Accomplishments — Crick Waters

$105M

Ribbit exit to British Telecom, 2008

285%

Avg. YoY sales growth, Falkonry (2016–2022)

56%

Falkonry bookings from renewals & expansions

168%

Revenue growth, Applied Process Technology

Issued U.S. patents

AISTech conference publications

40+

Years across engineering, telecom & software

Company Building

Founded Ribbit Corporation2004–2011, as IDP Communications → Duality → Ribbit · Built the first telephony API platform, sold to British Telecom for $105M in 2008. Won an “app of the year” award at Salesforce Dreamforce 2007 and was named an InfoWorld Top-Ten Tech Startup in 2008.
Founded EasyNDA2013–2025 · Conceived, designed, and personally coded the front end of an NDA-automation platform; recruited a technical co-founder.
Co-founded Conga, Inc.2011–2012 · An early machine-learning platform for predicting relevant connections between people, using patterns from social graph data.
Co-founded LeafLit2013–2014 · A socially-annotated e-book reading platform; closed a distribution agreement with the Duke University Alumni Association.

CEO, Patero Inc.2022–2026 · Led a post-quantum cryptography company protecting critical infrastructure and federal/DoD networks; panelist at the 2025 KPMG Tech and Innovation Symposium on PQC strategy.
SVP Sales & Marketing, FalkonrySep 2015–Oct 2022 · Joined as the company’s third employee and only customer-facing executive; grew ACV from five to seven figures; built a customer success organization spanning four continents.
Sales Specialist (Part-time), FalkonryNov 2022–Jun 2023
VoIP Product Group Leader, AT&T2001–2005 · Co-led business development for fiber-to-the-home voice and video services for the 115,000-household UTOPIA network in Utah; launched a Wi-Fi service in 50 days at a 16% gross margin.
Director of Value Added Services, NorthPoint Communications2000–2001 · Delivered the first commercial Voice over DSL service in the U.S.
VP of Sales and Marketing, Applied Process Technology1997–1999 · Increased revenues by 168% and assisted in raising $4MM of equity financing.

Board of Directors, Ribbit Corporation / Ribbit (BT)2005–2011
Board of Directors, Alianza2011–2015 · Hosted voice solutions for the wireless broadband industry
Board of Directors, DSL Forum2001–2003
Strategic Advisor, The Sure Chill Company2015 · Built strategy and business development pipeline for a Gates Foundation-backed cold-chain technology company; secured the “Most Innovative New Cold Chain Technology” award at Cold Chain Global Forum, 2015
Advisor, SeeControl2012–2015 · Acquired by Autodesk
Advisor, Vidtel Inc.2008–2013 · Acquired by Fidelity Investments
Advisor, Vonjour2014–2015
Advisor, VidQuik2011–2015
Advisor, TimeBridge2009–2010 · Acquired by MerchantCircle
Mentor, SparkLabs Global Accelerator2012–Present

Transforming Metal Production by Maximizing Revenue Generation With Operational AICrick Waters, Beverly Klemme, Raj Talla, Prerna Jain, Nikunj Mehta (Falkonry Inc.) · AISTech 2021, Proceedings of the Iron & Steel Technology Conference, Nashville, TN. DOI 10.33313/382/115, pp. 1164–1174.
Time Series AI for Anomaly Detection and Diagnosis in Steel ProductionCrick Waters, Prerna Jain, Raj Talla, Keval Bhanushali (Falkonry Inc.) · First presented at AISTech 2022, Pittsburgh, PA; republished as a Technical Article in Iron & Steel Technology magazine, May 2023.
Securing Canada’s digital future with the feds’ new roadmapThe Hill Times, Dec 2025 (also on patero.io) · A call to action for Canadian federal CIOs and CISOs on the Cyber Centre’s Post-Quantum Cryptography migration roadmap

InfoWorld Top-Ten Tech Startup2008 · Ribbit
“Most Innovative New Cold Chain Technology”Cold Chain Global Forum Excellence Award, 2015 · The Sure Chill Company
Featured guest, The Ribbit Rollercoaster: A Founder’s Story From Concept To $105M ExitTechCrunch, 2012

MBA, Business AdministrationDuke University, The Fuqua School of Business · Sep 1990–1992
MS, Nuclear EngineeringBettis Reactor Engineering School · Jan 1984–Jul 1984
BSEE, Electrical EngineeringDuke University · Sep 1979–May 1983