Advisors

• Shankar Narayanan
• John Montgomery
• Brian Jacobs
• Joel L. A. Peterson
• Marc Merryfield
• Chris Horan

 

Shankar Narayanan

Mr. Shankar Narayanan is a successful entrepreneur in the Silicon Valley. Prior to founding Spime Inc, Narayanan co-founded Emuzed Inc, a mobile multimedia leader in the year 2000, this company introduced the world's first audio and video synchronized camcorder application and over 25 mobile applications which were licensed to Nokia and most of the top cell phone manufacturers. Flextronics International acquired Emuzed in early 2005. Shankar steered the company from founding to acquisition with his excellence in innovation of technology, sales, marketing and operational management expertise. After Flextronics's acquisition, Shankar Narayanan headed Flextronics's Mobile and Handset devices software division as Vice President and General Manager until June 2006. Narayanan has over 22 years of business development, sales, marketing and engineering operations management experience in the technology industry. Shankar has successfully managed high powered technology teams for many years. He understands the challenges to take technology intensive products and applications to the OEMs and customers. He has extensive experience and knowledge in managing businesses in Asia, Europe and North America and also implementing software and engineering development projects in remote locations such as India. Before co-founding Emuzed, he co-founded and headed Nexus Inc., USA, a networking solutions company. Prior to becoming a serial entrepreneur, Shankar worked as a technical staff, sales and marketing executive and management expert at various levels at British Physical Laboratories, Aurelec Systems, and Nexus computers. Mr. Narayanan has an Electrical and Electronics Degree and a Masters in Marketing and Administration from MK University. Mr. Narayanan currently lives in the Bay Area of California, USA.

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John Montgomery

John has practiced corporate law in Silicon Valley since 1984. John's experience includes extensive corporate counseling to public and private companies and venture capital firms. He has represented clients in connection with numerous venture capital financings, initial public offerings, public and private mergers and acquisitions, going private transactions and a variety of other general corporate matters.

John is passionately committed to accelerating the growth and success of our clients' businesses. He is a frequent speaker and panelist on venture capital topics at such forums as the Churchill Club, SVASE and Intel's CFO Forum. John is also a frequent leader of continuing legal education programs about the venture capital process. See https://www.cognistar.com/MontHansen/.

Prior to co-founding M&H, John was the co-chairman of the venture capital practice at Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison, LLP, an early partner of GCA Law Partners, LLP and an associate corporate attorney at Baker & McKenzie and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. John was also an in-house attorney at The Cooper Companies.

John is also actively involved with Peninsula Habitat for Humanity, The Asian Religions and Cultures Intitiative at Stanford University, and E2, Environmental Entreprenuers.

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Brian Jacobs

Brian Jacobs is a Founder and General Partner of Emergence. He has over 20 years of venture capital experience, a deep national network and broad experience helping both consumer and business startups become market leaders. Prior to founding Emergence, Brian was an early General Partner at St. Paul Venture Capital. During his 10 years with St. Paul, Brian helped to grow the firm to one of the 15 largest venture investors in the country, while he led the firm's Silicon Valley investing activities. His prior venture capital experience was at Security Pacific Venture Capital. Brian also worked for the Raychem Corporation, where he developed and marketed advanced software and electronic components. He also has engineering and new product development experience with RCA, Westinghouse, and Polaroid, and he holds several patents.

Brian was named to the Forbes' Midas List of the top venture capital investors in 2006 and 2007. He is an experienced board member who has served on dozens of public and private boards. He currently serves on the boards of Intacct, YouSendIt, InsideView, Bill.com and DVDPlay.

Brian's reputation for helping entrepreneurs build market-leading technology-enabled service companies comes from his active involvement in HireRight, WebTV (sold to Microsoft), nQuire Software (sold to Siebel Systems), BigFix, NetPerceptions (NETP), NextCard (NXCD) and others. Brian has backed leading companies in other sectors, including Lexar Media (LEXR), Microchip Technologies (MCHP), and many others.

Brian has a MS and BS in mechanical engineering from M.I.T. and an MBA from Stanford. He is happily married with two children. He enjoys international travel, cycling and cross-country skiing.

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Joel L. A. Peterson

Joel is Managing Director of Pintoresco Advisers which provides a wide range of M&A, corporate finance and strategic consulting to boards of directors, business owners and management teams. Prior to Pintoresco, he has served in senior executive positions responsible for strategy, investments, alliances, operations, financings and mergers & acquisitions for multi-billion dollar financial and operating companies conducting business worldwide.

Previously, Mr. Peterson was the founder of a WiFi network company; was President, Global Partnerships for an AT&T affiliate company; and was Senior VP for European operations of Level 3 Communications, Inc., a $5 billion public company, where he led business lines with $115 million in revenues and 300 employees with operations in 7 countries throughout Europe.

Before Level 3, Mr. Peterson was Senior VP, Strategy and Corporate Development for Concert Communications, a $7 billion independent joint venture company of AT&T and British Telecom, with 7000 employees and offices in 52 countries. He led all global strategy, worldwide business development, all mergers & acquisitions, strategic alliances, investments and investment portfolio management.

Prior to Concert, Mr. Peterson was Executive Director, Corporate Development for BellSouth Corporation, a $25 billion company. He led international mergers & acquisitions activity and was the architect of BellSouth's European strategy. He successfully concluded $30 billion of mergers & acquisitions in 25 countries.

Before BellSouth, he was a high finance VP with Wachovia Corporation, Mitsubishi Bank, The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi and SunTrust Banks, serving Fortune 500 corporations.

A Navy veteran, he rose to the rank of Lieutenant Commander, the youngest officer ever to attain full professional qualifications on an aircraft carrier. Mr. Peterson was a National Merit Scholar, receiving his BA in Economics from the University of Virginia in 1986, where he was an Echols Scholar, as well as a Rodman Scholar in Nuclear Engineering. He earned his MBA in Finance (Magna Cum Laude) from the R. B. Pamplin School of Business at Virginia Tech in 1992.

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Marc Merryfield

Marc Merryfield, a partner in the LDV Hospitality, is the President of Yolato®. He initially joined the LDV Hospitality as an investor in June 2002 with the opening of the first corporate location and joined the company full-time in April 2004. Mr. Merryfield has held various responsibilities with the LDV Hospitality including Director of Purchasing, Human Resources and Information Technology. Prior to joining the LDV Hospitality, he was Senior Vice-President for Airline Container Leasing, Inc. He held various positions over eight (8) years with Airline Container Leasing, Inc. including sales, marketing, purchasing, human resources and accounting before leading its largest division to international development in Europe. Marc graduated from St. Bonaventure University receiving a Bachelor of Business Administration in Marketing. He also received a Master's of Business Administration from the Sellinger School of Business at Loyola.

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Chris Horan

Chris Horan is a foodservice manufacturing industry veteran with twenty five years of experience in sales & marketing, business development, distribution and manufacturing. Mr. Horan currently directs and manages the business development efforts of CTI /Chefco Foods, a major manufacturer of custom developed food products for National Restaurant Chains. Prior to joining CTI in 2007, he was Vice President of Sales for Simeus Foods International, also a Texas based custom manufacturer. Since beginning his career in sales with Campbell Soup Company's Foodservice Division, Chris held senior management positions at Heinz USA, Unilever-Best Foods and Cadbury Beverages/Mott's N.A. In addition to his business career, Mr. Horan volunteers for several causes in North Texas and is a member of the board of directors at the Tarrant Area Food Bank in Fort Worth.

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