Executive Leadership
Neville Street, Chief Executive Officer Neville Street has a proven track record of leadership with several high-growth computing and communications companies. Prior to joining Casabi, Street served as CEO of Mobile 365, the global leader in mobile messaging and data services. Previously, he also held the position of vice president at BT Wireless and mm02, a leading European mobile telephone carrier. In addition, he was CEO of OmniSky International, a News Corporation joint venture and an early leader in wireless data services in both in the U.S. and Europe. Street has also worked as vice president of international at Palm Computing and 3Com, leading them to the number one market position in international markets. Street earned an Honors’ degree in business from Sheffield Hallam University in the United Kingdom, and is a member of the institute of Directors.
Greg Pounds, Chief Technical Officer and co-founder Before founding Casabi, Greg Pounds was an EIR for Mayfield Venture Partners researching technologies and business opportunities in the cellular, wireless and VoIP communications space. Prior to joining Mayfield, Pounds held multiple executive level positions including VP of Product Management and VP of Platform Engineering, at Vertical Networks, an industry leader in IP-based distributed communications systems. Prior to Vertical Networks, Pounds was the founding member of the technical team and served as the Director of Engineering for Jetstream Communications where he led product development, which resulted in an award-winning voice and data product. He also managed hardware and software design efforts at Octel/VMX and held multiple engineering positions at OPCOM and ROLM. Pounds received a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of California, Berkeley. He also completed the Executive MBA program at Stanford University. Pounds holds six patents in the areas of communications and distributed system design.
Dave Weinstein, Chief Marketing Officer and co-founder Dave Weinstein has over 25 years experience with a broad range of communications companies in the mobile, landline and the Internet arenas. His roles in these companies included CEO and Founder as well as Vice President of Marketing, Business Development and Sales. He has co-founded three companies and has been instrumental in creating value for them through IPO, acquisition and technology sale. Weinstein has also successfully raised approximately $40 million in venture capital. Weinstein was CEO at Zack Systems; Vice President of Marketing and Business Development for First Virtual Communications, Jetstream Communications and Centigram Communications; and Vice President of Marketing for Openwave. In addition, Weinstein was a senior consultant at Bain and Company, and was one of the first members of Bain's technology consulting team. Weinstein graduated from Haverford College with Honors in Political Science and Economics, and graduated as an Arjay Miller Scholar from the MBA program at Stanford University Graduate School of Business.
Management Team
George Dinsdale, Senior Director of Sales George Dinsdale joined Casabi bringing over 20 years of telecommunications in IP based communications and messaging services. Prior to joining Casabi, Dinsdale served as VP, Sales and Marketing for IGP, VoIP Global Services Providers and VP of Linkon Corporation’s Sun Microsystems business unit where they design and launched one of the industry’s first Telco Class Carrier VoIP Gateway with SS7 and C7 Signaling. Previously, Dinsdale consulted on telecommunications projects in Eastern Europe, Central America, the Caribbean and in the Pacific Rim and held sales management positions with voice messaging companies including VMX, Centigram and Octel Communications. Dinsdale graduated Loyola College and Concordia University with a Bachelor Commerce degree and a Double Major in Business Administration and Economics.
Chris Koverman, Vice President of Product Development Chris Koverman has more than 18 years experience in telecommunications and networking engineering. Prior to joining Casabi, Koverman was vice president of business development and strategy for Dulance, which developed a next-generation product search engine. Dulance was acquired by Google in 2006. Prior to Dulance, Koverman was vice president of engineering at Clarent Communications Corp, a leading provider of next-generation telecom equipment with a $2+ billion market cap. Koverman was responsible for Clarent’s VOIP, Local Access product. Koverman has held numerous other management and technical positions at Jetstream Communications, Centigram Communications, and Bell Northern Research. Koverman holds a Bachelor of Science in Biophysics from U.C. Berkeley and a Bachelor of Science in Computer Science from U.C. Santa Cruz.
Tim Kusumi, Vice President of Engineering and co-founder Tim Kusumi has over 20 years of experience in the communications industry. Prior to co-founding Casabi, Kusumi was an entrepreneur in residence at Mayfield and has held multiple senior leadership positions at Vertical Networks, a leader in IP-based distributed communications systems most recently serving as vice president of engineering. Prior to joining Vertical Networks, Kusumi held various positions in engineering and project management at Octel Communications, VMX and Opcom. Kusumi received his Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from Stanford.
