About Us

Founder/CEO

Adam learned many valuable lessons as a first-time founder and CEO at Technology Transfer, Inc. The lessons Adam has learned are the critical importance of any startup organization:

(1) Building a high-performance team

(2) Developing robust company culture

(3) Financial discipline.

Adam was involved at Technology Transfer end-to end sales lifecycle where he was the subject matter expert regarding product features/functionality and developed pricing structures and closed the sales within the business for multi-million-dollar results. Before that, Adam managed Microsoft's Southeast region business with annual revenue of $20M, and during his tenure at IBM, he sold data center renewal service agreements and net new revenue of $23M directly to enterprise accounts such as Paccar, Nordstrom, Nintendo, Starbucks, Freightliner, Weyerhaeuser Fred Meyer. Adam negotiated the North America Starbucks IBM service contract.

Lead Digital Address Infrastructure (DAI) Product Development

Andy Carothers, founder and CEO of Arondas, helps companies bring new digital services to market as a drop-in executive.

As a consultant, he specializes in product development, business operations, strategic alliances, and customer analytics. Andy’s passion for new tech can be traced back to Xbox, where he worked on its original European launch and later directed part of its games business across four continents.

He also had stints at Nike+, and most recently, he was the co-founder and Chief Operating Officer for Les Mills On Demand, an online fitness service based in New Zealand.

Through the years, he’s had the good fortune of building alliances with some of the most notable companies in the world, including Apple, FIFA World Cup, Aston Martin, and Sesame Street. Andy earned an M.B.A. from Duke.

Partner, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe, BAW BAB Corporate Legal Advisor

Blake is the founding member and leader of Orrick’s Technology Companies Group practice in the Pacific Northwest. His practice focuses on advising high-growth technology and life sciences companies and their investors.

Blake brings a unique and invaluable mix of in-house, entrepreneurial, and law firm experience, having served as General Counsel and senior executive of a software company and two biotech companies (cofounding one of them), as well as outside corporate counsel in elite AmLaw Global 100 law firms.

Blake’s experience spans multiple industries, including life sciences, software, hardware, mobile, fintech, cybersecurity, manufacturing, and retail. He has counseled fast-growing companies on hundreds of venture capital financings and M&A transactions, numerous public offerings, as well as service as a trusted advisor to management teams and Boards on both strategic and day-to-day matters.

Blake is proud to have worked with a variety of technology and life science companies, venture capital firms and investment banks, including AppSheet (acquired by Google; Nasdaq: GOOGL), Arris Composites, Barclays, Cloudhopper (acquired by Twitter; NYSE: TWTR), CI Security, Coatue Management, DimensionalMechanics, fatfoogoo (acquired by Digital River; Nasdaq: DRIV), Ikaria, IronPort Systems (acquired by Cisco. Prior to his legal career, Blake served with distinction in the U.S. Navy as a Surface Warfare Officer, including two combat deployments to the Persian Gulf, where he was decorated for his performance during Operations Southern Watch and Desert Strike.

Special Advisor to CEO

Gerry Baron, Global Head of Sales for Siren Data Intelligence, has over 25 years of sales and marketing leadership experience leading global direct and indirect sales channels. He has held senior executive positions at big data, information security, cloud services, defense, communications, network management, and mission-critical software firms serving the law enforcement, intelligence, defense, financial services industries. He is an advisory board member for several early stage startups.

Gerry received his B.S. from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and his M.B.A. in General

Management with a Concentration in Healthcare from Emory University’s Goizueta Business School (GBS). He is a member of Beta Gamma Sigma Honor Society, the Project Management Institute (PMI), and Alpha Phi Alpha Fraternity, Inc. Gerry also volunteers as a mentor for MIT and GBS students, serves as an MIT Educational Counselor (candidate interviewer), and actively mentors Boy Scouts as a Merit Badge Counselor.

Head of Organizational and Cultural Development

La’Kita Williams is the Founder and Principal Strategist of CoCreate Work, a future-focused coaching and consulting company.

A certified professional coach with a Masters in Social Work from The University of Southern California and over 15 years of experience, La’Kita is an organizational designer and developed her signature model, The 5 Components of Inclusive Culture, to provide a step-by-step framework for startups, small businesses, and emerging companies to build inclusive and responsive workplaces. She’s has worked with numerous companies to help them build and retain talented teams, consistently increase their annual earnings, scale, and build human-centered workplaces of the future.

La’Kita has been quoted in the New York Times, Harvard Business Review, and HelloGiggles, and has appeared on numerous podcasts to discuss leadership and the future of work. She lives in Seattle.

Lead/Technical Platform/Marketplace Product Development

As IBM Distinguished Engineer & CTO for AI practice, I equip various industry clients with Artificial Intelligence, NLP for compliance and acquiring new customers. Engage in business-driven technical strategy & transformation – conception to complex large-scale implementation on Cloud and supporting multiple channels. Successfully built and managed AI, cloud, and architecture consulting practices, defined practice technical expertise, hired and developed talent. I have worked with IBM research, engineering and software product teams. I have led teams of between 3-30 engineers, developed reference architectures based on open systems and software engineering principles.

I hold a M.S. in Computer Science from University of Illinois, Chicago. I also have won several awards, recognition and certifications.

Robert is an assiduous geospatial professional leveraging GIS, cartography, and analysis for healthy and biodiverse landscapes, cities, and communities.

Having worked in the public, private, and non-profit sectors, Robert has varied experiences and is passionate about collaborating with others to develop sustainable and equitable strategies for people, mobility, and nature-centric issues.

Mentor & Business/Product Strategic Advisor

Marty is a technology professional and serial entrepreneur. After finishing his PhD in Computer Science from the University of Washington, Marty worked creating new technologies for IBM and Clarify. Following that, he spent the next twenty-five years in his true love: Entrepreneurship.

Marty has started, run, and grown a series of technology companies in CRM, payments, and food waste and reclamation. He also spent the past twenty years as a mentor for the Venture Mentoring Service at MIT. Having just moved back to Washington state, Marty is working on a new set of challenges and technologies, and is always looking for other ways to help companies make a significant impact on people and communities.