Meet
the Tempest Team
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Jessica
Firestone, Chief Executive Officer
Jessica Firestone is a co-founder and Chief Executive
Officer of Tempest Telecom Solutions. Jessica's career began as a sales and customer support
representative at Century Computer Marketing,
a leading distributor of computer equipment and
spare parts. In 1996, she joined Somera Communications,
a pioneering provider of new and used telecommunications
infrastructure equipment and services as a divisional sales manager responsible for
sales to wireless carriers through out the United
States. From 1996 to 2002, Jessica was promoted several
times, from Manager to Director and finally to Vice
President of Wireless Sales, where she led the company's
largest sales division, managing a team of 27 people,
with responsibility for $97 million revenue. Jessica
left Somera Communications in 2002 to pursue other
opportunities. She then joined Somera Ventures,
a Santa Barbara based private equity investment
firm where she worked with several of their
portfolio companies as a Business Development Advisor.
It was her vision and industry insight that ultimately
led to the launching of Tempest Telecom Solutions. |
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Julie
Lubin, Chief Financial Officer
Julie Lubin is a co-founder and Chief Financial
Officer of Tempest Telecom Solutions. Ms. Lubin
also holds the same title at Somera Capital Management,
where she is responsible for internal financial
management, oversight of investment reporting,
and company planning. She has more than 15
years of experience as a controller, chief financial
officer, business manager, as well as the tax and
financial adviser to many high net worth individuals
and privately owned businesses. She has extensive
experience handling sophisticated multi-million
dollar financial transactions in both the real estate
and non-real estate markets, ranging from sales
and purchases, recapitalizations and reorganizations,
venture capital investments and workouts. Ms. Lubin
served as the Controller and Chief Financial
Officer for Somera Communications, Inc., a worldwide
distributor of telecommunications infrastructure
equipment, where she managed the company.s growth
from start-up to more than $100 million in revenues
in less than four years. She instituted the financial
reporting systems needed to facilitate a significant
investment in the company by a venture capital firm,
leading to the company.s eventual IPO and NASDAQ
listing. |
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Dan Firestone,
Chief Operating Officer
Dan Firestone started his business career in 1978
when was engaged in several small, high-growth private
companies in the computer distribution, real estate,
and manufacturing industries. In 1984, Mr. Firestone
and a partner co-founded Century Computer Marketing,
a distributor of computer products and spare parts,
and served as its Chief Executive Officer until
May 1994. Under Dan's direction, Century Computer
grew from start-up to $40 million in annual revenue
with six offices in four countries before it was
sold in 1994 to a small public company for $32 million.
After spending a year providing management consulting
services and searching for his next project, in
July 1995 Dan and two partners launched Somera Communications,
Inc. (NASDAQ: SMRA), which grew to $220 million
in annual revenue. Dan served as Chief Executive
Officer from 1996 to September 2001, and as Chairman
of the Board from inception until September 2003.
Along the way, Dan was responsible for raising $52.8
million in venture capital, $65 million in debt
financing, and $120 million in the company's initial
public offering in November 1999.
In September 2001, Mr. Firestone stepped down as
Chief Executive Officer of Somera Communications,
Inc. to pursue his own venture investment and business
consulting activities, as a principal and President
of Somera Ventures, LLC, a Private Equity Investment
firm that now holds seven companies in its portfolio.
He sits on the board of, and provides strategic
and operational consulting to, several of his portfolio
companies, including Tempest Telecom Solutions. |
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Gordon
Smith, Vice President, Services
Gordon joined Tempest Telecom Solutions in October
of 2006 to oversee our growing Services portfolio.
Gordon comes to the Tempest Team with 12 years of
Telecommunications Services experience. Prior to
joining Tempest, Gordon served as Vice President
of Services for Somera Communications where he oversaw
Depot Repair, Spares Management, Consulting and
Lifecycle Services. From September 1994 through
October of 2002, Gordon served a variety of executive
roles in Telecom Services companies including COO
of Compass Telecom and President of TDI, Inc. In
his experience, Gordon has overseen teams of more
than 100 employees and P&L’s in excess
of $25M. Gordon holds a B.A.Sc. degree in Civil
Engineering from the University of Waterloo as well
as an MBA from Goizueta Business School (Emory University)
and is a licensed Professional Engineer |
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Dave
Smargon, Vice President of Supply & Sales Operations
Dave Smargon joined Tempest Telecom Solutions in October of
2006 to drive the expansion of our New Products
Distribution Services and Supply strategy. Dave
began his career in 1986 as a Microelectronics Microwave
design engineer at Raytheon Company in Goleta CA,
and was later promoted to Section Manager of the
Receiver design group. Dave then took a job with
Superconductor Technologies as a Transition to Manufacturing
Specialist. He spent nearly 10 years at Superconductor
Technologies in a variety of expanding roles, with
the last 5 years as the Director of Customer Service
and Sales Operations. In this capacity Dave played
a critical role making sure his wireless customers
received high quality service to go along with their
high quality products. Dave brings that focus on
quality to his new position at Tempest to facilitate
successful growth. As Director of New Product Distribution
Services and Supply he will be responsible for identifying
the best new products available in the Telecommunications
industry and bringing those products into Tempest’s
portfolio of offerings to its customers. Dave received
both a BS and an MS in Electrical Engineering from
the University of Massachusetts in Amherst. |
