John Zozzaro

Born and raised in the Chicagoland area suburbs, John Zozzaro started his entrepreneurial journey in his early twenties playing music and touring all over the U.S. During this time, his passion and obsession with the convergence of media and technology began to blossom. In mid-2013 he decided to break away from the stage, and forge a new path, launching two different marketing agencies leveraging his music industry experience to create more opportunities for bands and brands. In 2015, These new endeavors brought John and his family to Austin, TX where he started to work with the city to help address their music economy challenges. Then in October of 2016, he met his now business partner Paul O'brien and launched MediaTech Ventures as the solution to help educate public, private, and corporate capital on how to invest in Media-Technology, while providing innovators access to networks, education, tools, and capital, necessary for their success. He's mentored hundreds of startups globally, was a finalist for Austin Young Chamber's "Changemaker" award, built and launched an incubator that’s helped startups raise >$2.5M to date, advises and built innovation programs with/for other countries, created Tile Yard’s entrepreneur module programming based in London, and is an advisor and mentor for many other conferences and startup programs around the world. He continues to make music with his very talented wife, is the proud father of three children, and loves helping innovators make the world a better place.