David Warthen

 

120 Village Square, #148

Orinda, California 94563

Email: david@davidwarthen.com

Cell: (310) 622-3957

SOFTWARE DEVELOPMENT MANAGement

 

R  Visionary behind development of innovative, next-generation media/Internet technology products

R  Expert in exploiting emerging markets and technologies to achieve key business growth objectives

R  Scaled an organization from startup to publicly traded, multibillion-dollar, multi-national corporation (Ask.com co-founder)

20+ year track record of dynamic executive contributions across a broad range of technology organizations and industry verticals. Deep understanding of emerging technologies, technology trends, and market needs. Expert communicator and relationship builder; proven ability to rally management, staff, customers, stakeholders, and partners around a compelling technology and business vision. Proven skill in:

 

-        Strategic Technology & Business Planning

-        Product Lifecycle Development

-        Business Development & Market Launch

-        M&A / Strategic Partnerships

-        Product Strategy & Positioning

-        Product Planning and Definition

-        End-User Needs Assessment/Fulfillment

-        Venture Capital Financing

 

Professional Highlights

FUTURE VISTAS, San Francisco, California                                                                                                               July 2012-Present

(Unfunded startup company developing independent agent technology.)

Principle Architect and Developer

  • Developing software to assist consumers in making rational qualitative product purchasing decisions with incomplete or uncertain information using technology based on Bayesian belief networks and on mining prior user behavioral data, using a user-centric approach.
  • Applying this technology to both autonomous and non-autonomous agents and to modeling and predicting actual consumer behavior.

FINAL FRONTIER GAMING, Las Vegas, Nevada & San Francisco, California                                      January 2012-June 2012

(Startup in the online poker market in anticipation of legalization in the USA, using European software and backed by European investors.)

Consultant

  • Part of a small (3 person) team in the USA hired by a European group to help them establish an online poker business in the USA, to develop a business plan, and obtain casino partners.  Assisted with incorporation in Nevada, in negotiating and “papering” the bridge investment documents, and with general management and operations to get this venture started in the USA.
  • Developed specifications and budget for deployment of the online poker technology in Nevada.  Tracking the Nevada state regulatory requirements, which are in flux and not yet finalized, for both the technology and operations of internet poker gaming sites.  Nevada is widely expected to be the first state to legalize intra-state online poker, with legalization anticipated in 2012.  Federal legalization is uncertain, and unlikely to occur in the 2012 election year.
  • Developed a marketing plan and budget for launching and scaling up multiple online poker sites in the USA.
  • Met with and developed proposals for several casino groups based in Nevada (principally in Las Vegas).  Meetings are ongoing.

Pulse point / aLLVOICES, San Francisco, California                                                                                April 2011-August 2011

(PulsePoint, Inc acquired Allvoices Inc as an owned-and-operated property.  Leaders in digital marketing and audience measurement.)

Vice President of Engineering of PulsePoint & Chief Technology Officer of Allvoices.com

  • Defining a new product roadmap for Allvoices, and part of a team defining an integrated product family for PulsePoint.  Part of this effort is also identifying M&A targets, and build versus buy analyses.
  • Expanding the product development team and using offshore resources, which PulsePoint has not utilized previously.
  • Leading development of Allvoices Facebook Application utilizing offshore team.

aLLVOICES inc, San Francisco, California                                                                                                    January 2010-April 2011

(Venture financed startup developing the leading Citizen Journalism website and new pay-for-performance business model for news.)

Chief Technology Officer

Addressed issues of scalability and reliability on the Allvoices.com website, and introduced new technologies into the system.

  • Re-architected parts of the system for scalability and redundancy, introducing a master/slave database configuration and solving problems of multiprocessor support, replicative scalability, and race conditions.
  • Added Natural Language Processing technology to improve the precision of content matching between articles, articles and related images (by title and captions),
  • Focused on Search Engine Optimization, taking Allvoices.com from around 3 million unique visitors and 7 million page views per month, to 11.6 million and 62 million respectively in January 2011.
  • Led development engineering teams based in San Francisco and an offshore team in Lahore, Pakistan, and also a QA team in Islamabad, Pakistan.
  • Added Curation and Social Network Integration features into the Allvoices system.
  • Devised and developed Allvoices Social News Agent technology, to distribute news in an automatic and intelligent manner through various social networks (Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn).

Getfugu inc, San Francisco, California                                                                                                 June 2008-December 2009

(Mobile visual search technology – search by taking a picture on your iPhone/Android/Blackberry.)

Chief Technology Officer

Led team of 12 building both the mobile client apps on the iPhone/Android/Blackberry and the server software, and restructured the server architecture for reliability and scalability.  The technology extracted logos and other visual keys from a picture and return geo-targeted information.  Led design and implementation of high performance, massively parallel software on NVidia Tesla Server architecture.

Jiles inc, San Francisco, California                                                                                                                                2008-April 2009

(Start-up company developing natural language search products based.)

Chief Executive Officer and Founder

Developed angel-funded next generation natural language search engine targeting specific market segments.  Incorporated many progressive features, including support over various modes of communication (including SMS, IM, and iPhone app), both internet and mobile search, and implementing both social and rich media components.  Needed to raise additional financing in late 2008/early 2009, which was not achievable in the economic environment at that time.

Geomas SOFTWARE, Los Angeles, California                                                                                                                     2007-2008

(Privately held company developing Geo-Targeted search products based on their intellectual property.)

Chief Technology Officer

Defining and architecting the Geomas’ internet and mobile GeoTags software for Geo-Targeted Search.

