Kumar Ganapathy, Ph.D. / Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder

A recognized leader in DSP, wireless and computing systems architecture, Dr. Ganapathy has years of leadership experience as an operating executive and entrepreneur in the high technology field. Prior to founding Virident in 2006, Dr. Ganapathy was an Executive in Residence (EIR) at Artiman Ventures. Before that, he was the Chief Technical Officer and co-founder of VxTel, developer of VoIP DSP processors and subsystems, which was acquired by Intel in 2001. At Intel, Dr. Ganapathy was Director of Architecture and Engineering in Ultrawideband Networking Operation (UWB) and Edge Access Division (VoIP, 3G BTS) as well as in the CTO Office of the Intel Communication Group. Before co-founding VxTel, Dr. Ganapathy was Principal Engineer and Fellow of Conexant and Rockwell Semiconductor leading the development of 56-kbit modems and GSM phones.

Dr. Ganapathy holds a Bachelor of Technology degree from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras where he received the prestigious Siemens Gold Medal. He received his Ph.D. from University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. Dr. Ganapathy has published over a dozen papers and has been issued sixteen patents.

Vijay Karamcheti, Ph.D. / Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder

Dr. Karamcheti has over 15 years of experience in designing and developing technologies at the leading edge of parallel and distributed computer systems architecture, middleware, and application frameworks.

From 1998 through 2009, Dr. Karamcheti was a member of the faculty of the Computer Science Department at the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences at New York University, most recently holding the position of Associate Professor with tenure. Dr. Karamcheti led the Parallel and Distributed Systems group and conducted research in the area of high-performance cluster and grid computing. Dr. Karamcheti also spent a sabbatical year as a Visiting Research Scientist at Google, Inc. as part of the core Systems Infrastructure team, gaining a deeper understanding of the opportunities and challenges of massive web scale-out system infrastructures.

Dr. Karamcheti received his undergraduate degree from the Indian Institute of Technology at Kanpur, India, and his master's degree from the University of Texas at Austin. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

Michael Goguen / Sequoia Capital

Mr. Goguen works with energy, internet and technology companies. 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.

Mr. Goguen has a BS in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University and an MS in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University.

Yatin Mundkur / Partner, Artiman Ventures,

Yatin Mundkur focuses on early-stage Technology and Medtech investments. As a Partner of Artiman Ventures, he is currently on the boards of Cellworks, InfiniteZ, Pricelock, Prysm, Virident Systems and XTRM.

Before joining Artiman Ventures in 2004 as a Partner, Mr. Mundkur was Managing Director at TeleSoft Partners, where he led investments in over twenty companies, in the early stage semiconductor and software sectors. Prior to joining TeleSoft Partners, he founded and served as President of Equator Technologies, a developer of Programmable MediaProcessors. His prior experience also includes VP/Group Manager at Conexant, and Chief Architect/Design Manager at Sun Microsystems, Ross Technology and Cypress Semiconductor.

Mr. Mundkur has over 17 years of overall experience working with technology companies in venture capital. He also holds ten patents in areas of computer architectures, digital consumer electronics, semiconductor design, and software.

Mr. Mundkur holds a B.S.E.E. from MSU of Baroda, India, and a M.S.E.E. from the University of Texas at Austin.

William J. Raduchel Ph. D.

Bill Raduchel is an independent board member and brings a wealth of experience at the executive management and board level from start-ups to multi-billion dollar public companies in the technology space. He is strategic advisor to DMGT PLC and Naspers, Ltd. In addition, he serves as a director of Silicon Image, ePals, LiveIntent, and moka5. He currently teaches corporate strategy at the McDonough School of Business, Georgetown University, is a member of the Conference of Business Economists and at the National Academy of Sciences is chair of the Committee of Copyright and Innovation in the Digital Era and a member of the Board on Science, Technology and Economic Policy.

Dr. Raduchel served as CEO and Chairman of the Board of Ruckus Network, a digital entertainment network. Prior to Ruckus, he served as Executive Vice President and CTO of AOL Time Warner, Inc., and as Senior Vice President and CTO of AOL. Prior to AOL, he was Chief Strategy Officer and a member of the executive committee at Sun Microsystems. In his eleven years at Sun, he also served as CIO, CFO, acting Vice President of Human Resources and Vice President of Corporate Planning and Development. Bill has also held senior executive positions at Xerox Corporation and McGraw-Hill, Inc. He has received honors as CIO of the year, CTO of the year and the best CFO in the computer industry. Until June of 2011, he was chairman of Opera Software ASA.

Dr. Raduchel is a past member of the National Academy Committee on Internet Navigation and Domain Name Services and the STEP committee which produced A Patent System for the 21st Century. He served on the National Advisory Board for the Salvation Army from 2000 to 2009 having achieved the position of vice chairman and chairman of its Committee on Business Administration and rejoined the board in 2010. In 2003, he served as the Castle Lecturer on Computer Science at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.

Dr. Raduchel received his B.A. in economics from Michigan State University in 1966, and earned his A.M. (1968) and Ph.D. (1972) degrees in economics at Harvard. At Harvard, he taught economics, econometrics and public policy for ten years. He was Assistant Dean of Admissions and Financial Aid for Harvard and Radcliffe colleges. In 2002, Michigan Technological University, which he had attended in early 1960s, honored him with an honorary doctorate in business. He has eight issued and several pending patents.

Sanjay Pichaiah / Investment Director, MGI – Mitsui Global Investment, Inc

Sanjay Pichaiah focuses on venture and growth equity investments in technology and select energy technology companies and has 12+ years of experience in Principal Investments, Investment Banking/M&A, Operations and Engineering.

Prior to Mr. Pichaiah, he was an Investment banker at Bear Stearns & Co. advising companies in the Technology, Media & Telecom (TMT) sectors before which he worked at Millennium Technology Ventures, where he was involved in venture investments and launch of a Special Purpose Acquisition Company (SPAC). He also held various roles within Intel Corporation's New Business Initiatives Group and as an engineer at Level One Communications (acquired by Intel). He started his career as an entrepreneur developing and selling applications for warehouse and logistics management.

Mr. Pichaiah holds a BS in Electrical Engineering from University of Madras, India, MS Electrical Engineering from California State University and a MBA from Cornell University. His other investments/board representations include OpenX, Mobeam, Location Labs, 4info, Solaria and Redwood Systems.

 

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