Ashmeet Sidana, General Partner at Foundation Capital, an early investor in Cantaloupe Systems, is a veteran executive experienced with both startups and large established companies whose expertise spans engineering, sales, marketing and product management.

Just prior to joining Foundation Capital, Ashmeet was Director of Product Management at VMware, where he led the team that grew the company’s flagship product, ESX Server, from inception to deployment in Fortune 500 companies on a global basis. Prior to VMware, Ashmeet was CEO of Sidana Systems, an enterprise-software company that pioneered Docsan for publishing very-large (terabyte) documents, that was acquired by Doclinx. He began his professional career at Hewlett-Packard and later Silicon Graphics, holding various technology roles.

In addition to his board duties at Cantaloupe Systems, Ashmeet also serves on the boards of Foundation Capital portfolio companies Azure Power, CiiNOW, Freewheel, PanoLogic, Sanrad, Simply Hired and Zetta.

Ashmeet holds an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, an MSCS from Stanford University and a BSCS from the University of Southern California.

J. W. Chip Fowler is a first-round investor in Cantaloupe Systems.

Chip is semi-retired and the general partner/owner of INCAL Associates providing business development and marketing services to technology-oriented early-stage companies. His primary area of interest is in companies that provide integrated hardware and/or software solutions for manufacturing or commercial process-flow management. His strengths include international and domestic sales and marketing, representative and distributor management, product development and engineering/research management. During a two-year consulting assignment with GW Associates, a provider of semiconductor industry process-management software, he developed and executed a strategy to position and sell the company to a major equipment manufacturer in the industry.

Before forming his consulting service, Chip was Senior Vice President, COO and Member of the Board of Quester Technology Inc., a builder of atmospheric pressure CVD systems used in the manufacture of semiconductor devices. He had primary responsibility for Marketing and Sales, all Customer-support activities and the Technology Research and Development Group. He led the management team that negotiated and sold the company to Canon Sales Co. of Japan and remained with the company after the sale.

Prior to joining Quester Technology, Chip held senior world-wide sales, marketing and management positions in Therma-Wave (semiconductor process- analysis instruments), Optimetrix/Eaton (microlithography systems), Coates & Welter (scanning electron microscopes) and Atmospheric Sciences (automation systems for the lumber industry).

Chip holds an MBA from Stanford University and a BS in Mechanical Engineering from the University of New Hampshire.

Anant co-founded Cantaloupe Systems and is the company’s chief marketing officer. As CMO, Anant is responsible for worldwide business development, customer management, sales, advertising and communications.   Anant’s love of entrepreneurship began in high school, when his computer-building business, Laltech Computers, grew into a $600K operation. By the time he entered UCLA, Anant was interning at Imagine Venture Capital and ITU Ventures.

Anant met Mandeep at UCLA, where they discovered their shared interest in technology and its application to business ideas. This fortuitous friendship also began Anant’s education in and passion for vending. Upon graduation, the two entrepreneurs set out on a three-week trek through India where, as a sidelight to their journey, they began to brainstorm specific business ideas, and Cantaloupe Systems was conceived. Anant gave up a full time offer at ITU Ventures to devote his efforts to building the new company, and he hasn’t looked back. He credits his early experiences in technology design, sourcing, and manufacturing as a major factor in the growth and development of Cantaloupe Systems.

Anant has a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and a B.A. Economics from UCLA.

Anant’s favorite vending snack is Twix.

Mandeep co-founded Cantaloupe Systems and is the company’s chief executive officer. He is responsible for setting Cantaloupe Systems’ overall direction and product strategy.

Born into a family in the vending business, Mandeep stocked his first vending machine when he was 13, and has never stopped trying to make the industry smarter, faster, and better. Today, he and the Cantaloupe Systems team are helping vending machine operators optimize their business operations through innovative technologies and services, including wireless communications and cloud-based applications. 

While keeping his hand in vending through his family’s business, Mandeep began his entrepreneurial career with a website development business started while in high school. Mandeep met his Cantaloupe Systems co-founder, Anant Agrawal, at UCLA, and immediately found common ground in their shared interest in entrepreneurship and technology.

Mandeep has had a variety of relevant work experience, including Work Life and Cisco Systems. While working with these companies, Mandeep had the opportunity to research, analyze, and improve data-driven service offerings, while also gaining knowledge in testing and quality assurance in software and hardware. His experience at Cisco in particular gave Mandeep an appreciation for network connectivity that helped shape his vision for Cantaloupe Systems. What he learned through his online service experience with these companies contributed to Mandeep’s creation of Cantaloupe Systems’ innovative, web-connected vending solutions designed to lift vending from a plodding, best-guess industry to a more precise, technology-driven undertaking.

Mandeep earned a B.S. degree in Engineering from UCLA.

Mandeep’s favorite vending snack is Peanut M&Ms.