Business Development & Licensing

Mr. Ahroon joined Acacia in July 2007. Prior to joining Acacia, Mr. Ahroon was President of Cadis Design Group and Co Founder of two start up companies in the Orange County Area. Earlier in his career, Mr. Ahroon was Program Manager at Argo-Tech Carter Cryogenics, Project Engineer at Quantum Technologies, and Product Development Engineer at Star Trac Fitness. Mr. Ahroon holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of California, Santa Barbara and an M.B.A. from the University of California, Irvine and is a registered USPTO Patent Agent.

Mr. Botsch joined the company in December 2007 as Vice President. He has extensive experience in licensing and intellectual property law and previously held the position of Vice President and Chief Intellectual Property Officer at ON Semiconductor from 2004 to 2007. Previously he was Associate General Counsel of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) from 2000 to 2004. Mr. Botsch was Motorola's Division Patent Attorney for the Ground System Division from 1995 to 2000. Earlier in his career he was a Senior Design Engineer for Motorola from 1986 to 1989 and was a Patent Agent with Motorola from 1990 - 1994. Mr. Botsch holds a B.S.E.E. from Purdue University and M.S.E.E. and J.D. degrees from Arizona State University.

Mr. Butts joined the company in June 2003 as Vice President. He has extensive experience in licensing and intellectual property law and previously held the position of Vice President, Business and Legal Affairs for Intertainer Inc. from 2000 through 2002. He practiced law at the Los Angeles law firms Riordan & McKinzie and Loeb & Loeb from 1998 to 2000 and the Washington law firms Finnegan, Henderson, Farabow, Garrett & Dunner and Sixbey, Friedman, Leedon & Ferguson from 1992 to 1998. Mr. Butts received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from North Carolina A & T State University and a J.D. from the George Washington University Law School.

Mr. Eastman joined Acacia in December 2002 as Vice President. He was formerly Director of Strategic Business Planning for Pioneer North America and led the company into the XM satellite radio business. Prior to Pioneer North America, he held various positions at DIRECTV and played a pivotal role in the startup of DIRECTV. Earlier, Mr. Eastman held program management positions at Hughes Electronics. Mr. Eastman received his B.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of California, Irvine and a M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Southern California.

Mr. Frechette joined Acacia in November 2006 and was promoted to Vice President in June 2007. Prior to joining Acacia, Mr. Frechette was employed as an associate attorney with Crockett & Crockett P.C. and as an in-house attorney for Discovision Associates, a patent licensing and enforcement division of Pioneer Electronics. Earlier in his career, Mr. Frechette worked as an engineer for several companies including The Boeing Company, Ducommun and Conexant. Mr. Frechette is a registered patent attorney and holds a B.S. in Manufacturing Engineering from Boston University, a J.D. from Whittier Law School and a M.B.A. from the University of California, Los Angeles.

Mr. Granara joined Acacia in August, 2007 as Senior Contract Manager. He has over 20 years of experience in contract management, primarily in the technology sector. He previously held contract management positions in the legal departments for Broadcom Corporation, Conexant Systems, Inc. and for Rockwell International Corporation. Mr. Granara hold a B.S. degree in Business Adminstration from California State University, Northridge and an MBA from the University of LaVerne.

Mr. Kim joined Acacia in December 2007 as Senior Manager, Business Development. Mr. Kim was previously Founder/President of a patent investment search fund, working on fund-raising and patent deal sourcing. He was formerly an Associate with IPVALUE Management, helping develop/manage patent licensing programs for Xerox Corporation and Palo Alto Research Center (PARC). Prior to IPVALUE, he was an Inventor and Head of Financial Services at Walker Digital Corporation, an incubator that invented the Priceline.com patent portfolio. Mr. Kim holds a B.S. degree from New York University’s Stern School of Business, double-major in Finance and Information Systems. He is a co-inventor on 6 U.S. issued patents.

Ms. Stender joined the company in September 2005 as Vice President. Ms. Stender has extensive experience in the worldwide commercialization of intellectual property. She previously was managing attorney with Alea Global Law and formerly held positions with David International Trading Company and with Pillsbury Winthrop. Ms. Stender received a B.S. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, an M.S. from Loyola University Chicago and received her J.D. from the Loyola University Chicago School of Law.

