Leadership
Leading the way in the new world of enterprise management in the social cloud, Kenandy has assembled an executive team and board of directors comprised of action-oriented, results-driven deep thinkers, all of whom are committed to continual collaboration for ongoing innovation that benefits our customers, partners, investors, and employees.
Executive Team
Sandra L. Kurtzig, Chairman and CEO
Software industry pioneer Sandra Kurtzig founded Kenandy in 2010 with the vision to once again transform the world of enterprise management software. She did this the first time starting in 1972 when she founded ASK Computer Systems and created the groundbreaking MANMAN product family. During her 20-year tenure as founder, chairman, and CEO of the ASK Group, Kurtzig grew the company into one of the 10 largest software companies in the world.
Now, as Chairman and CEO of Kenandy, she is helping to create and drive the new industry paradigm of enterprise management in the social cloud, supporting a growing, global, social community of companies that design, manufacture and distribute products.
Kurtzig has been widely covered in the media and has received numerous business awards. She was the first woman to take a technology company public, and was included on Business Week's list of the top 50 corporate leaders. Her best-selling autobiography, CEO: Building a $400 Million Company from the Ground Up is published by Harvard Business School Press and is available on Amazon.com.
Since retiring from ASK in 1993, Kurtzig has been the managing partner of SLK Investment Partners, a private equity investment partnership. She has also been a mentor for and investor in entrepreneurial technology companies and has taught the Business for Engineering class at Stanford University.
She has served on the boards of Harvard Business School, Hoover Institution, Stanford's School of Engineering, Stanford Engineering Strategic Council, UCLA's Anderson Graduate School of Management, and UC Berkeley's Haas School of Management.
Kurtzig has a B.S. in mathematics from UCLA and an M.S. in aeronautical engineering from Stanford University.
Rodney Butters, Chief Operating Officer
Rod Butters brings more than 20 years of executive experience in marketing, strategy, sales, and product development to his position as Kenandy’s Chief Operating Officer. He is responsible for Kenandy’s product development and marketing organizations, including driving the launch of the company’s cloud-based ERP solution. Prior to joining Kenandy, Butters was the Chief Marketing Officer and Vice President of Products for RNA Networks, the technology leader in memory and flash virtualization.
Before joining RNA Networks, Butters was the Vice President of Marketing for Salesgenie.com, the market leader in sales effectiveness and sales lead development. Previously, he served as SVP of Marketing at Tidal Software, where he helped position the company as a leader in IT automation. Butters also worked at Aspect Communications, where he served as Executive Vice President of Marketing and, subsequently, President of Worldwide Marketing, Sales and Service. Previously, he was a vice president at Oracle Corporation in the Application Server division. He helped define the applications server market, driving the creation of the market category and establishing Oracle as a leader in middleware. Butters also held senior sales, marketing and engineering positions at Object Design and Mentor Graphics.
Butters has a B.A. and an M.S. in chemistry from the University of Oregon.
Peter Stern, Vice President, Sales
Peter Stern brings 14 years of technology sales and leadership experience to his position as Kenandy's Vice President of Sales. Prior to joining Kenandy, Stern served as senior vice president of sales at OpSource. Previously, Stern was vice president of enterprise corporate sales at Salesforce.com, where he was responsible for the west coast development and growth of a new direct sales division. Prior to that, Stern worked at Oracle and ultimately managed a North American field sales organization responsible for ISV sales for embedded infrastructure technology.
Stern attended the University of California, Berkeley where he was a two-time All American on the men's NCAA water polo team, a member of the US Men's Senior National Team, and a gold medal winner in the 1997 FINA World Championships.
An active member of the Bay Area community, Stern, together with his family, supports several philanthropic causes including the Wender Wiess Foundation, the Cancer Prevention Institute of California, and the PlumpJack foundation. In December 2010, he was appointed to the Airport Commission of the San Francisco International Airport.
Stewart Florsheim, Vice President, Marketing
Stewart Florsheim brings over 25 years of experience in the software industry to his position as Kenandy’s Vice President of Marketing. His responsibilities include marketing communications and user assistance tools. Prior to joining Kenandy, Florsheim was Director of Learning Products at Advent Software. He managed a team responsible for the company’s client website, as well as all documentation, online training, and user interface design.
