Management Team

Ellen is Executive Director and President of the UMBC Research Park Corporation and Special Assistant to the Vice President for Institutional Advancement at University of Maryland Baltimore County (UMBC). She is responsible for overseeing a 515,000 SF high technology research and technology park (bwtech@UMBC) which includes three incubators, an accelerator and research park, and two technology commercialization programs (ACTiVATE and INNoVATE). bwtech@UMBC currently houses 85 companies (including 30 cybersecurity, 30 life science and 15 clean energy companies) and holds equity positions in 25 tenant companies. bwtech@UMBC companies have access to faculty research collaborations, student workers, specialized technology training programs, and a full range of business services including access to experienced entrepreneurs and funding. ACTiVATE and INNoVATE facilitate tech transfer for universities and federal labs and provide entrepreneurial opportunities for women (ACTiVATE) and post docs (INNoVATE).

Ellen sits on the boards of the New Markets Venture Fund, Greater Catonsville Chamber of Commerce (Vice President and Chair, Economic Development), Maryland Business Incubator Association, Research Parks Maryland, and is a member of Baltimore Angels. Ellen is Past President of AURP, the Association of University Research Parks, and is a 2006 graduate of Leadership Maryland. In 2007, she was elected by The Daily Record as one of the Fifty Most Influential Marylanders and as Business Person of the Year by the Greater Catonsville Chamber of Commerce. In the same year, UMBC Research Park Corporation was selected as a Heavy Hitter in Real Estate by the Baltimore Business Journal. In 2009, Ellen was selected as one of Maryland’s Top 100 Women by The Daily Record and received one of SmartCEO’s Brava! Women Business Achievement Awards. More recently, Ellen received the 2011 Innovator of the Year Award recognizing bwtech@UMBC’s innovations in cybersecurity. Ellen was also one of Corridor Inc’s 2011 Person of the Year nominees.

Prior to joining UMBC, Ellen was a Vice President at the Baltimore Development Corporation (BDC) serving as its Senior Lender and Director of the Enterprise Development Fund, the City’s venture capital fund. While at BDC, Ellen successfully started up the city’s first business incubator and spent two years as a business development officer marketing Baltimore to high technology businesses. Prior to joining BDC, Ellen was an Associate with K.S. Sweet Associates, a real estate advisory and development firm, and TDH, a venture capital firm. In addition, after graduating from Cornell University’s Johnson School of Management with an M.B.A., Ellen spent six years as a banker with Mellon Bank (formerly Girard Bank). Ellen has a B.S. (magna cum laude) in Mathematics from Moravian College.

Walt, director, is responsible for managing the Incubator and Accelerator complex and leasing available space at bwtech@UMBC. He is the initial point of contact for incubator and emerging technology companies interested in joining the Incubator and Accelerator Program and/or those interested in initiating potential collaboration opportunities with the university faculty and staff. He, along with the director of Entreprenuerial Services, organizes business reviews of all companies entering the Incubator Program by the center’s Business Advisory Board.

Prior to joining UMBC, Walt served 25 years with the Maryland State Police Department in positions including regional commander of the Drug and Criminal Investigation Bureaus and supervisor of White Collar Criminal Investigations within the Office of the Attorney General. He also served on federal, state and local Task Force Advisory Boards responsible for drug enforcement and drug prevention initiatives. During his career, Walt was recognized by the Maryland State Police Department, federal and local agencies and the community for outstanding service.

Walt has his Real Estate License. He earned a Bachelor of Science (magna cum laude) from the University of Baltimore and is certified as a Real Estate Property Administrator by the Building Owners Management Institute (BOMI).

David’s career in biotechnology and biomedical product development spans over 30 years as a researcher, research manager, consultant, entrepreneur and officer of several start-up biotech companies. He was trained in chemical engineering at the Universities of Cincinnati and Michigan and was a post-doctoral fellow in biochemistry at Purdue University. He then joined Battelle Memorial Institute in Columbus, Ohio where he conducted and managed research on more than 100 projects over a 12-year period.

In 1986 he founded his own biomedical consulting business, Bio-Integration Inc., which was active until 1997. In 1988 he founded and served as president of CollaTek, Inc., in collaboration with Gattefossé SA of Lyon, France, to develop and commercialize technology licensed from Battelle for manufacturing collagen-based medical implants. David became the second employee of Osiris Therapeutics at the time it was founded in 1993. Osiris is a Maryland-based tissue regeneration company with a platform technology based on adult stem cells. In 1997 David became vice president for International Technology Development and was responsible for planning and coordination of all international programs and collaborations conducted by Osiris, including a major corporate partnership with Novartis Pharma, Basel, Switzerland. Fink joined Chondros Inc., a start-up cell therapy company in Baltimore, as its first employee in 2001, and continued as its President and COO until November 2003. He served as Vice President for R&D of Cell Targeting, LLC, a cell therapy start-up in Cleveland, Ohio, from 2005-2008.

As bwtech’s Director of Entrepreneurial Services, David advises early-stage incubator companies.  Heis the Co-PI and Instructor for the INNoVATE program, an entrepreneurship training program for scientists that UMBC offers in collaboration with the Jhons Hopkins Carey Business School.and He is an Adjunct Professor of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering, and serves on UMBC’s Patent Advisory Subcommittee.. He has authored 41 scientific papers and book chapters, and he has been awarded 22 US patents.

