Leadership

Management

Board of Directors

 Dr. John Cioffi is a 35-year veteran of the DSL industry and sports numerous prestigious awards for his contributions to technology and industry. Prior to founding ASSIA in 2003, he served as founder, CTO and vice president of engineering at Amati before its acquisition by Texas Instruments. Dr. Cioffi held a tenured endowed professorship at Stanford University in the Department of Electrical Engineering from 1985 to 2009, where he is now an active Professor Emeritus with limited ongoing research efforts in broadband access. He has published more than 400 papers and holds more than 100 patents. Dr. Cioffi is a member of the United States National Academy of Engineering and an International Fellow of the United Kingdom Royal Society of Engineering. In 2013, Dr. Cioffi was inducted into the Internet Hall of Fame. He is a winner of the Economist Computing and Telecommunications Award (2010), the IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal (2010), the IEEE Kobayashi Award (2001), and the Marconi Society’s Marconi Prize (2006). Cioffi has served on the boards of directors of more than 10 public and private companies. He currently serves on the boards of Alto Beam, Tinoq, and on the Marconi Society Board of Trustees. Dr. Cioffi holds a BSEE from the University of Illinois and a PhD in electrical engineering from Stanford University.

Ms. Assia Cioffi is a founding board member of the company, as well as the company’s namesake. Since 2003, she continues to oversee all aspects of ASSIA’s appearance, including the company logo, Web site, shareholder, investor, board, and advisory board meetings, and other company events worldwide. Ms. Cioffi created and fosters the company’s unique and beloved culture that emphasizes personal engagement, open communication among hard-working professionals, and an international, customer-focused orientation. A graduate of the École Internationale Élysées Marbeuf, Paris, Ms. Cioffi worked in a number of aesthetics positions in Paris prior to co-founding ASSIA, and in 2009 she was recognized for her contribution to and support for the Stanford University community. In 2017, she received the United States National Academy’s Einstein Society Award for her philanthropic contributions to the United States’ continued technical leadership.

Douglas King is a Certified Public Accountant with significant experience in the accounting industry, including over 30 years of auditing experience at Ernst & Young LLP where he served in various capacities in multiple offices. Mr. King served as the managing partner at the San Francisco office of Ernst & Young LLP from 1998 to 2002. Currently, Mr. King is a member of the Board of Directors, Chairman of the Audit Committee, Finance Committee and member of the Governance and Nominating Committee at SJW Group (NYSE). He has servred in similar capacities with the Boards of Directors at Rackable Systems (NASDAQ); SGI International (NASDAQ), Fuel Systems Solutions (NASDAQ) and Westport Fuel Systems (NASDAQ).

Dr. Lee is a seasoned technology executive with over 30 years of management experience in the high-tech industry. He was the General Manager of eBay China Development Center, Shanghai, China where he led research and product development for the global eBay platform. Prior to eBay, he was the CTO of Yahoo! North Asia, where he led development of key services in e-commerce, mobile, communications and advertisement sites for the Asia Pacific region. Prior to Yahoo! he was with HP, where he held management positions at HP Labs and at HP Internet Imaging Operation where he led the development of imaging technology and photo hosting service. While at HP, he worked in Japan at the Advanced Telecommunications Research and at HP Labs Japan. Prior to HP he worked at IBM Research where he did research on image processing. In Standardization, he served as the Convener of JPEG Standards Committee, a position he held for 18 years. As Convener, he led the development of the highly successful JPEG family of imaging standard that has been widely adopted in the imaging industry. Dr. Lee received a BS degree from Cornell University and the MS and PhD degrees from Stanford University. He completed the Executive Development Program at Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University. He has published over 70 publications and currently serves on the Advisory Committee, Information Engineering, of the Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Laura S. Stark has more than 30 years’ experience in technology with special emphasis on business strategy, mergers and acquisitions, research and development, and emerging solutions. Laura has spent most of her career at Rambus, where she held a variety of executive positions, most recently as Senior Vice President and General Manager of the Emerging Solutions Division. In that capacity, she was responsible for the company’s first DARPA program and first China venture. Previously she had been responsible for a series of acquisitions, agreements, and investments, which collectively seeded two new business units and two new strategic initiatives. She is also credited with developing the strategy and pricing for Rambus’ successful patent license renewal program, which at one point was responsible for between 50% to 70% of the company’s annual revenue. Laura received her bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from MIT and has been on the board of directors for Roy-G-Biv Corporation for a decade.