Prior to joining Advent, Florsheim was Group Manager at Intuit, where he was responsible for localization of Quicken into multiple languages, and user assistance for QuickBooks. Florsheim was one of the original employees at ASK Computer Systems, where he started several groups including Marketing Communications, Creative Services, and User Information Products. His teams have won over 40 awards from the Society for Technical Communication.
Florsheim has a B.A. in Journalism and Philosophy from Syracuse University, and an M.A. in English from San Francisco State University. He is the award-winning author of four books of poetry, and sits on the Advisory Council of Compassion and Choices of Northern California.
John Kepp, Vice President, Professional Services
John Kepp brings more than 20 years of experience in professional services, project management, business development, and sales to his role as Kenandy’s Vice President of Professional Services. He is responsible for implementation services and client success. John brings an extensive background working in fast-paced and challenging environments; he has in-depth knowledge of developing and implementing effective services methodologies and packages for ERP systems and cloud computing.
Prior to joining Kenandy, John was Vice President of Americas and Asia Pacific Professional Services at Navis LLC. Before joining Navis LLC, he served as the Vice President of Operations and Services at Selway Company. John has also held management and leadership positions at Oracle Corporation and Nortel Networks.
John holds a B.S. in Psychology and an MBA from Saint Mary’s College, and a Master of Applied Project Management from Villanova.
Board of Directors
Sandra L. Kurtzig, Chairman and CEO
See bio in leadership section.
Raymond J. Lane, Managing Partner
Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
As a managing partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Ray Lane helps entrepreneurs with technological and market insight, organizational development, team building, selling, and managing growth. He has sponsored several investments for the firm in enterprise and consumer technology, as well as in clean and alternative energy, including Ausra (solar concentrator), GreatPoint Energy (coal to gas conversion), Fisker Automotive (plug-in hybrid car), and many more. He serves on the board of Hewlett-Packard, and is also on the board of Quest Software.
Before joining KPCB, Lane was president and chief operating officer of Oracle Corporation, the second-largest software company in the world and a leading enterprise software and services company. Lane led Oracle's business expansion beyond its core database technology into enterprise applications and professional services. During Lane's eight-year tenure, Oracle exhibited phenomenal revenue growth, from approximately $1 billion in 1992 to over $10 billion.
Lane has a bachelor's degree in mathematics from West Virginia University (WVU) and received an honorary Ph.D. from WVU as well as from Golden Gate University.
Chris Schaepe, Partner
Lightspeed Venture Partners
Chris has over 20 years of venture capital experience and invests in areas including cloud, SaaS, enterprise infrastructure as well as mobile technologies and applications. In 2013, Forbes ranked Chris #6 on its Hall of Fame list of technology investors. He has backed over 25 successful startups including over 10 first-time CEOs who have led their companies though successful IPOs. Chris has served as a director of a number of public companies including eHealth (EHTH), Fusion-io (FIO) and Riverbed Technology (RVBD) where he currently serves as Chairman of the Compensation Committee. Prior to Lightspeed, Chris was a General Partner of Weiss, Peck & Greer Venture Partners which he joined in 1991, focusing on seed and early-stage technology investments. Previously, he worked in corporate finance and capital markets roles at Goldman, Sachs & Co. after serving as a software engineer at IBM.
Chris holds B.S. and M.S. degrees in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and an MBA from Stanford University Graduate School of Business. He is involved in various non-profits focusing on children’s health and education including the Lucile Packard Foundation for Children’s Health.
Larry W. Sonsini, Chairman
Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati
Chairman of Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, Larry W. Sonsini has gained international recognition for his expertise in the areas of corporate law, corporate governance, securities, and mergers and acquisitions. He has been instrumental in many of the most notable IPOs, mergers, acquisitions, and other key transactions of Silicon Valley and beyond.
In addition to his duties at the firm, which included serving as chief executive officer for more than 30 years as well as chairman, Sonsini served as a member of the NYSE's board of directors from 2001 to 2003 and he was chairman of the NYSE's Regulation, Enforcement and Listing Standards Committee until 2008. He also teaches securities law at Stanford Law School and UC Berkeley School of Law.
Sonsini has a B.A. in Political Science from UC Berkeley and a J.D. from UC Berkeley's Boalt Hall School of Law.
