Pejman Makhfi
Managing Director
Pejman is a Silicon Valley technology veteran,
serial entrepreneur and angel investor in the
high-tech industry. Pejman has more than fifteen
years of progressive experience in providing
consultancy services and best practices to entrepreneurs,
technology investors, and forward-thinking Startups.
Widely known as a leader in the field of Business
Process Automation and Knowledge Modeling, Pejman
has an extensive background in the software
and financial industries and has been the key
architect for several award-winning industry
leaders, such as FinancialCircuit and Savvion.
Today, Pejman is the Director of Venture Development
at Singularity
Institute, Managing Director of a private
angel group and is a member of Venture Mentoring
Team where he provides assistance and guidance
to several early-stage companies.
His background includes executive position
at TEN,
a top Silicon Valley technology incubator hosting
more than fifty Start-ups. Pejman managed TEN’s
R&D as well as advised startups on the issues
and trends affecting early stage and emerging
growth companies. Since its inception, TEN has
helped launch of over sixty Startups, including
eBay, iPrint, Xros, Vertical Networks, Right
Works, and Intruvert Networks.
Mr. Makhfi holds a B.S./M.S. degree in Computer
Science from Dortmund University in Germany
and is an internationally licensed Project Manager
(PMP) as well as a certified Lean Six Sigma
Black Belt (SSBB) in continuous business improvement.
He has authored multiple Patents and standards
and is an active contributor to organizations
such as "IEEE Neural Networks Society",
"American Association for Artificial Intelligence"
and “American Society for Quality”.
Mr. Makhfi is the author of numerous articles,
including Heptalysis
– A Methodic Approach to screening investment
opportunities in private sector.
Chutta Ratnathicam
Managing Director
Having served as CFO, Chutta has twenty seven
years experience in Finance and Executive management
with Conway (NYSE CNW) a $4+ billion publicly
traded global transportation and logistics company
headquartered in Palo Alto, California. He held
several positions in its subsidiaries and the
corporate office. Experience in CFO functions,
Finance, Strategic Planning, Investor relations,
International Operations and sales, Internal
Audit and Financial Accounting and Information
Technology.
Chutta currently serves on the Board of Directors
of Franklin Resources Inc, a $3+ billion Financial
Services Company headquartered in San Mateo,
California and is on Advisory Board of California
State University, School of Business.
Chutta holds an MBA from University of Portland
and has been a Member, Council of Financial
Executives, the Conference Board.
Fernando Garcia
Managing Director
Fernando Garcia has a rich business background
combining entrepreneurial and managerial experience
with business school research & teaching.
Mr. Garcia began his business career in the
mergers & acquisitions department of Kidder
Peabody & Company and worked on major M&A
client engagements including General Electric,
DuPont, and Honeywell, among others, advising
them on potential acquisitions, divestures,
and other corporate finance issues. At that
time, Kidder was a major Wall Street firm representing
Fortune 500 companies.
He has served as president of First Venture
Securities Corporation and Cambridge Venture
Partners, where he identified and structured
transactions for middle market privately held
companies seeking financing for "roll-ups"
via acquisition or merger, including $100 million
equity investment for businesses in the global
power supply manufacturing industry. In addition,
Mr. Garcia advised small and middle market companies
on operational issues as well as financing acquisitions
and business expansion.
Since 2004, Mr. Garcia has been the chief investment
advisor to a global private equity fund, reviewing
investment opportunities in Asia, and Latin
America.
Mr. Garcia has taught corporate finance and
entrepreneurship courses at Haas School of Business
at UC Berkeley, and the Graduate School of Management
at UC Davis. Mr. Garcia was born in Los Angeles,
California, and received his M.B.A. degree from
Harvard Business School, and B.A. and law degrees
from UC Berkeley.
Dr. W. Keith Kennedy
Jr.
Managing Director
W. Keith Kennedy Jr. is Chairman of the Board
of Con-way, a publicly traded global supply-chain
management company.
Dr. Kennedy has served as Chair of Joint Venture:
Silicon Valley Network and has served on the
board of that organization for over ten years.
At the present time he serves on two boards
of organizations sponsored by Joint Venture:
Silicon Valley: Smart Valley which deals in
Information Technology and Smart Health.
He has lectured at Stanford University in both
the School of Engineering and the Graduate School
of Business and he was a visiting professor
at U.C. Davis' Graduate School of Management.
