Governance
Board of Directors
Andy Green (Executive Chairman)
Andy is a Non-Executive Director of ARM Holdings plc, the world’s leading microprocessor IP Company, and Chairman of npGroup, offering technical resourcing services in Europe and Asia.
He also chairs the Connected Digital Economy Catapult, which was set up in 2012 to ignite digital innovation in the UK and e-skills UK (the Sector Skills Council for Business and Information Technology). He is President of UK Space, co-chair of the UK Space Leadership Council, a CBI Board member, a trustee of ABESU, and is a Companion of the Chartered Management Institute.
He was Chief Executive Officer and a member of the Board of Logica from January 2008 to August 2012. Prior to joining Logica, Andy was a Board member at BT plc and CEO of Group Strategy and Operations. During his 21 years at BT Andy held several senior positions, including that of CEO, BT Openworld. From 2001 to 2007 he was CEO of BT Global Services. He has served on boards in Europe, Asia and the US, including, until July 2008, the board of Navteq Inc. He began his career with Shell and subsequently joined Deloitte Haskins & Sells. He holds a degree in Chemical Engineering from Leeds University.
Gunnar Walstam (Founder)
Gunnar Walstam is an experienced global investor and business developer with 30 years of successfully founding, growing and transforming companies across the world. He has been involved in all aspects of commercialising disruptive technologies in life sciences and other high tech industries.
After a career at Bain & Co and Ericsson, he founded Bactiguard in 1990, which he, over a 15 year period grew into the world’s leading antibacterial coating company. He successfully exited Bactiguard in 2006 through a sale to a US hedge fund. He was an early investor in Wayfinder (precursor to GoogleMaps, sold to Vodafone), SWE-DISH (satellite technologies, sold to Rockwell Collins) and Jolife (Lucas Chest Compression systems, sold to Medtronic).
He is a Board member and advisor to various high tech start up companies such as iZettle and Helperby Therapeutics. In addition, he served as an advisory Board member at Sandvik AB.
Dr. Gregory Poilasne (Director)
Gregory has over 17 years of telecommunications expertise, spanning technology development, marketing, sales and customer support, and business operations. Before DockOn, Gregory was VP Business Development for a high tech telecom equipment start up company in California, where he grew licensing revenue from companies across the world.
He also served as Director of Advanced Development and Product Definition for Kyocera handset business and was co-founder of Ethertronics, a VC-funded antenna startup. Gregory holds a PhD from Univ. of Rennes, France and an MBA from the Wharton School, U. Penn.
Michael Albisser (CFO)
Michael has worked for more than 20 years in the finance area. He joined DockOn in July 2013, and is based in the offices of DockOn AG in Zürich, Switzerland.
For more than a decade he has been acting CFO of the controlling unit of a multi-billion dollar Single Family Office in Europe, where he was responsible for the group-wide accounting activities.
Michael is familiar with running complex structures in different tax regimes. Extensive experience in accounting, controlling and reporting of investments in all asset classes, including Private Equity, Hedge Funds, industrial and agricultural ventures – as well as co-leading efficiency-driven developments of ERP applications allowing him to quickly adapt to new challenging situations. He holds a Master’s degree in Finance from the University of Zürich.
Christopher Smith (Director)
Christopher Smith was a Partner of Cazenove & Co. for 19 years, and subsequently a Managing Director – Corporate Finance of JPMorgan Cazenove, a joint venture company formed with JPMorgan Chase in 2005. He retired from JPMorgan Cazenove in 2008.
He is Chairman of The Law Debenture Corporation, a provider of independent fiduciary services and an investment trust, which is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index. He is also a non-executive director of CG Asset Management, of Helperby Therapeutics Limited and is a Trustee of Allchurches Trust Limited, the parent company of Ecclesiastical Insurance Office.
Erik van Kaathoven (Director)
18 years in private equity, management consulting and executive management of technology and services companies. Prior roles include: CSO of Rebus, a software firm backed by Warburg Pincus and General Atlantic, MD Business Services of Xchanging, a FTSE listed outsourcing business, Venture Partner at Antfactory, a tech incubator, and various roles at Yokogawa Electric in Tokyo.
Erik is CEO of Metellus, a Swiss venture capital firm focused on early stage technology and life sciences and serves on the board of several portfolio companies in Europe and the US. He studied Applied Physics and Business at Delft University of Technology and Leading Change & Organizational Renewal at Stanford Graduate School of Business.
