Engineer Design
Resume:
Daniel R Salmonsen
Carlsbad, CA 92011
***@*********.***
Biography
Dan Salmonsen is an independent artist, computer engineer and product manager who played key roles in
semiconductor and software product development and product management at Oak Technology, Zoran and
DivX in products ranging from optical storage controllers to networked media adapters, and internet based
consumer video software. Dan also built and led a user experience group at DivX for the desktop software and
web based products.
Work Experience
Director, Product Management and User Experience
Rovi
Public Company; ROVI; Consumer Electronics industry
Jan 2006 April 2011 (5 years 3 months via acquisition of Sonic Solutions in Feb 2011)
See DivX below.
Director, Product Management and User Experience
Sonic Solutions
Public Company; SNIC; Computer Software industry
Jan 2006 February 2011 (5 years 1 months via acquisition of DivX in Oct 2010)
See DivX below.
Director, Product Management and User Experience
DivX
Public Company; 201-
500 employees; DIVX; Computer Software industry
January 2006 October 2010 (4 years 10 months)
See main body of resume above for DivX experience
Sr. Director Consumer and Embedded Electronics
ArcSoft
Privately Held; 201-
500 employees; Computer Software industry
April 2004 April 2005 (1 year 1 month)
Provided transitional support for the MaestroLink / Mediamirror project conceived and developed while at
Zoran corp. Provided technical sales and design support to new customers, provided engineering direction and
managed project to completion into mass production.
Sr. Director, Strategic Marketing
Zoran
Public Company; 201-
500 employees; zran; Semiconductors industry
July 1995 April 2004 (8 years 10 months via acquisition of Oak Technology in Aug 2003)
Sr. Director, Strategic and Technical Marketing 3/02
Conceived and developed new networking architecture for bridging PC and CE devices (MaestroLink) resulting
in company attaining early lead in a new product area. Managed prototype development and partner
alliances. Resulted in spin out of project to Arcsoft for production.
Sr. Director, Strategic Marketing 11/99
Provided support to Corporate Business Development group in strategic acquisitions and potential mergers by
providing both technical and market related due diligence. Provided key contributions to strategic initiatives of
the Bus Dev group.
Sr. Director, Technical Marketing 5/97
Technology Marketing Manager 5/96
Sr. Field Applications Engineer 7/95
Provided technical marketing direction to Oak's Optical Storage group resulting in company attaining
dominant market position (>80% market share) as leading supplier of IDE CD-
ROM and CD-
RW controllers with
chip revenue growth from $1M to $80M sales per quarter
Sr. Director, Strategic and Technical Marketing
Oak Technology
Public Company; 201-
500 employees; OAKT; Semiconductors industry
July 1995 August 2003 (8 years 2 months)
Oak was acquired by Zoran in Aug 2003. See description of Zoran above for further details
VP Engineering
Mintronix Inc.
Privately Held; 11-
50 employees; Computer Hardware industry
June 1991 July 1995 (4 years 2 months)
Formerly PC&C Research Corp
VP Engineering, 12/93
VP Engineering/Senior Design Engineer 6/91
Managed system engineering team for the development of standard and specialized notebook computers for
commercial, POS and military applications. Worked closely with sales team to win contracts for development
of portable computers and peripherals for military applications.
Responsible for implementation of all major system components including motherboard, switching power
supply, battery charging system and backlight inverter. Specified and selected system components and BIOS.
Designed first commercially available notebook with ultra low current sleep mode.
Systems Development Coordinator
Adtek Inc.
Privately Held; 1-
10 employees; Computer Hardware industry
June 1990 May 1991 (1 year)
Design Engineer
Designed and implemented high resolution A/D converter EISA bus add is card for PC. Designed logic using
high level language tools into multiple PAL devices. Prototyped and debugged first unit and finished product
into mass production.
Design Engineer
Distributed Image Systems Corp.
Privately Held; 11-
50 employees; Computer Hardware industry
January 1986 May 1990 (4 years 5 months)
Senior Engineering Technician
Designed laser printer and scanner interface subsystems for PC based document imaging product using PAL
devices and ABEL compiler. Worked closely with software engineers for system development and debug.
Managed prototype testing and debug efforts. Managed prototype and production builds of all products.
Provide field application and system debug support.
Senior Engineering Technician
California Data Corp.
