Principal Bios

We see value others do not and create value others cannot. Banking IP-centric companies require uncommon insight, resourcefulness, perseverance and the right team.

Christopher A. Marlett, Co-Founder - Chairman and CEO

Anthony DiGiandomenico, Co-Founder - Head of Investment Banking

Gary Schuman, CFO and CCO

George H. Brandon, Managing Director - Business Development

Robert Clifford, Sr. Managing Director - Head of Equity Capital Markets

Peter J. Conley, Sr. Managing Director - Investment Banking

Kevin Cotter, Managing Director - Equity Capital Markets

Erin-Michael Gill, Managing Director & Chief Intellectual Property Officer

Cary Hurwitz, Managing Director - Investment Banking

Dan Landry, Managing Director - Investment Banking

Robert M. Levande, Sr. Managing Director - Investment Banking

Dan Nagy, Managing Director - Fixed Income

Jeffrey Sun, Managing Director - Asia Pacific

Amy Wang, Ph.D., Managing Director - Investment Banking

 

Christopher A. Marlett

Co-Founder - Chairman and CEO

Mr. Marlett is a founding partner of MDB, focusing on equity financing and capital formation for growth-oriented companies. Mr. Marlett’s experience includes all phases of corporate finance from the completion of initial public offerings, secondary offerings, PIPEs and strategic consulting. Mr. Marlett’s clients have included companies as varied as biotechnology, medical products, entertainment, direct marketing, environmental, computer-related technology and nutritional supplements.

Prior to forming MDB, Mr. Marlett held the position of Managing Director with Laidlaw Equities, an investment firm focused on financing small capitalization growth companies. Mr. Marlett has over 20 years experience in investment banking. Mr. Marlett holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from the University of Southern California.

Anthony DiGiandomenico

Co-Founder - Head of Investment Banking

Co-founder of MDB, Mr. DiGiandomenico focuses on corporate finance and capital formation for growth-oriented companies. He has participated in all areas of corporate finance including private capital, public offerings, PIPEs, business consulting and strategic planning, and mergers and acquisitions. Mr. DiGiandomenico has also worked on a wide range of transactions for growth-oriented companies in biotechnology, nutritional supplements, manufacturing and entertainment industries.

Prior to forming MDB Capital, Mr. DiGiandomenico served as President and CEO of the Digian Company, a real estate development company. Mr. DiGiandomenico holds an MBA from the Haas School of Business at the University of California, Berkeley and a Bachelors of Science Degree in Finance from the University of Colorado.

Gary Schuman

CFO and CCO

Mr. Schuman joined MDB Capital Group in 2009 and serves as the firm’s Chief Financial Officer and Chief Compliance Officer. Leveraging more than 18 years of securities industry experience where he has been instrumental in the launch of several investment firm start-ups, including hedge funds, broker-dealers, and investment advisors, Mr. Schuman is responsible for all financial reporting, compliance and general administration at MDB.

Previously, Mr. Schuman was the Chief Financial Officer and Chief Compliance Officer of USBX Advisory Services, LLC, an investment banking firm focused on mergers and acquisitions, and Chief Financial Officer of its parent company, USBX, Inc. Mr. Schuman also served in several managerial capacities at Equibond, Inc., a securities broker-dealer based in Los Angeles. Mr. Schuman received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Economics from UCLA and an MBA from the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California.

George H. Brandon

Managing Director - Business Development

Mr. Brandon has 24 years of investment experience working on both the buy and sell side. Prior to joining MDB, he served as the director of business development for Dallas, Texas based start up, MileMeter Insurance. Mr. Brandon’s business focus has primarily been with entrepreneurial start-ups, micro-cap and small cap companies. He has served as a partner of Trinity River Advisors, LLC, a turnaround consulting firm, targeting small companies dealing with financial distress. Mr. Brandon also served as a partner for a micro-cap investment firm, Sawtooth Capital Management Inc.

His security related experiences include institutional sales of distressed securities at Drake Capital Securities and manager of the Los Angeles Office for Robert Thomas Securities, a division of Raymond James Financial. Mr. Brandon received a B.A. from Concordia University - Irvine.

Robert Clifford

Sr. Managing Director - Head of Equity Capital Markets

Mr. Clifford joined MDB Capital Group in 2010 as the firm’s Head of Equity Capital Markets. He possesses nearly 25 years of institutional equity sales and trading experience. Mr. Clifford got his start in the business in 1986 with Sutro & Company in Los Angeles apprenticing for the legendary Felix Juda. He remained with Sutro & Company until 2002 when the firm was acquired by the Royal Bank of Canada.

