zach Freed is the Advocacy and Outreach Manager at the American Economic Liberties Project. Zach helps develop and execute policymaker outreach strategies for Economic Liberties and Fight Corporate Monopolies.

Before joining Economic Liberties, Zach was a researcher with the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, where he helped publish a number of reports and assisted with policymaker education and outreach. Prior to joining ILSR, Zach worked for former Congressman Keith Ellison for four years in his Washington, D.C. office, handling anti-monopoly, telecommunications, and technology policy.

Eric Fuller is a consultant advising management teams who lead industries and those who seek to displace them. He has extensive experience with live entertainment, and all forms of negotiation and strategy.

Prior to creating his consulting organization Eric spent more than a decade as a trial lawyer. For the past 10 years in addition to consulting, Eric has been deeply involved in all aspects of the ticketing and resale ticketing markets.

Eric publishes True AF, his daily newsletter, and films between five and ten video podcasts per month. In addition, Eric writes for Forbes Magazine, and is working on getting old enough so his golf score can one day be equal to his age.

Drew Gainor is a visionary, 18-year ticket industry veteran, currently developing industry-leading pricing tools that increase resellers ROI and improve overall markets as the Chief Product Officer of Automatiq.

Before his time at Automatiq, Drew was a frounder of Seat Scouts. Gainor also spent five years as a founder and Vice President of Ticket Evolution where he led the development of the industries most widely used B2B tools and API's.

Caroline Gibbs currently serves at Chief Purchasing Officer at TicketCity, a recognized leader in the sports and entertainment brokerage industry. With 20 years of industry experience, Caroline is charged with the full operational oversight, fulfillment and management of the inventory division, 360 Access at TicketCity. Caroline’s additional roles within the company include providing strategic management of national event operations and assisting in the development of new corporate partnership opportunities. In 2016, Caroline received the NATB Visionary Broker of the Year Award.

Prior to being named CPO, Caroline served as the Vice President of Sales & Customer Service at TicketCity for seven years. Under her direction, the company procured massive growth in sales, as well as setting the industry standard in the areas of client relations and customer service. In 2015, that Customer Service Team was recognized by the NATB at the World Ticket Conference as the pinnacle of Client Services, as TicketCity was awarded to the Elite Broker to Broker Award. Previously in her career, from 1998 – 2009, Caroline served as one of TicketCity’s top producing Sales Associates.

A native of Plano, Texas, Caroline studied Communications at the University of Texas in Austin, where she still resides with her husband, Corey and twelve-year-old sons, Will and Ben, while Victoria (16) lives in Hoover, Alabama.

Brett Goldberg received a B.S. in Finance from Lehigh University. Upon graduation, Brett went to work in Barclays' Investment Banking Division in the Industrial Group. Following Barclays, Brett joined Sixpoint Partners, a boutique investment bank in New York City.

In 2011, Brett turned his business skills to the ticketing industry and realized his dream of creating the first two-sided, transparent ticketing marketplace: TickPick.

After nearly missing a San Francisco Giants NLCS game because he didn’t have access to print his tickets, Brad Griffith reimagined a simpler process for buying tickets on the go. Focusing completely on the mobile experience, Brad wrote v1.0 of the Gametime iOS application in 2012 and now leads a passionate team focused on mobilizing the ticket buying process for fans. He’s fascinated with fan experience - answering the question: How can we make it faster and easier to attend games?

Brad is a Santa Cruz native and huge S.F. Giants, Golden State Warriors and 49ers fan. After earning an Engineering degree from Stanford, he followed his dreams to work in sports by helping the Colorado Rockies and Chicago White Sox (2005 World Series Champs!) build statistical infrastructure to analyze player value.

In 2010, he helped launch Zappedy, which delivered customer analytics for local businesses (sold to Groupon in 2011). From our founding in 2012 to launching in over 50 cities today, Gametime continues to put fan experience above all else to unite communities.

Brian Hess is the Executive Director of Sports Fans Coalition. SFC is best known for overturning the NFL's Sports Blackout Rule at the FCC and the successful passage of the Sports Bettors' Bill of Rights in DC, Maryland, and Virginia. Brian has advocated before more than a dozen state legislatures, Congress, and federal agencies. on pro-fan ticketing legislation. In 2021, Brian was named a "Top Lobbyist" by both the National Institute of Lobbying and Ethics and The Hill. Go Nats!

Jim Holzman founded Ace Ticket in 1979 after identifying the need for a reputable ticket agency to provide premium seating and tickets to sold-out events. Since then, Mr. Holzman has opened ten Ace Ticket locations throughout New England. Ace’s growth has been organic as well as through the acquisition of eight area competitors.

Ben Horton serves as the Director of Inventory Strategy at SeatGeek, where he oversees all supply on the SeatGeek marketplace including B2C, C2C, and B2B. Horton has lead the SeatGeek team, managing the relationships with broker partners.

