Board of Directors
Nagesh Challa
Founder and Board Chairman
Nagesh Challa is co-founder and Board Chairman of Ecrio. As the Founding CEO of the company, he successfully assembled the team, set the direction for the company and raised money from both VC investors and strategic investors, he is also co-inventor of the MoBeam technology. In 2010, he spun MoBeam from Ecrio as a subsidiary and successfully assembled a management team and raised funding for MoBeam. Prior to Ecrio, he founded Nexcom Technology Inc., a Silicon Valley start-up that pioneered the concept of mass storage for mobile devices. As an inventor of the technology and CEO, he negotiated several license agreements with large global OEM's. He successfully sold Nexcom to ISSI (Nasdaq:ISSI) in December 1997. During his 25 year career, he held various engineering and management positions with National Semiconductor, Exel Microelectronics and Catalyst Semiconductor. Mr. Challa received a BS in Physics from Andhra University, India, an MS in Physics from Western Michigan University, and was a graduate student at Purdue University before starting his career in the Silicon Valley. He has been granted 24 patents in semiconductors, software and mobile technologies.
Michel Gannage
Founder & CEO
As one of the co-founders of Ecrio, Michel Gannage has been involved with the company since its inception. During his tenure at Ecrio, he managed international business, OEM/ODM relationships, strategic partnerships, and was actively involved in product planning and sales strategy. Before founding Ecrio, he co-founded Nexcom Technology with Nagesh Challa and served as Vice President of Engineering. At Nexcom, Mr. Gannage developed the Serial Flash and MediaStick product lines, and managed the system development for flash data storage in the form of SIM cards for consumer wireless devices. Prior to that, Mr. Gannage held various engineering and management positions with Catalyst Semiconductor, Exel Microelectronics and Intel. Mr. Gannage received an engineering degree from Ecole Centrale de Paris, an MS in EECS from Princeton University, and holds 9 patents.
Tom Okada
Director, Investor
Tom Okada is currently Executive Vice President and a board member for a global embedded platform and multimedia contents company, Gaia Holdings Corporation and Aplix Corporation, and drives business development and sales, as well as major account relationship with major operators and OEMs for the company, in the US, Japan, Asia, and Europe. Mr. Okaka has over20 years of experience in telecommunications industry, starting as an engineer at a global OEM in the US, and later led an entry to Japan market. He is an executive with a strong track record of accomplishments in the areas of general management, business development, sales and account management, marketing, product management, R&D and development engineering, and strategic alliances. Mr. Okada has developed industry relationships globally through his business engagement. His contacts span operators, OEMs, 3rd party ISVs, solutions providers, and investors, in multiple industries such as telecommunications, embedded systems, M2M, and contents ans service industry. Mr. Okada holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Arizona State University. He took master's courses in communication engineering in Illinois Institute of Technology, and holds 4 US patents. He is fully bilingual in Japanese and English.
Giacomo Marini
Director, Investor
Giacomo Marini is the founder and managing partner of Noventi/CIR Ventures, an early stage, Silicon Valley technology venture capital firm. Noventi's past investments include Bitfone, acquired by Hewlett Packard; Easy Market, acquired by TUI; M7, acquired by BEA Systems; and Sygate, acquired by Symantec. From 1995 to 2001, Marini was a private venture investor, contributing to and advising a portfolio of technology companies, including Teknema, acquired by Axeda, and PCTEL. In 1981 Mr. Marini co-founded Logitech, the world leader in personal peripherals. At Logitech he served first as Vice President of Engineering and most recently as Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer. Prior to Logitech, he held technical and management positions with Olivetti and IBM. He is also on the Board of Aurora Biofuels, Minerva Networks, Neato Robotics, PCTEL (NASDAQ: PCTI) and TES Automation. Mr. Marini holds a Laurea Degree cum laude in Computer Science from the University of Pisa, Italy.
Hide L. Tanigami
Director, Investor
Hide L. Tanigami is Chairman & CEO of Marubun/Arrow USA, LLC. a joint venture between Marubun Corporation, the largest semiconductor distributor in Japan, and Arrow Electronics (1998 to present). From 1985 through 1994 Mr. Tanigami was a co-founder and Vice President of Corporate Development at Catalyst Semiconductor, Inc. He took the company public in 1993 (NASDAQ: CATS). From 1994 through 1998 he was President and CEO of Marubun USA Corporation. From 1997 through 2000, Mr. Tanigami was Chairman of Catalyst Semiconductor (CATS). He has served on the Ecrio board from the company's inception and raised initial funding in 1998. He also has previously served on numerous boards in Silicon Valley, Japan and Taiwan. Mr. Tanigami currently serves on the board of directors of Marubun/Arrow and QuickLogic (NASDAQ QUIK). He was born and raised in Osaka, Japan, and holds an MA degree in applied linguistics from San Francisco State University and a BA degree from Kansai University of Foreign Studies. He became a US citizen in 2002.
Michel Wendell
Director, Investor
Mr. Wendell is a founding partner of Nexit Ventures, a fund focused on mobile internet opportunities. Nexit has raised EUR 100 million to invest primarily in Scandinavian and U.S.-based early stage companies, leveraging Nexit's presence in the 'wireless Mecca' and Silicon Valley. Mr. Wendell has 20 years of broad experience in international building and scaling of Infocom businesses, including high tech operations in Finland, Sweden, France and the U.S. His responsibilities have included executive positions within sales, marketing and business development for companies like Mentor Graphics, OrCAD and Cadence Design Systems. Mr. Wendell also has been involved with several technology companies as an angel investor, Board Director or adviser.