Our Team
Warren A. Schad
Raghu Rao
Kevin L. Reager
Ravi Rao
Sanjoy Bose
Warren A. Schad
Partner and Senior Managing Director
Warren Schad is a partner and Senior Managing director of Granite Financial Advisors, a Maryland based investment bank. He has more than 30 years of both banking and industry experience.
Prior to founding Granite, Mr.Schad was a Partner and Senior Managing Director at The McLean Group, a Northern Virginia based investment bank. At both Granite and McLean, Mr. Schad has executed transactions in mergers and acquisitions, capital formation and corporate restructurings. These transactions were in technology, government contractors, financial services and business services sectors.
Before joining The McLean Group, Mr. Schad was Chief Financial Officer (CFO) for several companies in the real estate, technology and media sectors.
Mr. Schad was CFO of Solomon Equities, major New York City real estate firm that developed 2.5 million square feet of office space in three large Manhattan developments. He led a team that raised and restructured $1 billion of senior and subordinated debt to finance the construction of those buildings. Mr. Schad also developed a capital structure model and a portfolio risk model that allowed the company to consider multiple investments and to allocate investment capital in the most profitable ways possible. He also negotiated complicated debt and equity financings.
In addition to serving as CFO in the real estate sector, Mr. Schad was CFO of three companies in the technology (SystemsLink Corporation, InFoZen, Inc. and SavvyData, Inc) and a media and entertainment company, TimeSpan Communications, Inc.. He was responsible for the structuring and rapid growth of these companies, two of which he sold at high multiples to larger companies and one which he sold to an investment group.
During the course of his industry experience, Mr. Schad has designed strategic plans, performed competitive analysis, executed acquisitions, raised debt and equity, conceived and negotiated joint ventures, designed forecast and budget models, executed monthly dashboard reviews, and implemented accounting systems, among other accomplishments.
Prior to his industry experience, Mr. Schad held a number of senior positions in merchant and commercial banking. He was in charge of the US corporate finance division of Societe Generale, large European financial organization. During his five-year course with this organization, Mr. Schad completed more than $3 billion in transactions. These transactions ranged from Euro-bond underwritings for US oil companies, leveraged finance for US commercial and hotel construction projects, and mezzanine finance for leverage buyouts.
He also was Senior Managing Director of the US Division of a Canadian merchant bank, Hees International, Inc.. In this position, Mr. Schad raised debt and equity for many corporate purposes, and identified and structured acquisitions both within the US and cross-border.
Mr. Schad holds a Bachelor in Business Administration from Adelphi University and an MBA in corporate finance from Pace University. He sits on the Board of Directors of WizNucleus, Inc. and is on the Board of Advisors of RMS Direct Inc.
Raghu Rao
Partner and Senior Managing Director
Raghu Rao is technology and social enterpreneur. He has over 20 years experience in business and IT strategy, architecture and design, development, outsourcing, marketing and sales. Raghu has successfully managed and implemented complex projects on varied platforms for clients in Government, Publishing, Aerospace, Utilities, Chemicals, Legal, Healthcare and Telecom. He has advised clients on the strategy and rollout of high-profile projects, including the Federal Internet Portal USA.gov (firstgov.gov), National Cancer Institute’s cancer.gov and other e-Government initiatives of the President’s Management Agenda. Raghu is on the board of several companies and non-profits (Paperbattery, WizNucleus, eLawForum, Forum for Religious Freedom, and Arsha Vidya Gurukulam).
Until 2008, Raghu was the Chairman & President of InfoZen, which he founded in 1995. At InfoZen, Raghu created a world-class team that filled a critical business gap by providing innovative turnkey solutions that converted data into actionable information. InfoZen has emerged as a leading provider of integrated information management and technology solutions to commercial and government clients. Prior to founding InfoZen, Raghu was a program manager for electronic journals and a member of the R&D group at Reed Elsevier’s Technology Information Services, where he helped develop several pioneering databases delivered on CD-ROM, electronic journals and encyclopedias.
Raghu has a Master’s in Computer Science from Virginia Tech and B.Tech in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras. He has also completed coursework for an MBA in Information Systems at George Washington University.
Kevin L. Reager
Managing Director
Mr. Reager is currently a Partner with Owe Global Solutions (OGS) and is the CEO of their U.S. subsidiary. OGS is a technology start-up company focused on transaction and security software solutions based in Chennai, India and Scottsdale, Arizona. Prior to joining OGS, Mr. Reager was the CEO of Innovus, Inc., a Dallas, Texas based processor of debit and pre-paid card financial transactions.
