Staff

Liliana Bravo, Senior Client Services Engineer
B.S., Systems Engineering, Universidad Nacional del Callao, Peru; MCSE

Liliana works on a variety of tasks, including software development, technical support, documentation and research, on a variety of network and messaging platforms. Prior to CGNET, Liliana was on the IT staff of the International Potato Centre in Lima, Peru, for nine years.

Karin Cornils, Senior Systems Engineer, B.S., Electrical Engineering, University of Tennessee

Karin is responsible for maintaining CGNET's mail hubs, and for supporting upgrades and migrations to new platforms, operating systems, and applications. Prior to CGNET she worked for flight projects at NASA Langley in Hampton, Virginia. She is fluent in German and speaks some Spanish.

Tom Knudsen, Accountant
B.S., Business Administration, Emphasis in Accounting, College of Notre Dame

Tom is responsible for CGNET's accounting system, including accounts payable, accounts receivable, general ledger, preparation of reports and cash flow. Previously, Tom worked as a fiscal manager for the Center for Independence of The Disabled for nine years, where he was in charge of all financial data, billing, payroll and payables. Tom has more than 30 years of accounting experience as a staff accountant, senior accountant and full charge bookkeeper.

Abraham Bekele Negash, Senior Systems Engineer
B.S., Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Addis Ababa University

Abraham manages a wide variety of CGNET's service environments and infrastructure. Previously based in Addis Ababa, Ethopia, Abraham worked for CGNET as a field consultant and for more than 13 years in Information Technology for such companies and NGOs as IBM, NCR, the International Livestock Research Institute, the International Livestock Center for Africa, and the Ethopian Science and Technology Commission.

Jimmy Nguyen, Client Services Specialist
Currently Attending San Jose City College

Jimmy monitors, troubleshoots, documents and escalates CGNET network-related problems. Prior to joining CGNET, Jimmy held positions at Ontrac, Bank of America and Fry's Electronics.

Dennise Ong, Web and Database Operations and Engineering
M.S., Computer Information Systems, Golden Gate University

Dennise provides support and troubleshooting for hosted applications, particularly Web and database applications. Before joining CGNET, Dennise worked as a network and IT support specialist at a number of organizations, including Current TV, iGames and the non-profit ecology organization, ARC. Prior to moving to the United States, Dennise was a senior executive in retail measurement and services for A.C. Nielsen in Manila. He is fluent in Filipino and English and conversant in Mandarin and Taiwanese. He is a Cisco Certified Network Associate.

Mohamed Osman, Client Services Specialist, B.S. Network Communication Technology, DeVry University

Mohamed monitors, troubleshoots, documents and escalates CGNET network-related problems. Prior to CGNET he worked at Neopost as data analyst and Abovenet as system support tech. He speaks English, Somali (native) , Amharic (Ethiopian language) and has a good understanding of Arabic.

Dante Palacios, Senior Systems Administrator
B.S., University of Lima

Dante maintains CGNET's mail hubs, and supports upgrades and migrations to new platforms and operating systems, particularly those involving Microsoft Exchange, Active Directory or virtualization. Prior to CGNET he worked for the International Potato Center as a server administrator. Dante is a VMware Certified Professional, and he is fluent in Spanish and English.

Christopher Rini, Client Services Specialist

Christopher divides his time between various administrative duties at CGNET and pursuing his education at Foothill College. Before coming to CGNET, Christopher worked at Apple Inc.

Jefferson Suarez, Client Services Specialist, B.S., Industrial Technology, San Jose State University.

Jefferson's responsibilities for CGNET include monitoring and supporting dozens of remote & in-house client networks, providing preliminary analysis and diagnosis of network & system issues, coordinating network maintenance outages with clients and their network partners, performing basic setup, installation, and maintenance of servers, routers, switches, and workstations, implementing the racking, cabling, and patching of network devices, and managing incoming support ticketing queue. Prior to CGNET, Jefferson worked at his Alma mater as a Network/Computer Technician.

Lonni Ton, Systems and Network Engineer
B.S., Computer Science, Sacred Heart University

Lonni is a leader of CGNET's 24/7/365 team that is responsible for monitoring, troubleshooting, documenting and escalating any CGNET network-related problems. She also provides project management and advanced technical support, including Traveler's Access Service support. Lonni is also responsible for maintenance and administration of AntiVirus, Monitoring, Documentation, and Backup systems. Before joining CGNET, Lonni owned and managed her own business. Before that, she was a network administrator at Microphase Corporation and a PC support technician at Nash Engineering.

CGNET Africa

Issa Lawali, Field Consultant
Certification of Accreditation, First Year Agronomy Studies, Faculty of Sciences, Niamey Abdoul Moumouni Dioffo University; Baccalaurat, Exact Sciences (Maths & Physics), National Lyce of Tahoua

Issa is based in Niamey, Niger, and is part of the Fidafrique installation and support team. This project involves the installation of a Cobalt Qube -- a self-contained LINUX server -- to provide e-mail, file sharing, and web access for selected IFAD projects in West Africa. Issa has 18 years of experience serving organizations in West Africa in the areas of IT implementation and management, LAN administration, programming and user training.

