Summit Series is set of semi-annual, invitation-only events for young leaders in the business, art, and philanthropic worlds. The organization launched its first event in March 2008 with ski trip to Utah for 19 people and gained national attention one year later following an invitation from the Obama administration to curate a meeting on economic strategy at the White House, attended by business leaders including founders from Twitter

Twitter

Twitter is an online social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read text-based posts of up to 140 characters, informally known as "tweets".Twitter was created in March 2006 by Jack Dorsey and launched that July...

, YouTube

YouTube

YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....

, and Zappos.com

Zappos.com

Zappos.com is an online shoe and apparel shop currently based in Henderson, Nevada.In July 2009, the company announced it would be acquired by Amazon.com in an all-stock deal worth about $1.2 billion. Since its founding in 1999, Zappos has grown to be the largest online shoe store.-Inception:Zappos...

. In May 2010 Summit Series held DC10, a three-day conference in Washington, DC for 750 people with participants including Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton

William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton is an American politician who served as the 42nd President of the United States from 1993 to 2001. Inaugurated at age 46, he was the third-youngest president. He took office at the end of the Cold War, and was the first president of the baby boomer generation...

, Ted Turner

Ted Turner

Robert Edward "Ted" Turner III is an American media mogul and philanthropist. As a businessman, he is known as founder of the cable news network CNN, the first dedicated 24-hour cable news channel. In addition, he founded WTBS, which pioneered the superstation concept in cable television...

, and John Legend

John Legend

John Roger Stephens , better known by his stage name John Legend, is an American singer, musician, and actor. He is the recipient of nine Grammy Awards, and in 2007, he received the special Starlight award from the Songwriters Hall of Fame.Prior to the release of his debut album, Stephens' career...

.

According to Elliott Bisnow, who founded Summit Series at the age of 22, the company’s focus is to build a community in which attendees support and inspire each other to achieve personal, business, and altruistic goals. Aside from lectures and discussions, the youth-focused events offer activities like whitewater kayaking

Whitewater kayaking

Whitewater kayaking is the sport of paddling a kayak on a moving body of water, typically a whitewater river. Whitewater kayaking can range from simple, carefree gently moving water, to demanding, dangerous whitewater. River rapids are graded like ski runs according to the difficulty, danger or...

, paintball, and skydiving. Since its inception, the organization has raised more than $1.5 million for charities and non-profits.