Management Team
Steve Fox: Operations and Logistics
Michael Helfrich: Products and Technology
Joe Fiorentino: Sales and Marketing
John Cayanne: Director of Training
Michael Reagan: Chief Financial Officer
Board of Directors
Alan Silverman
Stephen McGowan
Michael Chandler
Steve Fox
OPERATIONS AND LOGISTICS
Steve Fox is a graduate of West Virginia State University and the Armed Forces Staff College of Norfolk, Virginia (Joint Command, Control, and Communication Staff and Operations). He attended the U.S. Army Europe Combat Support Training Center and the U.S. Army Signal Schools at Fort Gordon, Georgia and Fort Monmouth, New Jersey.
He has served as CEO of Operations Security International, LLC (OSI), providing tactical and technical support for first responders with staff including veteran law enforcement, military, government, and professional personnel. The mission of OSI was to provide first responders with the best solutions available for information sharing, collaboration, and intelligence.
He has 35 years of information technology experience, including command, control, communications, and intelligence. During the last ten years of his military career, he was the senior executive officer of a major U.S. Army command. He directly supervised and managed all planning, project implementation, and deployments in support of major mobile command, control, communication, and intelligence systems with mobile commands involving 1,600 personnel.
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Michael Helfrich
Products and Technology
Michael Helfrich holds a Bachelor of Science in Mass Communications from Towson State University and was founder of Blueforce Development Corp., specializing in information technology for national security. Previously he was vice president of product strategy and applied technology at Groove Networks (later acquired by Microsoft). He also served as market executive for Groove’s federal business from 2001 to 2004, responsible for more than half of Groove’s 2004 revenues crossing defense, intelligence, and homeland security market segments.
He was a key member of the team that brought Groove Networks to market in 2000 and was instrumental in closing V1.0 early-adopter customers including GlaxoSmithKline, DARPA/Project TIA, Abbott Labs, Citigroup, and Merck. In 2003, he served in Iraq as a special advisor on inter-agency collaboration and information sharing for the Coalition Provisional Authority (CPA) led by Ambassador Paul Bremer.
Prior to Groove, he was director of product development in Lotus Development Corporation's Knowledge Management Products Group after serving as lead architect for the Lotus Notes Public Networks’ implementation business. He designed and implemented massively scalable communications and applications infrastructures for 11 of the world’s largest international telecommunications companies with projects in France, the United Kingdom, Italy, Malaysia, Singapore, Hong Kong, Germany, Australia, and the United States.
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Joe Fiorentino
Sales, Marketing and Services
With over 30 years of experience, Joe heads up global Sales, Marketing and Service operations for Commsfirst. Key responsibilities in this role are to translate company strategy into effective go to market initiatives required to build a scalable and profitable business. In addition Joe will oversee all field sales and channel activities, strategic partnering relationships, definition and execution of integrated Marketing programs and service delivery. Joe’s background is in leading early stage start-ups through rapid growth and development stages. Joe brings a commercial focus to this effort having scaled software and service companies in the enterprise compliance space and enterprise software markets.
Prior to Commsfirst, Joe has held executive leadership positions in emerging companies resulting in four successful acquisitions and two initial public offerings. Joe has played a leadership role as the CEO or VP of Sales in companies such as FTP Software, American Internet, Idiom Technologies, Eprise and Ecora. This proven track record of driving rapid revenue growth, building teams and launching successful products and service offerings is a great addition to the management team.
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John Cayanne
Director of Training
For over 18 years, John Cayanne has provided training for military special operations groups, and federal, state, and municipal law enforcement agencies in the United States and abroad. He has designed base defense plans for military installations, and has developed courses for numerous tactical training companies. Teaching others how to operate in high-threat tactical environments is his primary expertise.
John has extensive experience as a law enforcement officer and veteran Marine. He is a federally certified Terrorism/WMD Instructor, SWAT Team Leader, firearms and tactics instructor, and Scout Sniper.
