Meet the Xero Beautiful Business Fund judges

Meet our global judges

Our global judges will select one winner for each of the four categories, from the pool of regional winners across the globe.

Sukhinder Singh Cassidy

CEO, Xero

As CEO, Sukhinder leads the growth and performance of Xero globally. With more than 25 years in Silicon Valley as a CEO, digital leader and board member, she has experience building and scaling global companies including Google, Amazon, Yodlee, Joyus and StubHub.

James Bergin

EGM, Technology Research & Advocacy, Xero

James is responsible for exploring and understanding technology trends, and providing insight and advisory to senior leadership teams across Xero, as well as our customers and partners. His role entails keeping an eye on the future, and helping others understand how technology can unlock new opportunities and capabilities for people in small business, their advisors and communities around the world.

Mike Cohen

Global Head of Partnerships, Square

Mike is the Global Head of Partnerships at Square. In this role, he oversees the business development, partner management, and partner operations teams that are responsible for growing an ecosystem of partners that enable Square to reach and serve businesses around the world. Prior to Square, Mike held senior product and partnerships roles at Facebook, InMobi, Qualcomm and Nokia. He holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Science from UC Berkeley. Mike lives with his family in the San Francisco East Bay area.

Kate Dundas

Executive Director, UN Global Compact Network Australia

Kate is the Executive Director of the UN Global Compact Network Australia (UNGCNA), which is the Australian local network of the United Nations Global Compact. As Executive Director, Kate leads a team of experts across the fields of business and human rights, environment and climate change, anti-bribery and corruption and sustainable development. Kate is an experienced and well-regarded executive leader with 20 years of experience across the public and private sectors in sustainability, strategic foresight, strategy and city planning. She holds degrees in industrial design, landscape architecture and urban design, is a graduate of the Australian Institute of Company Directors, Cranlana Center for Ethical Leadership, Harvard Executive Education for Sustainability Leadership program and is an Executive MBA candidate. 

Melissa Laurie

Founder & Managing Director, Oysterly

Melissa is the founder of Oysterly, a leading social video agency based in Singapore that specializes in creating User-Generated Content (UGC). The agency's innovative work led to Oysterly being selected as a winner in the 2023 Xero Beautiful Business Fund. Melissa has also been recognized as a Woman to Watch in Asia and was shortlisted for the Women Leading Tech Awards by Atlassian.

Lara Brennan

Partner, Advisory & Outsourcing, Forvis Mazars

Lara leads the mid-market advisory and outsourcing business for Forvis Mazars in the UK and is the global relationship lead for Xero. She specializes in working with fast-growing businesses, helping to develop strategy and drive business performance. Lara has a passion for innovation and enjoys building technology-enabled solutions for clients.

Meet our US judges

Our US judges will select one winner for each of the four categories, from the pool of entries from across the US.

Ben Richmond

Managing Director, North America, Xero

Ben is responsible for driving Xero’s growth in the United States and Canada. In 2013, he joined Xero as New Zealand sales director where he led the business' national growth and spearheaded Xero's global agriculture strategy. Prior to joining Xero, Ben worked in a large regional accounting practice before joining New Zealand's largest telecommunications company in a senior accounting role. He was also one of the founding board members of the Spark Foundation. Ben is a chartered accountant and earned a Bachelor of Commerce majoring in accounting, finance and information systems from the University of Canterbury.

Claire Van Holland

Founder and Principal, CV Ledger

Claire is a 50% left-brain, right-brain split. Through her work, it is her mission to shift the way society thinks and talks about money by connecting small businesses with the necessary resources to provide education, training and support in all the areas of financial operations needed most.

Shahir Daud & Shivali Gulab

Founder and Executive Producer and Operations Director, SuvaNova

Shahir is the founder and executive producer of SuvaNova, while Shivali serves as the operations director. SuvaNova is a leading cutting-edge global media production agency that brings unique stories to life with innovative technology and was a winner in the 2023 Xero Beautiful Business Fund.

Sarah Prevost

Founder, Mintage Labs

As an accomplished leader and collaborator, Sarah is known for her contributions to the community and her love for entrepreneurship. She’s passionate about accounting for various businesses, especially in the legal space, and inspires others through mentorship and innovative solutions.

Krista Simpson

Operations Specialist, Xero

Krista is an operations specialist who currently splits her time across several projects as a coordinator within the Inventory and Projects, Programs, and Portfolio teams at Xero. With undergraduate classes completed at Wichita State University, Krista joined Xero as part of the LOCATE acquisition in November 2021.