SBF Consulting :: Main Consultants

	Senior Consultant

		Jeff Blokker
		Jeff Blokker completed all PHD course work in Electrical Engineering and was a research assistant under Nobel Laureate Herbert Kromer investigating GaAs device fabrication at UCSB. He left school with a Masters degree in 1984 to form a corporation, CableSoft Inc, that he ran as CEO for 18 years. He has a broad engineering background with expertise in material, software development, networks including wireless and advanced computing. In 2010 he completed a Masters degree in Financial Mathematics at Stanford University. He has been a member of the Board of Directors of the Center for Engineering Entrepreneurship and Engineering Management, a member of the UCSB Engineering Advisory Committee, and Member Board of Directors of the Mericos Foundation at the Whittier Trust Company.
		Oskar Vierny
		Mr. Vierny assists entrepreneurs in developing market and product strategy, in forming strategic alliances, in raising capital and launching their ventures. Having strong ties to the Israeli hi-tech industry, Oskar is poised to serve as a liaison between those hi-tech frontiers and any company seeking a genuine, advanced technology. Formerly, he held senior managerial positions in Customer R&D and worked in the Manufacturing and in the Corporate Technology Center at Applied Materials, Inc., where he incubated and launched new product into a self-sustained business unit. His product and business development experience spans industrial control, telecommunication, semiconductors, and nano materials. Oskar holds a BSEE degree from the Israeli Technion, and a Certificate in Business Administration from the Haas School of Business, UC Berkeley, California.
		Keith Bennett Ph.D.
		Dr. Bennett has a strong technical and business background in photonics, optical systems and instruments and over twenty-year's experience in international (particularly Japan - US) high technology businesses. He specializes in assisting large and mid-sized companies enter new markets and expand their technological competencies. Notable achievements include starting the Newport Corporation's transformation from a mechanical component company to a leader in optoelectronic instrumentation and equipment. Most recently, he co-founded Symphony Systems, a Silicon Valley startup that provides web-based Equipment Productivity Management software solutions for the semiconductor industry, and served as its Chief Executive Officer. He holds a bachelor's degree in physics from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and a master's and doctorate in applied physics, with a specialization in lasers from Stanford University.
		Andre Serao
		Mr. Serrao's technological background is telecommunications industry. His experience includes designing cable networks / WAN networks, hosting services and security solutions. Now in SBF, he covers mainly network communication, mobile and wireless, and security solutions. He also investigating technology trend through R&D activities and VC investment. He is also familiar with the communication market in middle and south America. He has a bachelor's degree in Electrical Engineering from State University of Campinas (Unicamp), Brazil, and he is fluent in English, Spanish, and Portuguese.
		Mary Jean Koontz Ph.D.
		Ms. Koontz has 15 years of international market research and management consulting experience for global corporations and government agencies in the U.S., Japan, Vietnam, Malaysia and Thailand. She has been involved in project management of high-profile projects; design of qualitative and quantitative client projects, preparation of IT and e-commerce industry. She also covers "human science", environmental, healthcare, partly biotechnologies. Ms. Koontz worked five years for Dames & Moore, as an environmental auditor and Asia business development manager. She has Ph.D. from Golden Gate University. Also she has MBA focusing international marketing from University of South Carolina and B.S. from Georgetown University.
		Saeko Ozawa
		Ms. Ozawa is a consultant specializing in the securities industry. She started her career in the securities industry at Morgan Stanley in New York in 1987, immediately after graduating from Kellogg School, Northwestern University with an MBA. Since then, she has been with Swiss Bank Corporation and Instinet Co. for two years until January 1999, she was an investment risk management consultant at Barra Co. After then she worked for Merrill Lynch until March 2006 as financial advisor. Prior to attending Kellogg School, she worked as a market researcher at JETRO and Dataquest. She also holds an MA in Sociology and Anthropology of Education from University of California, Berkeley, and a BA from Waseda University in Tokyo.
		Roger Chen, Ph.D.
		Dr. Roger Chen is a faculty member at School of Business and Management of University of San Francisco. He has a Ph.D. in Management from the University of Texas, a M.S from Shanghai Jiao Tong University, and a B.S from Shanghai Engineering and Technology University. Since coming to the U.S., he has worked at Galaxy Electronics Inc., AsiaInfo Co. and JKRen.com. He is an expert on High-Tech business model, strategy and international business. He has received "Silicon Valley Guru" Award by Silicon Valley Roundtable of the National Business & Economics Association, and his article received the "Abramson Award for Outstanding Article" from the Business Economics Journal. He has been actively involved in business consulting and research.
		Yutaka Ujiie President & CEO, Founder
		Mr. Ujiie has over 25 years biz experience in investment banking and technologies areas and now he is working to link high-tech innovation between U.S. and Japanese companies, thereby encouraging international synergy and success. Prior to founding SBF, he worked at Nikko Securities for nearly two decades and gained extensive expertise and experience in the areas of business planning, corporate research / analysis and other investment banking services. For last ten years at Nikko, he was especially involved in supporting in IPO, venture capital financing and M&A for emerging private firms in Japan. The charged companies cover Japanese local corporations of Silicon Graphics, Compaq, Intuit and other. He is now an official IT industrial advisor of Miyagi and Osaka prefecture in Japan, also a member of The Japan Society for Science Policy and Research Management. He contributes articles on high-tech trends of US to Nikkei-Net, the web-version of Nikkei Newspaper. He is a graduate of Tohoku University, where he majored in macro economics and corporate financing.
		Sheridan Tatsuno (Partner)
		Mr. Tatsuno has worked for tech-research and business strategy consulting firm and venture incubator. Mr. Tatsuno worked at Bechtel in civil infrastructure planning, international project financing, and environmental assessment. He co-founded Dataquest's Japan and Asian semiconductor groups and served as industry liaison manager at Stanford University's U.S.-Japan Technology Management Center. He is familiar with electronics and computer communication including the uniting field of these areas and medical-healthcare, new energy. Mr. Tatsuno also has long experience in venture support and consulting venture cluster. He is the author of two books produced for television: The Technopolis Strategy (Prentice-Hall, 1986) and Created in Japan (HarperCollins, 1990). He is a graduate of Yale University and Harvard's Kennedy School of Government.
	Senior Advisor

