Ann Hand

• Company: Project Frog

• Age: 45

Though Hand was British Petroleum's SVP of Global Brand, Marketing and Innovation, for several years, she's on a much more environmentally friendly mission today. Project Frog aims to revamp the construction industry with simple-to-build spaces (they takes days, rather than months to construct) that consume about 50% less energy than traditional buildings for sectors like education and healthcare. Hand's plan seems to be working: revenue is expected to more than double this year.

安•汉德

• 公司：建筑公司Project Frog

• 年龄：45岁

虽然汉德曾在英国石油公司（British Petroleum）担任过多年全球品牌、营销与创新高级副总裁，但她现在却在从事更加环保的事业。Project Frog的使命是希望通过易于建造的空间（通常几天或者几个月便可完成），彻底改造建筑行业。相比教育与医疗等行业的传统建筑，Project Frog的建筑可以节省约50%的能源。汉德的计划似乎已经奏效：公司今年的收入预计将增加一倍以上。

Julia Hartz

• Company: Eventbrite

• Age: 33

Hartz started Eventbrite, an online ticketing platform, with her now-husband Kevin in 2006. Since its founding, the company has raised $140 million from firms like Sequoia Capital and Tiger Global Management and reached $2 billion in gross ticket sales this September. Entrepreneurship forced Hartz to appreciate candid and collaborative conversations. "I had to learn how to ask for help," she says. "Everyone always thinks it's brave to go out alone, but I think it's even braver to put yourself out there in front of others, and to figure out how to work together." 

茱莉亚•哈茨

• 公司：在线票务平台Eventbrite

• 年龄：33岁

2006年，哈茨与现任丈夫凯文共同创办了在线票务平台Eventbrite。自成立以来，这家公司先后从红杉资本（Sequoia Capital）和老虎全球基金（Tiger Global Management）等公司获得了总计1.4亿美元的投资。今年9月，它的票务销售总额达到了20亿美元。创业让哈茨不得不在与人沟通时运用坦率、且具有合作性的对话方式。她说：“我必须学会如何寻求帮助。所有人都认为创业是勇敢的举动，但我认为，更需要勇气的事情是，把自己摆到众人面前，同时努力达成协作。”  

Jules Pieri

• Company: The Grommet

• Age: 53

After years working with large consumer product companies like Stride Rite and Keds, Pieri grew frustrated with the difficulty mom-and-pop shops had launching new products. "The more innovative a product—as opposed to mainstream and "known"—the harder it was to get distribution," she explains. In response, she launched The Grommet, a discovery platform that connects customers with inventors' stories and their products, five years ago. Pieri, whose company helped launch products including SodaStream and Fitbit, counts HP CEO Meg Whitman as a mentor and has a side-gig as an entrepreneur in residence at Harvard Business School.

朱尔斯•皮耶里

• 公司：The Grommet公司

• 年龄：53岁

皮耶里在大型消费类产品公司工作过多年，如Stride Rite和科迪斯（Keds）等。所以，这种夫妻店在推出新产品时所遇到的困难令皮耶里感到失望。她解释道：“越创新的产品，因为与主流和‘已知’相悖，因而越难销售。”因此，她在五年前成立了The Grommet，这个信息分享平台会将消费者与发明者的故事和产品联系起来。皮耶里的公司帮助发布的产品包括自制碳酸饮料机Sodastream和智能腕带Fitbit。她一直把惠普公司（HP）CEO梅格•惠特曼作为自己的导师，并在哈佛商学院（Harvard Business School）担任入驻企业家。

Leila Janah

• Company: Samasource

• Age: 31

In 2008, Janah talked to a call center worker from Dharavi, India, the largest slum in South Asia, while working as a consultant. The worker said there were millions of unemployed villagers as talented as he was. "I thought, 'What if outsourcing could generate a few dollars for billions of people, rather than billions of dollars for a wealthy few?'" Janah says. She went on to launch Samasource, a tech platform that connects impoverished women and youth with large corporations like Google, LinkedIn, and Microsoft to complete digital projects. To date, the non-profit has helped over 16,000 people rise above the poverty line and it recently launched SamaUSA, a domestic program for low-income students living in San Francisco.

