Team

JP became CEO of EarthRisk in June of 2011 with a focus on propelling the company from a successful prototype stage into a market leading weather analytics company. He provides strategic leadership at EarthRisk, and is responsible for the company's business development efforts as well as nurturing productive relationships with our investors and stakeholders.

Prior to joining EarthRisk, JP and his partners founded venture capital group SEAR Technologies in 2008 to spur innovative developments and capitalize on developing opportunities in predictive analytics and observational data technologies. In addition to his "day job" at EarthRisk, and role with SEAR, JP has had a varied entrepreneurial career as the founder of P-Fleet, an integrated fleet electronic transaction processing and resource management provider throughout the U.S., a founding partner of MRV Systems, LLC, providing products and solutions for the marine research communities, a founding partner of Commercial Property Tax consulting firm RPC Property Tax Advisors, and a founding partner of Pacific Scene Capital, a real estate management and investment firm, all based in San Diego, CA. JP also has extensive experience in the petroleum products and distribution industry. After building Plavan Petroleum for more than 16 years, he sold the company in 2008 to enable a more focused hands-on approach with SEAR Technologies and its growing portfolio companies.

JP's passion is in helping to develop innovative solutions to unmet needs. But in his spare time, he also has a lot of fun with his young family in Point Loma -- in and on the water or on any given youth sports field. JP also enjoys vintage auto racing and uses his multi-IFR rated private pilot's license for extensive family and business travel.

JP has enjoyed a long tenure in the San Diego chapter of the Young Presidents Organization (YPO) and is currently the Chairman of the San Diego chapter of YPO. He and his wife Beth are actively involved in a variety of local charitable organizations including Voices for Children, Makua, and the Naval Special Warfare Foundation. He graduated from the University of California, San Diego with a bachelors degree in Quantitative Economics and Decision Sciences.

Stephen (Steve) Bennett, J.D. is a founding partner and Chief Science and Products Officer for EarthRisk Technologies. In his many-faceted role with the company, Steve directs EarthRisk's product pipeline and provides strategic leadership for the company's research portfolio. He also manages the EarthRisk development team, and is the company liaison with university researchers around the world.

Steve is a technology and commercialization advisor for Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, where he worked for three years as the Director of Business Development. Plus, he is the Executive Director of the Scripps Partnership for Hazards and Environmental Applied Research (SPHEAR).

While at Scripps, Steve forged relationships linking earth systems research to energy, insurance, and financial firms, and he developed corporate partnerships to become a new channel for Scripps research. Steve was also instrumental in forging a university/corporate partnership with $25-million invested in a new global environmental monitoring network.

Steve has been a meteorologist since 1995, forecasting the weather and applying weather research for financial investing and media applications. Prior to joining Scripps, he served six years at Citadel Investment Group in Chicago. Steve was asked to join Citadel as part of a seven-person team that built and launched Citadel's Global Energy Trading business. During his time at Citadel, Steve worked in multiple roles from quantitative research (supply/demand fundamentals), to managing Citadel's Weather Research desk, to his final position as Citadel's Director of Reinsurance Research.

Previously, he'd spent nearly two years at the Enron Corporation in the research division supporting natural gas trading. Steve spent the first half of his career working for a variety of consulting companies and media outlets including The Weather Channel, WeatherData Inc. and Weather Services Corporation.

He completed his undergraduate meteorology degree in 1995 from the University of South Alabama and graduated Magna Cum Laude from the John Marshall Law School in 2008. He is currently the chairman of the American Meteorological Society's Energy Committee on the AMS Board for Enterprise and Economic Development and Commission for the Weather and Climate Enterprise.

Dave provides the meteorological link between EarthRisk's customers and the company's analytic products. He develops EarthRisk's short-term research milestones and manages the internal research team.

Dave has been at the forefront of weather research and forecasting as applied to the energy markets since 2000. Prior to joining EarthRisk, he managed the U.S. Meteorology desk at Citadel Investment Group, one of the world's largest hedge funds, working with teams of investors on the equities and commodities markets. Dave's diverse accomplishments include creating forecast tools to predict severe freezes in Florida's citrus belt and profitable weather/natural gas trading strategies. While at Citadel, Dave's strong relationship-building skills enabled him to pool talent from highly regarded research and academic groups from around the world.

Prior to moving to Chicago to work at Citadel, Dave spent three years at Reliant Energy in Houston, TX where he supported power and natural gas trading. He also worked at The Weather Channel and AccuWeather where he gained experience in forecasting and communication.

Dave is committed to the meteorology community and is actively involved in the American Meteorological Society (AMS). Dave serves as a board member on the AMS Board of Private Sector Meteorologists (BPSM) and is the current manager of the BPSM Mentorship Program. Dave has been a mentor in the program for the past three years.

