Penny Herscher
President and CEO
Penny joined FirstRain in late 2004 with the mission to solve the qualitative information overload problem of the institutional investor. She has developed FirstRain from a technology provider to the leading search-driven application provider to the financial services market.

Prior to FirstRain, Penny was Chairman and CEO of Simplex Solutions, an electronic design automation company serving the global semiconductor industry. As CEO, she grew Simplex from a few engineers in 1996 to a high-growth, profitable software company. She led the company to an IPO in 2001 and through the sale of the company to Cadence Design Systems in 2002. Penny then worked at Cadence as Chief Marketing Officer and General Manager of a major division of the company. From 1988 to 1996, Penny was an early employee and executive at Synopsys. She started her career in 1982 as an R&D engineer with Texas Instruments and then Daisy Systems.

Penny serves on the boards of FirstRain, Rambus, the Anita Borg Institute, Planned Parenthood Mar Monte and CCPY (California Community Partners for Youth). Penny speaks on entrepreneurship, career management and technology challenges and has given talks at Berkeley, Stanford, BU and Santa Clara business schools as well as for numerous industry organizations and women's career development organizations. She holds a B.A. with honors in mathematics from Cambridge University in England.

YY Lee
Chief Operating Officer
YY brings strong operational leadership and experience to her position at FirstRain. She leads engineering, product marketing, and professional services in the US and India. Under her guidance, our teams develop new software capability and provide professional services to our customers.

YY was most recently vice president of worldwide services at Cadence Design Systems, leading that business into profitability. Prior to that, she co-founded the software company Aqueduct. After successfully building that business, the company was acquired by NetManage, which she joined as a director of engineering. She has also worked at Bell Labs, Integrated Information Technology (IIT) and Synopsys. YY earned an A.B. in mathematics from Harvard University.

David A. Frankel
Vice President, Business Development
Prior to joining FirstRain, David was vice president of sales at BNY Jaywalk, the independent research consultancy division of the Bank of New York, where he created a go-to-market strategy for a business line that targeted broker-dealers. Before Bank of New York, David spent more than 11 years at FactSet Research Systems, where he led the team that built the foundation for FactSet's current global product marketing strategy as vice president of marketing, and contributed to the creation of a new business development department focused on establishing key strategic alliances as vice president of content and partnerships.

David holds a B.S. in marketing and political science from the Carroll School of Management at Boston College.

Todd Rudley
Vice President, Sales
Todd is a results-oriented leader who has led sales organizations for vendors that provide investment-technology solutions to major financial services institutions. Todd came to FirstRain from Mellon Financial Corp., where he drove sales strategy for portfolio management and investment technology solutions. Throughout his career, Todd has worked closely with top buy-side institutions to deliver technology solutions tailored around their workflow and information requirements. Todd has also held sales leadership and management positions at Eagle Investment Systems, Golden Source (then Financial Technologies International, Inc.) and Advent Software, Inc. He started his career at Goldman Sachs and Company.

Todd holds a B.S. degree in Economics from Carnegie Mellon University.

Martin Betz, Ph.D.
Vice President, Technology
With over 15 years experience building algorithm intensive software applications, Marty brings management expertise with a passion for data-intensive analytics. Most recently he was a founding partner of Beon Software creating systems for the collection and analysis of real-time text-based communication. Marty previously led an EDA software product group at Credence Systems Inc. and managed development of software for their EmiScope product line. He's been a partner and associate at several technical consulting firms, delivering software in diverse fields ranging from drug development to document and customer categorization. Prior to choosing a career in software, Marty worked as a math professor and researcher at the University of Texas, Austin. Marty's perspective and technical acumen will add substantial depth to FirstRain's information delivery technology.

Marty holds a Ph.D. in mathematics from Stanford University and an A.B. from Harvard University, also in math.

Udit Mathur
Vice President, FirstRain, India
Udit heads the India operations for FirstRain and brings strong leadership and management experience in research and analytics operations in the consumer and financial services industry. Prior to joining FirstRain, he was part of The Blackstone Group, a Chicago-based market research firm, where he built the knowledge services operations from the ground up. Earlier, Udit worked with leading market research organizations such as International Data Corporation (IDC) and AC Nielsen, as well as GE Capital where he led the development and deployment of portfolio strategies through analytics for financial products such as credit cards, insurance, and reinsurance.

Udit has earned an MBA in Marketing from Centre for Management Development and a BS in Computer Science from University of Delhi. He is also a certified Green Belt in Six-Sigma.

Eugene Tighe Corporate Controller Eugene has more than 15 years of finance and accounting experience in the high-tech industry, growing emerging companies through successful IPOs. Before joining FirstRain, Eugene worked in financial leadership positions with mBlox, Astoria Software, Trintech and Quickturn Design Systems. He is a certified chartered accountant and previously worked at Ernst & Young. Eugene holds a B.B.S. in Accounting and Finance from the University of Limerick.

Ana Pease Director of Worldwide Human Resources Ana brings over 11 years of experience running human resources as a strategic asset to her role sustainably accelerating FirstRain's business strategy and values. Prior to FirstRain, Ana was with Cypress Semiconductor where she managed strategic partner relationships globally and led HR teams on several mergers and acquisitions. Prior positions include Lara Networks and Digi International. Ana holds a B.S. in Marketing and Industrial Psychology from San Jose State University.

David Cooke Director, Business Analytics & Operations David brings over 25 years of experience growing high-performance global organizations, most recently as an executive in the services organization at Cadence Design Systems, prior to which he co-founded business consultancy MarketSpeed, with additional prior roles at Sun Microsystems and Fairchild Semiconductor. David holds a B.Sc. in Engineering Science and MEng in Microelectronics and Management from the University of Durham, England.

Todd Enders Director of Marketing Todd brings 11 years of startup and large-company product marketing and strategy experience to his role, most recently in product strategy for Oracle Corporation, prior to which he led product marketing teams at Primavera Systems and Evolve Software. Todd holds a B.A. in English from Yale University.