Sylvan Source Directors
Brief BiographiesLaura Demmons - Robert J. Frankenberg - Lawrence H. Dubois - James P. Simmons, Jr. - Roger H. Goodspeed
Laura Demmons, Chairman
Laura Demmons is a founder and CEO of Sylvan Source, and a 20-year veteran with a successful track record of growing teams and businesses. Ms. Demmons has been an entrepreneur in the "CleanTech" industry since 2001.
Ms. Demmons started her career in sales with Eastman Kodak and then joined Hewlett-Packard in 1988. She spent 12 years with Hewlett-Packard in a variety of business management positions in technology areas ranging from high speed cable modem and interactive television infrastructures to PCs, servers and storage.
Prior to becoming a CleanTech entrepreneur, Ms. Demmons was CEO for TDC-The Design Company, a marketing and product design firm.
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Robert J. Frankenberg
Bob Frankenberg currently chairs Kinzan, a leading provider of internet services platforms. Mr. Frankenberg was the chairman, president and CEO of Encanto Networks when the company's major business was sold to Avaya in July 2000. Prior to Encanto, Mr. Frankenberg was the chairman and CEO of Novell, the world's largest networking software company and corporate vice president & group general manager of Hewlett-Packard's Personal Information Products Group. Mr. Frankenberg joined Hewlett-Packard in 1969 as a manufacturing technician, later became a design engineer, software engineer, project manager, engineering and marketing executive and general manager.
Mr. Frankenberg serves as a member of the board of directors of public companies ElectroGlas, National Semiconductor, Nuance Communications, and Secure Computing, as well as private companies BroadWeave, Digital Bridge, Kinzan and Sylvan Source. He also serves on the advisory board of the Sundance Film Festival and is a member of the Westminster College Board of Trustees.
Mr. Frankenberg is widely published, a frequent public speaker and holds several computer design patents. He has received numerous awards including the Air Force Commendation Medal, Smithsonian Jefferson Scholar, Distinguished Utahan, and SJSU College of Engineering Distinguished Graduate. He was recently inducted into the Silicon Valley Engineering Hall of Fame.
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Lawrence H. Dubois
Dr. Dubois is corporate vice president and head of the Physical Sciences Division of SRI International where he leads a group of over 160 scientists and engineers focusing on the development and commercialization of technologies impacting a broad range of important problems including energy, environment, healthcare, national security and transportation. Before joining SRI, Dr. Dubois was the director of the Defense Sciences Office at DARPA and a distinguished member of technical staff at AT&T Bell Laboratories. Dr. Dubois received his BS degree in Chemistry from MIT and a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley. He is the author of over 130 publications and holds numerous U.S. and foreign patents. His many honors include the prestigious IR100 and Alpha Chi Sigma awards as well as the Office of the Secretary of Defense Award for Outstanding Achievement and the Secretary of Defense Medal for Outstanding Public Service.
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James P. Simmons, Jr.
Mr. Simmons has over 28 years of operating experience in high technology firms and served as an Entrepreneur in Residence for Draper Richards, an early stage venture capital firm, before co-founding Simmons Goodspeed Investment Management in 2006. He is a board member at Sylvan Source and LucidPort, and has served as a board observer at WiDeFi and Nusym, all privately held firms. Mr. Simmons served as Vice President, Marketing and Sales and Vice President, Marketing at Conductus and Superconductor Technologies from 1994 until 2002. In 2000, the market capitalization for Conductus exceeded $1.3 Billion.
Previously, Mr. Simmons was Product Marketing and Applications Manager at Therma-Wave Inc. (now part of KLA-Tencor); Vice President, Marketing and Sales at Nanometrics; and Product Marketing Manager at KLA Instruments. He began his career by holding a variety of marketing and manufacturing management positions in wireless semiconductors and computers at Hewlett-Packard.
Mr. Simmons received a BS in Applied Physics with Honors from the California Institute of Technology and an MBA from the Harvard Business School. He is a member of the Board of Directors of the Caltech Alumni Association, of which he is a lifetime member. He is also a member of the VC Private Equity Roundtable and Northern California Harvard Business School Association.
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Roger H. Goodspeed
Prior to co-founding Simmons Goodspeed Investment Management in 2006, Mr. Goodspeed served in various roles at Lehman Brothers Inc., a major investment banking firm, for over 28 years. He joined Lehman Brothers in 1974 and became a Managing Director in 1984. During his tenure at Lehman Brothers he served as a Sector Head, with senior management responsibility for several investment banking groups, including Utilities, Telecommunications, Energy, Healthcare, Transportation, and Project Finance, and as the Chief Administrative Officer of the Mergers and Acquisitions Department. He was also as a member of the Operating Committee of the Investment Banking Division.
In 1994 Mr. Goodspeed became the first Chairman of Citizens Lehman Power, an electric power marketing joint venture 50% owned by Lehman Brothers, and continued in that role until the joint venture was sold in 1997 and changed its name to Citizens Power LLC. He served on the Board of Directors of Citizens Power from 1997 until 2000 and on the Board of Directors of Peabody Energy (NYSE: BTU), which acquired Citizens Power, from 1998 until 2003. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of Sylvan Source and eLOT, Inc.
Mr. Goodspeed received a BS in Mechanical Engineering with Honors from the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) in 1972 and his MBA from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management, where he was awarded a Carter Fellowship, in 1974. He is currently a member of the Board of Directors and the Executive Committee of the Caltech Associates and was formerly a member of the Board of Directors of the Caltech Alumni Association, of which he remains a lifetime member.
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