People
thePlatform was founded and is managed by a veteran team, with experience from Microsoft, Adobe, Apple, RealNetworks, Loudeye, and other top technology firms.
Ian Blaine CEO
Ian Blaine's experience at large software companies, successful start-ups, and as a software industry entrepreneur gives him the credentials to successfully guide thePlatform from inception through the June 2006 acquisition by Comcast and beyond. Nine-plus years as a senior manager in the publishing division at Aldus/Adobe Systems gave Ian a strong product development background, and his pioneering acumen is proven by successfully launching Uniplanet—acquired by NBCi in 1999—and thePlatform in 2000.
Alex Glass VP, Operations
Alex Glass manages the entire lifecycle of thePlatform's systems and networks, defining quality goals to constantly improve our services' reliability and scalability. Before becoming the VP of Operations, Alex Glass worked with thePlatform as a Solutions Architect, the Director of Customer Service, and the VP of Client Services. Prior to joining thePlatform, Alex was with Digeo, Inc. where he worked as both a Project and Program Manager responsible for the deployment of an interactive television (iTV) personal video recorder.
Tricia Iboshi VP, Sales
Working closely with media companies and content aggregators at thePlatform since 2000, Tricia Iboshi has extensive experience in digital media solutions, interactive marketing, and content syndication solutions. As VP of Sales, she oversees thePlatform's sales and account management organization. Prior to thePlatform, Trish was a co-founder and VP of Business Development at RocketVox Corporation, where she was responsible for licensing and distributing special interest video content to video portals and aggregators. Previously, Trish served as Project Manager, Sales Director, and Managing Director for fine.com's European operations.
Andrew Olson COO & CFO
Andrew Olson oversees thePlatform's operations, finances, and business partnerships, including OEM partner relationships. Prior to founding thePlatform, Andrew worked for Microsoft's MSN division, where he was responsible for business planning for MSN .NET services (Hailstorm). His diverse background includes digital audio music development for top companies in the U.S. and Japan, co-founding of two biotechnology companies, and three years with The Boston Consulting Group developing data analysis and presentation software solutions, and helping define BCG's global IT strategy.
Alan Ramaley CTO
Alan Ramaley is responsible for the functional design of all of thePlatform's product offerings. Prior to co-founding thePlatform, he was a program manager at Microsoft for seven years, where he worked on Microsoft Project, Microsoft Team Manager, and Microsoft Office. He holds nine patents and has one patent pending in the areas of digital media management, workflow, and content publishing. Alan has a Bachelor's degree in Symbolic Systems and a Masters in Computer Science, both from Stanford University.
Marty Roberts VP, Marketing
Marty Roberts' diverse leadership background includes ten years of product management and marketing. His experience developing strategy, building relationships with development organizations, and creating new products and services helped increase the customer base and profitability for organizations such as GiftCertificates.com and RealNetworks. Since joining thePlatform in 2006, Marty has contributed to the company's success by updating the messaging, redesigning the web site, launching several successful products and increasing the brand awareness through advertising and PR.
Nick Rossi VP, Engineering
Nick Rossi has led the development and deployment of thePlatform's core software since joining the company in 2001, overseeing the development, QA, and network operations teams. Nick has been developing software applications for over 20 years, with an emphasis in scalable, high-availability services. Before thePlatform, he was an engineering manager at Loudeye Technologies, where he led the development of a music preview web service and a media processing workflow system. Prior to that, Nick worked for a start-up developing data mining servers used in DARPA projects to analyze large document sets. Nick holds a bachelor of science in engineering, with a minor in economics, from Harvey Mudd College.