		Nobuyuki Hata
		Mr. Hata worked as a security analyst in the investment banking division of Nomura Research Institute for 17 years. In 1991, he joined JAFCO as the manager of the evaluation department. He moved to Kokugakuin University to become a professor of corporate finance in 1994. He is now visiting scholar of Stanford University, researching US venture capital and venture firms. He is a member of Council on Modernization of Small and Medium Sized Firms by METI and a director of The Japanese Academic Society for Venture & Entrepreneur as well. Co-translator of "Venture Capital at the Crossroads" by Bygrave & Timmons, 1995. Editor/co-author of "The Diversification of Venture Finance" 1996. Co-author of "Management of Venture Firms and Its Support" 2000. He holds Bachelor and Master of Economics degrees from Waseda University.
		Katsuhide Hirai
		Mr. Hirai served as a member of the board of directors and President of Fujitsu Software Corporation and Fujitsu Network Industry Inc. since 1994. He was responsible for directing and managing the company's overall business strategy and direction in the North American and European market. He is a veteran of the global software industry, having worked in both Japan and the United States, first as an engineer and later as an executive directing and implementing Fujitsu software strategy. His engineering and marketing experience covers a wide range of business and industry application software, including CAD/CAM/CAE, ERP, groupware and supercomputer applications. A member of IEEE, SIGGRAPH and the Information Processing Society of Japan. He has also served as a director of the MIT X-Windows Consortium and Computer and Communication Industry Association in the U.S. He is graduate of Osaka University, where he earned a degree in engineering science.
		Tai Hasegawa, Ph.D.
		Dr. Hasegawa worked initially as researcher at Poland Academy Institute of Physical Science in Warsaw, then he came to Stanford, CA, where he obtained a permanent residency. Beside his scientific endeavors in the Chemistry Department, he was nominated as the president of the Henry Taube Institute, which was established to honor Nobel laureate Dr. Taube. In addition to his academic career, he is an active member of Palo Alto Philharmonic and began to study piano with his favorite Steinway, "Millennium". Dr. Hasegawa received his B.S., M.S., and Ph. D. from the University of Tokyo, Japan.