— Seattle-based Lighter Capital announced Patricia Elliott as chief sales officer and Kevin Fink as chief technology officer. The “alternative VC” company landed a $100 million deal in January to grow its organization and build new products.
Elliott joins Lighter Capital from Capital One, where she was a regional vice president. Her experience includes leading sales and business development at travel companies Yapta and Expedia. Fink was most recently CTO at scheduling tool Shiftboard and previously served as CTO at online directory WhitePages.com.
“Kevin is an accomplished tech veteran whom we’re excited to welcome to the team,” said Thor Culverhouse, CEO of Lighter Capital. “We believe he is the perfect person to lead our technology efforts as we enter a new stage of growth in 2020. The addition of Patricia to lead our partnerships and sales efforts will accelerate our growth as she partners closely with our clients to help them take full advantage of the array of services we now offer.”
— PR and communications leader Gaby Adam launched OurPlanet365, aiming to help companies design and build environmental sustainability platforms from research to execution.
Adam has run her own agency, By the Sea Communications, for more than 16 years, working with clients such as Microsoft, Holland America Line, Seagate and others. She was previously a senior vice president at DDB Worldwide Communications and an account supervisor at the agency now known as WE Communications.
— Seattle-based healthcare tech company Accolade named Pat Wadors to its board of directors. Wadors is currently chief talent officer at ServiceNow, a Santa Clara, Calif.-based enterprise cloud services company.
Wadors previously lead LinkedIn’s global talent organization and has held HR roles at Twitter, Yahoo and Align Technology, the company behind Invisalign.
“Technology in service of people allows you to provide time for care of employees, patients and their families, and I see a tremendous opportunity for Accolade’s service and technology platform to scale in ways that further engage people in their own health, wellness, productivity and presence,” said Wadors. “Accolade keeps the human at the center of the technology to move them toward better health and happiness. That’s a solution I want to be part of.”
— Microsoft and Amazon alum Andy Glaister has been named CTO of Chicago, Ill.-based Level Ex, which creates medical video games for physicians. He will be based in Chicago.
Glaister most recently worked as technical director at Amazon Lumberyard, a 3D game engine that’s part of Amazon Web Services. Prior to Amazon, Glaister spent 17 years at Microsoft in various roles on the Game Studios and Windows Graphics teams. Level Ex CEO and Founder Sam Glassenberg is also a Microsoft alum and worked alongside Glaister there.
“Creating games for doctors is among one of the most daring and challenging objectives of my professional life. I can think of no better cause—medicine—that warrants the best that technology has to offer,” Glaister said.
—Sales engagement startup Outreach is expanding to Europe with a new London office led by Tom Castley, who previously managed European accounts for Apptio, also a Seattle-based company. Castley previously was a sales director for Oracle and VP of EMEA for San Jose, Calif.-based compensation software company Xactly.
— The VP of product for Expedia’s conversation platform, Jay Fluegel, left after five years with the company. Fluegel previously spent 15 years at Microsoft, working on products including Xbox One, MSN Calendar, Messenger and others. Fluegel also spent time at startups including Jump.com, acquired by Microsoft in 1999, and Event Innovation.
“The timing seemed right to start a new chapter after five years helping transform the Expedia service experience,” Fluegel said via email. “I want to determine where I might have the most impact — in a big company or in another entrepreneurial venture.”
It has been a tumultuous few months for Expedia Group, with a move to a new 40-acre campus, an executive shakeup, and most recently, laying off 12 percent of its workforce.
— Ahead of its annual shareholders meeting, Boeing’s board of directors announced a changing of the guard. The board nominated Qualcomm CEO Steve Mollenkopf and Akhil Johri, former CFO of United Technologies Corporation and current independent director of Cardinal Health, for election to the board.
Current independent directors Edward Liddy, former chairman and CEO of Allstate, and Mike Zafirovski, an executive adviser at The Blackstone Group, will retire at the meeting. Both served on the board for more than a decade. Boeing’s annual shareholders meeting will be held April 27.
— University of Washington spinout Neoleukin Therapeutics appointed Robert Ho as chief financial officer effective in March. Ho most recently served as director of finance at DaVita, Inc., a provider of kidney care services. He was previously a vice president in the investment banking division of Morgan Stanley.
Only eight months after launching, the cancer-fighting startup focused on protein design was acquired by Vancouver, B.C.-based Aquinox Pharmaceuticals, which took Neoleukin’s name. The combined company is headquartered in Seattle and traded on the Nasdaq exchange.
— Web and mobile bill pay company doxo named Scott Scazafavo as VP of product management. Scazafavo joins the Seattle startup, which is backed by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, among others, from Unify Consulting where he consulted with Starbucks’ retail technology division. Scazafavo previously held product roles at consumer fintech startup Subtractor, ecommerce solutions company Digital River, Microsoft and Allrecipes.com.
