Adam Breslawsky
Managing Director and Principal
Adam has been on Wall Street since 1993. Prior to joining Oberon, Adam was most recently a Vice President with JP Morgan's Telecom, Media & Technology Group where he was instrumental in the creation of the firm's Wireless Data Investment Banking coverage effort. While at JP Morgan, Adam led the execution of numerous private placements, mergers and debt financings.

Prior to joining JP Morgan, Adam worked at Merrill Lynch in the Leveraged Finance Group, underwriting high yield bonds and bridge loans as well as arranging syndicated loans and mezzanine financings. Adam also spent two years as a member of Merrill Lynch's Mergers & Acquisitions Group executing over $2 billion in completed transactions across a number of industry sectors including consumer products, healthcare and technology. Adam holds an MBA from the Wharton Business School and a BA from Union College.

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Elad Epstein
Managing Director, Principal and Co-founder
Prior to Oberon, Elad was with Deutsche Banc Alex Brown most recently in the Mergers & Acquisitions Group where he focused on servicing innovative, leading-edge technology companies. Prior to the Mergers & Acquisitions Group, he was a member of the Financial Sponsor Coverage Group working with the top private equity firms on a wide range of transactions.

While at Deutsche Banc Alex Brown, Elad executed over $2.5 billion in merger and acquisitions, leveraged debt and equity transactions. Prior to Deutsche Banc Alex Brown, Elad was a member of Oppenheimer & Co. Technology Investment Banking team. During his time at Oppenheimer, Elad executed over 14 public and private equity transactions, raising over $750 million for emerging growth technology companies. Elad holds an MBA from the Wharton Business School and a BA from Tel Aviv University.

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Nicole Schmidt, Esq.
Managing Director, Principal and Co-founder
Prior to co-founding Oberon, Nicole was head of US operations for Kentech Ventures, an Israeli-based VC, where she was successful helping start-up technology companies identify business opportunities, forge strategic relationships, amend and execute their business plans and source capital. Prior to joining Kentech, Nicole spent nearly 7 years working on Wall Street as a senior equity analyst on both the buy and sell-side.

Nicole is an expert on Internet, e-commerce, enterprise software, contract manufacturing and IT services companies and wrote the definitive tome on the Information Security space in early 1998, while she was a Vice President/Director of Technology Research at CIBC Oppenheimer & Co. She started her finance career as an equity analyst on the buy-side at Hudson Capital Advisors, a firm which managed $1 billion in institutional assets.

Nicole is a lawyer and holds a B.A. in Political Science from New York University. She began her career working at The Segal Company, the premiere multi-employer employee benefits consulting firm, drafting pension plans and welfare plans for unions and their employers.

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Ralph H. Isham
Managing Director
Mr. Isham is the founder and Managing Director of GH Venture Partners LLC ("GHVP"). Since 1990, Mr. Isham has directed GHVP’s private investments as principal and agent in numerous emerging growth companies in the field of telecommunications, transportation technologies and health care services.

Before GHVP, Mr. Isham was a consultant with The Boston Consulting Group and Strategic Planning Associates (Mercer Consulting acquiree). His responsibilities included development of long-range business strategies for domestic and international markets for Fortune 100 companies.

Mr. Isham was a Director at the American Stock Exchange under Mr. Arthur Leavitt, the former Chairman of the American Stock Exchange and the SEC.

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Robert Lipps
Managing Director
Prior to joining Oberon, Mr. Lipps was a Director at GoldenTree Asset Management and a member of the Capital Solutions Group where he focused on sourcing, structuring, analyzing and monitoring first lien, second lien and mezzanine investments in middle market companies. Prior to joining GoldenTree Asset Management, Robert was a Managing Director in the Financial Sponsors Group at Deutsche Bank where he worked on a variety of bank, bond, advisory and equity transactions for private equity clients.

Prior to joining Deutsche Bank, Robert held various research analyst positions focusing on both equity and fixed income securities. From 1993 through July 1994, Robert worked as a senior high yield generalist for Cowen & Co., responsible for coverage of special situations as well as the airline, aerospace and defense industries. Mr. Lipps received his MBA from New York University and his B.S. / B.A. degree from Boston University.

