Management Team

Avinoam Nowogrodski brings over 20 years of experience in sales, engineering and business management to Clarizen. He brings insight and expertise gained in those positions to Clarizen's vision of bringing collaborative project management to every business.

Prior to establishing Clarizen, Avinoam co-founded SmarTeam Corporation, a leading provider of collaborative product life cycle management (PLM) solutions. As CEO from 1995 – 2005, Avinoam's leadership molded SmarTeam into a leading enterprise PLM solution which was sold and supported by IBM. In 1999 SmarTeam was acquired by Dassault Systemes (DS) and Avinoam served on the DS General Executive Management team for 6 years. At his departure from the company, SmarTeam had 3,500 customers across diverse industries and over 100,000 users worldwide.
Avinoam Nowogrodski holds a BSc in Electrical Engineering from Tel Aviv University, Israel.

Jason brings a proven record of success in financial and operations management and leadership to Clarizen. Previously, he served as CFO and Head of Marketing for ActivePath, where he led its initial sales and marketing initiatives and raised $10 million of venture financing.  As CFO of Actimize, he led the company to an acquisition by NICE Systems Ltd. for $282 million and oversaw its growth to a $100 million global business. As CFO of Cyota, Jason was instrumental in the company’s rapid expansion and its acquisition by RSA Security for $145 million.  Prior to that, he served in various capacities in the finance department of Shopping.com – including VP of Finance and CFO – from 2000 through the company’s initial public offering in 2004.  Earlier in his career, Jason worked for seven years at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP. Jason is a Certified Public Accountant and holds a B.S. in Accounting from Yeshiva University.

Guy Shani is responsible for Clarizen's global sales including channel development and strategic partnerships. Guy brings over 10 years of experience in sales, engineering and business development to Clarizen.

Guy joined Clarizen from Eurotech Technology Inc where he served as CEO. Prior to Eurotech, Guy spent over 7 years at SmarTeam Inc, Dassault Systmes (DASTY) company, where he held several positions, including technical manager of Asia Pacific and Director of Sales and Business Development in the US and South America. Before joining SmarTeam Guy worked as project manager at Elbit Ltd. Israel.
Guy holds a Bachelor Degree in Industrial Management Engineering.

Rachel has been with Clarizen from its first days working on product definition and the setup of the company's EMEA sales operation.

Rachel has 15 years of experience in the software industry dealing mostly with product management and customer success programs. Previous to joining Clarizen, Rachel led the Customer Success initiative at SmarTeam as Director of Customer Success and later on the product team as Director of Product Management. During her time at SmarTeam, Rachel managed several key customer accounts some of which were: Acer, Siemens and Bosch.
Rachel holds a BSC in Computer Sciences and is also certified PMP.

Ariel Utnik brings to Clarizen over 15 years of executive management experience in the software industry.
Ariel is both in charge of the Clarizen Research and Development group, working alongside the Product group to ensure the best product release and performance; and responsible for Clarizens' production infrastructure, hosting operations and service security. 

Ariel joined Clarizen from Comverse where he led the Comverse Voice projects Customization and Delivery group including Project Management, Development, and Testing. Prior to his work at Comverse, Ariel worked for over 7 years at SmarTeam, Inc, Dassault Systems (DASTY), where he managed the Testing and Quality department and was responsible for the customer relationship and satisfaction within R&D.  Ariel holds a Bachelor Degree in Business Management.

Gilad brings with him over 10 years of experience in Inside Sales, Online Sales and Business development. Gilad is responsible for Clarizen's business activity in the EMEA region with global responsibility over sales operations.  Prior to Clarizen, Gilad spent over 9 years at LivePerson (NASDAQ: LPSN) where he held several positions in Sales and Business Development. In his last role at LivePerson, Gilad was the head of the SMB business unit, which was responsible for over 8,000 of LivePerson's customers and contributed over $25M in annual revenues. Gilad holds a B.A. in Business Administration from the Interdisciplinary Center, Herzliya and an Executive MBA from the Kellogg-Recanati program at Tel Aviv University. 

Shai Etzion brings to Clarizen over 20 years of experience in Global Business Development and Channel Management. Shai is in charge of the Clarizen's Partners Programs, developing new channels and increasing the company's research to new domains.

Shai joined Clarizen from Dassault Systems USA, where he served as VP Operations for SmarTeam in the Americas. Prior to DSA, Shai held several positions at SmarTeam, including Sales Manager for Asia-Pacific and VP IBM Channel, in which he was responsible for channels and operations of SmarTeam sales and deployment Projects in AP and in Europe.
Shai Holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Industrial Engineering and an MBA, specializing in Marketing.

Michele brings 20 years of experience in technology marketing and is responsible for driving Clarizen’s outbound marketing, including communications, branding, PR and analyst relations. Prior to Clarizen, Michele led marketing for Wanova, a company redefining desktop virtualization, and for Decru, a storage security company that was acquired by NetApp. Michele holds a B.A. in Mass Communications from the University of California Berkeley, and a Graduate Certificate in Public Relations from the University of Washington.