September 16, 2004 - VentureWire.com
By VentureWire Staff Reporters
Cellular hardware and services company Spotwave Wireless Inc. said its president and chief executive is relinquishing the CEO post to an outside executive, a top manager at a publicly traded wireless network infrastructure company.
In addition, Spotwave's headcount will grow faster than projected earlier, the company told VentureWire. Spotwave, which markets hardware and services for providing cellular coverage to "dead spots" inside buildings, has said its key mobile operator market is spending more on coverage.
Shane Young, the current CEO, is being succeeded by Bill Carlin, senior vice president and chief operating officer at InterWAVE Communications International Ltd. Young, 43 years old, will continue to be president and a director. Carlin will join the board.
The transition takes effect Oct. 4.
Young, who was part of the search committee for the new chief executive, said Spotwave is "in growth mode." He said his successor brings "a lot of depth" to the company in terms of wireless industry know-how and marketing experience.
Carlin, 45, said he worked at InterWAVE for about three years. The Nasdaq-traded company is being sold to broadband wireless access company Alvarion Ltd., also a Nasdaq-listed company. The acquisition is expected to close by October. Carlin said it was "sort of a natural transition" to leave InterWAVE at this time.
Prior to InterWAVE, Carlin founded and directed Terrapin Broadband Inc., a closely held consulting and systems-integration company for the 2.5G mobile, 3G mobile and broadband wireless infrastructure markets.
He said Terrapin was founded "just as things were...heating up on the 3G side but cooling down on the investor side." Terrapin isn't an active business today and had its last year of significant sales in 2002, according to Carlin.
Spotwave closed C$7 million in a Series C round of funding last month. At the time Young said the money wasn't raised to increase headcount and Spotwave might add five or 10 employees over the next six months to its current base of 60.
In an interview Wednesday, Carlin upped the number, saying five to 10 hires was a "conservative estimate" for the number of hires made the next couple of quarters.
Spotwave investors include Newbury Ventures and VenGrowth Capital Partners. Others are RBQ Ltd., Primaxis Technology Ventures, VentureLink Fund, GrowthWorks WV Funds and Venture Coaches, now part of Skypoint Capital Corp.
Founded in May 2000, Spotwave, based in Ottawa, has raised about C$35 million to date, including the Series C round and a recently secured credit facility from Royal Bank of Canada.
