Board of Directors and Management Team

Dr. Manuel Aparicio, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder

Dr. Manuel Aparicio sets Saffron’s corporate vision and fundamental company direction. With more than 25 years experience in the industrial development and commercialization of software solutions supporting real intelligence for intelligent agents, Aparicio has long been an evangelist for broad adoption of associative-memory technology, or what Saffron calls Experience Management solutions.

Prior to Saffron, Aparicio was Chief Scientist of the IBM Knowledge Management & Intelligent Agent Center. At IBM, he and Jim Fleming, co-founder and president of Saffron, worked on the development and commercialization of associative memory systems. Aparicio also served on the Board of Directors for The Agent Society and the Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents, an international standards body.

Aparicio holds several patents for memory-based technology, and has published numerous papers and journal articles. For example, he wrote “Concepts of Personalization” for The Practical Handbook of Internet Computing, and “Learning by Collaborative and Individual-based Recommendation Agents” in the Journal of Consumer Psychology, the latter co-authored with Dr. Dan Ariely, a leading marketing economist. He co-edited Neural Networks for Knowledge Representation and Inference and is now writing Making Memories: Applying Neuron-inspired Associative Memories to National, Business, and Consumer Intelligence.

Aparicio formed Saffron in 1999, and currently serves as a technology advisor to Sociocast, LLC, a Web 3.0 social influence network company. A frequent speaker and guest lecturer, Aparicio is an alumnus of the University of South Florida, where he earned a Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology, with a focus on biologically based neuro-computing.

He lives near Chapel Hill, North Carolina.

Mr. Jim Fleming,
Chief Technology Officer, President and Co-Founder

Jim Fleming leads Saffron’s research and development in Associative Memory Technology and is Chief Architect for the Saffron Natural Intelligence Platform, the company’s flagship product.

In 1999, Fleming and Aparicio left IBM to establish Saffron Technology and develop truly intelligent associative memory-based computing solutions. Fleming’s engineering leadership has resulted in Saffron becoming the world’s first commercially scalable associative memory analytic platform. In the Saffron engine, memories are implemented as coincident matrices for greater storage efficiency and processing speed, an approach wholly different from traditional tables or other semantic stores of explicit graphs. It is this patented method of data representation that enables Saffron’s associative memory-based solutions to achieve enterprise scale, the primary shortcoming of competing offerings.

Prior to founding Saffron Technology, Fleming worked for IBM on agent-based learning technologies and security products. He also helped pioneer LAN-based e-mail systems while working as a technical lead at Lotus/cc:Mail. His interest in agent-based software formed while at cc:Mail working on rule-based systems in the early 1990s. He also worked with Microsoft’s PowerPoint division on writing slide-imaging software.

Fleming is an alumnus of Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois where he earned his bachelor of science in computer science.

He makes his home in North Carolina.

Dr. Paul Hofmann,
Chief Strategy Officer

Paul is responsible for developing Saffron’s roadmap to maximize future growth opportunities including corporate development.

With more than 20 years’ experience in enterprise software and services, Paul’s background combines academic thought leadership with international executive leadership at global companies.

Paul has been entrenched in research as Senior Scientist and Assistant Professor at outstanding European and American Universities (Northwestern University, U.S., Technical University Munich and Darmstadt, Germany). He is an expert in computational chemistry and computer graphics (Ph.D., research and teaching in Nonlinear Quantum Dynamics and Chaos Theory), authoring numerous publications and books, including a book on SCM and environmental information systems as well as performance management and productivity of supply chains.

His passion has always been AI, machine learning and semantics. In 1986 Paul programmed an associative memory system at Technical University Munich to predict chemical reactions in mass spectrometer. His team at SAP Labs used semantic rules engine from CMU to show the right data to the right person when accessing enterprise systems and computational logic from Stanford for the SAP Business by Design Configurator.

Paul was Vice President Research at SAP Labs in the heart of Silicon Valley from 2006 to 2011.

Paul joined SAP in 2001 as Director for Business Development EMEA SAP AG where he has created the Value Based Selling program.

