Doug Brenner

Executive Vice President & General Manager - Avail Medical Products

Doug Brenner received bachelor, masters, and Ph.D. degrees from Harvard University in chemistry.  After postdoctoral work in chemical physics at Columbia University, he did research in the Aerospace industry, got a MBA in the Executive MBA program at the Anderson School, UCLA, and transitioned to a business career.  His thesis, a consulting project with LaserMedia, resulted in a career change to chief operating officer in the entertainment industry before buying a patent with investors from LaserMedia that resulted in his founding Cogent Light Technologies.

Cogent Light was a start up, first funded by angel investors and then a VC investment from Metromedia Company.  After 3 years, Brenner arranged a tender offer with Metromedia and realized a 10X ROI for his original investors.  Over the course of the next 5 years, Brenner led his team in the launch of the medical device business and raised a total of $40M to support business growth and R&D for Cogent Light's proprietary optical light engine technology.  In 2000, Welch Allyn purchased Cogent Light and the medical technology and Brenner with Metromedia repositioned a new company, Wavien, as a licensing and R&D company for digital television.

Building on his entrepreneurial experience, Brenner moved on to be CEO of a software e-learning company briefly before being recruited to turnaround and grow the Americas subsidiary of Elcoteq SE, a $5B global electronics manufacturing services-company.  For this position, the CEO was looking for a strong entrepreneurial leader who could strategically position Elcoteq Americas to compete successfully in the wireless technology and consumer electronics sectors.  After recruiting an outstanding new management team, Brenner led the Americas in the first two years from loss making to profitability by growing the top line from $75M to $500 M and to $1B by 2006.

Brenner accomplished this explosive business expansion through a combination of organic growth and acquisition.  Strong consultative selling increased business both with existing customers and with new tier one OEM customers. Acquisitions in Mexico and the U.S. increased the Americas service offering and added substantial new revenues.

Brenner's 16 years of executive leadership underscore his strong, disciplined entrepreneurial leadership across a diverse range of business sectors.  This versatility combined with sophisticated strategic vision positions him well to lead in service and technology driven markets.  Strategic vision with the right toolkit for execution is what Doug Brenner's general management style contributes in successfully leading a business.

Small to mid-market size companies with unrealized potential are a good fit, especially in the wireless consumer electronics, business services, and medical markets.  These markets require both global perspective and an ability to adapt quickly to new business challenges - qualities demonstrated in Brenner's leadership.