Hemant Thapar is the Chairman, CEO, and Co-founder of OmniTier Inc.. He previously founded and led two successful startups, DataPath Systems and Link_A_Media Devices, which were acquired by LSI Corporation and SK Hynix, respectively. Together, these startups delivered many “industry firsts” in controllers for data storage and data recovery and system-on-a-chip technologies. During his early career, Dr. Thapar held technical and management positions at Bell Telephone Laboratories, Holmdel, and at IBM Corporation, San Jose, where he made pioneering contributions in circuit-switched networking, data communications, and data storage. He has over 50 publications in the areas of data communications and storage, and his work on Extended Partial Response (EPR) Systems became the de facto industry standard for data recovery in hard disk drive and tape drive products. He is co-recipient of three best paper awards. Dr. Thapar was elected Fellow of the IEEE and also received the Distinguished Engineering Alumni Award from Santa Clara University. He holds a Ph. D degree in Electrical Engineering from Purdue University. Dr. Thapar serves on the Advisory Boards of the School of Engineering at Santa Clara University and on India’s Ambala College of Engineering and Applied Sciences.

Dr. Nersi Nazari brings decades of experience in the communication industry, including successful stints as a Marvell Semiconductor executive, before becoming the managing general partner of Pacific Generation Ventures. Dr. Nazari has also served the boards of ClariPhy and Teranetics, where he was also CEO. Dr. Nazari presently serves as the Chairman of Vital Connect, a company specializing in both biotechnology analytics and real-time connectivity to patients, where he was also its founding CEO.  Dr. Nersi is also a significant investor in ASSIA Inc.

Richard Chernicoff brings decades of experience in intellectual property to ASSIA’s board, having practiced law at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher and Flom, being a partner at Brobeck, Phleger & Harrison, and then progressing to various corporate financial and legal positions the last 20 years at SanDisk, Unity Semiconductor, Tessera Intellectual Property Corp., Marathon Patent Group, and Great Elm Capital Group. He presently also serves as Chief Financial Officer of SunRise Memory Corp, and serves the board of HopTo Inc. and other private and public organizations. 

Advisors

Dave Burstein has been editor of DSL Prime & Fast Net News since its inception in 1999. He’s working on a book, Gigabit Wireless: 5G, 4G, and Beyond. He wrote DSL: A Tech Brief (Wiley) and Web Video: Making It Great, Getting It Noticed (Peachpit). His analysis of the industry has been quoted in numerous publications, including the New York and Los Angeles Times, the Wall StreetJournal, and government studies. He chaired three Fast Net Futures conferences, which featured the first public demonstrations of 100 megabit DSL.

Luis Lada Diaz was Telefónica CTO in the 1980s, managing director of AMPER, chairman of Telefónica Móviles and Telefónica de España, and a board member of many other technology companies. He is currently the non-executive chairman of Banco Inversis and Gamesa by Ence, and serves on the boards of Indra and Gamesa. Luis is a telecommunication engineer from the Madrid Polytechnic University and a Fellow of Spain’s Royal Academy of Engineering.

Beppe Donagemma is a senior executive with more than 20 years of experience in the information and communications technology industry and has an extensive background in global account management and international corporate leadership. Currently, he is the senior vice president of the European telecom division of Samsung. Previously, he was chairman of Electro Power Systems, a fuel cells producer. He is also a board member of E-blink, a wireless front-hauling company, and Linko, an application software innovator, and serves as an advisor to several other venture capital and private equity companies. Prior roles include vice president for Mobile Networks at Nokia with global responsibility, and executive vice president/general manager for the Nokia Siemens Networks European region. Beppe holds a degree in Electronic Engineering, as well as a non-degree Executive Masters in Strategy and Leadership.

Gerhard P. Fettweis earned his Ph.D. under H. Meyr’s supervision from RWTH Aachen in 1990. After one year at IBM Research in San Jose, CA, he moved to TCSI Inc., Berkeley, CA. Since 1994 he is Vodafone Chair Professor at TU Dresden, Germany, with 20 companies from Asia/Europe/US sponsoring his research on wireless transmission and chip design. He coordinates the 5G Lab Germany, and 2 German Science Foundation (DFG) centers at TU Dresden, namely cfaed and HAEC. Gerhard is the CEO of the newly founded Barkhausen Institute – the German IoT Platform Institute.

