Optus Case Study

Team Members

Mary-Kay Peacock

Mary Kay has 20+ years’ experience in Technical Project and Program Management working for a variety of Fortune 500 enterprises and small start-ups across multiple industries. After receiving her Computer Science degree from Rochester Institute of Technology, she was accepted into a prestigious 5 year accelerated management training program at the Travelers Insurance company.

After successfully completing the program, Mary Kay relocated to Boston, MA where she began working at multiple technology startups, driving improved quality practices within Engineering as well as leading successful enterprise customer engagements. Most recently she has held positions working directly for company leadership to drive strategic transformation of Engineering and non-Engineering operations alike.

At PW, she spear-heads the efforts to strategically transform operational activities to ensure PW is creating products and delivering services to create customer success. Mary Kay is equally passionate about company culture and communication and has led PW’s Value in Action Awards program along with the Getting to Know PW series.

Sanjay Harwani

Sanjay Harwani is the GM, India and VP, R&D at Parallel Wireless. Sanjay is a highly experienced R&D manager with 25+ years of experience in Research and Development. Sanjay joined Parallel Wireless in 2014 and built various products in Parallel Wireless portfolio. Sanjay played a key role in building various R&D teams and was instrumental in growing them manifolds.

Before joining Parallel Wireless, he worked with Cisco for 10+ years where he lead various cross functional teams in the domain of Broadband Access, Core Routing, Switching, Telecom Core and various Gateway functions. Sanjay has held several technical and leadership roles within high tech companies, among them Cisco, Infineon and Marconi/FORE Systems.

Sanjay holds a Master of Science degree in Networking and Telecom from Stratford University, USA and a Bachelor of Engineering degree in Electronics and Communications from NIT Bhopal, India.

On a personal note, Sanjay is married to Keerti and is a proud father of 2 kids, Kanav and Hrishant. In his free time, he loves to play table tennis and spending time with his family.

Baruch Navon

Baruch is highly experienced R&D manager with almost 20 years of experience in Research and Development. Before joining Parallel Wireless Baruch held a position of engineering manager at Intel, where he led cross domain teams for several wireless solutions, from the Silicon and RF design through development and integration till mass production. It included several engineering functionalities such as VLSI, software, firmware, and hardware.

Baruch had several technical and leadership roles within high tech companies, among them Siano Mobile Silicon and Motorola. Baruch joined Parallel Wireless back in 2018 as a Director of Access Technologies, which he led and built several teams globally. Baruch promoted into a Vice President of Access Technologies role for 2 years and today he is acting as Head Of global R&D.

As Head of R&D Baruch is in charge of leading all engineering functions, strategic planning, budget, and execution. Baruch holds a B.Sc in computer engineering from the Technion, Israel Institute of Technology (Cum Laude), M.Sc. in Electrical Engineering from Tel Aviv University and Management studies from Tel Aviv University.

Reni Ninan

Reni Ninan brings over 25 years of experience to his role as SVP of Product Management at Parallel Wireless. His unique background from living and working in Delhi, Dubai, Chicago, Dallas, Moscow, Gurgaon, and India, across multiple technologies: Optical, IP, Microwave, Mobile and 2G/3G, 4G, and now 5G, will serve as an asset to the organization. Additionally, his ability as a results-oriented, problem solver and quick, data-driven decision maker with a strong customer focus will positively impact the Parallel Wireless experience.

His most previous experience was as Vice President and Head of Global RAN Operations at Mavenir where he successfully oversaw and grew an incubation team for customer engagements spanning across multiple countries in all continents. Prior to joining Mavenir, he served 21 years between Nortel and Ericsson, with Nortel being acquired by Ericsson in 2009. During his tenure, he held various advancing roles, across multiple technologies, with his final role as VP and Head of Operations of Emerging Business.

He holds a BS in Electronics and Communications Engineering from Government College of Engineering, Trivandrum, India.

Steve O'Brien

Steve O’Brien is an HR Executive with 30 years of experience. He has a strong track record and passion for building great teams and businesses with publicly traded companies (GE, Cadbury Schweppes, Sara Lee, Avon Products), distressed companies undergoing turnarounds (Playtex and Mikasa) as well as global, well funded pre-revenue startups (Freshly, Clever Leaves).

One of his greatest strengths is the ability to build cohesive global teams filled with talented, engaged teammates who deliver results in a supportive, high performance culture. He believes passionately in a People First Strategy. During his tenure, he has experienced both success and failure as a business leader. He brings a "Work Hard and Play Harder" philosophy and strives to be an empathic leader and player/coach.

On a personal note, he is married to Susan O’Brien, a talented and successful Psychotherapist, and he is the proud father of four kids, including Triplets (Daniel, Sara, and Rebecca O’Brien). In his free time, he enjoys golf, open water swimming, Notre Dame Football (Go Irish), and spending time with his family.

