Farzad Naimi, Co-Founder & Managing Partner

Farzad Naimi is a serial entrepreneur, philanthropist, and co-founder - managing partner at RONA Holdings investment company. He brings over 30 years of successful Silicon Valley startup leadership, including co-founding and being part of the initial team of four startups with successful IPOs in the U.S., Japan, and Brazil (Centex Telemanagement - NASDAQ, Prestige International - NIKKEI, Genesys Labs- NASDAQ, subsequently acquired by Alcatel for nearly $2 billion in 2000 and Cielo - BOVESPA, raised over $4 billion, one of the largest IPOs in the world in 2009).

Naimi also co-founded RONA Holdings investment company to address opportunities in Disruptive Technologies, Biotechnology, and Artificial Intelligence with 18 successful Exits.

Naimi believes mentorship is the cornerstone of successful entrepreneurship. His philosophy and life's mission are promoting and internationalizing responsible entrepreneurship with social, economical and environmental impact. Naimi is an advisor to UC Berkeley AMENA Center for Entrepreneurship & Development and is actively involved with the non-profit organization World Innovations Network (WIN), focusing on engaging the private sector in Project and Mentor based learning.  Naimi received Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering from Cogswell Polytechnics in Silicon Valley and Master of Science in Telecommunications Management from Golden Gate University in San Francisco, California.

Dr. Mostafa Ronaghi, Co-Founder & Member

Dr. Mostafa Ronaghi, Ph.D has served on the Summit Board of Directors since April 2024. Dr. Ronaghi is the Co-Founder and Executive Board Member of Cellanome.

Prior to founding Cellanome, he was Chief Technology Officer, Senior Vice President and member of the Executive Leadership Team at Illumina, Inc. (Nasdaq: ILMN) from 2008 to 2021. While at Illumina, in 2016, Dr. Ronaghi co-founded GRAIL, a next-gen liquid biopsy platform for cancer detection. Prior to Illumina, Dr. Ronaghi was Principal Investigator at the Stanford Genome Technology Center from 1999 to 2008. Throughout his prolific career, Dr. Ronaghi co-founded several other companies, including Pyrosequencing AB in 1997, ParAllele Biosciences in 2001, NextBio in 2004, Avantome in 2008, and Clear Labs in 2014, each of which sought to increase our understanding of particular diseases through next-generation sequencing (NGS), advanced genotyping, or other advanced technology.

Dr. Ronaghi holds a Ph.D. in Biotechnology from Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden

Kazutaka Ohno, CFO

Kaz Ohno is the company’s chief financial officer, and also acts as CFO at some of Rona’s portfolio companies. Ohno has more than 20 years of experience in financial management and operations at startups and large organizations. His extensive experience in developing and executing operational plans for startup companies has led to several successful exits in the U.S., Japan, and Brazil.

As senior finance executive, Ohno played a critical role in privately fundraising more than $160 million for several startups, including Genesys Labs, Centerbeam Inc. and Reply.com. He is also the former director of business planning and strategies at Visa International and the previous director of business planning and strategies at Prestige International, Japan's leading value added CRM solutions provider.

In Sao Paulo, Brazil, Ohno spearheaded merger and acquisitions among Brazilian and foreign companies in logistic services. He also founded an emission reduction project development company and established partnerships and strategic alliances between Brazilian companies and foreign companies in the area of manufacturing and energy management.

Ohno has a B.A. in Economics from Doshisha University and an MBA from East Carolina University

Richard Murdock, Co-Founder & Member

Richard Murdock is one of the co-founders of RONA Holdings and one of the members.

After working for three years at Arthur Andersen & Co and obtaining his California CPA, Murdock began his business career as a financial analyst at Arcata Corporation, a $500 million, publicly traded commercial printer and forest products company headquartered in Menlo Park, California. Murdock worked his way up to vice president, controller and participated in the leveraged buyout of Arcata in 1984.

After a successful career as a CFO in a variety of startups, Murdock joined The Brenner Group in 1995 and became a partner in 1997.

In 2000, he left the company to establish his own interim CFO consulting practice. In 2004, he co-founded RONA Holdings to explore a hands-on approach in creating new startups. During his career, Murdock has closely worked with and mentored a large number of startups across a wide range of industries, including software, hardware, internet and consumer products.

Murdock has a B.A. and MBA from Stanford University and is a California Certified Public Accountant (inactive)