Our Financial Algorithms Team
Scott Juds, Founder and Chief Science Officer
Scott Juds is a Founder and Chief Science Officer of AlphaDroid Strategies of San Luis Obispo, CA, and Founder and CEO of SumGrowth Strategies of Seattle, WA. He holds an MSEE from Stanford University, a BSEE from the University of Wisconsin – Madison, and is a Registered Professional Engineer in the state of Washington. He is the named inventor on over 40 U.S. and foreign patents and is the published author of Photoelectric Sensors and Controls: Selection & Application (Marcel Dekker, New York, 1988).
Scott has over 30 years' experience in both hands-on and executive-level positions, including Founder and President of piTech Engineering, a Seattle, WA engineering consulting firm; Founder and VP of Engineering of IDX Incorporated, an El Dorado, AR, company producing optically encoded coin acceptors and RFID payment systems; and Vice President of Advanced Engineering at EATON Corporation’s Opcon division for industrial photoelectric sensor in Everett, WA. Scott’s passion for improving investment algorithms utilizing cross-disciplinary mathematics from the field of electronic signal processing began in 1992 when he created a Quattro spreadsheet experiment that demonstrated trends in fact exist in market data. His long-term hobby eventually led to the 2009 launch of SumGrowth Strategies, and the subsequent 2015 launch of AlphaDroid Strategies, a platform for financial advisors and wealth managers.
Jim Gamache, Founder and Chief Technology Officer
Jim has over 30 years' in both hands-on and executive-level positions. Jim was a Founder and Vice President of Observational Systems, formed in 1977 to develop and market portable data collection systems for researchers in the behavioral sciences. The company was later re-named GageTalker when it moved into the field of, and set new standards for how industrial statistical process control was done. The company was again later re-named as Cimworks and eventually sold in 2000 to GE Fanuc. Jim was also a Founder and CTO of Zorch Software in the field of life science project management. Jim holds a BSEE from the University of Washington.
Jim is an avid snow skier, water skier, and windsurfer. He has climbed Mt. Rainier multiple times, and has seen the curvature of the earth from atop Mt. Kilimanjaro. Jim is well calibrated in the operation of his outdoor grill, pours a mean martini, and loves to bake in the Lake Chelan sun with his wife Laura.
Warren Hyland, Co-Founder and Director
Warren Hyland, Hyland, Co-Founder and Director, is a strong business development and technology licensing professional, skilled in startups, turn-arounds, sensing technology, waste management, biofuels, mining, and renewable energy — and sailing the warm beautiful seas. Mr. Hyland is CEO of the Inventor Mentor Group, Manager of the Wizards Chest, LLC, Manager of the Legacy Fund, LLC, Co-Founder of Luminaerospace, and past Director of Novita Technologies. Mr. Hyland holds a BaSc Engineering from the University of Toronto.
Sue Guzman, Director
Sue Guzman, Director. With an MS-Engineering Management degree from Stanford University and BSEE from UW-Madison, Ms. Guzman has three decades of successful corporate leadership experience in Blue Chip firms (Hewlett Packard and National Instruments), as well as new companies, such as fiber optics startup kSaria. These experiences led to her selection as CEO and General Manager (ret.) of Celerity Systems/Aeroflex Inc., a major supplier of broadband test and measurement products based in Cupertino, CA. Aside from her duties at MAI, she is President of Canine Companions for Independence (South Bay), a nonprofit that trains highly skilled assistance dogs for placement with children and adults with disabilities— for free.
Mark J. Strefner, Board Member
Mark Strefner is a Senior Partner with Chicago-based Infinity Wealth Management, LLC; a premier financial and estate-planning firm located in the suburb of Oakbrook Terrace, Illinois.
Mark’s goal is to bring clarity to the financial planning process. He has always been a promoter of the idea that, even though many investment and insurance programs are complicated by nature, your financial plan should not be. After all, how can you follow something you do not understand? His straightforward nature and communication style has led to the development of relationships than span decades and has been the cornerstone of his growth in this discipline.
A native of Chicago, Mark is a graduate of the University of Illinois at Chicago’s School of Business and Honors College, earning a Bachelor of Science degree in Business and Information & Decision Sciences. Mark began his financial services career in 1995 when he joined Franklin Financial Services as a Registered Representative and Insurance Specialist.