利拉•詹纳

• 公司：撒马源公司

• 年龄：31岁

2008年，詹纳作为顾问与印度达拉维一家呼叫中心的员工进行了交流。达拉维是南亚最大的贫民窟。那名工人说有数以百万计的无业村民具备有与他一样的能力。詹纳说：“我想：‘有没有可能利用外包为数十亿人每个人带来几美元，而不是为少数富人带去数十亿美元？’” 于是，她成立了撒马源公司（Samasource），用这个高科技平台帮助贫困的女性和年轻人获得谷歌（Google）、商务社交媒体公司LinkedIn和微软（Microsoft）等公司的数字项目。到目前为止，这个非盈利机构已经帮助16,000人脱离了贫困。近期，它还在美国成立了一个国内项目SamaUSA，主要面向居住在旧金山的低收入学生。

Lisa Stone

• Company: BlogHer

• Age: 46

In early 2005, Stone and her co-founders Elisa Camahort Page and Jory Des Jardins noticed that there were countless women blogging, but mainstream media rarely linked to their posts. The trio decided to host a grassroots conference that year and attracted sponsors like Google and Yahoo. It quickly sold out and soon after, they launched BlogHer.com. The publishing platform turned blogging into a lucrative business for many women -- it paid $25 million to 5,000 of its bloggers between 2009 and 2012 -- and now reaches an audience of 92 million.

丽萨•斯通

• 公司：女性博客网站BlogHer

• 年龄：46岁

2005年初，斯通和其联合创始人爱丽莎•卡玛赫特和朱瑞•德斯•贾丁斯发现，使用博客的女性规模庞大，但主流媒体却很少会引用她们的文章。于是，三人决定召开一次草根会议，并吸引了谷歌和雅虎（Yahoo）等赞助商。门票很快销售一空，不久，她们便成立了BlogHer.com。这个博客发布平台把撰写博客变成了许多女性可以用来赚钱的一项业务——2009年至2012年期间，这家公司向5,000名博主支付了超过2,500万美元。目前，这个平台的用户已经超过9,200万人。

Lori Steele

• Company: Everyone Counts

• Age: 50

Ten years ago, Steele was a successful investment advisor speaking at ITU World, a United Nations conference on technology for government. That same week, California experienced its first-ever gubernatorial election recall. Steele couldn't believe these kinds of hiccups were happening during such important races (the infamous Florida presidential election recall was only three years prior), so she decided to solve the problem herself. To date,169 countries, including Bosnia-Herzegovina, used Everyone Counts' electronic voting platform, as did the Academy Awards committee.

劳瑞•斯蒂尔

• 公司：网络投票公司Everyone Counts

• 年龄：50岁

十年前，斯蒂尔作为一名成功的投资顾问在世界电信展（ITU World）上发言。世界电信展是联合国主导的一项活动，重点是科技在政府中的应用。同一周，加州经历了史上第一次州长罢免选举。斯蒂尔不敢相信，在如此重要的选举中，会出现这种不合时宜的平台故障（三年前才刚刚发生了臭名昭著的佛罗里达州总统选举罢免），所以她决定凭一己之力来解决这个问题。到目前为止，共有169个国家使用了Everyone Counts的电子投票平台，包括波斯尼亚黑塞哥利亚和奥斯卡奖评审委员会。

Maria Rios

• Company: Nation Waste, Inc.

• Age: 46

Rios is no stranger to hard work. She moved to the U.S. from El Salvador when she was a child. She graduated at the top of her high school class and raised a family while putting herself through college. She was not intimidated when she started Nation Waste Inc. At just 22, months after graduating from the University of Houston, she took out loans and purchased two trucks, jumping into the male-dominated waste-removal industry. Today, her Houston-based company has 24 full-time employees. "It is pretty amazing when I look back and see, I started as a little girl entering the United States with my parents and now I am truly living the American dream," says Rios.

玛丽亚•里奥斯

• 公司：垃圾处理公司Nation Waste

• 年龄：46

里奥斯工作非常努力。她很小的时候就从萨尔瓦多来到了美国。以优异成绩从高中毕业后，她一边养家，一边读完大学。成立Nation Waste Inc.公司的时候，她并没有感到害怕。22岁的时候，里奥斯刚刚从休斯敦大学（the University of Houston）毕业几个月就贷款购买了两辆卡车，毅然投身由男性主导的垃圾处理行业。目前，这家位于休斯敦的公司有24名全职员工。里奥斯说：“回头看看过去的经历，总是让我感到吃惊。我很小的时候就跟着父母来到美国，现在我正在实现我的美国梦。”  

Rose Wang

• Company: Binary Group

• Age: 44

Wang studied computer programming while growing up in China. After college, she hoped to move to the U.S. to start her career. The next year, the Chinese Students Protection Act was passed and Wang got her master's in computer science at University of Houston. She worked at several Silicon Valley startups (and launched her own, iBizWomen.com) until September 11, 2001. The attack inspired her to create Binary Group, a technology consulting company that works with the Federal Government. Over the past 16 years, Binary has helped its clients save piles of money -- like the Army 20th Support Command, which cut $60 million over five years for its satellite communication bandwidth requirements.

