Diane Schrader

Founder & CEO, thirdACT

355 - DEMYSTIFYING CRYPTOCURRENCIES AND INITIAL COIN OFFERINGS (ICOs)

Diane Schrader is the founder and CEO of thirdACT PBC, a real estate finance technology company. She is recognized for her support of entrepreneurs (advisor to hf.cx, the largest association of technical founders in the world), her decade-plus dedication to the advancement of women (BOD for 100women.org, wynema.org, thehawthornclub.com), and for leading the nation as the first blockchain company to be a Public Benefit Corporation.

Ms. Schrader is known for her rookie smarts and self-determination. She studied figurative painting at SJSU, taught herself to code and began her career as an animator in the computer games industry. Her work included the infamous Dungeons and Dragons series. In the decade following, without any prior experience in training or education, she was tasked with developing a new talent base to seed global commercial sales for digital animation and effects software. Her work took her to over 50 countries. In doing so, she created products and services that transformed a cost center to a global profit center. Then, leaning back again on her software skills, Ms. Schrader leapt into institutional finance, where she developed systematic trading platform for index futures. Deeply moved by the financial crisis, she was drawn towards finance + sustainability. She since has become a pioneer in real estate finance, blockchain and planet tech for cross-sector impact. Ms. Schrader is the mother of two spirited daughters, whom she encourages to have a point of view, and to be insatiously curious about everything, big and small, near and far.