Kari Perez is Vice President of Gaming Communications at Microsoft, where she leads global PR and communications strategy for Xbox. She joined the Xbox team in March 2021 after a distinguished career spanning gaming, streaming, and entertainment — including VP-level roles at Netflix Latin America and corporate affairs at HBO Latin America. Multilingual and internationally experienced, Perez has become one of the most prominent communications voices in the gaming industry, issuing statements on major Xbox announcements ranging from Game Pass price changes to leadership speculation.
Cortney Lusignan is a seasoned communications and public relations executive currently serving as Senior Program Manager, AWS Communications, supporting the AWS Global Communications Vice President at Amazon Web Services. With a career spanning major PR agencies including Weber Shandwick and Edelman, and deep industry expertise in financial services, healthcare, and technology PR, Lusignan has built a reputation as a trusted operator at the intersection of enterprise cloud and strategic communications.
Daniella Vallurupalli is the Vice President and Head of Global Communications at Cloudflare, the internet infrastructure and security company. She joined Cloudflare in 2014 when it had fewer than 80 employees and built its communications organization from the ground up. Today she oversees all internal and external communications across public relations, corporate and employee comms, analyst relations, social media, and visual storytelling for one of the most recognized brands in cloud networking and cybersecurity.
Hassan Al Shouli is a senior communications and strategic business executive at Microsoft's CEMA (Central Eastern Europe, Middle East and Africa) President Office, based in the UAE. With nearly two decades of career experience, he has shaped Microsoft's presence across the Gulf, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and broader MEA region through executive communications, multi-channel campaigns, and leadership engagement. Before Microsoft, he spent years in the fast-moving MENA digital market at dubizzle and analytics consultancies. He holds an MBA from Cass Business School (now Bayes) and a BSc in Electronics, Engineering, and Communications from the Arab Academy for Science, Technology and Maritime Transport.
Tom Phillips spent 18 years at Microsoft rising to VP of Communications, where he led PR strategy for the company's advertising business, managed media around major acquisitions, guided CEO communications, and drove narratives through cultural transformations. With over four decades of total PR experience, he left Microsoft in late 2024 to launch Upstream Communications, a Seattle-based strategic communications firm focused on helping clients tell their stories with precision and purpose.
Stacey Paynter is the founder and CEO of Strategic Connections, LLC, a San Francisco Bay Area strategic planning and brand consultancy she launched in 2004 after a career spanning some of the largest names in global advertising. As former CEO of Publicis Dialog's San Francisco office and COO of EvansGroup, she co-authored the 'Holistic Communications' framework later adopted worldwide by Publicis Groupe. Today she advises C-suite executives on brand strategy, customer acquisition, and operational transformation — and serves on the board of the OSET Institute as a Brand, PR & Media Advisor.
Natalie Miyake is Partner, Marketing at Sequoia Capital, one of the world's most storied venture capital firms. A seasoned communications strategist who grew up in Japan and studied in Madrid before working in New York and San Francisco, she shapes how Sequoia tells its story to the world. With a career spanning crisis PR at Brunswick Group, corporate communications at Twitter during its most turbulent acquisition years, and nearly a decade steering Sequoia's voice across its portfolio of unicorns and breakout companies, Miyake brings a rare mix of global perspective and Silicon Valley fluency to the intersection of finance and narrative.