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We build transformative technology to save lives
We don't believe in limits - we believe in inventing the expansion of what is possible to transform lives.
Honesty and transparency of everything we do is the only way we can truly transform the lives of millions annually.
Our most important asset is our team and the quirks, passions, and beliefs that collectively compose who we are and our shared mission.
Our Team
After personally witnessing the challenges of our existing emergency communications infrastructure, our team formed RapidSOS with the mission of transforming emergency communication. We are dedicated to harnessing cutting edge technology to change the outcomes of millions of emergencies across the United States and globally.
Michael Martin
Michael Martin is a leading voice on public safety,
personal security, and technology innovation. Michael has
spoken before federal agencies and at top industry events
on innovation, technology, safety, and security. Michael
is co-founder and CEO of RapidSOS, an advanced emergency
tech start-up, commercializing technology to predict and
preempt emergencies before they occur, dynamically warn
people in harm's way, and ensure that first responders are
one touch away globally.
Michael's personal experiences around the challenges of emergency communication led him to found RapidSOS in 2013. In 2012, Michael was followed home one night in Harlem, NYC, when he realized how difficult it is to get help when you need it most. More recently, Michael's father fell off the roof of his childhood home while trying to clear snow. For nearly two hours, Michael's father lay in the frozen driveway with a broken wrist and shattered hip, unable to reach 911 from his cell phone. It wasn't until Michael's mother came home from work and was able to dial 911 from the home's landline phone that an ambulance was called.
Michael brings extensive experience in start-up commercialization, financing, and strategy to RapidSOS. Previously, Michael worked at Braemar Energy Ventures, a New York-based firm with over $600 million AUM, focused on both traditional and alternative energy industries, as well as efficiency-related IT areas. Michael also co-founded MS Consulting, a start-up strategy, financing, and operations consulting company with clients in the internet and mobile sectors. Between Braemar and MS Consulting, Michael served as a Board Member or Board Observer for eight companies in four countries. Before Braemar, Michael worked at Piper Jaffray in the Clean Technology Group. In the course of his principal investing activities and advisory work, Michael assisted nearly 50 companies commercialize their technologies, helping them secure in excess of $2 billion of capital.
Michael holds an MBA with High Distinction from Harvard Business School, where he received the R.F. Jasse Distinguished Award in Entrepreneurship and Leadership (top entrepreneurship award for class of 2015) and was named one of the "World's Best & Brightest MBAs" and one of the top two HBS '15 graduates by Poets & Quants. Michael received his BA Summa Cum Laude from Carleton College, where he was a Rhodes Scholar Finalist. In 2017, Michael was named to the top of Forbes 30 Under 30 Healthcare list.
Michael has published pieces in a variety of media outlets, including the Washington Post, has been featured on the homepage of MIT and across national media including The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Newsweek, Fox News, TechCrunch, New Scientist, Smithsonian Magazine, and Popular Mechanics.
Nick Horelik, PhD
Nick first experienced the challenges of locating individuals in emergencies while manning the suicide prevention
hotline at Tufts University during college. These experiences led Nick to co-found RapidSOS to ensure that technology was never an
impediment to emergency response.
Nick brings deep expertise in full-stack software development and experience leading teams for the simulation of complex nuclear systems as part of his work at two national labs, a Gates-backed start-up, and his research at MIT. Nick holds a BSc in Chemical Engineering with a minor in Mandarin Chinese from Tufts, as well as a MSc and PhD in Nuclear Engineering with a minor in Entrepreneurship from MIT. Nick has produced numerous publications in peer-reviewed journals, international conference proceedings, and DOE technical reports, and is one of the core developers of the leading MIT "BEAVRS" PWR benchmark as well as the OpenMC open-source neutron transport code (today one of the most active open-source Fortran projects on Github). Over the course of his dissertation work, Nick has worked at the Oak Ridge and Argonne National Laboratories and developed highly-optimized parallel algorithms for nuclear reactor simulations on the Titan and Mira supercomputers. Previously, he also worked at TerraPower, a Bill Gates and Khosla Ventures funded company. In addition, Nick managed two computer clusters in MIT datacenters in support of the MIT Computational Reactor Physics Group, and has served as lead web architect for several high-profile student organizations, including the 2013 International American Nuclear Society Conference held at MIT.
Henry Katz
Henry is an accomplished software architect and development leader, bringing nearly 30 years of software, telecommunications, and VoIP experience to RapidSOS.
Before joining RapidSOS as the VP of Engineering, Henry founded Korrent Corporation - a disruptive Connected Health business. Henry recruited, assembled, and led his engineering team to create a connected health platform to help organizations and patients with disease management.
Prior to founding Korrent Corporation, Henry was a Software Architect and Senior Software Manager for Oracle. There, he was responsible for strategy, architecture, and development of mobile applications and secure communication services and products.
Henry joined Oracle after they were acquired by Acme Packet (for $2.1B) where Henry was an early employee who led several of Acme Packet's key products in the VoIP space. Additionally, Henry was involved in architecture, design, and implementation of secure tunneling technologies and products, including highly scalable Servers and Client SDKs on Android, iOS, Windows, and more. Acme Packet was acquired by Oracle after a successful IPO.
Prior to Acme Packet, Henry was an early employee and VoIP pioneer at Starent Networks (a venture backed startup acquired by Cisco for $2.9B ). At Starent Networks, Henry developed the Fast Path system software for the distributed mobile data management platform that allows high speed mobile internet.
Prior to Starent Networks, Henry joined Lucent Technologies as a technical lead and manager after Lucent acquired Ignitus Communications (for $240M). Before the acquisition, Henry was a Sr. Software Engineer at Ignitus Communications where he developed a number of components of highly available system software.
Prior to Ignitus Communications, Henry was a Sr. Engineer at Synernetics and then at 3Com after 3Com acquired Synernetics. There, Henry worked on Network Microprocessor/ASIC development - the largest and most advanced Network Processing Chipset at the time. The CoreBuilder 3500 (switch/router) has brought in more than $300M of direct revenue.
Prior to 3Com, Henry was a Senior Engineer at C-Port Corporation (a venture backed startup acquired by Motorola) where he worked on the industry leading programmable Network Processor, Compiler and SDK.
Prior to C-Port, Henry worked as an Engineer at Data General where he developed operating software for the highly scalable NUMA computer architecture products.
Henry has a MSc and BSc in Electrical Engineering from the University of Rhode Island and a BSc in Mathematics from Gomel Technical University where he authored scientific papers in the area of Large System Stability. Henry has many patents pending for VOIP, Lawful Intercept, Security, FIPS, DISA, and Call Recording technologies in the U.S. and internationally.
Brian Evans
Brian is a Software Quality Assurance Professional with 16 years in testing methodologies and project management in fast
paced environments. Throughout his career, he has spearheaded test strategies for new software projects that increased
testing efficiency, analysis, and reporting capabilities, and provided software quality expertise throughout the project
Before coming to RapidSOS, Brian was an early employee at Acme Packet and then for Oracle after they acquired Acme Packet. He led the testing of the core features of various Acme products, including the testing of the IMS architecture products. With Oracle, he was manager and team lead for a SQA team, designing and developing a new testing infrastructure for both hardware and software testing.
Previously, he was a SQA engineer with Telica, and then for Alcatel Lucent after they acquired Telica,which provides broadband switching systems for wireline and wireless carriers and enables carriers to simplify network architecture and optimize the switching and transport of voice and data traffic over a unified broadband packet network.
Brian graduated from Syracuse University with a BS in computer engineering. He was a member of the University's track team.
Kaiying Liao
Kaiying joins RapidSOS from the Human Computer Interaction Group at Microsoft Research Asia in Beijing, China. During her work with Microsoft,
Kaiying completed her masters thesis on mobile systems for pronunciation analysis that aid students in second language learning. In addition,
she prototyped software that presents visual media on large displays and tablets to aid meetings and discussions in a non-linear fashion with
the incorporation of annotations and multi-gesture touch screen interactions.
Prior to working at Microsoft, she interned at NASA Jet Propulsion Lab, where she contributed to an interface that monitored activity of Mars Curiosity during cruise operations and provided visualizations of the information streams for easy comparison. Later, an interest in gesture interaction led her to an internship at Hadron Industries where she worked with 3D in-air gesture computer interfaces to detect intentional user mode switching.
Kaiying has a MEng and a BS in Computer Science and Engineering from MIT.
Gabe Mahoney
Gabe is a veteran iOS developer with over seven years of experience building robust, award-winning applications.
Prior to joining the RapidSOS team, he worked for five years as a developer on KAYAK's mobile team, bringing the KAYAK app from an
experiment to an indispensable travel tool used by millions - one that he still uses frequently.
At KAYAK, he worked on nearly every aspect of the iOS app at various points. Highlights include building comprehensive trip management tool, and creating an iPad version of the KAYAK app that was available in the app store the same day the iPad was released.
After six years at KAYAK, Gabe left to travel the world and develop apps as a freelancer. He took two client applications from the brainstorming phase to the App Store, re-immersed himself in the world of web development for a third client, and got some face time with a group of mountain Gorillas in the Virunga mountains in eastern Rwanda.
Early on, Gabe's interest in video games led to a curiosity about how those games worked. He found an opportunity to study this in high school, and continued this study at Dartmouth College, where he graduated in 2008 with a BA in Computer Science.
A four year member Dartmouth's lightweight rowing team, Gabe's 2007 varsity 8+ won the prestigious Eastern Sprints while setting a course record that still stands as of press time.
Outside of rowing and writing code, Gabe enjoys traveling, skiing, and listening to podcasts.
Josias Sena
Josias is a self taught developer with a passion for Android development. He brings to RapidSOS experience in various fields,
ranging from systems admin to web development.
Prior to joining RapidSOS, Josias was an Android Developer at Bytemark, a leader in providing mobile ticketing technologies to the transit industry. Josias was responsible for building multiple transit agency applications and re-architecting legacy code by using the industry best common practices and the latest and best tools and techniques. Josias was also responsible for architecting and building transit applications from the ground up for major cities across the United States, Canada, and the United Kingdom.
Prior to Bytemark, Josias was a technical project manager at Mobile Programming, LLC, where he was responsible for delivering multiple half million dollar projects (web, mobile and server side) against agreed scope, budget, schedule and client expectations. Josias did all this while simultaneously supervising, directing and motivating multiple teams of multi-discipline developers and QA specialists.
At the age of 14, Josias started writing code, mostly BASH scripts, and later moved on to web development. His first program was a simple piece of desktop software that he used to keep track of the usernames and passwords for his online accounts with a master password.
Before Josias got his first development job, he had already built 9 mobile applications on his own and over a dozen websites for others as a freelancer. He jump started his career as an Android Developer by joining a Spanish company called Microarea, a software development company that mainly provides case management software for lawyers. Josias was Microarea's third employee in the U.S. and their first Android developer. Josias was responsible for managing a team of developers to build what was already a desktop software into a mobile version.
Josias attended Lehman College. During his last semester he joined the school's annual Hackathon - an event where schools from all over New York City got together to compete for a major prize. As the only developer in his team, Josias carried his team to 3rd place while every other team in the tournament had 3 or 4 developers.
Josias thinks fried green plantains is the second best thing in the world. The first best thing is fried green plantains and beer.
In his free time he is either reading up on the latest news in Android development, working on his own projects, or simply spending time with his family.
John Hinton
John comes to RapidSOS from Bytemark, Inc., an
innovative mobile platform for payments and
ticketing. At Bytemark, John maintained a
clean, well designed architecture for both
mobile apps and an SDK available to third party
developers. Additionally, John leveraged 3rd
party libraries to create a native android
experience that is both reliable and innovative.
Prior to Bytemark, John worked as a software developer for Suncoast Social, a digital marketing agency in Sarasota, FL. There, John assisted in designing and implementing REST APIs for mobile and web and developed bluetooth mobile technology for Alakai Defense Systems. John attended the State College of Florida-Manatee-Sarasota where he received an Associate of Science in Computer Programming. John enjoys visiting the beaches in Florida and barbecuing.
Chris Lin
Chris brings a background in mobile development that spans over 25 mobile apps currently available in the iTunes and Google Play stores. Prior to joining RapidSOS Chris ran his own software development company where he built a host of mobile, web, and infrastructure products. Chris graduated from a training program at NIIT Technologies in India.
Lucas Eager Leavitt
Lucas is a software engineer, working on the backend team as well as all things web development for RapidSOS. As such, he has a passion for building technology that
improves lives on a daily basis. The product we are building at RapidSOS has provided the perfect platform to do exactly that.
With experience working at companies spanning every size in the industry, Lucas has served as an engineer at huge corporations such as Intel, where he developed an enterprise logging service used by developers across the entire company to this day, down to ground level startups such as Champio, where he served as lead engineer, prior to joining RapidSOS.
As a versatile software engineer, Lucas has worked in 10 different programming languages, contributing to production applications in 4 of them. An enthusiast of all things programming, he enjoys learning and teaching programming technologies as much as he does using them, and even formerly ran weekly workshops and tech talks for fellow students looking to learn more about the field while in college.
A self proclaimed "hacker", Lucas enjoys building small applications in his spare time that make life easier and more interesting, particularly in ways related to music. He has built an award-winning playlist crowd-sourcing application, being honored as the "Best use of Rdio API", and many other side projects.
Lucas holds a BS in Computer Science from Binghamton University where he was distinguished as a member of the Upsilon Pi Epsilon Computer Science Honor Society.
Jeff Sternberg
Jeff has experience developing networking and communications software with deep expertise in Voice over IP. Prior to joining RapidSOS,
Jeff worked for Acme Packet. Acme Packet was the leading provider of carrier grade Session Border Controllers before it was acquired by Oracle
in 2013 for $2.1 Billion. During his time at Acme Packet, Jeff worked on NAT traversal, encryption, and scalability, helping to build a system
that supported 200,000 concurrent users and 10,000 concurrent encrypted voice calls.
Prior to his time at Acme Packet, Jeff worked for the firm Landmark Ventures. At Landmark, Jeff worked on creating in-house automation software to increase task productivity. In addition, he worked on creating data scraping scripts to gather information from sites like LinkedIn.
Jeff has BS in Computer Engineering from Boston University. During his time at Boston University, he worked on developing computer vision software using GPU processing.
Jeff is an avid ultimate frisbee player and has a passion for spicy food.
Josh Thomas
Josh is a full-stack application engineer with much experience developing geospatial and information security systems.
Before coming to RapidSOS, he worked at Zonar Systems building a system to enable trucking fleet managers to track, manage, and
analyze freight truck behavior on American highways, allowing for optimization of driver routes and behavior. Josh implemented task queues
to process massive amounts of data streaming from the trucks, and created the code to parse and handle that data from binary form onwards.
As the company grew it became necessary to store and analyze hundreds of streaming data packets per second. Utilizing NoSQL technologies,
the database system was re-built to handle the growing data in a scalable fashion which opened up new possibilities for the company.
After Zonar, Josh architected and built a system that scraped and parsed publicly available disaster and emergency-responder data to be used by interested clients. In the past Josh has worked in the entertainment booking industry for Gigsalad.com, developing online systems to connect event planners with entertainers.
Vinson Koo
Since graduating from NYU Tandon School of Engineering with a Bachelors of Science in Civil Engineering, Vinson transitioned
into technology through teaching himself to code and General Assembly's Back End Web Development course. Since 2014 Vinson has been
a web developer at HindSite Metrics, providing digital consultancy services for startups, small businesses, and e-commerce stores.
In his spare time Vinson helps manage the communications for a local Chinese restaurant his family manages in Chinatown and likes to shoot pool, read manga, and keep up to date on the latest in tech, design, and business news.
Matt Hochler
After two years of attending Hunter College for
literature, Matt felt his childhood passion for
programming hard to deny. Joining e-commerce
company SSTL Inc. as a customer service agent, he
quickly rose through the ranks to project manager
and lead software developer.
At SSTL, Matt developed his first REST API for public use, implemented the EDI protocol for automatic order processing, and built their own customer relations software ― all developments that salespeople and service agents rely on to this day.
Moving to the financial startup 7Park Data, Matt's efforts began reaching clients in some of the biggest startups and Fortune 500 companies. There, he built a REST API to serve a terabyte of analytics data live to clients, and a data pipeline tool to reload all of that data every day. Assisting in the development of their web app as well, Matt helped lead the growth of their next-generation analytics platform.
Hearing how hard RapidSOS was working to revolutionize emergency services, even without a strong desire to leave where he was, Matt knew he had to join the team. A chance to grow his skills even further while also helping so many people seemed like the perfect fit.
As a backend developer, Matt is currently a part of the development of RapidSOS' NG911 software and the new version of their public REST API.
When not developing for RapidSOS, Matt enjoys programming projects for himself, listening to too many podcasts, and pretending it's still cool to like wrestling when you're an adult.
Zvika Ferentz
Zvika is a software engineer and software
architect with 18 years of experience. Born and
raised in Israel, Zvika started his career
during high school writing software for a local
business. In 1997, after being released from
the Israeli Defense Forces, Zvika worked as an
eCommerce/web-developer for a major Israeli
firm – Ness Technologies.
In 2002, Zvika joined a small security start-up
named Kavado where he developed Web Application
Firewalls and related network-security
components. At Kavado, he developed TCP/IP
servers and initiated the networking/
infrastructure team. The start-up was acquired
by Protegrity Corporation, a U.S. company, in
Zvika relocated to the U.S. as a Protegrity employee in 2008 and worked on Linux-based software appliances – at first as a one-man-team and later on as a team-leader and a senior software-architect for a multi-regional team. The framework developed by Zvika's team is an optimized, hardened and highly-available Linux-based framework which is the platform for Protegrity security enterprise solutions. This framework is deployed in many banks, airlines, enterprises and retail companies all over the world.
In 2016, seeking new challenges, Zvika joined RapidSOS hoping to make the world a better and safer place. Zvika holds a BSc in Computer Science from Ben Gurion University, Israel and is an inventor of security-related tokenization patents.
Austin Shea
Austin's experience developing reliable, and
maintainable, infrastructure comes from six
years of being on-call. He brings to RapidSOS a
history of providing developers the tools they
need to be self-reliant, and his passion for
deploying infrastructure-as-code.
Austin's career started by building computer-vision/video-transcoding systems for LiveClips and installing them in ESPN's network operation center. At LiveClips, he worked with hardware vendors, and satellite farms, to create a parallel system for use with prospective clients. After multiple demos for the NFL, LiveClips obtained a contract, and was bought by DirecTV.
At Handy, Austin containerized their operations and enabled engineering teams to confidently deploy production code as many times per day as they deemed necessary. At RapidSOS he is building a forward thinking infrastructure, allowing for the safe scaling of RapidSOS services, and staff.
When Austin isn't on-call, he enjoys the theatre, eating all over NYC, and hosting tabletop game sessions.
Zakia Khan
Zakia is a patent attorney with experience in
advising clients in various industries
including medical device, wireless, food and
beverage, drug release, polymer, battery and
green technologies.
Zakia spent two years working on prosecution, client counseling and litigation matters at a large law firm in Chicago. She obtained a Juris Doctor from Chicago-Kent College of Law where she served as the President of the Intellectual Property Law Association. She has completed a Bachelor's and a Master's of Science in Chemical Engineering from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign including some coursework at the National University of Singapore.
Prior to law school, Zakia worked as an engineer at a fuel cell startup in Illinois where she was a co-inventor on three patent applications.
Reinhard Ekl
Product & 9-1-1
Reinhard combines business experience with a background in Emergency Medical Services. Prior to joining RapidSOS, he has
worked in management consulting (The Boston Consulting Group), where he helped large corporations solve strategic challenges in 10 countries in
4 different continents, and in Technology (Google), where he worked predominantly on Global Customer Experience, while also contributing to Google
Crisis Response. He holds a Master of Business Administration from the Stanford Graduate School of Business with a Certificate in Public Management
and Social Innovation, and a Bachelor of Science from the Vienna University of Economics and Business in Austria, where he graduated in the top 1%
of his class.
