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Management

Executive Officers

  • James B. DeBello

    Chief Executive Officer and President

    Mr. DeBello has been a director of Mitek since November 1994. He has been President and Chief Executive Officer of Mitek since May 2003. In January 2009, Mr. DeBello was appointed Mitek's Chief Financial Officer and Secretary, in addition to his other positions. Prior to joining Mitek, he was Chief Executive Officer of AsiaCorp Communications, Inc., a wireless data infrastructure and software company, from July 2001 to May 2003. He was Venture Chief Executive Officer for IdeaEdge Ventures, Inc., a venture capital company, from June 2000 to June 2001. From May 1999 to May 2000 he was President, Chief Operating Officer and a member of the Board of Directors of CollegeClub.com, an Internet company. From November 1998 to April 1999 he was Chief Operating Officer of WirelessKnowledge, Inc., a joint venture company formed between Microsoft and Qualcomm, Inc. Before that, from November 1996 to November 1998, Mr. DeBello held positions as Vice President, Assistant General Manager and General Manager of Qualcomm, Inc.'s Eudora Internet Software Division, and Vice President of Product Management of Qualcomm, Inc.'s Subscriber Equipment Division. Mr. DeBello holds a B.A., magna cum laude and MBA from Harvard Business School and was a Rotary Scholar at the University of Singapore where he studied economics and Chinese.

  • Russell C. Clark

    Chief Financial Officer

    Mr. Clark brings more than 20 years of financial leadership and experience with public markets, growth companies and the software industry to the CFO role.  Most recently, Mr. Clark served as Senior Vice President, Finance at Epicor Software, a leading global provider of enterprise business software solutions for midmarket-sized companies.  He also provided financial leadership for a successful turnaround as Chief Accounting Officer at Peregrine Systems, and served as Vice President Finance at FICO (formerly Fair Isaac Corporation), and as Senior Vice President, Finance at HNC Software. Mr. Clark began his career at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP, where he served as a senior manager in the technology industry group. Mr. Clark holds a bachelor’s degree in business administration with an emphasis in accounting from the University of Iowa and is a certified public accountant.

  • Dr. Grigori Neponmniachtchi

    Chief Technology Officer

    Dr. Neponmniachtchi serves as Chief Technology Officer and leads Mitek's scientific research staff in the United States and Russia. He is an accomplished international expert in image preprocessing, and has played a principle role developing Mitek's industry leading IMagePROVE recognition technologies for cell phone camera applications.

    Prior to becoming CTO in September 2003, Dr. Neponmniachtchi served as Mitek's Chief Scientist between 1999 and 2003. He joined Mitek in 1996 as Staff Scientist.

    Before joining Mitek, Dr. Dr. Neponmniachtchi worked as Senior Analyst at AUDRE Inc., where he designed and implemented Optical Character Recognition and Geometrical Recognition engines for converting engineering drawings, maps and electronic schematics into machine-readable format.

    While at Mitek, Dr. Neponmniachtchi created Mitek's advanced algorithms for finding dynamic data in unstrucutured forms. These algorithms enable Mitek's award winning DynaFind toolkit for EOB, HCFA and invoice processing. His work in image enhancement and form identification has contributed to Mitek's leadership in the intelligent character recognition industry. Most recently, he has invented various fraud detection techniques including signature and check stock validation which are the foundation of Mitek's Check Image Analytics.

    Dr. Neponmniachtchi holds 4 patents in image analysis and intelligent character recognition. He has published more than 40 technical papers and has spoken at numerous international conferences on Document / Image Analysis and Understanding, Pattern Recognition and Biometrics.

    Dr. Neponmniachtchi has a M.S. in Math and a Ph.D. in Topology/Geometry from the Lomonosow University in Moscow, Russia. Dr. Neponmniachtchi was recognized as Outstanding Researcher/Professor by the United States INS in 1995.

