Nick Felisiak

Nick was a co-founder of Spider Systems in 1983. When Spider Systems was acquired by Shiva in 1995, Nick bought back the networking software business and subsequently sold this to Artesyn Inc in 2000.

Since then, Nick has been involved with several software companies in the areas of networking and e-learning, including Pentech investment Cachelogic, where his background in the design of networking software is particularly relevant.

 

Michael Ramsay

Mike, along with Jim Barton, founded TiVo in August of 1997. Mike was Chairman and CEO of TiVo from it’s founding until July of 2005. During this time he led the company form the ground up, delivering the first DVR to market in March of 1999 and, ultimately establishing TiVo as the leader in DVR technology and the leading Brand in the market with over 4 million subscribers to the TiVo Service. Mike continues today with TiVo as a member of their Board of Directors and as Chairman of the Technology Committee of the Board.

Before TiVo, Mike was Senior Vice President of the Silicon Desktop Group for Silicon Graphics Inc. There he was responsible for engineering, marketing and business development for all desktop products, with P/L responsibility for approximately half the company's revenue. Prior to joining this group, Mike was President of Silicon Studio, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Silicon Graphics focused on enabling applications development for merging interactive digital media markets.

Before joining Silicon Studio, Mike was Senior Vice President and General Manager of the company's Visual Systems Group. He also held positions of Director in the Advanced Systems Group.

Prior to joining Silicon Graphics, Mike held R&D and engineering management positions at Hewlett-Packard and Convergent Technologies. He earned a first-class B.S.E.E. from the University of Edinburgh, Scotland.
Before that, he watched a lot of Monty Python.

 

Derek Gray

Formerly, Derek Gray was a Senior Vice President with Adobe Systems Inc – a NASDAQ quoted corporation with a turnover in excess of $1bn. He was involved in business development, strategic planning, investment/acquisition activities in addition to developing business strategies for specific vertical markets.

Prior to this role, he was Adobe’s European General Manager with direct responsibility for all aspects of Adobe’s business in Europe and then progressed to manage Adobe’s sales, support & field marketing organisation on a world-wide basis.

Derek Gray is an active member of the high-technology sector and an investor in several of Scottish- based software companies. Gray is focused on the growing software sector and is specifically interested in early- stage companies with strong technology which require both financial investment and sales/marketing expertise. He currently serves on the board of Enigmatec Corporation.

 

Ian Ritchie

Ian Ritchie has been active in the start-up and development of several Scottish based technology companies. He serves as non-executive Director of I-Play, and is Chairman of Connect, and the Interactive University, amongst other advisory roles.

Previously, Ian founded and managed Office Workstations Limited (OWL) in Edinburgh in 1984 and its subsidiary OWL International Inc in Seattle from 1985. OWL became the first and largest supplier of Hypertext/Hypermedia authoring tools for personal computers based on its Guide product. OWL's customers used its tools to implement large interactive multimedia documentation systems in industry sectors such as automobile, defence, publishing, finance, and education. OWL was sold to Matsushita Electrical Industrial (Panasonic) of Japan in December 1989 and now undertakes multimedia software R&D services for its parent in Osaka.

He is the author of 'New Media Publishing - Opportunities from the digital revolution' published by Financial Times Telecoms and Media Publishing (1996).

 

Robert Thomson

Robert Thomson was founder Past President and CEO of Hyperion Solutions (NASDAQ: HYPL), retired from Board of Directors August 1998.

Hyperion Solutions was formed in August 1998 from Hyperion Software, the world leader in financial analytical applications and Arbor Software the creator and world leading provider of OLAP technology. Currently the company has over 1800 employees and $300 million of revenues.

Previously, Robert has held management and technical positions with: Citicorp; Citibank; Rank Xerox; Dolby System Labs. Robert is based in Bermuda, and is an active business angel on the East coast of the United States, in addition to his angel activities in Scotland. He currently serves as non-executive Director of SeeWhy and is an observer on the board of AMT.

Donald C. Smokey Wallace

Donald C. "Smokey" Wallace has been working in Silicon Valley for 34 years and in the computer industry for 43 years.

Smokey is currently the founder of RealBeerUSA, an importer and wholesaler of authentic cask conditioned beers (i.e. “Real Beers”) from the UK.

Before founding RealBeerUSA, Smokey was Vice President and founder of InvisibleIT, a provider of outsourced IT operations and procurement services . Prior to IIT Smokey was Sr. Vice President of Development at Ensenda, an “Immediate Delivery” company that enabled 60 minute delivery of most web purchases. Prior to Ensenda, Smokey was Sr. Vice President of Business Development at Certainty Solutions, Inc, a high-end network operations management and outsourcing company. At Certainty, Smokey was responsible for strategic business direction, partnerships and marketing.

Prior to Smokey’s startup phase, he was vice president of corporate engineering at Adobe Systems, Inc. where he was responsible for advanced technology, core technology and international engineering. Smokey was the founder, vice president and general manager of the Network Products Division of Oracle Corporation where he was responsible for the development and marketing of Oracle's network software products and services, as well as the management and operation of the Oracle Corporate Data Center and the Oracle Worldwide Multi- protocol Communications Network.

Prior to Oracle, Smokey has held various management, research and development positions at the Digital Equipment Corporation, Xerox Corporation, Xerox PARC, SRI International, Bolt Beranek and Newman and the IBM Corporation. Smokey holds a BA in Mathematics from California State University Northridge.