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Board of Directors

Reno Sub-Systems > About Us > Board of Directors
Reno Sub-Systems > About Us > Board of Directors

Don Whitson – Chairman

Managing Director – Vital Equity Partners
Mr. Whitson has been building, owning, guiding, and investing in mid-market manufacturing companies for his entire career. As co-founder and CEO of Span Instruments in the mid-1970’s, Mr. Whitson built Span into an instrumentation manufacturing company serving a broad range of industries, including semiconductor manufacturing. In 1996 the company merged with publicly traded Tylan General. After the sale of Tylan General to Millipore Corporation, Mr. Whitson invested in many successful private manufacturing companies. From 2000 to 2003, Mr. Whitson was Chairman of Authentix, which was later acquired by Carlyle Group. Mr. Whitson is a graduate of the University of Texas at Austin with a BBA in finance.

Rod C. Fallow

President – Swagelok Northern California
Mr. Fallow has enjoyed a long and varied career with the Swagelok organization, starting in Canada, and with international experience in sales, distribution, manufacturing, and marketing. Mr. Fallow was the president and owner of Swagelok Sunnyvale until 2010 when he oversaw the merger of the company with Oakland Valve and Fitting. Prior to that, Mr. Fallow was the vice president of marketing for Swagelok Company in Ohio. Additionally, he serves on the board of Living Classroom, a non-profit educational organization. Mr. Fallow attended the University of Alberta and graduated from the Northern Alberta Institute of Technology.

Robert B. MacKnight

CEO – Reno Sub-Systems
Mr. MacKnight is a seasoned international business leader with more than 40 years of experience. His dynamic leadership background provides Reno the strategic insight needed for its profitable success. For the last 30 years he has held executive roles with P&L responsibility. His experience includes the successful launch of two startups. In Mr. MacKnight’s past role as president and CEO of Crossing Automation, he oversaw all operational activities. He repositioned the company and renewed its marketing efforts. These activities led to the company’s acquisition by the largest market shareholder. Previously, he served as president and COO at Mattson, where he spearheaded operational activities, led manufacturing and the product groups, and was responsible for the company’s global business operations. Before joining Mattson, Mr. MacKnight spent 3 1/2 years at Microbar Inc., where he was president and chief operating officer. He has also held senior management positions with Cymer Inc., Watkins-Johnson Semiconductor Equipment Group, Aktis Corp., Peak Systems, and Eaton Corp. Mr. MacKnight holds bachelors and masters degrees from the University of Massachusetts.

Sung Hoon Yang, Ph.D.

General Manager, Samsung Ventures America
Senior Director, Samsung Ventures
Dr. Yang’s career with Samsung has spanned engineering, design, simulation, and investment assignments in Korea and the US. He currently serves as GM of Samsung Ventures America. Prior to this role, he was Chief Investment Manager in Korea, where he led mergers and acquisitions of several semiconductor materials companies (Voltaix-acquired by Air Liquide, NexPlanar-acquired by Cabot Microelectronics, StoreDot, Inpria, SBA, Aveni, DSC), equipment and tools (IMS-acquired by Intel, Teraview, Exnodes), software (SolidFire-acquired by NetApp, Mirero-acquired by Samsung, xTAL), and new concept memory (Nantero). From the Seoul National University, Dr. Yang received a Ph.D. and MS in Material Science and a BS in Polymer Science.