Leadership team bios
DONALD R. DePRIEST , Chairman of the Board of Critical RF, Inc.
Mr. DePriest also served as Chairman of the Board of Directors of MCT Corp., a cellular carrier that established over 29 cell phone ventures in the former Soviet Union, including Russia and Central Asia. Mr. DePriest led the successful sale of MCT Corp.’s operations in July 2007.
He has extensive experience as an entrepreneur and as an investor in the telecommunications industry. He founded Charisma Communications Corporation (through its predecessors and affiliates, "Charisma") in 1982, serving as Chairman of the Board and President through the sale of its operations in 1986 and 1987. Charisma developed and operated eleven mobile systems in the major cities in the southeastern United States.
Mr. DePriest formed MCT Investors, L.P. ("MCTI") in 1987 to develop telecommunications and health care ventures, serving as President of the General Partner since inception. He has served as a director of several MCTI portfolio companies, including his responsibility as Chairman of the Board of American Telecasting, Inc. ("ATEL") which was sold to Sprint in 1999. MCT Corporation w as spun out as a separate operating company from MCTI in 1995.
Mr. DePriest also founded Boundary Healthcare Products Corporation ("Boundary") in 1987 to implement a leveraged buy-out of the Boundary Division of the Kendall Company, serving as Chairman of the Board through its sale to Maxxim Medical, Inc. (NYSE symbol MAM) in 1992. He served as a director of MAM through its going private in 1999. Mr. DePriest has been a multi-market owner of mid-size and smaller radio stations in southeast U.S. cities.
JOHN REARDON , CEO of Critical RF, Inc. Mr. Reardon helped launch Critical RF in 2006, based on his interest in deploying Radio over IP technology to achieve interoperability among first responders and other users of two-way radios and related devices.
Mr. Reardon also serves as CEO of Maritime Communications/Land Mobile, LLC, where he was responsible for putting together much of the AMTS footprint that the company holds today.
Prior to joining the Company, Mr. Reardon served for five years as the President and CEO of Mobex Communications, Inc., and its subsidiary, Mobex Network Services, LLC. In that role, Mr. Reardon led the sale of 800 MHz licenses to Nextel in 2001. Mr. Reardon also oversaw the acquisition of AMTS licenses by Mobex, and shaped the direction of the FCC’s regulatory policy through his advocacy.
Mr. Reardon is a 1993 graduate of Columbia Law School. He is active in several trade associations, including Comcare, the interoperability trade association, and EWA, the two-way radio trade association.
STEVE CALABRESE , Founder and CTO of Critical RF, Inc. Mr. Calabrese is the founder of the Company, having dedicated most of his professional life to the pursuit of communications interoperability for first responders and others in the two-way radio industry. Mr. Calabrese brings his extensive knowledge of two-way radios, as well as software design and telecommunications architectures, to bear in the development and advancement of new technologies for the Company.
TIM SMITH , COO of Critical RF, Inc. Mr. Smith has been involved with radio frequency engineering for the past 18 years, first as part of Waterway Communications Systems, Inc. (Watercom), a provider of ship to shore communications for vessels along the inland waterways and Gulf of Mexico. Later, Mr. Smith worked at Mobex Communications, Inc. as head of a large two-way radio spectrum operation. Mr. Smith has extensive experience working with hardware and software related to Radio over IP as well as two-way radios.
