COO at UnitedLayer
San Francisco Bay Area
COO at UnitedLayer
San Francisco Bay Area
Richard joined UnitedLayer Jan’06 thru the acquisition of ASPextra by UnitedLayer. Richard was the co-founder and managing partner of ASPextra, a leading managed services provider headquartered in the Bay Area. Since joining UnitedLayer, Richard has successfully doubled UnitedLayer’s size thru organic sales and gorilla marketing tactics. Richard introduced the "Technocratic Oath" - "We will do no technical harm" - and has brought a vision of customer service to the company. As of Jan 08, Richard was promoted to COO of UnitedLayer and will oversee all day to day business operations along with evangelising the vision of a one stop shop providing access to optimized global internet infrastructure.
Prior to co-founding ASPextra, Richard was a strategic, marketing, & business development consultant for three years. His clients ranged from startups to enterprises all of which had technologies that they were bringing to market. Before building his own robust consulting practice, Richard was a business development executive for two leading venture backed IT services startups, SeniorSurfers, bringing the Internet and its services to Older Adults thru a peer tutoring model, and TechPlanet, brining IT services to the small and mid sized business market much like Best Buy's Geek Squad.
Richard started his near 10 year Silicon Valley career with Montgomery Securities (acquired by Bank of America) as an analyst in the private equity group.
Richard hold a B.A. from Colgate University and has completed graduate level work in finance at UC Berkeley. Richard is a frequent speaker on technology, marketing and strategy.
Richard grew up in Minnesota, lived and worked in Europe and upon receiving his B.A. in International Relations, packed a backpack and traveled for a few years primarily as a chef and SCUBA/Ski instructor before landing in the Bay Area. Richard can be found swimming in the Bay regularly training for triathlons.
Strategy - from idea creation to strategy development, change management and "fresh-eye" perspectives
Marketing - Brand/Identity building, messaging, outbound campaing design & execution, collateral development and more!
Business Development - lead generation, contract negotiation, alliance building, cross-team communications, large rolodex, economic modeling, pitched to over 30 VCs
Tech - hands-on experience in wired, wireless, internet and HW development
(Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Information Technology and Services industry)
January 2008 — Present (7 months)
Richard's influence on the company, the vision for service delivery and commitment to the customers along with key hires that he has attracted to the team made it a natural fit to run day to day operations for UnitedLayer. The transition to this role was effective as of January 1st, 2008.
(Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Information Technology and Services industry)
January 2006 — December 2007 (2 years)
Richard joined UnitedLayer Jan’06 thru the merger of ASPextra into UnitedLayer. Richard was a co-founder and managing partner of ASPextra, a leading managed services provider headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area and servicing clients around the globe. Since joining UnitedLayer, Richard has successfully grown UnitedLayer’s sales, marketing and optimized services delivery, all resulting in doubling the size of the company in all areas along with implementing many processes to help scale the business. Richard developed the "Technocratic Oath" - "We will do no technical harm" - and has set the company up to potentially double in size again in 2008.
(Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Information Technology and Services industry)
February 2004 — January 2006 (2 years)
Richard Donaldson is a co-founder and Managing Partner of ASPextra, a leading managed services provider headquartered in the San Francisco Bay Area servicing clients around the globe. Since co-founding ASPextra with Ed Buck, Richard and Ed have built the business from the first customer to an expanding, cash-flow positive business with 100% client retention. Richard has primarily focused on business development, marketing, finance and operations since its inception.
Ask us how we can help you...www.aspextra.net
(Privately Held; Myself Only; Information Technology and Services industry)
January 2002 — February 2004 (2 years 2 months)
Mission statement: Enabling businesses of all sizes to clarify their mission, quantify their business case, evangelize their value proposition and then execute their strategies in the real world
boxIT (www.boxITllc.com) San Francisco, CA
Ikena Corporation (www.ikenacorp.com) San Francisco, CA
Vietnam Post & Telecommunications Corp (www.vnpt.com.vn) Hanoi, Vietnam
InVision Technologies (www.invision-tech.com) Newark, CA
FreeWay Entertainment (www.freewayentertainment.com) San Francisco, CA
New Visual Corporation (www.newvisual.com) San Diego, CA
LaConner Technologies (www.laconner.com) Seattle, WA
(Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Information Technology and Services industry)
October 2000 — November 2001 (1 year 2 months)
Mission statement: SeniorSurfers was to become the pre-eminent educational company, serving adults 55+ by training them in the use of computers, the Internet and evolving technologies. $4M Series-A funding provided by St. Paul Venture Capital (Sept.00)
First Business Executive hire (subsequent to CEO); reporting directly to CEO (9th employee)
Created, planned and executed all direct and indirect channel strategies
Identified, initiated and cultivated partnership with Cable & Wireless A-Service division to mitigate the burden of IT infrastructure development vis-à-vis SurferLab deployment.
Identified and structured deal development stage/discussions with: Large Consumer Retailers Sears and H&R Block, Workforce Development NCOA and Manpower.,
Online Content Providers eBay, Intuit and Adobe, Adult Community Developers & Managers JF Shea, Del Webb and Marriott,Washington-based Congressional leaders & Non-Profits, International Firms Japan, England & Canada,.
(Privately Held; 201-500 employees; Information Technology and Services industry)
September 1999 — October 2000 (1 year 2 months)
Mission statement: TechPlanet was to become the leading technology consulting company exclusively serving small business. Services include hardware and software purchase and installation, networking, and maintenance and support. Raised $15 million in a Series B round of financing in Feb00.
Established and executed corporate strategy and associated alliances.
Worked directly with CEO, CFO, VP of Marketing and VP of Business Development.
Grew revenue from $1M 12-month run rate to an approximate $10M 12-month run rate in 6 months.
Identified, structured and then developed deals resulting in agreements or LOI/MOUs with:
 ISPs - Concentric, Verio, Internet Connect, etc.,
 CLECs - Northpoint, Covad, etc.,
 ASPs - Stamps.com, Mimeo.com, WebEx, etc.,
 Hardware OEMs - Gateway, Dell, Netopia, etc., and
 Content Providers - Excite@Work, smalloffice.com, etc.
(Public Company; 1001-5000 employees; Legal Services industry)
May 1998 — September 1999 (1 year 5 months)
Managed and directed segments of offices largest revenue producing case, billing over $1M per year.
Performed multiple cost analyses, cost projections, domestic and global market analyses.
Database creation and management (MS Access).
Managed teams of up to 6 Consultants.
Other areas of active participation included: Environmental and Intellectual Propertys practice development, office-wide infrastructure development/enhancement and creating outside technical training curriculums.
(Privately Held; 1001-5000 employees; Investment Banking industry)
April 1997 — March 1998 (1 year)
Analyzed and sought relationships with over 95 Venture Capital/LBO firms through direct contact and leveraging Internet-based research.
Developed relationships to leverage as Investment Banking opportunities.
Created a new Statistical Analyst position due to work generated.
BA, International Relations & Economics, January 1989 — May 1992