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Former Lantronix CFO to Same Post at BlueCava

Sakai: resume includes stint in Austin, home of BlueCava’s latest backer

Reagan Sakai, who resigned under fire from Irvine-based networking gear maker Lantronix Inc. earlier this year, has landed a new job down the road.

Sakai was named chief financial officer earlier this month at BlueCava Inc., an Irvine-based device recognition and anti-fraud software maker that has backing from from billionaire Dallas Mavericks own-er Mark Cuban.

“His unique background in managing high-growth environments while implementing financial discipline will prove instrumental as we continue to expand,” said Chief Executive David Norris.

Sakai took the position because it offered him a new path in the technology sector.

“This is a new market, a new opportunity,” he said.

His arrival follows the latest round of funding for BlueCava.

The company raised $5 million last year from Cuban, owner of Denver-based cable network HDNet Inc. and the National Basketball Association’s Mavericks, and Tim Headington, founder and owner of Dallas-based Headington Oil Co.

Cuban and Headington were part of a second round of funding for $9.5 million last month. Austin, Texas-based S3 Ventures also took part in the latest round. S3 Ventures executive Brian R. Smith and Marsh Marshall of Putney Capital are new board members.

Resume

Sakai counts stints as finance chief for several technology companies, including HyPerformix Inc., an Austin, Texas-based business software maker that was acquired last year by CA Technologies in New York; and Austin-based business software maker Vieo Inc.

He also oversaw an $80 million public offering of Austin-based Crossroads Systems in 1999 as chief financial officer there. Crossroads made storage routers that connect older servers and storage systems to new storage area networks. It now is moving into software.

Sakai served as chief financial officer at Lantronix until June, when he left amid internal strife and disagreements with the company’s board.

Sakai and then-Chief Executive Jerry Chase stepped down over questions raised by the company’s largest shareholder, Bernhard Bruscha, also a Lantronix director and cofounder.

Bruscha’s TL Investment GMBH, based in Germany, owns 38% of Lantron-ix.

Complaints

The complaints led to an internal investigation that found improper use of travel expenses and stock options, as well as misleading statements made during conference calls with investors and analysts, according to the company.

“Read between the lines and it was a dispute with a shareholder,” Sakai said. “It was time to move on.”

Chase, in a resignation letter, said he disagreed with the findings and called the probe “flawed and unfair.”

Light Shed

Lantronix’s earnings report for its June quarter shed some light on the cost of the dust-up.

Last month Jeremy Whitaker was named finance chief for Lantronix after spending the past nine months as vice president and corporate controller for Mindspeed Technologies Inc. in Newport Beach.

BlueCava split off from Irvine-based Uniloc USA Inc. last year. It handles sales of Uniloc’s software, which helps online retailers and other website operators protect against fraud and improve targeted online advertising. It takes Uniloc’s technology for protecting against software piracy and tailors it for online retailers and other website operators.

Uniloc still owns a stake in BlueCava, which until this year shared the company’s space. BlueCava moved into University Research Park in Irvine in March.

Uniloc

Uniloc is best known for a $388 million jury award it won last year after a protracted courtroom battle with Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp.

The case brought the small company out of anonymity. In January, an appeals court ruled Microsoft did infringe, but called for a new trial on damages, calling the award “fundamentally tainted.”

Since then, Uniloc has named more than 80 other software makers in lawsuits alleging patent infringements. \

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