Board of Directors
Maria Cirino
Maria Cirino is a General Partner of .406 Ventures. She has over 20 years of technology leadership experience, including executive roles in worldwide sales, marketing and business development. Most recently, as the Senior Vice President of VeriSign's Security Services, Cirino led the integration and day to day operations of the managed security services business for VeriSign after Guardent was acquired by VeriSign in 2005.
Previously, Cirino was CEO, Chairman and co-founder of Guardent, Inc., a market leading Managed Security Services (MSS) provider. In her role at Guardent, Cirino secured the venture financing from Sequoia, Charles River and NEA, and dedicated her vision, strategy and leadership to ensuring the company's growth and success. As a pioneer in a nascent technology category, Guardent earned high marks for innovation and customer service from its Global 2000 clients and earned top honors from industry press and analysts. Prior to co-founding Guardent, Cirino was a senior executive at Shiva Corporation (now Intel Corporation) and i-Cube, Inc. (now Razorfish, Inc.) and served in various management capacities at Lotus Development Corporation.
Cirino was named "CEO of the Year" in 2004 by The Massachusetts Telecommunications Council and "Entrepreneur of the Year" for business services in 2001 by Ernst & Young.
Cirino is a member of the board of directors for Keane (NYSE: KEA), and serves as a director for several venture capital backed privately held companies including Bit9, VeraCode (a company Cirino co-founded and Chairs) and Memento. Cirino also serves on the board of governors for the Entrepreneurs Foundation of New England and the board of trustees of Mount Holyoke College.
Cirino holds a bachelor of arts in English from Mount Holyoke College.
Bob Davis
Bob Davis is a Managing General Partner at Highland Capital Partners, a firm founded with the mission of helping great people build great companies. Since its inception in 1988, the firm has taken a sector-focused approach to investing in exceptional information technology, communications and healthcare companies. With more than $2.6 billion of committed capital, Highland has invested in and worked to create such firms as Altiga Networks, Ask Jeeves, Avid Technology, Be Free, CheckFree, Conor Medsystems, Continental Cable, EXACT Sciences, Lycos, MapQuest, New Oak Communications, Ocular Networks, Odyssey Healthcare, Sybase, Telica, VistaPrint and WebLine Communications.
Prior to joining Highland, Bob served as the Chief Executive Officer of Terra Lycos and was responsible for all aspects of the company's business. Before the October 2000 combination of Terra and Lycos, Bob was President and Chief Executive Officer of Lycos, Inc. since its inception in 1995. In just five years, Bob led Lycos from a start-up with $2 million in venture capital funding to a multi-billion dollar profitable business. Under his leadership, Lycos jumped from the fastest IPO in Nasdaq history, a mere nine months from inception to offering, to an esteemed member of the Nasdaq 100.
Bob has served on the boards of several public and private sector companies including John Hancock (JHFS), Ticketmaster (TCMS), Terra Lycos (TRLY), Lycos (LCOS) and Lycos Europe (LCY). He also serves as a Trustee for Children's Hospital Trust Board and The Rivers School.
Bob is the best-selling author of "Speed is Life: Street Smart Lessons from the Front Lines of Business (Currency)." He holds a B.S. from Northeastern University, an M.B.A. from Babson College, and Honorary Doctorates from both Bentley College and Northeastern University. Bob has been inducted into the Academy of Distinguished Entrepreneurs and received the Massachusetts Interactive Media Council's Lifetime Achievement Award.
Richard DeSilva
Richard DeSilva is a Partner at Highland Capital Partners, focused on information technology investments as specializing in emerging media and online marketing.
Richard was co-founder and President of SiteBurst Inc., an enterprise software vendor of channel management solutions. Prior to SiteBurst, Richard was part of the team that founded IronPlanet, a venture-backed marketplace for used heavy equipment. Richard was also an Engagement Manager at Corporation Decisions Inc., (CDI) and Mercer Management Consulting, where he led strategic marketing initiatives for Global 2000 clients including IBM, Tribune, Scientific Atlanta and Leo Burnett.
