Who We Are

Meet the Team

Orlando Saez

CEO & Co-Founder

C-level executive in two successful startups with IPO exits. Solid software product, B2B sales and operations experience. Pioneered Wi-Fi at Boingo Wireless. Founder and inventor of Aker's IP. Tech, telecom and data analytics background. BS in Computer Engineering at UPR, MS Computer Science at IIT, MBA at Stuart School of Business.

Dave Zar

CTO

Master’s Degree in Electrical Engineering, former faculty at Washington University and a recognized technology leader within the medical and life science industries.

Alyssa Cho

Agronomy Lead

Agronomy and field experience with a Ph.D. in Agronomy and a 5-year faculty member at University of Hawaii in sustainable farming systems.

Sean McQueen

Operations Manager

Led his own business. Over 10 years of drone and GIS operational experience in agriculture and mining industries.

John Krupela

Product Lead

Has degrees in Computer Science & Chemical Engineering from Washington University and brings 4-years of FinTech and Cleantech experience building software solutions.

James Page

Software Developer

Software Engineer improving customer experience by upgrading functionality and layout of Aker web apps. DevMountain program graduate with a hunger for learning, personal study and application.

Haley Ressl

Senior UI/UX Designer

UI/UX Designer hailing from a background in fine arts and web development. Has worked with companies to help them launch new products, grow their business, and solve big problems.

Kacper Laska

Systems Engineer

Engineer with a B.S, M.S in Mechanical Engineering with technical knowledge in hardware development, robotics, software development, and rapid manufacturing.

Sean Reynolds

Principal ML Engineer

Principal Machine Learning Engineer engineering a computer vision system for detecting issues with crops. Holds an MS in Computer Engineering with unique expertise in data science, complex computer vision algorithms and sensor fusion.

Stu Gisburne

Senior Software Engineer

Having led many projects in industries ranging from pharmaceutical to entertainment, Stu brings over 30 years of experience to Aker. His expertise includes software development, data center infrastructure, mobile application development and cloud services.

Michael Kleckner

Insights & Strategy Lead

Strategy and Insights Lead with a focus on marketing and client service. Michael's career has covered a wide spectrum of disciplines including marketing strategy, tactical execution, client service, leadership, and project management. He loves to utilize his people skills to listen to, learn from, and understand clients and consumers. Michael graduated Magna Cum Laude from the University of Missouri-Columbia Journalism School in 2009.

mkleckner@aker.ag

Sharon Berberich

Business Development Lead

Experienced Ag Business Development and Start-up C-Level Executive. Over 30 years experience in Big Ag and Ag Start-ups with a focus on executive leadership, business development, sales, marketing, licensing, venture capital investment, regulatory, intellectual property, product development, and field operations. Background includes Monsanto Company, Donald Danforth Plant Science Center, Dow AgroSciences. Distinguished Alumni of the College of Agriculture Food & Natural Resources at the University of Missouri - Columbia.