Andre Botha Email & Phone Number

Redmond, Wa, Us

Redmond, Washington, United States

•Technical Program Manager (TPM) for three in development Surface PC products based on Intel & QualComm System on Chips (SoCs) covering power, performance & thermal.

Redmond, Washington, Us

•Hired, trained & led team in China to sustain 24 Surface devices; working closely with Surface Post Launch Engineering’s (PLE’s) software, hardware & manufacturing sustaining teams on software/firmware updates & minimizing impact of semiconductor shortages on production.

Redmond, Washington, Us

•Technical Program Manager (TPM) for Windows customer images (Laptop 2, Pro 6 & 7, Book 3) & provisioning manufacturing software (Book 3, Hub 2S 85”); worked closely with ImProv development, test & factory validation teams; managed inputs from product software/firmware teams, factory/manufacturing teams, Corporate, External & Legal Affairs (CELA), Manufacturing Test Engineering (MTE) teams, RF Teams, regulatory agency compliance teams; personally debugged issues.•Managed schedules between software teams (Agile) & manufacturing teams (Waterfall); gathered requirements from commercial & marketing teams; created specifications; worked with drivers & firmware; specified Windows & Office customizations; worked with Windows Operating Systems Group (OSG), Windows OEM & Office teams on requirements & issues.•Improved workflows, documentation, training, work tracking, product sunsetting, release process; transitioned team to Azure Storage for software releases; increased use of Azure DevOps (ADO); increased integration with manufacturing systems e.g., OnePDM hardware configuration management software & use of Engineering Change Orders (ECOs) for software releases; worked with OnePDM Team to add features to include software in Bills of Materials (BOMs)—ongoing.•Wrote C# tools to assist software releases, perform checks on software ECOs & interface with ADO.• Championed improvements in imaging (e.g., standardization & use of templates), provisioning (e.g., logging temperature during production & checking certificates during builds) & removing imaging & provisioning interdependencies.•Re-defined Surface device Stock Keeping Units (SKUs) for efficiency & for software differentiation to minimize SKU count; required convincing Surface (hardware) Release Management, Customer Support Service (CSS), configuration management teams, sales & marketing, supply chain & distribution teams.•Worked on Intel, AMD & QualComm (ARM) platforms.

WhichWay is a developer of offline guidebook mobile apps for National Parks and other recreation areas. Managed then took over development & testing of mobile app using JavaScript and Facebook's React Native cross-platform framework & incorporated Google Analytics. First version for iOS was recently released to the Apple App Store.

Redmond, Washington, Us

Firmware Development Manager for Microsoft Band 2 & 3 smartwatches (2016):• Led firmware team developing firmware for Microsoft Band 2 & 3 until cancellation.• Initiated & managed development of firmware signed boot / signed firmware update including infrastructure for code signing & factory deployment.• Wrote specifications & managed development of firmware for custom Band with ANT+ Heart Rate Monitor.• Wound down development team & handed off firmware to sustaining team.

Redmond, Washington, Us

Firmware Technical Program Manager for Microsoft Band 2 smartwatch:• Co-led firmware development with firmware development leads & firmware released on schedule.• Co-managed Firmware Test Team plus firmware test automation development & roll-out.• Pioneered use of Electronic Label (E-Label) for regulatory agency compliance at Microsoft.• Initiated & managed creation & manufacture of development boards for development, testing & automation.• Supported integration with hardware, apps & cloud as well as Manufacturing Test Engineering (MTE).

Redmond, Washington, Us

Firmware Technical Program Manager for Microsoft Band smartwatch (2013-2015):• Co-led firmware development with firmware development leads; successfully navigated firmware through major changes in feature sets & platform support: shipped on schedule without a day one firmware update.• Worked extensively on creating Bluetooth architecture to support Android, iOS & Windows Phone; over the air firmware update & simultaneous Bluetooth Classic & Bluetooth Low Energy support.• Hired & managed 25 contract firmware & software (Android, iOS, Windows & Windows Phone) engineers plus external firmware development companies to supplement internal firmware teams.• Worked closely with manufacturing test team on production test support & with hardware & firmware teams to ensure final product is FCC & CE approved & is Bluetooth 4.0, USB 2.0 & Windows Hardware Quality Labs (WHQL) certified.• In release manager & build engineer roles created builds & managed releases for testing, for over the air updates & for manufacturing via Siemens TeamCenter product lifecycle management (PLM) tool.• Wrote device specs; coordinated development & releases between firmware teams, app teams & cloud team.• Close coordination with customer support & provided final tier customer support.

