Board of Directors

Kevin Merritt, Founder & CEO

Prior to founding blist, Kevin founded MessageRite, a web-based email archiving software developer and service provider in 2002. He sold MessageRite to FrontBridge Technologies, became VP of Archiving and Compliance and functioned as CTO of the archiving service at FrontBridge. In 2005 Microsoft acquired FrontBridge. At Microsoft, Kevin initially served as a Software Architect and ultimately as Director of Operations.

At heart, Kevin is a software entrepreneur with a passion and focus on making customers elated by delivering great software as a service. (More)

Scott Darling, Director

Scott is a General Partner at Frazier Technology Ventures. Scott has more than 25 years of experience as a technology executive. Most recently, Scott spent 7 years with Intel Capital where he was Vice President and Managing Director. During this tenure at Intel Capital he managed the teams responsible for the Digital Home and Enterprise investment sectors in support of the business units representing more than two thirds of Intel’s revenue. During Scott’s years at Intel and prior to joining Intel Capital in 2000, he was the general manager for several business units including the Internet Media Services Division and the Personal Conferencing Division, as well as the marketing director for the OEM Computer Systems Division. Before Intel, Scott worked in product marketing at Apple Computer and at two early PC industry startups: VisiCorp and Osborne Computer Systems.

Scott received his MBA from Stanford University's Graduate School of Business in 1988. He earned his undergraduate degree from the University of California, Santa Cruz, in 1981, where he studied economics and computer science.

Paul Flessner, Director

As senior vice president of the Data Storage and Platform Division at Microsoft Corp., Paul Flessner leads an integrated product team that delivers application platform products as part of the Microsoft Server and Tools Business. Flessner’s key product responsibilities include Microsoft SQL Server, the company’s solution for enterprise data management and analysis, as well as Microsoft cluster, file and systems storage technologies.

Flessner joined Microsoft in 1994 as a program manager for enterprise computing. Later promoted to general manager and eventually vice president for SQL Server, he was instrumental in driving Microsoft’s breakthroughs in performance, scalability and reliability for the enterprise database market. After the release of SQL Server 7.0 and later SQL Server 2000, which established Microsoft as a world-class player in the database category, Flessner was promoted to senior vice president and assumed responsibility for all enterprise server software products. Flessner has most recently led the SQL Server 2005 development effort and focused on delivering Microsoft’s Data Platform vision, which spans devices, workgroups and servers all the way up to the most mission-critical enterprise environments.

Ken Gullicksen, Director

Ken is a Partner at Morgenthaler Ventures. Ken joined Morgenthaler in 2001 and currently serves on the boards of imeem, Voltage Security, Digital Railroad, Nominum and Danal Corp. He was either a Series-A lead or co-lead investor in all of the above companies.

Ken has 18 years of experience in Silicon Valley's high-technology industry as CEO, business strategist, marketing/engineering director and venture capitalist. Ken was founding CEO of FiberStreet, Inc., a gigabit network service provider. He previously served as Director of Business Development for Nortel Networks. Ken held a number of market development and engineering roles at Hitachi-Raychem Display Systems and Sun Microsystems. Ken has a BS in electrical engineering from San Jose State University, San Jose, California, and MBA from Stanford University, and is based in Menlo Park.

Monty Waltz, Director

Monty is Senior Vice President of Americas Sales for Manhattan Associates. Monty has been with Manhattan Associates for 10+ years serving in numerous sales and sales management positions. Monty started his career at Anderson Consulting where he worked for 7 years in various consulting, pre-sales and sales positions. Prior to joining Manhattan Associates, Monty worked for several start-up companies in management and leadership positions.

Advisory Board

Bill Bryant, Advisor

Bill has had early and instrumental involvement in over 20 leading software and Internet companies, serving in a variety of capacities, including founder, senior executive, investor and board member. Bill is a board member of ACL, a worldwide market leader in risk management and compliance software and Pluggd, a startup that is revolutionizing audio and video media search. He currently serves on the advisory boards of Medio Systems, Boopsie, Cascadia Capital, Sensors in Motion, Limeade, and Mixxer.

Bill is a former partner of Atlas Ventures, where he originated their investment in Isilon Systems. Prior to Atlas, Bill co-founded Qpass and served as its CEO and chairman. He also co-founded and served as president of Netbot, which built Jango, the first comparison shopping agent for the Internet. In the early 90s, he was the founding vice president of worldwide sales and marketing at Visio Corporation (now part of Microsoft). Since that time, Bill has consulted extensively with Microsoft, Real Networks, Getty Images and Corbis, and has helped a half dozen startups reach liquidity.

Bill is a popular speaker in the Northwest on technology, venture capital, entrepreneurship and startup topics. He received a B.A. in European History, an M.B.A., and his Ph.D. Candidacy in Business Strategy, all from the University of Washington. He holds a patent for an electronic commerce network.