Management Team
Robert LeFort
Robert LeFort was appointed as CEO of Ember in April 2006. Most recently, he was the President of Infineon Technologies North America Corp. in June 2002, with responsibility for all headquarters business activity and key customers. Earlier, he was Vice President Infineon's Automotive & Industrial business, managing business development and relationships with companies using Infineon chips for dynamic vehicle management, engine control, automotive safety systems and related applications. Before joining Infineon in 2000, LeFort was Customer Manager at Delphi Corporation, a Tier One automotive electronics supplier, and held positions at Cherry Semiconductor (now part of ON Semiconductor), Unitrode Corporation and Analog Devices. He holds an MBA from Boston University and a BSEE from the University of Massachusetts at Lowell.
Skip Ashton
Skip brings over 15 years of experience in new product development to his role as Senior Vice president of Engineering. Skip is responsible for management of the Ember chip design, hardware, software and quality assurance teams. Prior to joining Ember, Skip was Director of Engineering at MPM/Speedline producing screen printers for electronics manufacturing and Manager of Program Management at Avici Systems producing high speed internet routers. Skip graduated with a mechanical engineering degree from Georgia Institute of Technology and spent 5 years in the US Navy Nuclear Program.
Bert Lutje Berenbroek
Bert brings over 15 years of experience in sales and business development to his role as Vice President Sales. He is responsible for sales in Europe, Middle East, Africa and Russia. Most recently, Bert was VP Sales for Ubicom, a manufacturer of communication chips and software. In that role, he led a global sales team and developed major verticals by building a strong sales channel, support organization and partner relationships in Europe and Asia. Prior to Ubicom, Bert held sales leadership positions at Cypress Semiconductor and Samsung Semiconductor. Bert holds an EE MSc from Twente University and business degrees from TSM and BSM.
Nick Horne
Nick leads Ember’s integrated circuit development team, based in Cambridge, UK. He is responsible for managing the development and transfer into production of Ember’s IC products. He brings 15 years of semiconductor development experience to Ember. Prior to joining Ember, Nick led the wireless ASIC design team at Cambridge Consultants Ltd, which specialized in CMOS system on chip designs. Part of this team was hired by Ember in 2004. Nick graduated with an Electrical and Information Science degree from Cambridge University, and then joined Thorn EMI Electronics to develop hardware for military radar systems
Dennis Natale
Dennis Natale’s 15 years of experience blends engineering with high tech sales management for large technology companies, as well as entrepreneurial ventures. As Ember’s VP of sales, Dennis is responsible for market development, sales and revenue growth. Dennis was most recently director of North American sales and business development at Memsic. Prior to this, he was general manager, Wireless Sensing Solutions at Sensicast Systems and was a director at Sapient, where he was a senior member of the company’s energy services practice. Dennis also held the position of product manager at Texas Instruments’ sensors group. He received a bachelor of science in engineering from Clarkson University, and a master of science from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Bob Power
Bob is responsible for managing development of Ember’s industry leading networking, platform and tools software. Bob brings over 25 years of experience in technical and business aspects of software development including the past 15 years in start up companies. Prior to Ember, Bob was a co-founder of Invento Networks. Earlier, he was founding Director of Software Development at Spring Tide Networks, which was acquired by Lucent Technologies where Bob later held the position of Vice President of Software Development. Bob has also held management and engineering positions at Computer Network Technologies, Brixton Systems and Stratus Computer. Bob holds an MSM degree from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and a BSCS from Framingham State College.
Jim Sheehan
Jim has more than 20 years of financial and operations management experience in software, services and manufacturing. Jim was most recently the CFO at Demantra which was sold to Oracle in June 2006. In his role at Demantra, Jim was responsible for all aspects of finance, human resources and IT services. Jim has extensive M&A experience in both selling and acquiring companies. Prior to joining Demantra, Jim held senior finance positions at Neteos, BISYS Networking Services, Network Integrity, EMC and Epoch Systems. Jim holds a BBA in Accounting from St. Bonaventure University.
