PRESS RELEASE
Syntonetic Names Richard D. French Chief Executive Officer
Company announces expansion to United States, international markets
SAN FRANCISCO, November 30, 2009 – Syntonetic Inc. a pioneer in music profiling and recommendation technologies, today announced Richard D. French has been named chief executive officer. French brings more than thirty years experience in the software and hardware industries, and will direct the company’s global business strategy, investment, partnering, sales and marketing.
Syntonetic has also announced its expansion into the United States with new offices in San Francisco, Calif. As CEO, French will be based in San Francisco, and will lead the company’s entry into the American and international mobile, consumer electronics and online music markets.
“Richard’s expertise aligns very well with Syntonetic’s ambitious business goals, and we’re confident in his ability to make the company a leading brand in music recommendation and playlisting,” said Michael Ritto, founder and partner MBO Group A/S and Syntonetic board member.
Most recently, French, who has a 10-year track record in building successful internet companies and brands in remote access, online media, communities, entertainment and advertising, served as head of new businesses within the services division of Nokia. Prior to that, he was CEO at Avvenu, Inc. (acquired by Nokia), a venture backed company that provided services for users to securely access files, photos and music from web-enabled mobile devices or remote computers.
Prior to Avvenu, he was Senior Vice President and General Manager of the Open Source Development Network at VA Software Corporation/OSDN, Inc. (now Geeknet, Inc.). At OSDN, he brought together 11 Internet properties, including Slashdot, Sourceforge.net, Freshmeat and Thinkgeek, to pioneer community-driven business models for technology news, discussion, downloads and collaboration. He started his career in enterprise software at companies such as Oracle, Groupe Bull and Cincom.
“Syntonetic is a company that is passionate about music and music technology, and I have a deep appreciation for the dedication of all those who work here,” said French, chief executive officer of Syntonetic. “The company truly has cracked the emotional codes found in music to create a unique playlisting solution, and I look forward to helping it achieve its objectives and realize the success due it in this challenging, yet booming mobile app market.”
French holds a bachelor’s degree in mathematics from the University of Waterloo in Canada. He has spoken at industry events such as CES, Digital Hollywood, Canadian Music Week, LinuxWorld and OracleWorld. He has also addressed general audiences through a series of panels at the Commonwealth Club of California.
About Syntonetic
Syntonetic delivers powerful solutions for leading mobile device manufacturers, mobile operators, online music businesses and streaming music services, and provides applications direct to consumers. The company’s intelligent applications automatically decode unique properties within songs, including moods and emotions, to create new music services that attract and retain users, and applications that change the way people listen to music. More than 1,000,000 customers from 187 different countries have synced over 1 billion songs to create instant playlists based on moods and emotions. Syntonetic offices are located in Frederiksberg, Denmark, and San Francisco, Calif., and can be found online at www.syntonetic.com.
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