Our Team

Mr. Lazovsky is the founder, president and CEO of Intermolecular. He previously held several senior management positions at Applied Materials Inc., and was responsible for managing more than $1 billion in Applied Materials' semiconductor manufacturing equipment business. As director of product development and business management organizations in the thin films group, he worked closely with leading IC manufacturers to develop cutting-edge technology solutions. Mr. Lazovsky also served as director of business management for Europe and as technology program manager for Applied Materials' flagship 300mm metallization platform. He earned a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Ohio University, and holds 16 pending or issued U.S. patents.

Dr. Chiang joined Intermolecular in May 2005 and is responsible for the Company’s technology strategy and direction, HPC development platforms, and core technology and applications development. Prior to joining Intermolecular, Dr. Chiang was the founder and president of Angstron Systems Inc., a venture-backed ALD start-up company that was acquired by Novellus Systems Inc. in April 2004. Prior to founding Angstron in 2000, Dr. Chiang worked in technology development, program, and account management roles at Applied Materials where he led the development, productization, and qualification of several generations of enabling thin film deposition technologies used in high-volume manufacturing. Dr. Chiang holds a B.S. in materials science and engineering from Cornell University and a Ph.D. in materials science and engineering from MIT. He holds >175 issued or pending U.S. patents spanning advanced materials, process, device and device integrationtechnologies, and combinatorial systems and methods.

Mr. Eidelman joined Intermolecular in February 2006. Prior to joining Intermolecular, Mr. Eidelman served as senior vice president and CFO at Cellon International, where he led the company through several financings, acquisitions, restructurings and divestitures. Mr. Eidelman also served as CFO and treasurer of Sunrise Telecom Inc., which he guided through an initial public offering. Earlier in his career he was the manager of tax, accounting and compliance for Amdahl Corporation, and a manager at the public accounting firm of Coopers & Lybrand (now part of PricewaterhouseCoopers). He earned a B.S. in accounting from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and has completed post-graduate studies in business and taxation at Bentley College in Waltham, Mass. He also completed an executive mini-MBA program at the Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. Mr. Eidelman is a certified public accountant, and a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, Financial Executives International, and the Tax Executives Institute.

Mr. Behnke, who joined Intermolecular in October 2009, has more than 25 years of semiconductor industry experience. Most recently he was corporate vice president for process R&D and transfer at Spansion, where his responsibilities included development of the proprietary Charge Trapping NOR and NAND technologies. Mr. Behnke's previous roles at Spansion/AMD included product deployment for its Wireless Business Unit, and a role as director of its Fab 25 wafer fab in Austin, Tex. Under his leadership, Fab 25 led the development of AMD's APC/APM technologies. Prior to Spansion/AMD, Mr. Behnke worked at the Hughes Research Lab in Malibu, Calif., on development of InP/GaAs HEMT low noise amplifiers and radiation-hardened SOS. He earned a B.S. in mechanical engineering with an industrial engineering minor from Marquette University, and recently completed a Clean Energy program at the University of Texas at Austin. Mr. Behnke holds five U.S. patents.

Mr. Hunter joined Intermolecular in January 2009 and is responsible for the company's solar and clean energy business. Most recently, he was an Entrepreneur in Residence at Sequoia Capital, focused on the PV industry. Mr. Hunter previously worked at Applied Materials Inc., where he led the company's entry to the thin film solar business; he served as that group's general manager from conception of the SunFab Thin Film Line to manufacturing of the first solar panels. Mr. Hunter's previous roles at Applied Materials included product management of the PVD and e-beam inspection tools used in LCD manufacturing. Prior to joining Applied Materials he served in a variety of senior management roles, including chief financial officer of Evercare Corp., a manufacturer of consumer products, and director of mergers and acquisitions at The Beacon Group in New York. Mr. Hunter holds a B.A. in East Asian studies from Harvard College, and graduated with high distinction from Harvard Business School.