Prior to his time with SeatGeek, Horton was the Senior Manager of Supply at StubHub.

Casey Klein, Vice President and General Manager for Ticketmaster Resale, oversees the company’s resale business. He plays a leadership role in advancing Ticketmaster’s continued success in resale, defining and delivering products and services that support a healthy ticketing ecosystem. In Casey’s current role, he has oversight of Ticketmaster’s global resale business, which includes focus on strategic initiatives, efficient activation and event expansion, supply growth and strategy, and optimization of inventory sell-through. Prior to his current role, Casey was focused on growing partnerships and business relationships with professional sellers and helped contribute to professional seller and validated inventory growth.

Casey has been a member of Ticketmaster Resale for seven years with previous roles at the Chicago Bulls and Chicago Fire. Casey and his family currently reside in the Chicago suburbs.

Jason Knieriem founded 1Ticket in 2010. Prior to creating 1Ticket, Jason spent six years as the lead developer at GreatSeats.com. The experience he gained automating the existing point-of-sale systems was the foundation for 1Ticket's services. After seven years of consistent growth, 1Ticket was acquired by DTI in 2017.

DTI smartly left Jason in charge of 1Ticket, allowing him to use DTI's resources to expand and improve 1Ticket's services. In addition to the technical services 1Ticket provides, Jason has surrounded himself with knowledgeable, talented colleagues that provide expert guidance and advice to thousands of brokers.

Barry Landes is Vice President, Strategic Partnerships - Travel, Americas at Cover Genius, the insurtech for embedded insurance that protects the global customers of the world’s largest digital companies including Booking Holdings, AXS, Hopper and RyanAir. XCover is also available at Amazon, eBay, and Shopee. In his role, Barry is responsible for developing new partnerships with ticketing companies, Airlines, OTAs, Short Term Vacation Rental Providers and others in the travel space. Prior to Cover Genius, Barry has worked for over 20 years in a variety of executive roles overseeing Sales, Business Development and Partnerships at companies such as Expedia, Allianz, eNett and intent. Barry has a Bachelor of Science degree from State University of New York at Oneonta and an MBA-Finance from Georgia State University. Barry dedicates time to CG Gives, the philanthropic arm of Cover Genius.

Marc Lanoue is a Federal Trade Commission attorney who has been detailed to the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Competition Policy, Antitrust, and Consumer Rights, where he serves as Chief Antitrust and Competition Counsel for Subcommittee Chair Senator Amy Klobuchar (D-MN). His work focuses on competition and related policy issues, including antitrust agency oversight, competition and consumer protection reform, and antitrust issues arising in a variety of sectors, including technology, pharmaceuticals, agriculture, and telecommunications. At the Federal Trade Commission, Marc has led or worked on antitrust investigations into the pharmaceuticals, energy, and digital advertising industries, among others. He also spent several years in private practice, including an extended in-house stint assisting a pharmaceutical client with competition and product development issues.

Marc earned a J.D. from the New York University School of Law and a B.A. in Economics and Geology & Geophysics from Yale College.

Ryan Meyer is the Sr. Director of Ticketing Services, Tournament Business Affairs for the PGA Tour.

Diana Moss became the President of the American Antitrust Institute in January 2015. Since joining AAI in 2001, Dr. Moss has developed and expanded AAI’s advocacy channels and strategies, and strengthened communications with public and private enforcers, Congress, other advocacy groups, and the media. Her work spans both antitrust and regulation, with industry expertise in digital technology, electricity, petroleum, food and agriculture, airlines, telecommunications, and healthcare. From 1995 to 2001, Dr. Moss served in the Office of Economic Policy and Office of Markets, Tariffs, and Rates at the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. There, she coordinated the agency’s economic analysis for electricity mergers and contributed to the development of the landmark open access rules. From 1989 to 1995, she consulted in private practice in the areas of regulation and antitrust. Dr. Moss is also Adjunct Faculty in the Department of Economics at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Dr. Moss has spoken widely on various topics involving competition policy and enforcement, testified before Congress, appeared before state and federal regulatory commissions, at industry and academic conferences, and made numerous radio and television appearances. She has published articles in numerous economic and legal journals, including: American Economic Review, Journal of Industrial Organization, The Antitrust Bulletin, The Antitrust Source, Antitrust Magazine, and Energy Law Journal. She is editor of Network Access, Regulation and Antitrust, and has contributed chapters to The Structure of American Industry, and the Global Competition Review’s (GCR’s) The Guide to Merger Remedies.

Derek Palmer serves as Chief Revenue Officer at Project Admission responsible for all commercial and business operations of the company. An almost 30 year veteran of the ticketing industry including 25 years in senior roles at Tickets.com Derek has a passion for innovation and has extensive experience creating and streamlining organizational structures, process improvement, and bringing products to market.

