Investment Advisory Committee

HRV has assembled an experienced Investment Advisory Committee consisting of experienced venture capitalists from inside Michigan and around the country that assist in evaluating investment opportunities and provide deal structuring and portfolio management insight.

Jim Adox

Jim joined Venture Investors in 2007 and heads up their Ann Arbor, Michigan office. He leverages his technical, operational and venture capital background by focusing on investment prospects in hardware, software, communications and medical devices. Jim’s prior venture capital experience includes a combined nine years as a partner at RidgeLine Ventures and EDF Ventures, where he led the spin‐out, sourcing, financing, syndication and exit of numerous investments.  During this time, he performed the role of President, CFO and COO of select opportunities until a management team was recruited.  Jim served on the Boards of Directors of Avail Networks and HandyLab and as an observer for Alfalight, Ardesta, TherOx and Xtera Communications.

Prior to his venture capital positions, Jim had nine years operating experience both domestically and internationally.  In these roles, he wore many functional hats: marketing, engineering, business development and operations. Jim currently serves on the Boards of Directors of Incept BioSystems, Tissue Regeneration Systems and the Frankel Commercialization Fund, a pre‐seed investment fund at the University of Michigan. Jim earned a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, an M.S. in Mechanical Engineering and an MBA with High Distinction, all from the University of Michigan.

Tony Grover

Tony has over 15 years of private equity, operating, and technical knowledge and experience spanning a wide array of industries and corporate settings.  At RPM, Tony is on the boards of Performix, Arbor Photonics, and Eden Park.  Tony was previously involved on the boards of FLX Micro, Mobius Microsystems, ShareThis, and VizionWare.

Before co-founding RPM, he was vice president at White Pines Ventures, a $100 million venture capital firm, where he was responsible for investments in telecommunications, software, internet and supply chain sectors.  Prior to joining White Pines Ventures, Tony was co-founder of Promotum, an Internet-based promotion, marketing, and services company that obtained seed capital from Pandesic, a joint venture between Intel Corporation and SAP.

Tony serves on the advisory board of the University of Michigan Frankel Commercialization Fund.  Tony previously worked for Intel Corporation Cummins Engine Company.  He holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Michigan, a M.S. in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University, and a MBA from the J. L. Kellogg Graduate School of Business.

Peter Mills

Peter is the co‐founder of @Ventures, which was formed in 1995. Now investing the firm’s 5th fund, Peter operates out of the firm’s Menlo Park, CA office. Peter has played  a  key  role  in  a  number  of  successful  investments  for  @Ventures, including GeoCities  (Nasdaq:  GCTY  then  acquired  by  Yahoo),  Vicinity  (Nasdaq:  VCNT  then  acquired  by Microsoft), and Avamar Technologies (acquired by EMC). He currently holds board or observer seats with 212 Resources, Cobalt Biofuels and Propel Biofuels.

Previously, Peter had extensive operating and manufacturing experience across a wide spectrum of industries.  This includes the semiconductor industry,  as CEO of the United States Display Consortium (USDC) and as Chief Administrative Officer of SEMATECH, the industry‐led consortium focused on semiconductor manufacturing; software as co‐founder and COO of Softrend and Senior Vice President of BPI after the merger of Softrend and BPI Systems; hardware manufacturing at Digital Equipment and manufacturing at Ford Motor Company. Peter received his B.S. in Communications from Ithaca College and an MBA in Marketing from the Graduate School of Business at Columbia University.

Marc Weiser

Marc has over 10 years of experience in investment, start up and corporate settings.  At RPM, Marc is involved with the boards of OpenLane, RiverGlass, Xtime, BountyJobs, TetraVitae and Kabongo.

Prior to forming RPM, Marc was a founder of QuantumShift, where he was the executive in charge of early technology and e-commerce systems development and was responsible for raising part of the total $140 million it received in capital.  Marc was one of the first employees at MessageMedia (purchased by DoubleClick), where he pioneered some of the original methods for e-commerce transactions and assisted in launching the first Internet merchants.  Marc also worked in business development for Dell Computer Corporation and was also an associate at Arbor Partners, an early stage e-commerce venture capital fund based in Ann Arbor.

Marc is an active member on the board of the Center for Entrepreneurship at the University of Michigan College of Engineering where he is an Adjunct Professor, and serves as an advisor to the Wolverine Venture Fund.  Additionally, he is on the board of McKinley, a $2.5 billion national real estate firm.  Marc is an investor and advisor to a number of non-technology companies and was named to Crain’s Detroit Business 2006 “40 Under 40” list.  He graduated cum laude from the University of Michigan with a Bachelor of Science in aerospace engineering, and earned an MBA with highest distinction from the University of Michigan’s Ross School of Business.