ASSIA Management
John M. Cioffi
CEO and Chairman of the Board, ASSIA
Dr. John Cioffi is a 30-year veteran of the DSL industry and sports numerous prestigious awards for his contributions to technology and industry. Prior to founding ASSIA in 2003, he served as founder, CTO and vice president of engineering at Amati before its acquisition by Texas Instruments. Dr. Cioffi held a tenured endowed professorship at Stanford University in the Department of Electrical Engineering from 1985-2009, where he is now an active Professor Emeritus with limited ongoing research efforts in broadband access. He has published over 400 papers and holds over 100 patents. Dr. Cioffi is a member of the United States National Academy of Engineering and an International Fellow of the United Kingdom Royal Society of Engineering. He is a winner of the The Economist Computing and Telecommunications Award (2010), IEEE Alexander Graham Bell Medal (2010), the IEEE Kobayashi Award (2001), and the Marconi Society's Marconi Prize (2006). He currently serves on the boards of Teranetics, ClariPhy, Vector Silicon, and Alto Beam. Dr. Cioffi holds a BSEE from the University of Illinois and a PhD in electrical engineering from Stanford University.
Philip Bednarz
Executive Vice President of Product Development
Dr. Bednarz comes to ASSIA from 2Wire where he was vice president of media engineering and vice president of software, playing a key role in that company's development of DSL gateways, multimedia set-top boxes, and management systems. Previously he was CEO of Netergy Microelectronics, a subsidiary of 8x8 Inc., and developed some of the world's first consumer voice and video-over-IP semiconductors and systems. Dr. Bednarz has a PhD and MS from Stanford University and BS from the University of Michigan, all in electrical engineering.
Tuncay Cil
Vice President of Business Development
Tuncay Cil joined ASSIA in 2012 and leads new channel development and sales activities. He brings a track record of innovation and revenue growth in the consumer electronics, mobile Internet and over-the-top video related new ventures. Mr. Cil comes to ASSIA from AirTies Wireless Networks, where he led the Wireless Networking and IPTV business units. Under his leadership, the business segments achieved significant growth, won several exclusive industry awards, and established a profitable customer base in Europe. Prior to AirTies, Mr. Cil held general management roles in both global public technology companies and venture-backed start-ups. Mr. Cil has an MBA from Yale University, where he was John M. Olin fellow, and a BS in Physics from Bilkent University, where he was a National Science Council Scholar.
Assia Cioffi
Executive Vice President
Ms. Assia Cioffi is a founding board member of the company, as well as the company’s namesake. Since 2003, she continues to oversee all aspects of ASSIA’s appearance, including the company logo, Web site, shareholder, investor, board, and advisory board meetings, and other company events worldwide. Ms. Cioffi created and fosters the company’s unique and beloved culture that emphasizes personal engagement, open communication among hard-working professionals, and an international, customer-focused orientation. A graduate of the École Internationale Élysées Marbeuf, Paris, Ms. Cioffi worked in a number of aesthetics positions in Paris prior to co-founding ASSIA, and in 2009 she was recognized for her contribution to and support for the Stanford University community.
Marc Goldburg
Executive Vice President and CTO
Marc Goldburg is a veteran of the telecommunications industry with extensive experience in technology development and partnerships, intellectual property management, standards, and regulatory matters. Mr. Goldburg is a technical founder and former CTO of ArrayComm, LLC, whose spatial processing technology is deployed worldwide in more than 275,000 wireless base stations. Later, as a consultant, he guided companies in the mobile satellite, digital television, and WiMAX carrier industries. His prior positions also include a staff position at MIT Lincoln Laboratory and a research position at Stanford University. Dr. Goldburg holds a PhD from Stanford, an MSEE from the University of Washington and a BSE from Princeton University, all in electrical engineering. He is a Fellow of IEEE and was recognized by Scientific American as its Communications Researcher of the Year in 2002.
