Board of Directors
Alessandro Piol
Prior to co-founding Vedanta Capital, Alessandro A. Piol was a General Partner at Invesco Private Capital and led the information technology practice, an industry in which he has been active since the late 1970s. At Invesco, Alessandro was involved in numerous transactions that have led to successful IPOs or sales. Since joining the firm in 1995, Alessandro led investments in Arbortext (sold to PTC), CADIS (Aspect Development), Cast Iron Systems, Digital Persona, Extricity (Peregrine), LogLogic, ONI Systems ("ONIS"), Placeware (Microsoft), Portal Software ("PRSF"), Torrent Networking (Ericsson) and Verisign ("VRSN"), among others. Prior to joining IPC, Alessandro spent 10 years with AT&T Corp. where he split his time between operating and investment positions. In 1991, he co-founded AT&T Ventures, the venture capital arm of AT&T where he led the fund's investments in several new media and communications companies. He was also a co-founder and VP of Marketing of Pixel Machines, an AT&T-backed venture in the graphics computing business and was later director of Strategic Partnerships for AT&T Computer Systems. Alessandro received an M.B.A. from the Harvard Business School in 1985. He received an M.S. and B.S. in Computer Science from Columbia University in 1982 and 1979, respectively.
Barry James Folsom/ LiteScape CEO
Barry James is a visionary strategist and operational executive who alters the game by using innovation as the basis for delivering sustaining profitable growth and consistently improving margins. He has been CEO of public and private companies.
Barry James has played pivotal roles in 4 major game changing market categories: PCs, Workstations, Internet Data Centers and Web Conferencing. He has extensive Internet, entertainment, digital media, cloud computing services, collaboration, connected consumer devices (mobile, home), and computing devices (desktops/servers) experience. Barry James' teams have sold over $2B of products & services.
As a respected company leader, Barry James was Frost & Sullivan's 2002 CEO of the Year. Also in 2002, PlaceWare was the 4th fasting-growing private company in Silicon Valley. In 1997, Exodus was ranked one of the Silicon Valley's top 10 fastest growing private companies by The San Jose Business Journal for 2 years in a row. He also holds 2 Game-of-the-Year awards as well as Workstation-of-the-Year award.
Bruce K. Taragin
Bruce is a partner of Blumberg Capital, a San Francisco-based, classic, early-stage venture capital firm focused on investing in emerging information technology companies. He has 15 years experience as a venture capital investor, entrepreneur, technology investment banker and corporate attorney. Bruce’s venture experience includes the following exits: eVoice – acquired by AOL [TWX], PureSight –acquired by Boston Communications Group [BCGI], Vista Research– acquired by McGraw Hill [MHP] and IP Infusion – acquired by ACCESS CO., LTD [TSE: 4813]. Bruce also serves as a member or observer on the Board of Directors of CaseStack, Insightix, and Correlix.
Prior to joining Blumberg Capital in 1998, Bruce held several senior management positions within technology companies including Charles River Computers. Bruce also structured and managed early-stage technology transactions at Hambrecht & Quist, Mayer Brown & Platt and Bankers Trust Company. Bruce earned his BA in Finance and Communications, cum laude, from Yeshiva University, and his MBA and JD from Fordham University in New York.
Ronald D. Fisher
Ron Fisher oversees SOFTBANK's U.S. operations and other activities outside of Asia, and was the founder of SOFTBANK Capital. He is currently Vice Chairman of SOFTBANK Holdings, Inc. and serves as a member of the board of directors of SOFTBANK Corp., Japan. Ron has over 30 years of experience of working with high growth and turnaround technology companies.
Prior to joining SOFTBANK, he was the CEO of Phoenix Technologies Ltd., the leading developer and marketer of system software products for personal computers. Ron serves on the boards of several public and private companies, including E*Trade Group, GSI Commerce, and Vie Financial Group. He is also on the investment committee for the SB Asia Infrastructure Fund.
Ron earned an MBA from Columbia University, New York, and a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Witwatersand in South Africa.