Daniel Armbrust, Chairman
Daniel Armbrust is Chairman of the Board for Irresistible Materials Ltd. Daniel is also a Silicon Catalyst co-founder, member of the Board of Directors and its initial CEO. Silicon Catalyst is the first incubator for semiconductor solutions startups and is located in Silicon Valley. Daniel is also currently working with the Lawrence Berkeley National Labs to define a strategic public-private partnership program to continue advances in computing and semiconductor technologies. He served as President and Chief Executive Officer of SEMATECH from 2009 to 2014, with the responsibility to lead the consortium’s advanced technology R&D and manufacturing collaboration programs. Daniel previously held various technical, management and executive positions for over 25 years at IBM, culminating in his tenure as Vice President of 300mm semiconductor operations.
Dinesh Bettadapur, CEO, Board Director
Dinesh Bettadapur serves as the Chief Executive Officer of Irresistible Materials Ltd. Dinesh has over 20 years of executive management experience in the semiconductor industries and has held significant leadership roles encompassing general management, P&L management, sales, business development, strategic alliances, and operations. He has worked at industry leaders such as ASML, Intel, and Lam Research as well as multiple Silicon Valley startups and led them toward a significant degree of business growth including 3 successful exits (acquisition, merger, and IPO). Over the course of his career, Dinesh has successfully transitioned across several technology domains in the semiconductor ecosystem (chip design, deposition, digital twin, etch, IP licensing, lithography, photomasks, process R&D, software and services) and multiple markets (automotive, computing, display, memory, power devices, and 5G). He has also built long-term business relationships and partnerships with the leading chip manufacturers, foundries, equipment vendors and fabless chip companies of the semiconductor industry spanning a wide variety of business models. Dinesh has also held executive management positions in the LED materials and LED lighting industries. He holds an MSEE degree from Virginia Tech USA and BSEE degree from Bangalore University, India.
Alex Robinson, CTO, Board Director, Co-Founder
Chief Technical Officer and R&D Head Alex Robinson is a Co-Founder of Irresistible Materials. He is responsible for leading EUV resist material research & development. His areas of interest include molecular catalytic polymerization resists for EUV lithography, resist properties of amorphous low molecular weight materials, and ICP etching. He obtained his PhD for work on molecular resist materials done in the Nanoscale Physics Research Laboratory at University of Birmingham, and the Joint Research Center for Atom Technology ‘AIST Tsukuba’ in Japan, and has carried out research in the areas of modification of oxide surfaces using self-assembled mono-layer and multilayers, ultra-high carbon content spin-on materials, organic electronics, nanostructured catalysts, and bioprobe fluorophores, alongside work on resists for EUV, electron-, atom- and ion-beam lithography. Alex is a Chartered Physicist, Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, Member of the Institute of Physics and Member of SPIE. He has previously founded the spin-out company Chromatwist and served on the advisory board of Lace Lithography.
David Ure, COO, Board Director, Co-Founder
Over 20 years of senior executive experience in the biotechnology and materials science industries. Additional 8 years senior management, management consulting and financial controller experience to start-ups and high growth companies. Successfully founded and built three high tech start-ups, raising over $40M to support the companies’ commercial growth within the Biotechnology and Materials Science industries. Chairman of Inanovate, Inc. a US based diagnostic company. Recipient of the Sorenson Award for Outstanding Entrepreneurial Achievement 2006; MBA Summa Cum Laude from Babson College, USA, and MS with Distinction in Nuclear Physics from the University of Birmingham, UK. Inventor on twelve patents relating to medical devices and novel nano-scale materials. Published author and invited speaker on nano- and bio- technologies and their commercial and social impacts.
Patrick Wilmerding
Patrick S. Wilmerding is a co-Founder of Althea Partners LLC, which consults with and invests in early stage companies. Prior to co-founding Althea Partners, Patrick was a co-Founder and Director of the Narragansett Bay and Pawtucket Insurance Companies beginning in 2005. He is currently on the board of Cornerstone Pharmaceuticals and remains active with various biotech and technology companies. Patrick received a MBA from the Boston University Graduate School of Management and holds a BA from Northeastern University.
David Baker
David is a Portfolio Director at Mercia Asset Management with a focus on supporting and investing in Mercia’s portfolio of early-stage ventures, predominantly in the Midlands region. His investments to date have been in software and IP-rich technology companies and David sits on the board of a number of companies within Mercia’s portfolio. Prior to joining the Group, David worked at Blue Sky Corporate Finance in an advisory role, assisting small and medium-sized businesses with raising investment and sell-side transactions. He previously worked as a business manager for HSBC Bank, providing debt finance to a portfolio of clients.
David Coleman
David Coleman joined the University of Birmingham in May 2010, as Head of Spinout Portfolio. He is responsible for both managing the relationship between the University and its existing spinout companies, and for the development of new high quality ventures. David has many years technology transfer experience gained at Imperial Innovations and then University of Bath, where he also acted as Head of Technology Transfer and Consultancy for Bath Ventures in its first year of operation.
As well as significant experience in intellectual property and licensing, he has successfully spun-out a number of University companies including Ceres Power (fuel cells), NPSL (porous hollow fibres), and Nanogan (Gallium Nitride). He acts as a non-executive director for Irresistible Materials Ltd.