Mr. Jaggi joined Intermolecular in July, 2010. Prior to joining the company, he was general counsel and senior vice president of Intellectual Property at Robert Bosch Healthcare Inc. (formerly known as Health Hero Network Inc.) for 5 years. Prior to that he was at LSI Corporation (NYSE: LSI) for 11 years, where he held several positions including vice president, chief IP counsel, assistant corporate secretary and assistant general counsel. Prior to that, he worked for Lockheed at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, Houston for 6 years, where he held several positions including project leader, principal engineer and senior scientist. During his time at Houston he founded ETS Inc., which commercialized space based-technologies for NASA and the U.S. Navy. He obtained a J.D. with specialization in Intellectual Property law from Santa Clara University, and also holds a B.Tech. in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Tulane University, New Orleans. He holds 12 U.S. patents, and is licensed to practice law in the state of California and before the United States Patent and Trademark Office.

Mr. Malik, who joined Intermolecular in May 2011, brings 30 years of technology and management experience. Prior to joining Intermolecular as senior vice president, Global Sales and Marketing, Mr. Malik was the founder and chief executive officer of Princely Solar LLC, where he remains on the board of directors. Prior to Princely Solar, Mr. Malik was vice president of Worldwide Sales at PDF Solutions Inc., where he executed sales strategy for Singapore, Korea and China. Mr. Malik also served as vice president of operations at Ishoni Networks, and as the director, Foundry and Contracts Management Group at National Semiconductor. While there, Mr. Malik managed National Semiconductor’s diverse contract manufacturing portfolio and technology transfer agreements for the company’s domestic and international foundries. Mr. Malik obtained a M.S. in Chemistry from the University of Karachi and an MBA from the University of Phoenix.

Dr. Nijhawan, who joined Intermolecular in May 2011, brings more than 15 years of leadership and expertise in semiconductor devices and thin film manufacturing. Prior to joining Intermolecular, Dr. Nijhawan was the founder and CEO of Siorah Inc., a venture-capital backed LED Startup Company that was acquired by Intermolecular in May 2011. Prior to Siorah, Dr. Nijhawan was at Redpoint Ventures as an Entrepreneur-in-Residence and at Applied Materials Inc., where he led the company’s LED lighting business from its incubation as the group’s General Manager and product-line head. Dr. Nijhawan’s previous senior roles at Applied Materials included business development, product management, and technology development in frontend semiconductor manufacturing. As the product manager in the frontend group at Applied Materials, Dr. Nijhawan was instrumental in qualifying DPN Gate Stack for leading customers and increasing the market share to number one position. Dr. Nijhawan earned his Ph.D. and M.S. in engineering from the University of Minnesota, MBA from the International Institute of ManagementDevelopment (IMD), Lausanne, Switzerland and B.Tech. from the Indian Institute of Technology, Kanpur, India. He holds over forty issued or pending US patents.

Dr. Hashim has been with Intermolecular since June 2007 and is currently a vice president, responsible for Semiconductor Collaborative Development Programs. Prior to joining Intermolecular, he was a technology manager at Intel Corporation, where he worked from 2000 to 2007, leading various teams for flash/non-volatile memory and logic process development, and yield enhancement for technology nodes ranging from 180nm down to 45nm. In particular, he led the mid-section and back-end of the line process development teams for flash and logic technologies, and also managed the thin films group at Intel's Santa Clara development fab. Prior to that, he worked at Applied Materials metal deposition group, developing semiconductor equipment for copper barrier seed deposition. He received a B.S. in Engineering Physics from Cornell University, as well as an M.S. and Ph.D. in Applied Physics and Materials Science from the California Institute of Technology. He holds 15 issued U.S. patents and many more are pending.

Mr. Ashizawa joined the company in January of 2006 and is responsible for the company's program operations, manufacturing, and Informatics. He has over 20 years of experience in the semiconductor industry, having served in program management, hardware and software engineering, operations, and service functions. Prior to joining Intermolecular, he held executive management positions at KLA-Tencor Corp., where he was responsible for the microloop product and e-beam inspection programs. He previously held operations management roles at PDF Solutions, Ultratech Stepper, and Etec Systems (acquired by Applied Materials). He received his B.S. in mechanical engineering and M.S. in engineering from San Jose State University.

