Real estate tech company Porch adds five new directors to board ahead of public stock listing

Seattle-based Porch today named five directors that will join the company’s board when it goes public later this year.

The real estate technology venture and home improvement marketplace announced plans in July to become publicly traded through a merger that values the Seattle company at $523 million. Porch will combine with PropTech Acquisition Corp., a special purpose acquisition company, or SPAC.

The board members will join on Porch’s first day of public trading. They include:

Javier Saade, founder and managing partner of Impact Master Holdings; venture partner at Fenway Summer Ventures; former associate administrator of the U.S. Small Business Administration.Chris Terrill, former CEO of HomeAdvisor and Angie’s List; board member of Realogy Holdings Corp. and Infogroup.Regi Vengalil, CFO of Egencia (Expedia’s corporate travel division); former global head of corporate development and strategy at Expedia Group. He will serve as the chair of Porch’s M&A committee.Margaret Whelan, founder and CEO of Whelan Advisory. Her board experience includes time at PropTech Acquisition Corp, Mattamy Homes, John Burns Real Estate Consulting, Housing Innovation Alliance and TopBuild.Tom Hennessy, chairman, co-CEO, and president of PropTech Acquisition Corp; managing partner of Hennessy Capital Real Estate Strategies. He will serve as the chair of Porch’s compensation committee.

Dennie Haydon, Juan Sabater and Michael Baldwin will step down from the board as part of the transition.

The combined company, based in Seattle, will operate under the Porch name and trade on the Nasdaq under the ticker symbol “PRCH” after the expected completion of the deal in the fourth quarter. Porch co-founder Matt Ehrlichman will remain as CEO and chairman.

Los Angeles-based PropTech went public in November in a $172.5 million initial public offering. SPACs, or blank-check companies, have been surging in popularity as an alternative means for companies to go public, and lucrative transactions for Wall Street banks. SPACs have played a role in 35% of U.S. IPO filings so far this year, according to a recent report by Silicon Valley Bank. Axios reported Wednesday that around half of this year’s 42 announced SPAC deals are for companies that would have attempted an IPO in 2021.

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Tech Moves: Museum of Flight’s new education leader; Avalara vet joins Banzai board; and more

Dana Riley Black. (Museum of Flight Photo)

— Seattle’s Museum of Flight announced Dana Riley Black as its new vice president of education. The position includes overseeing the Boeing Academy for STEM Learning.

Black is the former assistant superintendent of Everett Public Schools and previously worked at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, University of Washington and Logan Center for Education. She received a doctorate in Education Leadership and Curriculum Studies from Miami University.

— Jennifer Ceran, CFO of Bellevue, Wash.-based Smartsheet, joined the board of NerdWallet. Based in San Francisco, Calif., NerdWallet is a site offering consumers financial tools and advice.

Ceran also recently joined the board of Smartsheet’s Bellevue neighbor Auth0. Earlier this year, she announced she plans to retire as CFO after transitioning to a successor.

— Bay Area subscription software company Zuora appointed Microsoft Corporate VPs Sarah Bond and Omar Abbosh to its board. 

Bond oversees Microsoft’s gaming ecosystem and was previously senior vice president of emerging business at T-Mobile. She is based in Seattle.

Abbosh recently joined the Redmond, Wash.-based tech giant as CVP of cross industry solutions. He spent more than 30 years at Accenture, most recently as CEO of communications, media and technology for the global professional services company. He is based in London.

Kevin Riegelsberger. (Shiftboard Photo)

— Former Avalara President and COO Kevin Riegelsberger joined the board of Banzai, a Seattle-based event marketing automation provider, as an independent board director. He currently serves as a director for Seattle startups TangoCard and Shiftboard.

Riegelsberger retired from Avalara in 2016, but returned to the Seattle company in December 2017 as interim head of engineering and development as he brought on a full-time replacement. Riegelsberger spent six years at Avalara, where he served as president, head of operations and head of the strategic initiatives group.

Suren Singh. (Photo courtesy of Suren Singh)

— After 25 years at Microsoft, Suren Singh departed to join Seattle-area cloud governance startup CoreStack. Singh was most recently senior director of hyperscalers and managed service providers. He joined Microsoft in 1995 and was an early member of the hosting and applications services team, which he described in a post on LinkedIn as his fondest memory.

“I am very excited to join CoreStack’s exceptional team,” Singh told GeekWire. “Multi-cloud compliance and governance continues to be a huge challenge for enterprises.

At CoreStack, Singh will be vice president of global partnerships and alliances. Founded in 2016, the Bellevue, Wash.-based company raised $8.5 million earlier this year.

— Veterinary technology startup Petriage named Joseph Coury as its new CEO. Co-founder and former CEO Allon Freiman will now be the company’s chief strategy officer.

Coury was most recently CEO of OMNI Practice Group, a service provider for dental practices, and was SVP of the veterinary division at California Bank of Commerce. Freiman co-founded Petriage four years ago with Chief Veterinary Officer Shlomo Freiman.

Also, Petriage VP of Sales and Marketing Wendy Hennig was promoted to chief growth officer. She has been with the company since 2018.

— Cybersecurity researcher Tarah Wheeler was named to the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s advisory board.

