Bio

My name is Edith Yeung. I am originally from Hong Kong and now living in San Francisco. I love bringing people together, especially creative people (my favorite are entrepreneurs), travelling (my goal this year is Kilimanjaro) listening and singing jazz (Love Ella!), thinking, and brainstorming.


Why I do what I do?
I came to the US with two suitcases and 0 dollar when I was 16. I know the feeling when you have nothing and the feeling “you don’t know what you don’t know”. Being an entrepreneur is even harder than that experience. I want to help. And I want to take this feeling away from others like me.


BizTechDay
3 years ago, I started my first entrepreneur meetup with 5 people at the Hotel Kabuki, San Francisco. I paid $300 bucks and I knew 3 out of the 5 people who attended… I thought it was kinda silly I had to pay to see my friends, but I really enjoyed the process and the experience of bringing people together. Slowly but surely, I learned and became a little bit smarter at organizing events. My meetup group grew and grew. From 5 to 10, to 20, to 50, to 100, to 300 which later on become BizTechDay – the conference! BizTechDay was born with one goal in mind – bringing cool business and technology people together to do more. I truly believe when amazing people get together, magic happens. Our goal this year is to bring together 1,500 most fascinating entrepreneurs and doers who have been there and done it.

All the entrepreneurs who attend BizTechDay care about helping each other out by sharing their practical business strategies, experience, and personal stories. BizTechDay typically runs for 12 hours, with 10 entrepreneurial speakers and 10 technology demos. We get together to inspire, educate, meetup, eat, drink and have lots of fun. With almost 1,000 attendees for the 2009 conference, I am looking to bring BizTechDay to Seattle and New York in 2010.


Professional Life Before BizTechDay
I moved to the Bay Area in 1998 and used to work for all the big guys: AT&T Wireless, Oracle, Siebel, Autodesk, Cisco Systems, Symantec, American Management Systems (AMS), Telstra Australia, Matav Hungary Telecom and Taiwan Semi-Conductor as a developer, consultant, program manager, and process owner.

In 2008, I left Autodesk (a great great company BTW) and decide what I really want in life. This lead me to take on marketing consulting gigs, running my own entrepreneur meetup groups, creating BizTechDay, guest-hosting Startup Profile segment on CBS5, and getting involved with different San Francisco city initiative like the San Francisco Small Business Week.


Press
Life after corporate has been quite magical to me. I got the chance to create something that I really love – BizTechDay, following my gut, getting involved to support local small businesses, being the guest host for CBS 5 Startup Profile, and teaching marketing and entrepreneurship at University of California Berkeley extension starting this spring.



Personal Stuff
Things that I really enjoy doing outside of my professional life:

  • Jazz Music – I love Ella Fitgerald, Louis Armstrong and good old Frank. I started to sing jazz when I live in Seattle way back when at Tula’s Belltown…but again.. not so good anymore. I also like Diana Krall!
  • Hiking – Machu Picchu Inca Trail by far was the best experience!  Can’t wait to visit Mt. Kilimanjaro – hopefully this year! When I am in a really good mood, I will sing jazz while I hike.
  • Travel – I have been to Egypt, Jordan, Greece, Hungary, France, Germany, Austria, Italy, England, Scotland, Netherland, Australia, New Zealand, Thailand, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, US (of course), Canada, Mexico, Brazil and Peru. And I can’t wait to go to India, Cambodia, South African, Argentina, Isarel, Russia, Iceland, Spain, Turkey and Belize.
  • Piano Music – Chopin and Rachmaninoff.  I play classical piano since I was 6… not so good anymore, but I still appreciating watching and listening to GREAT piano musicians.
  • Spending time with my mom – she is the most amazing woman I ever known. Even though I couldn’t quite understand her sometimes…she still make me laugh.
  • Laugh and smile. That’s what life is all about after all.



Download official bio by clicking here.