Bio

June 15th, 2010
david

@ Moya's in Johannesburg, August 2006

My “official” company bio follows at the bottom of the page. If you really want to know more about me, my View David Bressler's profile on LinkedIn is the system-of-record for my career, and Facebook has everything else, along with a professional summary. Or, you can just see me in action.

I have traveled well over a million miles, and worked in about 30 different countries. Typically, “worked” means sold technology into a country (feet-to-dirt), individually or as adviser to a sales team, though there have been situations where I’ve engaged in hands on implementations as well. Two particular favorites were kicking off a project with the Government of Singapore in 2005, and a project for Siemens in Dresden in 1998. The Siemens project led to an $8+ million dollar contract for TIBCO, in the words of the customer “because in that one week, I proved we could do everything we had been telling them we could do throughout the sales process.” That was the closest I’ve ever come to writing code.

Other Stuff

That's me. Always smile in battle.

I’ve been training non-stop in martial arts since 1980. Through the 80′s, I was a member of the US Karate Team (video), first with the AAU, later with the USA Karate Federation. Switching to Kendo in the early 90′s, I used the opportunities provided by business travel to train with both the Swedish and German national teams, as well as several other dojos through Europe who were beautifully welcoming. I’m very grateful for their hospitality, even years since, as they were some of the best memories and experiences of my life. I added iaido (video) to my repertoire starting in 1999, and due to a wrist injury that’s forced my kendo retirement, it’s my main practice these days. Anyone interested in what I get out of iaido should read Turning the Mind Into an Ally. I found that book accidentally, and it’s a fantastic introduction to meditation.

Returning from the ocean floor, NOT from outer space

I’ve also been doing expedition-class diving (video) for quite some time. Whereas training in martial arts was something I accidentally fell into, I’ve always wanted to be a diver. I had the opportunity to work on dive-vessel Seeker until it went out of business in 2007. Ah, the stories I could tell. Actually, one of my friends has told his story… and it’s one of my favorite books, Shadow Divers.

I swim regularly. It’s not quite the best thing I got from my MBA @ NYU (it was a very good program), but being an NYU alum and living in NYC, I can use the pool for a relatively small annual fee.

The Companies I’ve Worked For

  • Progress Software (acquired Actional), October 2002 – present
  • Radianz (now BT Radianz), April 2001 – September 2002
  • Aether Systems (IPO), June 1999 – February 2001
  • TIBCO Software (Teknekron Software Systems / Reuters; IPO), April 1995 – June 1999
  • Bell Atlantic Network Integration, April 1994 – April 1995
  • Digital Network Associates, June 1990 – April 1994
  • NeXT Computer, January 1990 – June 1990

Progress Bio

David Bressler is Progress Software’s Global Solutions Director for Enterprise Business Solutions (a $100M+ division of Progress Software). In this role, David is responsible for positioning the new Responsive Process Management solution to the market, and provides customers and partners with the expertise and experience required to successfully achieve business value in their deployments. With 20 years and over 30 countries of experience in enterprise technology, David brings to customer engagements a deep knowledge of application integration and data networking, blended with an ability to leverage emerging technology to create business value. David joined Progress in 2006 with the acquisition of Actional. Prior to joining Actional in 2002, David was one of the leaders responsible for bootstrapping Tibco’s European operations and the key driver behind TIBCO’s relationship with Cisco. He went on to become vice president of strategic technology development at Aether Systems through their successful IPO, and then on to manage the delivery of shared middleware networks at Radianz (now BT Radianz). David received his MBA in International Business from New York University Stern School of Business where he graduated with distinction. He can be reached at http://twitter.com/djbressler.

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