Attorney Performance Measurement

Rob Thomas is a widely published authority and frequent speaker on the use of technology for collaboration and the measurement of attorney performance. His articles have appeared in the ABA’s Law Practice Management, the ACCA Docket, Risk Management, and LawNet’s Peer-to-Peer, including the keynote article for LawNet’s 2001 series of technology white papers for corporate legal departments. He has spoken on the use of legal technology by legal teams and attorney performance assessment at national professional conferences such as the ABA’s Techshow, ACCA’s E-Lawyer, LawNet’s annual meeting, and the ABA National Conference on Professional Responsibility. He led the creation of the annual ACCA/Serengeti Managing Outside Counsel Survey, and for the past five years has written the 150+ page report analyzing the latest trends in how law departments are managing their work with outside law firms

Prior to joining Serengeti, Rob had more than twenty years of diverse experiences as a practicing attorney, including service as managing partner of Stokes Lawrence, a Seattle commercial law firm. Previously, he handled litigation and corporate finance transactions for Bogle & Gates, then the largest commercial law firm in Seattle. He has had extensive experience managing multi-firm national legal teams as coordinating counsel for large corporate clients. He has also handled international transactions while working with a Japanese law firm in Tokyo.

Rob received his undergraduate degree with honors and Phi Beta Kappa from Princeton University. His law degree is from Stanford Law School, where he was a member of the Stanford Law Review.

Security, Privilege and the Internet

Tom Melling is Serengeti’s Vice President, Product Management. He oversees the implementation and training team that supports law departments and law firms that are using Tracker. Tom has extensive experience as a transactional attorney specializing in business transactions, intellectual property, and e-commerce law. He is currently Vice-Chair of the Washington State Bar Committee of the Law of Commerce in Cyberspace, and is a member of the Information Security Committee of the American Bar Association.

Prior to becoming a Vice President of Serengeti Law, Tom practiced law at Perkins Coie in Seattle, Washington. His practice specialized in Internet and e-commerce law, including:

   ■ Electronic contract enforceability
   ■ Public key infrastructures
   ■ Data privacy, protection, and use issues
   ■  Encryption
   ■ Regulatory compliance
   ■ Documentation and negotiation of strategic alliances, technology
       licenses, co-branding agreements, and linking agreements

He also practiced at Hillis Clark Martin & Peterson, P.S., during which time he represented his primary client making multi-million dollar debt and equity investments in large real estate developments.

Tom received a B.A. in civil engineering from Brown University graduating magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa. His law degree is from Stanford Law School, where he was a member of the Stanford Law Review and received a Fellowship from the Stanford Center on Conflict and Negotiation. After graduating from Stanford Law School, Tom clerked for Judge Jerome Farris, U.S. Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit.

Infrastructure Design and Enterprise Software Systems

Richard Boone is the Company’s Vice President, Operations. Richard heads the development team and the team that maintains the hardware and software infrastructure for Serengeti.

Richard has over twenty years of experience in the design, planning, and implementation of state-of-the-art technologies in diverse industries. This includes enterprise level responsibility for data security, on-line transaction processing, project management, client/server development, network design and operation, and infrastructure design and operation. The industries in which he has worked include financial services, insurance, commercial software, forest products, and telecommunications. Just prior to joining Serengeti, he managed the technical infrastructure for a rapidly growing national wireless telecommunications company. His duties included management of enterprise voice and data network design, and technical operations support for multiple call centers, corporate operations, and data processing centers.