LiveAction
Leadership Team

Francine serves as the CEO of LiveAction.  Francine brings more than 25 years of proven financial strategy and operations leadership experience delivering outstanding results for B2B software and data companies.  Francine previously served as Deputy CFO and VP, Finance at INTTRA (a private-equity backed software and network business servicing the ocean shipping industry), where she helped lead the company through a successful exit and sale to E2Open.  Prior to that, Francine held various roles of increasing responsibility in both finance and operations.  She served as  Vice President of Global Sales Operations and Finance at TravelClick, a private-equity sponsored global provider of cloud-based data-driven solutions for maximizing hotel revenue and spent 10 years with Dun & Bradstreet (NYSE: DNB), a leading source of B2B commercial information & insight.  Francine began her career as an Auditor at Deloitte & Touche, growing and developing the foundation of her immense skillset. Francine earned her B.S. in Accounting from Fairfield University and her M.B.A. in Finance from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.  She is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

John Smith is CTO, EVP and founder of LiveAction and previously served as VP of Engineering at Spirent where he was responsible for $150M+ revenue per year product line with over 140 engineers.  John has been in networking and software development for over 25 years with companies such as Boeing, Phoenix Technologies and Referentia.  John holds 6 patents developed under LiveAction in the areas of network management and visualizations.     John holds a MS in computer science and research towards his PhD in machine learning using genetic algorithms for autonomous navigation.

Pete Tyrrell is the Chief Revenue Officer at LiveAction. He has spent the better part of 30 years building high performing global Enterprise sales teams for Venture and Private Equity backed software organizations including SmartBear, Digital Guardian, 170 Systems ArrowPoint Communications and PTC. Pete attended the University of New Hampshire and graduated with a BS in Mechanical Engineering.

Vishwas Puttasubbappa is the SVP of R&D and GM of LiveSP Business Unit at LiveAction. He and his team of awesome Engineers are responsible for delivering LiveAction Products in an efficient and timely manner so as to exceed expectations set by LiveAction’s Customers and thereby providing a strategic advantage to LiveAction. He has over 20 years of experience in the software and networking industry taking on various responsibilities. Prior to joining LiveAction as a product manager, Vishwas spent about 8 years at Cisco working for diverse teams such as solution test, product management, consulting, Customer advocacy and architecture. Prior to Cisco, he worked at Ericsson and Lucent Technologies developing Products in the computer networking space. He holds advanced degrees in Computer Science from North Carolina State University and a CCIE in Routing and Switching. He likes to spend any time outside of his work with his wife and three kids, watching movies, travelling, playing sports and expanding his culinary skills.

John McSherry is Live Action’s LiveAction’s Chief Administrative Officer and General Counsel, overseeing the legal and compliance, human resources and information security functions.Before joining Live Action, he served as the chief legal officer at Cloud9 Technologies, a leading voice communication and analytics cloud-based platform designed for the financial markets, and he led the legal effort in its successful sale to Symphony Communications.  Prior to Cloud9, John served as the General Counsel at Ipreo and IPC Systems, both private equity-backed financial technology companies.  He also served at the Enforcement Division of the United States Securities and Exchange Commission and as a commercial litigation associate at the New York law firm of Cahill Gordon & Reindel.  John holds a BA from Fordham University, a JD from Fordham University School of Law, and is a member of the NY State Bar.

Tom has 29 years of experience in financial management and operations. Recently he was the CFO of Hobsons, Inc. a SAAS provider of education software. Before that he was the CFO of Genscape, Inc. a fundamental data provider to the energy markets. For much of the last year he has been managing US Projects for the Daily Mail General Trust. Prior to that, he served in various financial leadership positions over 21 years at Thomson Reuters. All these roles have provided him with broad experience across corporate strategy, mergers, acquisitions, partnerships, corporate finance, product management and operations.

Niru Raghavan joined LiveAction in April 2022. As the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) at LiveAction, her responsibilities include LiveAction’s global marketing strategy, corporate marketing and communications, product marketing, digital marketing, demand generation, business development, marketing operations, and channel marketing.

She has over 20 years of experience building and scaling performance marketing teams for high growth technology companies. Prior to LiveAction, Raghavan held the position of Global Head of Demand Generation for Datto. Her previous roles include leadership positions at Cengage, Digital Guardian and Veracode. She has earned an MBA from Kirloskar Institute of Advanced Management Studies, India.

