IT Services

Bruce Maches, Principal, CIO Services
Bruce is currently engaged with CUSTOMatrix™ client, Sirion Theraputics, Inc. as their Chief Information Officer. An experienced information technology executive, Bruce has a proven record in using technology as a transformational tool for translating business vision and goals into IT strategy. His leadership expertise covers a broad spectrum, including information technology management, M&A IT integration, strategic planning, project management, business process re-engineering, systems development, computer operations, and computer systems validation. His approach comes with extensive program/project management skills with multiple large-scale enterprise system deployments using SDLC methodologies in a variety of industries. Bruce has accumulated over 18 years experience in FDA-regulated company environments with pharmaceutical, bio-tech and medical device firms and participated in multiple Part 11 validation efforts.

As Senior Vice-President of the IT Consulting & Integration Services Division for the Noblemen Group of San Diego, California, a full service M&A investment banking firm Bruce was a member of the management team. He was responsible for all client related activities regarding IT systems assessment, planning and associated integration and due diligence efforts related to mergers, acquisitions, and spin-offs.

Prior to that, he was Director and World Wide Manager for Finance & Procurement Integration for Pfizer, Inc. Global Research & Development, of San Diego, California. While there he worked with the CFO and Finance Leadership Team as liaison from the global enterprise informatics group and was responsible for turning company strategic goals into the multiple programs/projects required to integrate Pfizer and Warner Lambert business systems and provide the required information to properly manage a $4 billion R&D organization. For Pfizer’s Pharmacia acquisition, he managed processes to fulfill logistical, personnel, software, and asset related project needs, tasked with integrating Business Management processes between Pfizer and Pharmacia, and coordinated Informatics efforts with the Facilities Integration team regarding site change/closure issues.

As the Chief Information Officer for one of the largest collegiate business concessions in Southern California, The Aztec Shops, Bruce was chair of the MIS steering committee and acting member of the management and operations committees. He participated as a member of The Aztec Shops board of directors and created a new departmental structure, implemented processes for project tracking, systems development, change management, and problem reporting. He also managed all application development activities and the disaster recovery planning process for critical IT applications.

As a senior consultant with IBM Corporation of San Diego, California Bruce was a certified SAP SD/MM consultant trained in IBM implementation and consulting methodologies with multiple ERP engagements. Bruce has also worked as a senior analyst with Science Applications International, Inc. and Electronic Data Systems.

He earned his Bachelor of Science in Accounting from San Diego State University and has passed all sections of the Certified Public Accounting examination as well as attaining a certification as an SAP consultant.

Linda Amaro , Associate, CIO Services

Linda Amaro is an experienced manager and leader, having served as CTO, CIO an Vice President of Information Systems. In her 18 years with Mitchell International, the leader in software solutions for the automotive and insurance industry, Linda provided visionary, goal-oriented, leadership to a fast-paced, dynamic IT organization hosting services/applications for six business units with 60,000+ customers and millions of EDI transactions servicing the Insurance Claims, Medical Claims and Collision Repair industries.

Over the last 5 years Linda used operational expertise to transition the organization from a stand-alone product base to EDI transactions that support on-line / ASP services using SOA and BPM/WLI. Through dynamic team leadership, she achieved a high level of success in building cohesive, loyal teams that deliver technology solutions, data center management services, security administration, desktop support and telecommunications to meet the corporate vision and objectives. Because of her strength as a coach she was able to maintain less then a 4% attrition rate of human technical resources over the last 10 years.

As a result of promoting solid partnerships Linda built strong interdepartmental and vendor relationships for shaping corporate initiatives in IT to support employees, partners and customers. She was continually recognized for her success in utilizing matrixed management, project resource management and effectively directing cross-functional, high-performance teams.

Linda has a proven record across all major IT/IS functions and is skilled in all areas of management, including: developing policy and procedures, oversight of all IT services (network communications, server systems, database administration, business applications development, production control, corporate help desk, desktop support and telecommunications), short and long-term plan creation with expense/capital budget, and staff management / coaching for success.

Prior to Mitchell Linda was manager of Production Control at Pacific Southwest Airlines and her education and training includes: San Diego State University (Major: Graphic Communications); High Performance Teams, Wilson Learning, Certified Facilitator / Influence, The Forum, Certified Trainer / Benchmark’s Feedback, Center for Creative Leadership, Certified Trainer / Landmark Forum, Advance Course, and SELP, Landmark Education, Leadership Series / Seven Habits of Highly Effective People & Principled Center Leadership, Franklin/Covey.

