Leadership
An academic turned prolific technology entrepreneur, Micah Adler combines rich industry insight with complex technical knowledge in his role as the president, CEO, and founder of Fiksu. Micah is steeped in the workings of the mobile app ecosystem and offers a unique perspective on the formidable challenges facing app marketers as his foray into mobile began with the release of his own app, Fluent News® Reader. Leveraging his academic and entrepreneurial backgrounds spanning mathematics, computer science, and performance marketing, he developed the specialized technologies, tools and expertise to grow his app business in the increasingly crowded and complex app marketspace. It was from the challenges faced in promoting that app that Micah pivoted the company’s focus to creating a technology platform to help other app marketers promote their apps and rebranded the company as Fiksu (the name Fiksu – which means smart in Finnish – plays on Micah’s Finnish roots).
In addition to all things CEO, Micah also oversees the Fiksu Indexes, a series of industry benchmarks providing insight to help mobile marketers better understand app marketing trends and costs. He is a frequent speaker and panelist at industry shows and conferences.
Micah entrepreneurial excellence is recognized in his being named a finalist in the Ernst & Young 2012 Entrepreneur Of The Year Award and the 2012 Tech Luminary award by Boston Business Journal and Mass High Tech.
Previously, Micah was CEO, president, and co-founder of Adverplex, a search engine marketing optimization company. Micah was also the co-founder, president and board member of CourseAdvisor, which was acquired by the Washington Post Corporation in 2007. He has served on the boards of directors for more than 10 Boston-area startup companies.
Micah was also a tenured professor of Computer Science at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. He has authored more than 50 widely cited publications; holds multiple patents; and has served on numerous academic review committees, program committees and editorial boards. He received his BS from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his PhD in theoretical computer science from the University of California, Berkeley.
Craig Palli is a seasoned inventor and entrepreneur with a particular knack for creating client focused marketing and business development strategies for technology companies of all sizes, in all stages of growth – from inception to IPO or acquisition. As Chief Strategy Officer, Craig leads Fiksu's worldwide Marketing, Business Development and Client Services efforts spanning the Client Development and Client Performance teams who ensure client success.
Craig’s insight and quick wit make him a popular speaker at industry events as well as a trusted go-to source for the trade and business press. His commentary has been featured in news outlets such as TechCrunch, GigaOM, Forbes, MobileMarketer and Reuters.
Before Fiksu, Craig was founder and CEO of Torrent, Inc., a manufacturer of patent-rich and ecologically friendly consumer electronics products. Previously, Craig held senior management roles at DirectoryM, Inc., a premier online advertising network for small businesses, and ValueClick, Inc., one of the world's largest integrated online marketing companies. In addition, he helped grow Be-Free Inc. from a start-up with six customers to a $3 billion market cap before its acquisition by ValueClick. Craig graduated from Carnegie Mellon University with dual majors in economics and industrial management, and holds a MBA from the F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business at Babson College.
Mark Corner is an expert in the areas of mobile and pervasive computing and networking, file systems, and security. Mark leads all aspects of Fiksu’s engineering feats including overseeing the talented – and growing – team of developers, the development of a scalable infrastructure that processes thousands of events per second and tracks tens of billions of app launches, the Fiksu for Mobile Apps SDK which touches almost half of all iOS devices (and an untold number of Android devices), and FreeMyApps, with thousands of simultaneous users.
Prior to Fiksu, Mark served as Fluent Mobile’s vice president of engineering while on sabbatical from the University of Massachusetts Amherst. While at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Mark was a tenured Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Science, where he taught and did research in mobile systems, operating systems and usability.
Mark has authored dozens of publications on mobile systems, holds two patents, and has been awarded millions of dollars in federal and industrial research grants. In 2009, he was selected for DARPA's prestigious Computer Science Study Panel. Other awards include an NSF CAREER award in 2005 and Best Paper awards at USENIX FAST 2007, ACM Multimedia 2005, and ACM Mobicom 2002. He also serves on the editorial board of IEEE Pervasive and IEEE Transactions on Mobile Computing. Mark holds a PhD in electrical engineering from the University of Michigan and BS and MS degrees from the University of Virginia.
Mel Jackson
Chief Operating Officer
Mel Jackson holds down Fort Fiksu, overseeing the day-to-day operational workload along with the strategic management, planning, and implementation of policies and systems that are fueling Fiksu’s rapid growth and global expansion.
Mel brings over 25 years of experience to Fiksu, including leadership roles in engineering, product management, and operations for technology companies of various size and stages. Most recently he was the General Manager for the mimio product line at Newell Rubbermaid. Mel joined mimio (then Virtual ink) in 1998 as vice president of product development. He took over as CEO at the start of 2005 and sold the company to Newell in October 2006. Previously, Mel ran product management at Number Nine Visual Technology Corporation and VideoLogic Systems Ltd., companies that provided high performance multimedia and graphics accelerator subsystems to the PC industry. Mel started out with IBM Corporation for ten years, in a number of engineering, product development and advisory roles. Mel received a B.Sc. in Pure and Applied Physics with Electronics from Nottingham University.
Spencer Scott drives global revenue planning and generation for Fiksu and FreeMyApps. Spencer's fire is fueled by his 15+ years of business development efforts with early stage ventures in complex digital ecosystems, including video solutions provider OneScreen and search engine marketing innovator Adverplex.
Spencer was founder and CEO of ColoAccess, a colocation consulting company, and spent the early part of his career at Verizon and MCI. Spencer currently serves on the board of OneScreen, MashLogic, and Optimal, Inc. He holds a BS in Business Administration from Boston University.
Tom directs strategy and spearheads all product initiatives for Fiksu and FreeMyApps. His multifaceted technical and business expertise was honed in 18+ years of product and investment management with market leaders [x+1], Microsoft, Advanced Technology Ventures, Intuit, Capital One and Mercer Management. Tom is also the founder and developer of MyScorecard.com.
Tom holds degrees from the Stanford Graduate School of Business (MBA), Stanford University (BSEE), and Dartmouth College (BA Computer Science and Biophysical Chemistry).
Glenn Kiladis serves as VP & GM of FreeMyApps, Fiksu's proprietary app discovery & engagement ad network where users get rewarded for discovering, downloading and exploring great free and paid apps.
Prior to Fiksu, Glenn was VP of Marketing & Mobile Ad Monetization for HeyWire a leading SMS and social networking platform with over 2.7 million registered users across iOS and Android. Previously he was the VP of Marketing & Game Developer Relations for Zeemote a mobile gaming company, acquired by GAIA Holdings, focused on Bluetooth Wireless Controllers to enhance gameplay on mobile devices. There he worked with the likes of Nokia, BlackBerry, Sony Ericsson, EA Mobile, Glu, Gameloft, iPlay, T-Mobile Intl., Vodafone, Movistar and other category brand leaders. He also held leadership positions at Digit Wireless, a device interface company and Logica, the world's largest provider of SMS and Mobile Content Delivery Platforms.
Glenn is a Business-Centric Innovator in New Media & Advertising, Mobile Social Communication, Mobile Gaming, Mobile Device Interface Design, and Internet Content & Commerce.
