David Allspach

Northwestern University is a private institution founded in 1851 to serve the Northwest Territory, an area that now includes the states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Michigan, Wisconsin and parts of Minnesota. Northwestern has three campuses

Morningstar, Inc. (Research) is the investment research arm of Morningstar, Inc. (NASDAQ: MORN), an American financial services firm headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The firm was founded by Joseph Mansueto in 1984 and provides independent portfolio information offering star ratings and analysis of managed funds. They also provide economic commentary and asset allocation information based on qualitative research.

Northern Trust Investments, Inc. (Investment Management) (NTI-IM) is the asset management division of Northern Trust Investments, Inc., ultimately held by Northern Trust Corp. (NASDAQGS: NTRS), a multi-bank holding company established in 1889. The firm was founded in 1988 and headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. NTI-IM provides a wide range of discretionary and non-discretionary investment advisory and sub-advisory services to individual and institutional clients.

BMO Capital Markets Corp. (Broker) is the broker/dealer division of BMO Capital Markets Corp., a full-service North American financial services provider headquartered in New York City. The firm was founded in 1998 and is a subsidiary of BMO Financial Corp., which is owned by Bank of Montreal (NYSE, TSX: BMO) in Canada. BMO Capital Markets offers corporate, institutional and government clients access to a variety of products and services including equity and debt underwriting, corporate lending and project financing, merger and acquisitions advisory services, merchant banking, securitization, treasury and market risk management, debt and equity research and institutional sales and trading.

William Blair & Co. LLC (William Blair) is a SEC-registered broker/dealer firm headquartered in Chicago, Illinois. The firm was founded by William McCormick Blair in 1935 and is a subsidiary of WBC Holdings LP. Until 1941, they were known as Blair, Bonner & Co. William Blair provides broking services to individual, institutional and issuing clients.

Maranon Capital LP (Maranon Capital) is a private equity firm founded in 2007 by Tom Gregory and Ian Larkin. The firm is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.

Founded in 1958, Merrill Lynch Piece Fenner & Smith, Inc. is an SEC registered broker/dealer located in New York City. The firm is a subsidiary of BAC North America Holding Co. and their ultimate parent is Bank of America Corp. (NYSE BAC).

Goldman Sachs & Co. LLC (GS&Co.) is a securities brokerage firm headquartered in New York City. Founded in 1927, the firm is a subsidiary of The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. (NYSE: GS). GS&Co. provides services to help hedge funds manage risk, monitor portfolios, maintain liquidity and build their businesses. They offer clients access to global equity and derivatives markets, as well as foreign exchange, commodities, European Lefts, rates and credit across the Americas, Europe and Asia. The firm proactively monitors capital markets, searching for pockets of liquidity and news that may require changes to those strategies. Integration with the Goldman Sachs network gives clients access to the firm's sectored block trades and their insights into price discovery. Their electronic trading program provides clients with tools to manage their trades from pre-trade analytics to post-trade analysis.

Capstone Financial Advisors, Inc. (Capstone) is an independent, SEC-registered investment advisor headquartered in Downers Grove, Illinois. The firm was founded by Troy E. Bute and J. Frank Verkamp in 1999. Capstone provides advisory services to high-net-worth individuals, families, and institutions.

Massachusetts Eye & Ear Infirmary operates as hospital that provides patient care for disorders of the eye, ear, nose, throat, head and neck. It offers ophthalmology and otolaryngology research services and is a teaching partner of Harvard Medical School. The firm’s programs and services include anesthesiology, ophthalmology, otolaryngology, radiology, Coolidge Clinic laboratory and libraries. The company was founded in 1824 and is headquartered in Boston, MA.

Verb Surgical, Inc. designs and manufactures surgical equipment. The company was founded in August 2015 and is headquartered in Santa Clara, CA.

State Farm Insurance Cos. provides personal property and casualty insurance services. It also offers auto insurance quotes, auto, home, life and health policies. The firm also provides commercial auto insurance coverage for renters, business owners, boats and motorcycles. The company was founded by George Jacob Mecherle in 1922 and is headquartered in Bloomington, IL.

Old Second National Bank is a division of Old Second Bancorp., Inc. (NasdaqGS; OSBC). The bank is located in Aurora, Illinois.

The American Ophthalmological Society is an organization that aims to promote excellence in patient care, education, and research in the field of ophthalmology. The society is based in San Francisco, CA, and was founded in 1864 by Edward Delafield, Daniel Bennett St. John Roosa, and Henry Noyes. The private company addresses essential issues in medicine and advance the art and science of ophthalmology. The society holds annual meetings every third week of May each year, and they offer travel grants to non-members who wish to attend. Membership nominations are accepted until April 30th each year.

Golden State Warriors LLC owns and manages a professional basketball franchise. Its team is part of the Pacific Division of the Western Conference in the National Basketball Association (NBA). The company was founded in 1946 and is headquartered in Oakland, CA.

The Chicago Ophthalmological Society is a non-profit organization that provides ophthalmologists services.

The Association for Research in Vision & Ophthalmology operates an association focused on research in vision and ophthalmology. The non-profit company is based in Rockville, MD.

Proof of Play, Inc. is a team of experienced game developers and entrepreneurs who specialize in creating onchain games and open source technology. The private company is located in the US. The American company's goal is to develop games that give players power and ownership.

Sterling Fund Management LLC (Sterling Partners) is a Private Equity firm founded in 1983 by Eric Becker, Michael Bronfein, Shoshana M. Vernick, Jeff Elburn. The firm is headquartered in Chicago, Illinois.

SignalFire Management Services LLC (Signalfire) is a venture capital firm founded in 2013 by Christopher W. Farmer and Ilya Kirnos. The firm is headquartered in San Francisco, California.