Prior to joining SAP, Paul was Senior Plant Manager at BASF’s Catalysts Global Business Unit. After joining BASF 1989, Paul headed the development of object-oriented production planning and scheduling software for BASF’s plants. He implemented SAP’s Business Suite in BASF’s Chemicals Division.

Paul received his Ph.D. in Physics at the Technical University Darmstadt, Germany, after completing his Bachelor in biotechnology and a master’s degree in Chemistry from the University of Vienna.

Dr. John Poindexter, Director, Saffron Board of Directors

Dr. John M. Poindexter serves on the Board of Directors of Saffron Technology.

Now a private consultant, Dr. Poindexter most recently served as Director of the Information Awareness Office (IAO) at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA). The IAO developed and demonstrated information technologies and systems to counter asymmetric threats by achieving total information awareness useful for preemption, national security warning and national security decision-making. In addition he initiated research on privacy protection. As Director, Dr. Poindexter established the new office, managed the technical and financial aspects of all assignments, and identified revolutionary new projects within the Office’s mission.

Prior to coming to DARPA, Dr. Poindexter served as Senior Vice President for SYNTEK Technologies, a small, high technology firm, where he worked with DARPA on Project Genoa. He also served on the Board of Directors for Digital Commerce Corp. In 1990, he co-founded TP Systems, Inc., serving as that firm’s chief designer and programmer until 1996. From 1993 to 1996, Dr. Poindexter was a consultant with Elkins Group, where he was Chairman of the Maritime Advisory Committee and a member of the Board of Directors. Prior to that, he served as Senior Scientist with Presearch, Inc.

Dr. Poindexter served as National Security Advisor and Deputy National Security Advisor for President Reagan from 1983 to 1986, and as Military Assistant in the White House prior to that. He provided recommendations to the President on national security, foreign policy and defense policy issues. He was also responsible for improving command and management systems to support the President in national security crisis management, culminating in the creation of a new high-technology crisis management center.

Dr. Poindexter served 29 years active duty in the U.S. Navy, rising to the rank of Vice Admiral. While in the U.S. Navy, he specialized in training, new tactics and battle management procedures and pioneering uses of shipboard computers. He holds doctoral and master’s degrees in physics from the California Institute of Technology (1961, 1964). He received his bachelor’s degree in engineering from the U.S. Naval Academy (1958).

He lives in Washington, D.C.

Ms. Gayle Sheppard,
Executive Chair, Saffron Board of Directors,
Acting Chief Operating Officer

Ms. Sheppard leads Saffron’s overall business direction and market growth strategy.

With more than 25 years experience in enterprise software and services, Sheppard’s background combines international executive leadership at global companies, with hands-on involvement in emerging companies, boards and academia.

Prior to joining Saffron, Sheppard was Vice President and Managing Director at PeopleSoft, Inc. where she successfully turned around an under performing business unit and developed new market strategies, CEO and President with MarketMile, LLC (now part of Rearden Commerce) where she led the development and launch of an application service business focused on serving American Express’ Corporate Purchasing Card Customers, and Vice President, Worldwide Sales, J.D.Edwards & Company, President and General Manager, J.D. Edwards Japan, K.K., and Vice President Sales and Marketing, J.D.Edwards Asia Pacific Ltd. where she was responsible for defining new market strategies and establishing and leading new business units to accelerate J.D. Edwards revenue growth in international markets.

Sheppard is a Research Fellow at UNC Kenan-Flagler’s Kenan Institute of Private Enterprise, and serves on the Board of Directors for RedOak Logic, LLC, a drug discovery analytics firm focused on the pharmaceutical industry, the Advisory Board of Sociocast, LLC, a Web 3.0 social influence network platform company, the Board of Directors for the North Carolina Life and Sciences Museum, dedicated to life long learning in science and technology, and is a Charter Member of The Indus Entrepreneurs (TIE) – Carolinas; the world’s largest non-profit entrepreneurial organization.

Sheppard is a graduate of the University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida, where she received a B.S., Business Administration.

She splits her time between Florida, Maine and North Carolina.