CHET SMITH
H: 484.593.0441, C: 484.885.6000
chet_smith@chetsweb.com
www.chetsweb.com
Engineering Executive for Start-up, Turnaround, and Fast-Growth Organizations
Using Passion, Energy, and Knowledge to turn around Engineering programs by building development teams focused on
functionality, schedule and quality, bringing geographically dispersed teams together and resolving customer issues
resulting in record corporate revenue.
SUMMARY OF CAREER ACCOMPLISHMENTS
Driving Spirit Behind Change - Productized ground-breaking Research & Development Engineering programs.
Decisive Active Leadership – Drives productive conflict resolution resulting in high loyalty and productivity.
Turnaround Leader - Recognized for recovering major programs in multiple industries.
Team Transformation Driver – Transforms under-performing technical teams to ones highly engaged in the success of
the product/project resulting in meeting schedule/quality requirements and high employee retention.
Global Product Development Team Management – Successful management and partnering with remote teams and
companies.
Ground Breaking Product Leadership – First Iris Recognition product, battery operated portable copier/printer/fax,
commercially viable Video On Demand (VOD) server, home theater product with multi-stream audio, innovative hard drive
music selection algorithms, and auto EQ adjustment to optimize audio room characteristics, and first ion-stream printer.
Development Life Cycle Integration For Success– Achieved predictable outcomes through integration of Systems
Engineering, Development, and Quality silos, resulting in dramatically improved quality and revenue. Emphasis on
implementing an effective development methodology (Agile, Defined, or Hybrid).
PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
GUIDEWORKS, LLC, (Comcast/Gemstar JV), Radnor, PA 2006 – 2008
Set Top Box software company providing cable TV listings guide, DVR, on-demand, etc functionality plus database
software to enable distribution of data to over 24 million homes on a broad range of platforms.
Vice President Of Engineering
Led software design and development of JAVA software for OCAP (Open Cable Application Platform) set top box product
as well as turned around delivery/quality issues with legacy software used by Comcast and customers of Gemstar/TV
Guide. Engineering budget of $22M.
- Turned around morale and attitude issues by creating a culture where staff felt safe speaking about problems,
roadblocks and suggested improvements. - Built processes to improve productivity, quality, and ability to reliably release to multiple platforms.
- Instituted performance and quality metrics and publicly reported to the parent companies monthly. Successfully
challenged engineering staff and management to meet the goals resulting in renewed trust and respect by owners,
partners and suppliers. - Drove redesign of the OCAP JAVA application to achieve performance and quality goals.
- Embraced and customized SCRUM agile techniques that allowed the organization to embrace change in features
and/or partner/supplier schedules.
Consumer electronics company with over 10,000 employees and world wide customer base. Provides audio and home
theater products including multi-zone audio and video products. Division sales of $1.1B
Director of Software Engineering
Built Software/Firmware Development and Quality teams to produce a very diverse product set ranging from amplifiers
and Wave Radio to multi-zone networked home theater systems, music server, remote wireless audio zones, and RF 2-
way multi-zone remote control for Home Entertainment Division. $20+M budget.
- Proposed, built and led a world class software/firmware and quality organization whose products earned a number
of international awards.. - Sponsored the development of multi-product platforms through generalized object oriented designs and reusable
code ensuring more products could be brought to market. - Radically improved quality through process and test automation resulting in shortened and predictable development
cycles and a significant reduction in customer service calls. - Drove an integrated development/SQA process to provide metrics used to monitor the development process and
improve quality through active feedback. - Led formation of an expansion development and test team in Bangalore, India
- Above actions contributed strongly to multiple years of record earnings
Consumer electronics company building OEM DVD and video systems for PC’s.
Director of Engineering for Consumer Electronics
Drove user customizable software/hardware DVD reference designs developed by teams in Germany and the US to needs
of high volume producers in China, Japan, and Europe. Actively supported customers.
- Integrated development and SQA organizations in US with primary development team in Germany.
- Improved and maintained relationship between German team and partner in France.
- Drove product design using Windows as a vehicle for customers to customize product firmware look and feel so
that a single hardware platform could be marketed as a number of different end products. - SENSAR, INC. (SARNOFF LABS SPIN-OFF), Moorestown, NJ 1998 - 1999
- Providing leading edge technology for recognition of people through the pattern of the iris.
- Sr. Director of Software Development
- Led software and firmware algorithmic design and development in the iris acquisition module as well as design and
development of database servers, protocols and interfaces to fit into bank ATM networks. - Introduced engineering methodology for development and support successfully putting research engineers and
application developers on a predictable schedule. - Productized iris scan firmware and Windows based application software to work in client/server relationship with
Oracle or SQL database servers. - Established partnerships in financial world in order to facilitate protocol development that would work within their
existing networks. - Successfully turned out a product that interfaced with ATM networks with minimal disruption in one year and passed
every acceptance test on the first attempt.
SARNOFF REAL TIME CORP. (Sarnoff Labs spin-off) , Princeton, NJ 1995 - 1998
Developed SIMD Massively Parallel video server technology to provide the capability to provide thousands of independently
controllable video streams for Cable Video On Demand (VOD).
Vice President of Software Development
Built and managed firmware/software and quality teams engaged in finalizing and productizing the server.
- Transformed server development team from research to market oriented production mode.
- Reorganized teams and methodology in order to ensure delivery of finished quality product resulting in meeting
company goals for performance, cost, and schedule. - Met company goals for performance, cost and schedule.
- Successfully installed systems for multiple cable TV operators.
QUADMARK LTD. (XEROX SPIN-OFF), Rochester, NY 1993 - 1995
Xerox spin-off providing technology for the development of a miniature (12”x4”x3”) portable battery operated 400 dpi
printer including scanner/fax and printer modules.
Sr. Manager of Software & External Programs
- Successfully completed and productized the product and resolved a number of supplier quality issues.
- ]Identified, contracted with, and managed outside firms to create Scanner/Fax and Printer Modules.
NORTEL (Network Applications Systems Division - NASD), Rochester, NY 1987-1993
A division that produced multi-processor fault tolerant database servers (H/W and S/W) for telco 411 and E911
capability.
Director of Database Product Development
1990-1993
Respected by corporate leadership as a divisional Senior Management Troubleshooter. Assumed responsibility for
database product (411 and E911) fault-tolerant client/server systems development including customer facing roles.
- Led and re-engineered troubled projects with British Telecom, GTE South, and Bell Canada resulting in improved
delivery and quality and improved revenues. - Turned around a major program with British Telecom where server performance and software quality were less than
specified – customer subsequently was very satisfied. - Demonstrably improved delivery against schedules and quality resulting in improved customer satisfaction.
Director of Systems Engineering and Engineering Program Management 1989-1990
- Created a Systems Engineering function providing a holistic broad view of the product design.
- Proposed and created am Engineering Program Management team providing overall multifunctional coordination of
teams. - Reorganized formal QA function and merged it with systems engineers and developers to ensure timely delivery of
high quality product to improve team relations, product quality, and timely delivery. - Improved inter-departmental coordination issues between product management, development, and test.
Section Manager, Operating Systems Development 1987-1988
EDUCATION
Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT), Bachelor in Computer Systems, GPA 4/4
- Outstanding Scholar Award
- Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society
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Resume
Product Success Through Innovative
Engineering Solutions
Engineering Solutions
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