B.J. Cassin

Mr. Cassin has been a venture capitalist for nearly 30 years. He was a financial founder in a number of public companies: Advanced Fibre Communications, Cadence Design Systems, Centex Telemanagement, Cerus Corporation, Endosonics Corporation, Equatorial Communications, Laserscope, Maxtor, Quantum Corporation, Quantum Health Resources, Racotek/Zamba, Scientific Microsystems, Stratacom, and Symphonix Devices. Financial founder in companies sold as private companies: CardioRhythm (Medtronic), Extricity (Peregrine Systems), Metricon (Johnson & Johnson), and Mountain Computer (Nakamichi).

Before becoming a venture capitalist, Mr. Cassin co-founded Xidex Corporation in 1969, which achieved Fortune 500 status in 1987 with sales of $752 million and employing 7,000 worldwide.

Mr. Cassin is Founder and Chairman of the Cassin Educational Initiative Foundation, launched in 2000, to establish private, college preparatory middle and high schools in economically-challenged communities throughout the country. He was a member of the Board of Trustees of Saint Mary's College of California, serving as Chairman from 1995–1999. He also served for three years on the Advisory Board of the Business School of Santa Clara University and was a Director of the Daper Investment Fund at Stanford University.

He currently serves on the Board of Cerus Corporation and several private companies.

Mr. Cassin is Chairman of the Foundation for Nativity and Miguel Schools, a board member of the Cristo Rey Network and FADICA, and is a member of the California Jesuit Province Investment Committee.

Mr. Cassin graduated from Holy Cross and is married, the father of five children, and resides in Los Altos Hills, California.

Bert Zaccaria

Mr. Zaccaria has been an entrepreneur, CEO, and valued-added board member in the Information Technology arena for more than 25 years.

He was a founder and CEO of Xidex Magnetics. One year after a successful IPO, Xidex Corporation, a Fortune 500 company, purchased Magnetics. He then went on to serve as COO and CEO of the combined companies until they were sold to Anacomp.

Anticipating the growth in optical storage technology, Mr. Zaccaria founded Triptych CD Corporation and served as its Chairman and CEO, The Company was acquired by AmericDisc.

Mr. Zaccaria served on the Board of Directors of Quinta Corporation, which was sold to Seagate. He was Chairman of Das Devices, which was sold to Applied Magnetics.

Mr. Zaccaria's accomplishments have been recognized by several organizations, including the Harvard Business School Alumni Association, which honored him with an Entrepreneur of the Year Award (shared); and Rochester Institute of Technology, who elected him Alumnus of the Year. He was also awarded personal and unit citations while serving off the coast of Vietnam as a Naval Officer.

Donald A. Lucas - Lucas Venture Group

A second generation venture capitalist, Don founded the RWI Group of funds in 1999, after successfully raising five different funds he has now created the Lucas Venture Group.

Don’s father, Donald L. Lucas was one of the first practicing venture capitalists in Silicon Valley. Don worked alongside his father for more than a decade as an associate and investor.

Don’s past and current investments include Khimetrics (acquired by SAP), Dexcom, Lightspeed International (acquired by Cisco), BlueArc, Turin Networks, Intraspect (acquired by Vignette), Infinera and Paracor Medical.

Don also serves on the Boards of the Silicon Valley Chapter of the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, the Richard M. Lucas Foundation, and is a member of the UCSF Diabetes Center Leadership Council. Don holds a B.A from Santa Clara University.

Kip Sheeline - Levensohn Venture Partners

Kip is a Managing Partner at Levensohn Venture Partners, where he focuses on the software, Internet and communications sectors. He is currently a director of BroadLogic and Capella, and until its recently completed acquisition by Microsoft, was a director of Rapt (NASD: MSFT).

Kip joined LVP in April 2002 from the Summit Accelerator Fund, which he co-founded in 1999 as a joint venture with Summit Partners. Kip led a number of SAF’s investments there, including Webex (NASD: WEBX/CSCO), MediaQ (NASD: NVDA), Postini (NASD: GOOG) and Rapt (NASD:MSFT). Prior to Summit, Kip spent 11 years at Hambrecht & Quist (“H&Q”) specializing in communications, software and Internet infrastructure. As Managing Director of the communications industry practice at H&Q, Kip was responsible for its investment banking activities related to communications and also served as the first Internet banker, with UUNet, Netscape and Network Solutions among his clients. He also led H&Q’s investments in Corsair Communications (NASD: CAIR/LTBG) and Navis (NASD: ZBRA), among others. Prior to H&Q, Kip was Managing Director, Technology Planning at PacTel Corporation (a unit of the Pacific Telesis Group) and worked in software development and international marketing at Oracle Corp., where he was one of the company’s earliest employees.

Kip received his BA and an MA in Computer Music from Stanford University and holds a Ph.D. in Psychoacoustics from Stanford Medical School.

Larry Schwerin - Capella, President and CEO

Larry brings more than 20 years of firsthand experience in telecommunications, technology, and venture capital to his role as President and CEO.

Most recently, Larry was General Partner at Vanguard Ventures where he sat on the Board of Directors at Capella. Larry was President and CEO of CenCom V, a venture/corporate sponsored business accelerator focused on the telecommunications market. Prior to CenCom V, Larry was founder and General Manager of Lucent Technologies' Wireless Broadband Networks Division, responsible for developing a market leadership position for wireless broadband services around the world. Larry spent twelve years at Bell Laboratories where he was Director of AT&T's Global Fiber Access Systems.

Larry graduated with highest honors with a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from Drexel University, and achieved highest honors with a Master in Science degree in Electrical Engineering from Cornell University.

Tom Unterman - Rustic Canyon Partners

Tom Unterman founded Rustic Canyon in 1999 after a long career as a corporate executive and prior to that, a corporate lawyer. He continues to serve as managing partner. From 1992 though 1999, he held several executive positions at the Times Mirror Company, most recently as its Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer. Prior to joining Times Mirror, Tom was a partner of the law firm of Morrison & Foerster LLP, which he joined after serving as a partner of Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP. He earned his bachelor's degree from Princeton University before receiving his law degree from the University of Chicago. Tom currently serves on the boards of the California Community Foundation, The Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, The Public Library of Science, Heal the Bay and Pacific Community Ventures.

Emeritus Board Member

Joseph E. Davis - Co-founder

The 30-year career of Joe Davis is one of combining imaginative technical innovation with sound business practices to set new industry standards. His areas of specialization have included wavelength selective switches, tunable lasers, magnetic and optical disk drives, as well as such related technologies as optical switches, micro-optics, and micro-machining.

Prior to his retirement, Joe served as the company's CEO from 2000-2004, and subsequently as the Chairman. He co-founded Capella in 2000. Preceding that, he was co-founder and interim COO of Iolon, a Seagate spinoff that focused on tunable lasers for telecommunications. In 1996, he co-founded Quinta Corporation and served as its CTO, where he co-invented a multi-disk data-storage architecture that combined the best features of magnetic and optical technologies. Quinta was sold to Seagate in 1997. Joe has also held senior executive positions with several successful public companies including Maxtor, Seagate, and SyQuest.

Joe received his MS and Ph.D. degrees in aeronautics, with a Ph.D. minor in business economics, from the California Institute of Technology. He holds 26 patents in the fields of optical subsystems, MEMS devices, and magneto-optical data storage and is the author of publications in several fields.