Robert Berger

Current

• CTO / Co-Founder at Runa.com (Solana Systems Corp)
• Advisor & Developer at CloudScale
• Advisor at WeFi

• Advisor at Grid Networks
• Advisor at Support Intelligence, LLC
• Technical Advisory Board Member at Panorama Capital
• Advisor at Netenrich, Inc.
• Owner / Principal at Internet Bandwidth Development, LLC

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Past

• Consultant at ZipDx
• Consultant at TelTel
• Advisor at Boorah.com

• Consultant at SkyPilot Networks, Inc.
• Program Chair at APRICOT: Asia Pacific Regional Internet Conference on Operational Technologies
• Vice President of Network Engineering at MetroFi, Inc.
• Visiting Research Fellow at Center for Global Communication (GLOCOM) Tokyo, Japan
• CEO at UltraDevices
• Advisor at Alteon WebSystems
• Consultant at Ascend Communications
• Founder, Board Member, CEO, CTO VP of Engineering at InterNex
• Founder, CTO, CEO at InterNex Information Services, Inc
• Founder, CEO, CTO, Board at InterNex Information Systems
• Architect & Software Manager at Sony Advanced Video Technology
• Software Engineering Manager at Digital F/X
• Director of Software Engineering at Datacube
• Computer Graphics Consultant at Utopia Video Studio
• Engineering Assistant at DeAnza Systems (Gould Imaging)
• Fund Raiser / Concert Promoter at New England Clamshel Alliance
• Engineering Assistant at Control Data Corp / Microbit

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17 more...

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Websites

• My Company

Robert Berger’s Summary

Consulting in the realms of Wireless Broadband, Internet Infrastructure, Open Spectrum Technologies, and Open Source Implementations. Knowledge and experiences span all 9 layers of the OSI Stack, from hardware, firmware, networking, software, systems, marketing, management and running companies.

· Founded multiple startups in the Internet infrastructure and equipment industries

· Well known as a technological visionary in the Internet infrastructure, wireless & services industry.

· Organizer of and Instructor/Speaker at many International Internet / Computer conferences, seminars, tutorials and workshops.

· Author of articles for various industry magazines and journals

· Integrates working knowledge of business issues, market needs and technological trends to create business opportunities, innovative products and services.

· Created and Managed several engineering organizations. Lead several design and development projects with focuses on Network Infrastructure, Object Oriented Design, sophisticated graphical user interfaces, networking, and significant system / hardware integration issues.

· Extensive customer relations experience. Product evangelism, market feedback and customer support. Well received speaker at conferences and seminars. Working relationships with International Telco, ISP Carriers and equipment vendors.

· Direct experience and understanding of the integration of Operations, Network Management, Business Process, Marketing, Sales and MIS for Internet and telecom services.

· Designed, Developed systems that integrate Internet, wireless, video, audio, software and computers

· 26+ years Internet experience, 28+ years of developing with Unix, Linux and Unix like systems, Ruby on Rails / LAMP Design, development and deployment.

Robert Berger’s Specialties:

Technological and Business due diligence, architecture, design review and consulting for hardware, software and services in the Internet and Wireless industries. Scalable Web Services, Ruby on Rails, Broadband Wireless, Internet Infrastructure, Open Spectrum, Open Source

Broad experience in software and system design and integration.

Can span and find synergy across all 9 layers of the OSI stack (including the economic and political layers).

Robert Berger’s Experience

• CTO / Co-Founder

  Runa.com (Solana Systems Corp)

  (Internet industry)

  December 2007 — Present (1 year 8 months)

  Early Stage Startup developing a SaaS that enables dynamic promotions, rewards and affinity donations for Long Tail Online-Merchants. Core functionality is Temporary Price Reductions and/or reward "dollars" based on merchant's goals and each site visitor's purchase intent / history.

