Rajeev Singh
Rajeev Singh.

Amperity, the marketing technology startup that raised $9 million from a who’s who of angel and venture investors in February, announced Wednesday that Rajeev Singh has joined the company’s board of directors.

Singh, CEO of Accolade and former president and COO of Concur, brings a wealth of experience to the new company founded by Kabir Shahani and Derek Slager.

“We are incredibly fortunate to have Raj join us on the Amperity journey,” Shahani, Amperity’s CEO, said in a news release. “He’s a true visionary and champion of big ideas, and has the operational horsepower and skills to actually see those ideas come to life. Having his expertise, mindset, and experience around the table is going to be transformational as we build Amperity.”

Singh, who co-founded the travel and expense management company Concur in 1993, has worked at nearly every role imaginable over the past 20 years, and said he’s thrilled to be part of the team. He’s currently CEO at Accolade, an on-­demand healthcare concierge for employers, health plans, and health systems.

“The team at Amperity is tackling an incredibly large and difficult problem that, when solved, will be invaluable to their customers. Having known the founders for a number of years, it’s clear to me that they have the vision, mindset, and experience to address a real market need,” Singh said.

Amperity’s website still just says “Coming soon” and welcomes visitors to keep in touch.

Theresa Wise
Theresa Wise. (Christopher T Martin photo)

Impinj announced that Theresa Wise has joined its board of directors. The information technology veteran announced her retirement from Delta Airlines earlier this year after serving as vice president and chief information officer since 2008.

“Theresa is a highly respected CIO and we are excited to welcome her to our board,” Impinj CEO Chris Diorio said in a news release. “Her operational expertise, deep knowledge of process optimization in complex, distributed systems and her vision in using technology to improve customer experience is synergistic with Impinj’s mission of connecting every item in your everyday world. Her expertise will be instrumental as we further diversify our solutions and expand our footprint across many industries including airlines.”

Wise led the successful merger of Delta and Northwest airlines’ technology and processes, combining more than 1,200 IT systems in what became recognized as a blueprint for airline mergers.

Seattle-based Impinj is a leading provider of RAIN RFID solutions, delivering real-time information to businesses about items they create, manage, transport and sell.

Kelly Smith, VP of Digital for Starbucks China.
Kelly Smith, VP of Digital for Starbucks China.

Starbucks has named Kelly Smith the VP, Digital Product – International, based out of the company’s Seattle headquarters. The move brings Smith back from China, where the startup vet spent two years in Shanghai leading the company’s digital expansion for customers in the country.

In his new role, Smith will  lead the extension, expansion, and support of Starbucks’ core mobile and web applications within and across international regions and markets, according to an email announcing the move.

Smith will spearhead the design and development of a Starbucks Global Software Developers Kit (SDK) for mobile and web applications as part of a strategy to scale a consistently secure and elevated digital experience.

Smith previously spoke to GeekWire about his ambitions for Starbucks while in China.

“My goal is to help build in the relatively near future what will ultimately become the most significant brand app in the country,” Smith said. “Exclude the social platforms and the payment platforms — I’m just saying as a brand, my goal would be to make this the most prevalent application used by people in China, bar none.”

Yin Tat Lee
Yin Tat Lee.

— The University of Washington has added Yin Tat Lee to the faculty of its Computer Science & Engineering program.

According to the school, Lee’s research focuses on the design of fast algorithms for fundamental optimization problems. Leaders in convex optimization acknowledge that his work has yielded the most important breakthroughs in interior point methods in the past two decades. Together with his co-authors, Lee has developed the fastest known algorithms for linear programming, submodular function minimization, and the maximum flow problem. He has been the recipient of a variety of Best Paper and Best Student Paper awards from flagship theory conferences, including FOCS and SODA.

After finishing his Ph.D. at MIT, Lee will spend a one-year postdoc at Microsoft Research in Redmond, Wash., before starting at UW CSE.

Steve Johnson
Steve Johnson.

Impact Hub Seattle, the co-working space and innovation lab, has named Steve Johnson its new CEO.

Johnson previously served as executive director of the City of Seattle’s Office of Economic Development from 2008 to July 2015. His work included attracting, retaining, and expanding businesses in Seattle and helping neighborhoods organize and execute strategies to develop strong commercial districts. His aim was also to ensure that all residents could share in Seattle’s prosperity.

Johnson said in a company newsletter that Impact Hub Seattle’s board has asked him to “help the organization achieve an even greater impact on the social, civic, and environmental well-being of the Seattle area. This means leveraging our members, tenants, partners, and global network to influence more forcefully public awareness, civic discourse and collaborative problem solving on the major challenges of our time.”

Jeremy Stone
Jeremy Stone.

Code.org recently added two new members to its leadership team.

The Seattle-based non-profit, dedicated to expanding access to computer science, and increasing participation by women and underrepresented students of color, announced that Jeremy Stone will join the company as CTO.

Stone spent the last eight years as VP of Engineering at Clean Power Research. He will lead a 15-person Engineering team “building resources to redefine how computer science is taught to the tens of millions of students using Code.org’s tutorials in over 45 languages and in more than 180 countries.”

Rachel Klein
Rachel Klein.

Rachel Klein will lead Code.org’s new Professional Learning & Community team.

The Seattle-based organization, which helps promote computer science education, said Klein will work “to increase the number of skilled computer science teachers in the country and make sure they feel connected to a community focused on quality, sustainability, and a passion for teaching.”

Klein was formerly a central office administrator for Washington’s Highline School District.

Raakesh Parmar
Raakesh Parmar

Planetary Power, the Redmond, Wash.-based developers of hybrid technology for off-grid telecom towers, has added Raakesh Parmar as vice president of Product.

The company’s HyGen hybrid generator is geared toward the telecom market, where Planetary estimates there are over a million towers without access to a reliable power grid. Parmar has a background in both telecommunications and technology innovation ideally suited to supporting the introduction of HyGen to key customers.

“Over a million telecom towers worldwide rely on diesel generators for energy, causing untold environmental damage. There is a better solution,” Joe Landon, President & CEO of Planetary Power said. “Raakesh’s proven track record deploying new technology to the telecom market ensures successful introduction of HyGen to our growing customer base. We are excited to add his experience to our leadership team.”

Parmar has more than 18 years of management experience with organizations including AT&T Wireless, Telefonica, Ericsson, Huawei and Bechtel. He has led several initiatives at the forefront of technology leading the deployment for the first 3G wireless network in the United States, as well as the first Long Term Evolution (LTE) network deployment in the Southeast.

Brad Myers
Brad Myers

Oracle has named Brad Myers area vice president of Consulting.

Myers will be based in Bellevue, Wash., and his team will be focused on assisting Oracle’s enterprise client base in the Western region. He will be responsible for overseeing consulting and success teams for Oracle focused on Cloud and on-premise solutions.

Myers previously served as partner and executive VP of Clutch and in various senior level roles at Microsoft.

David Greenberg
David Greenberg.

Customer.io, the Portland-based behavioral messaging platform for automating hyper-personalized customer communication, has announced the addition of David Greenberg as chief marketing officer.

Greenberg was formerly with Puppet Labs and has worked at several early stage start-ups in Portland including Jive Software and Urban Airship.

“As a lifelong marketer, I am intimately familiar with the challenges marketing departments face today in building meaningful relationships and brand loyalty with their customers,” Greenberg said in a news release. “Marketers have been stuck using the same, heavy automation solutions and forced to play by their rules, for well over a decade. That’s why I am excited to join Customer.io — because we are leading a new wave of data-driven, flexible marketing solutions that take personalization, relevancy and scale to a whole new level.”

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