  • Josh Roach

    Senior Vice President, Engineering and Product Management

    Mr. Roach is responsible for all product design, engineering, product management and testing and joined Mitek as Vice President of Engineering in November, 2008. He is the principal architect of Mitek's mobile applications. He is an experienced software technology executive and chief architect with an extensive history of large-scale software development in a variety of companies. Prior to joining Mitek, Mr. Roach was Chief Technology Officer at Printable Technologies, a leader in SaaS Online Marketing Software, from 2006 to 2008, and CTO and co-Founder of ConVisia, an Hosted Image Collaboration System from 2004 to 2006. In addition, Mr. Roach held Vice President of Engineering positions at Intuit, Accelrys and was also an engineering executive with HNC software between 1993 and 1998.

    Mr. Roach specializes in web-based SaaS, enterprise and B2B/B2C eCommerce systems. He brings a strong process orientation (Six Sigma, Agile) focused on execution and product delivery, including modern object-oriented software development (including ASP.NET, Java/J2EE and LAMP multi-tiered architectures). He has led engineering as well as product management teams, providing mentoring and leadership development among all levels of software organizations. He holds a B.S. in Computer Science from SDSU.

Board of Directors

  • John M. Thornton

    Chairman of the Board

    Mr. Thornton has been a director of Mitek since March 1986. He was appointed Chairman of the Board as of October 1, 1987 and served as President from May 1991 to July 1991, as Chief Executive Officer from May 1991 to February 1992 and again as Chief Executive Officer and Chief Financial Officer from September 1998 to May 2003, when he resigned from his positions as President and Chief Executive Officer. He resigned from his position as Chief Financial Officer in May 2005. He continues to serve as Chairman of the Board. From 1976 through 1988, Mr. Thornton served as Chairman and Vice Chairman of the Board at Micom Systems, Inc. Mr. Thornton is also Chairman of the Board of Thornton Winery Corporation in Temecula, California.

  • James B. DeBello

    Chief Executive Officer and President

    Mr. DeBello has been a director of Mitek since November 1994. He has been President and Chief Executive Officer of Mitek since May 2003. In January 2009, Mr. DeBello was appointed Mitek's Chief Financial Officer and Secretary, in addition to his other positions. Prior to joining Mitek, he was Chief Executive Officer of AsiaCorp Communications, Inc., a wireless data infrastructure and software company, from July 2001 to May 2003. He was Venture Chief Executive Officer for IdeaEdge Ventures, Inc., a venture capital company, from June 2000 to June 2001. From May 1999 to May 2000 he was President, Chief Operating Officer and a member of the Board of Directors of CollegeClub.com, an Internet company. From November 1998 to April 1999 he was Chief Operating Officer of WirelessKnowledge, Inc., a joint venture company formed between Microsoft and Qualcomm, Inc. Before that, from November 1996 to November 1998, Mr. DeBello held positions as Vice President, Assistant General Manager and General Manager of Qualcomm, Inc.'s Eudora Internet Software Division, and Vice President of Product Management of Qualcomm, Inc.'s Subscriber Equipment Division. Mr. DeBello holds a B.A., magna cum laude and MBA from Harvard Business School and was a Rotary Scholar at the University of Singapore where he studied economics and Chinese.

  • Vinton Cunningham

    Director

    Mr. Cunningham has been a director of Mitek since May 2005. Retired since 2002, he served as Sr. Vice-President-Finance of EdVision Corporation from 1993 to 2002. Mr. Cunningham was Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer of Founders Club Golf Company from 1990 to 1993. He was Vice President-Finance of Amcor Capital, Inc. from 1985 to 1990. Mr. Cunningham was Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of Superior Farming Company, a wholly owned subsidiary of Superior Oil Company, from 1981 to 1985.

  • Dr. Gerald I. Farmer

    Director

    Dr. Farmer has been a director of Mitek since May 1994. He was Executive Vice President of Mitek from November 1992 until June 1997. Before joining Mitek, from January 1987 to November 1992, Dr. Farmer was Executive Vice President of HNC Software, Inc. He has held senior management positions with IBM Corporation, Xerox, SAIC and Gould Imaging and Graphics.

