Jason Barbour
Chief Executive Officer
Mr. Barbour brings to START Lighting more than 20 years of experience in the electrical distribution and lighting industry, as well as 15 years of Senior Executive leadership. He has held senior positions in two of the largest lighting distributors in the world and has a history of creating high growth and increasing revenue and profit. He founded The Barbour Group, providing leadership consulting and training to executives, established Diogen’s SSL Division, was a co-founder and partner of Lumena SSL and went on to create START Lighting.
Mike Rainsberger
Vice President of Operations
Mike Rainsberger is one of the nation’s premier global sourcing and operations management professionals, with over 15 years of manufacturing, global sourcing, quality assurance, distribution and product development experience. Fluent in Mandarin Chinese, Mike has extensive experience in offshore manufacturing supply chain development and management. Mr. Rainsberger has been successful in developing manufacturing relationships with rapid product turnaround and extremely high quality standards. Coupled with his deep expertise in LED lighting products, he provides critical operational leadership to START Lighting. Mr. Rainsberger has the innate ability to cultivate strategic partnerships, establish operational excellence and influence stakeholders across culturally diverse environments and functions.
Board of Directors
Jerome A. Levine
Mr. Levine is a seasoned professional with over 40 years of experience, predominately in the software and services industries. Mr. Levine is an Operating Partner responsible for conducting due diligence and providing operational support and strategic portfolio oversight to portfolio companies within Marlin Equity Partners. For the past 27 years, he has participated in numerous M&A transactions and has been retained by investors to provide operational and turnaround services. Previously, Mr. Levine worked for Intel Corporation’s Data Services Group where he rose from Salesman to Division President over a 15 year period. For several of those years, Mr. Levine served as the executive in charge of its M&A activity. Prior thereto, he spent 5 years as a salesman with the Burroughs Corporation after beginning his career as an accountant. Mr. Levine earned a BBA in Accountancy from the Bernard M. Baruch College of the City University of New York and served in the U.S. Army.
Bob Grant
Bob Grant has over 25 years’ experience as a senior executive. His experience spans a wide range of companies from Fortune 100 to start-ups, with a focus on services and technology companies. As President and CEO, he successfully led the turnaround of multiple companies. He has held other executive roles in the areas of Sales, Marketing and Business Development in high tech companies including EagleView Technologies; Alliente (acquired by Ariba); Ligos Corporation; Covad Communications (IPO); US WEST (merged with Qwest). Currently, Bob is an angel investor and advisor to several high-tech start-ups in the Denver area. Bob holds a Masters of Science in Management from the MIT Sloan School of Management (Sloan Fellow 1988). He has served on the board of several companies and non-profits.
Robert C. Hawk
Mr. Hawk is president of Hawk Communications whose mission is to help develop high technology companies. In 1997 he retired as President and CEO of US West Multimedia Communications, Inc. where he was responsible for the Media 1 cable business and the Time Warner partnership. From 1986 until 1995, Mr. Hawk was president of the Carrier Division of US West Communications, Inc. Prior to that Mr. Hawk was Vice President, Marketing and Strategic Planning for CXC Corporation, a high technology start up and before that was Director, Advanced Systems Development for American Bell. During 1997-2002 Mr. Hawk served as a Special Limited Partner of Crosspoint Venture Partners. During that time he served on the boards or advisory boards of sixteen companies that went public. Mr. Hawk currently is a Special Limited Partner of DCM capital management and Miramar venture partners. He serves as a director of several private high technology companies. During the past twenty plus years Mr. Hawk has worked with the CEOs and officers of over 100 high-tech companies as a board member, advisor and investor.
