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Board of Directors

Axel Bichara

Axel Bichara is a Senior Partner in the technology sector at Atlas Venture. He joined Atlas Venture in 1993, and focuses on software and services technology. Prior to Atlas Venture, he was Vice President of Product Development at Premise, a venture-backed software company which he co-founded in 1987. Premise was acquired by Computervision in 1991.

Axel was a lead investor in SolidWorks, a mechanical design automation software company that was acquired in 1997 by Dassault Systemes. Axel also participated as a first round lead investor in SpeechWorks where he served as a Board Member and helped build the company through an IPO in 2000 and its later sale to ScanSoft in 2003.

Axel has served on the Board of Phase Forward since its IPO in July 2004, where he was also the first round lead investor. Axel currently sits on the Boards of portfolio companies BlueShift, Bluespec, CLK Design Automation, Liquid Machines, Marathon Technologies and NaviMedix.

Between 1997 and 1999 Axel spent 18 months in Munich to build up Atlas Venture's business activity in Germany.

Axel holds an MBA from INSEAD, a Master of Science degree from MIT and a Masters degree in Mechanical Engineering from Technical University in Berlin.