Since our charter class graduated more than 25 years ago, alumni
from the UC Davis Graduate School of Management have been making
their presence known around the world.
Our graduates are CEOs, vice presidents, chief financial
officers, chief operating officers and entrepreneurs. Around the
globe, they have taken prominent roles as international business
leaders in a wide range of industries and organizations.
Graduate School of Management alumni are actively involved in
their communities, and they make time for mentoring, advising and
assisting current students and networking with fellow graduates.
Andrew Barkett Finds Innovative Ways to Fuel Entrepreneurship
Named First-ever Chief Technology Officer for Republican National Committee
UPDATE: Andrew Barkett is leaving his post as senior engineer at Facebook to bring his decade of experience in Silicon Valley to become the first-ever chief technology officer for the Republican National Committee.The June 4 announcement has stirred a whirlwind of media coverage, including the Huffington Post and Washington Post.Bark
Roger Halualani’s Lasting Impact
Roger Halualani MBA 91 recently made a multi-year, $25,000 gift to support the Integrated Management Projects and Articulation and Critical Thinking (IMPACT) curriculum for MBA students.
A founding partner at the leading healthcare consulting firm, Epiphany Partners, Halualani assumes the GSM Alumni Association presidency on July 1. He shares what motivated his gift, reflections and highlights of his successful career—and his priorities for building the School’s alumni community.
Gary Lew Flies High in Aviation Finance
Gary Lew’s career has enjoyed an interesting evolution. A political science major at UCLA, his first job after college was on the staff of U.S. Senator Pete Wilson. When Wilson was elected California’s 36th governor in 1991, Lew followed him to the State Capitol in Sacramento. After four years in the governor’s office, he decided to pursue a new path in business and joined Merrill Lynch’s investment management group. He also determined to earn an MBA and enrolled in the Graduate School of Management in 1996.
Tina Angell Takes an Entrepreneurial Leap
With a degree in computer engineering from California State University, Sacramento, Tina Angell began her career at Hewlett-Packard, performing technical marketing in HP’s Internet Printing & Imaging Division. Realizing the doors a UC Davis MBA would open, she enrolled in the Sacramento MBA program, and grew into progressively more responsible marketing positions at HP while she earned her degree in 1999.She continued with the company, spending six years in marketing communications as the worldwide sales tools manager in the ProCurve Networking Division, and then served as a produc
Graham McDougal’s B-School Skills Help Build a Successful Law Practice
After graduating from law school, Graham McDougal accepted a position as a deputy district attorney, responsible for half of the office’s misdemeanor calendar and for assisting with felony cases. “Working as a DA was a lot of fun,” he says. “I had a really good group of co-workers, challenging work and a feeling that what I was doing actually made a difference.
Alumni Tim Keller and Collin Casper Savor VinPerfect’s Success
Start-up Produces the "Perfect" Wine Cap
Tim Keller MBA 08 has a dream—and the persistence to make it a reality. A UC Davis viticulture and enology alumnus, Keller worked for 12 years as a winemaker in Sonoma and Napa counties before enrolling in the Graduate School of Management.
Today he’s the co-founder and CEO of VinPerfect, maker of a revolutionary screwcap for wine bottles that is poised to turn the 21-billion-unit annual global market for wine closures on its head. He’s joined in this quest by former classmate Collin Casper MBA 08, VinPerfect’s co-founder and COO.
Craig Cummins MBA 05 Invests in Global Sustainability
Craig Cummins’ father started a chain of successful optometry stores in New Jersey during the late 1970s. He sold them and remained with the company, but the new owner sold them to a private equity company, which eventually sold them again.
As a teen, Cummins watched these changes and pondered the role of private equity in business and in society. He followed a very different passion in college, earning first a bachelor in science in biomedical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, N.Y.) and then, in 2004, a master’s in this subject at UC Davis.
But private equity continued to intrigue him, and Cummins was drawn to the world of business. He applied to the Graduate School of Management while still at the UC Davis College of Engineering and in 2005 earned his MBA through the concurrent MS/MBA program.
Sam Saliba’s “Amazing Ride” at Google
Sam Saliba MBA 00 has focused his career at the intersection of technology and creativity, starting at Intel’s Consumer Marketing division, “a great role straight out of b-school.” When the Internet bubble burst, he joined Lucasfilm Entertainment Company to oversee marketing of their Star Wars–based video games. Four years later he moved to Ubisoft Entertainment, where he managed a portfolio of entertainment software products and a brand management team.
In early 2011 Saliba got a call from Google about joining the Consumer Marketing team to lead engagement efforts for their Search product. “At first I thought it was mistake that the recruiter called me, but one thing led to another and it’s been an amazing ride ever since.”
Paris Proves Perfect for Stephanie Swannack’s International Career
Stephanie Swannack MBA 07 came to UC Davis as a doctoral student in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics, but “quickly discovered that a Ph.D. wasn’t the right path for me—too theoretical and removed from the industry I had been born and raised in,” she says. Shifting gears and heeding the advice of her new friend Alex McCalla, a professor of agricultural economics and the founding dean of the Graduate School of Management, she applied to the UC Davis MBA program and enrolled as a member of the full-time class of 2007.