In addition to his business background, Reinhard is also a certified EMT-P (Notfallsanitäter-NKV) in Austria, where he has been a volunteer paramedic and unit commander for 10+ years at Samariterbund ambulance service. Spending countless nights and weekends in the back of an ambulance, he has witnessed first hand how important accurate location is in case of emergency. Reinhard has accumulated thousands of hours on duty, not just directly treating acute patients but also assuming a leadership role in coordinating the medical response for natural disasters (Upper Austria Flooding of 2013), complex events (European Soccer Championship 2008) and several concerts and large sports events. In addition to his service in Austria, he has done ride-alongs and fly-alongs with Emergency Medical Services across the world and knows that location information and pre-arrival situational awareness is a universal challenge. From desperately trying to find an unconscious patient in a huge park, to knocking on 20+ doors until finally getting to a woman giving birth - Reinhard has seen it all, and has set out to solve this challenge with RapidSOS.
At RapidSOS, Reinhard leads the product development team for all of our emergency-related products. Reinhard ensure that all products are not just perceived as useful by end consumers, but also make a meaningful difference for the 9-1-1 Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs) who are on the receiving end of information transmitted by RapidSOS. Reinhard leads the outreach and engagement with the 9-1-1 community, speaks at industry events and conferences, and actively participates in standards development and working groups with the National Emergency Number Association and other industry organizations.
When Reinhard is not working or volunteering on an ambulance (which he claims is not work, but fun), he trains for Triathlons and enjoys back country hiking.
Tracy Eldridge
For the past 20 years Tracy has been working in Public Safety. She began her career back in 1997 as a 9-1-1 dispatcher and then became the
Chief Dispatcher in Rochester, MA, her hometown, in 2003. Tracy also serves the Rochester community as a firefighter/paramedic on the
fire department. Additionally, she is a member of the Massachusetts Department of Fire Service Special Operations team providing support
services to fire departments across the Commonwealth during large scale incidents and pre-planned events. Since 2006 she has been
educating telecommunicators, EMTs and Firefighters all over the country. In 2013 Tracy joined The Public Safety Group and she enjoys
traveling to teach telecommunicators things that can assist them in their duties, as well as how to take better care of themselves. Tracy
has also recently joined The Denise Amber Lee Foundation and is working on their third party quality assurance initiative.
In December of 2016, Tracy left her position as the Chief Dispatcher in Rochester and became the 9-1-1 Operations Lead with RapidSOS because she knew it was time to serve the 9-1-1 community in a different capacity.
Tracy's husband Jeff and her two daughters support everything she does. Her oldest daughter just became a registered nurse and her youngest daughter is determined to be a Fire Chief some day. Tracy's life revolves around making all aspects of public safety, especially 9-1-1, better. Her motto is "Life is too short to not know how to save one."
Keith Viveiros
Keith has over 35 years of experience working in Public Safety, including 10 years as a Police Officer
and Criminal Investigator for the Stanford University Police Department. For the last 26 years Keith
has worked as a Senior Supervising Dispatcher with the Sunnyvale Department of Public Safety in Silicon
Valley. Over the past 10 years, Keith also was the Senior Technical Dispatcher for the City of Sunnyvale
where he was primarily involved in the acquisition, implementation and administration of CPE, CAD and
other systems, and was also a member of the EOC team.
Keith has been honored several times by the Santa Clara County Communications Managers with their Annual Outstanding Performance Award for Critical Events. Keith has also earned his ENP (Emergency Number Professional) certification from NENA. Recently retired from Sunnyvale PD, Keith is excited to start his journey with RapidSOS as the 9-1-1 Liaison for the State of California.
Gabe Esparza
Gabe Esparza brings over 20 years of business experience to RapidSOS where he serves as SVP and Head of Global Partnerships.
Prior to joining the company, he spent 13 years at American Express, most recently as Vice President of Global Business Development
in their Commercial Payments business. During his tenure, he closed deals that generated over $1B in volume on the Amex network.
Earlier in his career, Gabe worked for Diamond Technology Partners (a tech strategy consulting firm since acquired by PWC), the Walt
Disney Company, G.E. Capital, and Wells Fargo Bank.
Since 2009, Gabe has served as a public official in the City of Los Angeles having been appointed by the Mayor to the Board of Civil Service Commissioners. The Civil Service Commission oversees the 50,000+ employees of the City of Los Angeles through the Personnel department and has the power to enforce the Civil Service rules of the city, including appeals from discharge/suspension, discrimination complaints, and other administrative matters.
He was the co-founder and former chairman of the Board of Bronx Charter School for the Arts in New York City and previously served on the Alumni Board of Harvard Business School.
He holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA in International Relations and Psychology from Stanford University. He and his wife live in Los Angeles, CA with their two children.
Julia Chang
Prior to joining RapidSOS, Julia worked in investment
banking at Credit Suisse in the Global Energy group. At
Credit Suisse, Julia helped manage the client relationship
and run the execution cycle, working with a variety of
clients across the energy sector. She has extensive
experience working on M&A transactions and capital
raising, with a special focus on leveraged buyouts.
Julia is very passionate about the intersection of entrepreneurship, policy, and technology – using technology to build products to solve meaningful problems. She has public policy experience from her time at the Paulson Institute, where she worked to promote sustainable economic growth and environmental protection in the U.S. and China. She has also worked at The Blackstone Group in alternative asset management, worked on mobile application development, and worked at an early-stage e-commerce startup.
Julia graduated with honors from the University of Chicago with degrees in Economics and Political Science. She is a University Scholar and a member of the College's honor society.
Eric Thoman
Eric is an avid computer science enthusiast and has been
coding since the beginning of high school. He loves
spending his time creating applications, including a
photoshop clone, fish tank simulation, and a data
compression algorithm better than what comes built into
computers. He has done research at Columbia University and
Rockefeller, where he applied his computer science skills
to automate a data analytics process that otherwise took
days to complete.
In his spare time, Eric loves helping kids foster a love for education and reading in the New York school system. As the result of this, in 2014 he founded Books for Fun, an organization that has been commended by the New York City government for its great work.
Eric is a rising sophomore at Princeton where he is pursuing a Computer Science degree in the Engineering School.
Marta Milkowska
As a former Social Enterprise Specialist at the World Bank Innovation Labs, Marta has over eight years of experience
in private-sector innovation around the world, with a
special focus on health-technology and behavior science.
She was instrumental in designing innovations in ~$330M
World Bank investments across Africa, South Asia, and
Europe, including €10Bn innovation and start-up investment
strategy in Poland (>3000 innovators), $30M malnutrition
project in Benin, and $1.5Bn sanitation project in India.
Marta also founded and pioneered several ventures, leveraging technology and behavioral science in service delivery, including an award-winning Dignify, a mobile platform linking refugees to digital micro-work. Her portfolio includes: a machine-learning risk prediction tool for HIV and TB patients in South Africa and Lesotho (with a mobile healthcare start-up Dimagi) and a Fin-Tech mobile app leveraging behavior insights to help young UK citizens save (with BI Ventures). She also pioneered the Harvard Social Innovation Studio and led its Design Thinking Series, helped design the World Bank internal Human-Centered-Design incubator, and served on the board of OPENIdeo DC.
Marta is an MBA – MPA Candidate at Stanford Graduate School of Business and Harvard Kennedy School.
Mette Andersen
Mette is a health tech enthusiast and joins RapidSOS from
Harvard Business School. Prior to HBS she worked at The
Boston Consulting Group, where she was a core member of
the Healthcare and Digital Health practice areas. She has
worked closely with the world's leading pharma/biotech
companies and hospital systems to shape their strategies
across R&D, digital health and IOT, and more. A
Copenhagen native, her experience has spanned from
Copenhagen to Singapore to Ghana to San Francisco.
Mette graduated with honors from Harvard University with a BA in Chemistry and Physics, and graduated from the University of Cambridge (UK) with a master's in Micro- and Nanotechnology Enterprise. She is currently completing her MBA at Harvard Business School.
Lori Weil
Lori brings experience in healthcare and business operations to the RapidSOS team. Prior to joining RapidSOS, Lori worked in Sales Operations and Planning at WebMD for nearly 3 years. At WebMD, she managed US and global physician-targeted advertising campaigns for pharmaceutical companies and facilitated pharmaceutical and institutional sponsorships for online Continuing Medical Education courses for healthcare professionals. Lori's passion for healthcare began at the University of Pennsylvania, where she earned a BA in Health and Societies. While at UPenn, she interned in the health policy division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and conducted research on international HIV treatment delivery with the Vanderbilt Institute for Global Health.
Amy Ma
Before Amy arrived at RapidSOS, she spent a couple of
years working in the home security tech space as well as
recruitment. She's always loved working with people, but
it was through those years that she really developed an
interest in people operations and working with individuals
who are passionate about developing life-saving
Outside of work, she spends a lot of her free time (arguably too much) exploring restaurants in and out of the city and has a habit of rotating through new hobbies. Most recently, she's been excited bouldering and trying out tea tasting and glass blowing classes. On the side, she's an ordained marriage officiant in the state of New York and working on becoming registered in Pennsylvania, as that's where her best friend is getting married next year.
Amy graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with a BA in Political Science with a concentration in International Relations, and a minor in International Development.
Haley Mullins
Haley is a rising senior at Harvard University. She
returns to RapidSOS for a second summer, previously
interning with the team in the summer of 2015. Outside of
RapidSOS, Haley has worked with the International Economic
Alliance (IEA) as a student ambassador, reaching out and
connecting country leaders from Europe with country leaders
from around the world.
At Harvard, Haley works as a Lab Assistant in a Social Psychology Lab focused on predicting people's behaviors in the future based on their certain present circumstances. She also works as a Fellow at Yard Ventures, a Harvard alum venture fund investing in Harvard alum-led companies.