Colin MacKinnon, Principal, CIO Services
Colin brings more than thirty years of diverse business and technology experience to CUSTOMatrix™ from a broad range of industry, government, education, and non-profit organizations. He specializes in planning, building, implementing, directing, and tactically executing complex information technology systems and technology training environments throughout the world. Colin has served clients in the training, health care, insurance, electronics, manufacturing, retail, broadcasting, and multi-media industries as well as not-for-profit organizations where he has led infrastructure development, eCommerce, enterprise software implementation, security, and multi-location voice and data convergence projects.

Prior to founding Transition IT, Colin was the founding San Diego Technology Partner in 2001 for Tatum CIO Partners, a national technology leadership consultancy. Colin also served as IT Director for Microelectronic Packaging, Inc., a multi-national semiconductor manufacturing company, and Director of School Programs for Coleman Foundation. He has served on the graduate faculty of Oregon State University, Alliant International University and West Coast University, where he built computer training centers and developed and operated regional computer education and training programs. Colin also spent two years in the Middle East providing technology leadership for USAID public works projects for the Government of Egypt.

Colin has been responsible for change agency in both public and private companies, in for-profit and not-for-profit environments. He has managed difficult transitions in leadership, business process re-engineering, strategic re-direction, turn-around, M&A, start-up and dissolution. He has held key executive positions in Broadcasting and Motion Pictures, Electronics Manufacturing, Training and Media, Human Services, Health Care, and Insurance.

Colin holds a Bachelor's from Wesleyan University and both a Master’s and Doctorate from the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. He has taught Management Information Systems and Strategic Planning at the graduate level and was responsible for the infusion of computing technologies into education and training programs throughout Southern California.

Robin M. Sutton-Brown, Principal, CIO Services
Robin has extensive experience managing high performance IT and business teams in global technology companies, delivering effective results through business improvement, change management and business driven IT initiatives. This includes experience in aligning business and IT initiatives with strategic business objectives. Most recently Robin has run a successful CIO consulting service for small and medium sized businesses helping them overcome classic “speed bumps” on their way to profitable growth. Prior to that, as the Vice President and CIO for Cymer, Inc., a $600 million manufacturing company serving the semiconductor industry, he implemented a worldwide installation of the Oracle e-Business Suite. He also directed the adoption of a process methodology across the organization, which resulted in a 30% improvement in revenue per employee. He also developed a Business Intelligence program and performed IT and business integration of multiple plants and acquisitions across the United States an Asia.

Prior to that Robin was in charge of business process and information technology services for Unisys Corporation, of San Diego. As a member of the management team for this $6 billion global services and technology company, he was responsible for managing IT technical teams and planning a factory built to accommodate flexible manufacturing. Robin also designed and implemented the processes and ERP functionality for the server manufacturing plant in San Diego, California. He is particularly adept at improving IT governance practices and strategic planning.

Robin is committed to lifelong learning spanning many years and disciplines from Math and Computer Science at the University of Waterloo, Canada to a Master of Industrial and Organizational Psychology, from Alliant International University, San Diego.

Tom Bergmann, MBA, Principal, CIO Services
Tom Bergmann has more than 27 years experience in government, public and private companies in the areas of technology road mapping, enterprise architecture, IT portfolio management, sourcing strategy and execution, IT governance, and organization transformation. His experience includes extensive work in supply chain management, facilitating client teams in the development of business and technical system performance requirements followed by the deployment of technical solutions enabled by optimized business processes. Tom’s expertise extends to systems integration, secure credentialing and identity management, IT architecture trade studies, and the design and implementation of program management office operations.

Tom served as Vice President, Consulting for Gartner, the world leader in research and advisory services for the technology industry. At Gartner he established and led the Federal Services Practice in western United States. He was responsible for go-to-market strategy, engaging with prospects, and delivering engagements to the delight and profitability of customers. Additionally, he led engagements providing telecommunications capability assessment; IT strategy development; enterprise storage assessment; information systems security evaluation support and sourcing strategy; and execution support.

At BearingPoint Tom established the technology focus of the San Diego practice, doubling practice revenue by guiding clients in the implementation of technology to improve performance. He also served as the technical lead for a winning $126 million proposal for an SAP implementation for an 80,000-person government department. He also led the development and the West Coast implementation of a biometrically-enabled, smart card-based credential for the transportation industry.