Derek is a 20 year member of INTIX and served as Board Chair in 2019.

Tom Patania is President and CEO of Select-A-Ticket, a Ticket re-sale company located in New Jersey. He founded the company in 1978 while he was in High School in the Business program. After graduating from High School he opened his first retail store. In the years that followed Tom built the business by challenging the status quo and taking what was a hush business and bringing it front and center opening retail stores in 4 regional malls and an office in Florida. The business model proved itself to the point that a ticket re-seller had to put limits on tickets in order to service the lines at its stores.

With the advent of the Internet Tom had to change the business model. Today his company supplies the various different marketplaces with tickets as well as having their own successful website and retail operations. Recognizing the market going through another change Tom launched TicketInsight.com which helps teams and artist manage their inventory better with the proprietary analytical tools that the company built and Tom’s 43 years as an expert in dynamic pricing. He aspires to change consumer buying habits through proper pricing models.

From a client request Tom started another company PregameParty.com, which is an event party service that does Corporate parties and tailgates. Recently that company merged with TAPT – Tailgate and Party services to be able to accommodate more parties.

During the pandemic, while his other businesses were shut down, Tom started a 3rd company Pop-ItPromitions.com which is a promotional marketing company that provides innovative ideas that drive value for their clients.

Outside of work Tom enjoys volunteering his time to help others. He has a thirst for learning and is also a member and currently sits on the board of the Entrepreneurs Organization of New Jersey. One of his best experiences was having the opportunity to be invited to Necker Island and spend a week with Richard Branson. That experience left Tom wanting to inspire others and with a new leadership style.

Tom is a devoted father who lives in Pompton Lakes, NJ and has 2 children. His son Tommy is an attorney, and his daughter Lexi is finishing her Masters and just recently accepted a job in the engineering field.

Karl Roes is the CEO and Founder of Stage Front. Launched in 1984, Stage Front has evolved into an industry leader in ticket technology, pricing data, and strategy. Under Karls's leadership, Stage Front has pivoted from resale giant to creator of industry-leading proprietary products. Its core business lines include consignment and distribution, Ticket-Logic (auto-pricing software), full-service pricing, upfront funding, consulting, and strategic partnerships. Recently, Stage Front has partnered with LaLiga North America, The International Champions Cup, the ECHL, and more. Karl is a founding member of the NATB, as well as active with their new membership committee.

Karl and his wife Nancy oversee their own charitable fund and support the NATB's involvement with the Ronald McDonald house. He currently lives in Annapolis, MD, with Nancy, and their children Aidan and Quinn.

Harris Rosner founded VIP Tickets out of a small office in California in 1981. He was drawn to the ticket business first as a die hard fan of the Lakers, Dodgers and music. He built his business knowing that every client is a VIP, and that if a picture is worth a thousand words, then a ticket is worth a million memories.

After celebrating over 40 years in business, the mission hasn’t changed - VIP Tickets, VIP Service - and being the gatekeeper of our client’s memories is at the core of what we do.

Michael Ross is formerly the Managing Partner at Altitude 7, a consultancy focused on helping SMBs engage in international trade. Michael currently serves as the Entrepreneurs’ Organization (EO) Global External Engagement Chair.

Doxa7 is a boutique global staffing firm that helps businesses build and scale high-performing global teams while lifting the communities we serve here and abroad. Our fully-managed solution ensures your business can: hire the right talent the first time and retain them long-term, leverage technology to allow for a flexible work environment without compromising data or security, save up to 70% on skilled, fully dedicated talent and further reduce the cost of delivery over time, improve the culture within your domestic team by up-leveling their roles.

As a result, you benefit from leveraging a global talent pool to reduce costs and improve productivity without the headaches of managing a labor force in another country.

Gina Rotolo is the VP Marketing & Communication for the Coachella Valley Firebirds.

Holly Rowe has spent more than 20 years as one of ESPN’s most versatile commentators, covering a wide variety sports. Rowe is one of the lead reporters for ESPN’s college football, college basketball, college softball, beach volleyball and WNBA coverage. She has also covered gymnastics, soccer, swimming, track & field, and the Little League World Series.

Rowe graduated from the University of Utah with a broadcast journalism degree. While at Utah, she was a sportswriter for the Daily Utah Chronicle and the Davis County Clipper, and she anchored the campus TV station news.

Having undergone treatment for stage IV melanoma, Rowe has become a tireless advocate for cancer research and prevention. Through speaking and appearances, Holly loves to support efforts that help those battling their own fight or working towards a personal goal. Rowe resides in New York City.