• Advisor & Developer

  CloudScale

  (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Internet industry)

  December 2006 — Present (2 years 8 months)

  CloudScale is a startup still in stealth mode developing technologies for scaling Ruby on Rails and LAMP stacks for Web and Enterprise services leveraging Virtual Machines such a Xen and VMware on target grid environments such as Amazon EC2.
  
  My work includes helping with fund raising, architecture and some development with Ruby (can not divulge details at this time)

• Advisor

  WeFi

  (Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Internet industry)

  September 2005 — Present (3 years 11 months)

  Member of the Board of Advisors for WeFi which is a Startup in the WiFi / Social Networking space.
  
  I help them with market positioning and technical issues. Also have done some technical prototyping (using RubyCocoa) and testing with their Macintosh client.

• Advisor

  Grid Networks

  (Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Internet industry)

  August 2005 — Present (4 years)

  "The GridNetworks GridCast™ Platform enables content owners to securely stream full-screen, DVD-quality video across the Internet to millions of broadband connected viewers worldwide...
  
  The GridCast Platform is a complete video delivery solution that combines centralized command-and-control with automated video encoding, sophisticated video syndication capabilities, extensive analysis and reporting capabilities and the industry’s toughest security architecture. The result is an end-to-end video publishing system that provides precise control over every aspect of the preparation, management, delivery and presentation of premium movies and videos."
  http://www.gridnetworks.com
  
  As an advisor, I help with funding introductions, technology and partners.

• Advisor

  Support Intelligence, LLC

  (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Internet industry)

  April 2005 — Present (4 years 4 months)

  Support-Intelligence "data mines" Internet Infrastructure and huge volumes of SPAM from various sources to discover compromised hosts and other normally anonymous threats on the Internet.
  
  The company was founded on the premise that malicious network activity can best be controlled by applying modern machine learning algorithms to large volumes of aggregated traffic data.
  
  http://www.support-intelligence.com/
  I am helping them with funding, market focus, partnering and technology.

• Technical Advisory Board Member

  Panorama Capital

  (Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Venture Capital & Private Equity industry)

  February 2005 — Present (4 years 6 months)

  Panorama Capital invests in early and mid-stage Internet, Networking, Biotech startups. http://www.panoramacapital.com/
  
  As a member of their Technical Advisory Board I introduce opportunities, offer due diligence services and help to refine key investment themes, assess technical, product and market risks in new deals, and provide post-investment input.

• Advisor

  Netenrich, Inc.

  (Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Information Technology and Services industry)

  November 2004 — Present (4 years 9 months)

  Netenrich offers IT infrastructure management and optimization services including end-to-end NOC based management framework that enables complete remote visibility and management of a multi site infrastructure from core network components to desktops. They have developed a set of hardware, software and remote services that enable afordable and secure access & compliance for IT infrastructure monitoring and management.
  
  These services include:
  * IT Infrastructure Remote Monitoring Management and Alerting
  * Remote DBA
  * Desktops & Laptops Management
  * IT Infrastructure Optimization
  * Application Maintenance, Application Tone, IT Production Support and Sustenance Engineering
  * Outsourcing of Technical Support Partnering Services for Mission-Critical IT Products
  
  http://www.netenrich.com/
  
  I help out with architecture, experience with ISP infrastructure and remote management as well as supporting their sales and funding efforts.

• Owner / Principal

  Internet Bandwidth Development, LLC

  (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Internet industry)

  October 1996 — Present (12 years 10 months)

  Consulting firm to assist start-ups, venture capital firms and enterprises, to understand, develop and utilize Internet technology / infrastructure and Open Source.
  