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Yoav Rekem
Managing Director
Prior to joining Oberon, Yoav was a Vice President with CIBC World Markets' Technology Investment Banking group where he initiated banking coverage of telecom networking equipment and voice-over-packet sectors. While at the Technology group, Yoav led the execution of numerous equity financings, including IPOs, secondary offerings and private placements and mergers and acquisitions transactions.

Prior to the Technology group, Yoav worked at CIBC’s Leveraged Finance Group, where he executed various financing transactions, such as, high yield, mezzanine and bank debt offerings, M&A and restructuring advisory assignments and private equity investments.

Yoav is a lawyer, practicing for over a year at M. Seligman & Co. in Tel Aviv. He holds an MBA from the NYU Stern School of Business and a joint degree in Law and Economics from Tel Aviv University.

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Noel C. Rimalovski
Managing Director
Mr. Rimalovski has a deep background in M&A and private equity management. Mr. Rimalovski was previously Senior Vice President at Macquarie Capital (USA), in the Telecom, Media, Entertainment & Technology Group where he completed $2 billion investments in the telecom sector. Prior to Macquarie, he was Director in the M&A Group of Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein, and its predecessor Wasserstein Perella, where he completed transactions in the media, telecom, technology and consumer sectors.

Prior to this, he worked on structured financings, securitizations and proprietary investments at Lazard Frères and Millennium Capital Markets.

Mr. Rimalovski earned his MBA in Finance from Columbia Business School and holds a BA from Tufts University.

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Ed Zabar
Managing Director
Ed Zabar, a Managing Director with Oberon Securities, focuses on M&A advisory and fund raising in the Technology, Media and Telecom sectors as well as Defense related transactions.

Mr. Zabar has over 16 years of experience in investment banking, venture capital and business consulting. Previously, Mr. Zabar was a Managing Director at National Capital Companies where his focus was on M&A and funding of early and expansion stage Technology, Media, Telecom and Defense opportunities. Prior to his work at National Capital, Mr. Zabar worked as a Vice President at two Venture Capital firms where he executed multiple technology at various stages of development. Prior to these roles, Mr. Zabar was an Executive Vice President at ViewTrade Securities where he was instrumental in increasing the company’s global client base and revenues from $500K to over $15 Million a year. Mr. Zabar has also worked as a financial and technology consultant at Goldman Sachs as well as at PwC where he advised many fortune 500 financial services and manufacturing firms. In addition, Mr. Zabar started and successfully exited two technology startups.

Mr. Zabar offers clients a broad cross-section of experience as an entrepreneur, consultant and advisor to public and private companies both in the US and abroad. He has participated and led numerous transactions of various sizes and complexities.

Mr. Zabar holds an MBA from Columbia University and a BS in Finance and Information Technology from New York University. Mr. Zabar is a Registered Representative with FINRA and holds series 7, 63 and 62 licenses.
 

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Stuart Fromm
Senior Vice President
Prior to joining Oberon, Mr. Fromm founded Fromm Financial Group, a successful national and international lending firm serving clients’ business needs. Prior to this, Stuart was a Senior Vice President at ING Funds, Distributor, where he was responsible for the distributions of the firm’s mutual funds and separate accounts throughout the Tri-State area. He was responsible for more than $1 billion of sales during his tenure. Prior to that, Stuart worked as a Regional Vice President for Evergreen Funds and obtained the status of Top Producer, having raised hundreds of millions of dollars for the firm.

Early on, Stuart was a Senior Regional Vice President for State Street Research, where he launched their mutual fund capability. He was awarded the firm’s coveted Chairman’s Award for his outstanding sales achievements. Stuart’s first foray into finance was as a Regional Marketing Director at Planco, a marketing firm specializing in annuities, mutual finds and life insurance. He began his career as an accountant with Arthur Anderson & Company.

Stuart earned his BA in Accounting and Communications from Marietta College.

 

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Assaf Guterman
Managing Director
Assaf has nearly 10 years of experience in financial markets and the healthcare industry.