Before being recruited by Innovus, Inc. Mr. Reager was a Senior Vice President with eFunds Corporation, a Scottsdale, Arizona based Technology Company listed on the NYSE. Mr. Reager initially joined eFunds as the SVP, ATM Services Division with responsibility for the $140 million division and the largest non-Bank ATM program in the United States and Canada. After stabilizing the business, Mr. Reager led the successful sale of the portfolio two years later. Mr. Reager then became the Senior Vice President of eFunds International Division, working primarily in Mumbai, India. As the executive responsible for the domestic business of eFunds India, he led the integration of a major acquisition and executed the largest third party processing agreement in India up to that point in time. In addition, Mr. Reager also worked on corporate acquisitions in the United Kingdom, Canada and the United States and consulted on several projects in Latin America and Europe.
Earlier in Mr. Reager’s career he spent 15 years with Bank of America in various Retail Delivery, Finance and Technology roles. With Bank of America he managed several multi-state operations and grew the non-bank retail delivery network from 1,500 to over 8,000 sites.
Mr. Reager is a CPA in Connecticut, California, North Carolina and Nevada. He is an internationally recognized expert on the ATM / Debit Card industries having spoken at industry conferences throughout the world.
Mr. Reager lives in Scottsdale, Arizona with his wife and two daughters.
Ravi Rao
Managing Director
Ravi Rao has over 25 years of executive management experience in the High Tech industries covering the following markets: Information Security (microchip technology –Vitalinx, USIS, Schlumberger Smart Cards and multi-factor authentication -Akros TechLabs), Information Technology and Services – IndusRad, Shakti Solutions, MIMCO, Sports and Media Rights Management (Sports LED Media, MIC Electronics), Bollywood Film and TV Animation – Motion Pixel Corporation, Healthcare – Vitalinx, USIS and Akros, Aviation – CAE, Axelo, Prescott Products, Telecommunications – Nortel Networks and Home Entertainment – Axelo. He is currently involved in real estate and investment capital deals in USA and Canada through SLM Investments, Perfica Solutions, Sunvalley Capital Investments and Oceanview Golf Resorts and Spa. His expertise lies in the following skillsets: business development and partnerships, operations, ROI growth strategies, profit maximization, capital funds raising, contract negotiations, start-up catalyst specialist, smart card and microchip technology expert (NIW) and mergers /acquisitions / joint ventures.
Ravi is currently President and co-founder of Sports LED Media Inc. (SLM) and instrumental in creating a JV strategic partnership with Latin America Futbol Corporation (LAFC) and MIC Electronics Inc. to offer complete sports management and exploitation of rights from LED Perimeter stadium advertising, Sponsorships, Licensing and Merchandising of Team products. Created a 10 year revenue opportunity with two Ecuador Professional Soccer Teams (Barcelona SC and Emelec) amounting to around $20M revenue potential. He is also currently the COO / VP of Strategic Alliances and Partnerships of Axelo Inc. that has a patented 3D inertial sensing technology that spans multiple vertical markets – Home Entertainment, Military, Healthcare, Sports, Aviation and Simulation. He has provided strategic guidance to Axelo and SLM and developed strategic/tactical plans to drive worldwide revenue growth through an integrated approach to sales, marketing, alliance building, and product/services strategy.
Ravi is on the board of several companies (SLM, Axelo, Vitalinx, Sulakshana Circuits and Celestial Technologies). He has extensively traveled both in the USA, Canada and abroad to grow the business and grow vertical partnerships with customers, suppliers and business partners.
Ravi has a Masters of Engineering (Electrical) and a Bachelor of Engineering (Computer) from Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
Sanjoy Bose
Managing Director
Sanjoy Bose is a Managing Director at Granite Financial Advisors. He has over 30 years of multi-dimensional experience as a Business Executive with multinational corporations. His expertise lies in developing cross-border setups and management of joint ventures, sourcing for investors and partners in the commercial and government sectors, building public-private partnerships in India and Sri Lanka, as well as M&A ventures in the USA and in India.
Mr. Bose’s core competencies include: strategic alliances and partnership formation, Broad-based entrepreneurial BD expertise in business start-ups, strategic market penetration of various market verticals, project management, contract negotiations, marketing and sales of managed services, management of account teams, implementation of product installation and services, key client retention strategies for long term contract renewals, partnerships and management of channel distribution processes, amongst others.
Mr. Bose has held key frontline positions at Oracle, Xerox and McGraw-Hill acquiring and managing large multi-million dollar accounts. He has a Bachelors of Science degree in Business Management from the State University of New York and has completed coursework for a MBA from Radford University.