Advisory Board / Key Investors
Karen Barrett
Ms.
Barrett is a 25-year financial services veteran and is currently the president of
M2B Solutions. She is a former banking executive of Bank One (now JP Morgan Chase)
who specialized in developing innovative and patented products. Such products have
included the Merrill Lynch CMA account and the 401(k) credit card. Ms. Barrett managed
Bank One's dial terminal authorization service later adopted by Visa. She was the
senior managing director of Bank One's Institutional Trust Admin Division as well
as the senior vice president of the Huntington Bank proprietary mutual fund. Ms.
Barrett also developed the systems to support the first broker-managed ERISA accounts
for E. F. Hutton Trust Co. (Citigroup).
Top
William J. Benedict, Jr.
Mr.
Benedict is President of Alpine Meridian, an advisory and investment firm focused
on information services, Internet, financial services, and healthcare industries.
He is also managing partner of Resource Ventures, L.P., a venture capital fund that
invests in Internet media and technology businesses, and chairman of Reach Financial,
LLC, a specialty finance company. Prior to founding Alpine Meridian, Mr. Benedict
held management and trading positions with Societe Generale, including responsibility
for Societe Generale's U.S. National Banking Department. Prior to Societe Generale,
Mr. Benedict was a corporate lending officer with Chase Manhattan Bank in New York
and Tokyo. He was a co-founder of LaSalle Commodities, a futures investment fund,
and Realty Factors, Inc. a real estate finance firm. Mr. Benedict is a director
of Formtek, Directories, Inc., and Good Health Advertising.
Top
Jack W. Calabrese
Mr.
Calabrese began a distinguished four-decade career in 1965 with First National Bank
of Denver, acquired by First Interstate which included positions in lending, operations
and marketing. Mr. Calabrese managed the Cash Management business and, as Senior
Management Committee Member, represented all Bank Operations for the Denver Bank
as well as lead many areas for First Interstate Bank. In addition, Mr. Calabrese
was a member of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. Recruited by First Data
Corporation (FDC) in 1992, Mr. Calabrese held various positions helping the company
grow from under $1B to over $10B in annual revenue. Since his departure from FDC
in 2002, Mr. Calabrese has created retail and real estate businesses mentoring new
and seasoned entrepreneurs.
Top
Adam Coyle
Mr.
Coyle is an Operating Partner with Advent International, a global private equity
firm with extensive experience in the financial service and transaction processing
sectors. Prior to working with Advent, Mr. Coyle was at First Data Corporation where
he was President of First Data's Integrated Payment Systems group (IPS), a business
unit comprised of four distinct subsidiaries that focused on providing transaction
processing and risk-management services to financial institutions and their clients.
In addition to his position as President of IPS, Mr. Coyle served as the President
of First Financial Bank, First Data's limited-purpose banking subsidiary. His career
at First Data also included a variety of corporate roles, including Senior Vice
President of Strategic Business Development and General Counsel of Western Union
North America. He is a past board member of several corporations and was recently
reappointed by the Governor of Colorado to the State Banking Board, which oversees
state-chartered financial institutions in Colorado. Mr. Coyle also holds two U.S.
Patents on processes and technology related to payment disbursement systems.
Top
Lewis Gersh
Mr.
Gersh is the Managing Partner of Metamorphic Ventures, a venture capital firm he
founded that focuses on early stage ventures in the media and financial technology
sectors. Mr. Gersh is a Director and the Treasurer of Tranvia, Inc., a transaction
processing firm providing integrated Visa, MasterCard, gift card, customer loyalty
and e-commerce features, to smaller banks, Independent Sales Organizations and small
to medium-sized merchants nationwide; Reach Financial, a merchant lending company
specializing in advances to small merchants backed by their credit card volume;
IndustryBrains, Inc., a performance advertising network focused on the B2B market;
Fast Asset Corp., a computer industry asset recovery and logistics firm; Resource
Ventures, LP, a late stage private equity fund; Empire Media, Inc., an integrated
media publishing company; and the Pierce Law Center, a world leader in intellectual
property law. Mr. Gersh has founded several start-ups, secured many rounds of venture
capital and made a number of acquisitions and divestitures. Mr. Gersh has a law
degree and master’s degree in intellectual property law and is a member of the bar
of the State of New York.
Top
Geoff Judge
Mr.
Judge worked at American Express in the Card Division in several key roles including
VP and General Manager, Travel & Corporate Insurance Group and VP Marketing,
New Cardmember Group. He is a Venture Partner at iNovia Capital and Metamorphic
Ventures and sits on the board of Global Cash Access (NYSE: GCA). Mr. Judge is an
investor in early stage companies and an active member of The NY Angels. Mr. Judge
was the COO of Preclick, a Digital Photography software firm, an investor in IndustryBrains
(sold to Marchex Nasdaq: MCHX), Collective Media, Preclick, Payoneer, Hyperquality,
JiWire, Good Health Advertising, SchoolLoop and ReImage to name a few. Prior to
Preclick, he was the Chief Operating Officer of Media Solution Services Inc., the
market leader in credit card billing insert media and a subsidiary of Havas (Nasdaq:
HAVS). Prior to MSS, Mr. Judge was Senior Vice President & General Manager of
the Media Division at 24/7 Real Media, and a co-founder of the company. He was formerly
the President and Chief Operating Officer of Interactive Imaginations, one of the
three companies that merged to form 24/7 Media in 1997. Prior to joining Interactive
Imaginations, Mr. Judge was Vice President, Marketing for iMarket Inc., a venture-backed
software company.
Top
Vincent Passione
Mr.
Passione is CEO of Fynanz, an innovative web-based student lending/risk management
business for banks and credit unions. He is a financial services executive whose
specialty is building high growth technology based businesses. Mr. Passione was
the former Chief Operating Officer of DealerTrack, a credit portal that connects
car dealers to financing sources enabling the electronic submission of credit applications.
DealerTrack had a successful public offering in 2005 and today processes over 35%
of all auto finance loan applications in the U.S. Prior to DealerTrack, Mr. Passione
was President of Ameritrade's Institutional Client Division where he was responsible
for launching Ameritrade Connection, a clearing services platform for registered
investment advisors and independent broker/dealers. He is the former CEO of OnMoney.com,
an online personal financial management website enabling its customers to aggregate
all their financial services accounts into a single online statement. For the first
twelve months after its launch, OnMoney was in the top five most visited financial
websites with just under one million register users. Prior to OnMoney, Mr. Passione
held several senior level positions at Citigroup that included CTO of their U.S.
Consumer Bank and COO of CitiFinancial Interactive. He began his career at IBM.
Top