He has also lectured at Cornell University,
Southern
Methodist University and Santa Clara University.
Other organizations for which he as served
as a member of the board include the California
Chamber of Commerce, New California Network,
Lytton Gardens, Superschools Foundation of the
Fremont High School District, Pacific Skyline
Council
of the Boy Scouts of America, Silicon Valley
Defense/Space Consortium, Center for Quality
Management (West) and the Bay Area Council of
the American Electronics Association.
Dr. Kennedy earned a B.S.E.E., M.S. and a Ph.D.
from Cornell University. He continues to support
Cornell University as a member of the Engineering
College Council and is also a member of the
University Council.
Robert Schweikher
Managing Director
Mr. Schweikher has over 30 years of Chairman,
CEO, COO and Executive management experience
managing companies and businesses that have
spanned from the early start-up stage to over
$700 million in size. These companies have been
in the aerospace, agricultural biotechnology,
electronic materials & devices, advanced
materials, agricultural chemical and wireless
communication sectors. He has been actively
involved as a principal, advisor, or director
with early and late stage companies within these
sectors. His most recent startups have been
Terra Access, Comtier, TerraMeth Industries
and Calgene.
His experience and expertise is in finance,
strategic and tactical planning, operations,
marketing, product development, business development,
chaos & change management, acquisitions
and divestitures, restructuring, and turnarounds.
He has successfully led significant company
acquisitions, company divestures, joint ventures,
and numerous licenses for product and technology.
He has served on the boards of Nitragin Company,
Nippon Amorphous Metals Company, Biologicals,
Conductimer Corporation, Calgene Inc., and TerraMeth
Industries. Mr. Schweikher also has served on
the U.S. Feed Grains Council and Board of the
Semiconductor Equipment & Materials Institute
(SEMI). He has also served as an advisor to
TEN, the Silicon Valley Incubator, and De Anza
– San Jose Business Incubator as a mentor.
Currently Mr. Schweikher is the founder and
chairman of a private consulting practice, founded
in 1985, providing chaos and change management
services to investors and management of start
up through medium sized business faced with
major strategic and tactical operational issues.
John West
Managing Director
John has a broad business and technical background
that includes International Business Development,
Direct/Indirect Sales, and Marketing on top
of solid Product Development and Engineering
foundation for a wide variety of enterprise-level
software products.
John was a Channel and Alliance Sales executive
at NetManage having joined them when they acquired
Librados, a highly successful open-source software
vendor where he had been an advisor from the
start of the company.
As a Business Development specialist at BEA
for 6 years, John drove revenue growth through
worldwide channel programs and major accounts
sales initiatives leveraging strategic ISV and
SI partners and spearheading new technology
introductions. In this role he lived in Tokyo
for two years helping them to become the fastest
growing region in the world growing over 200%.
Before that John ran Product Marketing and
Product Development in global systems vendors
ICL, Fujitsu, and Sperry Univac driving breakthrough
developments in fault tolerant computer systems.
John is known best for his exceptional strategic
planning and product positioning skills due
to his technology plus business background on
top of Math/Economics education. He has a Bachelors
degree in Math and Economics from Augsburg College
in Minneapolis, Minnesota and attended University
of Minnesota MBA program.
Stephen
Gertz
Managing Director
Stephen Gertz is President of Sage Associates,
providing management consulting and investment
banking services to early stage technology companies.
He currently lectures in the MBA program at
the Lester Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation,
within the Haas School of Business, University
of California at Berkeley. Additionally, he
is an adjunct professor and advisory board member
for both Entrepreneurship and Interactive Media
Studies at Miami University (Oxford, OH) teaching
Entrepreneurship.
Steve has more than thirty years of senior
operating management and strategic consulting
experience (at C-level positions) at both start-up
and established technology-application companies,
domestically and in Europe and Asia. Steve has
served as CEO, President and board member of
several venture-backed early stage companies
where he defined and developed strategic direction
for these companies. Steve is a former Senior
Partner with Diamond Management & Technology
Consultants (Nasdaq:DTPI), a global management
consulting firm. Steve’s background also
includes technology investment banking where
he specialized in venture financing for Internet
start-ups during the Internet’s breakout
stage.
Steve holds a Master of Business Administration
degree with a concentration in Finance from
Long Island University, and a Bachelor of Science
degree in Physics from Miami University (Oxford,
Ohio).
Robert
Walstra, PhD
Managing Director
Bob brings to VentureChoice
a 20-year track record in new-business creation,
market development, and technology sales serving
in executive positions in the start-up and enterprise
sectors.
Prior to VentureChoice, he
headed sales, marketing, and business development
for one of the leading enterprise software companies
in Identity and Access Management, which was
acquired by IBM. Before that he established
a database-as-a-service start-up as the leading
vendor in the online-media sector. As a co-founder,
he created an entirely new business in Tax Technologies
and delivered global tax compliance systems
to public companies in the high-tech sector.
He established European sales operations with
offices in Amsterdam, London, and Rome for his
first start-up.
Before joining start-up community,
Bob launched Hewlett-Packard's early and successful
presence in electronic banking and electronic
commerce delivering installations with banking
and telecom conglomerates in the US, Japan,
and Europe. He started with HP as an R&D
project manager in parallel system design, followed
by an assignment to create HP's software factory.
Bob holds a Ph.D. in Computer
Science from the University of Toronto, and
an engineering degree in Applied Mathematics
from the Twente University in The Netherlands.
Dr. Marc R. Hannah
Co-Founder Silicon Graphics, Angel
Investor
Dr. Hannah co-founded Silicon Graphics, Inc.
(SGI) and spent 16 years there helping grow
the company from a small startup to a multi-billion
dollar computer hardware and software company
with products from desktop workstations to large,
multiprocessor supercomputers. When Dr. Hannah
left the company in 1997, he was Vice President
and Chief Scientist.
At SGI, Dr. Hannah was chief architect for most
of the company’s low-end and mid-range
graphics systems. His duties also included evaluating
technologies and markets in the 2-5 year time
frame to propose new products and strategies.
He worked closely with Jim Clark to initiate
projects to deliver SGI technologies into consumer
applications, including the Nintendo-64 game
machine for Nintendo and Orlando Interactive
TV trial for Time-Warner.
Since leaving SGI, Dr. Hannah has done consulting
projects for SGI and other companies, and participated
in a few start-ups, including Omniverse Digital
Solutions, a minority focused, web-based media
company (as VP of Technology), Pulsent Corporation,
a technology company developing compression
technology for video delivery over the Internet
(as VP of Product Architecture), and SongPro,
a consumer electronics company focused on offering
portable media players cartridges and content
for the Nintendo Game Boy (as Chief Technology
Officer). Dr. Hannah has also served on several
corporate Boards.
Dr. Hannah received a BS in Electrical Engineering
from Illinois Institute of Technology, and an
MS and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from
Stanford University.
Dr. Hannah has been granted 13 patents, and
received numerous awards & honors, including:
Kilby Young Innovator Award; Black Engineer
of the Year Technical Contribution Award; IIT
Alumni Association Professional Achievement
Award; NTA Professional Achievement Award; San
Francisco Black Chamber of Commerce Front Runner
Award; M.E.N.T.O.R. Network Technology Award;
M.O.B.E Influencers & Innovators Award.
Farvardin Jahansooz
Corporate Venture
Farvardin has more than twenty three years
experience working at technology startups and
corporations in Silicon Valley. He has held
senior managerial positions at HP, Agilent,
Photon Dynamics and other corporations.
As a corporate investor for Hoya Corporation,
he made investments in material, telecom and
display companies and participated on their
boards. His experience spans due diligence,
business plan preparation, financial analysis,
business development, M&A, general management
and P&L. He has also served as a director
on two non-profit boards.
At HP he was nominated for and completed a
year long executive leadership program. He has
published five technical papers and has an MBA,
MS Physics and completed the coursework and
residency requirements towards a PhD in Physics
at the University of Oregon.
Blake Escudier
State Director of SBDC, University Fellow
Blake has a diverse business background with
20 years of start-up, small/medium enterprise
(SME) experience. Most recently Blake was the
Director of Small Business Development for Northern
California with San Jose State University where
he managed a federally contracted program with
an annual average of six thousand small business
clients in counseling and more than fifteen
thousand in training seminars.
Prior to this nationally recognized position,
he was the Director of the Small Business Development
Center in Southeastern Washington State with
over 400 business clients including start-ups
from the Dept of Energy Hanford Nuclear site.
Blake's specialty area is marketing strategies
and has been teaching college level marketing
courses and public short courses for the past
10 years. As an entrepreneur he has started
businesses ranging from a sports agency to online
retail. He is President of Entrepanalysis LLC,
a business counseling firm.
