About Us - Board of Directors

Muneer A. Satter (Co-Chair)

Muneer Satter is a Managing Director at Goldman Sachs in the Principal Investment Area (the "PIA") which manages the firm's private equity investments. The PIA is one of the largest private equity investors in the world, investing in the U.S., Europe and Asia. Muneer joined Goldman Sachs in 1988 and became a Partner of the firm in 1996. He sits on the Investment Committee of the PIA and he is the Global Head of the Mezzanine Group.

Muneer serves on the Boards of CCC Information Systems, Inc. and Grupo Clarin, S.A. He also serves on the Board of the Nature Conservancy.

Muneer received a B.A. from Northwestern University, a J.D. from Harvard Law School, and an M.B.A. from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration.

Hilary Valentine (Co-Chair)

Hilary Valentine is a partner at Black & White Design and serves on the Board of Directors of the Donald and Rachel Valentine Foundation and Breast Cancer Connections. Her primary focus has been to evangelize the Room to Read mission in front of high net-worth donors in the technology world. The Donald and Rachel Valentine Foundation provided the initial multi-year seed funding for Room to Read's Girls' Education program.

Herb Allen

Herb Allen is President of Allen & Company, LLC in New York. Prior to working at Allen & Company, Herb was with T. Rowe Price and Botts & Company Ltd. A graduate of Yale University, Herb resides in Manhattan.

Marc Andreessen

Marc Andreessen is Chairman and Co-founder of Opsware Inc., the leading provider of data center automation software. Marc is widely recognized for his role in launching the Internet revolution in 1993, with his creation of the Mosaic browser while at the University of Illinois. After graduation, Marc co-founded Netscape Communications, and played a critical role in the company's hypergrowth. Marc later became CTO of AOL when the company purchased Netscape in 1999.

As one of the technology icons of our time, Marc has received numerous accolades, was named one of the "Top 50 people under the age of 40" by Time Magazine in 1994, and graced the magazine's cover in 1996.

With Mosaic and the Netscape browser, Marc's ideas created a platform that enabled individuals to access the Internet. Similarly, today Opsware is enabling businesses to take advantage of the massive business opportunities created by the web and new web-based architectures.

Christopher Beer

Christopher S. Beer is the founding member of Ironmark Law Group, PLLC, a firm providing legal services and counsel to companies, creatives and lawyers in the fields of intellectual property (copyrights, trademarks, trade secrets) and corporate law. Chris serves a variety of individuals and entities within the United States and throughout the World.

Chris received a B.A. from Pacific Lutheran University, a J.D. from the University of Washington and M.A.I.S. from the Henry M. Jackson School of International Studies, University of Washington.

Marjorie Craig Benton

Marjorie Craig Benton has been a U.S. Commissioner, International Year of the Child, U.S. Ambassador to U.N.I.C.E.F., Board Chair of Save the Children Federation, Board Chair for the Chapin Hall Center for Children at the University of Chicago, a Trustee of the Bernard van Leer Foundation and the Van Leer Group Foundation in Holland, and was appointed to a commission to look into the future of children's programming on PBS.

She is the Co-Founder of the Chicago Foundation for Women and served as Board Chair of the Council on Foundations. She was the Public Delegate to the United Nations, a Delegate to the Special Session on Disarmament, a Co-Chair of Americans for SALT, and Special Advisor to the United Nations Disarmament Commission. She was also Co-Founder of the Peace Museum in Chicago, Illinois.

Marjorie spent forty years working in the Democratic Party - as a delegate to the National Conventions and its special commissions. She served for eight years as Chair of the White House Fellows Commission. For her service in government, Marjorie received the U.S. Office of Personnel Management Award for Meritorious Service.

Craig Bruya

Craig Bruya has been Chief Financial Officer of Microsoft Business Solutions at Microsoft headquarters since returning to the company in 2004. During a three year sabbatical, he taught accounting and management classes to MBA students at Seattle University and the University of Washington. Prior to this, he spent 12 years at Microsoft in executive finance positions as well as nine years with the audit division of Arthur Andersen & Company in Seattle, Brussels, Belgium and Athens, Greece. Craig is an active contributor to Room to Read and has endowed multiple schools, local language books, and Girls' Education participants.

Scott Kapnick

Scott Kapnick is a Managing Partner and Member of the Board of Highbridge Capital Management, LLC, and Chief Executive Officer of Highbridge Principal Strategies, LLC. Highbridge Capital Management is a global leading alternative investment and asset management organization. Scott is a retired Management Committee Member, Partner, and Co-Head of Global Investment Banking at the Goldman Sachs Group. Before returning to the United States in 2006, he was also Co-Chief Executive Officer of Goldman Sachs International. Scott received his BA degree, magna cum laude, from Williams College. He holds a combined JD/MBA from the University of Chicago.

Scott is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Chairman of the Churchill Archives Centre Campaign Board, Managing Director of The Metropolitan Opera and serves on the Board of Directors of the Naples Botanical Garden.

Alastair Mactaggart

Alastair Mactaggart is President of Emerald Fund Inc., a San Francisco residential real estate developer. Since 1998 Emerald has developed in excess of US$1 billion of real estate, including over 1,300 units of new housing, and 1,700 units of condominium conversions.

Alastair is the Chair of the Physicians' Foundation of the California Pacific Medical Center and serves on the boards of the California Pacific Medical Foundation, the Ploughshares Fund, and the Swig Corporation. He serves as co-chair of his undergraduate class fundraising effort.

Alastair received a BA from Harvard College and an MBA from Harvard Business School. He lives in San Francisco, CA with his wife Celine.

John Ridding

John Ridding is the Chief Executive of the Financial Times newspaper and FT.com. He was formerly Editor and Publisher of the Financial Times, Asia, as well as Chairman of Pearson in Asia. John led the launch of the Asia edition of the FT in 2003. It won the award for the best newspaper from the Society of Publishers in Asia in its launch year and picked up top awards for business reporting, scoops and newspaper design at the same ceremony in 2006. He also led the development of the FT's Chinese language website.

John has also served as Deputy Editor, Hong Kong bureau chief, Paris correspondent, Korea correspondent, UK companies reporter and foreign desk correspondent. Between 1986 and 1987, he worked at Oxford Analytica on the Asia Pacific desk. He graduated from Oxford University with a first class honours degree in philosophy, politics and economics.

John Wood

John Wood is Founder and CEO of Room to Read. His full bio is available on the Management Team page.