Barry L. Kramer Engineering Services
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Barry L. Kramer Engineering Services
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Barry L. Kramer's online resume Independent Engineering Consultant / Experienced Engineering Manager and real-time embedded systems Software and Hardware Engineer (15+ years experience) with diverse technical skills and a strong customer- and quality-oriented style of leadership. Accomplishments include product development and validation of both PC-based and consumer electronics digital video and audio products for profitable mass production by major OEM customers, and the staffing and training of a software engineering department that led to a corporate IPO and later to an acquisition by a world-class IC manufacturer. B.S. and M.S. in Electrical Engineering.
Professional Objective and Availability First priority: Consulting: expert witness services, software engineering and software quality, hardware engineering, and diagnostics development. My expertise is in the areas of Intel chipsets and buses, digital video, digital audio, computer graphics/VGA, consumer product and DVD firmware development and validation, the development of software and diagnostics at the hardware level, the design and validation of hardware products, and the development and automation of a validation infrastructure. I will consider permanent employment in senior positions in engineering or technical management (Manager/Director level or higher in Test Engineering or Software Engineering) leading a product development or validation group, with emphasis on creating a high-quality, successful product from concept and design through completion. An ideal work environment would be a small company (<100 employees), or a large company that can change and adapt like a small company, with a good product, that adopts participative management, seeks continuous improvement in processes and in the skill sets of myself and my colleagues through teamwork, training, actual engineering, and direct experience with the product to achieve profitability and customer satisfaction. In my experience, companies that do not fit those criteria do not have a sustainable competitve advantage. I am authorized to work in the United States for any employer. I do not hold and am not interested in obtaining a security clearance.
I am not willing to relocate. I perform the majority of my work based out of my home office/laboratory, but I am willing to travel or work at any client site as necessary. When consulting, I am willing to travel up to 75% of the time, and I will temporarily relocate. Permanent positions or extended contracts (longer than 6 months) that require my full-time presence at an office that is not commutable will not be considered. PA and NJ opportunities only. For more information about what I consider commutable, email me.
Employment Experience Barry L. Kramer Engineering Services Providing technical engineering, reverse engineering, hardware and software design and implementation, and expert witness services. ThinkFire Services USA, Ltd.,Clinton NJ (2004) Evaluated and rated patents in client portfolios, performed technical research and reverse engineering of products and industry standards to find and document intellectual property infringements to secure licensing agreements for the client. QI, Ravisent Technologies, Inc., and STMicroelectronics Inc., Malvern PA and Lancaster PA (1996 - 2003 ) Held positions of increasing responsibility, detailed below, at a technology start-up through its IPO and eventual acquisition. STMicroelectronics Inc., Malvern PA and Lancaster PA Responsibilities include a variety of activities related to the development of a "standard product" consumer electronics set-top DVD/VCD/CDDA/MP3 player, including specification, design, software engineering, embedded software debugging, testing, and the integration of new features completed by development staff into production versions of software. Interact with customers, other departments, and engineers working at facilities in other parts of the world for the purpose of improving development schedules and product quality, providing training, and resolution of software issues relating to customer acceptance and mass production. Ravisent Technologies Inc. (acquired March 2001 by STMicroelectronics
Inc.), Malvern PA Performed a variety of predominantly managerial activities related to the development of the company's first consumer electronics DVD player product with essentially no involvement from upper management. Responsibilities included identification and specification of tasks that maximized achievement of customer requirements with a minimum of engineering effort, task assignments, design decisions, prioritization, interaction with customers and with engineering and management of the Karlsruhe (Germany) design center, and managing delivery and support of customers. Performed most of the recruiting, interviewing, and hiring activities to create a critical engineering department by adding six (mostly senior) software engineers and several co-ops, and fulfilled all management responsibilities (training, performance and compensation reviews, technical leadership, process development, and expense approval) for the development staff. Quadrant International (changed to Ravisent Technologies Inc.
for IPO), Malvern PA Designed the foundation of the company's test plan and quality processes for the qualification of the device drivers and user application for two designs of a PCI-based DVD playback card. Performed engineering analysis of problems with the software and worked directly with development engineering and customers to characterize and correct the defects. Verified compliance to all hardware requirements of PCI 2.1 specification and to all software requirements of DVD licensing entities. Specified and wrote all of the production diagnostic software used to validate the product at the manufacturing facility and on the production floor at Dell Computer, our largest customer. Supported engineers and customers, and participated in some product (software) design decisions. Hired, managed one engineering technician. Tseng Labs Inc., Newtown PA (1994 - 1996) Performed a variety of engineering activities associated with the qualification of video graphics (VGA) chips up to and including the ET6000. Used test equipment and logic analyzers to perform the hardware design qualifications (both at the board and chip level) on a variety of ISA, PCI, and VL motherboards, and wrote C and 8088 assembly language programs at the hardware register level to facilitate the silicon validation. Verified compliance to all requirements of PCI bus specification and hardware compatibility with prototype and production processors, chipsets, and motherboards. Analyzed silicon problems found by software engineers writing the device drivers and designed programs to cause these anomalies quickly for ASIC simulation and silicon microprobing. Debugged customer-reported problems. Characterized test chips and worked with the ASIC design group (including the corporate founder) to perform experiments and analyze hardware design defects and improve silicon test vectors. Accu-sort Systems Inc., Telford PA (1990 - 1993) Wrote and debugged 8085 assembly language programs and some C programs to customize industrial barcode scanning systems to meet customer requirements for RS-232 and RS-485 serial port communications and control. Developed and improved barcode decoding algorithms in moving-beam scanners.
Skills and Expertise - at a glance Software engineering management (5+ years)
Skills and expertise - additional detail Test equipment (HP logic analyzers [HP16500B], spectrum analyzers, Audio
Precision [AP2] audio test equipment) Microchip 12F629 and 16F630 microcontrollers and PIC midrange MCU assembly language Intel chipsets and components, including: 82430FX PCIset (Triton chipset for Pentium) 82371FB PCI ISA IDE accelerator
Education (transcripts available on request) Pre-employment Post-employment
Other Activities and Interests Photography, astronomy and cosmology, cooking, cellular microbiology, gardening, computers, digital audio, and music collecting and occasional travel with my favorite band Blondie, who were popular in the late 70's and whose Official Website I created, own, and maintain.
References Professional references of any relationship and some additional samples of my work beyond what is in the library will be provided on request.
Software applications Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0, Visual SourceSafe, Rational ClearCase
Terms and Conditions Copyright 2012 Barry L. Kramer All rights reserved. This information may be copied or distributed to or by individuals or corporations whose primary business is to develop products or to provide engineering services. Use by any search firms, recruitment services, employment agents, or any person or corporation which charges a fee for placement is strictly forbidden without a negotiated agreement and my prior written permission.
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