Tom holds a MBA in international finance and a BA in anthropology. He has presented at various national conferences and workshops. He currently serves on the Dean’s Advisory Council, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences at Iowa State University. He has served as a Director of San Diego DEFCOMM and is a contributing author for the Life Sciences IT (LSIT) Global Institute development of Good Informatics Practices. Tom also serves as a CONNECT Entrepreneur-in-Residence, providing mentorship for start up technology companies. He is active in the Corporate Directors Forum and the MIT Enterprise Forum. Tom currently holds a security clearance rating with the Department of Defense at the level of SECRET.

Leon D. Rizio , MS, Associate, CIO Services

As an associate with the CIO Services practice, Lee is a highly successful CIO with global enterprises and has led several highly complex ERP implementations for IBM and Grant Thornton, LLP. He is a goal-oriented, senior IT executive with more than 15 years experience in Business and IT Strategy and Management. He also has over ten years as a senior consultant. His principal strengths include PMO/project management, business development, transformation and change management, business process assessment and re-engineering to support SAP, Siebel and other ERP engagements. He has successfully implemented SAP in several market segments, including strategic guidance for a merger of two large industrial companies, previously utilizing Oracle and JD Edwards.

Lee has the advantages of being a CIO and an executive project leader implementing large ERP systems for different companies including the aerospace and defense segments:

As CIO for over 15 years at several enterprises; American Hospital Supply (AHSC), Jenny Craig, City of San Diego and Cardinal Health – Pyxis. While serving he was the chief IT strategist who led the implementation of several ERP systems and complex projects as CIO for these companies.

As the senior executive for IBM Global Services (Principal and Executive Project Manager), SAP (Customer Engagement Manager and Client Partner) and Grant Thornton, LLP (Senior Manager – Project Manager) Lee also developed successful SAP practices.

Lee was hired by the President/CFO of Cardinal Health -Pyxis, to “fix” the SAP implementation which was at risk of failure. The company had spent over $5 million on an original budget of $3 million. Turnover was creating an unsustainable situation and they had hired 16 consultants to implement SAP. Lee first inherited SAP as the Vice President of Information Services, where he established an executive steering committee and set the “critical success factors” required for effective governance and successful project completion. Within six months SAP was operational and the IT Department was under control.

Lee’s success and reputation with Pyxis lead him to Grant Thornton, LLP where he established the west coast SAP practice. He implemented two successful large SAP implementations; one for a petro-chem logistics company and the second for an aluminum smelter. These were literally back-to-back engagements with the smelter engagement commencing on the Monday following successful cutover of the Petro-Chem implementation. Both companies returned to Grant Thornton for follow-on SAP engagements.

Lee was then recruited to IBM where he became a Principal. In a multi-national engagement, he conducted a summit for two companies of a large Japanese manufacturing firm. His innovative facilitation of the group of enterprise executives identified 62 major issues. Following that, Lee as team leader successfully categorized the issues into business process priorities which were successfully implemented as follows:

Redesign of SAP Design Flow.
Order fulfillment analysis.
Integrated sales and service process, as one company.
Project management for large complex manufactured machine systems.
Combination of the two companies into a single SAP platform.
SAP was implemented based upon the Design Flow parameters, and Siebel CRM was implemented for field maintenance.
The two companies were combined into one and they are still operating on SAP. Lee was the principal and chief architect of the merger and consolidation plan as well as the IT Strategist.
A follow-on engagement was Customer Value Management, wherein 33 of the key customers were interviewed to determine their wants and needs. The resultant presentation was given to US Executive management as well as in Japan to the CEO and High level Executive management.

Lee also consulted to Honeywell Engines Systems and Services while at IBM Global Services, and other aerospace and non-aerospace divisions of that enterprise. He implemented the Siebel 7.2 upgrade, with offshore resources in India and also an SAP Business Warehouse pilot.

As Consultant, Lee also managed an extensive engagement with Best Western Hotels. Over twenty projects were implemented over a four month periods, prior to the Reservations Shut-down for the summer busy period. The strength of this engagement was the Offshoring and On-Shore management of over 120 Indians IT professionals who performed the work and successful implementation of the projects.

Lee is sharing his rich executive and systems implementation experience as a professor for the Introduction to SAP Course and Globalization of IT – Outsourcing and Offshoring at University of California - San Diego (UCSD). He has also taught IT management and technical courses at CalPoly Pomona and the University of San Francisco. Lee earned a Master of Science in Operations Research from Columbia University, New York and a Bachelor of Science in the Arts, Sciences and Literature from the United States Military Academy, West Point, New York. He is certified for SAP ASAP and previously was a PMP.