Outside Directors & Advisors

Dave Lyon is an entrepreneur and telecommunications engineer. In the early 1980s, while working for the company that would become Hughes Network Systems, Dave and fellow board member, Tom Scholl led the definition and development of the first successful Ku-band VSAT networks with anchor customers including Walmart, Exxon, Southland Corporation and Schlumberger. 

Dave subsequently co-founded Pacific Communication Sciences Inc. (PCSI) and as CEO managed the company through its ground-breaking developments of the first packet data system to run over cellular networks (Cellular Digital Packet Data) and the silicon and software underpinning DDI’s first microcellular Personal Handy Phone networks in Japan. PCSI was acquired by Cirrus Logic in 1993.

Dave founded and continues to operate Sage Strategies, a technology and management consulting firm specializing in wireless telecommunications. He currently serves as a board member or advisor to several growth-stage companies in the US and Asia.

Dave earned his BS, MS, and PhD degrees at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), all in the field of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science.

Jassem Nasser is Chief Business Development Officer at Thuraya, a strategic partner of eSAT Global. In his current role, Jassem is responsible for business strategy, business development, product management and marketing activities. He explores and leads new ventures outside Thuraya’s core MSS business through partnerships and alliances.

Prior to his present assignment, Jassem led Thuraya’s strategy, marketing and business development streams as Chief Strategy & Marketing Officer. He has more than 20 years of experience in the satellite industry, imparting strategic direction and overseeing functions including business development, corporate planning spectrum and regulatory affairs. Jassem’s engineering background and expertise has been applied to a business environment that specializes in satellite communication technologies and other radio communication systems. He was actively involved in setting up and managing Thuraya as a start-up satellite organization, and was thereafter part of its various stages of development by formulating objectives, priorities and selecting strategic directions and business initiatives.

Jassem graduated with first class honors from the UAE’s Khalifa University with a Bachelor’s degree in communications engineering.

Tom Scholl is an entrepreneur and private investor who has been involved in over 60 high-tech start-ups. Most recently, he was a partner at Novak Biddle Venture Partners. In 1990, he founded his first company, Telogy Networks, which was later acquired by Texas Instruments in 1999 and valued at $1.4 billion in stock by 2000. Previously, Tom was Senior Vice President of Engineering at Hughes Network Systems where he worked with Dr. David Lyon on the creation of the very first VSAT Personal Earth Station.

Tom is a graduate of Purdue University in Philosophy and Literature receiving an honorary Doctorate of Letters from Purdue in 2014. Tom has served as a trustee at the University of Maryland and Stevens Institute of Technology. He was Chair of the Engineering School Board at Maryland and Chair of the Research and Commercialization Committee at Stevens. He is currently Chair of the School of Liberal Arts Dean’s Advisory Council at Purdue.

Dr. Sachio Semmoto is a successful entrepreneur in the telecommunications industry, with more than 30 years in senior management positions with leading Japanese telecommunications companies.

His career began when he joined Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Public Corporation (NTT, Japan) in 1966 and served until 1983.  Following the deregulation of the telecom industry in Japan in 1984, he co-founded the first private telecom startup, DDI, which is now known as KDDI Corporation and is valued at a market cap of approximately $70 billion. After its IPO, Dr. Semmoto left the company to become a Professor of Entrepreneurship at Keio University, Tokyo, Japan in 1996 as well as a visiting professor at the University of California, Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon University and a Research Fellow at Stanford University.

In 1999, Dr. Semmoto founded and served as CEO of eAccess, Ltd. an Internet access startup, and following its successful IPO, he founded EMOBILE, which became Japan’s fourth largest mobile network operator.  EMOBILE and eAccess were sold to SoftBank in 2013. Today he serves as Executive Chairman of RENOVA, Inc., a leading renewable energy power company in Japan. 

Dr. Semmoto holds a BS degree from Kyoto University, and a PhD from the University of Florida.

Michelle Hays, a founder of eSAT Global, is an experienced financial leader with over 25 years of experience driving the financial growth of organizations in both the software and hardware technology market segments. 

Michelle has held key leadership roles with several venture-backed, early-stage and turnaround companies, and is highly energized by the challenges and opportunities that accompany preparing small companies for growth and success.