Senior Management
Peter W. Van Ness
President & CEO, Van Ness Group, Inc.
Van Ness Group is the third technology-related venture for entrepreneur Peter Van Ness. For 20 years, Peter has been helping people and organizations realize the benefits of information technology since he founded Personal Computer Solutions in 1983.

During the 1980s, Personal Computer Solutions built state-of-the-art database systems for a wide variety of corporations and institutions, including Benjamin Thompson and Associates, National Association of Social Workers (Van Ness Group built their first Web site 15 years later), Kenner Parker Toys and Kaiser Engineers (working on the Red and Orange Line extensions and the Ted Williams Tunnel project in Boston).

During the 1990s, Peter co-founded StockPlan, Inc. and grew it from a tiny software startup into the largest independent provider of stock plan management services worldwide. While at StockPlan, Peter and his team (many of whom currently work with Van Ness Group) discovered the power of the Web and built the first systems for employees to exercise and sell their stock options over the Internet. According to Rodger Mastako, inventor of OptionsLink (now part of E*Trade), "Peter invented financial services outsourcing."

In 1997, StockPlan was purchased by American Stock Transfer and Trust Company in New York City and Peter served as President of the newly formed AST StockPlan for one year. Salomon Smith Barney (a division of CitiGroup) purchased AST StockPlan in August 2000.

In 2000, Peter co-founded MyStockOptions.com, winner of numerous awards and the Web's most comprehensive, respected, and frequently visited resource on stock compensation for employees and executives.

An internationally recognized expert on new media, outsourcing and information management, Peter has spoken at conferences in the US and Europe. (See his paper presented at AoIR in Maastricht on 20 Oct 2003.) He is also a founding member of the National Association of Stock Plan Professionals. In 1984 Peter was elected to the first Boston Computer Society Member Services Council and served on its steering committee for two years.

Vickie S. Van Ness
Chief Media Officer & CFO, Van Ness Group, Inc.
Vickie has been working in corporate finance for over 17 years, with a focus on integrating information technology into HR and Finance departments. At StockPlan in Silicon Valley, she pioneered the first web-based systems integrating stock trading with stock benefit plans. Working with E*Trade OptionsLink and NDB NetLink (now part of Ameritrade) Vickie managed two ground breaking projects that, for the first time, allowed employees to enroll electronically in employee stock purchase plans and exercise and sell employee stock options in a completely paperless environment.

As a senior, international client manager at StockPlan, Vickie served major industry leaders, such as Yahoo!, Dell, Amdahl, Business Objects, JD Edwards, Newport Corporation and The Hartford.

Vickie's expertise in developing powerful, flexible, user-friendly interfaces empowers Van Ness Group to create exceptionally intuitive systems, perfectly suited to the specific needs of our clients and their users.

Vickie is an internationally published author and speaker on User Interface Design and Women in Technology. (See her paper presented at AoIR in Maastricht on 20 Oct 2003.) Vickie leads Van Ness Group's role as a platinum sponsor of the Women's leadership & Technology Consortium in Boston.

Joe Pappalardo
CEO, Managed Information Services, Inc.
A brilliant engineer with a BSEE from U. Mass and two patents for biomedical devices, Joe Pappalardo founded Advanced Access in 1995, which became Managed Information Services, Inc. in 1999. For over 15 years, Joe has been developing high-end database applications and teaching computer software and hardware courses in the Boston area.

Today Joe and his company focus on developing SQL databases that power Rich Internet Applications.