Executive Team
-
Russell Stern
President and Chief Executive Officer
Russell Stern has served as President and CEO at Solarflare Communications since 2004. He was formerly President and CEO at JNI Corporation in San Diego, California. Prior to JNI, Stern served as General Manager and COO at Quantum Corporation. For more than 13 years, he held a number of increasingly responsible positions in the disc drive industry including five years at Western Digital Corporation in Irvine, CA, where he held the positions of Sr. VP, R and D, VP, Worldwide Operations and as Co-Chief Operating Officer. Stern has also held executive engineering and marketing positions with Seagate Technology and Adaptec. He began his career at IBM, where he held various engineering and management positions in the development and manufacturing of the IBM PC / XT / AT and PS/2. He obtained his Bachelor of Technology in Electrical Engineering from the Rochester Institute of Technology in Rochester, NY. Stern is also Chairman of the Foundation Board for the Orange County High School of the Arts, a chartered public school in Santa Ana, CA.
-
Mary Jane Abalos
Vice President of Finance and Human Resources
Mary Jane Abalos is responsible for finance and human resources. Previously, she was VP Planning and Finance Operations at Cogent, Inc., a global biometric identification solutions provider in Pasadena, California, where she was involved with strategic planning efforts that ultimately led to the sale of the company to 3M. Prior to Cogent, Abalos held various finance and management positions in technology companies including JNI Corporation in San Diego. She holds a MS in Business Administration with an emphasis in Finance from San Diego State University and a BS in Management Science from the University of California, San Diego.
-
Andre Chartrand
Vice President Engineering
Andre Chartrand is responsible for leading the engineering team in developing software and hardware solutions that create more efficient, accelerated networks. Chartrand joins Solarflare with over 30 years of engineering experience, having led Entropic Communications through a successful IPO in 2007 after serving as Engineering Vice President for three and a half years. Following his role at Entropic, Chartrand served as the Vice President at ClariPhy Communications where he created and managed several world-class teams. Chartrand also held a variety of engineering positions for Transwitch Communications, Velio Communications and Chromatic Research. He holds a BSEE from Ecole Polytechnique, University of Montreal.
-
Russ Krapf
Vice President of Sales and Business Development
Russ Krapf is responsible for all worldwide sales and business development efforts which includes strengthening customer relationships and OEM partnerships. Krapf was formerly with ARIO Data Networks where he was CEO and introduced innovative storage networking solutions. Prior to that, he was VP of Business Development in the Fibre Channel connectivity business at JNI Corp in San Diego, where he was responsible for all Business Development strategy and ultimately for the sale of the company to AMCC. Krapf was VP of Business Development at Western Digital Corporation and he has held a number of other CEO and senior executive positions in the past with companies such as Keen Personal Media, Western Digital, Censtor and Seagate. He holds a BS in Engineering Science from Florida State University and an MBA from Boston University.
-
Dave Parry
Vice President Development, Security Products
Dave Parry joins Solarflare with extensive experience managing teams that design and bring to market high-performance server and networking products. Previously, he served in a variety of executive roles at SGI leading engineering and business management efforts for server and storage products. Most recently Parry was senior vice president at SGI responsible for product strategy and roadmap, engineering, marketing and business management for SGI’s server product line and applications/performance engineering. Prior to SGI, Parry held various engineering and management positions in microprocessor and computer systems design at MIPS Computer Systems and Hewlett-Packard. He holds a BS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Colorado at Boulder.
-
Steve Pope, PhD
Co-Founder and Chief Technical Officer
Steve Pope is the CTO of Solarflare. Previously he co-founded Level 5 Networks and prior to that was a post-doctorate researcher in the field of high-speed networks and operating systems at Olivetti Research Labs, which later became AT&T Laboratories Cambridge. He holds a PhD in Computer Science from the University of Cambridge.
-
Martin Porter
Vice President, Software Development
Martin Porter is responsible for all software, firmware and customer support activities at Solarflare. He joined the company through its merger with Level 5 Networks where he served as Software Director for three years. Porter spent the previous five years in the same role at Conexant where he managed the software development group for ADSL silicon, leading to shipments of over 13 million units. Previous roles include lead software architect of the iconic SADiE Digital Audio Workstation. He holds a first class degree in mathematics from Nottingham University and a master's with distinction from York University.
-
Derek Roberts, PhD
Co-Founder and Vice President, Hardware Architecture
Derek Roberts is responsible for the controller hardware architecture at Solarflare. He co-founded Level 5 Networks in July 2002. Prior to this, Dr. Roberts was the hardware architect for the CLAN high-performance networking project at AT&T Laboratories Cambridge. While at AT&T Labs, he was also responsible for numerous leading-edge hardware developments. Previously, Dr. Roberts headed up application software development at Myriad Solutions. He holds a first class degree in Electrical Sciences and a PhD in Voltage Standards from the University of Cambridge.
-
Mike Smith
Vice President and General Manager, Host Solutions
Mike Smith is responsible for product planning, product management and product marketing at Solarflare. Previously, he was Executive VP of Worldwide Marketing at Emulex, a leader in the storage networking market. At Emulex, Smith played a key role in driving product strategy and customer engagements, and was instrumental in securing design wins with major OEMs. Prior to Emulex, he held various marketing management roles at Adaptec and spent 10 years at Western Digital, where he held a variety of marketing management and engineering positions. Smith began his career at Texas Instruments as a design engineer. He holds an MBA from University of California, Irvine and a BS in Electrical Engineering from the New Jersey Institute of Technology.
-
Bruce Tolley, PhD
Vice President, Solutions and Outbound Marketing
Bruce Tolley is responsible for solutions and outbound marketing including technical, event, and partner marketing activities. Previously, he served as Solarflare's Vice President of Marketing, and earlier Director of Product Management. Prior to joining Solarflare, Tolley was a Senior Product Line Manager at Cisco Systems where he managed the Ethernet transceiver business, and launched Layer 2/3/4, Metro Ethernet, 10 Gigabit switches. Prior to Cisco, he served in various marketing management roles at 3Com Corporation. Formerly Study Group Chair of the IEEE 802.3aq 10GBASE-LRM standards project, Tolley has been frequent contributor to the IEEE 802.3 Ethernet standards projects. He holds a BA from UC Santa Cruz, MA from Stanford University, MBA from Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley, and a PhD from Stanford University.