Epic Games, Inc. engages in the development of games and cross-platform game engine technologies. Its series of games creations include Fortnite, Unreal, Gears of War, Shadow Complex, and the Infinity Blade. The company was founded by Mark Rein and Timothy Sweeney in 1991 and is headquartered in Cary, NC.

Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP provides legal services. The firm specializes in corporate, financial services, litigation, real estate, commercial finance, intellectual property, trusts and estates, antitrust, bankruptcy, international trade, employee benefits and executive compensation, employment, environmental, public finance and tax. The company was founded in 1974 and is headquartered in Chicago, IL.

Marketing Analytics was founded in 1991 to help clients measure the impact of marketing on sales. Market response modeling traditionally involved a high degree of analyst intervention. They believe scalability, repeatability, and efficiency ensure more accurate results and make the business benefits of good analytic more broadly available. Their unique combination of strengths enables clients to maximize return on their data and analytic investments include depth of experience accumulated from modeling sales for thousands of products & services across a range of industries, sales channels, and countries, commitment to best practice leadership evinced by regular, company-funded research to improve modeling methods, highly flexible yet scalable model development process with update speed that is unmatched in the industry, recognized expertise in measuring media effectiveness and ROI, proven marketing and media mix optimization capability, software tools that let clients leverage models on an ongoing basis.

Los Alamos National Laboratory operates as a multidisciplinary institution. It offers services in science, engineering, earth science, chemistry, mathematics, physics, and space science. The company was founded in 1943 and is headquartered in Los Alamos, NM.

OneChicago LLC engages in providing electronic exchange services. It focuses on futures on individual stocks, narrow-based indexes, and ETFs. The firm offers single stock futures exchange services to invest and trade equity products for traders, brokers, and investors. It also provides market data, including quotes, list of market data vendors, market data vendor fees and licensing and various products. The company was founded in 2001 and is headquartered in Chicago, IL.

The National Association of Home Builders (NAHB) is a trade association located in Washington, DC. Their broad mission is to enhance the climate for housing, homeownership and the residential building industry. Its various groups analyze policy issues, take the industry's story to the public, monitor and work toward improving the housing finance system and analyze and forecast economic and consumer trends. They also provide a wide range of business-related services to members and Home Builder Associations. NAHB represents the industry's interests on Capitol Hill as it strives to ensure that all housing remains a national priority when laws are made and policies are established. NAHB also works with federal agencies on regulations affecting the housing industry in areas such as mortgage finance, codes, energy and the environment. In the HousingData section of their website, NAHB produces in-depth economic analyses of the home building industry based on private and government data. Their Economics Group surveys builders, home buyers, and renters to gain insight into the issues and trends driving the industry. NAHB also publishes HousingEconomics.com, the online economics information source for Americas housing industry. HousingEconomics.com is a subscription service that provides in depth housing and economic data and forecasts for those seeking greater detail than is available in NAHB's Housing Data section. HousingEconomics.com provides the latest housing forecasts, market trends, in-depth economic analysis and archival data relating to the housing industry.

Deerpath Capital Management LP (Deerpath Capital Management) is a private equity firm founded by Gary C. Wendt, James Kirby and John Fitzgibbons in 2007. The firm is headquartered in New York.

Pangea USA, Inc. provides global money transfer platform. Its platform enables international cash-to-cash transfers. The company was founded on September 19, 2012 by Rahier Rahman and Kyle Stoner and is headquartered in Chicago, IL.

Founded in 2001, Quantitative Services Group LLC (QSG) is a research firm located in Naperville, Illinois. The firm is a subsidiary of Markit Group Holdings Ltd. They seek to leverage the latest technology, construction techniques and specialty data to provide institutional investors a variety of global stock selection models focused on outperformance. QSG's Value Momentum Model provides a balanced approach to stock selection within the U.S. market. This model favors stocks with strong earnings quality, good valuation, strong balance sheets, positive momentum, and good earnings growth. The Value Momentum Model's approach is best for investors seeking broad exposure to a variety of proven stock selection methods and a core approach portfolio construction. The model is applied across all market-caps, investment styles and asset classes. The firm's Relative Value Model includes themes of price multiples, profitability, earnings expectations, intrinsic value and financial strength. This model is designed to avoid value traps, augment sector-relative and industry-relative viewpoints and provide a consistent source of value. QSG's Price Momentum Model provides a powerful, consistent 1- to 3-month investment signal. This model leverages put and call options and trading volume information to reduce the inherent risk-seeking nature of momentum-based strategies. The firm's GARP Model identifies growth stocks with strong value characteristics. The model consists of a proprietary combination of long-term earnings growth and relative value signals. It employs first-order partial correlation to create a blend of sustainable earnings growth and current cheapness. This model is best for strategies targeting stocks that demonstrate high long-term growth potential and the sustainability to realize that potential. QSG's Deep Value Model is a proven approach to selecting undervalued stocks across the broad US market. The Deep Value Model is designed to select future out performers over the next 9 to 12 months. The firm's Deep Value Model uses free-cash-flow, dividend yield and asset turnover to identify stocks that are currently trading at a deep discount to their intrinsic value. The Deep Value model provides discriminatory power for both long-only and long-short strategies and compliments more short term-oriented momentum and growth strategies. QSG's Earnings Momentum Model uses a proprietary search algorithm to combine analyst forecasts with the company's past earnings strength, along with several indicators of future earnings potential. The Earnings Momentum model has consistently outperformed in both pre- and post- Regulation FD environments. Utilizing a unique k-clustering factor selection technique, QSG's Historical Growth Model selects stocks with an above-average track-record of earnings growth, strong sales growth and high sustainable growth. This blended approach enables the model to identify traditional growth stocks, as well as value stocks on the verge of growth.