Advisors

Richard Goodspeed
Industry Advisor

Dick was the President and CEO of Vons companies, a 329 store chain that is now part of Safeway.

Prior to that Dick was on the Executive Committee of American Stores, the 1695 store supermarket

chain that was #2 in the US in 1990, prior to its merger with Albertsons. Dick was the President

and COO of Lucky’s Supermarkets from 1988 to 1994. Earlier, he  was the President of Family Mart

Stores. Dick  has spent 45 years in all areas of Retail Management that include Operations, Logistics,

Procurement, and Store Development.  Dick has  spent the last 15 years turning around under-

performing divisions and companies that included two major mergers and one divestiture.

Since retiring from the retail food industry, he has been working on consulting assignments for food

retailers and consumer packaged goods companies.  Retailers include Harris Teeter, Safeway,

Haggen, Publix, Eagle Foods, etc.  Consumer packaged goods companies include Pillsbury, Potlach,

Nabisco Brands, ConAgra, General Mills, etc.

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Robert J.Dunst, Jr.
Industry Advisor

Mr. Dunst served as Executive Vice President of Supply Chain and Technology at Albertson’s, Inc. as well as Chief Technology Officer.  He was responsible for the company’s supply chain organization as well as procurement, inventory management, distribution, warehousing, and logistics.   During his tenure, Albertson’s was a founding member of EPCglobal, the not-for-profit organization that created industry standards for RFID technology. Prior to its merger with SuperValu, Albertsons was the second largest supermarket chain in North America with over 2,000 stores.

While at Albertson’s, Dunst became an advocate for the use of data warehousing technology and oversaw the initiative to use RFID to track goods through the company’s supply chain. Prior to Albertson’s, he was vice president of advanced technology and the Internet business group at Safeway.  Dunst has served as a director in the consulting and outsourcing unit at IBM.  He was an executive board member of the Global Commerce Initiative and World Wide Retail Exchange.    

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Bill Bishop, PhD
Industry Advisor

Founder and chairman of Willard Bishop LLC, Bishop has been involved in thought-leading research and consulting in the supermarket and retail industries for more than 30 years and has led major studies on topics ranging from new "wide-angle" approaches to pricing strategy, to the application of activity-based costing to improve operational performance.

Prior to entering consulting in 1976, Bishop served for several years as v.p. of research for the Super Market Institute (now FMI) and he continues to serve as a consultant to that organization. He also taught marketing at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management. Bishop holds a Ph.D. in economics from Cornell University

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Patrick L. Kiernan
Industry Advisor

Patrick Kiernan is a managing partner of Day/Kiernan and Associates, a consulting group focusing on growth strategies and emerging issues with an emphasis on consumer future forces, e-commerce, and trade policy development. He serves on the advisory council of Saint Joseph's University Center for Food Marketing, and is a research affiliate with the Institute for the Future in Palo Alto, Calif. He also serves on various boards including DemandTec, Encore Associates, Prescient Applied Intelligence, and the General Merchandise Distributor's Council.

Kiernan's experience includes 10 years as s.v.p. at the Grocery Manufacturers Association leading the industry affairs function, and seven years as corporate division manager of industrial engineering for Safeway Stores, Inc. He holds an MS degree from St. Joseph's University and a BA in marketing from the University of Washington.

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Mike Heschel, PhD
Industry Advisor

Mike Heschel was Executive Vice President and Chief Information Officer for The Kroger Company, where he shaped the entire IT strategy since 1991 till his retirement in 2006.
Mr. Heschel, was initially the  group vice president of management information systems (MIS). Three years later, he was promoted to senior vice president with responsibility for coordinating all MIS services, logistics and reengineering projects. He was appointed executive vice president and CIO in 1995.
Prior to joining Kroger, Mike held senior leadership posts Security Pacific National Bank, Baxter International, Inc., American Hospital Supply Corporation, FMC Corporation, and Boeing Aircraft Company.
Some of Mike’s key accomplishments include:

• Complete overhauling of Kroger’s information systems environment.
• Creating a world-class distribution center automation system for Kroger.
• Participating in numerous food industry re-engineering efforts.
• Developing the ASAP automated ordering system at AHSC
• Authoring a Harvard Business. School case study on systems that provided a competitive advantage.

Mike received a B.S.I.E., M.B.A., and M.S.I.E. from Ohio State University, and was awarded a Ph.D. in Industrial Engineering from Arizona State University. Mike has been honored as Information Systems Executive of the Year and Logistics Officer of the Year.

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Ravi Chiruvolu
Investment Advisor

Ravi Chiruvolu is a general partner with Charter Venture Capital, where he focuses on information

technology, in particular enterprise software and software infrastructure. Ravi is a director of Ellie

Mae, ManageStar, Niku, Quantum3D, Talaris, Verano, and Winery Exchange. Additionally, Ravi is

an active speaker and thought leader in the venture capital industry, and among other things,

writes a monthly technology column for the Venture Capital Journal. He began his venture capital

career at Alta Partners, before which he was GM of online services and ran business development at

Peapod. He also worked in corporate development at Ameritech, where he led AIN rollout, corporate

Internet/content strategy, cellular footprint expansion, and a broadband rollout assessment. He was

on the response team for the 1996 Telco Act and was nominated in 1997 for the Chairman's Award

for his work in increasing efficiency in Ameritech's Call Centers. Prior to Ameritech, Ravi was with

McKinsey & Company, Motorola, Mitre Corporation, and NASA facilities at the Goddard and

Johnson Flight centers. Mr. Chiruvolu is a retired officer in the United States Army, Ordinance

Corp.

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Howard Befort
Retail Industry Advisor

Howard till recently was the VP Pricing of Safeway.

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Donald Harrington
Price Optimization Advisor

Mr. Harrington brings 26 years of retail industry experience and has held a variety of key

executive positions such as President, GMM, VP Store Operations and Regional Director at national

retailers such as Elder Beerman, Pic n' Pay, and CVS. At these retailers, Mr. Harrington successfully

managed and led chain-wide process reengineering efforts and multiple turnarounds, including Bee

Gee Shoes, a 130-store footwear retailer. Mr. Harrington joins KhiMetrics from JDA Software Group

where he served as Director of Strategic Consulting for JDA's global e-commerce practice. At JDA,

Mr. Harrington was responsible for developing alliances with best practice providers such as IBM,

Blue Martini, Accrue Software and others. His education includes a Bachelor of Arts in Political

Science.

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Sanjay Kasturia
Technology Advisor

Sanjay was the Department Head of Wireless technology research at Bell Labs with responsibility

for defining the technical direction of wireless research and delivering breakthrough technologies to

Lucent’s business units. Hehas over 20 yrs of experience in the industry heading Wireless design

projects. He was the co founder of Airgo Networks and VP of Engr. at IOSpan wireless, pioneers in the

802.11 space. He was the  He is currently the CEO and Founder of Teranetics. Sanjay has a Ph.D.

and an M.S. in E.E. from Stanford University and is the author of several papers and patents in RF

design.