Meet The Team

John brings 15 years of experience as both a founder and operator as well as an investor and advisor to Pre-Seed to Series B, B2B SaaS companies. As an operator, his experience has been focused on Sales, Partnerships, and fundraising. At Seed Stage Venture funds and accelerators Techstars and Project 11 Ventures, he was responsible for portfolio advisement, investor relations, deal sourcing and screening, fund operations, and the establishment of co-investment relationships with VCs and Corp Dev teams. Originally from Palo Alto, John holds a BA from Boston University and has spent his career in Boston and Silicon Valley. 

Bryan has over thirty years of experience in Talent Acquisition and entrepreneurial endeavors in the Bay Area. As the Talent Acquisition leader at Vitria Technology, he scaled the company from 40 people to 1,500 people in 5 years and a successful IPO. He has held several leadership positions at software companies like Proofpoint and Clover Network. Prior to NVSA, Bryan worked exclusively with early stage startups, helping them scale and build and execute on hiring plans. In addition, Bryan has started two successful startups from scratch, both achieving multi-million dollar exits. Bryan was born and raised in Silicon Valley, and holds a BS degree from Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. 

Paul brings 25 years of experience as CFO of both public and private technology companies including Vitria Technology, VMware, and Proofpoint. He has also served on numerous boards, including leading the audit committee at One Medical during their acquisition to Amazon and most recently Elastic and Cerebras. He has also spent time as an EIR at Benchmark Capital. His experience lends itself to advisement related to the financial considerations of fundraising, capital allocation and scale. Originally from Chicago, Paul holds a Bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering from Dartmouth and an MBA from Kellogg. 

With over 30 years of experience in Silicon Valley, Dan has focused on building and growing emerging technology companies. His experience spans early-stage startup through IPO at three companies (Object Design, Vitria, Proofpoint), and turnaround stage to acquisition at two others (SeeBeyond, Savvion).  Dan has served at the VP level in a wide range of roles including Technical Sales and Professional Services, Product Management, and has led both U.S. and International Sales departments. Dan has spent the last few years advising VC and PE portfolios on sales and go-to-market strategies. He holds a B.S. in Computer Science from Dartmouth College.

Chad is an experienced founder and CEO who has founded and exited multiple software and ML/AI-focused companies. He led Sensing Systems (acquired to 2d3), Metamoto (acquired by Foretellix), and Partridge AI (edge AI solutions, presently). Further, he was SVP, Operations for a company acquired by Boeing. Chad served on the Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International (AUVSI) and AUVSI Foundation Board of Directors and has been an advisor for numerous businesses. He has also held Future Founder/Executive in Residence roles at Menlo Ventures. He holds Engineering Degrees from Stanford University, the University of Illinois, and the University of Michigan.