Management Team
DockOn’s management team brings a rare combination of groundbreaking technical expertise as well as savvy business acumen to the company. Taken together, they bring many decades of hands-on serial success in launching and building great companies. Their passion is to create true breakthrough solutions that always increase their customers’ product value, decrease their costs and simplify their business processes.
Dr. Gregory Poilasne (CEO)
Gregory has over 17 years of telecommunications expertise, spanning technology development, marketing, sales and customer support, and business operations. Before DockOn, Gregory was VP Business Development for a high tech telecom equipment start up company in California, where he grew licensing revenue from companies across the world.
He also served as Director of Advanced Development and Product Definition for Kyocera handset business and was co-founder of Ethertronics, a VC-funded antenna startup. Gregory holds a PhD from Univ. of Rennes, France and an MBA from the Wharton School, U. Penn.
Michael Albisser (CFO)
Michael has worked for more than 20 years in the finance area. He joined DockOn in July 2013, and is based in the offices of DockOn AG in Zürich, Switzerland.
For more than a decade he has been acting CFO of the controlling unit of a multi-billion dollar Single Family Office in Europe, where he was responsible for the group-wide accounting activities.
Michael is familiar with running complex structures in different tax regimes. Extensive experience in accounting, controlling and reporting of investments in all asset classes, including Private Equity, Hedge Funds, industrial and agricultural ventures – as well as co-leading efficiency-driven developments of ERP applications allowing him to quickly adapt to new challenging situations. He holds a Master’s degree in Finance from the University of Zürich.
Patrick Rada (CTO)
Patrick has more than 20 years of professional experience in Electronic R&D, Wireless/RF and project management for consumer and professional markets. Lately he was co-founder and CTO at Geneva CleanTech, a startup active in the Clean Tech industry.
Previously Patrick served as Director of Wireless Engineering and Innovation at NETGEAR where he led the wireless team developing and introducing dozens of high performance 802.11a, b, g, n wireless routers to markets. He won 6 “Best Product” awards at CES; including RangeMax™ technology.
Patrick’s academic credentials include an MS-EE from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology of Lausanne, EPFL, and a BS-EE from the Engineer School of Geneva, EIG, both in Switzerland.
Anita Nielsen (VP Sales & Business Development, Americas & EMEA)
With 15+ years experience in High Tech companies in Silicon Valley, Anita Kjøller Nielsen brings broad experience from various International Sales Management, Business Development and Marketing roles in early stage startups, high growth companies and large corporations. Anita comes to DockOn from the Innovation Centre Denmark Silicon Valley where she was in charge of foreign direct investments within CT. Previously; she had joined the executive management team of an early stage start-up, LitePoint Corp. As VP Marketing, Anita first led the launch of what became the flagship product, the world’s first one-box-tester, and then moved to Sales to build both direct and channel sales in EMEA from scratch to a level that supported the establishment of the European Headquarters. Teradyne acquired LitePoint in 2011. Before LitePoint, she held various management roles in smaller startups as well as marketing at Cisco Systems. Anita holds a Master’s Degree in International Business from University of Southern Denmark.
Ryan Orsi (VP Tools & Services)
Ryan Orsi is from California’s San Francisco/Palo Alto area and has over eleven years of experience in the wireless and information technology/software industry. To achieve company objectives, he has led teams of many disciplines such as: engineering, sales, marketing, business development, R&D, and software development. Early in his career as VP Operations at Specialized Services & Consulting, in the IT/Professional Services field, Ryan developed one of the first successful Managed Service Provider (MSP) businesses spanning Nevada and northern CA. At Specialized, he consulted as CIO to law firms, medical practices, general contractors, and manufacturing equipment suppliers. Ryan has over ten years experience in creating and managing new software and web application businesses for various industry verticals such as Electronic Medical Records (EMR), e-commerce, finance, wireless device design and testing, general construction, and industrial equipment. After Specialized, Ryan consulted to an early stage RF technology start-up, RF Maxlabs, where he built an antenna engineering team, lead the IP strategy, developed business processes for growth, and co-invented a .NET software tool to speed up antenna design time up to 10x. He holds a high distinction Electrical Engineering Degree from the University of Nevada, Reno and a Master’s Degree in Business Administration.
About Us
Our team brings a rare combination of groundbreaking technical expertise as well as savvy business acumen to the company.