Section Title
Our Leadership Team
SynapSense Management
Peter Van Deventer, President & CEO
Peter Van Deventer is SynapSense President & CEO since co-founding the company in 2006. As CEO, Pete is responsible for the corporation’s strategy, financial management and operational execution. Pete is an established veteran of global technology market development, with over 21 years of international business experience. Prior to SynapSense, Pete spent a decade at Intel Corporation in a variety of sales, marketing and operational roles, including serving on the global Sales and Marketing, Flash Memories, and Mobile Products Group executive staffs. He was the Director of Worldwide Sales and Marketing for the global ramp of Centrino™ mobile technology and was involved in greater than 100 different technology ramps. Prior to Intel, Pete founded and built three companies. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Colgate University and holds an International MBA from Thunderbird, the American Graduate School of International Management.
Dr. Raju Pandey, SynapSense Co-Founder & Chief Technology Officer
He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science, at the University of California, Davis. While at UCD, Dr. Pandey led the SENSES project , which was funded in part under National Science Foundation grants. Dr. Pandey's research interests are in wireless sensor networks, distributed and parallel systems, system software, programming languages, security and software engineering. Dr. Pandey has authored over 40 papers on sensor networks and distributed computing and is a patent holder in this space. Dr. Pandey holds a Ph.D. from the University of Texas, Austin, a M.S. from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and a Bachelor in Technology from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kharagpur.
Rob Van Tuyle, Chief Financial Officer
Rob has over 20 years of experience in working with high technology companies. Prior to joining SynapSense, Rob was the Chief Financial Officer of Sierra Logic, a venture backed storage semiconductor company which was sold to Emulex Corporation (ELX) in October 2006. Prior to Sierra Logic, Rob was the Chief Financial Officer of ShareWave, a venture backed 802.11 wireless semiconductor company which was sold to Cirrus Logic (CRUS) in October 2001. Over his career, Rob has raised over $100 million in venture capital. Rob is a certified public accountant and a graduate from the University of Santa Clara.
Pat Weston, Vice President of Engineering
Pat is a 35 year industry veteran, having held multiple critical engineering positions in leading edge high technology companies. In his role as VP of Engineering at Watchguard Technologies, he oversaw large software development programs and selectively initiated and implemented the outsourcing of hardware and software development. While at Diamond Multimedia, he led the high energy development of the Rio MP3 Player products. During his 13 year tenure at Intel, he had a number of critical engineering roles, including Business Unit Manager responsible for conceiving, developing and delivering the world's first PCMCIA products. He holds issued patents in data communications and PCMCIA technology. Pat leads the SynapSense engineering and packaging effort. He is a graduate of the Witwatersrand Technical College in Johannesburg, South Africa.
Mike Frieswyk, Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Marketing
Prior to joining SynapSense, Mike was the Sr. Vice President of Sales at Flextronics/Vista Point Technologies, and also spent almost 20 years with Intel where he was the vice president, Sales and Marketing Group and director of Global Accounts. Prior to that, he was co-general manager of Intel's Worldwide Customer Solutions Group. Frieswyk was director of Intel America's Business Development Organization for six years, during which time his team drove the overall enterprise solution sales strategy and engagements across North America and South America. He helped to develop Intel's overall solutions sales strategy and align the company toward a solution sales/influence model in the field. For the three years prior to that Frieswyk was the sales director for Dell. Frieswyk received a bachelor's degree in computer and information services from Arizona State University in 1983.
Ray Pfeifer, Senior Vice President of Business Development
Ray Pfeifer is the Sr. Vice President of Business Development at SynapSense, a mesh wireless sensor networking company located in Folsom, California. Ray has over 20 years of experience in the design, construction and commissioning of research labs, biotech and semiconductor manufacturing plants and data centers. He is recognized as a technology development and thought leader in the IT industry. In addition to his technical leadership on data center energy assessments, energy efficiency retrofits and proof of concept projects using SynapSense’s innovative WSN technology his industry work includes: Co-Chair of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group’s data center energy efficiency initiative; USGBC Data Center LEED Adaption Working Group Chair; facilitator for the CEC Data Center EPC project; participation in the development of the DOE DCPro assessment tools and serving on the steering committee for the DOE’s Certified Energy Practitioner program for data centers; and participation in the Chill Offs (I and II) to test and evaluate high density cooling systems.
Jeff Boone, Vice President of Software Engineering
Jeff leads the SynapSense software engineering and quality assurance teams. Jeff’s extensive technical and software management background includes close to 25 years of experience in developing successful commercial software solutions and profitable software businesses. Before joining SynapSense, Jeff held senior C-level and VP-level product, technology and information positions with Bickmore Risk Services, Eliant, Island Pacific, Retail Technologies International, and Objective Systems Integrators. He has an extensive background in software engineering, including key technical positions at Walker Interactive Systems, Inc., ICOT Corporation, Systems Center, Inc., and IBM. Jeff holds a Bachelor degree in Computer Science from California State University in Sacramento. He serves on a number of Sacramento technology councils and is board president for a non-profit serving the needs of the Folsom Zoo Sanctuary.