Richard has worked extensively in the cable television industry as a consultant to Scientific Atlanta and as a product manager in the @Home Network's interactive television group. He has also worked at Apax Partners, and as a staff reporter for Newsweek magazine and the Washington Post.
Richard has an A.B. from Harvard College, a M.Phil. in International Relations from Cambridge University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.
Russell S. Lewis
Mr. Lewis is President and CEO of Lewis Capital, LLC, which was formed in 1999 to make investments and provide general business and mergers & acquisitions consulting services to growth-oriented firms.
From February 2002 until January 2005, Mr. Lewis served as Executive Vice President and General Manager of the VeriSign Naming and Directory Services (VRSN) Group, known for running a major portion of the Internet's critical addressing infrastructure that manages the authoritative directories of all .com and .net domain names. For the preceding 15 years, Mr. Lewis ran a wireless transportation systems integration company that is the market leader in RFID electronic toll collection systems, which he acquired from Control Data in 1986 and sold to SAIC in 1994. Prior to 1986, Mr. Lewis managed an oil and gas exploration subsidiary of a publicly traded utility company (UGI Corporation) and was a Vice President of EF Hutton in the Municipal Finance group. Mr. Lewis is also a Director of Castle Energy Corporation (NASDAQ/CECX) and Delta Petroleum.
Mr. Lewis is a graduate of Deerfield Academy and holds A.B. from Haverford College and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.
Martin J. Mannion
Marty Mannion is Managing Partner of Summit Partners, a firm he joined in 1985 when it had fewer than ten employees operating out of one office. Since then, the firm has grown to more than 100 people across three offices — Boston, Palo Alto, and London — and raised nearly $9 billion in capital and invested in more than 270 businesses. These companies have completed more than 100 public offerings and in excess of 100 strategic sales or mergers.
Marty has served on the boards of numerous private and public companies, with a particular focus on healthcare, financial services, and technology companies. His board directorships and investments include American Dental Partners, Bartlett Holdings, Benesight, Bennington Marine, Clinical Pathology Laboratories, Educational Services Institute, EMED Co., Help/Systems, Lincare, Liquidnet Holdings, Litchfield Financial, LogistiCare, MEDITECH, Prompt Associates, Suburban Ostomy Supply Company.
Marty graduated from Princeton University in 1981 with a degree in Economics. Upon graduation, he went to work as a Systems Engineer at IBM Corporation. Following two years at IBM, Marty attended Harvard Business School, and then joined Summit Partners upon graduation in 1985.
Marty also sits on a number of not-for-profit and educational boards, including Childrens Hospital Trust, Big Brothers of Mass Bay, Regis High School, and the Park School.
Joseph S. Tibbetts, Jr.
Joe Tibbetts has over thirty years experience in finance, working primarily with fast-growth technology companies. Currently, Mr. Tibbetts is Senior Vice President and CFO of Sapient, a leading technology consulting services company. Previously, Mr. Tibbetts was the senior Vice President and CFO of enterprise software company Novell. Mr. Tibbetts has also been CFO of SeaChange International, where he led the firm's IPO, and at Lightbridge.
Earlier in his career, at Pricewaterhouse (now Pricewaterhouse Coopers), Mr. Tibbetts built a twenty-year track record of success that included responsibilities as an audit partner and as the founding partner of the firm's Entrepreneurial Services Center, which assisted more than 100 technology and venture-backed clients during his tenure, including Lotus Development, Wellfleet and Shiva. Mr. Tibbetts has also been a partner at a leading venture capital firm, Charles River Ventures, where he created an in-house consulting practice, helped raise a $1.2 billion venture fund, and assisted portfolio companies in operations, finance and related areas. Mr. Tibbetts also served on the board of Great Plains Software for five years, through the company's transition to a public company and its eventual acquisition by Microsoft as well as a board member of Flarion Technologies, an early stage venture-backed company, before its acquisition by Qualcomm.