Sam Sherman is the CEO and Founder of Automatiq. After he began selling tickets in 2012, Sam envisioned an automated ticket marketplace that would mirror other commodity markets. The first product Automatiq introduced was the Auto Pricer in 2013. This revolutionary dynamic pricing technology helped automate a brokers' individual pricing strategy. His company continued the tradition of innovation by creating the first managed service pricing program in 2015 and releasing a brand new version of the product called UpTick in 2018. This year Automatiq is introducing Atlas, a data analytics technology that will empower brokers to make more intelligent buying and pricing decisions.

Lena is currently the COO of Premium Seats USA and the President of Entertainment LiveSTYLE. A proud graduate of The University of Miami, Lena has spent almost 15 years in the live entertainment space.

Lena resides with her husband Jimmy and two boys in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and is an avid enthusiast of all things live entertainment.

Rob is head of B2B Sales and Seller Relations at TicketNetwork, overseeing all broker operations and initiatives at the company. Rob has worked with brokers at TicketNetwork since 2007 in various capacities. He has observed many changes within the industry while helping countless brokers expand their businesses. He has onboarded many brokers onto the TicketNetwork POS11 and POSNext software and built hundreds of longstanding relationships along the way.

At TicketNetwork, he acts as an advocate for brokers and helps ensure brokers’ interests are voiced both on a routine basis and during strategic decision making. He is also responsible for ensuring brokers meet or exceed performance expectations and adhere to policies to maximize buyer satisfaction. He strives to make TicketNetwork a broker-friendly marketplace and to help brokers sell as many tickets through TicketNetwork as possible.

Rob is a veteran of the Iraq War, and is grateful for TicketNetwork’s support of his second “part-time” career as an officer in the Army National Guard. He lives in Connecticut with his wife and daughter.

With over two decades as a central figure in ticketing, Lee Shenker is widely recognized as one of the most accomplished and well-respected players in the industry. Building on his career as Vice President & General Counsel of ASC Ticket Company, Lee joined DTI Management in 2017 as President, steering the company's technological and strategic initiatives.

With the 2021 merger of Ticket Evolution, DTI, and 1Ticket, Lee now serves as President of the combined entity.

Ken Solky is currently President of Las Vegas Tickets, overseeing operations and growth of one of the city’s leading ticket businesses. Solky also enjoys giving back his time to his community and has served as a mentor for Clark County School Teachers. He is currently Vice President and West Coast Director of the NATB, National Association of Ticket Brokers. Solky has also served as President of NATB and earned the NATB President’s Award.

Blake Summerfield is the Director of Business Analytics – Strategy for the Philadelphia Phillies.

Scot Tobias is founder and CEO of Worldwide tickets, an independent privately owned company. Scot’s talent lies in building relationships that build business. His persistence and economic savvy has propelled Worldwide Tickets from a small resale start-up to a global enterprise. With more than 30 years industry experience, He has always taken an analytical approach to the business and continues to embrace new technology available to advance and promote business growth. He sees the future of secondary ticketing as both challenging and exciting in the years ahead.

Outside of work, Scot enjoys Tennis and golf and is the proud father of two teenage boys.

As Vice President of Product Management for Ticketmaster, Phil oversees the development of products and processes that make the movement of resale tickets secure and streamlined throughout ticket resale ecosystem. He also leads the teams responsible for innovating the company’s global checkout, app, post purchase, ticket management, client SDKs, and Account Manager.

Phil has focused on multiple facets of the ticketing industry during his 10 years at Ticketmaster, including consumer marketing, paid search, SEO, and website optimization. He also led resale products before taking on his current role overseeing global post purchase and ticket management products. Today, the main focus for Phil and his team is to ensure that our product offerings continually evolve alongside next-generation ticketing technologies.

Kevin Wagner is the Director of Full Service Pricing at Automatiq. The Full-Service Pricing team, launched in 2015, leverages Automatiq’s pricing technology and data resources to execute client strategies and maximize their returns as the premier managed pricing service in the industry. Joining Automatiq in 2016, Kevin has been able to make significant contributions in a number of roles ranging from Data and Analytics to Product Ownership.

A native New Yorker, Kevin received B.S. in Business Administration from Stony Brook University. He currently resides in Queens, where he enjoys spending his free time golfing and playing softball.

Daniel Weisbaum has worked at Ticket Evolution (TE) since 2014 in a variety of internal and client-facing roles, joining the management team as the VP, Ticket Operations in 2019. He helped the company develop, and now oversees TE's Ticket Operations Department, Technical support staff, and Integrations with major distribution partnerships. Daniel was an NCAA soccer player, failed musician, and highly-sought after extra in his middle school's 8th-grade rendition of Damn Yankees; needless to say, he's a sports, music, and theater enthusiast and is passionate about continuing to innovate and improve the live-event ticketing industry and relationships between event-producers, ticket suppliers, brands, and event-goers.

After the merger with DTI/1Ticket, Daniel will act as the VP of Ticket Operations of the combined entity.