Meet the people behind the mission

CO-FOUNDER, CEO

Jeff specializes in new product development and go-to-market strategy. He received his Master’s of Science in Technology Commercialization from the University of Texas at Austin. He previously worked in the Global Commercialization Group at the IC2 Institute at UT Austin, working with innovators from around the globe to take innovations out of the research lab and to the market. He holds an undergraduate Business degree from UT Austin, and worked in the Technology practice of Deloitte Consulting. He previously founded several start-ups and a non-profit. He has a passion for entrepreneurship and using technology to solve social issues and improve the world.

CO-FOUNDER, CTO

Nicholas Paine is the co-founder and CTO of Apptronik. He received his B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical and Computer Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin. His graduate work focused on the development of the UT Series Elastic Actuator, a compact high performance actuator for robotics. He was a member of the NASA-JSC DARPA Robotics Challenge team where he helped design SEAs and developed actuator-level controllers for the Valkyrie robot. He worked for one year as a post-doctoral researcher at UT Austin, investigating forced-convective cooling of electric motors and embedded system design. Since Apptronik's founding in 2016, he has directed technical strategy and execution. He has helped to lead numerous system design efforts ranging from commercial humanoids, to force-augmentative exoskeletons and novel robotic manipulators.

Chief Financial Officer

Kay has worked with entrepreneur-led companies in venture and private equity for much of her 25+ year finance career, with a focus on disruptive technologies. Kay currently serves as CFO to Apptronik, on the Finance Committee of the Contemporary Austin, and as advisor and investor to several investment funds and early-stage companies.Kay’s experience includes CFO at ICON Technology, a 3-D printing robotic construction company in Austin, TX where she joined as the eighth employee and helped build from Seed stage to a nearly $2 BN valuation. Before ICON, Kay was CFO to Lighter, a software company, and worked at CircleUp, a finance platform for venture-stage consumer companies. Prior to transitioning to CFO, Kay was a Managing Director of Investment Banking at Seaport Global in New York, where for 12 years she led financings and advisories for entrepreneur-led companies (both public and private) and specialized in structuring complex capital and helping management teams build for growth.Kay spent the early part of her career at Morgan Stanley and Jefferies in New York. Kay holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics from Duke University and a Masters degree from Stanford’s Graduate School of Business.

Chief Commercial Officer

Barry Phillips is Chief Commerical Officer at Apptronik where he oversees Sales, Marketing, Business Development, and Customer Success. Barry joins Apptronik after being the CMO of Fetch Robotics (acquired by Zebra Technologies), Maxta, Panzura, Egnyte and Wanova (acquired by VMware), where he led Marketing, Sales, and Business Development. Prior to Wanova, Barry was the Group Vice President and General Manager of the Delivery Center Product Group at Citrix Systems. Barry joined Citrix through the acquisition of Net6. He began his career in United States Naval Aviation where he logged over 1,000 hours in a P-3C Orion. Barry holds a Bachelors of Computer Science from the United States Naval Academy and a Masters of Computer Science from UCLA.

Chief Product Officer

Daniel Chu is Chief Product Officer at Apptronik. Daniel joins Apptronik with more than two decades of experience building and scaling product teams at frontier technology companies — always in pursuit of technologies that genuinely improve people’s lives. He has repeatedly scaled organizations at the leading edge of entirely new industries — from Waymo’s early commercial autonomy milestones to 23andMe’s evolution into a consumer health platform to products at Google. Daniel's leadership combines a rigorous technical foundation with deep empathy for end users and a disciplined approach to scaling teams and business lines.Daniel holds a BS in Computer Science and an AB in Economics from Stanford University, an MPA, from Harvard Kennedy School, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.‍

Chief Operating Officer

Steve O’Dea leads Engineering, Manufacturing, Field Service, and IT at Apptronik, guiding Apollo from prototype to high‑rate production and large‑scale customer deployment. His mandate is to fuse world‑class engineering with disciplined operational execution so Apollo can deliver immediate customer value on factory floors, in warehouses, and beyond.Throughout his career, Steve has specialized in commercializing and shipping highly complex, innovative hardware‑software products in consumer, retail, and defense markets. He has a decade of robotics experience, along with technical and operational leadership roles in both start-up and Big Tech environments. He holds patents in robotic spatial mapping, sensor‑fusion interfaces, and automation technologies.Steve graduated summa cum laude with an MBA from Boston University’s Questrom School of Business, and holds a BS in Electrical and Computer Engineering, highest distinction, from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.