Meet the Big Brains Behind CATS
Take a look at the office! here.
Asim Baig
Founder, Benevolent Dictator,
Architect
asim [at] catsone.com
Official: Asim Baig is the president of CATS Software, Inc., which he founded in 2004 after spending 14 years in the IT industry. Asim is a technical professional and entrepreneur. Before founding CATS, Asim started Seleriti Corporation in 1999 where he oversaw the development of a Java based Enterprise electronic billing and payment system. As Director of Development at Digital River Inc. (DRIV), he was instrumental in building and enhancing the B2B commerce division.
Also prior to starting CATS, he was CIO at Quorum, a leading legal technologies provider where he streamlined the IT organization and established offshore development centers. Asim has played a significant role in large scale UNIX implementations, developed enterprise systems and directed efforts for emerging web technologies. As a consultant he provided services to Honeywell, 3M, Medtronic, MCI, and the University of Minnesota. A 1995 graduate of the University of Minnesota, he holds a BS in Electrical Engineering.
Real: Likes to start new businesses. Secretly wishes to make a living doing photography and playing saxophone. Thinks you have arrived in photography, when one of your own photograph's is worthy of enlargement and hanging on the wall. After 10,000+ shutter clicks, he's still on the quest to find the perfect one.
Workhorse: 17" Unibody Macbook Pro w/ MacOSX Leopard
Andrew Kandels
Lead Developer
andrew [at] catsone.com
Read my blog
Official: Andrew joined the Cognizo team in summer 07. He grew up with several Tandy/Radio Shack computers, experimenting with programming in BASIC. As new technologies emerged, he learned and played with all sorts of languages, his favorites being C/C++, perl, bash and (of course) PHP in a Linux environment.
He has a fascination with advanced applied mathematics and competed on one of the top math teams in the St. Paul public schools. In the meantime, he enjoys working in parsing and machine learning, and designing lean computer systems to handle advanced tasks. He's designed software for a construction company, a car rental shop, a hardware store and a blues musician.
Real: Loves playing with his two wiener dogs (Johnsonville and Rascal). Plans to build the world's first mechanical centaur and conquer the world with it in the next 10 years.
Andy Mornes
Developer
andy [at] catsone.com
Read my blog
Official: Andy has been working with CATS since the summer of 2008. He mainly studied C/C++ in school, but has now branched out into PHP, perl, some Python, and more. He has a strong thirst for knowledge, so his skills are constantly growing.
He was first introduced to Linux at Minnesota State University: Moorhead, while earning his degree in Computer Science. After using it in the classroom, he decided to install it on his personal computer. Now, all of his computers are running Linux. He eventually plans to work on a free and open source project so that he can give back to the Linux community and help it grow.
Real: Enjoys spending time with his family and wife, going to the movies, eating out, and playing with his kitten. In his spare time he types on his keyboard, reads books (programming books and sci-fi novels) and listens to Linux podcasts.
Tony Sternberg
Product Manager
tony [at] catsone.com
Official: Tony began working with CATS in December 2007. Coming from a solid IT background while also working as a recruiter in the past, he brings a unique blend of recruiting and technical expertise to the CATS team. His role as CATS Product Manager involves overseeing the development team and determining feature priority by assigning tasks and setting deadlines for upcoming releases.
Tony holds a B.S. in Business & Marketing from the University of Minnesota. While he has always enjoyed working with and around people, it didn't take him long after graduation to realize that he wanted to get back to his technical side and develop his programming skills that he taught himself while working with Visual Basic in the late 1990s. Since January 2009, he has been working towards his plans of earning a Master's Degree in Computer Science by taking additional programming (C++/Java) and advanced math courses. Now, he has began delving into the PHP/MySQL world and has a strong interest in learning about/developing in new Web technologies as they emerge.
Real: Has been referred to as a walking oxymoron. Enjoys playing sports like hockey and tennis but openly admits he wants to rank among the top gamers in the world.
Workhorse: 15.4" Unibody Macbook Pro w/ MacOSX Snow Leopard
John Smith
Web De(velop/sign)er
john [at] catsone.com
Official: John has a degree in Computer Information Systems from Metropolitan State University and an Associate degree in Graphic Design. He has been working in graphic design, web design, marketing, and teaching for 10 years.
