Paladyne Systems, a leading provider of alternative investment solutions, today announced the appointment of veteran financial software product executives Jim Lenz, as Vice President of Product Strategy, and Ayman Sakr, Vice President of Client Services.
"We're delighted to have Jim and Ayman as part of Paladyne's management team," said Sameer Shalaby, CEO of Paladyne Systems. "Their collective experience in creating and delivering financial software solutions will further establish Paladyne's position as the leading provider of integrated hosted ASP solutions to the hedge fund industry. In addition, their experience working at both early-stage and mature companies will be instrumental in leading Paladyne through its next stages of growth and evolution."
Mr. Lenz joins Paladyne to lead all aspects of product strategy and is responsible for further expanding the scope of Paladyne's products and services within the hedge fund industry. Mr. Lenz has worked in the area of institutional trading for more than twenty years, and will be heavily involved in expanding the execution and electronic trading components of Paladyne's front- to back-office hosted technology platform. Prior to joining Paladyne, Mr. Lenz was a vice president and Product Manager in the electronic trading group at Jefferies & Co. (NYSE: JEF). In this role, Mr. Lenz was primarily responsible for the integration of proprietary QES algorithms into all of the major order management and trading systems. Prior to Jefferies, Mr. Lenz was the Co-President/Co-COO of Reuters/Bridge Trading Company (LSEL RTR, NASDAQ: RTRSY), managing all aspects of the company's operations. He has held senior positions in electronic equity and derivatives trading at Cantor Fitzgerald and The Interstate Group. Mr. Lenz is a member of the International Association of Financial Engineers and holds NASD series 4, 7, 9, 10, 24, and 63 licenses.
Mr. Sakr joins Paladyne to manage all client services activities, and is responsible for expanding Paladyne's services organization to meet the demands of its rapidly growing customer base. With more than 14 years of experience in building and delivering market-driven solutions to customers, Mr. Sakr is well qualified to build a scaleable, knowledgeable, and streamlined client service team. Prior to joining Paladyne, Mr. Sakr was Director of Client Services at Cogency Software, a venture-backed hedge fund solutions provider, where he was an early founder, and was responsible for designing, building, and delivering software solutions to hedge funds. Mr. Sakr has also held various technical and support management positions at TenFold Corporation (OTC BB: TENF.OB), a provider of vertical industry applications and development tools. Mr. Sakr held senior technology management positions at Ultimate Technologies, a software solutions provider in Canada, and Sakhr Software, a leading Arabic Solutions provider in the Middle East. Mr. Sakr holds a B.S. in electrical engineering from Cairo University, Cairo, Egypt.