JB Piacentino, Vice President of Business Development (Europe) Jean-Baptiste Piacentino joins Casabi with a broad background in wireless product marketing and business development. Prior to Casabi, Piacentino was the Senior Business Line Director at Philips Consumer Electronics with product management and strategic business development responsibilities. Prior to Philips, Piacentino served as Head of Devices Product Marketing at O2, the European mobile operator. Piacentino was part of the founding team of Omnisky International, a News Corporation join-venture, which introduced the first wireless data service for PDAs in Europe. Before Omnisky, Piacentino held various product marketing positions at Palm Computing, successfully launching the award-winning and market-leading Palm Pilot and Palm V series. Piacentino started his career as a systems software architect, designing and developing professional telecoms products. Piacentino holds a degree in Industrial Informatics from Epita, Paris, France.
Curt Schimmels, Vice President of Operations Curt has more than 25 years of operational expertise in telecommunications and data center operations with demonstrated success in building world-class infrastructures. Before joining the Casabi team, he served as senior director of support services for diCarta, where he teamed to deliver enterprise contract management solutions by building an operations organization under which multiple data centers were built and managed, a worldwide technical support organization providing tier three follow-the-sun support, and an adoption advocacy team that delivered programs to optimize end-user acceptance. Prior to diCarta, Schimmels performed as director of worldwide support services for Calico Commerce, delivering worldwide technical and operational support for their configuration product, Advisor, and for their ASP-based auction product, MarketMaker. Additionally, Schimmels delivered solutions in a number of roles on a world-wide basis for Siemens ICN, where he became one of the first Americans to serve as an international product team leader, delivering GUI-based service and configuration tools for private branch exchanges to be used in global markets. Schimmels is a member of the American Support Professionals.
Rachel Woodland, Vice President of Business Development Rachel Woodland brings a broad advertising and marketing background to Casabi. Prior to Casabi, Woodland served as senior director, media sales and development at InFreeDA leading product positioning, sales strategy and execution for the early ad-supported voice search service. Previously, Woodland performed as the director of marketing for XaviX, overseeing the interactive video game company’s US retail product launch and media strategy while spearheading relationships with Disney, The Jackie Chan Group and national academic and fitness organizations. Previously, Woodland held several management roles, most recently director of marketing for the Japanese conglomerate ITOCHU’s multimedia and technology division and prior to that at eVoice, an ad-supported voice messaging company acquired by AOL. Woodland’s agency experience includes Mindstorm, TSI Communication and The GlobalComm Group (acquired by Interpublic). Woodland attended San Jose State University for a Bachelor’s in Business Administration and is a member of the Mobile Marketing Association and the American Marketing Association.
Board of Directors
John Balen, General Partner, Canaan Partners
David Ladd, Managing Director, Mayfield Fund
Greg Pounds, Chief Technical Officer and co-founder, Casabi
Jason Spievak Jason Spievak is a venture partner and co-founder of Great Pacific Capital. Prior to Great Pacific, Spievak was a director, Chief Financial Officer and Vice President of Business Development at CallWave, Inc., (Nasdaq: CALL) a growing and profitable voice-over-internet software and service provider based in Santa Barbara, California. Spievak led CallWave’s successful IPO in September 2004 and was a key member of the senior team that brought the company to 12 consecutive quarters of revenue growth, GAAP profitability and positive cash flows. Prior to CallWave, Spievak was a Vice President in the technology mergers and acquisitions group in Broadview International's Silicon Valley office, where he led more than $1.25 billion in enterprise software, network infrastructure and internet services transactions. Before joining Broadview, Spievak held product management roles with Netopia, where he helped the company complete its successful IPO, and also with Nextel Communications' wireless data division. Spievak is a venture partner with Great Pacific Capital, an early stage venture fund based in Santa Barbara, and also with Pluritas, an intellectual property transaction advisory firm in San Francisco. He is currently a member of the boards of directors of Communication Services, Inc., Casabi, Inc., and KnowledgePlex, Inc. He is also a member of the board of directors of the UCSB Economic Forecast Project. Spievak earned his MBA from the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University in Chicago and his BA from the University of California, Santa Barbara. He lives in Santa Barbara, California with his wife and three children.
Neville Street, Chief Executive Officer, Casabi
Don Wood, General Partner, Vanguard Ventures