Real: Spends his free time taking photographs, watching movies, and wrenching on muscle cars. Loves to write and perform music on the saxophone, guitar, and bass. John will one day roam the Earth as a National Geographic photographer.
Workhorse: Macbook Pro w/ MacOSX Leopard : Adobe Master Collection
Sae Vang
Web UI Designer
sae [at] catsone.com
Official: With a strong interest in new media technologies, she freely exposed herself in radio, television and the Web, and earned an undergraduate degree in Journalism, Visual Communications and Spanish from the University of St. Thomas in 2006.
While learning about the Web, she picked up the front-end web design assets such as Photoshop effects, Illustrator vectors, XHTML, CSS and (light) Javascript. Now with CATS, Sae has entered into the world of Developer Darkness.
Sae has the sole responsibility of designing the user interface of CATS's software applications. She also handles customer support.
Real: Enjoys learning new life/design tactics, striking conversations with strangers, picking up on '80s and country music, catching up with early-years school friends, and cooking meals with her family and boyfriend.
Workhorse: Intel Workstation - Windows XP Pro w/ Adobe Creative Suite, MacBook Pro w/ MacOSX Leopard
Jos Bodewes
Dutch Team Lead
jos [at] catsone.nl
+31 (38) 88 00 150
Official: Jos Bodewes is the founder and managing director of Robuust Groep BV which he founded in January 2007 after spending over 12 years in the Dutch recruitment and staffing industry. Jos is a HR Professional and entrepreneur. Before founding Robuust Groep BV, Jos worked as a project manager at Hudson.
Prior to Hudson he worked as senior manager at Manpower Netherlands. There he was P&L responsible for all Manpower business lines in the east and northern part of the Netherlands. He played a big role in successfully restructuring operations to make sure Manpower was lean and mean again.
Prior to Manpower he worked as a senior manager at Randstad Netherlands and was hired for setting up a new business line (payrolling). Being in the field selling the concept and building a sales team. Nowadays Randstad is the market leader with this business line in the Netherlands.
Prior to Manpower he was general manager at Job Point, he established significant growth by opening new offices in the Netherlands and Germany. Jos holds a bachelor in Management, Economics and Law.
Real: Loves to build new businesses with passionate people. His other passion is to remix/produce dance tracks in his studio and performing live on stage, during weekends, as a DJ all over European clubs and festivals. After six years he still loves to play the multiplayer game HALO and never gets tired by it (his girlfriend does however).
Workhorse: Macbook Pro w/ MacOSX Leopard
Will Buckner
Official: Will has been the Core Team Lead since Summer '05. Will is an expert PHP developer, Linux/FreeBSD guru, and the resident open-source expert. Will is working on his Zend certification these days. Will started tinkering with computers since he was 8.
By age 13, he was actively coding in C, and participating in open source projects. He is also the Lead Developer for Eggdrop, the most popular IRC bot. Will likes to travel, and is also interested in live sound and music recording/mastering.
Will is involved in overall architectural design, coding standards, version control, documentation, system robustness/failover/resiliency planning and payment processing.
Real: Wants to be a sound engineer touring the country with a rock band (his own maybe).
Brian Hanson
Offical: Brian started working with CATS in summer 06. Prior to working on CATS, Brian has had an interest in Car PCs and Open Source Software, and has helped develop multiple applications for the open sourced community including a GPS software interface for touchscreen computers, and a tool to download files off of the IRC network. Brian spends most of his freetime working on his car and innovating (or breaking) personal electronics.
Brian's primary responsibilities have been in the area of dynamic UI design, sub-system design, plugin framework, bug/issue tracking, and supporting the CATS community.
Real: Wants to travel the world off of money made from a successful consulting venture. Wastes his time playing Warcraft III in the mean time.
Austin Smith
Official: Austin is an experienced LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP/Perl) programmer with expertise in dynamic graphics using the GD library as well as remote XML services and custom template solutions.
His computer science interests include lexical parsing, graphics analysis, and machine learning. He's taking time off from working on a B.A. in Computer Science and History at the University of Minnesota and plans to eventually attend some sort of grad school so that he can work for himself, or failing that, teach.
He plays the piano at parties, weddings, and churches on the side.
Real: Inept hacker who likes to eat, drink, and smoke.