  Previous onsulting and advisory positions have include Intel, Visa, Ascend, Cisco, IDG World Expo, NEA, Athena Tech Ventures, iAsiaWorks, Ipsilon, Firstpoint Communications, Stardust Forums, iPass, Conxion, Sentient, OKI, Kiwi Networks, and AsiaQuest, PepLink (Muni-wireless CPE), Wavion (smart antennas), Camp Ventures, Covad, LinuxWorld , CTO Forum, Interop, Class Data Systems, Alteon, AboveNet, Privada (Confidential Net Access), Xspeed (DSL CPE), Cosine Communications, Qala Communications (Singapore DSL CLEC), Reactive Networks (Anti-DDOS equipment), Vpacket (VoIP IAD), COM21, BizFinity (Web based accounting service), Proxinet (Enable Cell Phones and PDA to better access web content), Jetstream (VoIP DSL), Rainmaker Tech (Wavelet PHY layer), Pulsent (Video delivery), Sandpiper / Digital Island and others.

• Consultant

  ZipDx

  (Telecommunications industry)

  March 2007 — April 2008 (1 year 2 months)

  Startup in early beta mode developing innovative teleconferencing service.
  
  My work includes software design and development using both standalone Ruby and Ruby on Rails for email, calendar processing with RESTful interfaces. Main work now is on a real-time Ruby on Rails / Ext.js AJAX / Javascript dashboard for the conference calls.
  
  Also includes consulting on infrastructure design and deployment using Linux, virtual machines, VoIP, networking, Sun servers among other things.

• Consultant

  TelTel

  (Internet industry)

  2007 — 2007 (less than a year)

• Advisor

  Boorah.com

  (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Internet industry)

  November 2005 — November 2007 (2 years 1 month)

  Boorah had developed "a patent-pending Natural Language Processing technology to generate quantitative scores for domain specific attributes from plain English text, automatic summary from most relevant user sentiments and enables a highly customizable search based on personal preferences."
  
  For their initial domain that exploits their technology, they have chosen Restaurant Reviews. They have a revenue producing website, http://www.boorah.com.
  
  As an advisor I help with deployment technology issues, funding and partners.

• Consultant

  SkyPilot Networks, Inc.

  (Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Telecommunications industry)

  2005 — February 2007 (2 years)

  Initially researched the market for Muni-wireless size and requirements. Defined, architected and project managed the creation of the product (using the core products that Skypilot already made) that allowed SkyPilot to move from a pure WISP vendor to a leading Muni-Wireless equipment vendor.
  
  Worked with internal engineering / manufacturing and China based outsource software development / component manufacturing, and early SkyPilot customers to produce, test and release the product. Based on the results of the product acceptance, SkyPilot shifted its business plan to be primarily muni-wireless oriented.
  
  Developed a muni-wireless coverage and performance test tool prototype using Linux, Ruby, QtRuby and Google Earth.

• Program Chair

  APRICOT: Asia Pacific Regional Internet Conference on Operational Technologies

  (Non-Profit; 11-50 employees; Internet industry)

  March 1998 — March 2006 (8 years 1 month)

  Program Chair facilitating the organization of the Technical Program for the APRICOT conferences throughout the Asia Pacific Region.
  
  In the early days this included writing the conference registration system. Later managing the outsourcing and design of the conference registration and speaker management.
  
  The main work was finding appropriate speakers and tutorial instructors. Assembling the program and making sure everyone showed up.

• Vice President of Network Engineering

  MetroFi, Inc.

  (Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Internet industry)

  May 2003 — August 2004 (1 year 4 months)

  Last Mile wireless service provider that leverages "mesh" 802.11 technology.
  
  Developed the network architecture (metro, regional and Internet) which integrated the wireless mesh network into the MetroFi Backbone and interconnects with ISP partners and Internet upstream / peers.
  
  Defined, selected equipment, deployed and managed the pilot network.
  
  Defined, led the deployment and managed the tech trial network infrastructure which formed the basis of the production network architecture.
  
  Evaluated and help select wireless mesh, end-user wireless CPE and backbone network products and services.
  
  Developed and deployed acceptance and test procedures for wireless mesh equipment.
  
  Domain Expert for the Software Engineering Group to define requirements and review implementations of provisioning, network management and other OSS systems.
  
