About Us

Kevin Fliess

Kevin's work and family life have taken him all over the world: from Tahiti to India and Canada to Mexico; Amsterdam to Turkey and the northern California coast to South Carolina islands. He's also worked and lived in Munich, Germany. Prior to starting TravelMuse, Kevin spent 15 years as a leader in various high tech companies, most recently as VP of product marketing and product management for emerging solutions at SAP. He's also held strategic positions at Synopsys, Icarian and Siemens. A serial innovator, Kevin co-invented the first composite application at SAP and has one patent granted with seven applications on file. Kevin lives in Mountain View, Calif., with his wife and two young sons.

Eric Wood

Hailing from a remote town on the coast of British Columbia, Eric needed to travel to do just about anything, other than fish. Over the years, his journeys took him on a 2,500-nautical-mile offshore sailing trip from Hawaii to Canada, extended stays in Europe (where he met his wife, who also was traveling for several months) and an eight-month trip around the world. Today, he lives in Menlo Park, Calif., with his wife and 4-year-old son. Previous to starting TravelMuse, Eric was a director of SAP's Imagineering team. He has a total of 11 years of industry experience from interactive agencies to enterprise software. While at DNA Studio and Rare Medium, Eric led projects for such clients as Microsoft, Nestle, Sony, Epson and the rock band U2. His work has won a Cleo Award for Interactive Marketing, an Astrid award for interactivity and has been nationally recognized in such magazines as Entertainment Weekly. Eric also co-founded Emergency Exit, an online travel magazine for globetrotters.

Donna M. Airoldi

Donna travels to eat and to learn. Throw in an arduous hike and some beach time (not to mention a few good deals at a bazaar and the ability to procure a glass of single-malt Scotch) and she's found nirvana. Her favorite places include Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam, Spain, Nicaragua and Tahiti, as well as New York, Taos and Chicago, stateside. After more than 10 years in less-than-satisfying corporate jobs, along with a brief stint in independent filmmaking in the '90s, Donna took a year off to backpack through Southeast Asia and has been writing about travel ever since. Prior to joining TravelMuse, she was the executive editor/travel editor at Incentive magazine and a senior editor at MeetingNews. Her work also has appeared in Travel+Leisure, the New York and Boston Metro newspapers, Successful Meetings, and Sales & Marketing Management. She splits her time between New York City and Silicon Valley.

Cyril Bouteille

Cyril was most recently CTO of Peerflix, Inc., a peer-to-peer DVD trading service, where he was responsible for all software development, operations and quality assurance. Prior to that, Cyril spent six years at Hotwire as chief architect of its second-generation platform, scaling the travel technology infrastructure to support more than half a million searches per day. Originally from the Rhone Valley in France, Cyril now lives in Mountain View, Calif., with his wife and their infant son. When he's not creating world-class consumer software, he enjoys hiking, traveling, and good food and wine.

Jay GaBany

Jay brings a wealth of experience to the TravelMuse team. He's successfully designed several previous bookings systems (GetThere DirectCorporate, DirectMidMarket, DirectGovernment and Rearden Commerce's booking application) and has secured two patents in e-commerce. He has over 30 years experience in the travel industry, starting on the travel agent side before moving to travel software development. Jay previously worked for Carlson Wagonlit Travel, the world's second largest travel agency, and designed the preferred online booking solution—GetThere DirectCorporate—for American Express, the world's largest travel agency. He also is an avid astrophotographer. You can see his photos at: www.cosmotography.com

Fiona Ashley

Fiona grew up in Southwest rural Scotland where she developed a passion for the outdoors and a quest to see the world. She’s set foot on every continent; yet her most memorable trips include trekking in the Himalayas, mountain biking in the cloud forest of Ecuador and going on safari in Mole National Park in Ghana. Fiona has more than 15 years of travel industry marketing experience, most recently with three years at metasearch company SideStep in various leadership positions in marketing and strategic planning. Prior to that she worked at WorldRes, Hertz and STA Travel in senior marketing manager positions. Fiona lives with her husband and daughter in Menlo Park. In her spare time she enjoys rowing on the San Francisco Bay, skiing in Tahoe and mountain biking in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

Mike Kwatinetz

Mike is a founding general partner at Azure, where he specializes in software and related infrastructure technologies. His current board memberships include Education.com, Bill Me Later, Jacent Technologies, Kenamea, Knowledge Adventure, Medsphere, OQO and ROME. He also served on the boards of The Firm, Woodbury Computer Associates (acquired by JWP), TopTier (acquired by SAP) and Wildseed (acquired by AOL). Other representative investments include VMware (acquired by EMC).

