Management Team

The Accelrys management team includes:

Max Carnecchia
President & Chief Executive Officer

Max Carnecchia is President and CEO of Accelrys and also serves on the board of directors. Mr. Carnecchia brings more than two decades of high technology experience to his position. Most recently, he served as President of Interwoven, a global leader in content management solutions. At Interwoven, he ran the day to day operations of the business and led the company through 21 consecutive quarters of year over year revenue growth and operating margin expansion. Interwoven was acquired by Autonomy Corporation, PLC, in a transaction valued at approximately $800 million in Q1 2009. Mr. Carnecchia joined Interwoven in 2001 as Vice President of Alliances, and was then promoted to Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales, overseeing the company’s global field organization prior to being promoted to President. Before Interwoven, he was Vice President of Global Sales for Xoriant, Vice President of Worldwide Field Operations for Smart DB Corporation sales, and has also held management positions at Intel and Group 1 Software. He holds a Bachelor of Engineering in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from The Stevens Institute of Technology.

Michael A. Piraino
Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

Michael A. Piraino is Chief Financial Officer of Accelrys. Prior to joining Accelrys, he served as Co-founder and Chief Financial Officer of M2 Technology Partners, LLC, a private investment company focused on domestic and international acquisitions of software and services businesses. Before M2, he was Executive Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Epicor Software Corporation, a leading global provider of enterprise business software solutions for midmarket-sized companies. He was instrumental in Epicor’s merger, acquisition, and capital markets activities and led the negotiations, acquisition, and integration of ten companies during his tenure. Piraino received his B.S. in Accounting from Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles. and is also a Certified Public Accountant.

Dr. Frank Brown
Senior Vice President and Chief Science Officer

Frank K. Brown, Ph.D., has served as Senior Vice President and Chief Science Officer for Accelrys since October 2006. He has extensive experience in the areas of Computational Chemistry and Chemoinformatics, and is responsible for both the informatics and scientific direction of the company and all collaborative research with academic, government and industrial partners. Prior to joining Accelrys, Dr. Brown held positions of increasing responsibility at Johnson & Johnson, one of the world’s largest pharmaceutical companies, most recently serving as Senior Research Fellow within the Office of the CIO. In this position, he oversaw the informatics and information management architectural plan for all R&D in the organization’s Pharma sector. Before Johnson & Johnson, he started the first Chemoinformatics group in the industry at Glaxo Research Institute, and launched software products targeted to the pharmaceutical industry as Vice President for Product and Business Development at Oxford Molecular Group. Dr. Brown has also served as an adjunct associate professor in the Department of Medicinal Chemistry, School of Pharmacy, at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, as a Chair for the American Chemical Society (ACS) Computers in Chemistry section, and as an editor and advisor to publications. He also served six years on an NIH Special Study. He holds a Ph.D. in Physical Organic Chemistry from the University of Pittsburgh, and did post-doctoral studies in Biophysics at UCSF. His research has been published in more than 50 peer reviewed journals and trade magazines and he has given more than 70 national and international invited lectures.

Dr. Matt Hahn
Senior Vice President, Research and Development

As Senior Vice President, Research and Development, Matt Hahn, Ph.D., oversees product development at Accelrys, including the implementation of the scientific informatics platform underpinning the company's broad software solutions. He has been designing and creating software solutions for the research community for over 25 years. He co-founded SciTegic in 1999, and as CEO, led the company through significant growth to become the market leader in scientific workflow solutions, serving most of the world’s leading pharmaceutical companies. In 2004, SciTegic was acquired by Accelrys, where subsequently Dr. Hahn served first as General Manager of the company’s SciTegic division and later as Chief Science and Technology Officer. Prior to founding SciTegic, Dr. Hahn was Director of Development at Molecular Simulations Inc., where for ten years he oversaw the development and market introduction of a wide range of successful chemistry and informatics software products. He received his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Santa Cruz, under Professor W.T. Wipke, co-founder of MDL.

Paul Burrin
Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer

Paul Burrin is Senior Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer of Accelrys. Prior to joining Accelrys, he was responsible for sales, strategy and services in the Asia Pacific region for Google. Before Google, he held senior global sales, marketing and product management positions with Oracle Corporation, Chordiant Software, and Hyperion Solutions (subsequently acquired by Oracle Corporation).  He also has considerable international experience having lived and worked in the United States, Europe and Asia. Burrin received his B.S. in Environmental Science from Kings College at the University of London and his Ph.D. in Earth Science from the London School of Economics at the University of London. 

David Mersten
Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary

As Senior Vice President, General Counsel and Secretary, David Mersten is responsible for leading the legal and corporate governance functions within Accelrys. In this role, he and his staff oversee legal issues related to commercial licensing, contract negotiations and administration, mergers, acquisitions, finance, intellectual property/patents, labor and litigation, and stock administration. He also acts as Secretary to the company’s Board of Directors. Throughout his career, Mr. Mersten has gained considerable experience managing the legal offices of publicly-held technology firms. Prior to joining Accelrys, he was Vice President, General Counsel, Assistant Secretary and Compliance Officer at Applied Micro Circuits Corporation. Before that, he was Corporate Counsel for Integrated Device Technology, Inc. Admitted to the California Bar in 1990, he graduated Magna Cum Laude with a B.S. in Political Science from the University of California, Los Angeles and received his JD Cum Laude from the Hastings College of Law at the University of California, San Francisco.

Ilene Vogt
Senior Vice President, Worldwide Sales and Services

As Senior Vice President of Worldwide Sales and Services, Ilene Vogt oversees all sales, pre-sales, services, customer support and field marketing activities for Accelrys. Prior to joining the company in 2008, she was Senior Vice President of Worldwide Operations at Actuate Corporation, an enterprise software company specializing in business intelligence solutions. During her 14 year tenure there, she helped grow the company’s revenues from $2 million to $150 million. Ms. Vogt’s nearly 30 years experience in software sales also includes various sales positions at Interleaf (acquired by Broadvision) and Autographix. She holds a B.S. in Education from Ithaca College.

Judith Ohrn Hicks
Vice President, Human Resources

Judith Ohrn Hicks and her team are responsible for the recruiting, retention, training, and development of Accelrys’ worldwide staff. She has more than 20 years of experience in the field of human resource management and has spent a significant amount of her career staffing and developing organizations for emerging high technology companies. Prior to joining Accelrys, Mrs. Hicks was Vice President, Human Resources at Pharmacopeia, a biotechnology company (acquired by Ligand Pharmaceuticals in 2008.) She began her career in the specialty retail division at General Mills and has also held management positions with Ward Management Group, a prominent human resource consulting firm, and Software Developers Corporation, a publicly-traded software company. She holds a B.S. in Finance and Marketing from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts.