Tom Scholl · Director
Tom is a successful entrepreneur and investor with experience sitting on both sides of the boardroom table. He has more than 25 years of experience in communications systems, equipment, chipsets, and software, and has been active in the high-tech start-up scene in the Washington metro area for more than 15 years.
He currently sits on the boards of Novak Biddle portfolio companies Centice, Paratek, Princeton Optronics, Sennari, Command Information, Fiberzone Networks, and Digital Bridge.
In 1990, Tom founded Telogy Networks, a leader in providing embedded communications software products for wireless and IP networks. Telogy’s award-winning products were proven market successes with world-class customers such as Cisco, Motorola, Samsung, Nortel, Alcatel, and NEC. In 1998, Motorola purchased Telogy’s digital cellular technology and development team for more than $40M, and in 1999, Texas Instruments purchased Telogy as the leader in embedded VOIP software for more than $700M.
Prior to joining Novak Biddle, Tom co-founded and was chairman of Cognio, a developer of spectrum management and MIMO antenna technology for wireless applications. Cognio was acquired by Cisco in October 2007. Tom has also served as a Director of Torrent Networking, acquired by Ericsson, and Integrated Telecom, acquired by PMC Sierra.
In 1995, Tom was recognized as the Joseph A. Sciulli "Entrepreneur of the Year" by the Maryland High Technology Council. Prior to Telogy, Tom was Senior Vice President of Engineering at Hughes Network Systems, a combination of M/A-Com DCC and Linkabit.
Tom is a member of the Board of Trustees at the University of Maryland and Chairman of the Board of Visitors at the Clark School of Engineering. He is also a member of the Dean’s Advisory Council of the College of Liberal Arts at Purdue University.
Tom has patents relating to software, the Internet, and digital telephone systems, and he is the author of "Packet Switching" in McGraw Hill’s Electronic Communications Handbook. He’s a member of IEEE and ACM, and he is an alumnus of Purdue University and the Executive Management program at MIT Sloan School.
Growing up, Tom was an avid Ham radio operator and an Eagle Scout.