Prior to joining Oberon, Assaf was an Equity Research Analyst, covering the medical device industry for Lazard Capital Markets where he advised institutional investors on buying and selling opportunities within the sector. His coverage universe included companies from a variety of fields including cardiology, neurology, general and minimally invasive surgery, orthopedics, diagnostics and aesthetics. Assaf’s research experience includes macro analysis of the medical device and healthcare universe, fundamental equity analysis, institutional buy-side marketing and a variety of relationships with company managements and key industry-leading physicians.

Prior to joining Lazard, Assaf was Director of Finance at Taro Pharmaceuticals, a publicly traded company with over $300 million in revenues, where he held a variety of responsibilities including financial and SEC reporting, budget preparation, managing the company’s debt structure and helping to maintain relationships with Wall Street.

Prior to Taro, Assaf was the Chief Economist at the Israeli Ministry of Finance Mission to NY, helping the State of Israel raise funds through the issuance of sovereign bonds through the financial markets.

Assaf is a CFA charter-holder. He holds a B.A. in Political Science from Tel Aviv University and an MBA in Finance from Zicklin Business School at Baruch College. Assaf is a member of the CFA Institute and the New York Society of Security Analysts.

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Mark Rollins
Senior Vice President
Mr. Rollins started on Wall Street over 20 years ago with Credit Suisse First Boston where over the course of a decade with the firm he worked extensively in the Leveraged Finance Group and Mergers & Acquisitions. During that time, he executed 20 leveraged debt and equity public offerings raising nearly $3 billion and completed nearly $2 billion in mergers and acquisitions. Industries represented included media, general industrial, consumer and financial services.

Following his banking experience, Mark pursued entrepreneurial aspirations as CFO for Adventureseek, a travel website, and for Tracks magazine, a national music magazine. He successfully raised over $10 million in funding from over 40 investors over the course of the two ventures. He has returned to investment banking by joining Oberon in February 2008.

Mark earned his MBA from Stanford Business School and his BA from Harvard University.

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Adam Taplinger
Senior Vice President


Adam Taplinger, a Senior Vice President with Oberon Securities is an M&A and fund raising specialist in the Technology, Industrials and Retail sectors, among others.

Mr. Taplinger has over 10 years of investment banking and consulting experience. He was previously a Vice President in the Japan Focus Group at Sagent Advisors, where his work centered on cross-border M&A and capital raising activities. Prior to Sagent Advisors, Adam was a Vice President at Daiwa Securities, an affiliate of Daiwa Sumitomo Mitsui Banking Corporation, where he worked closely with Japan’s largest corporations to help develop, implement and execute their global M&A initiatives. He completed numerous buy-side and sell-side transactions on behalf of his clients. Some of his largest clients included JTEKT Corporation, a member of the Toyota group of companies and one of its largest tier one suppliers. He also worked with numerous other large Japanese clients including NTT Data, Marubeni Corporation, Autobacs Seven and Reins International.

Mr. Taplinger offers clients a truly global reach with his extensive cross-border experience. He has led transactions of various sizes in numerous industries in over 15 countries.

Mr. Taplinger holds a BS from the Leonard N. Stern School of Business at New York University. Mr. Taplinger is a registered representative with FINRA, and holds series 7 and 63 licenses.

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JW Vitalone
Senior Vice President


JW is responsible for initiating and executing transactions in the conventional and alternative energy sectors. Before joining Oberon Securities he spent nearly 15 years as an equity research analyst conducting fundamental analysis of companies in the Oil and Gas Exploration & Production, Oilfield Services & Equipment, and Power Generation industries as well as macro analysis of the oil and gas markets.

JW graduated with honors from St. Bonaventure University earning a BA in Finance, and earned an MBA with a concentration in accounting from the Rochester Institute of Technology Saunders College of Business. He also holds a Juris Doctorate from the Golden Gate University School of Law in San Francisco where during his third year he clerked for the Regional Counsel of the Comptroller of the Currency

Following law school JW was named Charles A. Dana Fellow for International and Comparative Legal Studies and interned with the European Economic Commission developing alternative approaches to financing developing countries. His international experience also includes participation in USAID-sponsored Russian business mentor programs in Vladivostok.

JW has been awarded the Chartered Financial Analyst designation by CFA Institute and has served as chairman of the organization’s Advocacy Committee.

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