Greg Burton is a veteran entrepreneur with the demonstrated and honed ability to recognize opportunity, to envision ways to seize it, and to drive to the realization of the goal. Greg has built his credentials in three disparate life venues, which have created a complete professional with extraordinary skills and capabilities across many traditional and cutting edge industries and disciplines.

Technology: Greg was one of the first people on Long Island to use the mainframe computer at Stony Brook in 1972, then the only publicly available computer on Long Island. Through the ensuing 6 years, Greg mastered 5 raw computer languages, coding complex programs and applications in all five, and building digital formulae for graphical problems. Since then, he has continued to build his expertise in computers, then the Internet, and finally Web-centric businesses, never losing sight of the fact that the Internet is not a panacea, but a friction-free data transfer tool with unlimited possibilities. His realization that the solution to athletes’ problems lies in an Internet-based delivery vehicle seems a natural outgrowth of these decades of knowledge.

Investment / corporate management: In the course of a 23-year career, Greg continued his connection with technology, in this case as an investor, advisor and sector specialist. During the last 13 years of his investment career, he successively managed two investment offices, a nationwide brokerage and investment advisor force, and then opened his own investment advisory firm. In this last role, as Managing Director of Burton Asset Management, he managed individual, corporate and hedge fund assets swelling to $70 million, with a track record of over 16% per year, before the correction in 2000. Averaging in the correction through 2003, his investment returns were roughly 12.6%, net.

Investment Banking: Greg also acted as an investment banker in the placement of $900,000 of Preferred Stock for iPhotoArt, an online provider of museum-quality archive photo reproductions. Greg produced all documents, directed Pro Forma development, ran investor meetings, and located investors for the Company. Prior to that, at PaineWebber, Greg ran Private Placements and Syndicate items for the Garden City branch of PaineWebber, and was the Liaison for Retain and Institutional Research.

Sports: Greg is a serious athlete, and has been a top amateur in four sports, a teaching pro in three sports, and a professional competitor in one. By his senior year in high school, he was considered an Olympic contender in fencing, was ranked in tennis on the East Coast, and had been racing sailboats and coaching sailing for seven years. He was recruited to the University of Pennsylvania for fencing, but a spinal injury in his freshman year took him out of contention for the Olympics. Although the injury kept him off the fencing strip, he took up squash, and was soon playing at the national level, playing on collegiate top-ten teams throughout the rest of his college career. After graduation, Greg continued playing squash, and concentrated more on sailboat racing, a lifelong passion. At his peak, he was ranked #2 in the nation in squash, and became a pro sailor, racing on “maxi boats” (over 80 feet long) on one of the most athletic positions on the water - foredeck. To this day, he competes in squash and races sailboats, and still has a couple of athletic goals in his sights.

Because of its structure, the culture of clean competition, and of course the health benefits of regular hard exercise, Greg is a strong advocate for sports at all ages, at all levels, and in particular for youth sports. Particularly because of his belief that sports can be a doorway to a much more fulfilling and healthy life, and that sports may open up many more opportunities for kids as they head toward college, Greg is passionate about developing a culture in the U.S. that fosters interest and participation in many more sports than are currently supported. His work in the sports industry is a direct result of this.

EDUCATION:
MBA Courses, Corp. Finance: L.I.U., C.W. Post College.
B.A. Economics, Microeconomics concentration; minor in Business:
Stony Brook University: Graduated in 1981
University of Pennsylvania & Wharton School. Undergrad work.

OUTSIDE INTERESTS:
Squash (nationally ranked), yachting – (ex professional racer) dinghies to maxis, skiing
and tennis, with a love of competition and for coaching young athletes in all sports.
Casual pursuits include chess, charity work, gourmet cooking, fine art, classical and jazz
music.

MEMBERSHIPS:
Breakwater Yacht Club, Southampton Youth Services, US Squash, US Fencing,
US Lacrosse, Southampton Squash, US Sailing, SGMA, NACDA,
other professional and athletic organizations