Our Company

Management Team

Pat Ryan Jr., Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder
Steve Fitzgerald, Chief Operating Officer
Jacob Solotaroff, Senior Vice President, General Manager of MAX Business Unit
David Nelson, Senior Vice President, General Manager of FirstLook Business Unit
Dave Adams, Vice President of Customer Operations

Pat Ryan Jr., Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder

Pat Ryan is a business and civic entrepreneur who has created several high growth tech companies. Pat is recognized as one of the few business entrepreneurs who has also achieved dramatic entrepreneurial success in urban education.

Pat currently serves as Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of INCISENT Technologies. INCISENT, recognized by Inc. Magazine in 2008 as the #4 fastest growing privately held software company in the United States, serves as the platform and incubator for innovative industry changing technologies that spin out into high growth companies.

Pat is responsible for INCISENT’s vision and strategy as well as leading its innovation incubator for new technologies and businesses. In that role Pat was awarded a U.S. Patent for INCISENT’s first generation Expert System Technology as a part of a team from INCISENT and Northwestern University’s Artificial Intelligence DevLab.

After graduating from Georgetown University with a degree in government, Pat started his career as a teacher on Chicago’s West Side and has been a leading civic entrepreneur in education for over twenty years. The three major initiatives founded by Pat are now unified under the Alain Locke Initiative with a focus on developing the “achievement accelerating” school leaders of today and tomorrow:

• Alain Locke Charter School—Located in the heart of Chicago’s West Side, Alain Locke is one of the most successful charter schools in United States, achieving the #1 test score gains in the history of Illinois’ ISAT standard test. Alain Locke, recognized by the U.S. Department of Education as one of 7 charter schools in the United States best “Closing the Achievement Gap”, serves as a model and demonstration site to train emerging school leaders in “achievement accelerating” school leadership.
• Accelerate Institute—A partnership with the Entrepreneurship Center at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management, Accelerate is the first urban principal training program to develop “achievement accelerating” school leaders. Accelerate prepares leaders for Chicago’s public, Big Shoulders and charter schools as well as leaders for charter schools in California and New York.
• Inner-City Teaching Corps (ICTC)—A pipeline of the future leaders of tomorrow for Chicago’s public, charter and Big Shoulders schools, ICTC energizes urban classrooms with top recent college graduates and career changers, many of whom go on to be award winning teachers and principals.

Prior to his entrepreneurial business and civic endeavors, Pat attended the Chicago Police Academy where his classmates elected him “Outstanding Recruit.” Pat’s work in law enforcement included work as a narcotics investigator focused on major gang narcotics activity in the inner-city of Chicago; in this role he received a commendation for leading a $1.1 million cocaine seizure.

After completing his work in law enforcement, Pat returned to graduate school earning a Master of Business Administration from the Northwestern’s Kellogg School of Management and a Juris Doctor cum laude from the Northwestern University School of Law.

In addition to his work leading the Alain Locke Initiative, Pat is a member of the Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO), the Council on Foreign Relations in New York and the Commercial Club of Chicago. Pat is a Trustee of Northwestern University and a member of its Executive Committee as well as past Chairman of the Advisory Board of Northwestern School of Education and Social Policy. In Chicago, he is a Director of the Chicagoland Entrepreneurship Center and is a Trustee of the Field Museum. Pat serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the Penske Corporation, a $17 billion diversified global transportation holding company.

Pat has been a Henry Crown Fellow at the Aspen Institute and was named one of the 100 Global Leaders for Tomorrow at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Pat and his wife Lydia live on Chicago’s North Side with their 3 children.

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Steve Fitzgerald, Chief Operating Officer

After graduating from Miami of Ohio University with a Bachelor of Science Degree in Business Administration, Steve entered the US Navy. During his 24+ year career as an officer in the Navy SEALs, he deployed to numerous countries around the world. Steve commanded at all levels from Lieutenant (O-3) to his final rank of Captain (O-6) in various assignments with the US military's special mission units. He was directly involved with planning and/or participating in combat operations in Panama, the Persian Gulf, Afghanistan and Iraq, and peace keeping missions in Haiti and Bosnia.

During deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, Steve commanded Joint Special Operations Task Forces charged with conducting the United State’s highest priority missions against Al Qaeda, Taliban and Iraqi enemy forces. He earned his Masters Degree in National Security Affairs at the Industrial College of the Armed Forces in Washington DC. His service awards include the Defense Superior Service Medal, the Legion of Merit, the Bronze Star (two awards) and the Combat Action Ribbon (two awards).

After retiring from the Navy in 2004, he was hired by Aon Consulting as the Senior Vice President for Sales Operations in the Central Region. He has served with INCISENT Technologies since April, 2006.

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Jacob Solotaroff, Senior Vice President, General Manager of MAX Business Unit

Jacob Solotaroff is a seasoned Product Management executive responsible for the overall strategy and direction of the MAX Business Unit. He brings 15 years of experience with analytical technology. His previous role was at Match.com where he served as the General Manager of DownToEarth.com, a Match.com Business Unit, and previously led their North American Product Management team and QA efforts. Prior to Match.com, Jacob was a Senior Software Engineer and Product Development Manager in the Silicon Valley at a Kleiner Perkins funded start up and a consultant with Bain & Company.

Jacob is a 1996 honors graduate of Stanford University in Physics. He currently resides in Austin, TX with his wife Jennifer and two beautiful dogs.

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David Nelson, Senior Vice President, General Manager of FirstLook Business Unit

Since 2001, David has guided FirstLook's (the division dedicated to the automotive industry) Performance Management Team in defining and executing industry retail performance standards, resulting in significant operational performance improvements at over 1,600 franchises across the country. Some of the nationally-recognizable dealers that he has positively impacted include groups such as Penske, Hendrick and Tuttle Click. The Performance Management Team is composed of automotive experts who are schooled in cutting-edge technologies that are grounded in the most effective practices of today's dealerships.

David joined INCISENT already a successful entrepreneur, having co-founded Uncle Julio's Restaurants. Under David's leadership, Uncle Julio's grew profitably to ten units in five states with 1,000 employees and $65 million in revenue. David holds a Bachelor Degree from University of Texas, a Kellogg MBA and Juris Doctor from Northwestern University's School of Law.

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Dave Adams, Vice President of Customer Operations

Before joining INCISENT in January 2008, Dave was a consultant with McKinsey & Company. In his 3+ years with McKinsey's Atlanta office, he participated in 13 distinct client engagements spanning a variety of Fortune 100 companies. Dave's specialization within the firm was Operations and Organizational Strategy, and he led the problem solving/solution development of major business issues for his clients' Chief Executives. Dave started his professional career in the US Air Force, where he served as a Special Tactics Officer in the US Air Force Special Operations Command. Over his 9-year career, he led multiple Combat Control/Pararescue teams in joint operations throughout Europe, North Africa, and Southwest Asia.

Dave earned an MBA from the Kellogg School of Management in 2004, and a Bachelors of Science in Management from the United States Air Force Academy in 1993

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