Practice Areas

  • Product Management
  • Disruptive Strategies
  • Innovation Process
  • SaaS
  • Web 2.0

  • puzzle peices The pressure to deliver the right product to the right market at the right time has never been greater.


    Today's thriving companies are the ones that define, produce, and promote products that not only meet current customer needs but also position the company for future success and growth. This requires a deep understanding of: customer needs, emerging opportunities, market trends, evolving technology capabilities, competitive activities, internal strengths and weakness, and a firm foundation in business management fundamentals.


    In short, it requires exceptional product management that can pull all of the pieces together and champion product programs that win the support of the entire organization. Our product management practice focuses on helping companies build world class product management capabilities, providing guidance on developing appropriate structure, process, and individual skill sets needed to navigate the challenges in the modern day organization.


  • wrecking_ball6Product innovation efforts within many companies focus on incremental improvements to established product lines in order to maintain current competitive position. However, such focus limits the opportunities for growth to the potential of the underlying served segments.

    We specialize in finding disruptive opportunities that deliver entirely new value propositions, redefine competitive landscapes, and open up significant new growth opportunities. Our experience with a wide range of technologies across diverse market applications provides the insight needed to recognize opportunities not readily visible to industry veterans. These opportunities often emerge from applying technologies and solutions proven in other markets to the needs of currently served customers, or applying current product capabilities to new markets, or from leveraging different channels and business models to reach underserved market segments.

    Our expert knowledge of emerging market dynamics allows us to develop business, market, and product strategies that match technology capabilities with unsatisfied needs, eliminate barriers to adoption, and drive rapid market penetration.

  • light bulbNew product innovation is the very life blood of IT firms today as the rapid evolution of contemporary technology quickly renders established products obsolete, reconfigures competitive landscapes, and simultaneously creates new opportunities.

    However, the successful creation and launch of a new product or service is one of the most complex projects a company can undertake. Our innovation process practice is focused on helping firms improve their overall efficiency and effectiveness in bringing new products to market. Whether implementing a disciplined structured approach for converting ideas into successful market launches for the first time, or addressing current limitations in an already established process, we can help.

    Our expertise in fitting proven best-practices to individual cultures and personalities covers the entire innovation cycle from idea generation and opportunity identification, through concept filtering and selection, market strategy and business planning, product development, organizational readiness, and market launch.

  • phone jackSaaS (Software as a Service) is rapidly emerging as a disruptive force in the IT industry, transforming the very nature of the vendor-customer relationships and creating new growth opportunities.

    However, SaaS is far more than subscription payments for hosted software. It has profound impact on virtually all aspects of the business including sales, marketing, finance, support, operations, product development, and customer care. Failure to recognize and effectively plan for this impact can makeentry into the SaaS market a painful if not disastrous endeavor for a classic software firm.

    Our SaaS practice focuses on helping companies address the challenges of adding SaaS offerings to their product portfolios. Our services start with identification of appropriate market opportunities and continues with strategic planning,service definition, pricing, assessment and development of organizational readiness, and market launch. With our experience guiding the way, software companies can experience significant new growth opportunities through expansion into SaaS.

  • gold teamWeb 2.0 applications and social computing technologies are changing the way the world communicates, allowing customers, business partners, and employees to easily share opinions, wants, needs, ideas, and motivations with each other.

    These social computing applications are providing users with access to the right information at the right time through access to the collective intelligence and relevant experiences of others.

    Our Web 2.0 practice helps clients make sense of this phenomenon and leverage it to radically improve interactions with constituents and translate it into competitive advantage in the form of increased innovation, productivity, and organizational agility. Opportunities range from improving an organizations on-line presence through web sites that allow for user generated content and community involvement to internal applications focused on improved collaboration among project and innovation team members.

Written by Administrator.

CAREER THUMBNAIL 

Beginning life as a product development engineering, my carrer progressed through roles in sales, marketing, product management, strategy, business development, and senior management positions.  These positions have spanned a variety of organizational situations ranging from fortune 100 global multi-nationals to entrpreneurial start-up ventures.  In all cases, my focus has been on development of some new product, venture, or market, and thus has always involved high levels of risk and uncertainty in fast changing environments. While the volatility of these situations  has resulted in a higher number of job transitions, it has also provided the opportunity for an unusually high number of successful programs involving different markets, organizational cultures, business situations, technologies, and functional perspectives. The result is a deep and holistic understanding of factors that impact the success of innovation efforts. This unique insight fuels my ability to quickly integrate diverse cross-functional perspectives into a unified vision, and lead the conversion of the collective hidden tacit knowledge of an organization into new products and services that deliver compelling value propositions and produce exceptional growth. 

Senior Vice President - AllOne Health - Mobile Health Information - (A Blue Cross Owned Company)

President - Product Acuity Consulting - (Privately held product and market strategy consulting firm)

Chief Marketing Officer - Arsenal Digital Solutions - ($20 million dollar venture backed firm).

VP - Product Management and Strategy - Cable & Wireless a-Services (An application service provider start-up joint venture with Compaq Computers) 

Sr. Director - Strategy and Business Development - Internet Products and Services - Compaq Computer

VP/GM Systems Product Division - Telxon Corporation ($500 million public global firm acquired by Symbol Technologies)

Analyst and Reseach Director, Network Technology Strategies  - Gartner Group 

Sr. Director Software Product Marketing - Norand Corporation ($250 million public global company acquired by Intermec)

Sr. Systems Analyst Architect - Retail Systems Group - British Petroleum 

Computer Products Sales Specialist - Arrow Electronics

Manager, Software Product Development - Diebold

Systems Engineer, Corporate Engineering - Firestone Tire and Rubber

EDUCATION AND PROFESSIONAL CREDENTIALS

Ph.D. - Organization and Management - Technology and Innovation Management

e-Business Graduate Studies Certificate 

M.B.A. - The University of Akron 

B.S.E.E. - The Ohio State University

Licensed Professional Engineer - State of Ohio

CPHIT - Certified Professional Heath Information Technologies

CPEHR - Certified Professiononal Electronic Health Records

CPHIMS - Certified Professional Health Information Management Systems

CHSS - Certified HIPAA Security Specialist

AMIA 10 x 10 - Bioinformatics Certificate

ITIL - V3

Spiral Dynamics Certified  Level II

Marquis Who’s Who in America;  Marquis Who’s Who in Science and Industry  


SELECTED COMMERCIAL SUCCESSES

Having continually been on the leading edge of new innovations that change the way we live and work, I.have developed a very deep understanding of how market forces and technical trends influence the diffusion, acceptance, and market penetration of innovations. This knowledge and experience forms the foundation for my strengths in strategic planning and developing product roadmaps that remain align with real and current market opportunities.  Utilizing the insight and experience from one industry often forms the basis for innovation in another, and provides the ability to identify opportunities often not obvious to established industry veterans.  The time line based information below highlights my continual participation in the early stages of market emergence and continued perspective on the leading edge of transformational change.

Recent years

For the last few years I have been involved with health care applications including electronic medical records for health care providers, and well as personal health records for consumers.  A key focus has been leveraging Internet and mobile technologies to streamline and factilitate consumer driven access to health related information and services. 

  • Developed product requirements for an automated patient check-in visit for use in physician offices based on use of Internet technologies, wireless LANs, and mobile touchpad computers (iPADs).
  • Developed the business and product plans, established initial offering, and first customers for a mobile phone based secured personal health record and secured communication between health plans and their members. Piloted by the US Army TATRC (Telemedicine Advanced Technology Research Center). 
  • Developed the business and market plan and requirements for a SaaS based solution for tracking pre-natal care, allowing multiple practices and acute care organizations to share and access up to date medical records on demand.
  • Defined the market opportunity and product requirements, established required partnerships, and launched a SaaS based EMR and PMS solution for a major vendor of licensed premised based EMR software.    

Mid 00"s - focused on Internet and Web based technologies and applications including  VoIP,  knowledge management systems, e-communities, and ambient intelligence.  The central theme is the use of computer mediated communication and distributed processing in the generation and application of collective knowledge.

  • Developed a knowlegde management and virtual community platform based on open source software, currently used by several local community non-profit organizations.
  • Developed the business plan for a VoIP connection service, securing a $10M series A investment.
  • Developed technology roadmap for incorporation of Ambient Intelligent technologies into office furniture for a leading global furniture design and manufacturing firm. 

Early 00's - Delivering software and IT support as a managed Internet service. 

  • Established growth position for a storage management start-up in new emerging compute utility services market. Through creation  of strategic plan, market reposition, and movement toward a collaborative culture, achieved brand recognition, position on Gartner's magic quadrant, EBITDA positive, and #20 on region's list of fastest 50 growth companies.
  • Broke new ground in web based delivery of hosted desktop and business applications in ASP (application service provider) joint venture.  Revised organization structure to enable innovation. Resulting products won industry recognition for innovation earning NetWorld+Interop Best of Show finalist and UK “ASP of the Year”.

90's - Handheld computers, wireless networks, and mobile data systems. 

  • Developed commercialization strategy for PDA information appliance and mobile phone convergence using mass customization of common core platform, expansion perhipherals, and addition of software solution building blocks. Product quickly ramped to 400,000 unit backlog after launch and won industry acclaim.
  • Leveraged software assets of handheld computer manufacturer to create industry’s first branded suite of mobile middleware and wireless system management software, forming new $100 million software business unit.
  • Established early market for commercial handheld computers and mobile pen based computer systems by creating front line data collection and access systems for vertical market applications leveraging bar code and RF-ID technologies. 
  • Pioneered wireless LANs as an original founding member of IEEE 802.11 standards effort and developed early market through creation and commecialization of market leading commercial product line, eventually acquired by Cisco.

 80’s -Distributed computer systems (in the days before PC's) 

  • Innovated concept of credit card activated dispensing in retail gasoline sales through development and launch of national electronic payment systems for a global petroleum company.This system set the standard for new industry approach for self service retail gasoline sales.
  • Pioneered the use of flexible n-tier architecture and parameter driven customization in ATM (Automated Teller Machines) systems application. Designed application ran on a middle tier and provided multiple ATM and financial network interconnection, an early example of transaction oriented middleware. Design has been ported to several operating systems and is still the dominate system in use today.
  • Designed and implemented a leading-edge multi-tier supervisory control and data acquisition system combining supervisory minicomputers with programmable logic controllers, and dedicated microprocess user terminals, setting new company record for shortest time from initial power on to full production capabilities.

PATENT GRANTS

# 6,259,898 (2001) - Multi-channel wireless network access point.

# 6,393,261 (2002) - Multi-function wireless network access point.

# 6,453,159 (2002) - Multi-level encryption system for wireless networks.

# 6,457,049 (2002) - Handheld computer middleware for enterprise systems.

# 6,473,805 (2002) - Wireless middleware server for enterprise networks.

# 6,526,506 (2003) - Multi-level encryption access point for wireless network.

# 6,876,295 (2005) - RF-ID Tag device configuration

# 7,106,175 (2006) - Wireless device configuration by RF-ID tag

# 7,234,002 (2007) - Tracking method for enterprise transactions.

PUBLISHED ARTICLES AND SELECTED RESEARCH MANUSCRIPTS

  • (2005) Ethical Dilemmas in Internet Data Collection, Capella University
  • (2005) Role of the Stage Gate Process in Transformational Change and Continuous Improvement, Capella University
  • (2005) Collaboration and Trust in New Product Development, Capella University
  • (2005) Organizational Lifecycles in Technology Firms, Capella University
  • (2005) Barriers to Market Adoption of Telemedicine Solutions for the Consumer Market, Capella University
  • (2004) The Fuzzy Front End of Product Development, Capella University
  • (2003) Application of Contingency Theory in Transitional Firms; Capella University
  • (2003) An Emergent Market Opportunity for Managed Data Protection Services, Capella University
  • (2003) Transformational Change in an Emergent Growth Company, Capella University
  • (2003) The Use of Statistical Significance Testing in Adoption and Diffusion Research; Capella University
  • (2002) An Analysis of Storage Networks as a Disruptive Technology in the Future of Information Systems, Capella University
  • (2002) A Collaboration ASP Start-Up Business Plan, Capella University
  • (2002) An Electronic Collaboration Environment for New Product Teams, Capella University
  • (2002) Telemedicine Internet Delivered Health Care: an Emergent Disruptive Internet Application; Capella University
  • (2002) Virtual Community Application in a Hospital Volunteer Organization, Capella University
  • (2003) Keeping the Doors Open, Computer Technology Review, August 2003, Volume XXIII Number 8
  • (1996) Rugged Wireless Systems for Front Line Workers, Wireless for the Corporate User, 1996 Buyers Guide
  • (1995) Wireless LAN Fault Tolerance, Wireless for the Corporate User, 1995 Buyers Guide
  • (1995) When the wireless network is mission critical, it must be fault-tolerant, Automatic ID News, March 1995, Volume 11 No. 3
  • (1994) Manufacturer Takes Stock in Wireless System, Wireless for the Corporate User, May/June 1994, Volume 3 Number 3
  • (1994) MRP Goes on the Air, ID Systems, August 1994, Vol 14. No.8

About Product Acuity

  • Customers We Serve
  • Our Value Proposition
  • Situations We Address

  • We serve a wide range of company types and situations:

    • Emerging and start-up companies seeking to establish thier initial customer base and growth trajectory.
    • Growing companies needing to strategically select their opportunities or improve their efficiencies and effectiveness in their product innovation and launch processes.
    • Established companies in mature markets looking for new growth opportunities.

    While we are technologists, our value is not limited to technology based companies or markets. Many of the best opportunities are found by applying new technology to established and mature non-techology markets and applications.




  • We help businesses increase their revenue and expand their markets through the creation, commercialization, and application ofinformation technology products, services, and solutions. We provide our clients with the experienced business leadership, marketing expertise, and technical knowledge needed to:

    • Identify unmet customer needs and hidden market opportunities for newapplications of information technologies that not only provideopportunities for new growth, but also disrupt and transform existing markets and industry practices.

    • Develop comprehensive strategies, business plans,and product roadmaps that leverage your strengths, transform your weaknesses into competitive advantages, and place you on the road to sustainable market leadership.
    • Improve your organizations capabilities for continuous creation and delivery of successful new product and services that delight customers, produce extraordinary growth, drive market evolution, and accelerate user adoption.

  • If you are experiencing any of the following situations we can help.

    • Trying to get a new concept or innovation off the ground and need to find either an appropriate market application for a technology innovation, or need to find the appropriate technology to support your business or application concept.
    • You seem unable to establish a sustainable competitive find a path that delivers the desired revenue and growth you seek.
    • Your current new product efforts always seem to be lagging behind the competition.
    • Your markets and products are mature and you are seeking new opportunities to reinvigorate organizational innovation, growth, or even replacement of declining revenues and margins.