I am so overjoyed & humbled to be part of the @EFF’s advisory board. We all have some feelings of helplessness right now, and to be part of this organization that does so much good in the world, and to contribute even a bit, is just everything right now.

Thank you so much. https://t.co/cJDOSLbVbS

— Tarah (@tarah) July 22, 2020

Wheeler is the author of the 2016 book “Women in Tech”, founder of Seattle startup Fizzmint and currently an international security fellow at think tank New America.

— Former Seattle Genetics SVP and Chief Information Officer Andrew Chen has joined Santa Monica, Calif.-based Kite Pharma. Chen arrived at Seattle Genetics in 2018 and prior to that spent more than a decade at global biopharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.

— Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Fellow James De Yoreo has been named a 2020 “Distinguished Science Fellow” by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science.

De Yoreo is a materials scientist and co-directs the NW IMPACT joint research collaboration between PNNL and the University of Washington. In addition to the recognition, he will receive $1 million in funding from the U.S. Dept. of Energy over three years to pursue new research.

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Tech Moves: Museum of Flight’s new education leader; Avalara vet joins Banzai board; and more

Dana Riley Black. (Museum of Flight Photo)

— Seattle’s Museum of Flight announced Dana Riley Black as its new vice president of education. The position includes overseeing the Boeing Academy for STEM Learning.

Black is the former assistant superintendent of Everett Public Schools and previously worked at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, University of Washington and Logan Center for Education. She received a doctorate in Education Leadership and Curriculum Studies from Miami University.

— Jennifer Ceran, CFO of Bellevue, Wash.-based Smartsheet, joined the board of NerdWallet. Based in San Francisco, Calif., NerdWallet is a site offering consumers financial tools and advice.

Ceran also recently joined the board of Smartsheet’s Bellevue neighbor Auth0. Earlier this year, she announced she plans to retire as CFO after transitioning to a successor.

— Bay Area subscription software company Zuora appointed Microsoft Corporate VPs Sarah Bond and Omar Abbosh to its board. 

Bond oversees Microsoft’s gaming ecosystem and was previously senior vice president of emerging business at T-Mobile. She is based in Seattle.

Abbosh recently joined the Redmond, Wash.-based tech giant as CVP of cross industry solutions. He spent more than 30 years at Accenture, most recently as CEO of communications, media and technology for the global professional services company. He is based in London.

Kevin Riegelsberger. (Shiftboard Photo)

— Former Avalara President and COO Kevin Riegelsberger joined the board of Banzai, a Seattle-based event marketing automation provider, as an independent board director. He currently serves as a director for Seattle startups TangoCard and Shiftboard.

Riegelsberger retired from Avalara in 2016, but returned to the Seattle company in December 2017 as interim head of engineering and development as he brought on a full-time replacement. Riegelsberger spent six years at Avalara, where he served as president, head of operations and head of the strategic initiatives group.

Suren Singh. (Photo courtesy of Suren Singh)

— After 25 years at Microsoft, Suren Singh departed to join Seattle-area cloud governance startup CoreStack. Singh was most recently senior director of hyperscalers and managed service providers. He joined Microsoft in 1995 and was an early member of the hosting and applications services team, which he described in a post on LinkedIn as his fondest memory.

“I am very excited to join CoreStack’s exceptional team,” Singh told GeekWire. “Multi-cloud compliance and governance continues to be a huge challenge for enterprises.

At CoreStack, Singh will be vice president of global partnerships and alliances. Founded in 2016, the Bellevue, Wash.-based company raised $8.5 million earlier this year.

— Veterinary technology startup Petriage named Joseph Coury as its new CEO. Co-founder and former CEO Allon Freiman will now be the company’s chief strategy officer.

Coury was most recently CEO of OMNI Practice Group, a service provider for dental practices, and was SVP of the veterinary division at California Bank of Commerce. Freiman co-founded Petriage four years ago with Chief Veterinary Officer Shlomo Freiman.

Also, Petriage VP of Sales and Marketing Wendy Hennig was promoted to chief growth officer. She has been with the company since 2018.

— Cybersecurity researcher Tarah Wheeler was named to the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s advisory board.

I am so overjoyed & humbled to be part of the @EFF’s advisory board. We all have some feelings of helplessness right now, and to be part of this organization that does so much good in the world, and to contribute even a bit, is just everything right now.

Thank you so much. https://t.co/cJDOSLbVbS

— Tarah (@tarah) July 22, 2020

Wheeler is the author of the 2016 book “Women in Tech”, founder of Seattle startup Fizzmint and currently an international security fellow at think tank New America.

— Former Seattle Genetics SVP and Chief Information Officer Andrew Chen has joined Santa Monica, Calif.-based Kite Pharma. Chen arrived at Seattle Genetics in 2018 and prior to that spent more than a decade at global biopharmaceutical company AstraZeneca.

— Pacific Northwest National Laboratory Fellow James De Yoreo has been named a 2020 “Distinguished Science Fellow” by the U.S. Department of Energy’s Office of Science.

De Yoreo is a materials scientist and co-directs the NW IMPACT joint research collaboration between PNNL and the University of Washington. In addition to the recognition, he will receive $1 million in funding from the U.S. Dept. of Energy over three years to pursue new research.

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