Mr. Clifford then joined Sanders Morris Harris as a Senior Vice President to assist in the formation of a new institutional equities effort before departing in 2007 to become a Managing Director with ThinkEquity LLC in San Francisco, where he remained until joining MDB. He holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Administration from the University of Southern California.

Peter J. Conley

Sr. Managing Director - Investment Banking

Mr. Conley brings to MDB over 20 years of institutional research, equity capital markets and investment banking experience. Prior to MDB, Mr. Conley was co-founder of The Analytiq Group, a top-decile-ranked equity research firm covering emerging technologies for Global Investor 100 clients. From 2001 to 2002, Mr. Conley was Managing Director of GlobalEuroNet, a private equity fund focused in early-stage technology companies.

In 1999, Mr. Conley was co-founder of E*Offering, the investment bank of E*Trade, where he was Head of Equity Capital Markets and involved in over 100 public offerings raising over $3 billion, including some of Wall Street’s largest public and private offerings including UPS, Phone.com, Red Hat, Sina, CarsDirect, among others. Mr. Conley began his career at Lehman Brothers in 1988 and joined Cruttenden & Co. in 1991 (later Cruttenden Roth / Roth Capital Partners) to start the firm's institutional equity business and serve as Head of Institutional Equity Sales, where he played a key role in over 100 equity financings raising over $1.4 billion.

Kevin Cotter

Managing Director - Investment Banking

Prior to joining MDB Capital in 2010, Mr. Cotter was a Senior Managing Director of Investment Banking at Source Capital Group. From 1998-2008 he lead the Middle Market and Private Placement group at Sanders, Morris, Harris, one of the consistently top-ranked PIPE groups on Wall Street, where he helped manage over 70 Private placement offerings with total proceeds in excess of $500 million.

In 1991, Mr. Cotter was the founding partner of Value Investing Partners, a boutique investment firm that specializes in small and micro-cap financings. Mr. Cotter has spent over 20 years building an extensive network within the U.S. hedge fund and money management community. Mr. Cotter holds a B.S. in Business Administration from Belmont Abbey College.

Erin-Michael Gill

Managing Director & Chief Intellectual Property Officer

Mr. Gill is MDB's Chief Intellectual Property Officer. Before joining the firm, he served as an adviser to the Obama-Biden transition team, reviewing operations and strategy for the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). He then served as an appointee within the Obama administration as Special Adviser to the Under Secretary of Commerce for Intellectual Property and Director of the USPTO. In that role, Mr. Gill was a key policy official, responsible for the development and coordination of US IP policy and agency operations.

He has held IP leadership positions for venture-backed IT companies in the US, Canada and India, as well as IP and product management roles within DuPont. Mr. Gill began his IP career as a US patent examiner while a graduate student in applied physics at Johns Hopkins University. He has a BS in astronomy and a BA in physics from Benedictine College.

Cary Hurwitz

Managing Director - Investment Banking

Prior to joining MDB in 2008, Mr. Hurwitz was the President and Chief Operating Officer of New Providence Capital Management Partners, a $100 million private hedge fund investing in a wide cross section of real estate opportunities. Prior to this tenure, Mr. Hurwitz spent the majority of his career in investment banking and corporate M&A, where served as financial advisor in connection with the public emergence of eight companies and the placement of over $275 million in debt and equity securities within the entertainment, technology, consumer products, real estate, and healthcare industries.

Mr. Hurwitz has also served as President of his own firm, C S Capital Resources, Vice President of Capital Transactions at New Capital Advisors, a boutique Los Angeles financial advisory firm, and as financial analyst at AEW Capital Management, a bi-coastal real estate investment banking firm. Mr. Hurwitz holds a J.D.- M.B.A. from the Pepperdine School of Law and Graziadio School of Management and is a member of the State Bar of California.

Dan Landry

Managing Director - Investment Banking

Mr. Landry brings a diverse technical background and 10 years of high tech entrepreneurial experience. Prior to joining MDB in August of 2010, he was the founder and CTO of Evident Technologies, Inc. an advanced materials company specialized in the commercialization of semiconductor nanocrystals. In building the business, Mr. Landry established himself as a pioneer in the nanotechnology industry having been responsible for successfully commercializing this technology in a variety of markets and applications, delivering the world's first commercial supply of this material. Mr. Landry is an inventor on 16 patents and patents pending and has extensive experience in creating and analyzing IP strategy.