  Worked with Operations Group to define and deploy Network Operations Center and Network Management System.

• Visiting Research Fellow

  Center for Global Communication (GLOCOM) Tokyo, Japan

  (Educational Institution; 51-200 employees; International Affairs industry)

  November 2002 — April 2003 (6 months)

  Led a research project on Open Spectrum wireless public networking. Included reports to Glocom’s clients such as NTT Communications and Tokyo Electric Power Company. Research areas included the technological and policy issues of Ultra-wideband, Wideband Spread Spectrum, Cognitive Software Defined Radios.
  
  Responsibilities included researching and reporting on changes in FCC spectrum policy, explaining the technology issues and communicating this to a variety of audiences on paper, in person and in public symposiums.
  
  Worked with GLOCOM clients and others to develop strategies to promote Open Spectrum technologies and policies.

• CEO

  UltraDevices

  (Privately Held; 1-10 employees; Telecommunications industry)

  August 1999 — July 2002 (3 years)

  Early stage start-up for carrier class broadband wireless networking equipment and gateways for next generation broadband wireless carriers/ISPs. Included the matching residential/SOHO gateway devices all leveraging 802.11 technology.
  
  The focus was on innovative software making 802.11 suitable for mesh networking and ease of deployment for service providers. The gateway and infrastructure devices were built leveraging Open Standards and Open Software to allow for high functionality and low cost.
  
  We were able to develop working prototypes of the mesh nodes, but had to shutdown due to lack of funding to move into production (2001 - 2002 was not a good time for startups).
  
  Personal Contributions:
  •Strategic business, product and technical planning and development
  •Fund raising and business development (presented to scores of VCs)
  •Team building and technical leadership
  •Open source software development for embedded systems

• Advisor

  Alteon WebSystems

  (Internet industry)

  1996 — 1999 (3 years)

• Consultant

  Ascend Communications

  (Internet industry)

  1996 — 1999 (3 years)

• Founder, Board Member, CEO, CTO VP of Engineering

  InterNex

  (Internet industry)

  1993 — 1998 (5 years)

• Founder, CTO, CEO

  InterNex Information Services, Inc

  (Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Telecommunications industry)

  August 1993 — March 1998 (4 years 8 months)

  Founded company to offer innovative business-to-business information services on the Internet. Originally One-Stop-Shopping for Internet access via ISDN (first to offer commercial Internet access via ISDN in the US).
  
  Supplied seed funding. Created business plan. Assembled and led start-up management team, fund raising and mergers. Company was sold to Concentric Networks early 1998. Original President / CEO and then VP of Engineering / CTO after merger, Member of the Board througout.
  
  Built and managed the Engineering, Tech Support, Network Operations teams. Set strategic and technical course for the company. Researched and initiated partnerships and potential merger candidates to enlarge business from regional to international.
  
  Designed next generation distributed ServerFarms suitable for broadcasting audio & video as well as super high volume “fat” content, including the first International collocation hosting service that included clients such as Real Networks and Adobe.

• Founder, CEO, CTO, Board

  InterNex Information Systems

  (Internet industry)

  1993 — 1998 (5 years)

• Architect & Software Manager

  Sony Advanced Video Technology

  (Public Company; 10,001 or more employees; Motion Pictures and Film industry)

  June 1990 — December 1992 (2 years 7 months)

  Developed the Software Architecture for a next generation professional video production environment that integrated video editing, special effects and production materials management.
  
  •Instituted and managed the software development effort (6+ team members) of a prototype and initial productization of the integrated video production environment.
  
  •Led the User Interface Design effort for the productization phase.
  
  •Evaluated and selected workstation platforms, OO development environments, OO GUI tools, real-time OS and embedded systems for use in developing the video production environment. (NeXTStep)
  
  •Defined requirements and oversaw the administration of the internal Unix / Macintosh / PC network at AVTC.
  