Matt Rowe

Matt brings over 15 years of global law firm and GC experience representing technology companies across all stages of growth. He has experience at Shoobx and Gazelle, where he was a member of the executive teams responsible for all corporate financing, legal operations and strategy to support growth. At Endeca, he managed commercial licensing and was responsible for overseeing corporate compliance and governance initiatives, intellectual property matters, international operations, and expansion. He was responsible for driving legal aspects of the successful negotiation and sale of the company to Oracle (its 6th largest acquisition ever when announced – reported at $1.1 billion).

As an attorney at Goodwin, Matt represented public and private growth technology companies and advised clients on IPOs, mergers and acquisitions, and venture capital transactions. Matt has a BA in Political Science from Boston College and a JD from Boston College Law School.

Eugina Jordan

Eugina, a self-made immigrant woman, started her telecom career as a secretary and now has gone on to become VP of Marketing for Parallel Wireless. She has over 20 years of strategic marketing experience, leading marketing and communications for small and large global technology companies.

She has been instrumental in establishing Parallel Wireless as the #1 supplier of Open RAN solutions globally. At Cisco, she was responsible for fiscal planning, managing a 20m+ budget, and all integrated marketing activities for SP Mobility and IPNGN product and solutions portfolios globally. Prior to Cisco, she was the Marketing Manager for Starent, developing and managing the marketing strategy for the launch of Cisco’s $2B Starent Networks acquisition at Mobile World Congress 2010.

She is also an inventor, holding 6 patents that include 5G and Open RAN. Her passion is to help other women in telecom realize their full potential through mentorships, community engagement, and workshops. Eugina resides in Massachusetts with her husband, teenage son, and three rescue dogs. She loves theater and museums, and volunteers for dog rescues and programs that help underprivileged children and women.

Eugina has a Masters of Teaching from Moscow Pedagogical University and studied computer science at CDI College in Toronto, Canada.

Chris Sullivan

Chris is an accomplished CFO, CEO, and Board member with a passion for leading dynamic high-growth businesses. His executive leadership experience spans companies of all sizes ranging from start-ups to large multinationals including Dataxu, Inc, Gazelle Inc, Fidelity Investments, Pegasystems, Event Zero, and Digital Equipment Corporation. Chris has helped these companies build game-changing and actionable business and financial plans to drive revenue growth and improved profits. His track record for improving financial results while improving customer and employee satisfaction led to his being named CFO of the Year (2012) by Boston Business Journal.

Yisrael Nov

Yisrael has over 30 years of experience in business development and account management, where he has driven revenue growth and led strategic planning, budgeting, forecasting, and deal pricing. At Gilat, he sought out clients by developing networks and independently identifying and developing relevant resources for sales and business development. Yisrael also refocused Gilat’s portfolio from satellite solutions to include cellular solutions to drive an increase of 42% in company revenue. Previously, as a General Manager at EMI System in Nigeria, he performed P&L and R&D responsibility for ‘full options’ security solutions to high profile clients while managing a global team responsible for product planning, marketing, new product introduction, software development, and post-sales support.

Simon Mellor

Simon has over 30 years of experience as a telecom and defense industry executive. He was the founder and CEO of Axis Network Technology, where he reimagined the remote radio head with next-generation re-configurable digital radio platforms. The company was acquired by leading Korean manufacturer AceAxis, and its products have been deployed in numerous cellular networks globally. Prior to AceAxis, Mr. Mellor led technology strategy at Airtech as Chief Technology Officer.

Simon holds an MSc in Microwave and Modern Optics from U. of London, a BSc in Electronic Physics from Royal Holloway, University of London, and an MBA from The Open University.

Sridhar Donepudi

Sridhar co-founded Parallel Wireless after 20+ years as a proven technology leader focusing on traffic/policy management, base stations, Class 5 Switching, IMS Core, Wireless MSC, and Telephony Application Server. As the Sr. Principal Architect of Next-Gen Products, he reimagined the design and development of Cedar Point/Genband 3GPP traffic and policy management solution. He holds an M.Tech in Applied Electronics from CIT and a B.E in Electronics Engineering.

Kaitki Agarwal

As Chief Product Officer, Kaitki is responsible for leading product strategy, product management, and engineering. She co-founded the company after 20+ years of leading worldwide product development teams. She has been instrumental in managing and scaling the development of the Starent/Cisco Multimedia/VoLTE product line, generating multimillion-dollar revenue. Kaitki holds an MBA from Babson College and a BS in Computer Science from IIT.

Rajesh Mishra

Rajesh is a visionary who, together with the other founders, identified the need for easy to deploy, resilient, and cost-effective LTE network architecture. He co-founded Parallel Wireless after 21+ years in the wireless, wireline, and cable industry. He leads the technology behind Parallel Wireless solutions, holding 25 US and international patents. Rajesh has a BS in Computer Science from IIT.

Keith Johnson

Keith brings a wealth of business, technology, and thought leadership expertise. As Chief Technology Officer at Fuze, he led innovation strategy for Fuze’s product portfolio. Keith holds a BSE in Civil Engineering and Operations Research from Princeton University.

Steve Papa

Steve leads the senior management team in setting the company’s strategic direction and guiding the company’s evolution from its first customer deployment into broad commercialization and growth. He has a BS from Princeton University and an MBA from Harvard Business School.