Thinkers and Doers

Neil Diener is a co-founder of Emanate Wireless and is the CEO. He is leading the company to become a strategic provider of RTLS technologies leveraging WiFi, BLE, and the Cloud. Prior to launching Emanate Wireless, Neil was a member of the CTO office in Cisco’s Wireless Networking Business Unit. He came to Cisco through the acquisition of Cognio, Inc. in 2007, where he was co-founder and CTO. At Cisco, Neil worked on shaping Cisco’s wireless technology and product strategies, with a focus on the areas of RF innovations, Spectrum Intelligence, and High Density wireless deployments.

Neil has over twenty-five years of experience in the conception, deployment, and delivery of innovative software and communication products. He has played a visionary and leadership role in building several successful start-up companies including Cognio, Direct Hit (acquired by Ask.com), and Telogy Networks wireless division (acquired by Motorola). Neil holds a BS Electrical Engineering from MIT and a MS Computer Engineering from USC. He has been issued 25 patents in the area of Wi-Fi and spectrum management. In his spare time, Neil enjoys working out, dancing, and playing poker.

Dan joins Emanate Wireless with over 20 years of direct sales experience as a leader within Cisco’s America’s Sales Organization. Dan is focused on working with customers and business partners to architect location and asset management solutions leveraging the latest RTLS technologies.

At Cisco, Dan led a team of Product Specialists and Consulting System Engineers across the Central Area. Dan and his team focused on network security and design, along with mobile solutions and applications to meet business initiatives and enhance end client productivity. Dan is a known strategic sales leader with proven success combining expertise in architecting technical solutions, business process improvement, and account management.

Prior to joining the field sales team, Dan was Director of Business Development for the Cisco’s Wireless Network Business Unit. In this role, Dan worked closely with IBM, Intel, Dell, Intersil, TI and other companies within the 802.11 industry to align them with Cisco’s overall wireless LAN strategy.

Dan has been directly involved in marketing and selling 802.11 wireless products since 1997, when the first 802.11 integrated wireless chip sets became available on the market. Dan has a MS in Electrical Engineering from Cleveland State University and currently resides in Chagrin Falls, Ohio with his wife and three children. He enjoys golf, biking, and traveling in his spare time.

Gary is a co-founder of Emanate Wireless and has over 25 years of experience in the conception, invention, design and development of digital communication products and technology. Gary has a great reputation as a creative force in leading breakthrough technology developments for both small and large companies.

Gary was an original founder of Cognio and led their development team of 30 people with a diverse skillset ranging from RF circuit design, UI development, and program man-agement. While at Cognio, Gary invented the initial MIMO beamforming, SAgE, pulse-based signal identification, generic signal identification, and interferer location concepts. Upon the Cisco acquisition of Cognio, Gary became the Director of Engineer-ing of the Wireless Networking BU. His team of over 90 engineers had responsibility spanning RF, digital, mechanical, antenna, compliance, PCB CAD, ASIC and DSP development disciplines. Gary’s team introduced Cisco’s leading edge “Clean Air” technology in Cisco's Aironet Access Points. Gary has fifty issued U.S. patents and holds a BS and MS in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland, College Park. In his spare time, Gary enjoys playing guitar, travel and skiing.

Libby has over 30 years of experience in finance and operations for technology and telecommunications companies, including local start-ups and publicly-traded multinational firms.  Before joining Emanate Wireless, she served as CFO of TRX Systems, a provider of indoor location software and solutions, and interim CFO of kajeet, a provider of cellphone services to kids and families.  She also held positions as CFO of Cognio, and VP, Finance and Administration of Megisto Systems.  In these roles, she was responsible for financial, accounting, tax, banking, contracts, legal, HR and administrative functions.  Earlier experience includes Global TeleSystems Group, Hughes Network Systems, Hughes Aircraft and System Development Corporation, a spinoff of the Rand Corporation.  Ms. Hess has a BA from Trinity College, Hartford, CT and a MBA from the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania.   In her spare time, she enjoys traveling to Africa and volunteering with a dog rescue group.

Chandra is a co-founder of Emanate Wireless and is a technical leader with over twenty years of experience in research, design and development of Communications and Signal Processing products. Co-founder of 2 highly innovative high-tech startups with several years of team and project management experience across multi-site and multi-disciplinary teams. Chandra is managing the Engineering resources at Emanate. Chandra was also a founder of Cognio as a member of initial team hashing out technical ideas and business plans. Chandra recruited and built up a team of ASIC, DSP/communications, hardware and software engineers in the development of Cognio MIMO and DSP technology.

At Cisco, Chandra managed the R&D team of technical leaders with expertise in hardware, ASIC/FPGA, DSP/communication and embedded software engineers. The team was responsible for development of Cisco’s wireless controllers, and various aspects of WLAN Access Point (AP) development. Chandra led the efforts of the integration of Spectrum Intelligence into Cisco APs (marketed under CleanAir). Chandra has PhD in Electrical Engineering from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN. and a MS in Electrical Engineering from Villanova University, Villanova, PA. Chandra has over 24 pat-ents issued. Chandra lives in Rockville, MD with his wife and kid. In his spare time he likes to explore the great outdoors.

Yohannes is a co-founder of Emanate Wireless responsible for the design and development of Emanate’s hardware products. Prior to Emanate, Yohannes was the lead architect for signal classification in Cognio’s Spectrum Analysis products. He designed and implemented various DSP algorithms for signal classification and was responsible for design, implementation and testing of key modules in Cognio’s SAgE (Spectrum Analysis Engine) chip. Yohannes was also chief architect of SCALE – Cognio’s RSSI based location algorithm which, takes in signal strength measurements from a devices transmission and a curately estimates its location.

At Cisco, Yohannes led a team of 7 engineers responsible for the design and development of Spectrum Intelligence and Beamforming features in Cisco’s next generation AP. He also led the design for Cisco’s market leading 3 spatial stream 802.11n Access Points. Yohannes has a Ph.D in Electrical Engineering from University of Virginia and MS Electrical Engineering from University of Virginia. When away from work Yohannes enjoys time with his wife and three kids, soccer and has recently taken up the guitar.

Mark leads the architecture and development of Emanate’s Cloud Server and Smartphone applications.  Prior to Emanate, Mark was the lead software architect in the Sports & Entertainment group at Cisco Systems, where Mark created innovative applications such as Cisco Engage for the Norwegian and Swedish Soccer Leagues, and Cisco StadiumVision enabling sports venues to offer fans multicast video services in their seats.

 

Prior to Cisco, Mark was a senior software engineer at companies include ADC Telecommunications, Redback Networks, PairGain, and RSA Consulting.   Mark has a BS in Computer Engineering from NC State.   When away from work Mark enjoys time with his wife and new baby.