— Former Zillow executive RJ Jones joined real estate brokerage eXp World Holdings as executive vice president.
Jones was most recently the head of investor and corporate relations at Zillow Group. Prior to that, he was chief marketing officer at investment manager Kosmos Funds and a senior vice president at Wells Fargo Investments. Jones was an Army officer and graduated from West Point.
“My main priorities will be to drive initiatives that benefit our agents, bring more innovation into the investor relations practice and help eXp continue to be a leader in the industry,” Jones said in a statement. “My time in the real estate industry and in working with agents and shareholders has brought an appreciation for agent needs and industry challenges, and gives me a unique perspective to tackle these things in creative ways.”
Bellingham, Wash.-based eXp is a “virtual brokerage” with thousands of remote agents whose offices exist only in virtual reality.
— F5 Networks CIO Tony Bozzuti is stepping down this month after five years with the Seattle company. Bozzuti was also senior VP of IT.
“During his five years at F5, Tony’s IT leadership has been crucial to our customers’ digital transformation, as well as our own. Tony’s F5 team here in Seattle and around the world wish him the best,” Steve McMillan, EVP of Global Services, said in a statement.
Bozzuti was previously chief information officer at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center. He also worked at Washington Mutual and GE Capital.
F5 has hired Veresh Sita as its new chief digital information officer. Sita was previously global head of strategic consulting at WeWork and has executive experience at companies including Emaar, Alaska Airlines, Colliers International, and Starbucks. He effectively replaces Bozzuti but his title reflects a new and expanded role beyond what Bozzuti did as CIO. Sita will start at F5 later this month.
F5 recently added Mika Yamamoto as executive vice president and chief marketing & customer experience officer, and Geng Lin as CTO.
— The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation promoted longtime legal leaders Lauren Bright and Keith Matthews to general counsel.
Bright, who joined the foundation in 2005, will support the foundation’s U.S. Program, Global Policy & Advocacy, and Operations teams while continuing to serve as director of the Washington D.C. office.
Matthews, who joined in 2010, will support the foundation’s Global Health, Global Development, Global Growth and Opportunity, and Strategic Investment Fund teams.
Bright was previously at Shaw Pittman LLP (now Pillsbury Winthrop Shaw Pittman) and earned her J.D. from Villanova University School of Law. Matthews was previously counsel at O’Melveny & Myers and also worked as a senior consultant with Deloitte, and as an associate with the law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius. He received his J.D. from the University of Michigan.
— University of Washington spinout Jeeva Wireless named Scott Bright as its new CEO. Bright co-founded Seattle-based Synapse Product Development in 2001 and helped lead the company before departing in 2014. He did independent consultant work and taught at Seattle University for the past four years.
Now he’ll head up Seattle-based Jeeva and help the company commercialize its work on ambient backscatter and wireless power.
“Using only tens of microwatts, Jeeva Wireless can deliver kilobit data rates across hundreds of meters, and up to a megabit-per-second in room-scale deployments,” Bright said in a statement. “The breadth of innovations made possible by this game-changing platform is astounding and we’re eagerly working to enable the next-generation of ultra-low-power IoT devices: personal electronics, medical and health-care appliances, industrial and enterprise process controls, smart-city and home automation systems, and manufacturing/distribution logistics tracking tools – just to name a few!”
Jeeva was co-founded by UW professor Dr. Shyam Gollakota, who remains president of the startup.
“We are excited for Scott to lead the company to both strengthen our existing partnership with leading brands as well as leapfrog growth and partnerships with businesses across a number of product verticals,” Gollakota said in a statement.
— T. Ron Davis, chief marketing officer of Seattle startup VRStudios, is retiring. Over the course of his career, Davis founded five companies, including the American Homestay Network and iRequest. He was also an executive at Microsoft and worked at Digital Equipment Corp.
“As a CMO and Corporate Secretary, I will continue to be involved with the company for several more months as an advisor,” Davis told GeekWire in an email. “There are a number of very exciting things in the works.”
VRstudios raised $2.2 million from investors last year to fund virtual reality systems that can be found in theme parks, movie theaters and casinos across the U.S.
— Brian Glaister has joined Itron as an entrepreneur in residence at Idea Labs, the firm’s internal innovation studio.
He’ll help the publicly-traded company build its next large business unit from scratch to combat climate change.
Glaister previously co-founded Cadence Biomedical, a Seattle-area medical device startup he led for nearly seven years. He became managing director at Conflux Innovations in November 2017 and later was an entrepreneur in residence at Intellectual Ventures. Glaister is an advisor at Seattle startup A-Alpha Bio, and a core committee member at the Jones+Foster Accelerator at the University of Washington.
— Seattle startup Zonar Systems hired Michael Gould as its new chief operating officer.
Gould was most recently senior vice president and general manager for technology consulting at Oracle, and also has experience at HP Enterprise. He’ll help Zonar expand its reach around the globe. Gould also sits on the board of publicly-traded Radiant Logistics.
“I don’t think there’s ever been a more exciting time in transportation technology, and I’m thrilled to be joining a company dedicated to improving the safety and efficiency of the vehicles on the road,” Gould said in a statement.
Founded in 2001, Zonar provides GPS and telematics hardware and software solutions for fleets across a variety of industries. German automotive giant Continental acquired a majority stake in Zonar three years ago.
“We’re excited to have Mike on our team — his unique mix of transportation industry experience coupled with his experience leading teams to deliver enterprise IT solutions and transformation will help our team advance our mission of enhancing the safety, performance and success of our customers,” Zonar CEO Ian McKerlich said in a statement.
— HNTB Corporation hired Deborah Taylor as group director for the firm’s Bellevue office.
Taylor has more than 20 years of experience with HNTB and relocated from the firm’s Houston location, where she served as director of environmental planning for HNTB’s Texas region.
“Deborah brings to our Seattle office a wealth of project management experience and expertise with environmental planning that is critical to advancing large-scale transportation projects,” Kevin Collins, PE, vice president and HNTB Seattle office leader, in a statement. “Her demonstrated leadership and commitment to client satisfaction genuinely reflects HNTB’s core values and will further drive outstanding results for the communities we serve.”