As the Entrepreneur-in-Residence at bwtech@UMBC’s Clean Energy Technology Incubator, Bjorn helps startup companies in the clean energy field. Bjorn has more than 35 years of experience across a broad range of technologies; much of it related to IT and energy. During the first ten years of his career, he developed advanced monitoring systems in support of operations of nuclear power plants. He then was the principal developer of a heat rate diagnostic expert system for nuclear and coal-fired power plants. Bjorn also did much R&D in the area of computer network performance and was Principal Investigator on several artificial intelligence applications funded by Department of Energy and other U.S. government agencies. In total, Bjorn has been the PI on 10 SBIR projects. He has strong technical and business experience in software management, design, development and marketing.

Bjorn has a Ph.D. in Nuclear Engineering from the University of California at Berkeley. He has experience as an engineer, manager, executive, entrepreneur and professor. He has co-founded five startup companies and has traveled many times to China in support of a group of entrepreneurs promoting U.S. technology to Chinese power companies. Bjorn has published 26 referenced papers in technical journals and conference proceedings. As a part-time professor for 10 years, he taught entrepreneurship, macroeconomics and MIS.

Vic Hess’ career has spanned a very wide range of successful achievements. He has served in senior positions in all of executive management, marketing, sales, business development, and technical disciplines. These roles have been implemented in a variety of business entities, all the way from the launch and growth of a number of entrepreneurial startups to the creation, development, and direction of the executive team in several midsize and Fortune 1000 companies.

Mr. Hess has consulted for major technology companies such as Intel, Fujitsu America , Cadence Design systems, COMDISCO and numerous small companies both on technology development and strategic market positioning.

Vic is the designer and developer of “Systematic Entrepreneurship” a nationally award winning program that is based upon the premise that businesses can be guided through a structured process toward a more successful, sustainable and profitable growth.

Mr. Hess is a Principal in the strategic management consulting firm Development Resources, LLC and a partner at Genna Associates, LLC strategic management consultants. Additionally he is Entrepreneur-In-Residence at the Cyber Incubator a Cyber Security focused Incubator where his primary responsibilities are to help nurture and develop entrepreneurial technology companies.

Mr. Hess is the author of numerous papers on high technology sales, marketing, business development and corporate management. He was educated in physics at Frostburg State and studied engineering and computer sciences at George Washington University . He also attended the Drucker Graduate School of Management.

Mr. Hess is a member of the American Management Association, The American Marketing Association, and board member of the Howard Community College Technology Advisory Board. He was the founding Chairman of the Howard Tech Council. He also serves as a trustee for TechGrowth, Inc. a not for profit organization focused on entrepreneurial technology development.

Nick Lantuh was the Founder & President of NetWitness Corporation (recently sold to EMC) where he raised funding, built the management team and ran day to day operations from inception to sale (2006 – 2011), culminating in a #23 ranking on the 2010 Inc. 500 List of Fastest Growing Private Companies in the US. In 2010, NetWitness was also recognized by the Virginia Chamber of Commerce as the Fastest Growing Company in the State of Virginia. Prior to this role, he was Vice President of the NetWitness Product Group, a Division of ManTech International, where he was brought in to run day to day operations and formulate the buy-out strategy for the NetWitness Group. Mr. Lantuh brings 20+ years of executive, fund raising & start up leadership, ranging from pre-revenue start-ups to Fortune 100s. He previously ran worldwide sales, marketing and business development teams at companies such as Cisco & Ceridian, and has held similar leadership roles in multiple startups in the networking, security & wireless spaces (Monterey Networks [acquired by Cisco], Trust Digital [acquired by McAfee], Corvis [IPO], Paragon Imaging [acquired by Ceridian], Global-Net [acquired by Globecomm Systems]). Mr. Lantuh was an Ernst & Young “Entrepreneur of the Year” Finalist for Greater Washington in both 2010 & 2011. Mr. Lantuh also sits on numerous industry Advisory Boards as well as private company Boards of Directors.

Mr. Lantuh holds a BS from Cornell University, an MBA from the University of Rochester’s Simon Graduate School of Business and has also completed the Executive Program at Stanford University’s Graduate School of Business.

Alagra is primarily responsible for all of the general accounting functions related to the management of bwtech@UMBC, a commercial real estate complex which includes eight buildings and several state of the art conference rooms.

Prior to joining UMBC, Alagra was the Assistant Director of Finance and Budget at the Department of Public Safety and Correctional Services – Information Technology Communications Division. She also served as the Chief Financial Officer of the Development Credit Fund, Inc. for 5 years.

Alagra earned her MBA from UMUC in 2009 and her Bachelor’s in Accounting from Howard University. She is also a Notary Public for the State of Maryland.

Allie manages all cyber security and tech-related incubator operations in the Research and Technology Park including: database management, leasing, website content, event planning, social media management, interior design, program coordination and marketing, business development, and administrative duties. Allie coordinates events at bwtech's Cyber Incubator and acts as liaison between the executives, administrators, faculty and staff of UMBC and bwtech@UMBC and the executives of bwtech companies. She also maintains a prospect and client database for the Research Park and provides tours of vacant space for bwtech prospects. Allie graduated from Dickinson College in 2010 with a degree in Psychology and a Health Certificate and attended The Park School of Baltimore. She is currently a master's candidate at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, studying in the Industrial/Organizational Psychology program.