Jon Thomas is Chief Financial Officer at Photonics Foundries, an optical electronics company. He is also a founder at Quicksilver Capital, where he advises and invests in private equity acquisition strategies. Jon has held senior investment banking roles at Stout Capital and Woodside Capital, where he focused on M&A and capital raise for technology companies. Jon was previously a hedge fund portfolio manager at Ziegler Lotsoff Capital, a boutique asset management firm in Chicago. He began his career in finance at JP Morgan Chase, where he held positions in New York, Hong Kong, and Thailand. Jon has served over a decade on the ICA San José board.

Jackie is one of twelve in her family to have graduated from Cal.  A Cornell business school grad, she worked as a marketing communications manager for many years and supports this function on the board.  She also holds a college counseling credential and teaches a summer workshop on careers in STEM to underserved high school women.  An ardent supporter of the California Community Colleges system, she’s studied theatre, writing and art history (Humanities AA) with excellent local instructors.  Free time finds her pondering art that pulls at our seams and opens our minds.

Jonathan Axelrad is a consultant and expert witness who specializes in matters relating to venture capital and other types of private investment funds.  He retired from the practice of law in 2018, having been a partner with the law firms Goodwin Procter and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati.  Earlier, he was an associate with Sullivan & Cromwell in New York and received his law degree from the Yale Law School.  He has been involved with the venture capital community since 1990 and has had the privilege to work with some of the most exciting and interesting venture capital firms in Silicon Valley and around the world.

Renee Billingslea is Teaching Professor at Santa Clara University, where she teaching photography. She earned a Master’s degree in Photography from San Jose State University, in 2003. Her art practice combines photography and stitching to illuminate historical issues of injustice, racial violence, trauma, and privilege. Research is central to her creative process, enriching the stories she tells. She is also a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer who served in Kiribati, Central Pacific.

With over 35 years of experience driving innovation at the intersection of technology, media, and science, I am a detail-oriented executive, entrepreneur, engineer, and architect passionate about building world-class software solutions. My career spans leadership roles at Apple, Pixar, and multiple startups, where I’ve led groundbreaking work in AI, computer graphics, and advanced data systems.

Currently, I am a Senior Engineer at Apple, where I focus on generative AI, large language models, and machine learning solutions for advanced video applications. Previously, I founded StormQuant, pioneering next-generation radar technology by building lightweight polarimetric Doppler weather radars and the HPC infrastructure to process them at scale. At Edison Pharmaceuticals, I bridged biotech and technology by leading cross-functional teams to develop novel tools for big data analytics, visualization, and machine learning in drug discovery.

Earlier in my career, I spent over a decade at Apple leading the Pro Apps team that developed Color, a groundbreaking application that democratized professional film finishing, earning me 25 patents in image processing and computer vision. I also founded Pixels Digital, developing a cutting-edge 3D animation system, and contributed to Pixar’s RenderMan during its formative years.

Technically fluent across languages and platforms (C/C++, Rust, Swift, Python, OpenGL, OpenCV, ML/AI frameworks), I thrive at the intersection of engineering depth and creative problem solving. Whether building real-time video systems, HPC clusters, or generative AI solutions, I am driven by a commitment to pushing boundaries and delivering results that matter.

Chris is a Sr. Director of Engineering at Lam Research Corporation, a leading manufacturer of silicon wafer processing equipment for the semiconductor industry. His work-related passion is lean product design through innovation and collaboration, and he derives great joy from recruiting and mentoring engineering interns and new college graduates.

Exposure to art began in Chris’ childhood, when his mother took him to art galleries and museums. When she became a full-time art writer at the San Jose Mercury News, she brought Chris to numerous press openings. Most relevant, thirty years ago she sent Chris and his wife Karla to the ICA for their very first art auction.

Chris is most passionate about contemporary art that either triggers human empathy, engages intellectual curiosity, or demonstrates creative and clearly refined techniques. He and Karla have recently been drawn to works that highlight social, political, and climate issues. They enjoy collecting, for which ICA auctions and art trips over the years have been a primary source.

As a Silicon Valley local, James has over 40 years’ experience working in the high technology. His first 18 years were spent at Intel Corporation in a variety of roles in production planning, sales, marketing, developer relations and venture capital roles. Upon leaving Intel in August of 2001, he started Matrix Solutions with a fellow Intel alum and at the same time joined Rohner & Associates as a Principal Consultant. As a consultant, his client list included over 45 high tech companies from venture backed start-ups to leaders in the industry with virtually a 100% rehire rate.

James went on to work at CleanTech Open, an incubator aimed at finding, funding and growing clean tech startups. After that he joined a venture backed rescue of InterAct Public Safety as a member of executive team which was successfully sold in early 2015 to Constellation Software, Inc.

He is now involved with multiple for profit and non-profits organizations, speaks regularly at Silicon Valley events and is current President of the Intel Alumni Network.

Cathy Grape recently retired after 38 years with IBM where she held a variety of leadership and technical positions in software, hardware, and services.  She led large global system integration projects with worldwide teams, developed relationships with IBM customers representing all industries, developed commercial software applications, and negotiated contracts with critical business partners.  Career highlights include being part of the team that led IBM’s systems integration of the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games, building a call center in the Philippines, and developing and delivering software products used by 95% of the Fortune 500 companies.

Growing up, her parents took Cathy to museums and theatre which led to an abiding interest in the arts.  She received her undergraduate degree in Mathematics from Vassar College and a MS in Computer Science from Syracuse University.  While at Vassar she took advantage of their renowned Art History department and studied art from ancient to contemporary.

Cathy has been a supporter of the arts for many years here in the Bay Area and in New York City which she visits often. Cathy is honored to be on the board of the ICA to help promote the mission to bring greater awareness, understanding, and appreciation of contemporary art to the community.

Nick Mailey is Vice President Integrated Talent Solutions from Equinix, one of the Best Places to Work and the world’s leading digital infrastructure companies, Equinix, a Fortune’s 500 company. He is an industry thought leader in Talent Acquisition and has been recognized as a Talent Acquisition Leader of the year by HRO Today. He’s had numerous speaking engagements, podcasts & interviews: ERE, HCI, Recruiting Nation, The Family, CareerXRoads and has been interviewed by Fast Company and the Wall Street Journal. He is a passionate Human resource executive with over 20 years leading recruiting teams in Silicon Valley at companies such as Equinix, Intuit, Motorola & Applied Materials. He is considered an innovative and strategic leader with a diverse background in various industries. Nick received his undergraduate from Temple University and his Masters in Organizational Development from The University of San Francisco.