gridline logo

about header left connecting people header right power lines
   
  About Gridline
 

Leadership

Management

Terry Dillon President, CEO
Kyle Stout Senior Vice President, Finance, CFO and Controller
Michael Massad Senior Vice President, Sales
Jesse C. Talamantez Senior Director, Government Programs
Luay Shawwa Senior Vice President, President/CEO of Wits Group, Inc.

Terry Dillon
President, CEO/CTO

Mr. Dillon has more than thirty-five years experience in the field of telecommunications, security, and network design and has an in-depth, well-rounded expertise in all aspects of business management. He has served in all levels of the Wire-line and Wireless Telecom Business from Operations, Branch Management, Regional Vice President, and President/COO to Chairman/CEO. He is intimately familiar with operating budgets and financials; as well as, business planning and execution, including turn-around. In addition he has served in senior positions in both the Vendor and Operator venues.

Mr. Dillon was the first employee of Boston Technology whose Patented Voice Mail Delivery technology revolutionized the telecommunications industry. Mr. Dillon performed the hardware design for the COACCESS product, and then sold the product to five Regional Bell operating companies, and multiple international Telecommunications firms. Terry has designed, proposed, and sold first of Telecommunications projects to major telephone companies world wide. He has built several profitable businesses and operated and managed several multi-million dollar budgets. Terry has been published in Telephony Magazine, the US Trade magazine for the Telephone Industry, and has been quoted in multiple publications on new industry technologies and their potentials. In addition, Mr. Dillon is the inventor of the three technology patents pending for Gridline Communications Holdings, Inc.

Terry studied at Lamar University and Northeastern Oklahoma State University. He is a member of the Boy Scouts of America Heritage Foundation and a member of the United Way Alexis DeTocqueville Society.

Kyle Stout
Senior Vice President, Finance and Controller

Mr. Stout has more than twenty-five years experience mainly in the telecommunication and financial service industries. From 1986 to 2006, Mr. Stout was with Ericsson, Inc. a wholly owned subsidiary of L.M. Ericsson A.B. where he was involved in a wide range of duties in the budgeting, forecasting, analytical and transactional aspects of finance. He has been involved in structured financing arrangements in the U.S. and U.K. which resulted in the first U.S. nationwide cellular phone network and the first U.S. commercial GSM mobile phone network as well as a cable telephony network in south-west England. From 2006 to 2009, Mr. Stout joined Bank of America working in Loan Administration as an Assistant Vice President of Finance.

From 2001 to 2006, Mr. Stout was the Ericsson Inc. North American Senior Financial Analyst and Worldwide Satellite Product Controller responsible for developing the forecasting and budgeting model and process for a $3 Billion annual sales budget for North American Market Unit. He prepared, communicated and reported consolidated Market Unit, Product Unit, Legal Entity, Cash Flow and Hedging Budgets and Forecasts. He was responsible for preparing board meeting financial presentation charts providing an accurate assessment of the company’s financial progress. Other duties included monthly variance analysis and business reports, KPI reporting, SOX reviews, IFRS to GAAP financial statement preparation, financial verses material forecast reconciliations and various sales proposal analysis.

From 1998 to 2001, Mr. Stout was the Ericsson, Inc. North American Wireless Business Unit Controller and Cingular customer team (KAM) Controller. He worked closely with local teams and Swedish counterparts at headquarters to forecast, report, follow-up, analyze, control and grow the North American market. He also was the acting Cingular KAM controller developing and reporting the KAM forecast, approving KAM related transactions and reviewing sales proposals. Finally, during this period, Mr. Stout was involved in converting the legacy financial systems to SAP/R3. He trained, developed and communicated various SAP/R3 financial system procedures and instructions to end users throughout the U.S.