Gerhard is a IEEE Fellow, a member of the German Academy of Sciences (Leopoldina) and the German Academy of Engineering (acatech). He has received multiple IEEE recognitions as well has the VDE ring of honor. In Dresden, his team has spun-out sixteen start-ups, and setup funded projects in volume of close to EUR 1/2 billion. He co-chairs the IEEE 5G Initiative, and has helped organizing IEEE conferences, most notably as TPC Chair of ICC 2009 and of TTM 2012, and as General Chair of VTC Spring 2013 and DATE 2014.

Reed Hundt is the CEO of the Coalition for Green Capital, a non-profit corporation, as well as Principal of private advisory firm, REH Advisors. He is on the board of directors of Intel Corporation and Kno, Inc., and also three non profit organizations, the United Negro College Fund, the Clean Energy Finance and Investment Authority of Connecticut, and the Advanced Energy Economy Institute. In addition, he is on the advisory board of the Yale School of Management, Peek Inc., Mytonomy and e-Access. Reed also serves on the Audit Committee of the Climate Reality Project and was Chairman of the Aspen Institute’s International Digital Economy Accord (IDEA) Project. Reed Hundt was chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) from 1993-1997. Previously he was a partner at Latham & Watkins, an international law firm. He is a member of the District of Columbia bar.

Reed graduated from Yale College (1969) with a B.A. in History magna cum laude and honors with exceptional distinction in history. He graduated from J.D. Yale Law School (1974) where he was member of the executive board of the Yale Law Journal.

KiHo Kim is a seasoned, innovative ICT executive with over 30 years of experience in the research, development, and executive management of business. In 1982, he started his career with the Korean Broadcasting System as a broadcast engineer. In 1991, he joined Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. (SEC) where he was engaged in the research and development of HDTV transmission, ADSL, and HDD read channel. From 2000 he pioneered the research and development of 4G and led the commercialization of the 4G mobile and wireless systems including LTE-A and IEEE 802.11n at SEC. From 2011, as Executive VP of SEC, Dr. Kim headed the Digital Media and Communication R&D center and served as CTO. From 2013 to 2017, he headed the Printing Solutions business unit as CEO of SEC. He is currently the CEO of Tower DG, a consulting firm in Korea.

KiHo received a B.S. degree from Hanyang University (Korea) in 1980 and an M.S. degree from KAIST (Korea) in 1982, both in electrical engineering. In 1991 he received his Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin in Electrical and Computer Engineering. KiHo is IEEE Fellow and a member of the National Academy of Engineering of Korea.

Vicente San Miguel Maza is the Chief Digital Transformation Officer for Telefónica Corporation. Previously, he was GCPO of Telefónica Corporation, overseeing supply chain procurement for all Telefónica global requirements, including network, IT, services, devices, marketing and advertising. Prior to that, he was responsible for the network evolution of the entire Telefónica footprint, and also served as vice president of network development for Telefónica de España, where he actively participated in developing and deploying new broadband networks and services, including Imagenio (IPTV). Prior to Telefónica de España, he served as director of Telefónica Corporation and participated in the creation of the Advanced Purchasing System for the Telefónica Group, with global purchasing responsibilities for all wireline and wireless infrastructures in more than 30 Telefónica companies. He also has worked as director of technology and business development for private satellite networks at Telefónica Sistemas de Satélites in Europe and Latin America, and focused on telecommunications systems for enterprise customers at Telefónica Sistemas.

Vincent holds a degree in telecommunications engineering from the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid.

Jisung started his career at Samsung Electronics as a Communications Systems Engineer and worked in multiple business divisions including digital TV, mobile handset, and telecommunication networks. He led mmWave core technology development for 5G cellular network as vice president of engineering and contributed to the launch of Verizon’s 5G Home Internet using mmWave technology. He moved to the US in 2018 and joined ASSIA as vice president of wireless development in charge of cloud-based wireless network management. In December 2020, he co-founded PHYTunes with his Ph.D advisor, Prof. John Cioffi, and his colleagues from ASSIA and is introducing a wireless-wireline convergence technology that solves the indoor penetration problem of 5G and Wi-Fi. He received B.S. and M.S. degrees in control and instrumentation engineering from Seoul National University and a Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University.