Dr. Lang, who joined Intermolecular in June of 2006, has more than 20 years of semiconductor industry experience. He is responsible for the company's Workflow Application and Technology group. Prior to joining Intermolecular, Dr. Lang worked for Novellus Systems Inc, where he was responsible for technology development in the Gap Fill business units. This included oversight of the extension of HDP technology to the 45nm technology node, as well as developing the disruptive STI technology for advanced technology nodes. Prior to that, Dr. Lang worked in technology and program management roles at Applied Materials. His responsibilities included the development and introduction of the production-oriented Black Diamond low-k dielectric product. Dr. Lang received his Ph.D. in polymer engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He holds over 49 granted patents.

Mr. Baruch founded CMEA Capital in 1989 as an affiliated fund of New Enterprise Associates (NEA). Before starting CMEA Capital, he was a founder and CEO of Microwave Technology, a manufacturer of gallium arsenide integrated circuits. Prior to that, he managed a dedicated venture fund at Exxon and was president of the Exxon Materials Division. Mr. Baruch holds an engineering degree from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and a J.D. degree from Capital University. At CMEA Capital, he was one of the original investors in Aclara Biosciences (which merged with Monogram Biosciences - NASDAQ: MRGM), Flextronics (FLEX), Netro (NTRO), Silicon Spice (acquired by BRCM), and Symyx Technologies (SMMX). In addition to chairing Intermolecular's board, he serves as chairman of CMEA's materials and energy companies including Codexis, Inc., Cnano Technologies and Wildcat Discovery Technologies. Mr. Baruch also serves on the boards of Entropic Communications (ENTR), and Foro Energy. An area of special interest to Mr. Baruch is combinatorial synthesis, an innovative process for developing chemical compounds. Mr. Baruch has pioneered CMEA's investments in companies that apply combinatorial synthesis, which include Codexis, Draths, Intermolecular, Symyx, Syryx and Wildcat Discovery Technologies. Mr. Baruch is a registered patent attorney and a trustee of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and also serves as a board member of the Energy, Security, Innovation and Sustainability (ESIS) Initiative Steering Committee of the Council on Competitiveness.

Mr. Lazovsky is the founder, president and CEO of Intermolecular. He previously held several senior management positions at Applied Materials Inc., and was responsible for managing more than $1 billion in Applied's semiconductor manufacturing equipment business. As director of product development and business management organizations in the thin films group, he worked closely with leading IC manufacturers to develop cutting-edge technology solutions. Mr. Lazovsky also served as director of business management for Europe and as technology program manager for Applied Materials' flagship 300mm metallization platform. He earned a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Ohio University, and holds 16 pending or issued U.S. patents.

Mr. Federman has been a general partner at U.S. Venture Partners since 1990. Prior to that, he was president and CEO of Monolithic Memories (MMI). After guiding the company from virtual bankruptcy to $250 million in revenues, he led MMI through its merger with AMD and became vice chairman of AMD. He served two terms as chairman of the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), and has also served on the board of directors of the National Venture Capital Association, as well as on the Dean's Advisory Board of Santa Clara University. He has received the Anti-Defamation League's Torch of Liberty Award, and the Brotherhood Award from the National Conference of Community and Justice. Mr. Federman received a B.S. in economics from Brooklyn College, and was awarded an honorary doctorate degree in engineering science from Santa Clara University.

A 40-year veteran of the semiconductor industry, Mr. Burkett joined our board of directors in 2011. Previously, he served as senior advisor to NVIDIA Inc., where he was CFO for seven years. Before that, Mr. Burkett served as the chief financial officer of Arcot Systems Inc. Mr. Burkett also served as an executive vice president and chief financial officer of Packard Bell NEC from 1998 to 1999. Previously, he spent 26 years at AMD in a variety of positions, including CFO, senior vice president, chief administrative officer, and corporate controller. Mr. Burkett also worked in the Semiconductor Division of Raytheon Company. In addition, Mr. Burkett has served as a member of the board of directors and the chair for the audit committee of the board of directors for Audience Inc., G2 Holdings Corporation, NetLogic Microsystems Inc., and Entegris, Inc. At Audience and Entegris, Mr. Burkett is also a member of the compensation committee. Mr. Burkett holds a master’s in business administration and a B.S. in applied mathematics and business administration, both from the University of Arizona.

Dr. McWilliams is CEO of SuVolta, Inc., a developer of low-power, high-performance integrated circuit technology. Dr. McWilliams also serves as a director of Tessera Technologies, Inc. (Nasdaq: TSRA) and was its CEO from 1999 to 2008. His management experience includes a senior vice president role at Flextronics International, a position he assumed upon Flextronics' acquisition of nCHIP, Inc., a multi-chip module packaging company he co-founded and led as CEO. McWilliams also founded and was CEO of S-Vision, a silicon chip-based display company. He is a director of NemoTEK, a mobile phone camera manufacturing company, a trustee of Carnegie-Mellon University, and also is a member of its advisory boards for Physics and Human and Computer Interaction. He holds B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees in physics from Carnegie Mellon University.

Mr. Scalise is past president of the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA), an association of semiconductor manufacturers and suppliers. He came to SIA from Apple Computer, Inc., where he served as executive vice president and chief administrative officer, and has also held executive management positions at National Semiconductor, Maxtor Corporation, Advanced Micro Devices, Fairchild Semiconductor and Motorola Semiconductor. Mr. Scalise was Chairman of the Board of the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco, and also served on President George W. Bush's Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. He is currently on the corporate boards of ATMI, Cadence Design Systems, Intermolecular, and MindTree. He served on the California Council on Science and Technology and was a member of the Joint High-Level Advisory Panel of the United States-Israel Science and Technology Commission, and chaired the Secretary of Energy Advisory Board at the US Department of Energy. Mr. Scalise holds a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Purdue University.

Mr. Walecka is a founding partner of Redpoint Venture, where he works closely with entrepreneurs to build industry-leading companies in emerging technology sectors. He opened Redpoint's offices in China in 2006. Prior to founding Redpoint, he was a general partner with Brentwood Venture Capital. Mr. Walecka currently works with Avnera, Envia, Fortinet (FTNT), Intermolecular, Schooner, Datameer and most recently FunSockets. Mr. Walecka works primarily with software infrastructure and security products for the enterprise market, and enabling technologies for the consumer market. Earlier in his career, he worked for Hewlett Packard and the Stanford University Smart Product Design Laboratory. He received B.S. and M.S. degrees in engineering from Stanford, and an MBA from Stanford's Graduate School of Business.

Yoshio Nishi has been professor of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University since 2002, and serves as director of research at The Center for Integrated Systems and director of Stanford Site at NNIN. With a Ph.D. in electronics engineering from the University of Tokyo, Dr. Nishi has worked at the senior level with Toshiba R&D for VLSI memory technology and Si-SiO2 interface physics, Hewlett-Packard Laboratories ULSI Research Lab, and Texas Instruments, Inc. R&D. He has contributed to more than 250 publications, co-authored/edited 11 books, and been responsible for over 70 Japan and U.S. patents. A fellow of IEEE, a member of the Japan Society of Applied Physics, and The Electrochemical Society, he has received numerous awards over the past 15 years.

Dr. Shanthikumar is professor of industrial engineering and operations research at the University of California, Berkeley. He has authored or coauthored more than 250 papers and has coauthored three books, “Stochastic Models of Manufacturing Systems,” “Stochastic Orders And Their Applications” and “Stochastic Orders.” He is a co-editor of Flexible Services and Manufacturing Journal, and has served on numerous technical journal editorial boards. As a consultant for KLA-Tencor Corp., he worked on joint development projects with AMD, IBM, Intel, LSI, Motorola, Texas Instruments, Toshiba, Fujitsu, TSMC and UMC. He received a B.S. in mechanical engineering from the University of Sri Lanka, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in industrial engineering from the University of Toronto.

Dr. Tether was director of the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) from 2001 to 2009. Prior to this, Dr. Tether founded The Sequoia Group and served as its CEO and president; he also served as CEO of Dynamics Technology Inc., and in top-level management roles at Science Applications International Corporation and Ford Aerospace Corp. He has also held positions in the Department of Defense, serving as Director of DARPA's Strategic Technology Office, and as the Director of National Intelligence in the Office of the Secretary of Defense. Dr. Tether has served on Army, Navy and Defense Science Boards, and on the Office of National Drug Control Policy Research and Development Committee. He is a Life Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE). Dr. Tether received his B.S. in electrical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and his M. S. and Ph.D. in electrical engineering from Stanford University.