INFOSEARCH MEDIA., Marina del Rey, California                                                                                                                 2006-2007

(Part of executive team leading a small-cap, publicly company, developing new business positioning and defining the products to support this positioning.  Led small engineering team developing these products.)

CTO and Executive Vice President

Joined as part of a management team led by George Lichter (CEO, and former president of Ask Jeeves International).  Defined and developed Search Engine Optimized products for InfoSearch Media (ISHM.OB).

  • Developed Social Q&A site Answerbag.com, until its sale to Demand Media in late 2006.
  • Key member of the executive management team charting a new strategy for the company.
  • Defined new products to support that new strategy, and led a small software development team that developed those products.  Helped develop new quantitative metrics to support the value proposition of these products, as sold to customers.
  • Introduced search-targeted video product, Traffic Builder Video, to compliment the company’s line of Traffic Builder Text products.   Found and sold first customer of Traffic Builder Video.

Eye Games Inc., Berkeley, California         2004-2005

(Pioneering developer of next-generation man-machine interactive webcam video games.)

CEO & Founder

Built this innovative start-up technology company from the ground up: recruited the management team, built the initial technology, and negotiated first distribution partnership with Creative Labs, who sold over 300,000 units.

GlobalStreams, Inc. / Vibe Solutions Group, Emeryville, California                                                                2000-2002

(Leader in digital video production software and hardware for the broadcast and Internet streaming video markets. Flagship product: GlobeCaster, a “studio in a box” product for set up of a cutting-edge life or post-production studio for a fraction of the traditional cost.)

Chief Technology Officer

Top authority for all aspects of technology strategy and operations; influential contributor on the executive team to such activities as business development, M&A, and partnership opportunities. Technology lead for architecting an Internet-ready product, a comprehensive mid-range solution for creating, editing, streaming, and syndicating web-ready video.

  • Key member of the acquisition team for bankrupt Play Industries (licensed technology and equipment vendor and part-owner in GlobalStreams); transitioned the video production technology to GlobalStreams ownership and integrated key technical personnel.
  • Reinvented the product strategy and defined/architected a new generation of products to transition from a broadcast to communications platform business. Resulted in spin-off into a separate company (VibePhone) that achieved 70% penetration in domestic cable-broadband markets.
  • Engineered and awarded patent for an improved green screen technology that effectively eliminated the problem of interfering with teleprompters. Spawned the next generation of GlobalStream’s green screen technology.

Ask Jeeves, Inc., Emeryville, California                                                                                                                                 1996-2000

(A top 15 Internet search engine company; innovative approach to search and user queries; pioneered the natural language query input.)

CTO & Co-Founder

Multi-functional executive role encompassing start-up business and technical operations, technology infrastructure, M&A strategy, IPO process, business negotiations, product engineering, sales, and development of emerging technologies. Pivotal role in recruiting and hiring key executive staff and growing the entire organization from the ground up to 750 personnel. Personally managed as many as 180+ staff. Member of the executive committee throughout tenure.

  • Influential in development of the core value proposition for the company that culminated in the profitable sale of Ask Jeeves for $2 billion 9 years after conception.
  • Redefined the marketing landscape, positioned company as the leader in the Question Answering category, and developed a unique “people-oriented” approach to differentiate Ask Jeeves from the other 250+ search engines. Led to over $35 million in venture-capital funding and rapid, grass-root growth to ranking as the 4th largest search engine.
  • Piloted build-out of a second major division (licensed extranet) to provide an alternate revenue stream to the out-dated advertising business model. Packaged technology for corporations in a broad range of industry verticals. Enabled mezzanine financing and IPO.
  • Evolved product features and influenced development of the sales force/processes to create a compelling value proposition for corporate customers and prospects. One feature (interactive query data mining) became a pivotal decision-making factor in more than 50% of all sales and led to a high renewal rate among existing customers.
  • Architected robust, highly scalable search engine, website, and processes that seamlessly supported growth from a budding organization with 5 employees to one of the top 15 Internet websites with 750 staff.
  • Established a structured environment and delivered motivational company speeches that inspired the staff enterprise-wide to meet challenging deadlines on new products and partnership opportunities.

Desktop Software, Berkeley, California                                                                                                                          1988-1996

President & Founder

Built and managed this software development outsourcing company that served such clients as Microsoft, Logicraft, Meridian Data, and Digital Equipment Corporation. Led staff of 6 in developing and delivering networking software, a file system, and CD-ROM server software.   This was my first experience founding and running a company.

  • Sample project: Worked on software for interactive television channel (ITV) for Time Warner’s ITV trials in Florida.

Virtual Microsystems, Berkeley, California                                                                                                                   1983-1988

Vice President of Engineering

Fast-track progression from programmer to manager with oversight for 30 engineers in this cutting-edge software & hardware startup. Key player in inventing the new generation of network-based products.   This was my first experience at a fast and dynamic startup company, and was a formative experience in entrepreneurship and technical management.

NCR INC, San Diego, California                                                                                                                                                  1981-1983

Programmer

Programmer on the NCR ITX operating system for NCR mini-computers.   This was a great entry level job for a well-run company.  I worked on operating system internals and NCR introduced me to formal development processes and working in a large team in a corporate environment.

 

Education

Ph.D. Program, University of California – Berkeley, School of Information                                                     2002-2004

  • Coursework completed - including Information Retrieval, New Media, and Social Computing.  Degree not completed.

B.A. in Computer Science, University of California – San Diego                                                                     1981