Prior to Azure, Mike was group head of technology research, a managing director and the senior software and hardware analyst at several major investment banks, including Credit Suisse First Boston, Deutsche Bank Securities and PaineWebber. He has provided research coverage and strategic advice to numerous technology companies and consistently has been viewed as a top resource by many of them, including Microsoft, Compaq, Dell, Apple, Hewlett Packard, VA Linux and Gateway. His theories on the shift of industry control to Microsoft and Intel, "The 4th Wave of the Web," the advantages of Linux and the need for PC vendors to go "Beyond the Box" were considered agenda-setting for the investment community. His technology investment strategy newsletter, SoundBytes, was one of the most widely read amongst public portfolio managers.

He was top-ranked by Institutional Investor in PC Hardware and ranked second in PC Software and was the only sell-side analyst to ever be top-three rated in both software and hardware, doing so for six straight years before leaving to form Azure in early 2000. In 1997 and 1998, Mike was rated Institutional Investor's No. 1 Large-Cap "Home-Run Hitter" for stock selection among all Wall Street analysts and remained among the Top 5 in 1999. Furthermore, Reuters and the Wall Street Journal have selected him as the No. 1 PC analyst. His book, The Big Tech Score, was published in 2001 by John Wiley & Sons.

Dorothy Pavloff

Dorothy is a managing director with California Technology Ventures (CTV) and brings operational experience from information technology and communications companies. She joined CTV in 2000 and has represented the fund at Agile Materials & Technologies, DolphinSearch, E Team, Kiyon, MindCruiser and Thinglefin.

Before joining CTV, Dorothy was a manager of business development at Conexant Systems Inc., a leading manufacturer of semiconductors focused on communications applications. Prior to Conexant, she held various positions at Hughes Electronics in its New Ventures Organization and at the MITRE Corporation, a research and development corporation focused on systems engineering for military applications.

Dorothy has taught venture investing to master's candidates at USC's Marshall School of Business. She received a master's in business administration from the Boston University Graduate School of Business and a bachelors degree in Economics from Boston College.

Kevin Fliess

»Biography

Michael A. Clinton

In his position since 2001, Michael oversees the publishing of Hearst titles: CosmoGIRL!, Country Living, Esquire, Harper's BAZAAR, House Beautiful, Marie Claire, O, The Oprah Magazine, O at Home, Popular Mechanics, Redbook, Seventeen, SmartMoney, Town & Country, Town & Country TRAVEL and Veranda. In addition, he oversees all corporate marketing, sales, brand development, custom publishing and books.

Michael joined Hearst in October 1997 as senior vice president, chief marketing officer, and added group publisher responsibility for five titles, including Esquire and House Beautiful, in 1998. Prior to Hearst, he was executive vice president of Conde Nast Publications, where he oversaw sales and marketing for the company's 15 national titles, including Vogue, Vanity Fair and Architectural Digest. He also spent 10 years at GQ magazine and seven at Fairchild Publications, in both editorial and ad management positions.

He has served as the chairman of the board of the Volunteers of America and serves on the board of the Starlight Foundation, as well as Lifetime Television Network. He has led expeditions to Nepal, Patagonia and to the top of Mt. Kilimanjaro to raise funds for Starlight. He also serves on the acquisitions committee of the International Center of Photography, has chaired the American Magazine Conference, serves as the chairman of the magazine marketing coalition of the Magazine Publishers of America, and is honored to have the Michael Clinton Award for Distinguished Service in Publishing, at The Pitt News, the campus newspaper of his alma mater, named after him.

Michael is an avid traveler and photographer—his work has appeared in several gallery exhibitions—and he is the author of two books, Wanderlust: 100 Countries, A Personal Journey, a collection of essays and photographs from all seven continents, and Global Snaps. A third book, Global Faces, was published in October 2007.

Russ Lemelin

Russ Lemelin is the former CEO and CFO of SideStep, Inc., a travel metasearch site. Russ joined SideStep at the “idea” stage and successfully built it into one of the Internet’s leading Travel sites. SideStep was acquired for approximately $200 million. Prior to SideStep, Russ oversaw corporate development at Komag, Inc., where his responsibilities included strategic planning and corporate finance. Before Komag, Russ was a management consultant with Ernst & Young’s Financial Advisory Services group where he focused on corporate restructuring and reorganizations.

Russ holds a bachelors degree from California Polytechnic State University and a joint J.D./M.B.A. from the University of San Diego.