| Roger Strauch is chairman of The Roda Group, an early stage venture capital group, based in Berkeley, California. The firm, co-founded in 1997 with Dan Miller, is focused on investment opportunities that address the consequences of climate change, stress on the Earth’s natural resources and the increased demand for low carbon energy. They are lead investors in mOasis, which has developed a polymer based soil amendment that increases water and nutrient retention around the roots of plants; Inventys, which has developed a post-combustion CO 2 capture technology for power plants; and Gridtential Energy, Inc., which has developed an advanced lead acid battery that incorporates semiconductor wafers inside the battery to greatly increase performance in energy storage applications.
The Roda Group was the lead investor in Solazyme, a renewable oil and bioproducts company and the leader in algal biotechnology. In 2009, 2010 and 2013, Biofuels Digest named Solazyme as the Hottest Bioenergy Company of the Year.
Roger is Chairman of the Board of Directors of Cool Systems, the manufacturer of Game Ready, a medical physical therapy system.
He was the first CEO and former chairman of Ask Jeeves (now Ask.com), a leading search engine on the web. Mr. Strauch was a board member and former CEO of Symmetricom, a public telecommunications equipment manufacturer. In 1983 he co-founded TCSI Corp., a telecom software company. As TCSI’s chairman and CEO, Mr. Strauch led the company from a start-up to a successful IPO in 1991 and secondary public offering in 1996.
Mr. Strauch is a member of the Engineering Dean’s College Advisory Board of the University of California at Berkeley. He is the recipient of the 2002 Wheeler Oak Meritorious Award from the University of California at Berkeley. In 2006, Mr. Strauch and his wife Dr. Julie Kulhanjian were named and honored as “Builders of Berkeley.” He is an executive member of the Board of Trustees of the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute and the Berkeley Repertory Theatre. Mr. Strauch is a member of the Advisory Board to the Yale Institute of Biospheric Studies. He is a Life Trustee of the Armenian Assembly of America. Mr. Strauch is a member of the Madison Council, a philanthropic advisory board to the Librarian of Congress. He is also on the Board of Trustees of the Northside Center for Child Development, a mental health social services agency in Harlem, New York City.
Mr. Strauch endowed the Roger A. Strauch Chair in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences and co-founded the William Saroyan Endowment for Armenian Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. Mr. Strauch is the Chairman of the Paros Foundation, which supports arts and education organizations in Armenia. |
