Directors

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Neil Furukawa is an accomplished operating executive with over 25 years of expertise solving hard problems in government defense and commercial markets. Neil’s expertise is in the creation of early stage technology start-ups through rapid growth. Prior to founding AKUA as CEO, Neil spent five years as the Chief Operating Officer at CyberPoint International from startup to over 250 employees and $85M+ in revenue. He is the inventor of U.S. Patent 5,987,069.

Laurie Meyer is a technology strategist with over 30 years of experience in aerospace and marine engineering. She has extensive experience leading research and development of advanced technologies to deliver real world projects. She was Chief Technologist at Lockheed Martin leading a team to design Ocean Thermal Energy Conversion plants and prototype key enabling technologies. Laurie is presently Senior Vice President at Moana Minerals Ltd.

Tim Stevens is an inventor with seven patents granted to date. U.S. Patent 11,276,127 was granted on March 15, 2022, “Recommending Matches Using Machine Learning”. The novel neural network architecture in this patent provides the technical foundation for AI Recommend. Tim served as a Lockheed Martin Fellow and was previously the Chief Systems Engineer at General Dynamics Advanced Information Systems.

Neal Linkon served as the Director of Marketing Operations for  Children’s Wisconsin. His career included work as a consultant and for  Fortune 500 companies, with responsibilities ranging from public  relations to internal communications to marketing, with a focus on  digital marketing over the latter half of his career. Neal was inducted  into the Healthcare Internet Hall of Fame in 2016 and was given the John  A. Eudes Vision and Excellence Award in 2021.

Flannery Stevens is a compassionate sustainability scientist who  is devoted to a more sustainable future through the integration of a  diverse set of fields to problem solve. She graduated cum laude with a  B.S in Ecosystem Science and Sustainability from Colorado State  University. She is presently working as a Project Manager Assistant at Northwest Electric and Solar.