Privately Held; 11-
50 employees; Computer Hardware industry
December 1984 December 1985 (1 year 1 month)
Built and debugged engineering prototype PC add in cards for ultrasonic robotic inspection systems. Used wire
wrap and discrete TTL logic components. Built and debugged analog front end pulser and receiver subsystem.
Hardware debug of multi-
processor DEC LSI based robotic control and data acquisition systems.
Test and Repair Technician
Anacapa Industries
Privately Held; 11-
50 employees; Computer Hardware industry
April 1984 December 1984 (9 months)
Test and repair of switch mode power suppliers for military and telecom applications. Created improved test
hardware and procedures quadrupling throughput and improving quality. Quickly learned to troubleshoot
highly complex power switching topologies such as forward and flyback converters down to the component
level.
Education
Spartan School of Aeronautics
Aviation Electronics -
AS Degree
FCC Class A Radio License with Radar Endorsement
Qualification Summary
Experienced Director of Product Management and User Experience
Experienced in strategy and execution aspects of product and project management
Strong background in engineering, Agile development practices and processes
Developed innovative UX process resulting in full buy in of PM and Dev teams
Lead teams of 5 PMs and 2 UX professionals supporting 40+ developers
Passionate about learning and problem solving
Continual self learner: Python, Clojure, JavaScript, JSON, Google App Engine, Heroku, Git
What I Can Offer
Broad experience in product development and customer acquisition meeting significant market needs while
developing and mentoring others. I will be happiest and provide the most value in a product driven
organization where the focus is on behaviors, efforts and attitudes that lead to success. My depth of
experience in engineering, product development, customer engagement, and pragmatic and effective
processes will benefit the right company interested in finding new opportunities without giving up what is
working.
Product Management and UX Experience at DivX
Lead an agile product team as Director of Product Management for a strategic initiative and product known as
DivX Connected. Product owner for multiple scrum teams developing consumer facing software, application
extensions, server software, device firmware, and hardware platforms for a turnkey production ready home
media networking solution.
Worked closely with the founders of DivX, reporting directly to Jerome Rota, to ensure the product was
developed in line with the company vision and strategy. Worked closely with stakeholders and major OEM
customers to define features meeting market and user needs within the time required. Effectively leveraged
the best aspects of the agile process to remain aware of the team s velocity while monitoring market changes
to make course corrections as needed while delivering according to CE partners schedule needs.
Leveraged engineering and engineering management background in understanding developers motivations
and fears. Knows the importance of staying informed of progress and prioritizing effectively when timing is a
firm requirement. Worked closely with project managers to obtain and track commitments. Collaborated
with product marketing, community web team, beta testers and larger DivX community to launch the product
and track how well the product was meeting the needs of the user community.
Directed team of five product managers working on projects and interacting with over forty engineering and
QA team members. Inherited and hired product managers and user experience professionals and assigned
roles based on interests and best fit for DivX s main stream consumer software products. Effectively
mentored junior team members into more senior roles. Lead strategic direction of main software products
away from the addition of larger, more complex features and towards ease of use and ecosystem exposure
resulting in a product with higher user engagement, improved usability and greater user comprehension of
the DivX ecosystem. Innovated new media interaction methods, created and tested rapid prototypes to
demonstrate a new product concepts value resulting in approval for further development.
Built and lead an agile UX team
Incorporated iterative user testing of product concepts and the creation and testing of rapid hi-
fidelity
prototypes as part of an agile development process. Testing concepts and interaction designs early and often
prior to committing a large amount of development resources ensured our products met the needs of our
business and our users.
Agile development process knowledge and skills
I have found the Agile process to be the most effective method for developing complex projects when either
time or feature set are the limiting factors. Agile development methods promote the growth of self organizing
teams allowing for group knowledge to emerge and be acted upon in an efficient manner. Complex projects
requiring creation of new technology are a domain where group knowledge of current progress velocity,
potential roadblocks and the best path to completion is superior to any individual team member s knowledge
and vastly superior to any individual program or product manager s knowledge. The self organizing nature of
a properly structured and practiced agile team will lead to a higher degree of team success and confidence in a
surprisingly short time after team formation. Iterative development is another valuable tool of the agile
process allowing real and not just perceived problems to be surfaced and dealt with earlier and more
effectively.
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