Cornelius B. Prior, Jr. is the Chairman of our Board of Directors. He served as our Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board from 1998 through December 2005, at which time he retired as Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Prior has served as the Chairman of CANTO (the Caribbean Association of National Telecommunication Organizations) and presently is the Chairman of CCAA (Caribbean and Central American Action). He was a managing director and stockholder of Kidder, Peabody & Co. Incorporated, where he directed the Telecommunications Finance Group. A former Naval Officer and Fulbright Scholar, Mr. Prior started his career as an attorney with Sullivan & Cromwell in New York. He is a former Trustee of Holy Cross College and former member of the Visiting Committee to Harvard Law School. He resides in St. Thomas, US Virgin Islands, where he is Chairman of the Forum, a not-for-profit arts organization, and Honorary Trustee of the Antilles School. He is also a Director of the Kneissel Music School in Blue Hills, Maine. He is the father of Michael T. Prior, our President and Chief Executive Officer. Mr. Prior earned his legal degree from the Harvard Law School.
Martin L. Budd has been a director of ours since May 2007, and is the Chair of our Compensation Committee and a member of our Audit Committee. He retired as a partner of the law firm of Day, Berry and Howard LLP effective January 1, 2007. Mr. Budd chaired that firm’s Business Law Department and its Business Section and had particular expertise in federal securities laws, merger and acquisition transactions and strategic joint ventures. Mr. Budd is Chairman of the Connecticut Appleseed Center for Law and Justice and has served on the Legal Advisory Board of the National Association of Securities Dealers. He is the Chairman Emeritus of the Board of Trustees of the Hartford Seminary and is a member of the National Executive Committee of the Anti-Defamation League. Mr. Budd earned his legal degree from the Harvard Law School.
Michael T. Flynn has been a director of ours since June 2010 and is a member of our Audit and Compensation Committees. He is currently a director of Airspan Networks, Inc., a provider of wireless broadband equipment and CALIX, Inc., a manufacturer of broadband equipment. Mr. Flynn has forty years of experience in the telecommunications wireline and wireless businesses, and spent ten years as an officer at Alltel Corporation prior to his retirement in 2004. He also previously served as an officer of Southwestern Bell Telephone Co. and its parent SBC from 1987-1994. Mr. Flynn has previously served on the board of directors of WebEx Communications, Inc., a provider of internet collaboration services, Equity Media Holding Corporation, an owner and operator of television stations throughout the United States, iLinc Communications, Inc., a provider of SaS web collaboration and GENBAND, a worldwide leader of next generation network systems. Mr. Flynn received a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial Engineering from Texas A&M University and attended the Dartmouth Institute and the Harvard Graduate School of Business’ Advanced Management Program.
Liane J. Pelletier joined us as a director in June 2012. Ms. Pelletier has over twenty-five years of experience in the telecommunications industry. From October 2003 through April 2011, she served as the Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of Alaska Communications Systems and prior to that time, served as the former Senior Vice President of Corporate Strategy and Business Development for Sprint Corporation. Ms. Pelletier earned her M.S. in Management at the Sloan School of Business at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a B.A. in Economics, magna cum laude, from Wellesley College. Ms. Pelletier currently serves on the Boards of Directors of Icicle Seafoods, Inc. and Washington Federal, as a Trustee of the Alaska Chapter of The Nature Conservancy and as a Director of the National Association of Corporate Directors, Northwest Chapter.
Michael T. Prior is our President and Chief Executive Officer.
Charles J. Roesslein has been a director of ours since April 2002 and is the Chair of our Audit Committee and a member of our Compensation Committee. He currently is the Chief Executive Officer of Austin Tele-Services Partners, LP and has been a director of National Instruments Corporation since July 2000. He is a retired officer of SBC Communications. Mr. Roesslein previously served as Chairman of the Board of Directors, President and Chief Executive Officer of Prodigy Communications Corporation from June of 2000 until December of 2000. He served as President and Chief Executive Officer of SBC-CATV from October 1999 until May 2000, and as President and Chief Executive Officer of SBC Technology Resources from August 1997 to October 1999.
Brian A. Schuchman is the Founder of Commnet Wireless, LLC, which we acquired in 2005. He joined our Board in May 2007. Mr. Schuchman has spent more than 15 years as an operator and entrepreneur in the wireless telecommunications industry. He founded Commnet Wireless, LLC in 2000 and served as its Chairman and Chief Executive Officer from its inception until July 2006. In 2000, he also co-founded a wireless telecommunications equipment distributor, Commnet Supply, which was sold in April 2004. In the early and mid 1990’s, Mr. Schuchman partnered with rural cellular license holders to build-out and manage numerous wireless markets which were later sold. In 1995, Mr. Schuchman founded Cellular Infrastructure Supply (CIS), one of the first companies to resell cellular switching and base station equipment. CIS was sold to World Access, Inc. in 1997. He continued to manage CIS until early 2000. In 2003, Mr. Schuchman was named Entrepreneur of the Year for the Greater Chicago Region by Ernst & Young.
