Ossama is a veteran of the communications and IT industries, having played active and diverse roles for over 35 years in the industry as an educator, entrepreneur, corporate executive and venture investor. He is currently a senior managing director of Newbury Ventures. Early in his industrial career, he spent several years with Nortel, initially as a member of Scientific Staff and later as vice president of marketing. By 1990, he became a serial entrepreneur, acting as chairman of a number of successful international companies including ACC in Santa Barbara (acquired by Ericsson), nCipher in Cambridge, UK, Echovox in Switzerland, Algety Telecom (acquired by Corvis), Highwave Optical Technologies (EURONEXT) and High Deal in France. He also held a number of non-executive appointments with Newbridge Networks (now Alcatel) including president of Newbridge Networks Holding and member of the Chairman's Executive Council. He is a cofounding investor of several companies spun out from Newbridge Networks and France Telecom, and holds or has held board seats with Broadwing Corp, BDNA Corp, NetCentrex, and PS'Soft. Ossama began his venture capital career in 1980 with Nortel as director of venture capital and then joined Berkeley International as executive vice president. In 1997, he joined Newbury Ventures and became founding Chairman of Technocom Ventures, a seed financing venture capital company managed jointly with France Telecom in Paris. In 1998, he launched Technoventures, a private equity joint venture with a prominent European investor. Ossama received his B.Sc. in electrical engineering (distinctions, first class honors) from the University of Alexandria, his M.Sc. in electrical engineering and M.B.A. from the University of British Columbia. He completed his Ph.D. program in Electrical Engineering at the University of British Columbia and his Ph.D. in Business Administration at California Coast University. |