Dave completed his undergraduate meteorology degree in 1998 and then went on to receive his master's of science at Florida State University in 2000.

Jason is a founding partner of EarthRisk Technologies and has served as the company's Chief Financial Officer and Chief Software Architect since the company's inception in 2010. As of June 2012, he joined EarthRisk in a full-time capacity and in his expanded role as EarthRisk's CFO, Jason oversees all fiscal activities for the company including revenue/expense, payroll and insurance. He is also EarthRisk's Chief Software Architect and he manages the design and implementation of the company's product vision.

Prior to coming to EarthRisk, Jason was a senior software engineer for Illumina, a genetic sequencing and biotechnology company in San Diego. He worked with Illumina's Laboratory Automation and Systems Integration as a team member developing laboratory information systems for genotyping and genetic sequencing.

Before IIlumina , Jason worked in enterprise document management, essentially "taking the paper out of business", at Kansas-based Perceptive Software. Jason also spent three years at Cerner Corporation implementing a radiology information system that allows radiologists and technicians to efficiently utilize digital radiology in a healthcare environment.

Jason is a Sun Certified Java Programmer with additional expertise in accounting, tax and small business finance. Jason received his Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science from the University of Arizona, with supplemental software engineering course work at the University of Maryland, College Park. He has completed "Biotech Demystified: The Science Behind the Business" and "Innovation to Market: From Engineer to Entrepreneur" at U.C. San Diego's Rady School of Management.

Arnold is a seasoned IT professional and technologist. Well-versed in software, hardware and infrastructure best practices, he uses critical thinking and problem solving skills to guide the technology strategy for EarthRisk.

Arnold has a degree in business from the University of Wisconsin-Madison with past experience including work with Abbott Laboratories and The Options Clearing Corporation in Chicago. Arnold was also a partner in a private IT consultancy in the Chicagoland area, serving a variety of professional industries.

Arnold is also the president of digital-telepathy, overseeing all operations and driving company initiatives to promote the success of all client projects.

Sonny handles the development and maintenance of the EarthRisk web-based application. An experienced software engineer, Sonny assists with processing large data sets, data visualization and data analysis, in addition to assisting with system administration duties.

He comes to the company with more than 10 years of software engineering experience as the general manager at Ebix BPO from 2001 to 2011. Sonny led all Ebix BPO product development efforts, including web and software development, product architecture, feature functionality and quality assurance. In addition, Sonny was responsible for Ebix BPO's network operations and technology development.

Prior to Ebix BPO, Sonny was the vice president of engineering at a small San Diego-based software company, Reticular Systems.

A native of San Diego, Sonny earned his Bachelor of Arts in computer science and a minor in engineering mechanics from the University of California, San Diego in 1997. He and his wife and two children live in Chula Vista.

Juliette M. Ruberté is EarthRisk Technologies' Software Products Manager in charge of various initiatives including project management, quality assurance, managing deliverables and facilitating team production. Juliette is a certified Scrum Master, and she has introduced and implemented scrum, a software development methodology, to the team at EarthRisk Technologies.  She currently leads EarthRisk's Products Team where she bridges the gap between our researchers and software developers to bring our research to life.

Juliette joined the EarthRisk Technologies team in May 2012. She brought with her 10 years of professional experience in the biotechnology industry from San Diego-based Illumina, an industry leader in research tools for genetic variation and biological functions.

In her role as Illumina's Senior Software Project Manager, Juliette was responsible for all areas of project management for web-based applications, client-based applications and embedded software. Her milestones at Illumina include successfully managing the installation of Laboratory Information Management System (LIMS) at a new manufacturing plant in Singapore in 2008, and the on-time release of the qPCR instrument software in 2011.

As Illumina's systems analyst and quality assurance engineer, Juliette served as project manager for consecutive releases of Infinium LIMS and Automation software. She wrote software test plans, test cases and performed software testing on LIMS-controlled applications, liquid handling robots and laser-based imagers.

Juliette graduated from the University of California, San Diego with a B.S. degree in Biochemistry and Cell Biology. Born in Puerto Rico and fluent in Spanish, she has called San Diego home for the last 15 years. Juliette enjoys cooking new recipes and gardening.

As EarthRisk Technologies' sales administrator, Miles develops prospects, maintains customer relationships and is the creative force behind the company's marketing efforts. He also works with the products/system analysis team where he oversees the quality assurance of the EarthRisk product suite.

Miles Starr received his bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Georgia in 2009 where he graduated with honors from the Terry College of Business. Following graduation, Miles was recruited by Amerisafe, Inc., a national leader in risk management/insurance for hazardous industries. Milesʼ territory included the entire southeastern U.S. and he is credited with generating over one million dollars in premium for the company.

