Pete Blackshaw is CEO of Cintrifuse, the syndicated venture fund and startup catalyst dedicated to making Greater Cincinnati the #1 startup hub in the Midwest and a top innovation center in the nation. Pete joined Cintrifuse from Nestlé, S.A. in Switzerland, where he was Vice President of Digital. He created Nestle’s industry-recognized Digital Acceleration Team (DAT), Silicon Valley Innovation Outpost (SVIO), and Open Innovation Platform (Henri@Nestle). Pete earlier served as CMO of NM Incite, a joint venture between Nielsen and McKinsey. He is the author of THE book “Satisfied Customers Tell Three Friends, Angry Customers Tell 3000” (Doubleday). Pete is a passionate entrepreneur who founded PlanetFeedback.com, one of the web’s first consumer-feedback portals. He also co-founded the Word-of-Mouth Marketing Association (WOMMA) and served as Chairman of the Board of the National Council of Better Business Bureaus. He co-chaired a Consumer Goods Forum committee of manufacturers and retailers that developed “Consumer Engagement Principles” to build trust in the digital space. In 2019, he served as an innovation juror at the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity and was named a “Cincinnati Marketing Legend” by the American Marketing Association. He has also been inducted into the Word-of-Mouth Marketing Hall of Fame and was a 2010 Grand Prize winner of the “Great Minds” award from the Advertising Research Foundation. Pete is a graduate of Harvard Business School and the University of California, Santa Cruz.