Team
MPI is comprised of an exceptionally diverse and experienced team of professionals. We bring together our unique individual skills to form a truly powerful mosaic of creative thinking, critical analysis and pragmatic solutions. Please meet our executive team:
Michael Markov, Chairman
Michael Markov is co-founder and chairman of Markov Processes International, LLC (MPI). Recognizing the power of quantitative analysis for investors, in 1992 he led the development of the industry’s first returns-based style analysis (RBSA) application based on William Sharpe’s groundbreaking methodology. Continuing this spirit of innovation, he co-authored Dynamic Style Analysis (DSA), a significant advancement to legacy returns-based modeling techniques for investors seeking the most precise analysis of managed investment products and portfolios.
Being an industry expert in quantitative analysis, Mr. Markov is a frequent speaker at investment management forums around the globe on fund performance attribution, due diligence and monitoring, investment risk management and hedge fund analysis. His thoughts and opinions are regularly sought by leading financial press. Mr. Markov is a mathematician by training and has published papers on investment style and performance analysis, quantitative modeling of investments and advanced hedge fund replication. Mr. Markov started his professional career in Ukraine, where he taught Mathematics, and in 1987-88 developed statistical software for the Russian Academy of Sciences. He holds an MS in Mathematics from Kharkov State University, Ukraine.
Ran Fuchs, Chief Executive Officer
Ran Fuchs joined MPI as CEO in 2012. Ran’s career spans from managing buy-side-focused business lines at major financial technology firms to heading sell-side credit derivatives trading desks. Prior to coming to MPI, Mr. Fuchs was with fund administrator Citco, where he was Head of Product Development of Citco Transparency Platform, an initiative to provide transparency and reporting to hedge funds and hedge fund investors. Before that, Mr. Fuchs was Global Head of a series of divisions at RiskMetrics (now MSCI, NYSE: MSCI), including Credit Risk and ESG (Environmental, Social, Governance), where he was instrumental in growing the respective business lines to become industry leaders.
He joined RiskMetrics in 2007 after spending three years as the APAC Regional Manager for Misys Risk Management Systems. Mr. Fuchs holds an MSc in Computer Science & Mathematics from the Tokyo Institute of Technology and a BSc in Mathematics from The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Mik Kvitchko, Chief Technology Officer
From 1979 to 1990, Mik worked as a software engineer, designer, and entrepreneur for several Ukrainian companies. He was the author of a very popular toolbox of system utilities but, unlike Peter Norton, distributed it for free.
After arriving in the US in 1990, Mik worked for Coopers & Lybrand. In 1991 he joined Markov Processes and steered the company in the direction of commercial software development. His main emphasis in programming is the overall system design and the user interface in particular. In 1992, together with Michael Markov, he developed the first returns-based style analysis software, the design of which got a "Wow!" from Nobel Prize laureate William F. Sharpe.
Since then Mik's break-through design ideas have become the trademark of all MPI's products. In his spare time he writes compilers and windsurfs. Mik has a BS in Mechanical Engineering from Kharkov Polytechnic University, Ukraine.
Patrick McKiernan, Chief Financial Officer
Patrick McKiernan joined MPI in September of 2007. Mr. McKiernan has more than 25 years of experience managing organization's financial and operational services. Previously he was the Vice President of Operations and Principal Accounting Officer of Vyteris, Inc., a publicly traded product based drug-delivery company. During his tenure, Patrick played a key role in the implementation of the strategic plan, raised more than $50 million in private equity, updated the overall accounting and reporting systems, coordinated the reverse merger to a public company and managed the overall company operation. Before joining Vyteris, he was the Corporate Controller of EpiGenesis Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a development stage biotechnology company, where he established the accounting function and supported the fund raising efforts of $23 million of private equity. He was also the Co-Founder of Zerbo, McKiernan and Zambito, an accounting and management consulting firm to public and private business entities. Patrick began his accounting career at Coopers and Lybrand. He received an accounting degree from the University of Bridgeport and is a Certified Public Accountant.
Jeff Schwartz, Managing Director
Jeff joined MPI in early 2003. Prior to joining MPI, Jeff served three years as Vice President, Investments and Vice President, Large Plan Sales for mPower, a provider of on-line investment advice to defined contribution investors.
Jeff began his career in finance with Ibbotson Associates, where, in his six years with the firm, he served as a product development analyst, consultant and eventually as the Vice President and Director of Asset Allocation Consulting. At Ibbotson Associates, Jeff was the chief developer of Portfolio Strategist, a mean-variance optimization and historical analysis tool for financial planners and Fund Strategist, a comprehensive book of returns-based analysis on public mutual funds; served as an editor of the Stocks, Bonds, Bills and Inflation (SBBI) yearbook; taught educational workshops for institutions, financial professionals and the Alliance - Ibbotson Research Institute (AIRI); oversaw Ibbotson's consulting practice which provided asset allocation, behavioral finance, fund analysis and capital market research solutions to other financial institutions.
Jeff's expertise lies in financial software development and application, strategic asset allocation, modeling (forecasting) of alternative and foreign investments, manager analysis, behavioral finance, asset-liability modeling, valuation and general capital market research. His opinions have appeared in such publications as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Pensions and Investments, Financial Planning, Smart Money and Money Magazine, as well as appearing on CNBC and NPR's Odyssey. Jeff holds a degree in Finance from The University of Arizona and is a CFA Level II candidate.
Anna Sotnichenko, Senior Vice President, Development
Anna joined MPI in 1997. Prior to that she was a Leading Software Engineer at the Central R&D Institute for Robotics and Technical Cybernetics, St. Petersburg, Russia, which designed robots for Russian military and space programs. With the Russian space program winding down, Anna decided on somewhat peaceful applications of her skills at the MPI launch pad in Central New Jersey.
Her areas of expertise are client-server applications, GUI, applied math, statistical methods and, of course, space shuttles and ballistic missiles. Anna holds an MS in Mathematics, University of St. Petersburg, Russia.
Brian Willem, Senior Vice President, Product Management
Brian Willem leads MPI’s product management efforts, focused on creating tools to unleash the power of MPI’s industry-leading analytics. He joined MPI as a Senior Vice President in 2012.
Mr. Willem has spent over 15 years developing analytical software in the financial industry. His early career was spent building quantitative risk and trading tools at Goldman Sachs and Merrill Lynch. He joined MSCI in 2004, where he took on a product management role for the Barra brand focused on the initial design and release of a new hosted portfolio management application.
He holds an MS and a BS in Computer Science from Cornell University and Rochester Institute of Technology, respectively.