David A. Kizer

Strategic advisor to firm leadership, providing critical analysis and investment recommendations for potential portfolio acquisitions to drive long term fund performance.

Align and set the strategic direction of teams that are responsible for all Business Intelligence, Product Quality Engineering, Manufacturing Engineering, Regulatory Affairs, Sourcing, Supply Chain, IT, Customer Service, and Sales Operations. - Maintained serviceability of 97% and minimized margin impact during global part shortage by aggressively pursuing alternate part swaps, negotiating stock allocations, and multisite production distribution. - Consolidated/validated data warehouse creating “single source of truth” for business system reporting. - Developed and implemented multi-3PL strategy delivering 2.1 day quicker shipping speed and 24% cost reduction for D2C shipments. - Obtained ISO13485 compliance certification for global medical device manufacturing. - Leading MD production line validation for compliance with FDA and MDSAP regulations. - Reduced customer service costs 19% while maintaining >95% CSAT through consolidation of global customer service, reporting, and reviews model servicing NA/EU/APAC. - Transitioned main product line refresh with < 0.1% material scrap through agile design and collaborative forecasting. - Transitioned to internal IT group and implemented IT controls to achieve Sarbanes–Oxley compliance within 6 months following Owlet’s IPO. -Maintained cybersecurity response time <24hr for all patches and established zero trust architecture for all company devices. - Organized quarterly program increment (PI) event to review, align, and resource all company objectives.

Investor and Advisor to Series A business redefining blue light therapy glasses and their clinical benefits.

Co-founded and launched Kickstarter raising over $400K from backers. Continued in an advisory role as Pale Blue has continued to expand in retail partners, online marketplaces, and international regions.

Guide the activities of the Operations team including Sourcing, Supply Chain, Customer Service, HR, Regulatory & Clinical Affairs, Product Quality Engineering, Sales Operations, and International Growth. - Obtained ISO9001 certification through implementation of companywide quality management system. - Built resilient supply chain able to withstand Covid related disruptions and meet increased sales demand while minimizing margin impact. - Increased product gross margin by 17% through leveraging strategic partnerships and sourcing initiatives. - Led market expansion resulting in 10X international revenue growth by launching into seven EU nations - Reduced customer service contacts per sales by 64% by improving online help center, implementing tutorial videos, and agent training to improve first contact resolution. - Reduced open hire time to fill by 4 weeks through design and implementation of company-wide hiring process to standardizing and streamlining interviews.

Lead Operations team in setup and execution of global supply chain yielding lower costs and consistent results. - Reduced COGs by 41% while surpassing quality benchmarks thru resource to new contract manufacturer and establishment of nominated supplier network. - Managed business award and six-month transition to Netsuite ERP which included integrations of payment portals, warehouses, CRM systems, EDI connections, e-commerce, and other 3rd party services. - Implemented S&OP process yielding $800K reduction in inventory over 4 months through cross-functional coordination and a systematic approach to demand and supply forecasting. - Created SOPs and KPIs for project sourcing, demand planning, supply planning, and logistics. - Cut spend by 48% for logistics through negotiation of outbound rates, warehouse transition and creation of Asian based freight consolidation while setting up internal controls to budget and monitor shipping spend.

Lead global team to design and develop innovative products to drive the growth of Gioteck market share. Managed team that was responsible for all aspects of the product commercialization process including: market analysis, product road mapping, creative direction, brand positioning, product design, product engineering, sourcing, packaging and quality control/assurance. - Implemented product roadmap focused on gross margin forecast while increasing product crossover to adjacent categories. - Created detailed product development calendar which increased on-time product launch rate while managing down development budget through waste reduction. - Created RFQ and BOM management process to allow for easy quote comparisons and product placements to contracted manufacturers. - Lead rebranding of logo, packaging, and brand guidelines to create a consistent brand message. - Identified and launched into 3 new market targets through analysis of NPD and Chart-Track data.

Lead team to develop and deliver “on trend” products to the market ensuring on-time delivery to our customers. Manage timelines for design mockups, bill of material creation, quality and compliance testing, packaging, licensing agreements, and forecasting from product ideation through mass production. Work collaboratively with sourcing, mechanical/acoustic/electrical engineers, supply planners and product managers to resolve issues as they arise. - Develop products representing 46% of total revenue consisting of 60+ new SKUs yearly across 9 product platforms. - Met design and development timeframe for 96% of 2014 SKUs allowing for successful product placements to key global customers. - Shortened development lead times by three weeks through creation of standardized sampling process for third-party vendors. - Increased tooling utilization 15% by coordinating sample builds with mass production builds. - Identified emerging technologies for integration into product designs to solve cable breaking issues.

Managed cross-functional team including members of product development, supply chain, sales, marketing, and category management teams to ensure that all new product launches to our global customer base are executed on time and in full while maintaining profitability. - Booked $4M in savings through creation and utilization of SQL based report to analyze customer profitability. - Led team to vendor-of-the-year awards from Target, Best Buy, Toys “R” Us, Radioshack and Fred Meyer. - Improved on-time launch rate to 97% from 50% during global relaunch of entire product line (250 SKUs) by creating a report that pulled all forecasted demand and incoming supply data to monitor product launch and highlighted needed adjustments. - Optimized inventory turnover, revenue recognition and gross margin contribution by establishing weekly allocation process for supply constrained product. - Implemented Hubsoft, an online B2B order portal, across 7 global sales teams to handle all non-EDI orders. This allowed the sales team to focus on improving profitability instead of entering orders. - Created consistent sample delivery schedules through development and implementation of sample forecasting, purchasing and tracking process. - Reduced promo overspend from 100% over budget to 5% under budget by designing and implementing global promo process to track budgets and process all orders. - Performed competitive analysis and identified market trends utilizing NPD sellthrough data.

Managed collections and payments for global customer and supplier base while striving to minimize financing needs and create tools to improve cash flow forecasting. - Collected $30M annually from 1700 active accounts, brought past due balance down from $1.03M to $100K in first year through the development of improved VBA based contact management tools. - Decreased financing costs 5% through improved management of daily cash flow needs.