He has since been honored with a number of corporate and industry awards including Million Dollar Round Table, Centurion, Chairman, and Ben Franklin Awards. Mark is also a student of the highly respected Strategic Coach® program designed for successful entrepreneurs. He has been a sought-after public speaker for highly rated Insurance & Investment firms on the topic of benefit/contingency planning for business owners, legacy/investment planning for affluent clients, as well as strategy specific topics such as Premium Financing, Captive Insurance, and Welfare Benefit Planning.
Mark has participated in various boards and groups related to the industry. He was named 2012 & 2013 Five Star Wealth Manager Award as featured in Chicago Magazine. Mark is a Principal member of First Financial Recourses; a professional organization comprised of strategic problem solvers for high net worth individuals, as well as public and privately held companies. Mark has also worked with firms such as Microsoft Corp, Motorola, Abbott Labs, and AT&T.
Mark believes in personal and professional growth and is constantly striving to learn new and innovative ways to find solutions for Infinity’s corporate, municipal, family, and estate clientele. Mark’s sincere desire to help his clients and assist other financial advisors become knowledgeable about advanced planning techniques is what he credits his success to. He resides in the western suburbs of Chicago with his family.
Bryan Sullivan, Founder and Strategic Business Adviser
Bryan graduated from Oregon State University in 1991 and spent 17 years working at a number of large Wall Street firms such as UBS, Merrill Lynch, and Edward Jones learning industry best practices. After the 2008 market collapse, Bryan wanted to build something different from the complexity and opacity of these traditional firms.
In 2009, he founded his own RIA platform for financial advisors where Bryan now serves as the firm’s Chief Executive Officer. In 2014 Bryan partnered with Scott & Jim to build a platform for Financial Advisors to create automated quant-based portfolio construction and trade signals that would be competitive in any market environment.
Bryan is the author of the book, “Protecting Your Money From Yourself: A Retiree’s Guide to Insuring You Have Enough Money to Enjoy Your Retirement.” He has also been featured in multiple media outlets, including USA Today, CNBC, The Boston Globe, The Miami Herald, Yahoo Finance, and The Wall Street Journal Online.
Bryan is married and has four children. He is a former president of the Morro Bay Lions Club and remains active as a member. In his free time, he enjoys camping and skiing.
Lisa Noble, Vice President of Marketing & Communications
Lisa Noble, Vice President of Marketing and Communications. With a BS and MS in Electronics and Communications Engineering from Rice University Lisa started her career designing signal processing software and hardware for spread spectrum communication systems at ESL/TRW, and later co-founded Spectral Innovations, a developer of digital signal processing technology. After continuing her education with a JD from Stanford Law School, she held positions as a patent attorney at Fenwick and West, Associate General Counsel and Intellectual Property Attorney at DIVA Systems, and Director of Intellectual Property at Liberate Technologies. More recently, she founded Lisa Noble Photography with publications including Cosmopolitan, Oprah Magazine, Huffington Post, Showtime, Travel Channel and The Colbert Show.
Gary Millhollen, Technical Support Manager
Gary has over 30 years’ experience trading his own accounts in the markets; from stocks and options to futures, and commodities, and finally ETFs. He studied architecture at Cal Poly in San Luis Obispo for 3 years and graduated from Sacramento State University eventually spending his adult career up and down the West Coast from Southern California to Seattle, Washington in commercial construction, including apartments, commercial buildings, school construction, and finally 10 years in his Hotel Construction and Renovation Consulting business.
His life's training and experience in the physical real-world of exact numbers and engineering was a perfect incubator for his mindset of precision and detail in the markets. His market pursuits and interests kept him in the hunt for the science of financial understanding and finally to the doorstep of AlphaDroid and the AI algorithms of Scott Juds.
Gary’s research into wall street and technical analysis lead to the accumulation of his financial Library dating from the late 1970s and numbers over 100. His books on fly fishing and sailing are next in quantity along with a smattering of horse husbandry, fine art, and philosophy.
Gary has been married for 40 years and has 3 adult children and 4 grandchildren. He and his wife enjoy skiing, fly-fishing, horse riding together. 2 of his 4 grandkids, 6, and 7-yr-olds are now hard to keep up with on the slopes and all are destined to be sailors, horsepersons, and fly fisherpersons and of course Merlyn’s little Magicians.
Gary is semi-retired and the Technical Support Manager of Alphadroid LLC.
