Management Team

D. Scott Mercer*
Chief Executive Officer

D. Scott Mercer was appointed chief executive officer of Conexant in April 2008. He currently serves on the boards of Palm, Inc., Polycom, Inc., SMART Modular Technologies, Inc., and Adaptec, Inc., where he is chairman. In 2005, Mercer was named interim chief executive officer at Adaptec. Before that, he spent a total of eight years at Western Digital Corporation in positions that included executive vice president, chief financial and administrative officer, and senior vice president and advisor to the CEO. He also spent a year at TeraLogic, Inc. as chief financial officer, five years at Dell, Inc. in a variety of financial-management positions, and seven years at LSI Logic Corporation, where he was promoted to chief financial officer. After graduating with a bachelor’s degree in Accounting from California Polytechnic University at Pomona, Mercer spent seven years with Price Waterhouse in San Jose, Calif.

Christian Scherp*
President

Christian Scherp was appointed president of Conexant in April 2008. He joined the company in June 2005 and previously served as the company’s senior vice president of Worldwide Sales. Prior to joining the company, he was vice president and general manager of the Wireless/Wireline Communications Group for Infineon Technologies North America. Scherp also served as their vice president of Wireline Communications products marketing, and vice president and general manager of the Communications Group's wide area networking business. Before the spin-off of Infineon from Siemens AG, he held positions in engineering, marketing, and business planning. Scherp holds a master's degree in electrical and electronics engineering, and a master's degree in business administration from the Technical University of Munich, Germany.

Sailesh Chittipeddi*
Executive Vice President of Global Operations and Chief Technical Officer

Sailesh Chittipeddi was appointed executive vice president and chief technical officer of Conexant in April 2008. Previously, he served as senior vice president of Global Operations since joining in June 2006. Prior to that, he held several senior operations-related positions with Agere Systems, Lucent Technologies, and AT&T Microelectronics. He also served as Lucent Technologies' representative to SEMATECH, and was a member of the Technical Staff with AT&T Bell Laboratories. Chittipeddi holds a master's degree in business administration from the University of Texas at Austin, a master's degree and a doctorate in physics from Ohio State University, and a master's degree in physics from Northern Illinois University. He also holds 59 U.S. patents related to semiconductor process, package, and design, and has authored nearly 40 publications.

Karen Roscher*
Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer

Karen Roscher joined Conexant in September 2007 as senior vice president and chief financial officer. Her semiconductor experience includes 26 years in financial management positions with Motorola, Inc., and Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. Most recently, she served as Freescale's vice president of Corporate Financial Planning and Analysis. Prior to that, Roscher was Freescale's vice president of Tax, and vice president and corporate controller responsible for worldwide transactional services and external reporting. While at Motorola, she served as vice president and Financial Planning and Analysis Director for the Semiconductor Products Sector, vice president and Network and Computing Systems Group Finance Director, and Semiconductor Sector Headquarters Controller. Roscher holds a bachelor's degree in accounting and a master's degree in business administration, both from Arizona State University. She is also a certified public accountant.

Mark D. Peterson*
Senior Vice President, Chief Legal Officer, and Secretary

Mark Peterson joined Conexant in March 2008 as senior vice president, chief legal officer, and secretary. Prior to joining the company, he was with Targus Group International, Inc. where he served as senior vice president, general counsel, and secretary. Before that, he spent nearly 10 years with Meade Instruments Corporation, where he held a variety of executive management positions including senior vice president, general counsel, and secretary. He also served as the company's senior vice president of International Operations, and managing director of Meade Europe. In addition, Peterson spent six years as a corporate attorney for the law firm of O'Melveny & Myers, LLP. Peterson earned his J.D. degree from the Boalt Hall School of Law at the University of California, Berkeley. He also holds a bachelor's of science degree in Accounting from Brigham Young University's School of Accountancy in Provo, Utah.