Haley enjoys sailing and playing ice hockey and serves as the team captain for Harvard's varsity Ice Hockey program.
Michelle Cahn
Community Engagement
Michelle brings a passion for marketing, particularly in the digital space. Prior to joining RapidSOS, she worked in the marketing
department of CipherHealth, a health-tech startup that aims to improve patient experience at hospitals. Previous to CipherHealth, Michelle worked in
the Public Affairs department of NBCUniversal's USA Network. There, she assisted the President and Vice President of Public Affairs in executing the
Characters Unite program - a program that aims to end hate and discrimination in communities across the nation.
Michelle has also been involved in various non-profit work at The Jewish Federations of North America and NYU's Bronfman Center. Through her work at the Bronfman Center, Michelle was awarded the NYU President's Service Award, awarded to students who have made significant contributions to the university community in the areas of learning, leadership, and quality of student life, and the Bronfman Center Excellence in Programming Award, given for Michelle's work in planning weekly, welcoming, and communal Shabbat meals that prioritize relationship-building, inclusivity, and pluralism.
Michelle has a BS in Business, with concentrations in marketing and finance, from The NYU Stern School of Business.
Jose Font Bullrich
Community Engagement
Jose brings passion about using digital media and art to tell stories. Originally from Seville, Spain,
he studied the equivalent of a B.A. and master's degree in Audiovisual Communications at the University of Seville, gaining skills in
photography, filmmaking, marketing and journalism. During his studies, Jose received a merit-based grant to study abroad and specialize
in the visual arts, at the Universidad de las Artes in Buenos Aires. After graduating, Jose was awarded a scholarship by the Andalusian
Government to attend New York Film Academy to further grow in filmmaking, from script-writing to editing.
Jose has directed and worked on several different kinds of productions, including music videos, documentaries and films. Prior to working at RapidSOS, Jose was the Video Content Specialist for Spotahome, a fast-growing Spanish hospitality startup that recently won the 2016 European South Summit startup competition award. At Spotahome, Jose created videos throughout all major cities of Spain. When not making videos, he loves traveling, bike riding, photography, and making music.
Jose is a strong believer in technology as a means of transforming lives by helping people when they need it most. He is thrilled to be working on video content for RapidSOS and to be a part of this revolutionary shift in safety technology.
Melissa Wu
Community Engagement
Melissa is a rising junior at UVA studying Finance and
Statistics. Through her five year involvement with Future
Problem Solving of Virginia, she developed her passion for
using social entrepreneurship to create positive social
At UVA, Melissa works with ReinventED to help host Design Thinking workshops centered around improving student educational experiences. As the Student Council Community Engagement Co-chair, she also works to improve collaboration between UVA service organizations and the Charlottesville community by initiating events such as UVA's first Global Public Service Case Competition. Melissa is also on the leadership team at HackCville, an entrepreneurial talent accelerator, where she organizes startup trips to companies such as RapidSOS and Google.
Outside of work, she enjoys playing tennis, biking, taste-testing restaurants, and watching TED Talks.
Jee Yoon Choi
Jeeyoon has experience in working on service, experience, and interaction design projects that tap into people's cognitive and emotional processes. Previous to joining RapidSOS, Jeeyoon collaborated with a Boston non-profit organization on a project that redesigned public spaces to better suit the needs of two particular low-income communities. She also contributed to the design processes of a mobile game application (Goldrush) for Samsung at Doubledot studio in South Korea. Jee Yoon recently graduated from the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) with a major in industrial design.
Anna Kang
Anna Kang brings experience from working across various industry verticals and strives to design creative
solutions that are user experienced, business approved, and development vetted. Prior to working at RapidSOS, Anna worked as an interaction
designer at Accenture Interactive for 2 years to create services for global clients.
Anna developed her passion for digital design from her internship at Involution studios, a Boston based user experience design firm, and graduated with a degree in Industrial Design in 2014 at the Rhode Island School of Design. In addition, Anna enjoys volunteering on the side and is currently a teacher's assistant at Arts in Action, a non-profit organization that provides a fine art education to children of all ages regardless of economic status.
Michelle Middleton
Mobile Tester
Michelle feels deliriously lucky to have landed at RapidSOS! She immensely enjoys the product, the people, and the razor-sharp focused,
supportive, caring, and fun atmosphere. She's equally excited about IT, specifically networking. She has a full Cisco lab at home that she
regularly adds to and tinkers with.
Having recently acquired her CCNA R&S certification, she continues to study for her next certification. Presently, she is soaking up all she can about QA and looks forward to what the future holds!
RapidSOS' advisors bring extensive expertise across the telecommunications, technology, and 9-1-1 industries.
Tom Wheeler
Tom Wheeler is a businessman, author, and was Chairman
of the Federal Communication Commission (FCC) from 2013
to 2017.
For over four decades, Wheeler has been involved with new telecommunications networks and services. At the FCC he led the efforts that resulted in the adoption of Net Neutrality, privacy protections for consumers, and increased cybersecurity, among other policies. His chairmanship has been described as, "The most productive Commission in the history of the agency." During the Obama-Biden Transition of 2008/09 Mr. Wheeler led activities overseeing the agencies of government dealing with science, technology, space and the arts.
As an entrepreneur, he started or helped start multiple companies offering innovative cable, wireless and video communications services. He is the only person to be selected to both the Cable Television Hall of Fame and the Wireless Hall of Fame, a fact President Obama joked made him "the Bo Jackson of telecom."
Prior to being appointed Chairman of the FCC by President Obama, Wheeler was Managing Director at Core Capital Partners, a venture capital firm investing in early stage Internet Protocol (IP)-based companies. He is CEO of the Shiloh Group, a strategy development and private investment company specializing in telecommunications services. He co-founded SmartBrief, the Internet's largest curated information service for vertical markets.
From 1976 to 1984 Wheeler was associated with the National Cable Television Association (NCTA) where he was President and CEO from 1979 to 1984. Following NCTA Wheeler was CEO of several high-tech companies, including the first company to offer high-speed delivery to home computers and the first digital video satellite service. From 1992 to 2004 Wheeler served as President and CEO of the Cellular Telecommunications & Internet Association (CTIA).
Mr. Wheeler wrote Take Command: Leadership Lessons from the Civil War (Doubleday, 2000), and Mr. Lincoln's T-Mails: The Untold Story of How Abraham Lincoln Used the Telegraph to Win the Civil War (HarperCollins, 2006). His commentaries on current events have been published in the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today, Los Angeles Times, and numerous other leading publications.
Mr. Wheeler served on President Obama's Intelligence Advisory Board prior to being named to the FCC. Presidents Clinton and Bush each appointed him a Trustee of the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. He is the former Chairman and President of the National Archives Foundation, and a former board member of the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS).
He is a proud graduate of The Ohio State University and the recipient of its Alumni Medal. He resides in Washington, D.C.
Dennis Patrick
Dennis R. Patrick served as the Commissioner and then Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) between
1983 and 1989, under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. During his tenure, Mr. Patrick oversaw a significant period of change
in the telecom industry. Mr. Patrick also served as Associate Director of Presidential Personnel at the White House under President Reagan.
Following his role at the FCC, Mr. Patrick served as CEO of Time Warner Telecommunications, a division of Time Warner Entertainment. He then founded and served as President & CEO of Milliwave LP, a local exchange telephone company later acquired by Winstar. Following Milliwave, Mr. Patrick served as the first President of AOL Wireless.
Mr. Patrick served as CEO & President of National Geographic Ventures, a subsidiary of The National Geographic Society, Inc. As CEO, Mr. Patrick oversaw National Geographic's rapidly growing television, feature film production, and cable channel businesses, as well as the maps and interactive divisions.
Currently, he is President & CEO of Patrick Communications Inc. and Doeg Hill Ventures LLC. Mr. Patrick is Director of Network Access Solutions and a Member of the Business Advisory Panel at HealthSport, Inc. He is a Board Member of the National Geographic Channel in the U.S. and National Geographic Channels International. Mr. Patrick also served as trustee of Occidental College.
Mr. Patrick holds a BA Magna Cum Laude from Occidental College and a JD from UCLA.
Bill Swanson
William H. Swanson is a retired chairman and chief executive officer (CEO) of Raytheon Company.
Swanson served as chairman and CEO of Raytheon from January 2004 to March 2014, at which time he
stepped down from the role of CEO. He retired from the company in September 2014, finishing a
42-plus year career with the company.
During Swanson's tenure as CEO, Raytheon's sales grew 26 percent, its stock price and dividend each increased three-fold and company debt was virtually eliminated. He also strengthened Raytheon's culture with a focus on core company values, ethics, diversity and the customer, while transforming the company's community engagement by championing corporate responsibility, STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) education and armed services support.
Swanson joined Raytheon in 1972 and held a wide range of leadership positions, including manufacturing manager of the company's largest operation, senior vice president and general manager of the Missile Systems Division, general manager of Raytheon Electronic Systems, president of Electronic Systems, chairman and chief executive officer of Raytheon Systems Company, and president of Raytheon.
In addition to his professional accomplishments, Mr. Swanson is a member of the Department of Defense's Defense Business Board; member of the NextEra Energy, Inc. board of directors and chair of its audit committee; chairman of the Massachusetts Competitive Partnership; and vice chairperson of the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation board of directors. He is active in the field of education as chairman of the California Polytechnic State University Foundation board of directors, and as a member of the Cal Poly President's Cabinet and the University of Massachusetts President's Advisory Council. Swanson served as honorary chair of MATHCOUNTS® from 2009 to 2014.
Swanson is chairman emeritus of the Aerospace Industries Association and is a fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. He serves as a member of the Air Force Association, the Association of the United States Army (AUSA), and the Navy League. He is also a member of the CIA Officers Memorial Foundation board of advisors and the President's National Security Telecommunications Advisory Committee.
