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Translating Foresight Into What's Next
Work Featured In
CNET Panel
Plug and Play SV Summit
CMU Capstone Review
Major platform shifts emerge when capabilities converge, not from a single breakthrough. My work across five industries, aerospace, automotive, wireless, telecom, and venture, has been the same: identify those moments early and translate them into technology roadmaps, product strategy, and capital allocation decisions that position organizations ahead of what comes next.
My foundation is technical. I began working on acoustics and dynamics problems at Sikorsky, building signal processing algorithms and focusing on acoustics, vibration, and real-time stability in tightly coupled physical systems. This work required systems thinking across and operating under real-world constraints. That same approach informed software platforms and UX at Harman, where I anticipated the convergence of sensing, machine learning, and human-machine interfaces years before the industry caught up, then carried into wireless and video platform strategy at InterDigital, where I helped place 6G and AI bets years before mainstream adoption.
Most recently, I built Nokia Technologies' Emerging Technology function from the ground up within the CTO Office, standing up a $35M R&D portfolio across quantum networking, AI, and 6G. Today, as Venture Partner at Silicon Foundry, a Kearney company, I lead investment diligence across quantum computing, AI, and edge computing for corporate and institutional clients, deciding what's real, what's hype, and what's ready to build with.
That same lens shows up in ClusterFunk, an AI research practice I founded to map technical momentum across research signals and identify where the next platform shifts are forming.
Inventor and co-author on multiple patents and publications across acoustics, human-computer interaction, and wireless systems, with a full list on Google Scholar.
My day-to-day is Venture & Advisory work at Silicon Foundry. I'm also evaluating full-time platform leadership roles, and take on select speaking engagements.
Built and ran $17M–$80M technology strategy functions from the CTO's office at Nokia, InterDigital, and Harman, including the $475M Technicolor integration. Led end-to-end product management for Harman's first Driver Monitoring System, from concept through CES launch, now an industry-standard safety platform in 25M+ vehicles. Also led customer discovery with Hendrick Motorsports and Under Armour for Harman's audio product line.
"I can't imagine an organization that wouldn't greatly benefit from hiring Donald."
Henry Tirri, Former Group CTO, Nokia · Harman · InterDigital
Currently Venture Partner at Silicon Foundry, a Kearney company, leading investment diligence across quantum computing, AI, and edge computing for corporate and institutional clients. Also a startup mentor at Yale's Tsai Center, and previously an EIR at Mitsubishi Electric Ventures.
"I was especially impressed by his early perspective on the quantum ecosystem, particularly in understanding how quantum interconnects could influence data center architectures and scale compute."
Sanjay Kumar, VP of Kearney
Founder of ClusterFunk, an AI-assisted research practice mapping where emerging technology sits on the adoption curve. Has presented at industry events including the Plug and Play Silicon Valley Summit.
AI-assisted semantic clustering and Bass diffusion modeling, applied across thousands of papers, patents, and signals to map where a technology sits on its adoption curve before it's obvious. Research published at clusterfunk.co and on Medium.
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