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Bill
Peardon, Vice President of Sales, Strategic Relationships
Bill joined Tempest Telecom Solutions in July of 2005, as
the Director of Strategic Accounts, with an extensive background
in sales, marketing and procurement within the telecommunications
Industry. His depth of knowledge and deep commitment
to servicing companies and individuals on the front
lines of this rapidly changing industry, makes him
a welcome addition to our growing team. Bill has
been serving wireless telecommunications carriers
since 1997, first at SRS Industries, and later at
American Communications. |
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Mike
Peters, Vice President of Sales, Wireless Division
Mike Peters joined Tempest Telecom Solutions in August 2005
as a Sales Director focusing on the Regional Wireless
Carrier space. Mike began his sales career in telecom
sales at Somera Communications in 1996, where he
was primarily focused on the Rural Wireless service
providers. Then from 1999 to 2003, as a Group Sales
Manager focused on the Rural Wireless Market, Mike
led his team to $23 million dollars in annual sales
revenue. In 2003, Mike was promoted to Sales Director
leading a team of 8 sales people to become the highest
revenue producing team in the company. During this
time Mike successfully negotiated several multi-million dollar vendor contracts to provide carriers
with complete network build-out support, utilizing
a combination of refurbished and new telecom
equipment from a variety of vendors, saving his
customers millions of dollars. |
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Ben Collins, Director, Microwave Solutions Sales
Ben joined Tempest in March of 2006 as an Account Executive tasked with finding new opportunities and developing strategic relationships with top companies in the Wireless industry. His focus now is to lead Tempest’s Spectrum Clearing effort, working primarily with the top AWS license winners, such as T-Mobile and SpectrumCo. Prior to Tempest, Ben worked as an Inside Sales Manager for Green Hills Software, an industry leader in real-time embedded software development. Ben’s customer first approach has been a valuable addition to the Tempest team and he is well received on all projects he’s been a part of. |
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Dave Root, Sales Director, Private Network Accounts
Dave joined Tempest in 2008 as a Sales Director, focused on expanding microwave solutions for government, enterprise & private network operators. Dave has worked with the Tempest management team for over 15 years, and is directly responsible for developing new business across various market segments in both the high technology & telecommunications fields. While at Somera, Dave was promoted to develop the company’s category leadership position with the Regional Bell Operating Companies (RBOC’s), and successfully converted 3 of the largest operating companies representing over $100 billion in annual capital expenditures from transactional customers to contract based programs. These programs drove predictable revenue streams which generated over $100 million in new business and increased gross profit margins by over 40%. Dave was instrumental in developing Somera’s first regionally based national sales team as well as the first regional sales office in Chicago. Dave has lived in Santa Barbara for the last 10 years, and relocated with his family to Tacoma, WA in 2007, where he currently resides |
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Steve Feinberg, Account Manager, Private Network Division
Steve Feinberg started his business career in 1980 working for DJC, a distributor of Computer products, while working part time in college. He eventually assumed the position of technical support manager and supervised the refurbishment of returned leased equipment. This background lead to him to be a co-founder at Century Computer Marketing a supplier of computer spare parts, Somera Communications a supplier of Telecommunications products and Century GSE a company that specialized in supplying airport ground support equipment. In September 2007 Mr. Feinberg joined Tempest to help in the sales development for wireless products and services to the Utilities Industries and Government Organizations. |
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Darren Corley, Contoller
Darren started his accounting career at Fleming Foods, the nation’s largest independent grocery wholesaler, where he worked out of various branch offices in Arizona and California. In 1994 Darren joined Rug Doctor, the world leader of do-it-yourself carpet cleaning equipment and supplies, based out of Dallas, Texas. While at Rug Doctor Darren was responsible for all domestic and international reporting, eventually serving as Director of Finance responsible for all consolidating entities. Prior to joining Tempest Darren also served as Controller and Chief Financial Officer for two local manufacturing and telecommunication services companies. Darren joined the Tempest team in January of 2008 as Controller. |
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Shabana Siyed, Director of Marketing
Shabana Siyed joined Tempest Telecom Solutions in February 2007 as the Marketing Coordinator. Prior to joining Tempest, Shabana was studying at the University of California Santa Barbara where she received her B.A. Shabana is now the Director of Marketing supporting the sales team with tradeshows, marketing collateral and anything else they may need to reach their goals. |
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Heidi Coffey, National Account Manager
After graduating with a BA from California Polytechnic State University, Heidi began her career as an Assistant Sales Executive in the computer component industry. After gaining a strong background in logistics and customer sales support, she moved into the telecommunications industry. In 1998, she joined the Wireless Sales Division at Somera Communications. Over the next 6 years, Heidi developed strong customer relationships with several Rural Wireless Carriers and helped support their network build-outs and operations. Heidi joined the Tempest Team in 2007 and is currently the National Account Manager for one of the nation’s largest wireless carriers. She lives and works in beautiful Paso Robles, CA. |
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