Carl Yankowski 259 connecties

Carl Yankowski is a widely successful global consumer products innovator and brand-builder, alternating between traditional consumer packaged goods, durables, and consumer technology with ease his entire career. Creative, disruptive growth and new business development are his specialties, and his expertise is evenly split between technology development and marketing in packaged goods, durables, retail, and electronics/communications. He has deep geographic experience, living and working on both coasts of the U.S., and in Europe and Asia.

Carl has homes in Boston and New York City, and is now CEO of Ambient Devices, Inc., bringing Internet information to everyday products without a PC or traditional Internet connection. The Company's technologies enable effortless access to information, such as current weather forecasts, stock market activity, sports scores, and much more - with minimal or no user configuration. Ambient Devices licenses its technologies to leading consumer products companies and organizations, and develops and markets its own solutions under the Ambient Devices brand.

Ambient Devices was founded in 2001 to commercialize patent-pending technologies pioneered at the MIT Media Lab. The company is headquartered in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and is privately held. For more information, please visit http://www.ambientdevices.com.

As background, Carl started at P&G Computer Systems, was transferred to Pringle’s and Duncan Hines, and then moved to Memorex, helping develop and launch high-bias audio tapes with the enduring “Is It Live or Is It Memorex” Ella Fitzgerald campaign. He also negotiated early first rights to compact disc for Memorex. At Pepsi, he reformulated, repositioned, and grew Mountain Dew dramatically, rolled-out the Pepsi two liter plastic bottle, developed the first full-face illuminated vending machines (simulating cans), and expanded the very successful Pepsi Challenge campaign, beating Coke nationally in market share---the only time in history. He implemented the first Local Market Planning efforts in Pepsi’s history.

At Polaroid, he headed up the fast-growing and profitable global business-imaging group, and was chairman of the Asia-Pacific region, living in Hong Kong. He also negotiated early first rights for Polaroid to DSL. At GE, he helped turn around small appliances by developing and expanding the SpaceMaker concept, and helping create the long-running “GE, We Bring Good Things to Life” campaign. At Cadbury Schweppes in London, he was CEO of new business development, reporting directly to the board.

Carl was President/COO of Sony Electronics, hired by Sony’s founder Akio Morita, and grew U.S. revenue from $6 to over $10 billion in four years, making it the world’s largest operation for Sony, and changing Sony from an analog to a digital company. His teams planned and led innovative development and launches of digital satellite systems, VAIO computers, Playstation, wireless CDMA cell phones (in an early JV with Qualcomm), and DVD, repositioning Sony with several major advertising awards, and earning Sony the most respected brand name in America twice, still unique for a foreign-owned company. Sony Electronics was also named the most ethically-run large corporation in America under Carl’s watch, honored by the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. Carl began the implementation of Six-Sigma at Sony.

He was CEO of Reebok, re-staffing virtually all senior management, reducing SKU’s and costs dramatically, and substantively improving operations and launching new products, initiating a now-successful turnaround and ultimate acquisition by Adidas.

Carl led Palm’s $1 billion-dollar-plus spinout and IPO on short notice, parachuting in and growing the business from a few hundred million to a profitable $1.5 billion in 15 months, driving awareness from under 15% to over 65%, with a dramatic restructuring and stabilization after the 2001/2002 global dot-com economic crash.

He then founded Westerham Group, focusing on creatively disruptive technology, products, branding, and demand generation, consulting for and leading several companies, including CRF in Helsinki, a start-up now the world’s top e-clinical diary company for global pharmaceuticals. He has helped implement Sox 404 several times.

Carl has five current internet music download patents, was a member of the AFL-CIO American Federation of Musicians in Pittsburgh when very young, and was named a distinguished graduate of Butler High School. He attended college on a full tuition scholarship from the state of Pennsylvania (uniquely applicable anywhere in the country).

He was accepted at a variety of top colleges as an English, music, speech, and engineering major, and was fluent in French. Choosing MIT, Carl holds simultaneous 1971 degrees in EE and Management, and a 1968 Wellesley College concentration in early European Art and Architecture. (He was among the first few co-Eds cross-registered at Wellesley). At MIT, he served as an elected officer of MIT’s student government and Phi Delta Theta, lettered in varsity heavyweight crew and played ice hockey, while focusing on solid-state physics research and operations research/modeling.

Carl was a teaching assistant in System Dynamics at MIT Sloan, and has served on the Boards of Boston College Carroll School, MIT Sloan and Media Lab, and several large and small, private and public technology and consumer product companies. He was the Carroll School commencement speaker in 2001, and education, guest lecturing, and mentoring remain his passions.

He is an active pilot, gadgeteer, and handyman. Carl speaks extensively, recently at the invitation of Boston College, MIT, and P&G in Cincinnati. He enjoys personal projects on an old home lovingly dubbed “the money pit.”