Thomas Cowan
President (and Co-Founder)
Execution, Strategy, Team
Thomas Cowan is President of
VECKER Institute. VECKER is dedicated to building companies
in a structured way - with CEOs, boards of directors and
investors.
For over 20 years Mr. Cowan has worked in the technology
industry for both large and small companies, public and
private alike. His experience involves building companies
of all sizes – from OutlookSoft (approx. $100M), to Tivoli
Systems ($100-500M), to the Communications and Media Sector
of IBM (over $1B).
Prior to VECKER, Mr. Cowan served as Chairman, President
and CEO of OutlookSoft Corporation. There he built
OutlookSoft into a significant competitor in the business
performance management marketplace and led the company
through revenue growth of ten times during his three year
tenure as CEO. OutlookSoft was acquired by SAP in May of
2007.
Mr. Cowan has an extensive background in building
organizations – from restructuring and building Vcommerce
(a private technology company based in Arizona) to
downsizing IBM’s development site located in Southbury
Connecticut. During IBM’s acquisition of Tivoli Systems, he
served as the senior IBM executive responsible for
transitioning Tivoli from an independent public company to
a subsidiary of IBM. During the early phase of Lou Gerstner
and Jerry York’s leadership of IBM, Mr. Cowan led the
design and implementation of a delegated pricing model for
all of IBM’s hardware, software and services worldwide.
Along with his responsibilities at VECKER, Mr. Cowan
currently serves as Chairman of Vcommerce Corporation. He
is Chairman of Tagetik North America (a private technology
company based in Italy) and serves on the boards of
Vcommerce, Tagetik, SMTC (a public technology manufacturer
in Canada), The Stables (a private infrastructure company
in Arizona), RMS (a private media company in Florida), OBT
(a private technology company in New York), and Cormont (an
arts related non-profit organization in New Hampshire). He
also has served as Chairman of the Board of Visitors of
Wake Forest University’s Graduate School of Management and
on the boards of OutlookSoft, Tivoli Systems, PGA.com and
NHL.com.
Among his education and training credentials, Mr. Cowan
holds a BA from Wake Forest University in Economics and
Philosophy and an MBA from the University of South
Carolina.
Tom's current activities are detailed in our
NEWS section.