Board of Directors
Beta-Rubicon's business is conducted by its employees, managers and officers under the direction of its President and the oversight of the Board to enhance the long-term value of the Company for its stockholders. The Board of Directors is elected by the stockholders to oversee management and to assure that the long-term interests of the stockholders are being served. Both the Board of Directors and management recognize that the long-term interests of the stockholders are advanced by responsibly addressing the concerns of all stakeholders and interested parties including employees, customers or clients, our communities, governments and the public at large.
Mr. Bill Ackerman, Director
Mr. Ackerman has been spent his entire career in financial planning, specializing in closely-held corporations, estate planning, and insurance, and he has headed his own company, Tax Concepts, Inc., for almost 20 years. His clients range across eight states, from California to Arkansas to Florida.
Mr. Ackerman is a former member of the Arkansas Game & Fish Commission and is a past board member and chairman of the Area Council on Aging. He is currently the treasurer of the NWA Community Development Commission, which services a nine-county area and is headquartered in Harrison. An Eagle Scout himself, Mr. Ackerman is active in the Boy Scouts of America and is past president of the American Fishing Association.
A native of New Mexico, he attended the New Mexico Military Institute in Roswell and earned his Bachelor's degree in Business & Accounting from Eastern New Mexico University.
Mr. Richard Bundrick, Director
Mr. Bundrick spent two years in the transportation industry with Arkansas-Best Corporation and returned to northwest Arkansas in 1981 to accept a position as an investment broker with A. G. Edwards. After a 15-year investment industry career, he founded a privately-held real estate, development and construction company, which he currently heads and which is his primary business interest.
Mr. Bundrick earned his B.S.B.A. in marketing at the University of Arkansas.
Ms. Laurel Donoho, Director
Ms. Donoho, whose expertise is market research and marketing strategy and analysis, is a principal and co-founder of VentureRAMP, a San Antonio, Texas, high-technology business generator providing business development and marketing research services. Prior to founding VentureRAMP, Ms. Donoho served as a director of research at Frost & Sullivan, an internationally known marketing consulting company. In her 12-year tenure with that company, her responsibilities include authoring numerous reports and executing client engagements, launching and managing several different research practices for the company, founding and managing a new corporate office in San Antonio, and working with many of Frost & Sullivan's top clients.
In her 20+ year career, Ms. Donoho has been involved in a wide range of strategic consulting projects and business operations activities with companies of all sizes, from Fortune 1000 to start-ups. She has advised clients on market trends, implications, and strategies on such diverse topics as wireless sensors, nanotechnology, consumer and commercial electronics products, industrial measuring and monitoring equipment, medical markets, and state-local community business developments projects.
She earned her M.B.A. (with a specialization in marketing) from San Jose State University and graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.A. in history from Point Loma College in California.
Dr. Collins R. Geren, Director
Dr. Geren is Dean of the Graduate School and Vice Provost for Research for the University of Arkansas. He previously served as Chair of the Chemistry and Biochemistry Department and interim chair for the Department of Biological Sciences at the U of A. He also serves as Coordinator of the Arkansas Biotechnology Center.
Dr. Geren was honored in the Who's Who in Frontier Science and Technology Who's Who in the Southwest. He received the NIH Research Career Development Award, the University's Distinguished Alumni Award in Teaching in 1986, and is listed among American Men and Women of Science.
Dr. Geren has been involved with approximately 60 publications and is presently working on several projects that include biological and chemical characterization of venom components; protein purification and characterization techniques; monoclonal antibody technology; and biochemical pharmacology. Dr. Geren's Ph.D. is Biochemistry is from Oklahoma State University, and his M.S. in Chemistry is from Kansas State College of Pittsburg. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Education at Northeastern Oklahoma State University.
Dr. R. R. (Ron) Goforth, Director & Chairman
Dr. R. R. Goforth is President of Beta-Rubicon, Inc., which he founded in 1999. He has been active in management consulting to private sector organizations, governmental agencies and academic institutions for over twenty years. He has served on the advisory boards of numerous technology-based and start-up companies and start-ups.
Dr. Goforth has provided technology assessments, R & D management services, project planning, and oversight services for: PetroCanada, Ltd.; Arkansas Science and Technology Authority; Motorola, Inc.; Cities Service; Energy Techniques, Inc.; the United States Food and Drug Administration; the University of Arkansas; the Institute of Industrial Engineering, Suranaree University of Technology (Thailand); Tec, Ltd. (Vancouver, Canada); the United States Information Agency; and the United Nations Environmental Program (Paris).
In addition to his management consulting experience, Dr. Goforth has been a tenured professor of Computer Systems Engineering, as well as adjunct Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville. He was the founding director of the Center for Artificial Intelligence and Expert Systems and of the Advanced Manufacturing Technology Laboratory at the University of Arkansas.
Dr. Goforth served for 10 years as the Director of Research and Environmental Affairs for Syncrude Canada, Ltd. (widely recognized as the largest materials handling and synthetic crude oil production facility in the Western hemisphere). He was a Senior Research Fellow at the U.S. Navy NHRC in San Diego, California, a Fulbright Fellow at the University of the South Pacific (Fiji), and has held a royal appointment as Professor of Computer Systems Engineering at the Institute of Industrial Technology, Suranaree University of Technology (Thailand).
He holds both a B.S. degree in Chemistry and an M.S. degree in Inorganic Chemistry from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, as well as a Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry from the University of Alberta in Edmonton, Canada.
Ms. Michelle A. ("Micki") Harrington, Director
Ms. Harrington is the founding partner of Harrington, Miller, Neihouse & Kieklak is a full-service, mid-size business law firm located in Springdale, Arkansas. Her areas of specialization are general corporate law, business and contract law, trusts, wills, estate planning, land use and real estate law, and hospital law. Ms. Harrington is from Terre Haute, Indiana, and she has lived in Northwest Arkansas for more than 25 years. She graduated with honors from the University of Kansas in 1975 with a Bachelor of Arts degree and practiced social work with Youth Bridge, Inc. after moving to Fayetteville. She later attended law school and graduated in with honors in 1985 from the University of Arkansas School of Law in Fayetteville.
She served as Deputy City Attorney for the City of Springdale for eleven years, acting primarily as counsel to the Planning Commission and handling land use matters. Ms. Harrington is currently serving as legal counsel to the Siloam Springs Memorial Hospital.