management
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Oded Melamed , Co-Founder and CEO
Oded Melamed is an accomplished telecommunications veteran with over 18 years of experience. As co-founder and CEO of Altair, Oded has led the company from its inception, growing it to become a leading player in its respective markets, with over 100 engineers spread across multiple product lines and a multi-million dollar annual revenue. Prior to founding Altair, Oded served as Texas Instruments’ Director of Cable Modem R&D, where he helped shape and execute strategies that positioned the company as the preeminent provider of silicon and software for the VoIP Cable Modem market. A core leader of Libit Signal Processing, Oded was instrumental to the successful transition and integration process when the company was acquired by Texas Instruments in 1999, and for directing the new business unit to exceptional profitability. Oded started his career at an elite R&D unit of the Israeli Defense Forces. He holds a B.Sc. and M.Sc. (Cum Laude) in Electrical Engineering from the Tel Aviv University and an Executive MBA from the Kellogg-Recanati program.
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Yigal Bitran, Co-Founder and CTO
As Vice President of R&D at Libit Signal Processing, Yigal established Libit’s R&D group and was pivotal in developing Libit’s core technologies. Following Libit’s acquisition by Texas Instruments, Yigal served as CTO of its broadband communications group in Israel. There, he developed multiple broadband technologies including Cable Modems, WiFi and Gigabit Ethernet. Prior to joining Libit, Yigal was a research scientist and team leader at an elite R&D unit of the Israeli Defense Forces, where he was awarded the prestigious “Innovative Thinking Award.” Yigal developed several broadband modem technologies from scratch, along with over 20 broadband mixed-signal silicon products. He has authored 20+ patents and published numerous papers in a broad range of scientific and technical publications. Yigal holds a B.Sc. and M.Sc. (Cum Laude) in Electrical Engineering from Tel Aviv University and Executive MBA from the Kellogg-Recanati Program.
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Eran Eshed, Co-Founder and VP Marketing
Eran Eshed brings to Altair a wealth of telecommunications business and marketing experience. As co-founder and VP of Marketing and Business Development of Altair, Eran was pivotal in the positioning of Altair in the market as a leading developer and supplier of 4G chipsets. Prior to co-founding Altair, Eran served as Director of Marketing for Texas Instruments’ Cable Modem business unit, where he was responsible for all marketing activities, including: creating and implementing strategic revenue plans, managing major accounts, as well as sales and channel development activities for OEM and ODM customers in North America and Asia. Prior to joining Texas Instruments, Eran worked for eight years in various hardware and silicon development and management positions, with various startups including Libit Signal Processing. Eran holds a B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from the Tel Aviv University.
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Chee Kwan, VP Worldwide Sales
Chee Kwan is a 25 year veteran of the wireless industry and the VP of Worldwide Sales at Altair Semiconductor. Prior to joining Altair, Kwan served as the Vice President of Worldwide Marketing and Sales at BroadLight Inc., a company acquired by Broadcom in April 2012. Previously, he was the CEO of Siimpel Corporation, a MEMS semiconductor company acquired by Tessera Corporation in 2010, as well as the senior vice president and general manager of Conexant System’s wireless business unit. While at Conexant, he also held various senior management roles in product marketing and technology development.
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Nohik Semel, VP Systems Engineering
Nohik Semel is Altair’s VP of System Engineering, leading the company’s software development and integration, QA, hardware and RF system design, interoperability testing and program execution. He previously served as the Director of the Silicon Design group at Altair. Prior to joining Altair in 2006, Nohik worked at Texas Instruments, where he was responsible for the development of various broadband Silicon cores and technologies. Nohik has significant experience developing broadband, WLAN and cable modem chipsets. He holds a B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science (with honors) and a M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Tel Aviv University.
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Eli Zyss, VP Silicon Design
As VP of Silicon Design at Altair, Eli is responsible for leading the overall physical design, development, architecture and methodologies of the company’s market leading baseband and RFIC chipsets. Over the course of his career, Eli has been responsible for the design of over 20 communications chipsets, spanning mobile, broadband, wireless and mixed signal. Eli began his career at medical device company Algotech, where he worked on FPGA designs for medical imaging algorithms and then joined Libit Signal Processing, where he was a project leader, leading the development of digital TV and cable receiver chipsets. Following Texas Instruments’ acquisition of Libit in 1999, Eli led the VLSI Core Methodology Team for Texas Instruments’ Cable Broadband Communication’s Group.
Eli holds a B.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Tel Aviv University. -
Guy Nathanzon, CFO
Guy comes to Altair with more than 15 years of experience in senior financial management positions at numerous hi-tech companies. Prior to joining Altair, Guy served for 10 years as the CFO of Provigent Inc., a leading provider of System-On-Chip solutions for cellular backhaul (infrastructure), that was acquired by Broadcom Corp (Nasdaq: BRCM) for $313M. As part of the senior management team, Guy led the company’s legal and financial teams, including raising almost $60M from tier-one venture capital firms, until the acquisition by Broadcom. Prior to Provigent, Guy was the corporate controller of ActionBase Ltd., a developer of software platforms for business activity. Following graduation from Tel Aviv University, where he earned a BA in Accounting (with honors), MBA and LLB degrees, Guy worked as a Senior Auditor at the Israeli branch of Price Waterhouse Coopers.
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Uri Yaffe, VP of Business Development
Uri has more than 20 years of experience as a C-Level executive at numerous private and public companies. Prior to joining Altair, Uri founded and served as the CEO of Cellular Bridge, a business development and consulting company focused on the telecom and Internet industries. At Cellular Bridge, Uri led numerous multi-million dollar tenders, as well initiated strategic business engagements for worldwide clients. From 2003 – 2007, Uri was the Co-CEO of e-Sim, a leading MMI solutions provider. Following Sky MobileMedia’s acquisition of e-Sim in 2007, Uri served as VP of Worldwide Sales for Sky MobileMedia, where he built the company’s worldwide sales organization and signed several agreements with strategic accounts. Uri earned a B.Sc from the University of New Haven.
