Management Team

As President and CEO, Kevin Haar is responsible for the vision, strategy and leadership of Appistry. Haar believes his greatest responsibility is building a team that can successfully execute on Appistry’s commitment to helping businesses solve complex, data intensive problems. He has more than 25 years of experience in building teams for rapid growth organizations – representing thousands of employees across several companies with distinct corporate cultures.

Prior to Appistry, Haar spent 17 years at Rational Software, serving in several strategic positions including Senior Vice President of Worldwide Field Operations. He played an integral role in transforming the company from a software startup into an industry powerhouse with more than $800 million in annual revenues – resulting in a $2.1 billion acquisition by IBM. Haar held several management positions at HP before joining Rational.

A family man at heart, Kevin enjoys spending his leisure time with his wife, four kids and two grandkids. Haar’s family values fuel his passion for building businesses and establishing corporate cultures that align with his employees’ financial and personal objectives. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering and a Master of Business Administration from Washington University in St. Louis.

As Co-Founder and Chief Architect, Michael Groner’s entrepreneurial drive and his strategic vision have contributed to Appistry’s growth and transformation throughout the years. In addition to assuming chief responsibility for the technical architecture behind Appistry’s products, Groner leverages his engineering background with his business acumen to ensure alignment of product and corporate goals. Amidst this quest to build a dynamic company with a scalable and reliable solution for applied analytics in the big data space, Groner can be found constantly communicating with—and learning from—Appistry’s customer base. It’s this approach that has shaped his understanding of evolving pipeline and application development opportunities for geospatial, next generation sequencing and other emerging technologies in the defense and life sciences industries.

Prior to co-founding Appistry, Groner served in various capacities at PaylinX, including as the company’s Chief Architect. Similar to his role at Appistry, at PaylinX, Groner was responsible for building large mission critical systems for the transaction world—including development of several versions of the PaylinX Payment Server— while balancing the company’s corporate and technical aspirations. Later, while seeing the company through its acquisition by CyberSource, Groner continued on as Director of Software Development. Prior to this, he began his career as a developer with Tapestry Computing where he designed and implemented PayPort 1.x, the foundation for the PaylinX concept.

With a background that includes research in artificial intelligence and other technical complexities, Groner holds a bachelor's and master's degrees in computer science from Washington University in St. Louis.

Trevor Heritage brings an influential and diverse background in areas such as pharmaceuticals, chemicals, computer science and sales to his role as Appistry’s Vice President of Sales and Marketing. In this role, Heritage effectively combines innate creativity with a results-driven approach to building and developing strategic customer, partner and executive-level relationships. In addition to overseeing the company’s sales and marketing initiatives, he oversees technical positioning and alliance building strategies for Appistry’s life sciences-focused solutions in order to differentiate the company’s innovative solutions from competitors.

Heritage has held a number of high-profile positions in the pharmaceutical, biotechnology, chemicals and software sectors. As comfortable in the boardroom as he is in the laboratory, Heritage has developed a proven track record for transitioning emerging technology companies through successful acquisitions. Prior to his post at Appistry, Heritage served as Executive Vice President, Software Products for San Diego, California-based life science software provider, Accelrys Inc. (Nasdaq: ACCL), where he oversaw business strategy and orchestrated a transformational merger with his former employer, the recently acquired Symyx Software (Nasdaq: SMMX). At Symyx, Heritage served as President with responsibility for software business operations. Heritage assumed this position after serving as the Senior Vice President Operations & Chief Science Officer for Elsevier MDL (acquired by Symyx in 2007). Prior to that, he managed the life science informatics business unit and professional services for St. Louis-based Tripos Inc. for several years.

A 2005 recipient of the St. Louis Business Journal’s annual “40 Under 40” Business Award, Heritage proudly returns to the city to facilitate the development of another innovative technology. In addition to this accolade, Heritage has served as a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for IBC Life Sciences and the University of Indiana, School of Informatics. His research has been published in over 20 peer- reviewed scientific journals and books and he holds a BSc in Chemistry and Computer Science, as well as a PhD in Organic Chemistry, from the University of Reading in the UK.

Sultan Meghji is driven by his goal of bringing genomics to the masses. His work at Appistry reflects this vision - working to develop the infrastructure needed to deliver medically actionable genetic data that can be applied to individual patients. As the Vice President of Product Strategy, he is responsible for harnessing the Appistry vision and developing the strategy for execution excellence.

Meghji has spent more than 20 years studying the technical aspects and business applications of high performance computing. He started his career at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications (NCSA), where he developed artificial intelligence systems and Internet technologies. From there, Meghji moved into several IT leadership and CIO positions at ABN AMRO, American Express, Monsanto, United Airlines, as well as in academia.

The son of a geneticist, Meghji spent much of his life travelling the world, interacting with some of the world’s top scientists involved in his father’s research. These formative years imbued him with his drive to make the $100 Genome an attainable goal. He earned his bachelor’s degree from the University of Illinois, during which time he became an avid Bears fan. Sultan also enjoys serving as a mentor for local start-ups through his volunteer work with the IT Entrepreneurial Network (ITEN), Infragard and other St. Louis-centric groups.

Rich Mazzarella, Chief Computational Biologist, is responsible for developing technologies and strategies that transform genomic data into actionable intelligence. With more than three decades of experience in diverse fields including biochemistry, cell and molecular biology, immunology, genetics, computational biology and bioinformatics, Mazzarella, serves as the in-house chief scientist guiding the company to take giant strides forward in turning personalized medicine into a reality.

Mazzarella’s vast expertise in genomics research ranges from advancing the human genome project at Washington University, St. Louis, to patenting progressive findings in cancer research while at Pfizer. His experience and education – which includes a Ph.D. in microbiology from Saint Louis University School of Medicine and serving as an instructor at The Institute for Biomedical Computing & The Center for Genetics in Medicine at Washington University – is not only tapped to advance Appistry’s role in life sciences, but also to nurture St. Louis’ leadership role in life sciences, medicine and technology.

An accomplished scientist with many published materials and referenced in more than 1,000 journal articles, Mazzarella is also a talented engineer who has designed and built robots capable of being controlled remotely over the Internet. Unlike The Jetsons’ robot Rosey, his robot cannot do housework yet, but it is fully capable of grabbing a Schlafly.

John Leighton, Vice President of Engineering, heads Appistry’s IT and engineering team, responsible for ensuring that the company remains on the cutting edge of HPC software development. Additionally, Leighton leads IT management, software deployment, quality assurance and customer technical support while also overseeing recruitment of the brightest and wittiest engineers in the business.

As a ‘big data’ veteran, John brings more than 25 years of experience in HPC and data delivery systems to his role – and he claims that he’s never met a ‘big data’ problem he didn’t like or couldn’t take to the next level of performance. Most recently, Leighton served as Director of Software Development for Reuters America (through its acquisition of Bridge Information Systems) where he helped develop a Reuters’ client data delivery system and facilitated the development and infrastructure design for the fifth largest news and financial sites in the world.

John is an avid drummer who holds a B.A. in Mathematics, with a minor in Computer Science from the University of Missouri-St. Louis. Talented and comfortable building applications for ‘big data’ analysis, Leighton’s passions consist of making a million transactions per second possible, and then making it happen exponentially faster. There is a difference between the ‘9-5’-ers and the ‘5-9’-ers. Those that eat, sleep and breathe high performance data management solutions – for fun – can be found at Appistry, and Leighton is at the helm.

As Chief Financial Officer, Jean Roberson is focused on improving the operational cost efficiencies of Appistry, including investor relations, budgeting and financial modeling. Under her guidance, the company has proactively raised more than $34 million in private investment.

Roberson brings more than 17 years of experience across all areas of finance to her role at Appistry. Prior to joining the team, she was the CFO of Bandwidth Exchange Buildings, and was co-founder and CFO of Partner Communications and Services. She also served as Treasurer for Purina Mills during the time of its leveraged buyout where she raised $350 million to transition the business unit into stand-alone enterprises and during the sale of the business to Koch Industries in 1998.

Roberson began her career as an auditor at Ernst& Young, joining the firm after receiving her bachelor’s degree from the University of Missouri and becoming a C.P.A. Jean has a passion for mentoring early-stage companies and founded the Technology Entrepreneur Center to provide guidance to early-stage companies in St. Louis. This is where she was first introduced to Appistry – she felt that Appistry was one of the “most interesting companies in St. Louis,” and joined the company shortly thereafter. Jean’s energy and passion serve her well as an avid triathlete, participating in races across the country.

