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John Kemp-Welch – Chairman
John joined BDC Venture Capital in January 1997. He has over twenty one years of investment management experience with early stage technology companies. From 1987 to 1997, John held progressively senior investment management positions at Innovation Ontario Corporation, a venture capital firm involved in early stage technology investments. In that role, he worked closely with the board and management of over thirty early stage technology companies. From 1981 to 1986, John was an investment manager with the Ontario Energy Corporation, which invested in a variety of oil, gas, and energy-related technology companies. John Kemp-Welch holds Bachelor degrees in both Economics and Geography from McMaster University.
R. Allan Mackenzie
Allan MacKenzie is the General Partner of Disruptive Ventures where he specializes in software and related infrastructure. His current board positions include BridgeWerx and the ROI Fund. In 1999, Allan joined the management team of one of his investee companies, as the Vice President of Finance. During his tenure, Allan helped grow the company from 6 employees to 85, leading to a 30-fold return to its investors when it was acquired by AOL in 2000. Allan holds an MBA from the University of Western Ontario (Ivey Business School) and degrees in Engineering and Economics from Stanford University.
Rakesh Mathur
Rakesh's primary focus in Optessa is the evolution of business strategy, especially in the areas of strategic alliances and business development. As an entrepreneur, Rakesh has created two successful high-growth technology companies. In 1994 he co-founded Armedia, an early leader in DVD semiconductors, which merged with Broadcom in 1999. In 1996, he co-founded Junglee, built the company as its CEO and merged it with Amazon.com in 1998. Junglee led to dramatic and innovative changes in the way consumers query the Internet. Rakesh was selected as a member of the 1998 Upside 100, Upside Magazine's list of the 100 most successful technology executives that year. In 1999 he founded Skyblaze Ventures, a venture fund investing in innovative early stage technology companies in the US and India. Skyblaze has funded and advised entrepreneurs who have created companies that include Yodlee, Elance, uReach, Xpeed, Stratify, Tavant and PointCross. Rakesh holds an M.S. in Industrial Engineering and Operations Research from the University of Texas and a B. Tech. in Mechanical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Mumbai, India.
Padman Ramankutty
Padman Ramankutty is a well known Supply Chain and Enterprise strategist with deep expertise in new generation technologies deployment. Padman has over 20 years experience in the ERP space and serves on the board of several venture backed companies. He is an advisor to several Fortune 500 CIOs. He also advises startups on their strategy and positioning and his expertise is often tapped into by SAP Ventures to provide due diligence on business software.
Padman is also the co-founder of KRK Labs, a Silicon Valley incubator. Prior to that Padman was CEO of Bristlecone, an IT services company that he founded in 1998 and spearheaded for over 8 years .
Before founding Bristlecone in 1998, Padman headed SAP's High Tech Global Industry Business Unit where he successfully positioned SAP R/3 as the premier enterprise solution for the semiconductor industry. Padman has also played a key role in the development, strategic assessment and marketing of SAP's Supply Chain Optimization and MES programs. He has held senior operational positions in diverse industries ranging from aerospace and defense, food processing and engineering.
He has a Masters in Business Administration from California State University Northridge, Masters in Industrial Engineering from Kansas State and Bachelor in Engineering from the University of Madras, India.
Srinivas (Vasu) Netrakanti
Please see Optessa Management Team
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