Steve Speidel

Board Member & Chief Executive Advisor

Steve Speidel is serving in the capacity as a Member of Board of Directors to Veritra and lending critical expertise in developing strategic vision and focus, while achieving operational excellence. Steve’s experience in these areas, as well as his ability to build and maintain valuable relationships, is a critical part of elevating the Veritra brand and building a world class IT professional services organization.

 
Previously, Steve was the Chief Information Officer and Chief Operating Officer at Insight Enterprises, Inc., where he led the company’s supply chain, client operations and IT teams.  Steve also worked in the IBM Services organization for more than 14 years.

 
Steve is a board member of Chicago’s I.C. Stars, which provides an opportunity for future leaders to develop skills in business and technology, as well as the Arizona Technology Council.

Ravi Achanta

Executive Vice President

Ravi serves as Executive Vice President for Veritra where he is responsible for determining overall strategy and direction for the company. Ravi has a successful history of owning and operating business ventures in the IT, educational, real estate, and manufacturing industries in the US and India.
 
Prior to joining Veritra, Ravi served as Director of Infrastructure for Insight where he was responsible for IT Infrastructure and Operations for North America.  Some of his accomplishments include successfully completing integration of Calence systems with Insight, as well significantly increasing service levels and reducing costs by selective outsourcing portions of Insight’s IT operations. Ravi has served in various technical and architectural roles in ecommerce, system administration, and network design. As a consultant at Metamor Technologies, he has provided services to companies such as Grainger, Baxter Health Corporation, United Health Care, Telllabs, OfficeMax and Sears for 4 years.

 
Ravi holds a Masters Degree in Information Services from Brisbane University and a Masters of Science from the University of Indore,India.

Michael Weaver

VP Cloud & Service Delivery

Michael is Veritra's Cloud evangelist as well as responsible for developing and delivering IT Cloud and Infrastructure services that are valued in the marketplace. As VP of Cloud and Service Delivery, Michael is focused on delivering on the promise of complete client satisfaction by integrating Agile principles into the fabric of service delivery. He is also responsible for creating and expanding strategic partnerships that will help grow the services portfolio in order to drive depth and deliver value for Veritra's customers.

Prior to joining Veritra, Michael served as Director of Cloud Operations for Insight, where he participated in incubating and executing Insight's Cloud go-to-market strategy. He also served as Insight's Director of IT Systems where he delivered IT infrastructure services to Insight's internal user community and lead the infrastructure integration activities for several acquisitions. Michael has a progressive history of IT technical and leadership positions at both Insight and the Louisiana Air National Guard, as well as having served in the United States Air Force.

Michael holds a Bachelor's and Masters Degree in Computer Information Systems from the University of Phoenix, as well as having earned various technical certifications throughout his career.

Bern Baumgartner

VP Strategic Business Development

Bern serves as Vice President, SAP Strategic Business Development for Veritra where he is responsible for determining overall strategy and direction for the company's SAP Practice. .

Prior to Veritra, Bern had a 20 Year Career in professional consulting, business development, and marketing/sales management. Highly successful 12+ years with SAP America in enterprise software pre-sales, sales, and management. During his career with SAP, Bern has been recipient of many awards including “Top Vice President- 2009” SAP America - West Region, Four SAP Top Performer Club Awards and Manager of Top Channel Partner Award.  Served as Foundation Board of Director and Adjunct Professor for Golden West College..

Joe Raszewski

VP Sales

Brian Hickie

Advisor

Brian Hickie is an accomplished technology and business solutions executive with over 17 years of experience, 9 years at the executive level.  Brian has had a chronicled success in creating and executing ERP, Business Intelligence (BI) and Infrastructure IT strategies/roadmaps for Fortune 500 Corporations.  He is a highly motivated and committed senior leader well versed in being an influential change agent who builds and enhances relationships at all levels within organizations.  

Brian has served as Vice President of Enterprise Performance Management for Apollo Group/University of Phoenix with the responsibility for creating and executing the Corporate Performance Management and Data Governance strategies.  Prior to the Apollo Group/University of Phoenix, Brian was the Senior Vice President IT/CIO North America for Insight Enterprises, responsible for global data center operations and North American application development.  Brian has also worked previously with Capgemini as the West Region SAP BI practice lead and with McKesson Corporation as the VP of BI where he led one of the largest, most comprehensive and successful SAP BI implementations in the world.  

Brian is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) and Certified Information Systems Auditor (CISA).  Brian holds a Masters in Business Administration (MBA) & a Masters in Information Management (MSIM) from Arizona State University and holds a Bachelors of Science in Commerce (Accounting), from Santa Clara University.

Rao Achanta

VP Software Development

Rao Achanta is an experienced Technology and Software Architect with vast experience in design and building highly scalable applications in large environments. As Vice President of Product Development, Rao is responsible for software development at Veritra.

 
Prior to Veritra, Rao worked as a Technical Architect and Senior Consultant for domestic & global clients in application development, SAP implementations and IT process development area. With more than 15 years of industry experience in information technology, Rao has deep expertise in design and implement complex, large-scale, and highly available enterprise architectures. During his career, his consulting engagements enabled him to work on projects to many clients, including Citibank, Jiffy Lube, Pennzoil, IAAI, Sony, Sears, IAAI, United Healthcare and others. 

 
Rao held several technical certifications from Microsoft and also a SAP certified Consultant. Rao holds Ph.D. degree in science from Saurashtra University, India and special diploma in Computer Applications.