Katarina was born into a family of lawyers in 1969 in Ljubljana, Slovenia, but spent her formative childhood years living in the USA, soaking up MTV and the consumer culture before returning home at 14. Her U.S.-forged interest in communications led her to her first job: launching a successful ad agency, the Vision Factory, in Ljubljana in 1993 where she created ads for carmaker Fiat/Alfa Romeo. In 1996, she left to create her own primetime TV show on advertising for TV Slovenia. That gig lasted until 2003 when he planned to a year off. Instead, she agreed to a three-month project to help set up OpenAd.net in London, Australia, Switzerland, Latin America and Slovenia. Five years later, she’s still there. At OpenAd.net, Katarina is revolutionizing the way that marketers find and develop marketing solutions — offering them access to an online community of 10,000 creative departments in 125 countries. It’s a new successful model for an industry that has strugged to keep its old model alive in the web age. Last year, Katarina opened a New York office. Having created an entirely new category, she now sees others firms trying to capitalize on the model she helped create.