Blake has been an instructor with Washington
State University and San Jose State University.
He has a BBA and MBA from Loyola University
New Orleans and served in the United States
Navy's nuclear program. He is presently a PhD
candidate in Organization and Management with
Capella University. Blake resides in Melbourne,
Australia.
Sam Pullara
CEO, Venture Capitalist, Angel Investor
Sam provides valuable experience in the Private
Equity business from many perspectives, especially
working inside a leading Silicon Valley Venture
Capital firm, but also being an active Angel
investor working with many Angel groups, and
having worked in corporate development evaluating
strategic investment opportunities.
As an EIR (Entrepreneur In Residence) at Accel
Partners, a highly successful VC, Sam evaluates
possible investments and consults for portfolio
companies. Currently founder and CEO at Gauntlet
Systems, an early stage software startup, he
has also worked as Technical Advisor at 3Tera,
Angel Investor at Gene Network Sciences, Angel
Investor at 4charity.com, Private Equity Investor
at Kenamea, Inc., Private Equity Investor at
NextMonet.com, and in Corporate Development
at BEA where he was one of the architects of
the WebLogic Server.
Sam has a Masters of Science degree in Physics
from Northwestern University and a Bachelors
of Science degree from Worcester Polytechnic
Institute.
David Richards
CEO, Serial Entrepreneur, Visionary,
Investor
Mr. Richards, has over 12 years as an executive
in the software industry and sits on both boards
and advisory boards of Silicon Valley start-up
ventures. Mr. Richards is a veteran of several
successful start-up companies in Enterprise
Software and is an industry-recognized leader
in both EAI and EAI standards. He has spoken
and written widely about standards in application
integration and the adoption of open-source
technologies. It is Mr Richards' vision of lowering
costs and adopting standards that is driving
down the costs of adapter technology in the
EAI industry.
David was VP and General Manager at NetManage
after they acquired Librados in 2004. He was
Founder, Chairman and CEO of Librados and before
that, Insevo, both highly successful software
startup companies.
He is also one of the founding members of the
EAI consortium; an organization actively involved
in the development of standards for integration
infrastructure and chairs the adapter committee.
Dan Meyers
Attorney, Entrepreneur, Advisor
Dan Meyers is a seasoned attorney with 13
years of experience representing start-ups,
private technology companies, large public companies
and venture capital funds in the various corporate,
intellectual property, equity financing and
acquisition transactions that are central to
the success of technology companies in Silicon
Valley. Dan was a partner in the Silicon Valley
office of a major national law firm, Bingham
McCutchen, for over five years. He has a wealth
of experience representing emerging growth companies
from start-ups to mature private companies in
Financing, M&A and IP related transactions.
Dan Meyers graduated cum laude from Harvard
Law School in 1994. He began practicing corporate
and transactional law with Bingham McCutchen
in its Silicon Valley office in 1996, and became
a partner in 2001.
David A. Rivkin, PhD, PE
Scientist, Entrepreneur, Professor
of Business & Technology, Advisor
Prof. Rivkin is a 20 year
veteran and founder of several Silicon Valley
and International high-tech startups. As an
executive at several highly successful startups
turned profitable, Prof. Rivkin bring strong
business, operations and technology skills,
his achievements have won him many honors and
awards. Prof. Rivkin holds degrees in Chemistry,
Nuclear Engineering, Applied Mathematics and
Engineering Management and teaches both graduate
and undergraduate students in technology and
business in addition to advising firms and being
on the board of directors of several.
As the former CTO of SciEssence
Intl, a global scientific instrumentation and
nanotechnology firm and Technical Director of
GCPI, a contract R&D firm specializing in
instrumentation and medical device technologies,
Prof. Rivkin brings real world expertise to
the firms he advises. He is well known for his
work with distributed engineering based firms
and the infrastructure necessary for small firms
to manage their operations, especially in highly
regulated fields such as medical devices and
instrumentation. Prof. Rivkin provides advice
and assistance from business strategy to infrastructure,
from technology development to intellectual
property assessment.
Prof. Rivkin volunteers his
time to many industry societies and chairs several
including nanotechnology standards bodies. He
is also an IEEE Engineering in Medicine and
Biology Society Distinguished Lecturer.
