RAPT Closes $7 Million Financing and Appoints Industry Leader as CEO
- Cathal Phelan, former Executive Vice President at Cypress Semiconductor Corporation, joins management team at multi-touch technology leader as CEO & President
EAST POINT BUSINESS PARK, DUBLIN and SAN MATEO, California, Dec. 18, 2014 /PRNewswire/ -- RAPT Touch announces today that is has closed a $7 Million Series B Equity Round through new and existing Investors. The financing facilitates support of RAPT's customers, furthers the company's investment in research and development, and enables RAPT to take on new design projects with leading global OEMs.
In conjunction with the close of the new round of financing, RAPT named Cathal Phelan as CEO and President. Cathal is a 30 year industry-veteran in the electronics industry, whose most recent position at Cypress was as Executive Vice President of the Consumer and Computation Division which included both the TrueTouch and Capsense Business Units.
With Cathal joining RAPT, Gerry Giblin moves back into the role of Executive Chairman. "I am thrilled that Cathal is joining RAPT," said Gerry. "Cathal's expertise in leading high performing teams and his depth of experience in the industry make him the ideal person to make RAPT a major industry player."
In addition to domain expertise in the multi-touch industry, Cathal Phelan brings a wealth of executive leadership, management and technical experience to RAPT, most recently from Cypress Semiconductor Corp. Cathal graduated from Trinity College, University of Dublin, Ireland, with an MSEE in 1985. He started his career in the Philips Research Labs in Eindhoven, Holland. Cathal joined Cypress in 1991 and held numerous roles in design and architecture definition, helping to invent the Quad Data Rate™ SRAM. Starting in 1999, Cathal managed the Cypress USB division, building that business through internal growth and strategic acquisitions into the world's No. 1 USB supplier. Cathal left Cypress in 2006 to join the software and systems company Ubicom Inc. as CEO & President. He led two rounds of financing for Ubicom. In 2008, Cathal returned to Cypress as Chief Technical Officer. Cathal was instrumental in Cypress' management of Intellectual Property and Patents, internal startups and strategic planning. Cathal currently holds 38 U.S. patents.
"The opportunity to help shape the way people interact with devices is very exciting to me," says Cathal. "Over the past few years, I've witnessed RAPT's innovative multi-touch technology mature and I'm confident our technology will become the go-to alternative to projected capacitive touch screens. With our latest financing in place, from an exciting blend of new and existing investors, we can grow the company appropriately and continue to innovate. Between our incredible team, the work we're doing with our customers and our product pipeline its truly an exciting time to be leading RAPT."
For more information about Rapt, please visit www.rapttouch.com
About RAPT (http://www.rapttouch.com)
RAPT is the leading provider of alternative multi-touch systems for Global OEM's and Systems Integrators. RAPT's technology breaks-through today's common multi-touch experience with natural advancements to touch features in unlimited screen sizes. RAPT is lead by a world-class team of industry veterans with deep expertise in launching mass produced products. RAPT is headquartered in Dublin Ireland with offices in Silicon Valley, Taiwan and Switzerland.
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