Joe Grady
Vice President of Global Sales
Joe Grady brings over 30 years of experience in the development of high profile products and companies in the telecommunications and high tech industries. He also brings 30 years of relationships with the world's major service providers, the key target customers for ASSIA’s current and future products. During his distinguished career Mr. Grady has served as executive vice president of sales at Excess Bandwidth and Amati Communications. Earlier, he held sales management positions with Newbridge Networks, Racal Data Communications, Octel Communications, and AT&T Paradyne. Mr. Grady has a BS in Economics and Business Administration from Mount Saint Mary's University.
Noah D. Mesel
Executive Vice President of Corporate Affairs & General Counsel
Noah Mesel is responsible for overseeing all legal affairs of the company, and has more than 20 years of experience representing technology companies in Silicon Valley. Mr. Mesel advises senior management and the ASSIA board of directors on corporate governance, intellectual property protection, commercial and strategic licensing transactions, international business, dispute resolution and labor and employment matters. He previously served as general counsel at Corsair Components, Ikanos Communications, Riverstone Networks and Legato Systems, and was corporate counsel at Lucent Technologies, supporting their global outsourcing business unit. Mr. Mesel also practiced law for nine years at the Palo Alto law firm Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati. He holds a J.D. from the University of Virginia School of Law and a B.A., cum laude, from Claremont McKenna College.
Raymond K. Ostby
CFO and Vice President of Finance and Administration
Prior to joining ASSIA, Mr. Ostby served as CFO over a 25-year period for numerous high technology companies, including NextG Networks, Inc., a wireless telecommunications infrastructure company; Arraycomm, Inc, a provider of multi-antenna signal processing solutions; KBC Pharma, a pharmaceutical research company; Quickturn Design Systems, a provider of system-level semiconductor design verification solutions; Force Computers, a computer products company; and Atmel Corp, a manufacturer of semiconductor products. Previously, Mr. Ostby held several senior financial management positions at Intel Corp, a manufacturer of semiconductor products. He has served on the board of directors and as chairman of the audit committee of Trident Microsystems, Inc., a manufacturer of semiconductor products for the digital television market. Mr. Ostby has been a Certified Public Accountant, holds BA and MBA degrees from the University of Montana, and completed his PhD coursework in quantitative analysis at the University of California at Berkeley.
Steve Timmerman
Senior Vice President of Marketing
A seasoned executive with over 25 years of experience in communication technology companies, Steve Timmerman leads ASSIA's marketing initiatives. Prior to joining ASSIA, Mr. Timmerman was vice president of marketing for ShoreTel, the enterprise IP telephony company, where he directed all marketing activities, helped quadruple revenue over 4 years, and served as a core member of the successful 2007 IPO team. He served as vice president of marketing for Proxim, where he was responsible for marketing indoor and outdoor wireless networking products and building the company into a market leader. Mr. Timmerman also held several management positions at Octel Communications (the voice mail company) up through the acquisition by Lucent Technologies. Early in his career he worked with McKinsey in San Francisco and Europe. Mr. Timmerman holds a BS in mechanical and aerospace engineering from Princeton University and an MBA from Harvard University.
Steve Welch
Senior Vice President of Opportunity Development
Steve Welch is responsible for ASSIA’s commercial agreements with customers and acts as chief negotiator for these contracts. Mr. Welch retired from AT&T in 2006 as a senior executive vice president. Mr. Welch spent 16 years as the chief procurement officer for SBC (Ameritech, Southwest Bell, Pacific Telesis), where he architected a centralized, world-class supply chain management organization through a series of successive mergers, achieving best-in-class results including over $6 billion in cost reduction. Mr. Welch was recognized for his excellence in procurement including: Buyer-of-the-Year, Electronic Buyer's News; "Top 20 Voices for Quality in the 21st Century," Quality News (2001); Executive-of-the-Year by the Economic Development Council of Los Angeles; Ron Brown Award from U.S. Commerce Department for leadership and diversity (2002); Corporation-of-the-Year by the National Minority Supplier Development Council (2001). He is a member of Accenture's Executive Advisory Board for Procurement Solutions and also serves as an executive advisor to the Board of Directors for QuEST Forum, a global telecom industry quality organization he founded in 1998. He is the principal of Value Propositions, LLC, a consulting firm specializing in supply chain management. Mr. Welch holds a BA from Harvard University, an MS from San Diego State University, and is a graduate of the Executive Program at University of Virginia Business School.