Selected as Outstanding Industrial Engineering Graduate in 1972, Swanson was also recognized as the Honored Alumnus from California Polytechnic State University School of Engineering in 1991. He received the Outstanding Alumni Award from the American Association of Community Colleges in 2013. Additionally, he was awarded the Semper Fidelis Award from the Marine Corps Scholarship Foundation, and Aviation Week and Space Technology's Laurel Award for his "significant contributions" to the aeronautics and propulsion field. Swanson was also named the "California Manufacturer of the Year" by the California Manufacturing and Technology Association, and is a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society (United Kingdom).
Swanson has received the Navy League Fleet Admiral Chester W. Nimitz Award, the NDIA James Forrestal Industry Leadership Award, the John W. Dixon Award from AUSA, a Diversity Best Practices CEO Diversity Leadership Award, the Institute of Industrial Engineers' Captains of Industry Award, the Six Sigma Premier Leader Award from the International Society of Six Sigma Professionals, a Woodrow Wilson Award for Corporate Citizenship, and the Kennedy Greenway Vision Award.
A native of California, Swanson graduated magna cum laude from California Polytechnic State University with a bachelor's degree in industrial engineering. His graduate work was performed in business administration at Golden Gate University. He has been awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Pepperdine University and an honorary Doctor of Science degree from California Polytechnic State University.
Terry Kramer
Terry has a 25 year career in telecommunications. For 18 of the 25 years, Terry worked for Vodafone Group Plc/AirTouch Communications in a
variety of roles domestically and internationally including Group Strategy and Business Improvement Director, Regional President, Vodafone Americas which included
oversight of Vodafone's 45% interest in Verizon Wireless and Vodafone's venture capital activities, Group Human Resources Director & Chief of Staff, President
AirTouch Paging and Vice President/GM AirTouch Cellular-Southwest Market. He has also spent several years leading and advising small, growing technology companies
in roles including CEO, QComm International and as a Board member of Fiber Tower, 724 Solutions, and Sonim Technologies. Terry's focus in his 25 year
telecommunications industry has been the global expansion of the mobile industry as well as the more recent transition of the industry from a voice to data based
one with mobile as the "platform of the future."
In June 2012, Terry received an appointment by President Obama to serve as Ambassador, Head of U.S. Delegation for the World Conference on International Telecommunications which was held in December 2012 in Dubai. In this role, Terry led a 100+ person delegation of U.S. government, industry, and civil society representatives negotiating a treaty on international telecommunications policy. This delegation formulated and communicated the U.S. policy regarding the criticality of a free and open internet, the criticality of inclusive, multi stakeholder governance, the need to proactively address cybersecurity threats and the need for liberalized, open markets which encourage accelerated broadband access in markets worldwide.
Terry is currently a Distinguished Visitor at UCLA's Anderson School of Management teaching two courses on the evolution and innovation in the mobile communications industry and is also a Faculty Advisor in the Global Access Program and Strategic Management Research Program advising students working on client assignments involved in new market entry, product development and business strategy. From 2011-13, he was an Entrepreneur in Residence at the Harvard Business School.
Terry sits on the Boards of Envivio Corp. (NASDAQ: ENVI),TeleSign and TangoCard and also sits on the Boards of the Harvard Business School California Research Center, Larkin Street Youth Services and theWorld Affairs Council of Northern CA.
Terry holds a Bachelors degree in Economics from UCLA and MBA from Harvard University and resides in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Blair Levin
Blair Levin serves as a non-resident Senior Fellow of the Metropolitan Policy Project of the Brookings Institute. He also serves as the Executive Director of Gig.U: The Next Generation Network Innovation Project, an initiative of three dozen leading research university communities seeking to accelerate the deployment of next generation networks. From 2009-2010, Mr. Levin oversaw the development of the FCC's National Broadband Plan. FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler cited Mr. Levin's work, noting that "no one's done more to advance broadband expansion and competition through the vision of the National Broadband Plan and Gig.U." Prior to his work on the National Broadband Plan, Mr. Levin worked as an analyst at Legg Mason and Stifel Nicolaus. Barron's Magazine noted that in his work, he "has always been on top of developing trends and policy shifts in media and telecommunications … and has proved visionary in getting out in front of many of today's headline making events." From 1993-1997 Levin served as Chief of Staff to FCC Chairman Reed Hundt. Previously, Mr. Levin had practiced law in North Carolina, where he represented new communications ventures, as well as local governments. He is a graduate of Yale College and Yale Law School.
Adrian Fenty
Adrian Fenty is the former mayor of Washington, D.C. Fenty is a special advisor at Andreessen Horowitz, providing government and strategic business
development expertise. At Andreessen Horowitz contributes solutions to some of the world's most innovative technology companies.
Before advising for Andreessen Horowitz, Adrian Fenty served as Special Counsel for Klores Perry Mitchell, P.C. At Klores Perry Mitchell, P.C., Fenty improved the firm's ability to prosecute cases by utilizing his experience in strategic planning, business judgment, and education reforms.
Previous to joining Klores Perry Mitchell, P.C., Adrian Fenty was a special advisor for the education technology company EverFi. Fenty provided outreach and strategic business development to EverFi, offering financial, digital, and civic education programs to school districts across the nation.
Adrian Fenty was the Mayor of the District of Columbia between 2007 and 2011, where he championed unprecedented initiatives to tackle challenges facing the Nation's Capital. As mayor, Fenty gained recognition as a national leader in urban education reform. Adrian Fenty raised students test scores, increased graduation rates, and achieved the first increase in enrollment in 39 years. Among his notorious accomplishments, Adrian Fenty maintained a rapid pace of development and achieved a AAA bond rating for the District of Columbia despite the worst economic recession since the 1930s. Fenty also reduced homicides rates by 23%, a reduction over two times greater than the nationwide reduction and streamlined government operations to improve services for residents. Adrian Fenty is also known for the expansion of affordable housing in the nation's capital, creating over 11,000 units of affordable housing and launching the Housing First program, which is now a national model for providing permanent housing for the homeless.
Adrian Fenty obtained a J.D. from the Howard University School of Law and a B.A. in English and Economics from Oberlin College.
Rear Admiral (ret.) David Simpson
Admiral David Simpson has influenced National Defense
and Homeland Security policy and provided cutting edge
Information, Communications Technology and Cybersecurity
solutions for over thirty years. Currently leading
Pelorus Consulting Services, he previously served as
Chief of the Federal Communications Commission's Public
Safety and Homeland Security Bureau from 2013 to 2017.
As Bureau Chief, he oversaw public safety, homeland
security, emergency management, cybersecurity, and
disaster preparedness activities for over 30,000
commercial companies in the telecommunications sector.
He worked with public and private partners and through
the rule-making process to ensure that our nation's
networks are accessible, reliable, resilient, and
secure, ready to meet the public safety needs of
Americans during emergencies.
Admiral Simpson served as the vice director of the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA) from 2011 to 2013. In that capacity, he helped lead an organization responsible for planning, developing and providing interoperable global communications for the Defense community. He also served as a senior delegate to the 2012 ITU World Radio Telecommunications Conference and to the World Conference on International Telecom (WCIT).
From 2009 through 2010, as Director for Communications and Information Services for U.S. Forces Iraq in Baghdad, he synchronized strategic and operational-level communications for U.S. Forces and assisted the Government of Iraq in building capacity for the information and communications technology sector. Simpson's extensive career includes assignments with responsibility for networks, IT, and crisis communications for afloat and other deployed forces in the United States, Europe, Africa, Asia, and South America.
Simpson is a native of Burbank, California and a 1982 graduate of the United States Naval Academy. He earned a master's degree in systems technology from the Naval Postgraduate School. Recipient of the Navy's Copernicus Award, Federal Computing Weekly's FED 100 Award and the Next Generation 911 Institute's 2017 Government Leader Award.
Jonathan Peachey
Jonathan has been involved in the development, financing
and/or growth of more than a dozen consumer businesses,
primarily in the telecommunications, technology and
transportation sectors.
For 15 years Jonathan worked closely with Sir Richard Branson, one of the world's most inspiring and prolific entrepreneurs. He held several senior positions at Virgin Group, ultimately being appointed CEO of Virgin Group North America, where he oversaw the development of the Virgin brand and portfolio in the region.
Jonathan was an early executive at commercial spaceflight venture Virgin Galactic, a co-founder of The Spaceship Company, which designs and manufactures advanced composite structures for Virgin Galactic and others, and was heavily involved in the financing, launch and growth of low-fare airline Virgin America (NASDAQ:VA, acquired by Alaska Airlines). He served on the boards of all three companies as well as the board of Virgin Atlantic and others.
Jonathan left Virgin in 2013 to become CEO of Filip Technologies, creator of 'FiLIP' – an award-winning wearable phone and locator for kids, enabling parents and kids to stay connected and kids to get help in an emergency. FiLIP was the first consumer wearable with fully independent cellular voice-calling capability to achieve FCC and PTCRB certifications, and was launched with major wireless carriers AT&T and Telefonica. After the business was sold in 2016, Jonathan formed TriBeCa Advisory Partners to advise clients on strategy, business development, business model optimization and financing.
Jonathan is a mentor at leading business accelerator Techstars and is a co-owner of the San Francisco Deltas professional soccer team. Originally from the UK, he is a graduate of the University of Warwick and qualified as a Chartered Accountant in London. He lives in New York City with his wife and young daughter.
David Nagel
David Nagel is a General Partner of Forte Ventures in
Atlanta, Georgia. He also serves as Chairman of the
Board of Trustees and Executive Committee of the
International Computer Science Institute (ICSI) at
University of California, Berkeley.
Before his current positions, Nagel was president and chief executive officer of PalmSource, Inc., a leading provider of operating system software platforms for smart mobile devices. Prior to joining PalmSource in 2001, Nagel was President of AT&T Labs from 1996 to 2001 and also served as the Chief Technology Officer of AT&T. Nagel also was the Chief Technology Officer of Concert, Inc., a joint venture of AT&T and British Telecom (BT).