From 1995 to 1998, Mr. Stout was the Ericsson Radio System U.S. General Accounting Manager and Eastern Region Controller. He was responsible for all wireless division transaction based activity including billing, costing, accounts receivables and payables, month-end closing activities, payroll and fixed assets for a company with annual revenues exceeding a billion dollars. During this period he was involved in negotiating structure financing agreements with customers and implementing loan administration computer system and procedures for a billion dollar structure financing loan portfolio. He also was the first to develop a profit and loss report for wireless services business which later grew into one of LM Ericsson’s largest Business Units. Finally, during this period, Mr. Stout was Eastern Region Interim Controller in Reston, VA working closely with the Regional Sales Directors and Regional Vice President reviewing sales contracts, insuring proper financial reporting and reporting year-end forecast for regional customer team.

In 1994, Mr. Stout became the Sector Controller for Ericsson Limited - New Public Networks following OFTEL’s deregulation of the local access market in the U.K. where he implemented new revenue recognition policies, worked with the sales teams negotiating contracts with the startup telecom customers and secured vendor financing for Eurobell Ltd.

In 1993, Mr. Stout became the Project Accounting Manager responsible for $450 Million in annual revenues plus associated cost of sales, receivable collections and loan servicing on commercial projects for all Ericsson U.S wireless systems. In 1990, he became the General Accounting Manager for Ericsson Radio Systems responsible for accounts payable, inventory, inter-company, payroll, benefits, expense accruals, balance sheet reserves, capital transactions, financial reporting and external audits. From 1986 to 1990, Mr. Stout held positions as a Project, Inventory and Senior Accountant.

Mr. Stout received a BBA in Accounting from the University of Texas, in Austin, Texas. and his MBA in Corporate Finance from the University of Dallas, in Dallas, Texas. He is a licensed Certified Public Accountant and received an Academic Honors Award from the Financial Executive Institute, Dallas, Texas in 1992.

Michael Massad
Vice President, Sales

Mr. Massad has over 25 years experience in sales, marketing, and general management in the telecommunications industry. He has a proven track record of developing new markets and developing distribution and direct sales organizations in the technology sector. Mr. Massad has served in multiple capacities in both sales and general business management.

Mr. Massad served as Director of Business Development for AudioCodes USA, Inc., from 1999 to February, 2006, where he was responsible for all sales and marketing for all areas west of the Mississippi river. Over his tenure with AudioCodes, Michael increased the client sales at an average growth of 60%+ per year.

Mr. Massad was also involved in Boston Technology in the early start up phase as Director of Sales. He was responsible for developing a national distribution network and forming strategic relationships with major clients. He participated in taking the company from $500,000, to $37,000,000 over a three year period.

Michael has continued to serve in multiple management positions and has consistently exceeded expectations in the establishment and implementation of new clients and distribution channels throughout his career.

Mr. Massad is a member of the Reserve Officers Association and the Association of Information Technology Professionals. He holds a BS in Marketing and Management from Southeastern Oklahoma State University.

Jesse C. Talamantez
Senior Director, Government Programs

Mr. Talamantez is a well-rounded senior manager in all aspects of communications and systems. His expertise covers a wide variety of communications project and program management and in all levels of the wire-line and wireless telecom services. He has served in engineering, operations, project and program management, and has management and implementation experience in satellite, microwave, fiber optics, tech control and data communications, video conferencing, and land line central offices. Jesse was also part of the team that implemented the Texas Lotto system.

Jesse was instrumental in the implementation, test and turn-up of the Pennsylvania Emergency Reporting Telephone System for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania with Homeland Security under then Governor Tom Ridge.

While with Winstar, Mr. Talamantez managed the Network Construction and Development Team, managing implementations, as well as conducting over 800 RF Site Surveys and Path Studies, including management of systems in Brazil, Venezuela, Argentina, and Peru.

While with (EDS) Electronic Data Systems, Jesse managed the implementation of a network of 10 Meter Satellite Earth Terminals including hubs and (VSAT) Very Small Aperture Terminals. He also managed and implemented a fiber ring around the City of Flint Michigan, and connected Level 1, 2, & 3 SL1 Nortel Switches.