Peter Buggy Leads New Directions in Health Care Strategy
Alumnus Enjoys Long, Healthy Career at Kaiser Permanente
By Marianne Skoczek
As Kaiser Permanente’s director of strategy management, Peter Buggy leads a high-powered team of business consultants that work with the health plan’s business lines to better execute strategies and measure their success. Often referred to as the model for the future of health care, Oakland, Calif.-based Kaiser Permanente is the nation’s largest not-for-profit health plan and health care provider, with annual operating revenue of more than $42 billion.
Shannon Staglin MBA 08 Pursues Excellence with Passion in the Vineyard
After Shannon Staglin MBA 08 received her undergraduate degree from UCLA in 2001, she returned to Napa to work in the family business—Staglin Family Vineyard—as a harvest intern. This experience, she says “taught me all about our enology and viticulture practices. It also clarified that my place was in the business rather than the production side of the vineyard.”
Kevin DeLury MBA 07 Solves Complex Problems at Booz Allen Hamilton
Kevin DeLury was “fortunate enough to have an internship through the GSM that ultimately led to my first position after business school. At Blue Shield of California I assumed a broad range of roles in their operations division, where I did everything from write and negotiate contracts, manage overseas call centers and internal operations, to automate manual enrollment processes. At every turn I found myself using the skills I learned at the GSM to help improve operational processes and drive better performance.
Ariana Brill ’10 Makes Work as Cool as Play at Nickelodeon
Ariana Brill thrives on challenges. A few months after receiving her BA in cognitive science and geography from Vassar College—one of the top liberal arts schools in the country—she entered the UC Davis School of Law to study intellectual property law. A year later she commenced her MBA studies at the Graduate School of Management.
Daniel Walter ’00 Finds a World of Satisfaction as a Director for WHO
On New Year’s Eve, 2000—just weeks after acing his last UC Davis MBA final—Daniel Walter, his wife and their two young daughters boarded a plane for New Delhi and a new life. They spent New Year’s Day “somewhere in the air,” arriving safely on January 2.
Jeff Ansley ’09 Builds a Soaring Solar Career
Jeff Ansley embarked on his planet-saving career in 1993 in East Africa, where he installed remote photovoltaic systems and taught residents how to install and service solar equipment. Today he is president of Natron Resources, Inc., an Oakland, Calif.–based solar system design and engineering company he founded while a student in the Bay Area Working Professional MBA program. Natron Resources is dedicated to making solar energy economically feasible for its residential and business clients.
Marc Adams ‘99: Pushing the Limits at Wells Fargo—and in Life
As vice president, risk consultant at Wells Fargo and Company in Charlotte, N.C., Marc Adams provides portfolio analysis and forecasts for the bank’s retail consumer credit lines of business. It’s challenging work that draws on his deep background in the financial services industry, where he experienced both the boom of the dot-com era and the subsequent economic meltdown at Barclay’s Global Investors and Wachovia.
Outside of work, “I’m learning Argentine tango with my wife, a native of Costa Rica, learning to play Flamenco guitar and traveling as much as possible,” says Adams.
Michael Fisher ’04: The Evolution of Content Consumption
As senior director of business development for Sling Media, Michael Fisher thrives on the cutting edge of the dynamic content consumption industry. Founded in 2004, Sling Media, Inc. specializes in audio and video placeshifting technology. Its innovative, Emmy award–winning products allowing consumers to watch their home TV from virtually anywhere across the globe.
“I feel extremely lucky to be at this intersection of amazing technology and compelling user experiences,” says Fisher.
Noemi Danao ’04: A Global Citizen Does Well by Doing Good
Noemi Danao’s passport reflects her frequent travel from her current hometown of Quito, Ecuador, to countries throughout Latin America and Europe. At the head of business development for the Dutch social enterprise SNV, Danao uses her business acumen to help private sector firms, government institutions, NGOs and community-based organizations link low-income producers and consumers to formal markets.
Mike Livak MBA 98 Thrives on Tahoe’s Snowy Slopes
A lifelong ski enthusiast, Mike Livak spent six years as a ski instructor before entering the UC Davis MBA program. Upon graduation in 1998, he explored other options, but quickly returned to the industry he loves. Today Livak is a senior vice president at the Squaw Valley Ski Corporation, a fascinating and diverse job that keeps him busy—most recently assisting in Squaw’s merger with neighboring Alpine Meadows. The deal combined two of Tahoe’s oldest resorts to create North America’s largest mountain resort.
Hanna Katrin Fridriksson ’01
Defining Success in Iceland’s New Economy
A few months after she received her MBA in 2001, Hanna Katrin Fridriksson returned to Iceland to embark on a career that has proven as rewarding as it is challenging and diverse. Today, after stints in higher education, the shipping industry and government, she is helping healthcare company Icepharma thrive in a radically new economic reality.