CFT Directors

John Mallard – Executive Chairman of the Board of Directors

John Mallard is a veteran entrepreneur in Silicon Valley. Mallard was CTO at National Semiconductor, CEO and founder of PortalPlayer, Inc., and CEO for a turn-around at Fyre Storm, Inc. He is a CFT founding member and was responsible for raising the initial investment, recruiting a high-performance team, and most recently closing a second round of investment and joint development agreement with Dow Venture Capital.

Jerry Corcoran – CFO

Jerry has over 25 years of executive level experience in high-tech, venture capital, private equity, turnarounds and manufacturing. Prior to CFT, he was VP, Finance and Executive Search at Essential Solutions, a boutique executive recruiting firm focused on VC-funded startups. Prior to joining Essential Solutions, Jerry was CFO and EVP of Marketing, Engineering, and Operations for Fyre Storm, Inc., a digital power semiconductor startup. Previously, he held executive positions at: Galleon Corporation (GaAs MMIC’s, transceivers and ODUs); Spectrian Corporation (RF power semiconductor and systems); Syquest Technology (removable media hard drives), Hiller Investments (turnarounds and private equity), and Waterbury Screw Machine (metal fabricator). He holds a degree in Physics from Rice University.

Frank Dutro – Managing Director

Frank Dutro is an entrepreneur and successful business owner. As a CFT founder, he developed the first CFT business plan and formed CFT's founding team. Prior to CFT, Dutro started several businesses and held positions in technology and marketing for Silicon Graphics and The Walt Disney Company.

Dianne J. McCord Maughon - Director

Dianne Maughon has been the New Business Development Director for Dow Water & Process Solutions (DW&PS) since 2007. Prior to her role in DW&PS, she was a senior finance manager in Dow's Venture Capital Group where her focus was on equity investments in start-up companies in the life sciences area as well as in opportunities aligned with Dow's strategic and sustainability objectives. Previous Dow roles were in research and development for Dow's Styrenics Business and in Corporate Research.

Christopher Jones – Director

Christopher Jones is an investment manager in the Venture Capital group at The Dow Chemical Company. Jones joined Dow in 1999 in Dow's Research Assignments Program and next accepted a research role in Dow Core R&D in 2000, where he was responsible for developing and scaling up separations technologies for new applications in the crystallization, distillation, and adsorption spaces. Jones then accepted a position in Dow New Products R&D in 2006 to lead their Opportunity Identification Team for new business development.