CGNET China

Yang Yiming , Field Consultant
MCSE, B.A. English and Computer Science, Suzhou University

Yiming has had more than 10 years of IT consulting experience with various companies in Beijing. He has been able to build solutions for clients successfully throughout the years. In college, he double majored in English and computer science; and now heads his own IT consulting firm. Yiming has worked with various organizations such as the World Wild Fund for Nature, UNFAO and The British Chamber of Commerce in China. Currently, Yiming is responsible for our onsite consulting in China.

CGNET India and Pacific

Kishore Bhargava, Senior Technology Consultant
B.Sc., The University of Delhi

Kishore Bhargava is based in New Delhi, India. He has worked with and for CGNET for 20 years. Kishore provides consultancy in the areas of IT Operations, System Administration, Facility Management, Network Administration, Security, System Design, and Training. Regions covered for CGNET have included South and South-East Asia, East and West Africa, USA and China. Kishore managed entire IT departments (from 250-1500 users) for CGNET clients in Indonesia, Philippines, and Kenya. He has also provided on-the-ground support to many CGNET clients including Ford Foundation, Packard Foundation, Family Health International (FHI), CARE, Center for International Forestry Research, International Rice Research Institute, International Development Research Center, International Crops Research in Semi-Arid Tropics, International Fund for Agricultural Development and many others. Kishore is a expert contributor to several respected technology magazines and a regular presenter on a Delhi-based technology television program, “Gadget Guru."

1. Peace of Mind

What you don’t want, and what your management definitely doesn’t want, are unpleasant surprises. The email shouldn’t go down. You should be able to recover smoothly from disaster. Everything should be backed up. CGNET understands that. We take responsibility for keeping your systems flourishing. You can relax.

2. Good Company

The best proof that nonprofits and foundations have found peace of mind outsourcing to CGNET is who and how many of them there are. The answer is “lots.” Here’s a partial list (link). A significant number of these have been with us for more than 10 years. And we’ve been in business for 27 years. During that time , almost all of our customers have been nonprofits, intergovernmental organizations and foundations (The others arepeople you used to work for one of our customers). When you work with us, you’re in good company.

3. We’re Here for You

Not only do we care for your systems and data 24/7/365, we have live telephone, email or IM support available all the time. If the technician on duty can’t resolve your issues, we have fast escalation, as far up the command chain as necessary to get the job done fast. We’re a smaller, nimble company. You don’t get lost in bureaucracy.

6. Understanding

In those 27 years we’ve been serving nonprofits, we’ve learned a lot about how you operate, from the time it takes to reach a consensus, all the way to the specific technologies you use (GIFTS, FoundationPower, FIMS, Dotche, Blackbaud, SharePoint, Exchange…whatever). We’ve found that we fit easily into the organizational rhythms and concerns of organizations like yours, wherever in the world you’re located.

8. Reliability

This is our watchword. While Service Level Agreements are good, and ours are among the best, they don’t help a lot while a service is down. The key is to keep things running and not to lose data. Making this happen requires a commitment to quality. We believe our commitment to reliability sets us apart and that our list of long-time references proves it.

Cloud Plus: Microsoft Exchange

CGNET provides cloud-based Microsoft Exchange which means:

· Freeing up IT staff for mission-critical assignments.

· Lower cost

· Higher reliability

· An embedded Disaster Recovery and Business Continuity Solution.

Clients have hosted mailboxes for all staff, eliminating the need to run and maintain Exchange servers. Cost avoidance is obtained by eliminating the need to purchase and maintain physical servers, by eliminating staff time for patches, hot fixes and crisis management of servers, and by lower costs for air conditioning, electricity and floor space.

Our service is provided via multiple Microsoft Exchange 2010 servers in geographically separate locations with replication of roles (CAS, hub transport, mailbox, etc.). This assures near-zero downtime, and provides full disaster recovery capability.

Our design includes sets of servers in two locations. Primary and secondary sites are Tier 3 co-location facilities with UPS and generator backup, 24/7 security on site, multiple Internet connections, etc. At any given time, mail databases are replicated on multiple servers, and a daily backup is made and retained for four weeks. It is unlikely that backup/restore would be needed, but it is added as an extra protection.

Cloud Plus: Email Archiving

CGNET provides best-in-class cloud-based archiving, with service for individual users to access their archived messages as well as a console where authorized staff can search for and access email across the organization. Notably, our service provides replication of each user’s set of private folders in the archive. The Outlook-like browser-based client shows a directory structure identical to what the user sees in Outlook. Meanwhile, the service is entirely managed in the cloud, and your designated CGNET team is available 24/7/365 to provide support.

Cloud Plus: Online Backup for Laptops, Servers, and Desktops

CGNET provides disk-to-disk backup of servers, workstations and laptops over the Internet. The service provides de-duplication and compression to reduce what is stored by 50 percent. Individual files are instantly retrievable through a friendly Windows-like directory interface. We also offer service at client offices, which is then backed up to the Internet, to provide the fastest recovery time combined with off-site storage. The service is easy to set up and use, secure and reliable, and surprisingly inexpensive. Like all of our services, your designated account team is always available to assist you.

Here is a list of links to descriptions of all our other services: