Mr. Lykiardopoulos is a travel industry veteran and the driving force behind the creation of Triton. He is a successful entrepreneur, an expert on travel industry trade negotiations and reservations systems, and a pioneer in leveraging the Internet to distribute travel products and services worldwide.
From 1973 to 1978, Mr. Lykiardopoulos was instrumental in the launch, daily operation and sale of Creative World Travel, a wholesale tour operating company. From 1979 to 1981 he developed a travel club that marketed memberships through mailing inserts in monthly credit card billings to customers of major U.S. banks, a new concept at that time. The travel club was sold to Encyclopedia Britannica after Mr. Lykiardopoulos built the subscriber base to more than 170,000 members.
Mr. Lykiardopoulos’ experience with the cruise industry in Asia led Pan American Airlines to ask him to travel to the People’s Republic of China with a U.S. delegation to negotiate the first regularly scheduled flights by a U.S. airline to Beijing in over 30 years. In a ground-breaking agreement, the delegation obtained Beijing landing rights for Pan American Airlines. Mr. Lykiardopoulos was invited to the White House in 1980 for the signing of the historic agreement.
His expertise with reservation systems led to an invitation in 1992 to testify before a joint Senate-House committee investigating the Airline Computer Reservation Systems that developed into the Global Distribution Systems (GDS) of today. Based on testimony to Congress and the Department of Transportation by Mr. Lykiardopoulos, the Federal Government decided to regulate the GDSs until 2004, when the travel industry was deregulated.
With the advent of the Internet, Mr. Lykiardopoulos recognized a significant opportunity for the development and marketing of a global airline distribution system that offered full content to agencies of any size. With this goal in mind, in 1993 he started a project that ultimately evolved into Triton Distribution Systems. As Triton’s CEO, Mr. Lykiardopoulos continues to lead the company and industry by combining business relationships with advanced technologies to create cost-effective, easy-to-use business solutions for the travel industry.
Mr. Lykiardopoulos is fluent in six languages. He holds a Bachelors of Art in Business Administration from the American University in Cairo, Egypt.
Michael Overby — Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Overby has experience in small and midsize private and public companies with international operations and has been directly responsible for acquisitions, divestures, restructurings, initial public offerings, private placements and preparing for compliance.
Prior to joining Triton Distribution Systems, Mr. Overby served as Vice President of Finance and Chief Financial Officer for Riverstone Networks, Inc., a provider of carrier class Ethernet network switching equipment. He was also Vice President of Finance and Chief Financial Officer for Adept Technology, Inc., and was a financial executive for Digital Generation Systems, Inc. and Borland. Mr. Overby also worked with Deloitte & Touche, LLP and Coopers & Lybrand, LLP, (currently PricewaterhouseCoopers, LLP) where he focused on auditing companies in the venture capital, high-tech and manufacturing industries.
Mr. Overby holds a B.S. in Business Administration from California Polytechnic State University.
Adam Himmelman — Chief Technology Officer
Mr. Himmelman joined Triton in February 2006 and as Vice President, Technology Development, he oversees information technology, product development and architecture. He is responsible for setting the strategic direction of the company’s technology development efforts and for managing the day-to-day efforts of the development team. Mr. Himmelman has held positions in many facets of technology development including Director of Engineering, Chief Software Architect and Senior Software Engineer in the fields of insurance, travel, imaging and GPS development.
From 2000 to 2003, Mr. Himmelman pioneered a new telephony GPS-enabled mapping system to be utilized by major cellular companies and delivered to a variety of personal mobile devices. The crux of the system was built on a new mapping instruction protocol aimed at reducing bandwidth by 75% over the transmission of imagery. Between 2000 and 2003 he was responsible for the development of a travel reservation system offering advanced functionality and an easy-to-use interface to consumers, professional agents and automated third-party vendors.
Mr. Himmelman received a Bachelors of Computer Science degree specializing in Virtual Reality from the University of Advanced Computer Technology, in Phoenix, Arizona.
Michelle Lu — Director of China, Operations
Ms. Lu is the Director of China Operations for Triton, overseeing partnerships and new business in China. She has more than 15 years of experience in the travel industry. She brings a depth of experience in international travel management. Ms. Lu has worked for Air China and the Venetian Hotel as a customer service professional. She also worked in the airline industry for eight years.
She earned a Management Certification from the General Administration of Civil Aviation of China (now Air China). Ms. Lu is fluent in Chinese (Mandarin) and English.
Steve Corey — Director of Information Technology
Mr. Corey has over 16 years of management and information technology experience in enterprise application services, business process transformation and enterprise-level systems integration. He has held various managerial positions including Senior Director Internal IT at MySQL where he provided strategic and tactical planning, development, evaluation, and implementation of multiple information and communications systems.
Prior to joining Triton, Mr. Corey served as a Senior Manager at Accenture where he directed the global implementation of Oracle ERP. He has also served as the Manager, Business Applications at Openwave, and senior consulting positions at both Oracle and JD Edwards.
Mr. Corey received his Bachelors of Science in Psychology from Central Michigan University, and his Masters of Business Administration from Wayne State University.
Suzy Sun — China Operations Manager
Ms. Sun has 20 years of experience in the Chinese travel and tourism market and joins Triton China as the Operations Manager. Prior to joining Triton China, she worked for Horizon Travel Beijing where she supervised the sales, operations and customer support departments. She has extensive experience working with Chinese travel agents and developing sales channels. Ms. Sun also worked for Beijing Cendant International Travel Service Company as the Business Development Director.
Her professional accomplishments include leading the team of a Sino-UK hotel reservation company in being recognized as one of the top six booking companies in China according to RN volume. She also led the promotional campaign of the China Distribution System, a hotel reservation platform, which led to the company being named a “Top Technology Company” by the Beijing Travel Agent Association
Ms. Sun studied Chemical Engineering at TianJin University in China.
Travel suppliers, from airlines, cruise lines, car rentals and hotels to wholesalers and consolidators, need inexpensive and scalable travel distribution channels to enable targeted market and product development. Travel agencies need inexpensive real time access to worldwide travel inventory. Creating one simple and powerful software solution that brings agencies and suppliers together takes a lot more than advanced technology—it takes a commitment to build close-working relationships that foster success on both sides of every business-to-business transaction.