萝丝•王

• 公司：技术服务公司Binary Group

• 年龄：44岁

萝丝•王在中国长大，在那里学会了计算机编程。大学毕业后，她希望到美国工作。第二年，《中国学生保护法案》（Chinese Students Protection Act）获得通过，萝丝•王获得了休斯敦大学的计算机科学硕士学位。2001年9月11日之前，她曾在多家硅谷初创公司（包括成立自己的公司iBizWomen.com）工作。911事件让她产生了创办Binary Group的想法。Binary Group是一家与联邦政府合作的科技咨询公司。过去16年间，这家公司帮助客户节省的资金不计其数——比如美军第20支援司令部（Army 20th Support Command）就在五年时间内共节省了6,000万美元卫星通信带宽开支。

Sarah Collins

• Company: (Wonderbag) Natural Balance

• Age: 43

Collins grew up in rural, apartheid-era South Africa in the 1970s. Her childhood inspired her to focus on empowering women living below the poverty line through grassroots efforts. The Wonderbag, which was inspired by watching her grandmother cook with cushions, uses heat retention technology to cook food for 8-12 hours without the need for additional fuel. Collins witnessed the benefits African women received from using Wonderbags, reducing the amount of time they spent collecting firewood. For every bag sold, another is donated to a household in Africa, and in the past four years, the Wonderbags have found themselves in 600,000 African homes. Collins has launched the Wonderbag in the U.S. on Amazon, and hopes to sell the products via other retailers by 2014.

萨拉•考林斯

• 公司：（Wonderbag）Natural Balance公司

• 年龄：43岁

上世纪70年代，考林斯出生在落后的、种族隔离时期的南非。她的童年经历让她更关注通过民间的努力改善贫困女性的生活。创办Wonderbag的灵感源自她观察祖母借助垫子做饭的经历。Wonderbag使用保暖技术在8至12个小时内烹饪食物，无需额外增加燃料。考林斯亲眼见证了非洲女性使用Wonderbag所带来的好处——它减少了她们收集柴火的时间。每卖出一个Wonderbag，这家公司就会向非洲的家庭捐赠一个这样的袋子。过去四年，Wonderbag已经走进600,000个非洲家庭。考林斯还通过亚马逊（Amazon）在美国推出了Wonderbag，并希望到2014年的时候能够通过其他零售商出售自己的产品。

Sari Davidson

• Company: BooginHead

• Age: 39

In 2005, Davidson found herself constantly picking up sippy cups her one-year-old son Jake would toss to the ground. She went to Target, bought a sewing machine, and created the SippiGrip, a leash-like contraption for a sippy cup. Her entrepreneurial dreams were slowed, however -- she was recruited by Microsoft to join the HR team working with its X-Box Group. But in 2007, she launched the SippiGrip at a national trade show. Fortuitously, Target approached her to join its 2008 Parent Invented Products Program and today, Davidson's BooginHead line is sold by retailers like Walmart, Babies "R" Us, and Amazon.com.

赛瑞•戴维森

• 公司：儿童用品公司BooginHead

• 年龄：39岁

2005年，戴维森发现自己总是得跟在一岁大的儿子杰克后面，收拾他随处乱扔的儿童吸管杯。于是，她从塔吉特（Target）上买了一台缝纫机，为儿童吸管杯设计出一个类似皮带的奇妙装置——SippiGrip。但她并没有很快实现自己的创业梦想——她加入了微软人力资源团队，与X-Box部门合作。2007年，她在全国性贸易展上推出了SippiGrip。幸运的是，塔吉特邀请她参加2008年父母发明产品计划。目前，戴维森的产品已经在沃尔玛（Walmart）、婴儿反斗城（Babies "R" Us）和亚马逊等零售商开卖。（财富中文网）

译者：刘进龙/汪皓