Vadim Akselrod

vadim@vadim.com
(650) 804-5617

62 Coronado Ave.
San Carlos, CA 94070

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• Leader: Identified, recruited and led teams of one to 37 engineers: team vision, goals, technology, personnel, project, outsourced coordination and employee career development.
• Technologist: Architected and developed innovative solutions using open-source (LAMP), Java, and Microsoft stacks. Significant work with presentation components, databases, system management and middle-ware.
• Usability Specialist: Worked with over a dozen companies to create and/or improve product user interfaces. Founded BayCHI-Web, a 400+ member usability professional organization. Conducted over 30 usability studies.
• Entrepreneur: Led development of new product leading to $50M buyout of Business Signatures by Entrust. Co-founded the leading web-based real estate ASP, raised >$20M from Sequoia and Softbank, and led engineering until the company’s sale to Primedia. Founded a usability / internet consulting firm.

Lead the engineering team building applications for real-time fraud detection, monitoring, prevention, and reporting for large transactional web sites. Responsible for the application’s vision, interface, architecture, and external interfaces.

• Instrumental to company’s $50M sale to Entrust by architecting and leading design and development of new product (for authentication) that was the key in getting market attention.
• Transitioned development from complete off-shore to in-house and off-shore blend (recruited / trained team).
• Shipped three major releases of the application suite – growing the customer base 300% in one year.
• Software developed using primarily a Java stack on top of Oracle 10i.

Built and led a three-person team focused on user interfaces for the fastest growing comparison shopping web site.

• Personally developed interfaces to launch company into new $1m+/yr market segment.
• Site developed using Java, Oracle 9i, XML, and heavy DHTML.

Architected, designed, and led implementation of a web-based systems/network management system for Amphus' hardware platform. The success of the software led the company to abandon its hardware focus to become a software company to enable faster growth, moving me from a consulting to full-time role.

• Software developed using C++, Microsoft IIS, MySQL / SQLServer, DHTML.

Co-founded the leading ASP for back-office automation for residential real estate property owners and managers.

• Recruited and hired key employees.
• Launched months ahead of competition, released new features every 6 weeks, secured several partnerships.
• Led company through three rounds of financing (>$20m from Sequoia and Softbank) and from two employees to over 70, managing 37 in engineering until the company’s acquisition by Primedia.
• Filed two critical patents - overall business process and SurfAlong® aggregation technology.
• Site developed in Oracle 8i, Java / EJB, Perl, DHTM. Fully redundant and tested to scale at >400 simultaneous connections.

Founded an internet consulting company with emphasis on user interfaces and intranet management software.

• Evolved it into advising high technology companies in all aspects from usability and technology to funding and structure.
• Grew the company to 8 employees while remaining profitable.

Example projects include:

Select New SoftWare clients in chronological order include:

• Sports Futures - As interim CTO, led technology and management with significant contributions in business development and financing.
• Hewlett Packard - Led team that implemented database-driven internal sales training web site.
• Time Periodicals - Architected and led implementation of two magazine web sites, instrumenting a content management system.
• The Dialog Corporation - Designed, prototyped, usability tested, and set up team to implement version 2.0 of DialogWeb information retrieval product.
• Network Equipment Technologies - Architected web-based network management system, taught class on Java, led team to implement it.
• GetThere (formerly Internet Travel Network) - Conducted usability studies, designed improved interface for leading travel site, leading to dramatic increase in user satisfaction and Gomez top site award.
• CustomerCast - Led design of front end to present customer survey results on the web.
• Proactive Networks - Created company web site, instrumented content management self-service tools.
• Seagate Technology - Defined web-based interface features for software division.

Led three teams developing network management applications including usability analysis and feature scoping. After acquisition by Seagate Software, was responsible for unifying user interfaces from heterogeneous products developed by their 10+ companies to provide a common look and feel.

• Managed project and product planning, implemented to specifications, and presented to customers and analysts and at industry trade shows.
• Headed the development of a cross-platform launcher application.
• Wrote common user interface guidelines and specifications.
• Led multi-site team of technical leads, integrated input from multiple divisions, and communicated results.
• Developed cross-platform applications using C/C++, Perl and Java.

Planned, coordinated, and participated in the development of a GUI for a telecommunications network management program. Resolved and implemented design issues, led 8-person development team, and managed 4-person software test team.

• Software developed in C/C++ for X/Motif.

Developed theoretical foundation and implemented software to manage the evolution of process and product design. System featured automated design configuration management, revision control, maturity tracking, and user access control. Written in C++.

Established and implemented system policy, developed applications and customized programs for a medical manufacturing facility.

• Set up and maintained a Digital VAX Cluster.
• Managed a network of a VAX, IBM PCs, and Apple Macintoshes.
• Programmed for and supported 12 users of the UniGraphics CAD/CAM system.

• Founder and Organizer, ACM CHI’s Bay Area Computer Human Interaction Web BoF
• CTO Forum Advisory Member, InfoWorld Magazine
• Co-founder and Director of Technology, Silicon Alley Entrepreneurs Club

Fluent in Russian with some background in Spanish. Interests include ultimate frisbee, travel, food and wine, games, music, drama, fiction and philosophy.