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A pioneer in the online collaboration and communication industry, Larry Schlang is the President and CEO of Bantu, Inc. Larry drives the company’s strategic planning and direction and ensures that Bantu continues to maintain its position as a premier provider of Web-based instant communications tools.

Larry has gained vast knowledge of what it takes to grow a high tech company in today’s economy. Prior to Bantu, Larry served as Vice President of Operations and then President of Bantu’s predecessor company, IntraACTIVE, Inc. Under Larry’s guidance, IntraACTIVE was one of the first players in the Web collaboration and applications service provider markets. He was instrumental in selling IntraACTIVE’s groundbreaking and award-winning Web groupware product, InTandem, to small and large companies, including Marriott, Ameritech, and SAIC. Larry was responsible for handling legal matters, partnerships and strategic relationships. Under his leadership the company sold InTandem to Mail.com.

Before joining IntraACTIVE, Larry served as Vice President and General Counsel for National Strategies Inc., where he handled various telecommunications and wireless issues at the Washington-based telecommunications consulting firm. Prior to working in the telecommunications industry, he practiced law at Shea & Gould, where he focused on commercial and securities law and litigation.

Larry often presents at shows and conferences including Radicati Group, Internet World, CTIA, Pulver.com and CommNet events. He received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Virginia and a law degree from George Washington University.

With nearly 20 years of technical experience in network and data security, software product development, systems architecture, and network design, Mike Hansen, Vice President of Research and Development, is responsible for leading the development of Bantu's enterprise Instant Messaging, Presence & Alerts Platform.

Before joining Bantu, Mike spent four years as the Chief Technology Officer and principal of AAJ Interactive Technologies where he was responsible for the analysis, design, and development of large-scale enterprise solutions for customers including the Discovery Channel, BBC, National Geographic, and Verizon as well as numerous Fortune 1000 customers. Prior to AAJ, Mike was Director of Technology at Proxicom (now a division of Dimension Data), where he was instrumental in shifting the core business from creative web design to technical solutions integration, ultimately leading to a successful IPO. Before Proxicom, Mike served as the chief architect for BellAtlantic.net (now Verizon.net), Bell Atlantic's consumer and business Internet access offering.

As Vice President of Client Services, Wade Peckman directs the customization, integration and support of Bantu's products and services across its customer base. Wade is also responsible for managing Bantu's hosted EIM solution and the corporate IT infrastructure. He brings to Bantu nearly 20 years of experience in IT operations, engineering, project management and executive management.

Wade joined Bantu from Discovery Communications, Inc., where he was most recently Director of Operations, responsible for deploying and maintaining Discoverys business and web infrastructure. While at Discovery, he successfully led a major multi-million dollar storage consolidation effort, a global Active Directory roll-out, and served as the technical lead for Discoverys corporate disaster planning initiatives.

Prior to Discovery, Wade held several lead technical and management roles at AT&T and EDS. While at AT&T he was responsible for the operations, engineering and architecture of large-scale database applications for business customers. At EDS, Wade was instrumental in securing and managing high-profile professional services contracts. Earlier in his career, Wade held various system, design and engineering positions supporting the commercial and defense industries.