Aaron Uri Levy
CEO, Strategic leader, Turnaround specialist
Mr. Levy is a strategic organizational business
leader with a successful track record in serving
as CEO, President, COO, and Director of several
publicly traded companies, Mr. Levy has developed
a reputation as a fast-paced, results-oriented
and hands-on leader who has successfully implemented
turnaround growth strategies. A published author,
an inventor, military veteran and an elected
Young Presidents Organization (YPO) member,
Mr. Levy’s business expertise is complemented
by strong educational background that includes
a Master and a Bachelor of Science in engineering
and a PhD. Doctoral Program in Leadership and
Organizational Behavior, currently being completed.
Mr. Levy’s expertise is based on practical
experience, that include but not limited to
operational management, P&L financial turn
around, strategic sales & marketing, R&D,
manufacturing, Mergers and Acquisitions (M&A),
Ventures Capital Resources, investment banking,
SEC and Wall Street investor relations.
Mr. Levy has managed operations in the U.S,
Europe, Asia and the Middle East and lead business
from start-up to publicly-traded corporations.
Mr. Levy also served on the Board of Directors
of several publicly traded firms and he is a
strategic advisor on homeland security products
to VIASPACE. VIASPACE, transforms Space and
Defense technologies from NASA, JPL, and the
DOD into commercial and defense solutions with
expertise in homeland security, energy/fuel
cells, sensors and RFID.
A holder of a U.S patent for high density memory
process, Mr. Levy is also the author of “Digital
Printing” book. He has been recognized
in Who’s Who, received the Alp’s
America Sales award, and the Certificate of
Excellence as a university guest lecturer at
Pepperdine University’s MBA program.
Mr. Levy resides in Southern California, he
is active in several professional and civic
organizations, served in the Air Force and Navy
and he is a USA FAA certified commercial pilot
and an FAA Flight Instructor for commercial,
IFR, and Multi-Engines aircrafts.
Erik Randles
Entrepreneur, Advisor, Investor
Erik Randles has more than 15 years of leadership
experience in building start-ups, executing
deals and guiding top-tier companies in the
technology industry. An accomplished corporate
strategist, operational leader and investor,
his achievements have been featured in The Wall
Street Journal, Asia Times and eMarketWorld
as well as other business media.
Erik is the founder of Avalon Advisors and has
provided services to many start-ups and leading
technology and private equity firms including
KPCB, Partech International, KKR, Norwest Venture
Partners, Veritas and Composite Software. Erik
is an active investor and has negotiated and
executed over $500 million in acquisitions and
early-stage technology investments. Erik has
also held leadership positions at BEA Systems,
KPMG and Suntory International, and currently
sits on the advisory board of several software
start-ups.
Erik earned his Bachelor of Science degree from
Baylor University and his MBA from the University
of Notre Dame.
Coleman Gross, PhD
Scientific and Clinical Expert
Dr. Gross is the Medical Director of AVIYA
Clinical Research and Development. He has been
involved in research, both in academic medical
centers and the biopharmaceutical industry for
over 14 years. He has experience in all stages
of biomedical research from bench to clinical
research.
Dr. Gross has led multidisciplinary teams within
the biopharmaceutical industry and has considerable
experience in preclinical development, clinical
development strategy and planning, clinical
trial design, protocol development, and clinical
trial execution. Dr. Gross is also an experienced
clinical investigator and has conducted pharmaceutical
and NIH sponsored studies in multiple therapeutic
areas including metabolic diseases, endocrinology,
osteoporosis, diabetes, obesity, and other disease
areas. He has served as a medical and scientific
expert in successful financing and licensing
projects. Dr. Gross also maintains active clinical
practice in diabetes, endocrinology and metabolism.
Dr. Gross received an AB from the University
of California, Berkeley and a MD from the University
of Southern California. He completed postgraduate
training at UCLA and Stanford University. Dr.
Gross is board certified in internal medicine,
endocrinology, diabetes and metabolism. Dr.
Gross is Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine
at UCSF.
David Belgum
Financial Solutions, Advisor
David has spent the last 12
years in finance leadership roles at Silicon
Valley startups. He is the founder of Belgum
Financial Solutions which provides CFO services
to venture-backed companies. His passion is
helping early-stage companies establish strategic
and operational excellence as a cornerstone
for creating wealth. He also conducts independent
valuations and advises companies on a variety
of valuation issues and is a member of the American
Society of Appraisers.
David has given presentations to entrepreneurs
at TVC and other forums on venture financing.
He holds a Master of Business Administration
degree with a concentration in Finance from
Santa Clara University.
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