An influential member of St. Louis’s business, technology and life sciences communities, Harlee Sorkin brings over fifteen years’ experience in commercialization of novel technologies to his role as Vice President of Business Development at Appistry. In this position, Sorkin utilizes his unique skill sets to develop dynamic sales and partnership strategies that penetrate new markets and customer profiles, while aligning with corporate and product objectives.

Prior to joining Appistry, Sorkin served in numerous leadership capacities with Mentor Management, LLC, a management consultancy for highly technical early stage businesses. Sorkin, who founded Mentor and served as Principal, specialized in providing customers with “go-to-market” strategies in the areas of business development, marketing and sales. Prior to this, he spent seven years with Traco Labs, Inc., a leading supplier of active ingredients to the nutraceutical & pharmaceutical industries. At Traco, Sorkin transitioned from product development to Vice President of Marketing & Sales before assuming the role of Chief Operating Officer. As COO, Sorkin helped capitalize the growth of the business while overseeing a successful exit to Munich, Germany-based Degussa AG.

In addition to his corporate responsibilities, Sorkin is regarded as one of St. Louis’ most prominent life science business advisors. Sorkin initiated the Bio Entrepreneur Development Program to accelerate and support first time entrepreneurs in the life sciences, and serves as Entrepreneur-in-Residence at the University of Illinois. He is currently a Director at Busey Wealth Management, Inc. (Nasdaq: BUSE), and Trustee for the College School of Webster Groves where he is responsible for the school’s fundraising activities.

Sorkin holds a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. In his spare time he enjoys translating his business drive into other competitive pursuits, including coaching his sons’ youth baseball, skiing in the backcountry and competing in triathlons.

Mike Pinette, Vice President of Sales, leads Appistry's partner and alliance efforts. In this role, he is responsible for empowering data-intensive industries across the globe with the computational power of Appistry’s technology. With over 25 years of industry experience in international business development and sales, Pinette excels at evaluating new opportunities, an expertise that he continually leverages while identifying and pursuing new market applications for ‘big data’ solutions.

Prior to Appistry, Pinette led multimillion-dollar deals for Zend Technologies where he served as Vice President of Business Development and managed strategic relationships with partners including IBM, Oracle, Microsoft and Adobe. With an impressive track record for growing companies, Pinette has also led Digital Equipment Corp. and Informix to notable growth, while priming TIBCO Finance Technology (acquired by Reuters) and Actional Corporation (acquired by ProgressSoftware) for successful acquisitions.

Pinette is an avid, low handicap golfer who can usually be found on the course in his limited spare time. As a New England native, with degrees from Harvard University, New Hampshire College and Salem University, Pinette is also a diehard member of Red Sox Nation who boasts the meanest ‘chowdah’ west of the Charles River. However, as a member of St. Louis-based Appistry, he also considers himself a Cardinals fan with bragging rights to the 2011 World Series.

Kim Harper, Director of Marketing, is responsible for translating Appistry’s complex architecture and algorithms into compelling and clear messaging that resonates with the company’s customer base. Harper brings more than 20 years of international marketing experience, primarily in life sciences, to her role at Appistry. While working for Herman Marketing, she was one of the few people in the world who witnessed the exact moment when Steve Jobs decided to change the iconic Apple logo from its former multi-color look to its minimalist version today.

Before joining Appistry, Harper worked at life science and high tech company Sigma-Aldrich, as well as one of the world’s largest biosciences company, Merck Millipore. During her tenure with Merck Millipore, Harper developed and managed the company’s most successful product launch--the industry’s first handheld automated cell counter, Scepter. Harper’s marketing campaign helped fuel product adoption to exceed $5M first year sales expectations.

When she’s not in the office, you can usually find Harper attending a St. Louis’ Cardinals game, golfing or photographing her trips across the globe. As a St. Louis native and University of Missouri and Webster University alumna, she also knows the best local eats throughout the city, including where to find the finest regional classic Toasted Ravioli and the best non-St. Louis style pizza.