While attending the University of Georgia, Miles was a four-year baseball letterman and a four time Academic All American. He also served as a team captain and helped lead the team to the College World Series twice in four years. In 2008, the Bulldogs advanced to the national championship, captured a Southeastern Conference (SEC) title, and had the second best finish in school history.

Will researches mathematical and statistical methods to help EarthRisk Technologies further leverage the use of vast amounts of data and meteorological expertise. He codes statistical tools, models and algorithms to create data mining and analysis processes for the TempRisk platform. Will is also a member of the products/system analysis team where he verifies code for EarthRisk products.

Will Henry received a master's degree in applied mathematics at San Diego State University. His thesis investigated ratcheting behavior of soliton solutions to the non-linear Schrodinger equation in a perturbed potential. Will's master's curriculum has covered both stochastic and deterministic models of various kinds with an emphasis on numerical investigation of the model's behavior and characteristics. His main interest is real-world applications of mathematical investigation and is furthering his knowledge via courses in machine learning and artificial intelligence via Stanford's online continuing education program.

Will grew up in Central Oregon and moved to San Diego in 2002 for college. He graduated Summa Cum Laude from Point Loma Nazarene University in 2005 and obtained a perfect score on the quantitative SAT and GRE. Will supported himself in school by starting a personal training business and performing classical guitar at weddings.

Jason "Jay" is a member of the research team and is actively involved in assessment and development of research projects conducted by team members and research partners. He provides research support for new product development and works directly with EarthRisk's Director of Meteorology.

Prior to his position at EarthRisk, Jay worked as a postdoctoral research associate through the National Research Council at the NOAA Earth Systems Research Lab Physical Sciences Division in Boulder, Colorado.

His postdoctoral research investigated far upstream precursors to extreme precipitation events along the U.S. West Coast in association with atmospheric rivers.

Jay received his MS and PhD in atmospheric science from the University at Albany studying a broad range of atmospheric phenomena in the area of synoptic-dynamic meteorology with a focus on short-term climate variability, weather-climate interactions, and extreme weather events.

Jason also holds an undergraduate meteorology degree from Plymouth State University.

As EarthRisk’s Weather Analyst, Travis provides in-depth analysis and discussion of TempRisk’s extended-range forecasts.  His responsibilities include weekly weather reports, diagnosis of weather events and map discussions.

Travis completed his Masters in Meteorology at Florida State University.  His thesis was in applied meteorology where he evaluated the forecast accuracy of the Arctic Oscillation (AO) in extreme events.

In the fall of 2011, he was hired by Citadel to build an operational AO diagnostics tool that leveraged his AO research.

Born and raised on Long Island, Travis was interested in science and weather at a young age.  He completed his undergraduate degree in meteorology at The State University of New York College at Oneonta in 2010.  While an undergraduate, he held a volunteer position at the National Weather Service in Upton, NY as well as a research position at the National Weather Center in Norman, OK.

Travis has a strong interest in finance and commodity trading.  At EarthRisk he will combine his knowledge of EarthRisk’s weather information with the analysis of weather-sensitive financial markets.

Adam O’Shay works with EarthRisk’s Research and Analytics teams focused on developing market and trading applications that leverage TempRisk.

Adam has worked in the commodities and capital markets since 2001 and has significant energy analytics and trading experience. His quantitative approaches and extensive statistical/numerical modeling background reach deep into the fundamental natural gas and Northeast power trading markets as well as the insurance and reinsurance sectors.

Most recently, Adam was the Head of Quantitative Analysis at e360 Power LLC - a commodities hedge fund in Austin, TX. There, he was responsible for all fundamental and statistical modeling for the North American Natural Gas and Power Businesses. These models formulated the basis for short-term and longer-term structural positions. While at e360, he managed a Natural Gas book, and co-led the Short-Term PJM On-Peak Power portfolio. These strategies relied upon modeling and quantifying risk for the North American Supply & Demand infrastructure and trading inter, and intra-commodity spreads, futures and option structures to identify mispriced markets across the forward curve.

Previous to this, Adam worked for Optiver US LLC where he was brought in to build the quantitative and strategic trading business of their Fundamental Natural Gas Futures and Options trading desk. There, Adam instituted both directional and delta-neutral strategies to connect the fundamental natural gas markets with the pre-existing high frequency trading infrastructure.

Prior to working at Optiver, Adam was a Senior Quantitative Research Meteorologist for the Global Energy Desk at Citadel in Chicago. Adam’s background in meteorology and statistical modeling aided the Natural Gas and PJM Power trading desks in quantifying medium and longer-range weather risks. Before joining Citadel, Adam worked as a Senior Developer at Risk Management Solutions where he developed statistical and numerical models for aiding in quantifying natural disaster risk for the insurance and reinsurance community.

Adam has published more than a dozen academic and private sector papers and reports, including chapters in books on reinsurance risk and weather and climate. Adam holds a B.S. in Atmospheric Science from Cornell University and a M.S. and PhD in Atmospheric Numerical Modeling from Florida State University.

Klaus is a Science Advisor to the EarthRisk team. His focus is on global weather patterns and their use for monthly subseasonal weather prediction, a project he and fellow Science Advisor, Ed Berry, have been developing together. Klaus and Ed derived a Global Synoptic-Dynamic Model (GSDM) of subseasonal atmospheric variability that incorporates phenomena known to contribute to predictive skill for weeks 1-5. The approach focuses on the different time variations of the phenomena and the typical weather patterns that accompany them.

Along with his work for EarthRisk, Klaus is affiliated with the University of Colorado-Boulder through CIRES (Cooperative Institute for Research in the Environmental Sciences) and works with scientists in the Physical Sciences Division of NOAA/ESRL in Boulder, CO where he has been a contributing scientist since 1986. Klaus is an expert in medium-long range weather prediction and in the phenomena that contribute to predictability, including the Madden Julian Oscillation, El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and the Global Wind Oscillation. He has more than 40 publications in refereed scientific literature in journals such as Journal of Climate, Monthly Weather Review, Journal of Atmospheric Sciences and Journal of Geophysical Research.

Prior to embarking on his 25-year career at NOAA, Klaus was a Research Assistant, Teaching Assistant and Assistant Scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison where he earned his master's and Ph.D. in meteorology with a minor in mathematics.

Over his years as a meteorologist, Klaus has participated in multiple professional societies including the American Meteorological Society (since 1973), the U.S. CLIVAR Subseasonal-MJO Working Group (2006), the Equatorial Pacific Ocean Climate Studies Advisory Committee (1989-93) and the AMS Committee on Tropical Cyclones and Tropical Meteorology (1991).

Kristen's code, developed at Scripps Institution of Oceanography, was the original source of data for the TempRisk product suite. As a science advisor and a research collaborator, Kristen has been an integral part of EarthRisk since its inception.

Kristen is currently a visiting scientist at Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Her research focuses on prediction and predictability of weather and climate systems with an emphasis on extreme events. Her background is in environmental fluid dynamics and application of global and mesoscale models to study complex ocean-land-atmosphere processes.

She received her Ph.D. in 2009 from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Duke University.

Ed Berry has spent his career analyzing weather-climate linkages while developing client-facing products that provide diagnostic interpretation and experiential predictive insights on monthly time scales. He is a recognized expert applying the Global Synoptic-Dynamic Model (GSDM) framework.

Prior to becoming a Science Advisor for EarthRisk, Ed worked for Bank of America/Merrill Lynch where he leveraged his research and expertise to support commodity trading. This was after being recruited from the National Weather Service (NWS) where his employment spanned a bit more than 20 years.

Ed joined the National Weather Service in 1986. His passion has always centered around global-scale processes and on extending the long range forecast. He embraced this challenge within the National Weather Service by becoming one of the first ten Science Operations Officers in the country in 1991. In this role, he concentrated on linking weather and climate to include subseasonal variability. Ed also spent part of his career at the National Meteorological Center (now called the National Centers for Environmental Prediction) where he helped to implement a methodology for ensemble numerical prediction. Ed began working with Dr. Klaus Weickmann in the summer of 2000 to rigorously develop new quantitative methods for monthly subseasonal weather prediction. Ed and Klaus worked together to derive the GSDM followed by an objective component termed as the Global Wind Oscillation (GWO). Ed co-authored papers on these efforts published in the 2007 and 2009 issues of Monthly Weather Review. From 2005 to 2009, Edalso maintained a blog that was widely read in the energy community where he discussed subseasonal weather patterns. He also co-organized a well-attended workshop on these subjects in Boulder, Colorado in February of 2009.

Ed completed Bachelor's and Master's Degrees in Meteorology at Iowa State University and the University of Oklahoma respectively. His academic focus honed in on synoptic-mesoscale interactions.

Chuck is the founder and CEO of digital-telepathy, the company whose creative team designed the intuitive analytic interface of TempRisk. digital-telepathy is a vested and active partner in EarthRisk Technologies, and Chuck serves on the EarthRisk board of directors.

At digital-telepathy, Chuck applies his passion for technology and his entrepreneurial arsenal to design unique online business strategies and revenue models for client projects. Chuck also leads the charge of the dt brand as an advocate of social capital, karmic business, design for change and community.

His past experience includes emerging technology consulting during the dot com boom for Arthur Andersen and sealing deals for !hey inc with brands such as HP, Microsoft and Marriott. For better or worse, Chuck decided to start digital-telepathy from the ashes of the dot com bust in 2001 and has delivered 100%+ growth on an annual basis.