The weeks' news showcases numerous experienced & talented people in the industry ...

Nascentric, Inc. announced the appointment of Vess Johnson as President and CEO, and Frank Childers as Vice President of field operations. Nascentric is a new company working in the area of IC design tools for timing power and signal integrity for nanometer-scale designs.

Prior to Nascentric, Johnson was President and CEO of Silicon Metrics Corp. at the time when the company was acquired by Magma Design Automation. He was then General Manager of Magma's Silicon Correlation Division. Prior to Silicon Metrics, he held management positions at Omniview Design Automation and Xynetix. Johnson has a BS in Mathematics, a BA in Philosophy, and an MS in Computer Science from the Bagley School of Engineering at MSU.

Prior to Nascentric, Childers was Vice President of Worldwide Sales for Silicon Metrics. Prior to Silicon Metrics, Childers was an executive at Alliance Systems and Micrografx, Inc . He also has served in management roles at Mentor Graphics. Childers has a BS from the United States Air Force Academy and an MA from the University of Northern Colorado.

Ambric, Inc. has named Mike Butts as Vice President of Architecture, and Kevin Ross as Director of IP for the company.

Jay Eisenlohr, Ambric President and CEO is quoted in the Press Release: "Mike Butts, a pioneer of the hardware logic emulation industry, brings his deep expertise in reconfigurable hardware system architecture and design. Mike's contributions will be invaluable in ensuring that Ambric's first products will be as advanced and comprehensive as possible. {In addition], it's very unusual for a start-up to have in-house patent counsel so early in its life, but we needed an early start on harnessing our large volume of fundamental and revolutionary intellectual capital. And we couldn't pass up such an exceptional talent. Not only is Kevin a senior patent attorney, he also has a strong background in both computer science and electrical engineering. He will lead a comprehensive program to turn our intellectual capital into a growing base of IP assets."

Prior to Ambric, Mike Butts was co-founder of a programmable IC platform company that he co-founded. In the 1980s, he co-invented hardware logic emulation using reconfigurable hardware-technology. He has also developed a number of reconfigurable chips and system products. He has worked, in addition, at Mentor Graphics, Quickturn Design Systems, Synopsys, and Cadence, where he was a Cadence Fellow. Butts has a BSEE and an MS in EE and CS from MIT.

Kevin Ross is a patent attorney and, prior to Ambric, was a partner at Marger Johnson & McCollom, P.C., an IP law firm providing IP counsel to Ambric. Ross formerly practiced law in Seattle, WA, and in Milan, Italy, where he worked as a U.S. patent law specialist. Before practicing law, he was an application computer programmer. Ross has a BS in CS from Westminster College in Fulton, MO. In addition, he did graduate studies in EE and received his law degree, both from the University of Missouri, Columbia.

ZMD AG announced the appointment of David Sanchez as its Distribution Sales and Marketing Manager for the North American standard products (ASSP) business unit. Prior to joining ZMD, he was an account manager at Insight Electronics. Sanchez will be based in Melville, NY.

** New Memberships **

Mentor Graphics Corp. announced it has joined the Serial ATA International Organization (SATA-IO). Per the Press Release: "The SATA-IO is a non-profit organization dedicated to sustaining the quality, integrity and dissemination of the SATA technology (a storage connectivity technology responsible for transmitting data to and from storage peripherals) by maintaining the specifications, promoting and marketing the benefits of the technology and creating future interface features and specifications that carry storage into the next decade. As an active SATA-IO member, Mentor Graphics will help influence the future direction of SATA specifications as well as drive industry adoption of the SATA technology."

Jim Venable, Director of the Storage Products Business Unit at Mentor, explains in the Press Release why membership in SATA-IP is important: "Mentor Graphics has invested heavily in standards-based intellectual property, with a focus on helping customers deal with increasing design complexity, shorten development times, and achieve higher levels of design productivity. Our goal is to ensure the IP we provide meets the highest industry and quality standards, so we feel it's important to be involved at all levels of IP development and distribution, including participation in specification and standards organizations."