  •Established standards for object oriented system development at AVTC and worked with Sony world wide engineering to establish new software development practices.

• Software Engineering Manager

  Digital F/X

  (Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Motion Pictures and Film industry)

  August 1989 — June 1990 (11 months)

  Managed the Composium Family software team. The Composium product integrates real-time Digital Compositing of 4 layers using alpha or luma keying, real-time Digital Video Effects, 32 bit color paint, machine control of up to 6 VTRs
  and video typography in one video workstation with 4:4:4:4 digital video processing throughout.
  
  •Facilitated the transition from engineering development into shipping the product.
  
  •Brought a higher level of stability and predictability to the software process including the introduction of project planning, scheduling and software release procedures.
  
  •Met extensively with existing and potential customers in the video post production industry (owners, artists and editors) to gain insight into customer needs and to clarify short and long term product direction.

• Director of Software Engineering

  Datacube

  (Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Computer Hardware industry)

  February 1981 — July 1989 (8 years 6 months)

  Was the intial Software person at Datacube and built the Software Engineering group there. Defined the architecture of several generations of Datacube's software and system level products. Built the software group from myself to a team of 20 people.
  
  Pioneered many techniques of integrating real-time image processing into early Sun Workstations and embedded systems.

• Computer Graphics Consultant

  Utopia Video Studio

  (Privately Held; 11-50 employees; Motion Pictures and Film industry)

  April 1980 — November 1981 (1 year 8 months)

  Designed and implemented (software in C under RT-11 and hardware integration of DEC LSI-11/23 and IKONAS Framebuffer) broadcast quality interactive electronic paint system for the rock music producer Todd Rundgren’s video production environment. Used for early Music Video Productions.

• Engineering Assistant

  DeAnza Systems (Gould Imaging)

  (Privately Held; 51-200 employees; Computer Hardware industry)

  September 1978 — November 1979 (1 year 3 months)

  Supported the design and implementation of an LSI-11 based image processing workstation. Trouble shooting of Q-Bus and image processing hardware.

• Fund Raiser / Concert Promoter

  New England Clamshel Alliance

  (Non-Profit; 1001-5000 employees; Political Organization industry)

  April 1978 — August 1978 (5 months)

  Full time fund raising for environmental group. Conceived, coordinated and organized very large (20,000+ people) concert / demonstration events with performers including Jackson Brown, Pete Seeger, John Hall and Arlo Guthrie.
  These demonstrations were the inspiration for the even larger political concerts of the 80’s.

• Engineering Assistant

  Control Data Corp / Microbit

  (Public Company; 1001-5000 employees; Computer Hardware industry)

  November 1976 — April 1978 (1 year 6 months)

  Designed and built mechanical and electrical prototypes as part of an Electron Beam Accessed Memory System (EBAM). A system to act as a “swap memory” for mainframe computers.

Additional Information

Robert Berger’s Websites:

• My Company

Robert Berger’s Interests:

Ruby, Ruby on Rails, Open Source, Open Spectrum, "mesh" wireless, Internet Infrastructure, Nanotechnology, Genetic Engineering, renewable energy, sustainable technology and systems

Robert Berger’s Groups:

IEEE.NANOG,APRICOT, Business, Digital Island Advisory Board

•    VLAB
•    Silicon Valley NewTech Meetup
•    UNIX United Professionals
•    RoR (Ruby on Rails) Open Source Network
•    Miva Merchant Users
•    ThoughtWorks Studios Mingle User Group
•    Panorama Capital Technology Advisory Board Members
•    Cloud Computing Interoperability Forum (CCIF)
•    Ars Technica Readers
•    O'Reilly Emerging Technology Conference
•    Muniwireless and Muni WiMAX
•    InterNex Alum

Robert Berger’s Contact Settings

Interested In:

• career opportunities
• consulting offers
• new ventures
• job inquiries
• expertise requests
• business deals
• reference requests
• getting back in touch