Board of Directors
Jeffrey S. Bennett
Jeff Bennett has been a leader in the digital economy through his work as an entrepreneur, executive and adviser. Currently, Jeff is the CEO of Swap.com, a Boston based company that has established a leadership position with this new form of social commerce. Prior to joining Swap.com, Jeff founded and served as President and COO of NameMedia, Inc.. Jeff started his work on the Internet as an executive at Lycos where he served in many roles that included Vice President of eCommerce and Executive Vice President of Corporate Development. Jeff earned his B.S. Degree, cum laude, with a concentration in Marketing and Management from Bentley College.
Bob Davis
Bob Davis is a General Partner at Highland Capital Partners, a firm that was founded with the mission of helping great people build great companies. Since its inception in 1988, the firm has taken a sector-focused approach to investing in exceptional communications, consumer, digital media, healthcare and information technology companies. With over $3 billion of committed capital and offices in Boston, Silicon Valley, Shanghai and Geneva, Highland has invested in and worked to create such firms as Ask Jeeves, Avid Technology, CheckFree, Conor Medsystems, Continental Cable, Helicos BioSciences, lululemon athletica, Lycos, MapQuest, Navic Networks, Ocular Networks, Odyssey Healthcare, P.A. Semi, Quigo, Starent Networks, Sybase, Telica and VistaPrint.
Prior to joining Highland, Bob served as the Chief Executive Officer of Terra Lycos (TRLY) formed in October 2000 with the $5.5 billion acquisition of Lycos by Terra Networks of Spain. Previously, Bob was the Founder of Lycos, Inc (LCOS) and served as its President and Chief Executive Officer since its inception in 1995 where he led Lycos from a start-up with $2 million in venture capital funding to become the most visited online destination in the world with over 100 million unique visitors. Under his leadership, Lycos jumped from the fastest IPO in Nasdaq history, a mere nine months from inception to offering, to a global media entity and an esteemed member of the Nasdaq 100. Bob has served on the boards of several public and private sector companies including John Hancock (JHFS), Ticketmaster (TCMS), Terra Lycos (TRLY), Lycos (LCOS) and Lycos Europe (LCY). He also serves as a Trustee for Children’s Hospital Trust Board, The Rivers School and also serves on the Board of Advisors for the Boston College Carroll School of Management and the Northeastern University School of Technological Entrepreneurship. Bob is the best-selling author of “Speed is Life: Street Smart Lessons from the Front Lines of Business (Currency).” He holds a B.S. from Northeastern University, an M.B.A. from Babson College, and Honorary Doctorates from both Bentley College and Northeastern University. Bob has been inducted into the Academy of Distinguished Entrepreneurs and received the Massachusetts Interactive Media Council’s Lifetime Achievement Award.
Richard DeSilva
Based in Highland’s Menlo Park office, Richard is a General Partner at Highland focused on digital media investments with specific experience and interest in online advertising, online media properties, consumer payment systems and consumer media technologies and infrastructure. He invests in early stage companies as well as later stage opportunities including growth equity, venture buyouts, spin-outs and recapitalizations.
Before joining Highland in 2003, Richard was co-founder and President of SiteBurst Inc., a channel marketing software company. Prior to SiteBurst, Richard was part of the team that founded IronPlanet.com, a venture-backed marketplace for used heavy equipment. Previously, Richard was an Engagement Manager at Mercer Management Consulting, where he led strategic initiatives for clients including IBM, Tribune and Leo Burnett. He has worked extensively in the cable television industry as a consultant to Scientific Atlanta and as a product manager at the @Home Network. He has also worked at Apax Partners, and as a reporter for Newsweek magazine and the Washington Post.
Richard has an A.B. from Harvard College, a M.Phil. in International Relations from Cambridge University and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.
Russell S. Lewis
Mr. Lewis is President and CEO of Lewis Capital, LLC, which was formed in 1999 to make investments and provide general business and mergers & acquisitions consulting services to growth-oriented firms.From February 2002 until January 2005, Mr. Lewis served as Executive Vice President and General Manager of the VeriSign Naming and Directory Services (VRSN) Group, known for running a major portion of the Internet’s critical addressing infrastructure that manages the authoritative directories of all .com and .net domain names. For the preceding 15 years, Mr. Lewis ran a wireless transportation systems integration company that is the market leader in RFID electronic toll collection systems, which he acquired from Control Data in 1986 and sold to SAIC in 1994. Prior to 1986, Mr. Lewis managed an oil and gas exploration subsidiary of a publicly traded utility company (UGI Corporation) and was a Vice President of EF Hutton in the Municipal Finance group. Mr. Lewis is also a Director of Castle Energy Corporation (NASDAQ/CEC and Delta Petroleum.Mr. Lewis is a graduate of Deerfield Academy and holds A.B. from Haverford College and an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School.
Martin J. Mannion
Marty Mannion is a Managing Director of Summit Partners, a growth equity firm he joined in 1985, when it had fewer than ten employees operating out of one office. Since then, the firm has expanded to more than 160 people across three offices – Boston, Palo Alto and London – and has raised more than $11 billion in capital. Summit has invested in more than 300 businesses, which have completed nearly 125 public offerings and more than 115 strategic sales or mergers.
Marty has served on the boards of numerous private and public companies, with a particular focus on healthcare, financial services and technology companies. His board directorships and investments include: American Dental Partners, Bartlett Holdings, Benesight, Bennington Marine, Champion Windows, Clinical Pathology Laboratories, Educational Services Institute, EMED Co., Help/Systems, Lincare Holdings, Liquidnet Holdings, Litchfield Financial Corporation, LogistiCare, MEDITECH, NameMedia, Prompt Associates, Sparta Systems, and Suburban Ostomy Supply Company.
Marty graduated from Princeton University in 1981 with a degree in Economics. Upon graduation, he worked as a Systems Engineer at IBM Corporation. Following two years at IBM, Marty earned an M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and then joined Summit Partners’ Boston office in 1985.
Marty serves on the boards of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Massachusetts Bay and National Association of Basketball Coaches Foundation. He also sits on the board of Harvard Business School Dean’s Board of Advisors and is a trustee of the Park School in Brookline, Massachusetts. Additionally, he is on the Board of Advisors of Year Up, an intensive training program that provides urban young adults with a unique combination of technical and professional skills, college credits, an educational stipend and corporate internship. His past directorships include Children’s Hospital Trust of Boston and Regis High School in New York City.
Joseph S. Tibbetts, Jr.
Joe Tibbetts has over thirty years experience in finance, working primarily with fast-growth technology companies. Currently, Mr. Tibbetts is Senior Vice President and CFO of Sapient, a leading technology consulting services company. Previously, Mr. Tibbetts was the senior Vice President and CFO of enterprise software company Novell. Mr. Tibbetts has also been CFO of SeaChange International, where he led the firm’s IPO, and at Lightbridge.Earlier in his career, at Pricewaterhouse (now Pricewaterhouse Coopers), Mr. Tibbetts built a twenty-year track record of success that included responsibilities as an audit partner and as the founding partner of the firm’s Entrepreneurial Services Center, which assisted more than 100 technology and venture-backed clients during his tenure, including Lotus Development, Wellfleet and Shiva. Mr. Tibbetts has also been a partner at a leading venture capital firm, Charles River Ventures, where he created an in-house consulting practice, helped raise a $1.2 billion venture fund, and assisted portfolio companies in operations, finance and related areas. Mr. Tibbetts also served on the board of Great Plains Software for five years, through the company’s transition to a public company and its eventual acquisition by Microsoft as well as a board member of Flarion Technologies, an early stage venture-backed company, before its acquisition by Qualcomm.
