Jody Holtzman has more than two decades of experience helping companies develop and implement competitive strategies and achieve their strategic market goals.
At AARP, he leads the Thought Leadership group, where his focus is to find ways for AARP to stimulate innovation in the market that benefits people over 50.
Jody and his team created and built the franchise Health Innovation@50+ LivePitch, which in just 2 years attracted 400 startup companies to apply, and has become a destination for entrepreneurs, leading venture capitalists, and industry. Fifteen of the 30 finalists raised $50 million in venture investment, and an additional two exited through acquisition.
Jody and his team also created the Innovation@50+ Ecosystem, which has brought together what has become a self-reinforcing network of investors, industry, incubators/accelerators, technology and design firms, academia and research organizations, and media – all seeking ways to address the untapped needs and business opportunity presented by people 50+.
Jody’s team also created the concept of the Longevity Economy, which established for the first time the macro-economic basis to change the discussion about aging and longevity, proving with economic data that people over 50 provide an outsized positive contribution to the US economy, rather than an economic drain as claimed in many Washington-based debates.
Previously, Jody led AARP’s Research and Strategic Analysis group, and created AARP’s first competitive intelligence group.
Before joining AARP, Jody was in senior leadership roles in several strategy consulting firms. Immediately prior to AARP, Jody founded and built the firm Strategy Dynamics Group where he helped Fortune 500 clients with competitive strategy challenges. Clients included: Mastercard, Citrix, Western Union, Harman International, Deloitte, PwC, McGraw-Hill, and AARP, among others. Jody also was part of a team that incubated a web-data marketing startup, Insight First, and led efforts to raise venture capital, The company successfully exited through acquisition.
Previously, Jody was a Director of Global Strategy and Planning, and led the Market Intelligence Network of PricewaterhouseCoopers. Jody’s team played a key role in both identifying Price Waterhouse as the optimal merger partner for Coopers & Lybrand, and in running merger integration teams following the merger. Before that, he was Vice President of Consulting for FutureBrand, where he helped clients develop and implement competitive brand strategies.
Jody started his career in the field of international economic development working with developing countries to design economic strategies and foreign investment promotion programs. He also produced the Report to the President on the Exxon Valdez Spill, and provided support to the US delegation to the Montreal Protocol to Protect the Ozone Layer.
Jody is a frequent speaker on the opportunities and challenges presented by the demographic wave. He has led numerous workshops on competitive strategy and organizational performance, and his work has been published in Venture Capital Review, the Journal of Business Strategy, Competitive Intelligence Magazine, The Competitive Intelligence Anthology, and Making Cents Out of Knowledge Management. His work has been recognized in the Financial Times, Bloomberg Businessweek, Fortune, Forbes, VentureBeat, MedCity News, Information Week, Xconomy, GigaOm and other media. He has a graduate degree in international political economy from the University of Chicago.