Board of Directors
Mike Fister is the former President and Chief Executive Officer of Cadence Design Systems, Inc. Prior to Cadence, he spent 17 years at Intel Corporation, where he was most recently Senior Vice President and General Manager of the company's Enterprise Platforms Group. Fister is a graduate of the University of Cincinnati where he received a BS and MS in electrical engineering in 1977 and 1978 respectively. He spent his early years in a variety of executive and engineering management positions at Wyse, Machine Vision International, and Cincinnati Milacron. He currently sits on the Board of Directors of Autodesk Corporation and the Fabless Semiconductor Association, as well as two non-profit organizations, the National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering (NACME) and the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society.
Cheryl Beninga is a Managing Director with American River Ventures, a Sacramento based venture capital firm investing in companies developing energy efficiency technology breakthroughs in commercial, industrial and manufacturing applications where more than half the world's energy is consumed. Cheryl has invested in and built technology based businesses for over 20 years. She developed an investment portfolio of twenty companies in the Mobile and Wireless Communications Sector as a Director and Senior Investment Manager at Intel Capital. Four companies in the portfolio have had IPO’s and three companies have been successfully acquired. As a Marketing Manager within Intel Corporation and Hewlett Packard, Cheryl helped build several new businesses from scratch to well over a billion dollars in revenues. Cheryl holds a B.S. in Finance with Highest Honors from Indiana University and an M.B.A. from The Harvard Business School.
Scott MacDonald is Chairman of the Board, and is a Partner with Emerald Technology Ventures, a global leader in cleantech venture capital. Founded in 2000 under the name SAM Private Equity, Emerald is a pioneer in this rapidly emerging sector and is focused on innovative technologies in energy, materials and water. From offices in Zurich, Switzerland and Montreal, Canada, Emerald manages three venture capital funds and two venture capital portfolio mandates totaling over US$380 million. Scott has been active in the venture capital industry for the past 10 years and has focused exclusively on the global cleantech sector for the past 5 years. Scott graduated with a Bachelors degree from McMaster University and an MBA from Dalhousie University. He previously served as Chairman of RuggedCom (TSX:RCM) and is currently a Director of Solicore and SoftSwitching Technologies. He is a member of the North American Advisory Board for the CleanTech Venture Network, an industry association that brings together all stakeholders in the area of cleantech, a volunteer director of Gymnastics Canada and is an elected voting member of the Canadian Olympic Committee for the 2005-2009 quadrennial.
Rodrigo Prudencio is a Partner with Nth Power Venture Capital. Rodrigo works with the portfolio companies and Limited Partners to lead strategic relationships that advance early adoption of energy technologies and services. The strategic relations program he leads is responsible for over $100 million of contracts and investments between Nth Power’s Limited Partners and portfolio companies.
Dr. Raju Pandey, SynapSense Chief Technology Officer, is an Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science at the University of California, Davis. While at UCD, Dr. Pandey led the SENSES project , which was funded in part under National Science Foundation grants. Dr. Pandey has authored over 40 papers on sensor networks and distributed computing and is a patent holder in this space. Dr. Pandey holds a Ph.D. from the University of Texas, Austin, MS from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and a Bachelor in Technology from the Indian Insitute of Technology, Kharagpur.
Peter Van Deventer is SynapSense President & CEO since co-founding the company in 2006. As CEO, Pete is responsible for the corporation’s strategy, financial management and operational execution. Pete is an established veteran of global technology market development, with over 21 years of international business experience. Prior to SynapSense, Pete spent a decade at Intel Corporation in a variety of sales, marketing and operational roles, including serving on the global Sales and Marketing, Flash Memories, and Mobile Products Group executive staffs. He was the Director of Worldwide Sales and Marketing for the global ramp of Centrino™ mobile technology and was involved in greater than 100 different technology ramps. Prior to Intel, Pete founded and built three companies. He received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Colgate University and holds an International MBA from Thunderbird, the American Graduate School of International Management.
Board Observers
Michael Goguen focuses on cleantech, semiconductor and systems investments. Prior to joining Sequoia Capital in 1996, Michael spent 10 years in various engineering, research, and product management roles at DEC, SynOptics and Centillion, and was a director of Engineering at Bay Networks (NT). Michael was also a Technical Chairman of the ATM Forum. Michael has a BS in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University and an MS in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.
Dr. Claus Schmidt is Managing Director at Robert Bosch Venture Capital GmbH (RBVC), and is responsible for the technical strategies and decisions at RBVC. After 24 years in different operational jobs with IBM, DEC and about 16 years with Bosch he joined RBVC as one of the founding managing partners in 2007. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Stuttgart after staying at the Max-Planck Institute for Metal Physics in Stuttgart.
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Jim Schraith is a Venture Partner of DFJ Frontier. He is an active angel investor in the Sacramento area and sits on the boards of several area early stage companies. Mr. Schraith's career in high technology spans 25 years and includes significant public and private company experience with operating roles of CEO, COO and EVP at Quantum, ShareWave, Compaq and AST Research. As the leader of Compaq's North American operations, he was responsible for over $10 billion in annual revenues and a team of over 6,000 people. At AST, Mr. Schraith was President & COO and a member of the team that took AST to the Fortune 500 list in 1992. He sits on the boards of Achievo, Semtech, and VisualCalc. Mr. Schraith co-founded QTV Capital, a Bay area venture capital fund, in early 2000. A cancer survivor, Mr. Schraith is an active fundraiser for the Lance Armstrong Foundation.