Dr. Fréchet is the Henry Rapoport Endowed Chair in Organic Chemistry at the Department of Chemistry, University of California, Berkeley. He also serves as scientific director for the Molecular Foundry at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. His research, reported in nearly 1,000 scientific publications and patents, focuses mainly on organic and polymer chemistry applied to nanoscience and nanotechnology, with emphasis on the design, synthesis, fundamental understanding and applications of functional macromolecules. Dr. Fréchet is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In addition to a B.S. in chemical engineering from the Institut de Chimie et Physique Industrielles in Lyon, France, he holds M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in chemistry from Syracuse University and the State University of New York.

Dr. Hawker is director of the Materials Research Laboratory and professor of Materials, Chemistry and Biochemisty at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Prior to joining the university, he was a research staff member at the IBM Almaden Research Center in San Jose. Dr. Hawker is editor of the Journal of Polymer Science-Polymer Chemistry, and is adjunct professor of chemistry at the University of Queensland. He serves on the scientific advisory boards of Relypsa, Inc., and Warwick Effect Polymers Ltd. He is the recipient of numerous awards, most notably election to the Royal Society, the 2010 MacroUK Award for Outstanding Achievement, and the 2008 DSM International Performance Materials Award. Dr. Hawker's research has focused on the interface between organic and polymer chemistry, with emphasis on the design, synthesis and application of well-defined macromolecular structures in biotechnology, microelectronics, and surface science.

Dr. Nuzzo, a recognized leader in the chemistry of materials, is director of the Frederick Seitz Materials Research Laboratory and the Center for Microanalysis of Materials at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. He also serves as the William H. and Janet Lycan Professor of Chemistry and professor of materials science and engineering at the university. Dr. Nuzzo received his B.S. in chemistry from Rutgers University, and his Ph.D. in organic chemistry from MIT. After completing his graduate studies he was a distinguished member of the technical staff in materials research at Bell Laboratories.

Dr. Weinberg is an award-winning scientist and advisor to start-ups and venture firms in the chemical space. He currently serves as general editor of the prestigious review journal Surface Science Reports. Previously, he was chief technical officer at Draths Corporation and chief technology officer at Symyx (and their 2nd employee). For more than 24 years, he was on the faculty of both the California Institute of Technology and the University of California, Santa Barbara. Dr. Weinberg was also principal investigator in the US-USSR Exchange Program in Chemical Catalysis between 1974 and 1980, and has served on many review panels for industrial, academic, and governmental organizations. He holds a B.S. degree in chemical engineering from the University of South Carolina, and a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the University of California, Berkeley.

Dr. Belfort is the Russell Sage Endowed Professor of Chemical Engineering in the Howard P. Isermann Department of Chemical and Biological Engineering at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Prior to joining Rensselaer, he spent four years on the faculty of the School of Applied Science at Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Dr. Belfort received his B.S. degree in chemical engineering from the University of Cape Town, and his M.S. and Ph.D. in engineering from the University of California, Irvine. He has won several major awards in separation science, and has made important contributions to the field of surface and interfacial science. He was elected to the National Academy of Engineering in 2003.

Dr. Engstrom is currently the BP Amoco/H. Laurance Fuller Professor in the School of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering at Cornell University. Since 2002 he has also been a member of the Graduate Field of Chemistry and Chemical Biology. Prof. Engstrom is the recipient of numerous awards, including a 1991 NSF Presidential Young Investigator Award, the Lilly Endowment Teaching Fellowship in 1995, and two College of Engineering Teaching Awards. In 2005 he was made a Fellow of the American Vacuum Society. From 1998 to 2001, he worked for Symyx Technologies, where he was vice president of high-throughput screening and electronic materials. Presently, Dr. Engstrom's research is focused on inorganic-organic interfaces, and organic thin-film electronics. He earned a B.S. in chemical engineering from the University of Minnesota, and a Ph.D. in chemical engineering from the California Institute of Technology.