Rick Escher, President & CEO

When Recognia President & CEO Rick Escher founded the company in 2000, he brought with him a wealth of experience, including the successful launching and management of two start-ups - Pricedex Software Inc. and MacSys Inc. Under Mr. Escher's guidance, Pricedex became a leading supplier of price management software throughout North America and Europe. Mr. Escher previously led MacSys, a custom software development firm, from inception in 1988 to acquisition in 1996. Before that, Mr. Escher worked for Canadian Astronautics as a space systems engineer, where he designed and implemented materials processing experiments for space flight and worked with the Canadian astronauts to test the equipment aboard NASA's KC135 "vomit comet".

Although the majority of his time is devoted to growing Recognia, Mr. Escher is involved in several non-profit organizations. One of these, a drop-in center for under-privileged youth in the Ottawa-Carleton region called The Door/La Porte, provides guidance and mentors to help develop skills in areas such as entrepreneurship.

Mr. Escher is a founding member of the Software Developers' Network (SDN), a forum for software executives to discuss business management, an associate member of the Sigma Xi scientific research society and a past member of the Young Entrepreneur's Organization (YEO). Mr. Escher is a graduate of the Florida Institute of Technology, where he earned a Master's degree with Highest Honours in Space Science in 1985.