Management Team
The Data Agent founders have more than 45 years of experience in financial services and investments technology.
Thuyen Nguyen
CEO and Founder
Thuyen Nguyen has spent 20 years providing advanced data storage and reporting solutions in the investment industry. Formerly, he was VP of Technology & co-founder of Montclair Financial Technology Inc (MFT) where he built the company's investment data warehouse software products. MFT was later sold to Netik Inc. which was subsequently purchased by the Bank of New York. Prior to MFT, he was vice-president at Bankers Trust in charge of development of the BT-World product line, an investment data warehouse solution for the bank's institutional customers.
Thuyen holds an MBA in Finance from NYU Stern School of Business & a BA in Computer Science and Political Science from Columbia University.
Steve Buck
Managing Director
Steve has over 25 years of financial and management experience primarily in the thrift and mortgage markets, bank mergers and acquisitions and the online payments industry. Prior to joining Data Agent Steve was President of Interactive Transaction Services, a payments technology company based in the Bay Area providing payment solutions to international telcom companies. Prior to ITS Steve was a senior consultant for Edgar, Dunn and Conover focused on financial consulting to major credit card issuers and commercial banks. Prior to EDC Steve was a senior consultant with both Poelker and Associates and Kaplan Smith and Associates, a subsidiary of the First Boston Corporation. Steve began his career in commercial banking in mergers and acquisitions.
Steve holds a BS in Architecture and an MBA from the University of Tennessee.
Nicholas Zagaroli
Senior Data Warehouse Architect
Nicholas has over 20 years of Information Technology Management and development experience focused on providing solutions to the complex problems encountered by finance and asset management organizations. Nick's experience includes managing large projects, including business process design and implementation, business information requirements and improvement (Six Sigma Quality management), policy and control reviews, diagnostic benchmarking analysis of major finance processes, design and implementation of Shared Service Centers, merger integration, and packaged software selections and implementations. Nick's broad experience includes operations management, product management, and Sales force management.
Prior to joining the Data Agent, Nick was a Quality Leader and Product Manager at GE Capital Solutions.
Background
Nicholas began his career as a consultant specializing in the conversion and integration of General Ledger systems for AT&T, Kaiser Hospital, and Alta-Bates Hospital Group in the San Francisco Bay Area . Nicholas then joined US-Leasing a Ford Motor Credit Company, in the Portfolio Management group as a Senior Programmer Analysts. Where during his tenure he developed a companywide Portfolio evaluation system, winning the Ford Quality is Job One award for Software application deployment with zero defects after 180 days from implementation.
Nicholas then went on to AT&T Capital Corporation where he led the development efforts for the creation of various asset management systems. He also directed and managed the conversion of the legacy billing and General Ledger system for the AT&T Automotive Fleet Services group.
AT&T Capital Corporation was subsequently sold off to CIT Group, Associates Capital, and various other enterprise whereupon he rejoined US Leasing as a Major Account Contract Liaison with responsibility for IT Management, Customer Service and P&L.
Upon the sale of US Leasing to Citi Capital Nicholas was transferred the headquarters office in Dallas, TX where he led the TeleCom Services Group and the Customer Review Group. Upon the sale of the division at Citi to GE Capital, Nicholas joined GE as a Functional BlackBelt and subse-quently promoted to Product Manager for GE Capital Solutions Outsource group.
Education & Training
Nicholas holds a Bachelor of Science with a minor in History from the University of California at Berkeley. Nicholas also holds a number of certifications in Six Sigma and Microsoft SQL Server.
Kelli Brown
Director of Private Funds
Kelli Brown is an attorney with more than 15 years of experience in the private fund advisory industry, in various back-office roles. Kelli began working in the hedge fund industry since 1997, first with Ernst & Young, LLP as a Senior Tax Consultant, and then with PricewaterhouseCoopers as a Manager in their Tax and Legal Services group. In 1999 she went to work with Bowman Capital Management as Special Counsel, working on tax, legal and compliance related matters for a fund complex that managed over 6 billion dollars at its peak and had offices in Silicon Valley, New York and London. In 2002, she joined forces with a group of Bowman colleagues (eventually 18 former Bowman personnel) to found the billion-dollar-plus spin-off advisory firm Cavalry Asset Management. As Cavalry’s General Counsel and Chief Compliance Officer, Kelli was responsible for legal, compliance and tax related functions as well as client services. Prior to joining Data Agent Kelli was Co-Founder of Sol Hedge, LLC, providing back-office consulting to various hedge funds including “in-sourced” roles of adviser COO, CCO and audit manager.
Holds a BS in Economics from the University of California, San Diego, and a JD and LL.M. in Taxation from the University of San Diego.