Dominique is Managing Partner at Ginko Ventures and has been working in venture capital since 2001. Dominique focuses on investments in the internet, communication and cloud computing sectors, specializing in wireless technologies. Prior to venture capital, Dominique was Vice President of Marketing at 8×8, a Silicon Valley telecommunication company. Dominique joined 8×8 in 1999 as part of the acquisition of Odisei, a telecommunication start-up from Sophia Antipolis, France. Prior to Odisei, Dominique held various engineering and management positions at Logitech, a market leader in computer peripherals, including Vice President of the scanner and video camera business units.

Dominique received a BSc degree in Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications from the School of Business and Engineering Vaud, Switzerland and a MBA from Santa Clara University, California.

Alfredo Redondo, currently serving as CEO of Agile Content, an international leading provider of digital TV/OTT and video delivery solutions, has a long tenure working for Technological Companies.

His career started in Alcatel (now embedded within Nokia) as Development Engineer, then Product Manager, Country Manager for Argentina, Uruguay and Paraguay, COO for Latin America and Executive President for Iberia and Latin America. Then, he led as Executive President the merging between Alcatel and Lucent in Iberia. Worth to recall Alcatel-Lucent played an outstanding role in the first IPTV Deployments in Spain and worldwide during those days

After Alcatel-Lucent, Alfredo worked for a while for ASSIA contributing to the landing in the Telefonica Account in Iberia and Latin America, Then, two positions else as CEO. Amper (International IS/IT Integration and Development of solutions for Defense & Security) and Altitude Software (International Software Vendor providing solutions for Customer Engagement). In parallel with those positions as Executive Manager in those Large and Medium Technological Companies, Alfredo has been very active in contributing as advisor to other initiatives and indeed he is part today of some Advisory Boards besides ASSIA, such as Finenza, a Boutique Investment Bank. Very committed with the Sector, he has been Executive Member of the Spanish Associations AMETIC and Digitales

Engineer of Telecommunications (UPM, Spain) and a couple of master’s degrees in Communications by Satellite (IRET, France) and in Business Administration (IESE, Spain). Living in Countries such as Spain, France, Argentina and USA shaped his open mindset

Gregory L. Rosston is Director of the Public Policy program at Stanford University, Gordon Cain Senior Fellow at the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research, and Professor of Economics (by courtesy). Previously, Dr. Rosston served as Deputy Chief Economist at the Federal Communications Commission working on the implementation of the Telecommunications Act of 1996 and helped to design and implement the first ever spectrum auctions in the United States. In 2011, he was Senior Economist for Transactions for the Federal Communications Commission for the proposed AT&T – T-Mobile transaction. Also, he served as a member and co-chair of the Department of Commerce Spectrum Management Advisory Committee from 2010 – 2014. He has written extensively on the application of economics to telecommunications issues, and has served as a consultant to various organizations, including the World Bank and the Federal Communications Commission. Other roles include serving as a board member and advisor to high technology, financial, and startup companies in the areas of auctions, business strategy, antitrust, and regulation.

Dr. Rosston received his Ph.D. in Economics from Stanford University and his A.B. with Honors in Economics from University of California at Berkeley.

Stephen Unger is an experienced technologist and strategic thinker, who has worked in both the public and private sector. For many years, he was a Board member of Ofcom, the UK regulator responsible for digital communications where he had various responsibilities, including setting regulatory strategy for the UK, representing the UK in international negotiations, and leading their technology program. For a period, he was Acting Chief Executive. Before becoming a regulator, Mr. Unger spent several years in the private sector working for a variety of high-tech start-ups whose focus was the commercial exploitation of new wireless technologies. He has served as a non-executive Board member for several organizations. Some have been responsible for promoting international collaboration on public policy (BEREC, the IIC), others the commercial application of technology (Cambridge Wireless).

Stephen holds a MA in Physics from the University of Cambridge and a PhD in Radio Astrophysics from the University of Manchester.

Francesco Vatalaro is a full professor in Telecommunications at the University of Rome Tor Vergata, Rome, Italy, and holds more than 40 years of experience in the information and communications technology sector as an academic, consultant, and in the industry. Francesco graduated with full marks in Electrical Engineering from Bologna University in 1977. After an industrial experience, in 1987, he joined the university. Founder in 2001 of the RadioLabs Research Center, Rome, Italy, was the President of the Center till 2008. He was a member of the Scientific Committee of Thales Alenia Space (France-Italy), President of the Italian Authority for communications “Next Generation Network Committee,” President of the Italian Section of the IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), and member of the Strategic Committee of the IEEE Communications Society, Piscataway, New York. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE.