Management Team
Board of Directors
Daniel J.W. Neal
Daniel J. W. Neal is the chairman, CEO & founder of Kajeet®. An innovator and forward-thinking leader, he is a named Inventor on 36 U.S. patents in the fields of wireless technology and systems and is widely recognized for pioneering many industry-firsts within these sectors.
Before launching Kajeet, Neal served as CEO and vice chairman of VCampus Corporation (Nasdaq: VCMP), which pioneered the delivery of SaaS e-learning applications for students and employees at universities, Fortune 100 enterprises and Federal government agencies. Prior to VCampus, he was part of the team that built USinternetworking (Nasdaq: USIX), where he conceived, launched and led the company’s AppHost™ division, one of the first businesses in the world to provide a SaaS-enablement platform for independent software vendors (ISVs). USinternetworking had a successful IPO and secondary offering, and was subsequently acquired by AT&T. Before that, he forged international commercial relationships with telecom carriers in Latin America, Asia and the Middle East for the delivery of advanced communications and pioneering internet technologies and services at Sprint Corporation (NYSE: S) and Global One Communications, Sprint’s joint venture with France Télécom (NYSE: ORAN) and Deutsche Telekom (FWB: DTE).
Ben Weintraub
Ben Weintraub is a board member and founder, president and chief operating officer at Kajeet®. An entrepreneur, inventor and wireless industry expert, Weintraub has over 20 years of experience founding and leading successful high-growth technology companies in the telecom sector and is a named inventor on over 30 U.S. patents in the fields of wireless technology and systems.
Weintraub started his entrepreneurial journey in the wireless industry in 1997 with the founding of Simply Wireless, one of the nation’s largest authorized wireless retailers, offering service from carriers including AT&T Wireless, T-Mobile, Sprint PCS, Nextel, Ntelos and Suncom. Before that, he served nearly six years in the U.S. Navy, working as a project manager before becoming an assistant program manager in the nuclear surface ship propulsion program.
Greg Jones
Greg Jones is the chief technology officer at Kajeet®. In this role, he is responsible for technology strategy, product development and innovation.
Before joining Kajeet in 2020, Jones held executive leadership roles and led digital transformation efforts at Kforce, an award-winning solutions firm, and Laureate International Universities, the largest international network of degree granting higher education institutions. Prior, he served as chief technology officer at Inovalon, a leading provider of cloud-based platforms empowering data-driven healthcare, where he led all aspects of product development and IT operations. Before that, Jones served as CIO of the 4G division at Sprint Nextel, where he spearheaded the launch of the nation’s first commercial 4G service.
Michael Flood
Michael Flood is GM/SVP of Education Markets, at Kajeet®. In this role, he is responsible for business and product strategy for the education market.
Before joining Kajeet, Flood was an education solutions practice manager at AT&T, where he was involved in product and service design, marketing strategy and vertical industry knowledge transfer to AT&T’s education sales force and executive briefings. Prior to that, Flood spent 10 years at Sprint-Nextel, where he was responsible for managing nationwide strategy, programs and partnerships for the education market.
Flood is heavily involved in the EdTech community. He is an active member of the Consortium on School Networking (CoSN), serving on the Board of Directors since 2015. In 2013, he was recognized as CoSN’s Private Sector Champion of the year. Flood also served on advisory boards for the Horizon K-12 Report, Driving K-12 Innovation Initiative, EdNET, WirelessEdTech, International Society for Technology in Education’s Special Interest Group – Mobile Learning (ISTE SIGML) and Digital Equity Professional Learning Network (ISTE DE-PLN). Flood is actively involved with federal, state a local policy via SETDA, SHLB and CoSN.
Derrick Frost
Derrick Frost is senior vice president, operations, at Kajeet®. He brings 25 years of corporate executive experience in the areas of large-scale operations management, technology development and implementation, project management, IT systems integration, product engineering, sales, and new business development.
Prior to Kajeet, Derrick was vice president of IT & cloud solutions for Ericsson, responsible for Sales and Services of Ericsson’s OSS/BSS, IT & Cloud Solutions to Cable Operators in North America.
Derrick also served as Senior Vice President and General Manager of Global IP Video Solutions for Alcatel-Lucent and as the Founder & CEO if Internet video company Invision TV. Derrick spent over 11 years in the cable industry, last serving as Senior Vice President of Operations and Engineering at Time Warner Cable. Derrick has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Maryland and lives in Silver Spring, Maryland.
Guy Abramovitz
Before joining Kajeet, Abramovitz most recently held leadership roles for two software companies and a veterinary hospital consolidator. Prior to that, Abramovitz was the fractional and part-time CFO for a variety of businesses, and also worked as a transactional advisory services professional for multinational accounting and consulting firms.
Abramovitz holds a BBA in accounting from Temple University’s Fox School of Business Honors Program, and an MBA in finance from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Guy is a licensed Certified Public Accountant (CPA) in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and a member of the American Institute of CPAs.
Abramovitz lives in the suburbs of Philadelphia, and is an avid Tottenham Hotspur fan who enjoys spending his time cooking and traveling with his family.
Melissa Blanken
Melissa Blanken is the vice president of marketing at Kajeet®. In this role, she will elevate Kajeet’s go-to-market strategy to increase brand awareness and help organizations create the best mobility experiences for users by taking advantage of the breadth of Kajeet’s products and services.
Throughout her successful career, Blanken contributed to the strategic product positioning of many industry firsts. At XOHM, a business unit of Sprint, she developed the go-to-market service and device offer structure for the first U.S. market of a nationwide high speed (4G) wireless internet service. Additionally, at Boost Mobile, a Sprint Corporation subsidiary, Blanken helped grow its pay-as-you-go and hybrid businesses from the ground up, resulting in more than one billion in revenue.
David Pinto
David leads the team of Kajeet engineers who build the parental controls for Kajeet cell phones and the filters for our Education Broadband™ that keep children safe online.
Before Kajeet, David spent 10 years with the company, Amdocs, leading hoards of developers in building OSS/BSS systems, managing data-center operations for 1st tier telecom carriers, and delivering mega-software products. He left Amdocs to pursue his interest in entrepreneurship and founded Hegati, a startup company that fused social media with location-based services, and he’s still a board member. As if one new venture weren’t enough, David joined Kajeet in its formative days, enticed by the opportunity to help ‘ramp it up.’
When he’s not working on the ‘next great thing’ at Kajeet, you’ll find David spending time with his family, at the gym, or driving his car really fast on track days.
Zack Kowalski
Zack Kowalski is vice president of customer operations and is responsible for daily education operations. He works closely with our internal teams and nationwide carriers, ensuring the highest level of customer satisfaction.
Prior to Kajeet, Zack was the Logistics Manager for Bumkins Finer Baby Products, a manufacturer of high-end baby products. Zack also served three years as a search and rescue commander in Israel’s Defense Forces.
Zack earned his BBA in business management from Northern Arizona University. He likes to spend his free time soaking up the beautiful Scottsdale, Arizona, weather with his wife and son.
Christopher Felix
Chris Felix is Vice-President of Sales, Education for Kajeet. In this role, Chris is responsible for Business Development and Account Management for all Education segments in all geographic markets. Chris brings over 32 years of Telecommunications experience working with Bell Atlantic Mobile, Verizon, Sprint, and T-Mobile.
Starting in Outside Sales, Chris worked his way into Management, and then held Senior level positions at Verizon Wireless, and Sprint/T-Mobile. Prior to his 4 years as VP & General Manager for Government at Sprint, Chris was Regional President for both the Upstate New York and DC Metro regions for Verizon Wireless. Chris built his leadership career around an absolute emphasis on creating the best possible experiences for the Customers AND Employees he served. Always with a field first focus/presence, making sure resources are properly allocated for maximum success for all involved.
Chris earned his Bachelor of Business Administration degree at James Madison University. Chris and his wife met at JMU, and have been married for over 30 years with 2 sons.
Rick Bolander
Rick Bolander is currently Managing Director and co-founder of Gabriel Venture Partners and Michigan eLabs, early-stage venture capital firms that are helping to build innovative, profitable and sustainable companies in the Internet, information technology, communications and IOT sectors. He began his investment career in residential real estate after launching Blue Sky Ventures, a Chicago residential real estate investment firm. A career in venture capital later ensued when he joined Chicago-based Apex Investment Partners, where he was a General Partner.
Rick has been involved in more than 50 venture deals, and has led over $100 million in early-stage financings. He was an early investor in disruptive companies such as AccessLine Communications (acquired by Telenetix), Arula Systems (acquired by Raritan), Chegg (IPO – NYSE: CHGG), Concord Communications (IPO – NASDAQ: CCRD), Encentuate (acquired by IBM), IPWireless (acquired by Nextwave), Neopath Networks (acquired by Cisco), NetScaler (acquired by Citrix Systems), Persistent Systems (IPO – BSE India: PER EQ), Placeware (acquired by Microsoft) and Tut Systems (IPO – NASDAQ: TUTS), as well as, on the public boards of Concord Communications (acquired by Computer Associates) and Exodus Communications (IPO – NASDAQ: EXDS, then acquired by Savvis). He currently serves as a board member of MobileForce Software and Kajeet, and is a charter member of The IndUS Entrepreneurs (TiE).
Prior to his career in venture capital, Rick spent nine years in various operating roles with AT&T, Lucent, Chevron and African Communications Group ranging from product development, operations management, marketing and sales management.
Rick received his Bachelor of Science and Master of Science degrees in electrical engineering from The University of Michigan where he taught computer architecture, and his MBA from Harvard University. In his spare time he can be found cheering on the Wolverines or climbing a mountain.
Randy S. Glein
Randy Glein joined DFJ in 2002. He is a co-founder and managing director of DFJ Growth, where he focuses on leading investments in high-growth technology companies. Randy’s career spans more than 28 years in the technology and media industries as a venture capital investor, operating executive, and entrepreneur. He is currently responsible for investments in Anaplan, Avant, Box (NYSE: BOX), DataStax, Fonality, SiSense, SpaceX, Tremor Video (NYSE: TRMR), and Yodle. Previous investments include Legacy.com (Great Hill), Performics (DoubleClick/Google), SmartSignal (GE), Tesla Motors (NASDAQ: TSLA), TicketsNow (Ticketmaster), Tumblr (Yahoo), Twitter (NYSE: TWTR), and Yammer (Microsoft). Forbes named Randy to its annual Midas List of top technology investors in 2013, 2014, and 2015.
Prior to co-founding DFJ Growth, Randy was CFO of FeedBurner, a DFJ portfolio company acquired by Google. He previously held senior operating positions at DIRECTV and Screenz, where he contributed to the formation, development, and growth of these businesses. Randy has served in senior investment roles with Tribune Ventures and Hughes New Ventures, where he participated in the founding investments for DIRECTV, Motient, and XM Radio. He began his career as an engineer with GM Hughes Electronics and Martin Marietta, where he worked in the fields of wireless and satellite communications, signal processing, and optoelectronics.
Randy holds an MBA from UCLA Anderson, an MSEE from the University of Southern California, and a BSEE with high honors from the University of Florida.
Michael Cooley
An expert in mobile strategy, building high-performing teams and identifying revenue growth opportunities, Cooley previously served as chief revenue officer at mobile search platform NTENT. Prior, Cooley was vice president of corporate development and general manager of mobile at Neustar, a global information services and technology company and leader in identity resolution. Earlier in his career, Cooley discovered a passion for entrepreneurship with the founding of Sundial.com, one of the first wireless online retailers in the United States that powered portals such as Yahoo!, MSN and Priceline. Cooley also held management positions at Fortune 500 companies such as Deloitte Consulting and Motorola.
Anthony Shimkin
Anthony Shimkin is senior vice president of marketing at Kajeet, a leading provider of wireless connectivity, software and hardware solutions that deliver safe, reliable and controlled internet connectivity to enterprises, state and local governments, students and IoT solution providers. Shimkin brings more than 25 years of medical and technology marketing experience to Kajeet, where he is responsible for driving brand awareness, expanding its go-to-market strategy and increasing revenue growth.
Prior to joining Kajeet, Shimkin served as the chief marketing officer at ReadySet Surgical, a cloud-based coordination platform that consolidates supply chain logistics and communications for surgical teams. Before that, he served as an advisor for sales and marketing at Farsight Genome Systems, a provider of an innovative SaaS platform for precision medicine, and was a principal at Sciencia Consulting, a consulting and interactive content marketing provider for the life science industry.
Previously, Shimkin spent four years at Qualcomm, where he served as senior director of marketing and, later, senior director of business development. Prior, he held senior marketing and innovation leadership roles at Lantronix, a leading machine-to-machine (M2M) technology provider with over 650 global health care customers; Quidel, a diagnostics manufacturer; Cardinal Health, a Fortune 14 health care company; Alaris Medical Systems, which was later acquired by Cardinal Health, and Neoforma. Anthony also led the health care equity research team at Wedbush Securities and consulted for several leading life sciences companies.
Shimkin holds a Master of Science in executive leadership from the University of San Diego, as well as a Master of Business Administration in marketing and finance, a Master of Arts in medical sciences and a Bachelor of Arts in psychology from Boston University. In his free time, Shimkin enjoys traveling and spending time with his family.
Sherry Rickard
Sherry Gonzalez Rickard is the Human Resources Manager at Kajeet and is responsible for human resources activities within the company.
Before joining Kajeet, Sherry held the HR Manager role for a large international hospitality organization and oversaw multiple sites and teams. Prior to that, Sherry worked in the Professional Community Management industry for 18 years. She started as a Community Manager, then a Portfolio Manager and then the role of Office/HR Manager.
Sherry holds a BS in Leisure and Recreation Services – Commercial Tourism – from Shepherd University in Shepherdstown, WV and graduated with honors. She holds a Certified Professional designation from SHRM.
Sherry was born and raised and lives in the Washington DC metro area – Northern Virginia. She loves to spend time with family and friends. In her spare time, she is a published author and plays the piano.
Darrell Miller
Darrell Miller is the Vice President of Service Management at Kajeet. He is responsible for managing Kajeet’s service and network performance ensuring customer expectations are exceeded. His team consists of our 24x7x365 NOC, Tier 1 Customer Support and Service Delivery Teams.
With over 30 years in Telcom, Miller brings a wealth of experience in maintaining and supporting wireline and wireless networks. Prior to joining Kajeet, Miller led Planning and Operations at Sprint/Nextel and Service Management at Nextel International to build out and support domestic and international markets.
Miller served in the United States Air Force and has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte.
David Pinto
David Pinto is vice president of research and innovation at kajeet. In this role, he is responsible for identifying and researching technologies, providing solutions for new and emerging markets, and fuel an innovation pipeline towards Kajeet’s business units. Pinto has over 25 years of experience in wireless communications technology and is a named inventor on several U.S. patents in this field.
Before joining Kajeet in 2009, Pinto held several senior leadership positions at Amdocs, a world leader in the telecoms industry, managing large software development projects, and data center operations for 1st tier telecom carriers, until he got infected by the entrepreneurial bug and founded a startup company, fusing social media with location based services.
When he is not working on the Next Great Thing at Kajeet, you’ll find him spending time with his family, at the gym, or racing his car in one of the area’s race tracks.
