Thomas Sonderman

Mr. Sonderman joined SkyWater in 2017 as the lead executive, driving the company’s successful business transformation from an IDM to a pure play foundry. He has effectively diversified SkyWater’s customer base by defining new product markets and target customers while simultaneously improving operational efficiencies. Mr. Sonderman has leveraged SkyWater as the only U.S.-based and U.S.-owned semiconductor foundry to expand the company’s government business and to focus on reinstating a strong commercial manufacturing presence in the U.S. He has built a world class leadership team that inspires 500 employees to deliver process R&D innovation and operational excellence.

Mr. Sonderman’s extensive industry experience in all aspects of fab operations has delivered market leadership and increased shareholder value to high-technology industry leaders Rudolph Technologies, GLOBALFOUNDRIES and AMD. Notably, he played a critical role serving as part of an executive team at AMD that spun-off manufacturing operations to form GLOBALFOUNDRIES.

Mr. Sonderman is a widely recognized subject matter expert, author of 47 patents and highly sought-after industry speaker. He received a BS in Chemical Engineering from Missouri University of Science Technology and an MS in Electrical Engineering from National Technological University.

Steve Wold

With more than 25 years of leadership experience in senior corporate finance roles, Mr. Wold provides key insight and strategy on both short-term and long-term growth of the company. As Chief Administrative Officer, he oversees critical business operating functions to streamline business processes and drive efficiencies across all aspects of the organization. He most recently served as Chief Financial Officer of SkyWater and prior to this, he was a key member of the leadership team of Arctic Cat Inc. (formerly NASDAQ:ACAT), where he was instrumental in completing the sale of the company to Textron Inc. in 2017. Previously, he served with Orbital ATK (NYSE:OA), for 18 years where he was focused on transforming processes, change management, and driving operational efficiencies as the company grew from approximately $1B to more than $5B in revenue. Mr. Wold began his career as a CPA with Deloitte Audit and Assurance focusing on providing services to both publicly traded and privately held manufacturing entities. He holds a Bachelor of Accountancy from the University of North Dakota and is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and the Minnesota Society of CPAs.

Steve Manko

Mr. Manko utilizes his extensive finance background in working with his team to drive profitability and enhance the value of the organization. He achieves this by collaborating with other leaders in the company to understand their challenges and opportunities, and develop a strategy for increased returns on investment. Prior to joining SkyWater as Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Manko was Managing Director at Riveron Consulting where he led the Financial Advisory Services practice in Minneapolis. He and his team assisted companies through various change events such as acquisitions and internal process changes and optimizations. Previously, Mr. Manko was at Ernst & Young and specialized in the Banking & Capital Markets industries. He spent time in the Cleveland, Ohio and Honolulu, Hawaii offices, before moving with his family to the Twin Cities in 2015. Mr. Manko holds a Master of Business Administration from The University of Akron and a Bachelor of Arts in Accounting and Business Administration from Malone University. He is also a member of various accounting and finance committees and organizations.

Brad Ferguson

Dr. Ferguson is responsible for developing the company’s technology roadmap and IP strategy by identifying high growth markets for SkyWater’s Technology Foundry business along with continuing to lead SkyWater’s government relations efforts. Previously, he served as Sr. Director of Sales in the custom foundry line of business at SkyWater and was responsible for the government relations strategy. He started his career in photolithography process development at Cypress Semiconductor. In 2008, Dr. Ferguson started up the Cypress custom foundry business to provide differentiated solutions to technology innovators. He also drove the accreditation process to achieve Trusted Foundry status which launched the site’s entry into the aerospace and defense market, a key component of SkyWater’s market strategy. Dr. Ferguson received a B.S. degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, and an M.S. and Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin.

John Kent

Mr. Kent is responsible for leading SkyWater’s technical vision and strategy for developing technology roadmaps and design enablement capabilities and partnerships to facilitate successful silicon for SkyWater customers. His 40 plus years of experience in the semiconductor industry include demonstrated successes in technology development, operations and leadership positions. Mr. Kent’s prior experience includes VP of Foundry IP; Customer Design Enablement at GLOBALFOUNDRIES, executive level positions with KLA-Tencor in the Wafer Inspection Group, and technology development leadership positions at Rambus and AMIS (now ON Semiconductor). Previously, for more than two decades he held a variety of positions at IBM Microelectronics with responsibilities for the development of various technologies, including a focus on DRAM/embedded DRAM process development. Mr. Kent holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from Michigan State University.

Mark Litecky

Mr. Litecky is responsible for growing and expanding SkyWater’s revenue strategies, systems and programs needed to drive profitable and predictable growth for the company. He is focused on building and aligning revenue generating teams to meet the needs of targeted markets and further expanding SkyWater’s diversified customer relationships. Mr. Litecky’s 30 plus years of industry expertise includes sales, marketing and business development roles, with leadership skills in organizational development, technology development, engineering and operations. His previous experience includes executive level leadership roles with GCM, Interlink Electronics, Soligie (Molex), Starkey Labs, August Technology (Rudolph Technologies), NT International (Entegris), and Rosemount Inc. (Emerson Process Controls). Mr. Litecky holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Minnesota.

Srila LaRochelle

Ms. LaRochelle is responsible for supporting SkyWater customers in the western region and aligning technology roadmaps with strategic customer requirements. She is also focused on new customer engagement in target markets to expand revenue and fab utilization. Ms. LaRochelle has more than 30 years of experience in the semiconductor industry. Prior to joining SkyWater, she was the Head of ASIC Sales for North America at GLOBALFOUNDRIES (former IBM Microelectronics division). Prior to this, Ms. LaRochelle was AVP of Business Development at United Microelectronics Corporation (UMC). Throughout her career, she has held various management and individual contributor positions in Marketing, Business Development and Sales at SanDisk (now Western Digital), LSI Logic (now Avago Technologies), Hitachi America, Actel (now Microsemi) and Harris Semiconductor (now Renesas). Ms. LaRochelle received her MBA from Florida Institute of Technology, and her Bachelor of Science degree from University of Central Florida.

Tom Legere

Mr. Legere focuses on evolving and enhancing SkyWater’s operations and driving foundry efficiency to support its customer partnerships and the company’s long-term growth objectives. He brings more than 30 years of expertise in operational excellence across a diverse array of industries and technology segments. He has held senior operational roles at various companies, most notably Aurora Semiconductor, Sonavation, eSolar, SVTC, Cypress Semiconductor and Atmel. Mr. Legere brings an ideal combination of leadership and operational talent to SkyWater with extensive industry experience in aerospace and defense, life sciences, security, MEMS, renewable energy and semiconductors. He has led both mature and start-up companies with extensive implementation experience in Design for Manufacturability (DFM), lean and six sigma principles, supply chain management and customer engagement. Mr. Legere began his career at Fairchild Semiconductor where he received a Sherman Fairchild scholarship grant. He studied economics and mathematics at Amherst College and holds an MBA from the University of Colorado, Colorado Springs.