Business Advisory Board

Greg Martin

Greg is an executive, entrepreneur, engineer and scientist with over 20 years experience taking medical technologies from concept to bedside to commercialization in academic, start-up and corporate environments. He has held leadership roles in multiple medical device companies ranging from start-ups to publically-traded corporations including Hologic Inc., Hemedex Inc. and Cytec. Greg has a track record of success in executive management, team building, R&D, change/crisis management, product development, product launch, operations, clinical research, regulatory affairs, business development, manufacturing and marketing.

Alec Karys

Alec is a mentor to multiple startups including TechStars Boston companies as well as MassChallenge. He draws on his experience as CTO with mShopper and Senior Software Manager with Amazon, Inc. Prior career highlights included founding Synapse Ventures Group, VP of Product Development for McKesson/Interqual and 16 years with Data General. Alec Karys' areas of business focus include e-commerce, e-business, m-commerce, security, healthcare, speech IVR, mobile applications, SEO/SEM/Social Media . He holds an MBA from Northeastern University.

Robert Panoff, MBA

Bob Panoff founded RPM and has led its client engagements for ten years. He combines exceptional strategic planning and sales management abilities with a track record of operational excellence in the telecommunications market. His particular strength is assessing complex and uncertain market conditions, anticipating market changes, and developing comprehensive and actionable plans to take advantage of market changes. Bob started the Rhode Island Wireless Innovation Networks (RI-WINs) project with an ambitious vision of what community wireless networks could ultimately contribute to their communities. He was formerly vice-president of marketing for Excel Switching (1997-98), in sales and marketing with NMS Communications and VP/GM of NMS Europe. Bob holds a BA (Cum Laude) from Harvard University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Phil Holberton, MBA

Phil Holberton has broad experience in all aspects of business strategy, capital formation and general management. Companies in which he played a pivotal role include as CFO include BioSepra, Genome Therapeutics, Active Site, Protein Forest, MaxThera and Differential Proteomics. He served as Controller for Becton Dickinson for seven years. He is an experience coach and mentor serving on the advisory board of multiple startup companies. He is also Professor for Leadership, Business Communications and IT Strategy courses to Master level students at Brandeis University and coaches executives and management teams to the next level of performance.

Mike Putnam, MBA

Mike Putnam leads product for Jana, a mobile startup that is reinventing marketing in the developing world. Mike previously led mobile product management for TripAdvisor, the world's largest and most popular travel network. Previously Mike held various marketing, product development, and eBusiness roles at MARKEM Corporation (now the world's largest product identification and traceability company) and Amazon.com. Mike started his career as an eCommerce analyst at Forrester Research, where he wrote award winning research on global eCommerce, digital distribution, services on the Net, and Internet regulation. In this role Mike was broadly quoted in publications including The New York Times, Business Week, and USA Today, and he has since been quoted on innovation and entrepreneurship by the Wall Street Journal and NPR. In his spare time, he is also CEO of Zeer, the leading online grocery information resource for consumers. Zeer has been named a Top 50 website by Time and a top mobile website by PC World. Mike holds an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and a BS in Engineering from Stanford. With a strong interest in international development and the role of technology in improving human development, Mike also holds an MPA from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, where he worked on various projects with the Center for International Development.

Casey Santiago, MBA

Casey Santiago works at the crossroads of technology, global health and social enterprise. At Kiva.org, the first peer-to-peer microlending website, Casey served as Portfolio Manager, overseeing multi-million dollar debt investments in West African institutions, and then as Product Manager, overseeing software development for microfinance staff in 60+ countries. Casey has been a trusted advisor and consultant to global health organizations like GAVI, the Global Fund, Doctors Without Borders, Elizabeth Glaser Pediatric AIDS Foundation and the Institute for OneWorld Health. Earlier in her career as a Senior Consultant at Deloitte Emerging Markets Group, Casey focused on innovative financing, institutional capacity building and multisectoral partnerships to expand access to MCH and RH services in Africa and the Middle East. Casey graduated magna cum laude with a B.A. in Political Science from Wellesley College, and has a Masters in International Affairs and an MBA from Columbia University. She is fluent in French and has worked in Bangladesh, Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Morocco, Palestine, South Africa, Senegal, Tanzania, Togo and Zambia.

Hilary Mason

Hilary is a computer science professor with a background in machine learning, data mining, and web applications. She is currently Lead Scientist at Bitly, a rapidly growing software company that makes it easy for users to shorten and share URLs (web links). She is widely published and regularly speaks at academic and industry conferences, and recently realized her dream of delivering a talk on algorithms while drinking a dry ice martini. She is an enthusiastic developer and often releases code on her personal site.