Speakers

Robert Held

Partner
Watermill Group

Rob Held (rheld@watermill.com) is a partner at The Watermill Group and oversees Watermill Advisors. He is responsible for strategy development, management and execution for Watermill Advisors mandates. Mr. Held’s professional experience has been evenly divided between serving operating companies in marketing and general management roles and strategic management consulting.

As an operator, Mr. Held has expertise in driving programs from initial creation through tactical execution while remaining focused on long run goals and implications. Most recently, he co-founded ComBrio, an enterprise software start-up, in Spring 2002. As VP of Marketing and Business Development, Mr. Held was responsible for corporate and product strategy and for the company’s “go-to-market” approach. Prior to that, Mr. Held served as the Director of Business Development for Sonus Networks (NASD:SONS), a telecommunications networking company. At Sonus, Mr. Held was responsible for all of Sonus’ strategic partnerships and OEM deals. Prior to Sonus, Mr. Held was the Director of Product and Channel Marketing at Merlot Communications, where he was responsible for all aspects of the company’s initial product, corporate channel strategy, new business development efforts, and corporate identity and positioning.

As a strategic management consultant, Mr. Held has advised senior management at companies ranging from early stage start-ups to Fortune 10 companies. He has done this as an independent through Gramercy Consulting, which he founded to assist companies in crafting partnering and go-to-market strategies, as well as with other professionals such as Secant Partners, specializing in maximizing customer productivity. Mr. Held began his career at the Monitor Company where he served as a senior engagement manager assisting multi-national corporations with strategic, market and partnering analyses. Mr. Held’s ability to translate complex concepts into language and values immediately accessible to the audience has lead to numerous speaking engagements at networking and telecommunications conferences. He was also an elementary school teacher in New York City and Oakland, CA as part of the Teach for America program.

Mr. Held received his B.A. in English from Stanford University, and an MBA from Yale University. He is married with three children.