Mr. Taub joined Acacia in July 2007 as Vice President. Prior to joining Acacia, he was Director of Strategic Alliances for Microsoft's Mobile and Embedded Devices division and Business Development Manager for Microsoft's Security Business Unit. Prior to joining Microsoft, Mr. Taub was Director of Business Development at Nortel Networks. He joined Nortel following the company's $450 million acquisition of software infrastructure developer Epicon, Inc., where he headed business development. He previously was an intellectual property and corporate law associate with Covington & Burling in Washington, D.C. and an analyst at Santander Investment in Madrid. Mr. Taub holds a B.S. from the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania and a J.D. from Harvard Law School.

Mr. Treska joined the company in April 2004 as Vice President. Mr. Treska was most recently General Counsel, Director of Patents and Licensing for SRS Labs, Inc., a technology licensing company specializing in audio enhancement. Prior to joining SRS Labs, Mr. Treska was an associate attorney with the intellectual property law firm Knobbe, Martens, Olson & Bear and a design engineer with the TRW Space & Technology Group. Mr. Treska holds a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Colorado State University and a J.D. degree from the University of San Diego School of Law.

Mr. Trueman joined Acacia in December 2006 as Director and was promoted to Vice President in June 2007. Mr. Trueman was formerly a Managing Partner for M1 Partners. Prior to M1 Partners, Mr. Trueman was Engagement Manager for McKinsey & Company, and Product/Business Development Manager for Oracle Corporation. He also worked as Senior Product Manager for Integrated Decision Systems and was CEO of Computer Solutions. Mr. Trueman holds a B.S. degree in Business Administration from the University of California, Berkeley and a Masters in Business Administration from the Wharton School.

Mr. Vella joined the company in November 2006 as Vice President. He was appointed Senior Vice President in October 2007. Formerly, Mr. Vella was Senior Intellectual Property Counsel for ATI Research, Inc. Prior to joining ATI Research, Mr. Vella was Lead Patent License Counsel for Nortel Networks, Inc and Counsel for Nortel Networks Corporation. Mr. Vella holds a B.S. degree in Electrical Engineering from Carleton University and a J.D. degree from the University of Toronto Law School.

Ms. Voirin joined Acacia in September 2009 as Licensing Manager. Ms. Voirin holds a B.S. from the University of Florida and received her J.D. from Florida State University College of Law. While attending law school Ms. Voirin was a Judicial Intern at the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit and a Congressional Legal Intern to a U.S. Senator.

Mr. White joined Acacia in February 2007as Vice President. Mr. White was formerly Vice President of Discovision Associates, a patent licensing company wholly owned by Pioneer Electronics. Mr. White was with Discovision from 1989 until 2006 where he managed all aspects of patent licensing and patent acquisition. He was most recently President of Intellectual Property Holdings, Inc. a patent brokering service company. Mr. White holds a B.S. degree in Engineering Arts from Michigan State University, and a J.D. degree from Michigan State - Detroit College of Law.

Mr. Wong joined the company in March 2009 as Vice President. He has extensive experience in intellectual property law and previously held the position of Managing Patent Attorney for Pioneer North America in charge of the IP prosecution group, from 2000 through 2009. While at Pioneer, he was involved in patent portfolio acquisition and due diligence investigations. Prior to that, Mr. Wong was an Associate Patent Attorney at the Los Angeles law firm Chan Law Group, LLC and served as a Deputy District Attorney for Stanislaus County District Attorney’s Office after law school. Before attending law school, he was a Systems Engineer at Intermetrics, Inc., General Dynamics/Space Division, and the Department of Defense. Mr. Wong received his B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Arizona and a J.D. from Thomas Jefferson School of Law.

Mr. Zhang joined Acacia in August of 2007 as an Engineer. He transferred into business development at the beginning of 2009 and was promoted to Manager in June 2009. Prior to Acacia, Mr. Zhang held numerous research-oriented positions, primarily in the therapeutic applications of ultrasound, at Case Western Reserve University and at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation. Mr. Zhang holds a B.S. in Biomedical Engineering, with a specialty in medical imaging, from Case Western Reserve University.