Home > Archive > October 19 2000 > Management
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Chief Executive Officer
Jeffrey Klein is Chief Executive Officer of Xamplify, a real-time data analysis company. One of the founding editors of Mother Jones, Klein was editor in chief from 1992 through 1998. Under Klein's direction in 1993, Mother Jones became the first national magazine to establish an online presence--the MoJo Wire. The site has frequently been acclaimed as one of the web's most vital, data-rich and user-friendly by Yahoo! and the New York Times, among others. Klein led Mother Jones to numerous national magazine awards, primarily for investigative reporting on consumer and environmental issues.
Klein also served as editor in chief of San Francisco magazine and founded the Sunday magazine of Knight-Ridder's San Jose Mercury News. Under Klein's leadership, the magazine received dozens of national prizes. A graduate of Columbia, he has taught graduate journalism at Stanford University and U.C. Berkeley, and appears frequently on television and radio as both a guest and a host specializing in uncompromising inquiry. He has written for many newspapers and magaines; currently he is a contributing editor and columnist for Brill's Content.
jklein@xamplify.com.
Chief Technology Officer
Sumer Johal is Xamplify's Chief Technology Officer. He is an expert in real-time information transfer and scalable, secure design. As Vice President of Engineering at C-Tribe, an e-commerce-based affinity club company, he was responsible for the implementation of wireless, IVR and Internet sites, leading a team of contractors and developers through two full-lifecycle product launches. He also designed and deployed market analysis, email marketing, and data-capture tools for large-scale targeted marketing.
Previously Sumer founded PSG, Inc., a consulting practice specializing in the architecture, design, and implementation of IT frameworks for clients including Nortel, Hewlett-Packard, AT&T and British Telecom. He was also Senior Operations Research Engineer at Analog Devices, Inc., where he conceived and designed plant-wide automated scheduling software to improve manufacturing efficiency. Johal graduated from M.I.T. with a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and an M.S. in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering, specializing in programming techniques, scalability and computer architecture.
sjohal@xamplify.com.
Vice Chairman
Bob Burnett has more than thirty years' experience managing leading-edge technology projects. He was founding Vice President of Engineering for Cisco Systems, whose engineers he led in building the routers that made the Internet commercially viable. Burnett headed the first implementation of a complete COBOL compiler, and then the first commercial multiprocessor for Burroughs in the 1960s. He later managed the development of the first digital tester for VSLI chips at Fairchild and led the implementation team for Rolm/IBM's large scale digital branch exchange -- yet another first. Burnett continues to work as an entrepreneur with for-profit and non-profit enterprises. He sits on the board of Xamplify. Burnett is a graduate of Stanford University.
Chief Consultant, Statistics
David Donoho is a professor of Statistics at Stanford. Winner of a MacArthur "genius" Fellowship, Donoho has done pioneering work in statistical theory and has applied it to a broad range of practical applications. One of his primary interests is "robust statistics." He has devised strategies for detecting errors in a database containing many dissimilar types of data. His recent research has centered on the theoretical properties of wavelets and he has developed a suite of interactive computer modules for exploring their properties. He is a former Presidential Young Investigator and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He has published extensively. Donoho earned his bachelor's degree from Princeton and his Ph.D. from Harvard.
Chief Consultant, Quantitative Psychology
Niels Waller, Ph.D., is Professor and chair of Quantitative Psychology at Vanderbilt University. He is interested in the development and application of quantitative models of individual differences. His main areas of expertise are item response theory, taxometric methods, factor analysis, and quantitative genetics. Among numerous other awards, Dr. Waller is a recipient of the 1998/1999 American Psychological Association Distinguished Scientific Award for Early Career Contribution to Psychology in the area of Individual Differences.
His work has also focused on the application of computerized adaptive testing to personality assessment. He has written a program, MicroFact, that allows social scientists to correctly analyze ordered categorical data in large data sets. He recently won a grant to review the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI)--the standard that mental health professionals use to measure psychopathology. Dr. Waller is the author (with Dr. Paul E. Meehl) of Multivariate Taxometric Procedures: Distinguishing Types from Continua (SAGE University Press). He received his Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota.
Product Advisor
Purna brings more than twelve years of experience in managing and leading technology architecture. Most recently, he was a director of technology for the online trading web-site of Charles Schwab, which is known to be the largest secure transaction site in the world, carrying over 90,000 concurrent users at peak hours. Purna was the chief architect for this site at its launch in 1996. Notably, Purna was the principal force behind the server-side Java deployment on schwab.com. His work has been highly regarded and published as a case study on the IBM web-site. He has also served as a speaker on the Java/J2EE technology direction for Java forums in the bay area.
Prior to Schwab, Purna worked at the NASA Ames Reserch Center, where he led teams to build real-time systems. Purna started his career at Megatest, a Silicon Valley firm where he led the development of a distributed system to control the automated wafer-test floor for IBM. Purna holds a Master's degree in Computer Science from Pennsylvania State University and received his undergraduate education at the Indian Institute of Technology.
Director of Research
Julian Brookes is head of the research team. He has extensive experience as an investigative reporter in radio and print journalism, having worked at KQED-FM, Mother Jones magazine, and the Associated Press. Brookes gained his undergraduate degree in Modern Languages and Literatures from the University of Edinburgh, where he graduated summa cum laude. His master's in European literature from Cambridge University focused on information revolutions and social mobility.
jbrookes@xamplify.com.
Director of Product Strategy
Amit Jain develops strategic relationships with Xamplify's technology and solution partners. He is also responsible for leading efforts to integrate Xamplify's software with third-party applications. He has had extensive experience in technology and finance.Previously, Amit worked in Wasserstein Perella's Technology M&A Group in San Francisco. He has also held positions in technology consulting with McKinsey & Company and in the Global Markets division of Deutsche Morgan Grenfell. Amit holds a B.A. in Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley.
ajain@xamplify.com
Director of Business Development
Joe McCannon has worked in editorial, marketing and development capacities for the print and online versions of Outside, The Atlantic Monthly and Fast Company magazines. He has also written for the "Let's Go" travel guide series. Joe holds a B.A. from Harvard University.
jmccannon@xamplify.com
Director of Finance
Debra Viall is Director of Finance. She has been an independent financial consultant since 1989, specializing in acquisitions, valuations, and management, serving such clients as Nomura Asset Capital and Nomura Securities, Menlo Equities, and AMB Property. She has held responsibility for portfolio analysis and reporting for separate accounts, commingled funds, and private REITS with real estate assets in excess on $1.8 billion. She has extensive experience in guiding companies through the IPO process, working on SEC documentation, market research, and financial analysis models. From 1986-1989, she was Financial Manager for the RREEF Funds, and before that was Controller for CRS Sirrine, Inc. She holds a B.A. from U.C. Berkeley.