Americas Speakers

Dean Bass is a Product Development Director for Oxford Instruments. He has over 20 years of industry acumen in guiding high tech R&D organisations towards strategic development and portfolio management. Currently managing a team of over 80 scientists and engineers for the NanoAnalysis business, he is responsible for driving People and Change Leadership within the organisation. His Program and Project Leadership expertise has allowed him to accelerate his team to new levels of performance through a combination of business analysis, process re-engineering, and change leadership skills.

Dean.Bass@oxinst.com

Damien Bullot is currently the Global VP, Thales Software Monetization, based in Austin, Texas. A French native, he moved to the US New York Metro area as VP of Sales for the Identity and Data Protection BL of SafeNet Inc, a Gemalto US based subsidiary. Prior to this, he held many roles within the company such as Sales Director for the Telecom Business Unit, Country manager of Brazil with responsibility for driving the software and services business and Sales/Marketing VP for Gemalto’s different business units. A graduate from Aix en Provence University in France, Damien also holds an MSC in Marketing Management from IAE Business Institute.

damien.bullot@thalesgroup.com

Karen Camara brings 20yrs of product management experience to her current role as Senior Product Manager with Sharp Imaging and Information Company of America. Karen and her team are responsible for all things licensing and the Sharp Partner Program. She is responsible for ensuring the Sharp License Portal meets the evolving needs of the business and its channel partners. The Partner Program is focused on building and supporting an ecosystem of 3rd party HW and SW offerings around Sharp multifunction printers (MFPs).

Anna has been a key member of the QSC executive team since joining the company in 2011, playing an instrumental role in developing and executing business strategies for growth. Prior to joining QSC, Anna worked for McKinsey & Company, a global management consulting firm, where she served clients in multiple industries and in various functional capacities around the world. In addition to her other responsibilities, she currently serves as Executive Sponsor for QSC’s Diversity & Inclusion Council. Anna holds multiple master’s degrees including an MBA from UCLA’s Anderson School of Management and an MS in Economics from Corvinus University of Budapest, Hungary and most recently an MA in Developmental Psychology from Azusa Pacific University.

John has been a key member of the Software Monetization professional services team since joining Thales in 2015.  Joining as a Principal Consultant, John assisted in developing many of processes and services designed to assist Enterprise level customers implement Sentinel Products.  Throughout his career, John has grown into leadership roles covering Business Consulting, Sales Operations, and Technical Sales, always with a focus on customer success.  John is a graduate from the University of Connecticut.

Sean’s career has focused on the technology industry. In 2007 he joined Juniper as business systems analyst and has held a number of different positions. Over the years, he has grown into team leadership roles that span supply chain operations, customer operations, sales operations, order management, business operations & large scale enterprise wide transformation initiatives.

Jake has been involved in many aspects of software monetization—from new product innovation, product management, engineering, service delivery, and more recently marketing. He even holds a patent related to SaaS licensing. Jake has been a part of the Thales team since 2004 and joined the SM business unit five years later. He is passionate about supporting customers of all sizes in optimizing and transforming their businesses through the Sentinel Platform and the SM team’s professional expertise. As a Jiu Jitsu purple belt, he competes internationally and is a happily married, proud father of three.

jake.fox@thalesgroup.com

Dale Hopkinson is the Senior Product Manager for Thales Software Monetization, responsible for the strategic direction and growth of SaaS. Dale is known for delivering revenue growth, improving operational cost and leading innovation to capitalize on new market opportunities. Prior to leading SaaS, Dale worked with Thales’ largest enterprise customers to help them transform their business through recurring revenue models by implementing Entitlement Management solutions. Dale has over 15 years of experience delivering entitlement solutions that meet customers’ business objectives.

dale.hopkinson@thalesgroup.com

Vince has a track record of successfully delivering award winning services and products by leveraging extensive expertise in business development, product management and digital transformation. In his current role with Sharp Imaging and Information Company of America, he leads a cross functional team responsible for cloud services & analytics, device firmware, API’s & 3rd party alliances.

Mike has worked in software application and network management roles for over 25 years, covering a wide spectrum of networking technologies, and in positions varying from development and product management to partnering and solutions marketing.  He rejoined Juniper in June 2017and is now driving their end-to-end software business processes. Mike is using his vast experience to great effect in driving Juniper’s transformation to significantly grow their software business. 

Darim is the unique breed who possesses both the deep technical expertise and the ability to explain that technology in dynamic terms for the lay person. He has been involved in software monetization/licensing for over two decades. Having started his career in pre- and post-sales support, Darim then moved to the product management side of the business. He is currently responsible for guiding the Thales Software Monetizing product strategy and roadmap, along with maintaining an effective product identity. You will find him to be a riveting speaker not to be missed.

darim.rahmatallah@thalesgroup.com

Johanna has a career spanning a variety of global B2B marketing roles. She is in her second year at THALES SM and is pleased to work closely with the marketing, product, services, and sales teams to articulate the organization’s values and present all that the Sentinel Platform has to offer. When she’s not working, Johanna is an avid skier and rower.

johanna.rose@thalesgroup.com

Todd Steel is the Director of Product Management responsible for creating customer value out of data within the Sentinel platform. Todd has been helping clients for over 20 years protect and grow revenues through Software Monetization strategies.

todd.steel@thalesgroup.com

Deb is our Director of Sales Enablement and has a passion for making training and events fun for all.  Prior to joining Thales, Deb performed a similar role for 10 years at IBM where she also ran the famous “Top Gun” training program for one of their business lines.  In a former life, she taught Kindergarten, had a Scrapbooking business and was a Director of Human Resources for a luxury hotel in Denver.  Hospitality is also a passion of Deb’s.  When she isn’t entertaining her colleagues at events, she’s entertaining family and friends in her home on a lake in Windsor, CO, USA.

Manoj is our Director of Product Management for EMS and other related Sentinel SaaS offerings. Prior to his product management role, Manoj worked in our professional services organization helping our largest customers achieve their goals in their software transformation journeys. In a prior life, Manoj led a team that built and managed the entitlement management systems of a very large Fortune 500 company where his team implemented strategy for end-to-end Software Monetization Framework supporting in excess of $8 billion of software revenue across cloud and traditional offers. Manoj’s hobbies include traveling and tasting new craft beer.

manoj.tharakan@thalesgroup.com

Mark Thomason’s research examines traditional and emerging monetization models for digital products and services and identifies disruptive business models and technologies such as cloud services, product to “aaS” transformation, and monetization enabled by innovation accelerators such as IoT. Mark holds a B.S. in Management of Information Systems from University of Central Florida and an M.S. in Business Administration from Keller Graduate School of Management.

mthomason@idc.com

Rick Towner is Principal Business Value Consultant in Software Monetization for the Americas region at Thales. His primary focus is on the business impact of the client engagement with Sentinel from top-line revenue drivers to bottom-line cost management. Rick works with clients alongside the technical team to identify and clarify economic priorities, and to understand the effect on the business landscape that a well-constructed software monetization program can have on all aspects of the client offering. His work in technology spans nearly 30 years, and covers many aspects of various industries, from RF Regulatory Compliance, to global operations support and includes enterprise data and SaaS service migrations. Rick holds a Bachelor’s degree from Occidental College, and an MBA from Santa Clara University in Silicon Valley.

rick.towner@thalesgroup.com