Before joining AT&T, Nagel worked at Apple Computer from 1988 to 1996, where he was senior vice president responsible for the Advanced Technology Group (the Apple "Labs" of the era) and then the worldwide research and development group, responsible for all Macintosh hardware and software products. Under Nagel's direction at Apple a number of industry leading software and hardware technologies were developed that still support Apple's innovative products (QuickTime, Firewire, and Speech recognition to list but three). While at Apple, Nagel also was responsible for heading up an important industry effort at the FCC to ensure that significant unlicensed RF spectrum would be set aside to support emerging wireless packet data systems. This pioneering work termed Data PCS led eventually to the designation of spectrum that today supports WiFi wireless networks and systems.
Prior to Apple, Nagel had a long career at NASA's Ames Research Center where he was head of human factors research as Chief of the Aerospace Human Factors Research Division. Nagel worked at NASA from 1973 to 1988 following a two-year postdoctoral fellowship stint at the NASA Ames Research Center.
He is the Co-Author and Editor (with the late Earl Wiener) of Human Factors in Aviation, published by Academic Press, 1988. This book was in print for more than 25 years and was a standard monograph in a number of formal academic programs in aviation. Nagel has served on a number of national and international advisory committees, among them NATO's Advisory Group for Aerospace Research and Development and the first President's Information Technology Advisory Committee (PITAC), on which he served five years for President William Clinton. He also served for a number of years on the UCLA Board of Visitors in the Sciences.
For the past 20 years, Nagel has served on the boards of directors of a number of private and publically traded companies. He most recently was a member of the board of directors of Align Technologies and Vonage Holdings, Inc. from which he is now retired.
Nagel and his wife also own a commercial vineyard in the Santa Cruz Mountains (Ascona Vineyards) that provides estate quality fruit to wineries in the SCM AVA and as far away as the Napa Valley.
In addition to serving on the ICSI board, He also served for a number of years on the boards of trustees of the SETI Institute and the Tech Museum in San Jose, California, and is an emeritus member of both boards. He holds a B.S. (1966 – Cum Laude) and M.S. degrees (1968) in engineering and a Ph.D. in perception and mathematical psychology (1972), all from UCLA.
Thera Bradshaw
9-1-1 Advisor
Thera Bradshaw is an expert in public policy, administration, strategic business and technology planning,
implementation and operation of 3-1-1 and 9-1-1 public safety communications systems. She is an internationally recognized leader in the
digital cities movement and is well known as the champion for public access through electronic government. Ms. Bradshaw is the Chief
Executive Officer of TKC Consulting Group, LLC, with a practice specializing in development of strategic business plans, implementation
of technology solutions, and building effective public relations/ communications strategies focused on meeting clients business needs
to better serve the public.
Ms. Bradshaw is currently on the e9-1-1 Institute Board of Directors. She is the former Chief Information Officer of the City of Los Angeles, where she oversaw all IT and telecommunications activities and five public safety LMR radio systems. Prior to this appointment, Ms. Bradshaw served as its Manager in charge of Strategic Planning and Regulatory Activities. She is also the previous International President of the Association of Public Safety Officials and National President of the National Emergency Number Association. Ms. Bradshaw has been named one of the top municipal CIO's by Government Technology Magazine.
Ms. Bradshaw's professional leadership extends to State, National, and International roles serving in appointed and elected position on a variety of boards and committees. She has authored numerous publications, is an in demand public speaker, and has testified before the United States Congress and the Federal Communications Commission. Ms. Bradshaw championed new college programs that were successfully adopted by the Boards of Higher Education in Oregon and California.
Ms. Bradshaw has received numerous honors. She has been named 2010/2011 Woman of the Year by the National Association of Professional Women. She was recently honored by Government Technology as the top technology innovator in America. Thera is recognized as one of the top Executive Women of leadership in Public Safety. Former Washington State Governor Gary Locke recognized Thera for her International leadership improving the quality of life in America.
Mark Fletcher
9-1-1 Advisor
For over three decades, Fletch has contributed to the telecommunications industry from all perspectives. He has spent time as a Police Dispatcher,
field technician, and a Systems Engineer building large global private voice networks. He has helped navigate the transition from TDM to VoIP and now to SIP and WebRTC,
and holds several US Patents focused on NG9-1-1 additional data, and call handling functionality.
Widely known for his customer advocacy, and work on Public Safety Standards, Fletch was honored by the NG9-1-1 Institute where he was awarded the Industry/Technology Professional Private Sector Award by Congress and the NG9-1-1 Institute.
As Avaya's Chief Architect for Worldwide Public Safety Solutions, Fletch manages the roadmap and strategy for Avaya solutions and ensures they meet the emerging requirements for Next Generation emergency communications in both the Enterprise and Government sectors here and abroad. He is a popular keynote speaker at many industry events, and produces several weekly Podcasts and CONNECTED Blogs covering emerging technologies and trending industry news.
In addition to his internal role, Fletcher represents Avaya as an active member in the major Public Safety organizations NENA, EENA, APCO Intl. and British APCO. He is a key author of the NENA MLTS/PBX model legislation, and an active contributor on the NENA NG9-1-1 transition standards. He was appointed to the APCO Standards Development Committee in 2014, maintains a Vice-Chair role on the EENA NG112 Technical Committee, and holds a position on the NENA Institute Board, defining standards for their Emergency Number Professional certification program. Fletcher regularly advises the FCC through participation in various committees and Task Force groups such as the EAAC, the DAC and the newly formed Task Force for Optimized PSAP Architectures.
One of Fletcher's most recent accomplishments is the introduction of Kari's Law, protecting MLTS users after the tragic death of Kari Hunt in a Marshall, Texas hotel in 2013, where her 9-year old daughter was unable to dial 9-1-1 while her mother was being brutally murdered just a few feet away by her estranged husband. In addition to attention at the Federal level in the FCC, new legislation in Suffolk County, NY, Illinois, Maryland and Texas were the direct result of those efforts.
Patrick Halley
9-1-1 Advisor
Patrick Halley currently serves as the Executive Director of the NG9-1-1 Institute, a non-profit organization
that works with the Congressional NextGen 9-1-1 Caucus to promote deployment of advanced and effective 9-1-1 and Next Generation 9-1-1
services throughout the nation. Previously, Patrick served at the Federal Communications Commission, most recently as Associate Chief
of the Wireline Competition Bureau. He also served as a legal advisor to Chairman Wheeler on multiple topics as well as the Deputy
Director of the FCC's Technology Transitions Policy Task Force.
Before joining the FCC, Mr. Halley spent over 5 years as the Director of Government Affairs for NENA – The 9-1-1 Association where he was NENA's main architect of policy and strategy and served as the association's liaison with Congress, the FCC and other government agencies and organizations on key issues affecting 9-1-1 and emergency communications. He served as the national 9-1-1 representative on the DHS SAFECOM Emergency Response Council and represented NENA on the FCC's Communications, Security, Reliability and Interoperability Council (CSRIC). Prior to that, Mr. Halley served as the Deployment Director for COMCARE, a non-profit emergency response alliance. Patrick Halley is an active presenter and speaker at national public safety and communications industry conferences.
Wolfgang Kampichler
9-1-1 Advisor
As Principal at Frequentis, Wolfgang Kampichler is actively contributing to innovation and technical expertise
for future Public Safety communication or technologies in Europe and abroad. In this role he is a recognised expert on NG9-1-1/NG112 and
speaker at industry and customer events addressing topics related to VoIP and emergency services. Recently, he participated with Frequentis
in the first ever NG112 emergency communications interoperability Plugtests in Europe. The event, organised by ETSI and EENA was designed
to trial independently and jointly all components of the 112 communication chain based on NG112 networks.
He is an engineer by profession. Wolfgang started his career as a research assistant at the Department of Computer Science (Vienna University of Technology) and was awarded with the degree of Doctor in technical sciences in 2002. Since then he has acquired international expertise in emergency communications when chairing the planning committee for the NENA Industry Collaboration Event #5 (ICE 5) and co-chairing NENA ICE 6 and represents Frequentis with his profound knowledge in order to support standardisation working groups in public safety and air traffic management. He holds the position as Chair of the EENA Technical Committee and focuses on technical topics ranging from the discussion of standards and deployment of IP-based emergency services to information sharing for safety-critical issues.
Steve Souder
9-1-1 Advisor
Steve Souder is a nationally and internationally
recognized and respected, authority and leader in the
9-1-1 public safety communications profession and
During his extensive forty-eight year 9-1-1 career, he has served in four jurisdictions of the National Capital Region (NCR); i.e. Washington, DC, Arlington County, VA, Montgomery County, MD and Fairfax County, VA…..the latter three, spanning 31 years, as the 9-1-1 center director. During his tenure in Virginia he worked very closely with the Virginia Information Technology Agency, Integrated Services Program, 9-1-1 Services Board and when in Maryland with the Maryland Emergency Number (9-1-1) Systems Board…..on a wide variety of issues. Recently, Maryland Governor Hogan appointed Steve to the Maryland Emergency Number (9-1-1) Systems Board.
Steve is a frequent guest speaker, presenter, spokesperson, writer and consultant on 9-1-1 matters, and on numerous occasions has provided testimony before Congress and state legislative bodies.
In 2014, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) selected Steve to serve as chair of the Task Force on Optimal PSAP (Public Safety Answering Point) [aka…..9-1-1 Center] Architecture. The report, just issued (fcc.gov/tfopa), provides the nation's 9-1-1 community, Local and State government appointed and elected officials…..a way forward for the implementation of the Next Generation 9-1-1 (NG9-1-1).
Steve is Life Member of the Association of Public-Safety Communications Officials (APCO), the National Emergency Number Association (NENA), International Association of Chiefs of Police (IACP), International Association of Fire Chiefs (IAFC). Additionally, he has served as the chair of the Metropolitan Washington (DC) Council of Governments (MWCOG) 9-1-1 Director's Committee. Steve is also active in the Congressional NG9-1-1 Institute, of the Congressional NG9-1-1 Caucus.