Paul has more than 25 years of operating experience as a Chief Executive Officer and senior executive leading a wide-range of technology organizations, from traditional software and SaaS to managed-service business models. Paul’s long track record of success includes start-ups, growth companies, and complex multinational businesses. Paul has a passion for fostering strong, team-oriented customer-centric organizations, characterized by high performing sales and marketing functions. Paul most recently served as CEO of Unitrends, a private equity backed data-management software company.

Paul holds a bachelor’s degree from Hofstra University and an from the MIT Sloan School of Management.

Philine is a vice president at Insight Partners. She focuses on both high growth and mature software businesses, particularly in cybersecurity and infrastructure software.

Previously, she spent time on Insight’s Onsite team, working closely with portfolio executives on GTM strategy, product strategy, and M&A. Prior to Insight, she worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Company’s New York Office. Her work at McKinsey focused largely on growth and transaction strategy, advising clients across a variety of industries including financial services and financial technology, pharmaceuticals, and industrials.

Prior to LiveAction, he served four years as CEO of the digital identity company Jumio, during which time ARR grew sevenfold while becoming cashflow positive in 2 ½ years; he is currently Jumio’s Chairman of the Board. Previously Mr. Stuut served as CEO of TruePosition, a leader in location-based services technology, which was spun off into Liberty Broadband Corp. and was the CEO of Broadband Innovations, delivering digital interactivity services to cable TV providers, which was sold to Motorola.

Mr. Stuut managed the Telecommunications Practice at McKinsey & Company and did business strategy consulting for Booz-Allen & Hamilton in Germany and Braxton Associates (now Deloitte & Touche) in the United Kingdom. He also worked for Northrup Grumman and Raytheon as an electro-optical systems engineer.

Mr. Stuut holds an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, an MA from the School of Arts & Sciences of the University of Pennsylvania, a BS with honors in electrical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology, and an MS from the College of Optical Sciences at the University of Arizona.

Ms. Griarte is a Co-Founder and Managing Partner of Ponte Partners, a secondary fund focused on the acquisition of direct private companies, PE/Growth/VC portfolios, and LP interests.  Ponte invests technology (security, fintech, enterprise software, SaaS, mobility, AR/VR, infrastructure), digital health, consumer and industrial sectors.

She serves on several private company boards and most recently served as Board of Trustee for the City of San Jose Police and Fire Retirement Plan, a $4.7 billion public pension fund where she chaired both the investment and governance committees and served on the joint personnel and audit committees, and San Jose Mayor Liccardo’s Retirement Stakeholders Working Group.

Ms. Griarte has been in private equity and venture capital for 20+ years.  Previously she was a Managing Director at Saints Capital, a secondary firm with $1B+ of assets under management with 200+ global portfolio of companies across US, Europe and Asia.  Prior to joining Saints in 2003, Ms. Griarte was at Centennial Ventures, a technology-focused early-stage venture capital firm with investments in broadband access, cable, networking, satellite, wireless and digital media.  Previously, Ms. Griarte was a strategy consultant at Gemini Consulting in the Telecom, Media and Networks practice focused on wireline and wireless telecommunications companies across Europe, US and Middle East.  Ms. Griarte began her career as an electrical systems engineer at Lockheed Martin and chaired the Corporate Avionics Taskforce.

Ms. Griarte received an MBA from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management, an MEM from the Robert L. McCormick School of Engineering, and BS degrees in Electrical Engineering and Computer Science from the University of California, Berkeley.

Francine serves as the CEO of LiveAction.  Francine brings more than 25 years of proven financial strategy and operations leadership experience delivering outstanding results for B2B software and data companies.  Francine previously served as Deputy CFO and VP, Finance at INTTRA (a private-equity backed software and network business servicing the ocean shipping industry), where she helped lead the company through a successful exit and sale to E2Open.  Prior to that, Francine held various roles of increasing responsibility in both finance and operations.  She served as  Vice President of Global Sales Operations and Finance at TravelClick, a private-equity sponsored global provider of cloud-based data-driven solutions for maximizing hotel revenue and spent 10 years with Dun & Bradstreet (NYSE: DNB), a leading source of B2B commercial information & insight.  Francine began her career as an Auditor at Deloitte & Touche, growing and developing the foundation of her immense skillset. Francine earned her B.S. in Accounting from Fairfield University and her M.B.A. in Finance from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania.  She is a member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.