Prior to founding Evident he was part of the Engineering Leadership Development program at Lockheed Martin. Mr. Landry received a bachelors degree in Chemical Engineering From Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in 1996 and a Masters of Engineering in 1999.

Robert M. Levande

Sr. Managing Director - Investment Banking

Mr. Levande leads our East Coast investment banking effort. Prior to joining MDB, Mr. Levande was co-head of Life Sciences Corporate Finance at Gilford Securities. Previously, he founded the Palantir Group, Inc., which specializes in providing strategic advice in business development, mergers, acquisitions, and capital raising for the medical technology industry. From 1972 through 1999, Mr. Levande held a number of managerial positions of increasing responsibility with Pfizer Inc., principally in its Medical Technology Group (MTG). From 1996-1999, Mr. Levande was Vice President - Business Analysis & Development of MTG. During his tenure at Pfizer, he actively participated in more than 20 acquisition and technology transfer agreements. Mr. Levande's tenure included 21 years with MTG's largest operating unit where he helped to grow the business from sales of $50 million to over $800 million. At Howmedica, Mr. Levande was a corporate Vice President and General Manager of the Canada, Latin America, & Far East Division. He devised the strategy to create this division, established seven additional business units, and negotiated over 25 distribution agreements during its implementation. He was subsequently promoted to Senior Vice President with responsibilities that included finance, planning, and business development.

Mr. Levande's other experience includes director of Orthovita, Inc. (NASDAQNM: VITA), founder / director of VirnetX Inc. (now VirnetX Holding Corp. (NYSE/Amex: VHC)), director of Integrated Surgical Systems (OTC: ISSM.PK), and member of the Healthcare Advisory Board of Prism Venture Partners. He holds an M.B.A. from Columbia University and a B.S. in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania's Wharton School of Finance & Commerce. Mr. Levande has also completed the Japanese Business Study Program at the Institute for International Studies and Training in Tokyo, Japan and the Spanish language program at Rennert Bilingual Institute.

Dan Nagy

Managing Director - Fixed Income

Mr. Nagy brings to MDB over 25 years of income sales and trading experience, including high grade corporate, high yield, US Treasuries and Agencies, marketable certificates of deposit and California municipal bonds experience. Mr. Nagy has established himself with both small to moderate size institutional accounts and individual clients. He is known for customizing investment strategy for each client, carefully balancing current market conditions with their liquidity needs, time horizon, risk tolerance and other special considerations to optimize safety, income and capital growth.
 
For the past 25 years, Mr. Nagy has been a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) and a member of the CFA Institute and the Los Angeles Society of Financial Analysts.  Mr. Nagy graduated Magna Cum Laude from California State University, Northridge, with a degree in Finance-investments.

Jeffrey Sun

Managing Director - Asia Pacific

Mr. Sun has over 20 years of experience in equity trading, cross-Pacific JV formation and investment banking. Prior to joining MDB, Mr. Sun worked in marketing and product development at firms such as, P&G, Texas Instruments, and Bank of America. His responsibilities at MDB have included running the equity trading desk, investment banking and strategic consulting for firm clients.

Mr. Sun initiated the first NYSE IPO for a Chinese regional company in 1996. He has also directed MDB’s investment banking services that have included PIPE’s, reverse mergers, and other cross border transactions for Hong Kong listed companies. His extensive cross-Pacific JV experience spans numerous Asia Pacific companies in sectors, such as mining & refineries, alternative energy, wireless communications, and waste recycling. He currently serves as a director for several JV and Chinese companies. Mr. Sun received his M.S. in Applied Mathematics from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

Amy Wang, Ph.D.,

Managing Director - Investment Banking

Dr. Amy Wang joined MDB Capital Group in 2007 to support and further our endeavors in life science and healthcare. With an extensive scientific background as well as biotechnology industry experience, Dr. Wang seeks new transformative medical diagnostics and therapeutics. In addition to life science, Dr. Wang also has interest in biofuels and cleantechnology. Prior to joining MDB, she was a development scientist at Invitrogen, Corp.'s Biosource division where she led a team in the Signal Transduction Assay group and spearheaded development of the Epigenetics program.

Prior to Invitrogen, Dr. Wang served as a staff scientist at Amcyte, Inc., a type I diabetes cell therapy biotech (acquired by ReNeuron). She was a post-doctoral fellow at UCLA in Michael Grunstein's laboratory where she worked on chromatin modifications and gene regulation. Dr. Wang received her BS in Biochemistry and PhD from the department of Biological Chemistry at UCLA and MBA from UCLA Anderson.