In addition to his distinguished 9-1-1 career, Steve is a highly decorated former Senior Chief Firefighter (retired) of the United States Coast Guard Reserve.
During Steve's career he, with his 9-1-1 communications center personnel at that time, were involved in many historic events including; the massive fires that swept Washington, DC following the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., the shooting of President Ronald Reagan, crash of Air Florida Flight 90 into the Potomac River, 9-11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon, Washington Beltway Sniper event in 2002 and the massive derecho storm and associated wide-spread 9-1-1 outage of 2012…..plus many more.
Additional information about Steve Souder is available via Google and LinkedIn.
Christy Williams
9-1-1 Advisor
Christy Williams is the 9-1-1 Program Manager for the North Central Texas Council of Governments (NCTCOG),
administrative agency for 9-1-1 in fourteen counties. NCTCOG serves 44 Public-Safety Answering Points in an area surrounding Dallas/Ft.
Worth. Christy has been in the 9-1-1 industry for over twenty years and previously held the positions of Operation/Communications
Specialist and Public Education/Training Coordinator.
Christy currently also serves as the President of NENA, the National Emergency Number Association. She has previously held positions on the Texas NENA Chapter Board as North Coordinator, Secretary/Treasurer and President and has served as President of the 9-1-1 Public Educators of Texas. She chaired the national NENA Public Education Committee for 7 years. Christy was honored with the Laverne Hogan Award in 2011 and currently serves on the national NENA Educational Advisory Board.
Francesca Dominici, PhD
Medical & Academic Advisor
Dr. Francesca Dominici is a Professor of Biostatistics, Senior Associate Dean for Research, and
Associate Dean of Information Technology at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Dr. Dominici's research
focuses on the development of statistical methods for the analysis of large and complex data. She leads several
interdisciplinary groups with the goal of addressing important questions in health policy, comparative effectiveness
research, environmental health science, and climate change.
In her role as Senior Associate Dean for Research, Dr. Dominici oversees the School's Office of Research Strategy and Development (ORSD) and leads ORSD's flagship faculty grant-writing short course. In addition to her own extensive research program, Dr. Dominici has provided scientific leadership in the submission of numerous proposals designed to advance the University's scientific innovation.
In her role as Associate Dean of Information Technology, Dr. Dominici has positioned the Chan School at the forefront of the Big Data revolution. Dr. Dominici worked closely with the Faculty of Arts and Sciences (FAS) to allow Chan School faculty, researchers, staff, and students to access the FAS Research Computing environment (Odyssey). Odyssey is Harvard's largest supercomputer, spanning 9,641 square feet dedicated to compute. Access to Odyssey has transformed the research computing landscape at the Chan School, allowing faculty to pursue Big Data driven research that is pushing the frontiers of science.
Dr. Dominici was recently recognized in Reuter's 2015 list of the most highly cited researchers, ranking in the top 1% of scientists cited in her field.
Dr. Dominici is the current chair of the Committee for the Advancement of Women Faculty at the Chan School, illustrating her career-long commitment to promoting diversity in academia.
Joyce A. Bender
Medical & Academic Advisor
Joyce A. Bender is the founder and CEO of Bender Consulting Services, Inc., a firm that recruits and hires people with disabilities in the public
and private sectors, who are trained in the information technology, engineering, finance/accounting, human resources, and general business areas. Bender partners with
corporations and federal agencies in order to assist them with achieving their diversity and workforce inclusion initiatives across the U. S. and Canada.
In 1985, Joyce had a life-threatening accident due to epilepsy that caused a cerebral hemorrhage that required subsequent brain surgery. Against all odds, Joyce recovered from this accident that left her with a 60 percent hearing loss in one ear and a realization that she had epilepsy. As a result of her personal experience, she developed a passion for helping people with disabilities and established Bender Consulting Services, Inc. in September 1995.
Joyce is the immediate past-chair of the board of the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD) and the former chair of the national Epilepsy Foundation board of directors. Joyce is a member of the 2013 Geneva College Advancement Board. She is a board member of the AAPD, the national Epilepsy Foundation, the Epilepsy Foundation of Western/Central Pennsylvania, Variety the Children's Charity of Pittsburgh, and Volunteers of America of Pennsylvania. Additionally, Joyce is on the Board of Advisors for the Homeless Children's Education Fund, is a member of the Board of Trustees of Carlow University, and a member of the National Advisory Group of the National Technical Institute for the Deaf.
Awards received by Joyce Bender include the following:
- 2015 Volunteers of America Lifetime Achievement Award
- 2013 AAPD Justice for All Corporate Award
- 2013 Geneva Distinguished Service Award
- 2011 Epilepsy Foundation Hero of Epilepsy Award
- 2008 YWCA of Greater Pittsburgh Tribute to Women Award in the Entrepreneur Category
- 2008 Pittsburgh Business Times Diamond Award
- 2007 Achieva Sattler Humanitarian Award
- 2006 Easter Seals Distinguished Service Award
- 2005 UCP of Pittsburgh's Gertrude Labowitz Lifetime Achievement Award
- 2003 Bush Administration's New Freedom Initiative Award
- 1999 President's Award, received from President Clinton at the White House, for her efforts in furthering the employment and empowerment of people with disabilities
Joyce has been featured in various periodicals including "Reader's Digest", "New York Times", "Investor's Business Daily", "Pittsburgh Post-Gazette", and "Chicago Tribune". Ms. Bender holds a bachelor of science degree in psychology from Geneva College, and hosts the weekly radio show, "Disability Matters with Joyce Bender" on www.voiceamerica.com.
Mariusz Ziejewski, PhD
Medical & Academic Advisor
Dr. Ziejewski is a Professor in the College of Engineering, and Director of the Impact Biomechanics Laboratory and of the Automotive Systems Laboratory,
North Dakota State University (NDSU). He is also an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Neuroscience, University of North Dakota School of Medicine. His professional
activities include research in mild traumatic brain injury (MTBI) sponsored by agencies such as the United States (U.S.) Department of Defense (DoD), Air Force and Army; and
a member of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) Collaboration Group on Human Brain Modeling and of the Biomechanical Brain Injury Evaluation research
group at the MeritCare Trauma Center.
Dr. Ziejewski has chaired scientific peer review committees for the DoD Post Traumatic Stress Disorder/Traumatic Brain Injury (PTSD/TBI) Research Program and has also been a reviewer for different DoD grant programs. He is the founding Chair of the North American Brain Injury Society (NABIS) Blast Injury Institute (BII), Editor-in-Chief for NABIS Conferences and Proceedings, and the NABIS Chairperson.
He has presented at numerous national/ international governmental/non-governmental meetings, and has published three book chapters on brain and neck injury, and over eighty technical refereed articles.
Scott Stern, PhD
Medical & Academic Advisor
Scott Stern is currently the David Sarnoff Professor of Management and Chair of the Technological Innovation
Entrepreneurship, and Strategic Management Group at the MIT Sloan School of Management.
Stern examines how innovation and entrepreneurship differ from more traditional economic activities, and the consequences of these differences for strategy and policy. His research in the economics of innovation and entrepreneurship focuses on entrepreneurial strategy, innovation-driven entrepreneurial ecosystems, and innovation policy and management. Recent studies include the impact of clusters on entrepreneurship, the role of institutions in shaping the accumulation of scientific and technical knowledge, and the drivers and consequences of entrepreneurial strategy.
Stern has worked extensively with practitioners in bridging the gap between academic research and the practice of innovation and entrepreneurship. This includes advising start-ups and other growth firms in the area of entrepreneurial strategy, as well as working with governments and other stakeholders on policy issues related to competitiveness and regional performance. In recent years, Stern has developed a popular new MIT Sloan elective, Entrepreneurial Strategy, co-founded the MIT Regional Entrepreneurship Acceleration Program, advised the development of the Social Progress Index, and served as the lead MIT investigator on the US Cluster Mapping Project.
Stern began his career at MIT, where he taught from 1995 to 2001. Before returning to MIT in 2009, he held positions as a professor at the Kellogg School of Management and as a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. Stern is the director and co-founder of the Innovation Policy Working Group at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). At NBER, Stern focused his research on the impact of information technology on emergency healthcare outcomes and costs. In 2005, he was awarded the Kauffman Prize Medal for Distinguished Research in Entrepreneurship.
Stern holds a BA in economics from New York University and a PhD in economics from Stanford University.
Scott Goldberg, PhD
Medical & Academic Advisor
Dr. Goldberg is the EMS Director in the Emergency Department at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, and an Instructor
in Emergency Medicine at Harvard Medical School. He also serves as the Associate Medical Director at the Professional Ambulance (Pro EMS) and
Pro EMS Center for MEDICS.
Dr. Goldberg brings significant experience in the practice, teaching, and leadership of emergency medicine. He has been active with Texas Task Force 2 Urban Search and Rescue in addition to being an operations level CONTOMS (Counter Narcotics & Terrorism Operational Medical Support) EMT-T. Prior to joining BWH, Dr. Goldberg held several leadership positions in EMS, including the Assistant Medical Director of Dallas Fire Rescue and several small suburban fire-based EMS systems.
Dr. Goldberg has published several medical papers on emergency care and response. His research interests include the improvement of EMS response and care, community paramedicine, and mobile integrated health.
Preet Anand
Product Advisor
Preet Anand was the founder and CEO of Patronus - recently acquired by RapidSOS. Patronus was featured during
The White House's Smarter Cities initiative, helped save multiple lives, and was requested by students at over
700 campuses across the country. He recently created reportjohn.org in partnership with the City of Oakland as
a first-of its kind way for community members to report sex trafficking.
Previously, he was the youngest Lead Product Manager in Zynga's history. In college, he co-led Team California's entry in the US Department of Energy's Solar Decathlon home building competition - ultimately winning 3rd place internationally.
Join the Team!
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Whether you're new to the area or just want to share your hobbies, we have groups for everything from frisbee players to weekend sailors, NFL fans, Smash Brothers enthusiasts and more.


