VIASPACE Boards

Board of Directors

Dr. Carl Kukkonen, CEO, Chairman, Co-Founder

From its founding in 1998 Dr. Carl Kukkonen has led the VIASPACE team, serving as CEO of ViaSpace Technologies LLC, the predecessor of VIASPACE Inc., and serving as CEO and Chairman today. ViaSpace Technologies incubated several companies based on technologies developed at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory and patents and software licensed from Caltech.

Prior to founding VIASPACE Dr. Kukkonen was a Caltech employee, serving as Director of the Center for Space Microelectronics Technology (CSMT) and Manager of Supercomputing at the NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory. At JPL from 1984 to 1998 he managed several technologies and technical subsidiaries. Dr. Kukkonen established and grew the CSMT into a 250-person operation with a $70M annual budget.

From 1977 to 1984 Dr. Kukkonen worked for the Ford Motor Company as Ford's leading expert on hydrogen as an alternative automotive fuel. As a Principal Research Engineer, he also led a team that developed Ford's first turbocharged intercooled direct injection diesel engine.

Dr. Kukkonen received a BS in physics from the University of California at Davis. He earned a MS and Ph.D. in physics from Cornell University and was a post-doctoral fellow at Purdue. In 1992 Dr. Kukkonen was awarded the NASA Exceptional Achievement Medal.

A.J. Abdallat, Chief Operating Officer, VP Business Development, Co-Founder

Mr. Amjad Abdallat is a co-founder of VIASPACE and serves as the company's COO and VP of Business Development. Mr. Abdallat also serves as President and Chief Operating Officer of VIASPACE Security, Inc., a VIASPACE subsidiary focused on government and commercial security applications.

From 1989 to 1998 Mr. Abdallat was with the Hewlett-Packard Company (HP) working in Business Development, Marketing and Program Capture. From 1984 to 1989 Mr. Abdallat was with Control Data Corporation (CDC), working in Business Development. He led and managed teams to capture large government contracts and successfully won many large and complex deals in the government, aerospace and defense, and manufacturing sectors.

Mr. Abdallat received his Master's degree in Engineering from the University of Missouri and a BS from the University of California at Berkeley.

Bernard P. Randolph, Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC), Senior Consultant Space, Air and Information Group (SAIG)

Bernard P. (Randy) Randolph is a retired four-star Air Force General and a former executive at the TRW Space and Electronics Group. General Randolph, who served in the U.S. Air Force for 35 years, has extensive experience in both military and commercial development of high technology systems. His last Air Force assignment was as Commander of the Air Force's Systems Command, which was responsible for the development and procurement of all major defense systems.

General Randolph later joined TRW Space and Electronics Group, where he held dual roles as Vice President and General Manager of the Defense Communications Division and Vice President and Special Assistant to the Group General Manager.

He is regarded for his experience in conceptual system design, engineering, and manufacture-from the earliest Request for Proposal response and contract negotiation, through system reviews and final customer product acceptance. General Randolph is recognized for his combination of in-depth knowledge of the Department of Defense procurement process and hands-on industrial program development.

Angelina Galiteva

Ms. Galiteva currently serves as a Chairperson of the World Council for Renewable Energy (WCRE), specializing in strategic issues related to renewable energy, environmental, energy efficiency and overall sustainable policy programs for public and private entities. She is also founder and Principal of New Energy Options, Inc. and a member of the Board of Directors of American Distributed Generation, Inc and TECOGEN.

Prior to July 2003, Ms. Galiteva was the Executive Director-Strategic Planning, for the City of Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP). In that capacity she was responsible for managing the Departments’ Corporate Environmental Services Business Unit as well as all LADWP’s Green LA Programs and New Technology Initiatives.

Before joining LADWP in 1997, Ms. Galiteva worked for the California Independent System Operator and Power Exchange Trusts and Corporations. Prior to that, Ms. Galiteva worked for the New York Power Authority on conservation, renewable energy and air quality initiatives.

Ms. Galiteva is an attorney with a JD and Masters’ of Law Degrees in Environmental and Energy Law from Pace University School of Law, New York.

