Robert E. Stewart, Sr. joins the Alliance for Clinical Research Excellence and Safety (ACRES) as Chief Technology Officer and Board member. He will lead the development and implementation of ACRES shared global system IT infrastructure, generating “smart tools” to radically alter the conduct of biomedical research.
The Alliance for Clinical Research Excellence and Safety (ACRES) announced today that Robert E. Stewart, Sr., who most recently served as the Chief Operating Officer at Sonavation, Inc, developer of next-generation ultrasonic biometric technology for secure identity management, has joined ACRES management team as a member of its Board of Directors and Chief Technology Officer.
In his new role, Stewart will assume leadership for development and implementation of ACRES shared global system IT infrastructure, including the BlueCloud™ and the integrated Apollo collaboration platform and secure cloud-based data vaults for enterprise data-sharing and analytics. The system will enable a new generation of “smart tools” that will revolutionize clinical trials operations, monitoring, quality management, pharmacovigilance and oversight, potentially saving over $20B annually and cutting time-to-market for new products by more than 3 years.
Stewart brings to ACRES extensive experience in network development and digital security. Over his career, Stewart has led design, development and operational deployment of several search, data mining and entity-linking products. He specializes in design of fault-tolerant hardware and software solutions to address the most challenging data intensive problems. Current interests include defensive cyber capabilities, geospatial ISR sensor processing, intelligent meta-data discovery and profiling, fusion and exploitation of sensor arrays for situational awareness, and a high through-put meshed-edge mobile computing platforms.
Stewart was formerly Chief Technologist of the Global Security Solutions Group at EMC and is primary author and publisher of the popular “open-source” guide, Open Systems Development Life Cycle.
While a member of Motorola’s $1B Internet and Networking Group, a winner of the esteemed Malcolm Baldridge Award, Stewart established and directed cross-functional teams to develop and deploy highly secure and federally audited, internet-centric x509v3-encrypted communications systems. As Chief Technology Officer for Verified Person, a deep background screening entity, he led drove the web-service enablement of Verified Person’s multi-terabyte data-warehouse.
Stewart is no stranger to the clinical research endeavor. As Chief Technology Officer and Co-Founder of CyberMedica, he worked with the World Health Organization (WHO) to deploy an integrated collaborative clinical research management platform to improve responsible research around the world. He participated as standards provider of peer-reviewed infrastructure platforms for technology to deliver secure open-systems for collaborative scientific research for biotechnology and pharmaceutical discoveries.
As a member of ACRES Board of Directors, Stewart brings his experience as an investment and M&A adviser for a number of venture capital firms in North America and Europe including a $220M acquisition from BellSouth and a $290M acquisition from Compaq (now Hewlett-Packard), to ACRES development efforts, including ACRES $50 million Capital Campaign currently underway.
“It is difficult to imagine a better person or a more perfect time for someone with Bob’s extraordinary qualifications and experience to join the ACRES team,” said Greg Koski, co-founder and CEO. “The development and roll-out of a shared technical infrastructure to support an open, collaborative network system is going to radically transform the clinical research enterprise, and Bob Stewart will be leading that effort.”
Among his overall responsibilities as CTO, Stewart will manage the ACRES Technology Consortium and the $140 M of technology and education assets its members have pledged to support ACRES system initiatives.
Stewart, commenting on his new role, was succinct: “ACRES offers a huge and rewarding challenge, one that needs to be done for the good of people everywhere--I am ready to go.”
ACRES
The Alliance for Clinical Research Excellence and Safety (ACRES) is a non-profit multi-sector alliance working in the public interest. It brings together diverse stakeholders across clinical research, harnesses their expertise to collaboratively build an open, integrated global system based in principles of Accountable Research™ and adapts lessons from industries that successfully implemented principles of systems and safety engineering, such as transportation, communications and information technology. For more information, please contact Mary F. Tobin, PhD, Special Advisor to the President and CEO at mtobin(at)acresglobal(dot)net.