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Slider images 928 x 355 but have white margin on right
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Slider works fine except that it has a white margin to the right. The images do not go full width. They are all same size of 928 x 355 and I have no other plugins other than "Corpo Toolkit."
Site is not live so would have to PM with link.
Thanks for any help!
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subset: commoncrawl


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3D school building
Prepared by: Imir Boriรงi
School building ď'— Introduction to the building
The project consists on designing a school to fulfill all the functional requirements which were presented as obligatorily. The building is composed of three main levels, and one underground level. The building is composed of two main volumes, each consisting of different functions. The project was designed and concept as a modern building and some of the crucial characteristics of it are presented in the 3D renders which are prepared in 3Ds Max computer program.
School building ď'— Introduction to the building
The building was concept to have a courtyard which was going to be mainly used for sport activities or for relaxing areas for the students. But the basic function of the courtyard was to allow light access for the corridor and classes, as the natural light access is somehow limited in the actual position of the building. To permit full access of natural light in the classes, as the most important function in the school buildings, there were designed some skylights in each of the class areas. These basic sources of light fulfill all the needed requirements for a good activity in the classes.
School building ď'— Plans of the school
School building ď'— Sections of the school
School building ď'— 3D Renders (3DS Max)


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Muslim father, Jewish mother, an American born in Egypt—Tamer Kattan was born an outsider and that's where he stayed. Very quickly, Tamer became adept at being comfortable in the uncomfortable. Comedy became the weapon of this underdog, enabling him to deal with challenges ranging from school yard bullies to an abusive father. His diverse background has given Tamer a deep understanding of the human condition as well as a wealth of material to draw from.
[Contains explicit content] Tamer Kattan talks about immigration and having parents from the middle east. Live from Desi Comedy Fest in 2016.
[Contains explicit content] Oh jeez, who gave Jackie Kashian a shovel? Well, given the tools, it should be no surprise that the self-proclaimed hole-digging expert has gone and done it again. But don't worry, here's the plan: we'll fetch the rope while you stay here, press play and maybe you can learn a thing or two from these other comedians' misadventures.
[Contains explicit content] Tamer Kattan explains the differences between men and women. Recorded at Laugh Boston on April 30, 2016.
[Contains explicit content]
Tamer Kattan performs comedy on fitting in as an American immigrant, live at Madhouse Comedy Club, on May 13, 2016.
[Contains explicit content] Tamer Kattan is shopping at Ross. Performed live at Westside Comedy Theater on May 18, 2014.


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As Beijing serenades Nepal's Prime Minister K P Oli in China this week, should New Delhi be concerned about the expanding partnership between our two northern neighbours? Geography and kinship tie India and Nepal in an inextricable but not necessarily happy relationship. A rising China and the anti-India resentments of Kathmandu's hill elite, however, have the potential to neutralise, over the longer term, some of Delhi's natural strategic advantages in Nepal.
Realists in India can't object to a good neighbourly relationship between Nepal and China. Pragmatists in Beijing know the dangers of moving too far and too fast and provoking an Indian reaction. But miscalculations and misperceptions often generate outcomes no one wants. For his part, Oli made a political gesture to India by visiting Delhi before heading out to Beijing. That significant differences remain, especially on the question of Madhesi rights in Nepal, was reflected in the inability of the two sides to issue a joint statement at the end of Oli's visit last month. If India-Nepal relations are never too tidy, Beijing-Kathmandu ties are rich in their affirmation of high principle.
Beijing revels in extending strong support to Nepal's territorial sovereignty. If Delhi claims a "special relationship" with Kathmandu, Beijing tends to emphasise "equality and non-intervention" in its engagement with Nepal. Underlying that rhetoric is the proposition that Beijing can't accept any claim that the subcontinent is Delhi's exclusive sphere of influence.
As a writer in China's Global Times put it in the paper's Monday edition, "New Delhi should wake up to the fact that Nepal is a sovereign country, not a vassal of India". The commentator was a lot less harsh in stating that the only sound choice for Nepal is in maintaining good relations with both China and India. "Instead of being forced into becoming a strategic barrier against China," Global Times concluded, "Nepal should be better treated and act as a bridge between Beijing and New Delhi".
Few in Delhi would quibble with the idea of Nepal as India's bridge to Tibet and China. Any sensible strategy in Kathmandu would leverage its location between the world's two fast-growing economies to bring prosperity to its people. As Delhi enthusiastically welcomes Chinese investments, it can hardly protest against a similar trend in Nepal and the rest of the subcontinent. Cynics in Delhi, however, would insist that the Sino-Indian dynamic in Nepal will always remain a zero-sum game. Their counterparts in Kathmandu find it hard to move away from the tradition playing the China card against India.
For the record, Kathmandu says Oli's trip to Beijing is not aimed at balancing India. Yet, there's no avoiding the sense that Oli's "special mission" to China is less about becoming a bridge between its giant neighbours. Its focus is on reducing the current dependence on India by strengthening ties with China. The political justification for this has come from the horrible impact of the Madhesi protests on fuel and other essential supplies from India.
While Oli and his hosts didn't sign a much-anticipated agreement on petroleum supplies, Beijing has agreed to assist Nepal in the exploration of hydrocarbon resources and expand the use of solar energy. The two sides also signed a landmark transit agreement that will allow Nepal to use Chinese ports to import goods from third countries.
Like many other neighbours of India, Nepal too has welcomed Chinese initiatives on connectivity grouped under the grand project called "One Belt, One Road".
During his talks with the Chinese leadership on Monday, Oli reportedly asked China to extend its Tibet railway into Nepal and also build an intercity railway system within Nepal. Beijing agreed to consider both requests. China's interest in connectivity with Nepal goes back to the early 1960s. What we see today is a dramatic expansion of the Chinese economic engagement and infrastructure-building in Nepal. While economic geography continues to be weighted towards the southern slopes of the Himalayas, the rise of China has begun to exert a powerful pull to the north.
China has also reportedly offered to upgrade the 1960 peace and friendship treaty with Nepal. But China is nowhere ready to match the kind of benefits — free movement across borders and national treatment — that the 1950 friendship treaty with Delhi confers on Kathmandu. Yet, for many in Kathmandu, the 1950 treaty with Delhi is a symbol of "Indian hegemony" and any treaty with Beijing is about expanding Nepal's "strategic autonomy". Delhi's problem then is less about coping with China's grand strategy than overcoming the entrenched distrust of India in Kathmandu and bringing greater purpose to economic engagement with Nepal.
In the end, Delhi too has a China card that it refuses to play. India might have a better influence on the outcomes in Nepal if it invites Beijing to restore and modernise the historic connectivity between the Gangetic plains and the Tibet region. Delhi has a bigger interest than some in Kathmandu in turning Nepal into India's bridge with China.
The writer is director, Carnegie India, and consulting editor on foreign affairs for 'The Indian Express'
For all the latest Opinion News, download Indian Express App
- Mar 22, 2016 at 3:55 amvery balanced article, thanks mr. mohan! because of india imposing blockade and supporting only a section of Nepalis (those who reject the consution endorsed by 89% of elected representatives of consuent embly), that nepal has moved closer to China! Of course, there is much more behind Oli's china visitReply
- Mar 22, 2016 at 10:14 am1. The arm-twisting tactics of our government shall end. 2. Nepal is a natural ally and its sovereignty shall be respected. 3. Kathmandu must recognize the importance of Delhi in the subcontinent. 4. We are surrounded by neighbours who are in a perpetual state of conflict. Nepal is a cherished ally and any interference by China in INDO-Nepal relations is not welcome. 5. Socio-cultural bonds are much more stronger between the two nations. Therefore minor thorns in relations, like the present one, are a test for the two countries otherwise blissful ties.Reply
- Mar 22, 2016 at 2:47 amNepal will soon become another Tibet.Reply
- Mar 22, 2016 at 12:54 pmThere is one factual error to this article. The few Madhesi politicians who went to sit at the Nepal India border did so only after two days of India having completely stopped vehicular movement into Nepal and, by their own recent admission, only after India prevailed over them to do so. It was Indian blockade pure and simple, and the Madhesi politicians, who include self-declared "Bharatbadis", only tried to save India's true face from being completely exposed. In any case it is time for India to recognize that the south Asian economic development is now breaking away from its traditional borders and China is into it in a big way. Similarly, once India's own development too begins to pick pace, it is bound to make its presence felt in China and beyond in a big way too. For all this, as dictated by the geography of our region, there can be no better bridge than Nepal towards this end. But this requires India to fundamentally reorient its policy towards Nepal which, as an Indian author S. Shah put it in 2004, is designed to create a "condition of perpetual disruption". it is time for India to say goodbye to its own version of Monroe doctrine.Reply
- Mar 22, 2016 at 6:24 amNepal is not stan in its utility to China. President Xi gently told PM Oli that he should return home and make his country a bridge between two large nations. Were India to abandon Nepal, it would be fluttering in the breeze.Reply
- Mar 22, 2016 at 11:03 amThat means it will not be another Goa or Sikkim. India has the largest people below poverty. So if independence is to be sacrificed, being with China is better than being with poverty stricken IndiaReply
- Mar 23, 2016 at 6:59 amLet's have equal relationship with Nepal. A pure, unadulterated state to state relationship like what China has with Nepal. There is no need for special relationship or natural partnership or any of that stupidity. Equal relationship means working visa to India for all Nepalis, Nepali goods taxed on international rates in India and all standard international laws be applied to Nepali citizens in India and vice-versa. I think that will restore many things between both countries. After all, India doesn't have a special relationship with Bangladesh or Myanmar or Sri Lanka so why should it have with Nepal? Equal relationship is the need now.Reply
- Mar 22, 2016 at 10:47 pmIndia is coexisting with neighbours who all are hostile but friendly to China. India must introspect its atude towards its neighbours and ask why. Indians have been behaving like a bully pretending to be what it is Not. That arrogance and atude must change and treat people as equal . We must learn from China how to conduct and maintain relationship and friendship.Reply
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