Lewis C. Brewster
Executive Vice President and General Manager of Broadband Media Processing

Executive Vice President Lewis Brewster served as Conexant’s chief operating officer and general manager of the company’s Broadband Media Processing business until December 2006, when he focused exclusively on Broadband Media Processing. Prior to that, he was executive vice president and chief operating officer of Conexant. Before that he held the position of executive vice president of Worldwide Sales, Operations, and Quality. He joined Rockwell Semiconductor Systems in 1991, which became Conexant when it was spun-off from Rockwell International in 1999. Brewster held various executive positions within Rockwell Semiconductor Systems, including executive director of Americas Sales, and director of Strategic Sales and Operations. He received a master's degree in business administration from Stanford University and a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering and biomedical engineering from Duke University.

Scott L. Allen
Senior Vice President, Communications

Scott Allen was appointed senior vice president of Communications in June 2003. He joined Conexant as executive director of public relations in February 2000 and became vice president of Communications in February 2001. Prior to joining Conexant, he was employed by Advanced Micro Devices (AMD). During his 16 years with AMD, he held positions of increasing responsibility culminating in his most recent assignment as director of worldwide public relations. Allen earned his bachelor's degree in journalism from San Jose State University.

George Chu
Senior Vice President and President, China Operations

George Chu joined Conexant as president, China Operations in February 2007. Previously, he served as Broadcom's senior director and general manager of R&D in Shanghai, China. Prior to that, Chu held senior engineering and business management positions at Broadcom in the U.S. Before that, he served as vice president, Engineering for Altima Communications, which was subsequently acquired by Broadcom in 2000. Chu also held various U.S.-based engineering positions with 3COM, Stratus, and Raytheon. He holds a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the University of Rochester, and earned his master's degree in computer engineering at Boston University.

Craig Garen
Senior Vice President and General Manager, Broadband Access

Craig Garen joined Conexant in November 2007 as senior vice president and general manager of the company's Broadband Access business. Previously, he served as senior vice president of LSI Corporation’s Mobility Division. Prior to that, Garen spent five years at Agere Systems.  His positions included vice president of engineering for the Telecom Division, and general manager of the company’s Broadband Access business unit. Before Agere, he served as general manager of Client Access for Lucent Technologies’ Microelectronics Group. He also worked for AT&T’s Microelectronics Group, and for AT&T’s Bell Labs. Garen earned a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Lehigh University, a master’s degree in electrical engineering from Stanford University, and an MBA from Lehigh University.

Jean Hu
Senior Vice President, Strategy and Business Development

Jean Hu joined Conexant as director of Strategy and Business Development in 1999, and was promoted to vice president in 2001. Previously, Hu held a variety of roles in Rockwell's Corporate Development department. Before that she was a consultant providing investment banking, valuation, and litigation advisory services to a wide range of clients. Hu holds a doctorate in economics from Claremont Graduate School and earned her bachelor's degree in engineering from Beijing Chemical Engineering University.

Bernd Lienhard
Senior Vice President and General Manager, Imaging and PC Media

Bernd Lienhard joined Conexant in September 2006 as senior vice president and general manager of the company's Universal Access business. He was previously with Qimonda AG, a spin-out from Infineon Technologies, where he served as vice president of Sales and Marketing. Prior to that, he spent eight years with Infineon in a variety of positions, including vice president and general manager of Advanced Sensors, Automotive and Industrial Business Group. Previously, he spent 10 years with Siemens Semiconductor and Siemens Defense Electronics. He holds a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from Munich's University of Applied Science in Germany.

Michael Vishny
Senior Vice President, Human Resources

Michael Vishny joined Conexant in January 2002 as senior vice president of Human Resources. Previously he served as human resources vice president and chief human resources officer for U.S. Robotics Corporation, and as vice president of human resources and internal communications for Gateway Computer Corporation's business division. He also served as the Asia-Pacific regional director of human resources for S.C. Johnson, Inc. , and spent six years in various senior management positions with Dun & Bradstreet Corporation/The A.C. Nielsen Company. Vishny earned a master's degree in labor and industrial relations, and a bachelor's degree in business administration, both from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

* Executive Officers