Prior to CommsFirst, he was a lead instructor for the U.S. Marshals Fugitive Apprehension Strike Team (FAST) and California Narcotics Officers Association High Risk Entry Search Warrant Class (CNOA Region 1). He also teaches POST-certified classes in weapons violations and criminal law for the Alameda County Sheriff's Academy and Las Positas College in Northern California.
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Michael Reagan
Chief Financial Officer
Michael, a CPA with over 25 years’ experience, holds an MBA from Syracuse University, an M.S. in national resource strategy from National Defense University and a B.S. in business administration from the University of Arkansas. Prior to assisting CommsFirst (while in his concurrent role as CFO for The Ginn Group – a CommsFirst partner), Mike built his expertise in military finance and operations most recently as a manager at KPMG LLP where he advised the Army Budget Office on IT spending and process improvements. As deputy director of resource management at the U.S. Army Forces Command in Ft. McPherson, Ga., Mike managed an annual operating budget over $15 billion supporting the global war on terrorism.
His prior experience includes DoD assignments with increasing responsibility in finance policy, including as CFO/Commander for the 13th Finance Group at Fort Hood; assistant to the director of the Defense Finance and Accounting Service; CFO/Commander for the 9th Finance Battalion and 10th Finance Support Unit in Fort Lewis, Wash. and Vicenza, Italy; assignments at U.S. Army Headquarters; and as a senior accounting instructor at the Army Finance School.
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Alan Silverman
Mr. Silverman is the president and CEO of CommsFirst. Born in Chicago, he grew up in Southern California. He graduated from the University of Southern California in 1965 with a Bachelor of Science in business management.
For over 40 years, he has been managing partner, founder, and early-stage investor in public and private companies involved in biotechnology, Internet services, Internet and chip technology, motion picture theaters, Hispanic TV broadcasting (Telemundo), Hispanic retail grocery, HDTV direct satellite broadcasting, and international call center outsourcing (TTEC, NASDAQ). His investments include companies that service the rapidly growing Hispanic market in the United States. He is, or has been, a director of numerous public and private corporations as well as charitable organizations.
He is on the board of trustees at the Naval Postgraduate School Foundation and the Board of International Advisors at the Monterey Institute of International Studies (Middlebury College). He is a present director of LRN, Bodega Latina, Caza Financial, Inc., and serves as the president of the Santa Lucia Community Service District. He is a past director of The American Cancer Society, The Infant Welfare Society of Chicago, National Association of Theatre Owners, and the board of the Lymphoma Research Foundation.
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Stephen McGowan
As the former chief financial officer and executive vice president of corporate resources for Sun Microsystems, Inc., Mr. McGowan had management responsibilities for Sun's finance, legal, information technologies, and global business services functions. He reported to Sun's chairman and CEO.
McGowan was a 14-year Sun veteran and has more than 30 years of finance leadership in the computer industry. He served as vice president of finance, planning and administration for Sun's Global Sales Operations organization. In this position, McGowan was responsible for the fiduciary and planning functions for the Global Sales Operations organization worldwide, managing finance, IT, workplace resources, leasing, and Sun's demand/supply functions.
Prior to joining Sun, he held senior finance and operational positions during a 17-year career at Digital Equipment Corporation working in both Canada and the U.S.
McGowan holds a B.S. in finance from Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts and an M.B.A. from Loyola University in Chicago, Illinois. He is a member of the Institute of Management Accountants and is a Certified Management Accountant.
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Michael Chandler
As former president of General Dynamics Information Technology, Mr. Chandler led a diverse organization of 16,000 professionals that provided systems integration, information technology, systems engineering and professional services to customers in the defense, intelligence, homeland security, federal civil and commercial sectors.
Prior to this assignment, he served as president of General Dynamics Network Systems and before that as president of General Dynamics Worldwide Telecommunications Systems when GD acquired GTE’s Government Systems Corporation where he had been VP and general manager.
Before joining GTE in 1985, Mr. Chandler served 20 years in the United States Navy, retiring with the rank of commander. He holds a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering from Auburn University and a Master of Science in management from the Naval Postgraduate School. He is also a graduate of the Stanford University Executive Program.
He currently serves on the boards of two other private companies and is an executive officer on the board of trustees of the Naval Postgraduate School Foundation.
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