Nobuyuki Denda, President Denda Associates

Nobuyuki (Norm) Denda is the founder and CEO of Denda Associates and Trusted Solutions Corporation, a Denda Associates spinoff. During his three decades of experience in the electronics industry working for both Intel Corporation and Intel Japan, Mr. Denda has been a key driver of pivotal change.

At Intel Mr. Denda served since 1971 as Marketing & Sales Director, Vice President of Intel US, President of Intel Japan, and CEO and Chairman from 1997-2001. Mr. Denda grew Intel Japan from a one-person division to a $3 billion per year business.

Rick Calacci

Mr. Calacci's background includes repeated successes at leading manufacturers of consumer electronics and computer products including Sharp, Toshiba and Sony. As a senior executive, Mr. Calacci has a history of achievement selling to all classes of the retail trade including mass merchandisers, independent retailers, chain and independent drug stores, chain and independent department stores, wholesale clubs and C-stores.

Mr. Calacci is an innovative and energetic leader, skilled communicator/team builder, and adept negotiator. He has the proven ability to analyze products, markets and growth opportunities and introduce strategic and tactical solutions that improve competitive performance while increasing sales, market share, and profits.

Scientific Advisory Board

Dr. Dwight Duston

Dr. Duston is currently Chief Technology Officer at the Egg Factory of Roanoke, Virginia, which incubates high-technology companies. Prior to that, Dr. Duston spent 20 years in research and high-technology management for the US Department of Defense. He was Director, Science and Technology and later Assistant Director for Technology at the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization. He has chaired and served on numerous review and advisory panels and working groups for NASA and the Department of Defense.

Dr. Duston has served on Advisory Boards for several companies and was co-editor of the journal, “TECHNOLOGY MANAGEMENT”. He earned his Ph.D. in Physics from the University of Michigan. Dr. Duston has a strong track record of technology transfer of military R&D, that has resulted in more than 350 commercial products brought to the market, traceable back to the military R&D his office at the Ballistic Missile Defense Organization funded.

Dr. Francis J. Harvey

Dr. Francis J. Harvey served as the 19th Secretary of the Army from November 2004 to March 2007.  As the Secretary, Dr. Harvey was responsible for the Department of the Army's annual budget, which in Fiscal Year 2007 was over $200 billion.

He led a work force of over one million active duty, Army National Guard, and Army Reserve Soldiers, 240,000 Department of the Army civilian employees and approximately 200,000 contracted service personnel. He had stewardship of over 15 million acres of land and about one billion square feet of facilities. While at the Army, Dr. Harvey applied his private sector expertise and experience in leading, managing and changing large organizations to transform the business side of the Army as well as to update its leadership development programs. 

The majority of his business career was spent with the Westinghouse Electric Corporation, where he retired in 1997 as the Chief Operating Officer of the Industries and Technology Group.  Just prior to becoming the Secretary, Dr. Harvey served on several corporate boards including three portfolio companies of the Carlyle Group.  Between 1997 and 2004, he served on total of ten different corporate and non-corporate boards

Dr. Harvey earned his doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania, and his Bachelor of Science from the University of Notre Dame in Metallurgy, Metallurgical Engineering and Material Sciences.

RACHID YAZAMI, Ph.D.

A native of Fez, Morocco, Dr. Yazami joined the graduate school of electrochemistry (ENSEEG) of the Grenoble National Institute of Technology (INPG), where he obtained a MS Degree (Engineer) in 1978.  He then engaged in a research project in Carbonaceous Materials for Lithium storage in batteries at a wharis now known as LEPMI' Lab where he earned a Ph.D. in 1985.  In the same year he joined CNRS as a research scholar and was promoted to ‘Director of Research' in 1988.

In 2000, Yazami came to CALTECH under a cooperative exchange program with CNRS and co-founded a joint CNRS-CALTECH international laboratory on ‘Materials for Electrochemical Energetic' (LIA-ME2) with Prof. Brent Fultz with the Department of Material Science.

In 2006 Yazami was appointed ‘Visiting Associate' in Chemistry and Chemical Engineering' in collaboration with Prof. Robert Grubbs. Yazami and Grubbs are the co-founders of CFx Battery, Inc. a CALTECH - CNRS start-up company on primary and rechargeable batteries.  http://www.its.caltech.edu/~battery/RBP.html#bio