Fred Helou is the founder and CEO of Vagaro, a cloud-based business management platform used by over 75,000 beauty, fitness, and wellness businesses across four countries. Born in Beirut in 1969, he escaped the Lebanese Civil War at 18, arrived in the United States penniless after being pickpocketed in France, and worked his way up from a $5-an-hour pickup boy to director of software development before being laid off in the 2008 recession — the catalyst that led him to build what is now a billion-dollar company. Vagaro has processed over $15 billion in payments, booked over 600 million appointments, and achieved unicorn status with a $1 billion valuation following a 2021 reinvestment by FTV Capital.
Sangram Vajre is the co-founder and CEO of GTM Partners, the only analyst firm exclusively focused on go-to-market strategy for B2B SaaS companies. Before that, he co-founded Terminus (2014), the platform that defined the account-based marketing software category, and served as CMO at Pardot through its $2.5B acquisition by Salesforce. A WSJ and USA Today bestselling author of three books, host of the 900-episode FlipMyFunnel podcast, and curator of the GTMonday newsletter with 175,000+ subscribers, Vajre is one of the most influential voices in B2B marketing. An immigrant from Nagpur, India who arrived in the U.S. with $350, he became an American citizen in late 2024 after 22 years in the country.