While with (ARCO) and Rockwell International, Jesse managed the implementation of a network of 10 Meter Satellite earth Terminals around the world. On the (PBS) Public Broadcasting System program Jesse was a part of a project management Tiger Team that managed the implementation of over 400 / 10 meter terminals and over 200 / 6 meter terminals for (NPR) National Public Radio.

Jesse has performed services for US Government agencies on many projects for the following organizations:

  • (DOD) - Department of Defense (CONUS)
  • (DOE) - Department of Energy (CONUS)
  • (DOJ) - Department of Justice (CONUS)
  • (BOP) - Bureau of Prisons (CONUS)
  • (FEMA) - Federal Emergency Management (USVI)
  • Home Land Security (Pennsylvania)
  • US Air force (Dover AFB, Barksdale AFB)
  • US Navy (Point Loma California)
  • Sandia Labs in (Albuquerque, New Mexico)

Mr. Talamantez is a Certified and Licensed engineer with a seal and has over thirty-four continuous years of experience and service in the field of telecommunications and is a Senior Member of the National Association of Radio and Telecommunications Engineers.

Luay Shawwa
Senior Vice President, President/CEO, WITS Group

Mr. Shawwa has over twenty-two years of experience in technology, and business development. He is the president and co-founder of World Information Technologies Solutions Group. WITS Group specializes in providing next generation technology solutions and services to educational, industrial and government institutions. Established international channels to provide products and services with HP, Sun Microsystems, Thompson Publishing, and NTT Labs Japan.

He spent 10 years at the University of New Mexico in several senior management positions consulting at the highest technical levels with respect to information technology, client server computing, and telecommunications. He was responsible for design, implementation and operation of the campus-wide network infrastructure, which he expanded in the early 90‘s from 1,700 to over 18,000 network connections over 3 years.

Mr. Shawwa has served in multiple executive consulting roles to a number of Fortune 500 companies in the areas of enterprise networking, systems management, security, e-commerce, and large scale system architecture design, development, and deployment. He has worked with Eastman Kodak, US Internetworking, New York Life, AT&T, IBM, ADT/Tyco, and Scheidt & Bachmann USA to develop and manage implementation of successful innovative solutions and strategies to solve both technology and business problems.

Mr. Shawwa’s projects have included the following: • Developed the architecture and implemented a plan for UNM, New Mexico Governor‘s office, Cisco Systems, Qwest and National Lambda Rail (NLR) to establish New Mexico as a founding member and a core node on the first fiber based national research and development network National Lambda Rail (NLR). • Responsible for developing and managing the TMA environment at AT&T in support of mission critical systems and 67,000 workstations for remote remediation as part of Y2K project. • Designed and implemented the first network for the Maui High Performance Super Computing (MHPCC) Center and subsequent upgrades. MHPCC became one of the largest supercomputing centers. • Mr. Shawwa partnered with Kalpana Systems and developed the requirements and implemented the first campus-wide fiber optic switched network in the USA. • Served as the director of The University Research Labs at the Electrical and Computer Engineering Department at the University of New Mexico, specializing in security enterprise management solutions and high-speed telecommunications networks. • For Los Alamos National Labs, Luay designed the secure export licensing network infrastructure, interconnecting all national labs and the Department of Energy. • As senior vice president of Networking at Aquila Technologies, a Subsidiary of Canberra Industries he developed solutions and partnerships with leading technology and security providers including Cisco Systems, Nortel Networks, Oblix, Check Point, Tipping Point, RSA Securities, Sun Microsystems, EMC, IBM, Oracle, Ambient and HP. • Adjunct faculty member in the areas of information systems, Internetworking, client server computing, and business process engineering. • Collaborated in the late 1980 on the design and development of the 1st network management system with Digital Corporation.

Mr. Shawwa holds a Bachelor's and a Master's of Science degree with honors in Computer Engineering from the University of New Mexico.


gridline power provider



hexagon shapes