  • Alex W. 'Pete' Hart

    Director

    Mr. Hart is Chairman of the SVB Financial Group and has worked as an independent consultant to the financial services industry since 1997. He served as Chief Executive Officer of Advanta Corporation, a public diversified financial services company from 1995 to 1997, where he had previously served as Executive Vice Chairman from 1994 to 1995. Prior to joining Advanta, he was President and Chief Executive Officer of MasterCard International, a worldwide payment service provider from 1994 to 1998. In addition to the SVB Financial Group, Mr. Hart is currently a member of the Boards of Directors of the following public companies: Fair Isaac Corporation, a predictive software company, Global Payments, Inc., a payment services company, and VeriFone Holdings, Inc., an electronics company. Mr. Hart has previously served as a member of the Boards of Directors of numerous other companies, including HNC Software, Retek Inc., Shopping.com, Sanchez Computer Associates, US Encode, eHarmony.com and Sequal Technologies, Inc. In addition, he is an advisor to a number of private companies, including Tempo Payments, NoLie MRI, Cimbal Technologies and US Encode. Mr. Hart holds a bachelor's degree in Social Relations from Harvard University.

  • Sally B. Thornton

    Director

    Ms. Thornton has been a director of Mitek since April 1988. She has been a private investor for more than 40 years. She served as a director of Micom Systems, Inc. from 1976 to 1988. From 1987 until 1996 she served as Chairman of Medical Materials, Inc, a composite plastics manufacturer. Ms. Thornton is on the Board of Directors of Thornton Winery Corporation in Temecula, California. She has been a Trustee of the Sjorgren's Syndrome Foundation in New York and Stephens College in Missouri. Ms. Thornton is also a Life Trustee of the San Diego Museum of Art. Ms. Thornton is the spouse of John M. Thornton, Chairman of the Board.

  • William P. Tudor

    Director

    Mr. Tudor has been a director of Mitek since September 2004. He is President of International Learning Corporation. Prior to that, he was Executive Vice President of Scantron Corporation from July 2002 to July 2005. He was Chief Executive Officer of EdVision from June 1990 to July 2002.

Advisory Board

  • John E. Major

    Advisory Board

    Mr. Major is chairman of the board of Broadcom Corporation and has been a director since January 2003. In January 2003 he founded MTSG, a strategic consulting and investment company of which he serves as President. From April 2004 to October 2006, Mr. Major served as Chief Executive Officer of Apacheta Corporation, a privately-held mobile, wireless software company. From August 2000 until January 2003, Mr. Major was Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Novatel Wireless, Inc., a wireless data access solutions company. Previously Mr. Major was Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Wireless Knowledge, a joint venture of Qualcomm Incorporated and Microsoft Corporation. Prior to joining Wireless Knowledge, Mr. Major served as corporate executive vice president of Qualcomm and president of its Wireless Infrastructure Division where he managed the high growth rate and global expansion of the company's infrastructure business. Under his leadership, the division achieved a leading position in open interface, wireless systems and developed a new line of extremely compact base stations. Prior to that, for approximately 18 years, he held various executive and leadership positions at Motorola. Mr. Major received a B.S. in Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering from the University of Rochester, an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Illinois, an M.B.A. from Northwestern University and a J.D. from Loyola University. Mr. Major holds ten U.S. patents.

  • Bruce Hansen

    Advisory Board

    Mr. Hansen co-founded ID Analytics, a consumer risk management company, in March 2002. Prior to founding ID Analytics, Hansen was President of HNC Software Inc., a $1 billion global provider of analytic software for financial services, telecommunications and healthcare firms to reduce fraud and credit risk. HNC was acquired by Fair Isaac in 2002. Prior to HNC, Hansen was CEO of the Center for Adaptive Systems Applications (CASA) Inc., a privately-held advanced analytics company that developed analytic software and services for risk, operations and marketing applications within the financial services industry. CASA was acquired by HNC in 2000. Hansen's previous experience also includes executive roles at Citicorp (now CitiGroup), Automatic Data Processing, Inc. (ADP) and Chase Manhattan Bank (now JP Morgan Chase). Hansen is also a member of the Board of Directors for the San Diego Software Industry Council and the San Diego American Electronics Association (AeA) Technology Board.