Redmond, Washington, Us

Technical Program Manager, Xbox 3rd Party Accessories Group (2005-2013)• Extended & managed product approval & acceptance test process for all Xbox 360, Kinect & initial Xbox One licensed products e.g. guitars & drums for Activision Guitar Hero & Harmonix Rock Band; Activision Skylanders & Disney Infinity RFID reader portals & RFID tagged figures; Thrustmaster steering wheels.• Provided development & test support to key external hardware & software partners for priority products including onsite production & production test support in China for RF, PCBA & final product test; help with regulatory agency certification; integration of Infineon SLE security controllers.• Helped setup 3rd party product testing at Microsoft Asia Center for Hardware (MACH) in China & trained test engineers.• Wrote all technical specifications used by 3rd party partners to create products for Xbox 360 & most technical specs for Xbox One (USB specs, wireless specs, protocol specs, product requirements).• Hired & managed hardware, firmware & software engineers to create wired & wireless reference designs for Xbox 360 accessory hardware to speed development by 3rd party partners.• Developed Xbox 360 console based accessory test tools as well as device interface library for Disney Infinity.• Worked closely with Xbox console software team to add support for new hardware on Xbox 360.• Successfully campaigned for flexible device support for Xbox One.• Worked with 3rd party publishing team to support to game developers’ incorporating accessories into games.• Hired & managed contract software development team to create & test Xbox One device interface libraries.Hardware / Firmware TPM for Xbox 360 Wireless Transceiver ASIC (2007) & Xbox 360 Wireless Module (2008):Managed development, testing, compliance certification (RoHS, CE / R&TTE, IC / ICES, FCC, VCCI / TELEC, C-Tick), supported production test. Both used in 3rd party products, ASIC used in Xbox 360 Wireless Microphone.

Redmond, Washington, Us

Software / Firmware Technical Program Manager for Microsoft Band precursor fitness tracker:• TPM for device firmware, Azure cloud, Windows Store device app libraries & Xbox 360 console application.• Hired & managed contract firmware & software engineers plus external firmware development companies to supplement internal teams; managed Windows Installer XML (WiX) development & testing.• Coordinated external software development team working on Windows Store app for Windows 8.• Worked closely with Microsoft’s Windows Store device app team to improve device support in Windows 8.1 e.g. access to WinUSB & Bluetooth RFCOMM—all recommendations were eventually adopted by Windows.• Wrote device specs, application SDK documentation & sample application code for Xbox 360 developers.Software Technical Program Manager for Xbox 360 wireless Bluetooth surround sound headset:TPM for Xbox 360 console software development & testing; coordinated development & testing between console software team, security team, audio driver & USB driver team in Redmond & firmware / hardware team in China.

Management: Recruited & trained 17 engineers in China & Hong Kong (new graduates & experienced). Setup engineering intern program; recruited, trained & managed 8 engineering interns in the US. Created, trained & managed CD-ROM development (using InstallShield) & test group in US, China & Hong Kong. Re-staffed & trained 12 person firmware development group in China & Hong Kong. Championed software development tools, software engineering processes & procedures. Installed, administered & provided training on Perforce & Bugzilla.Quality Assurance: Wrote CD-ROM development & multilingual test procedures, trained test lab engineers & testers. Created, trained & managed five person firmware/connectivity quality assurance group in China & Hong Kong. Developed test procedures for & trained engineers & testers on USB, EXIF, Secure Digital (SD) / MultiMediaCard (MMC), FAT file systems & Bluetooth.Technical Lead: Customer & marketing requirements elicitation & analysis. Wrote firmware/connectivity specifications for 13 digital cameras. Firmware / software development resource allocation & scheduling. Engineering support to outsourced digital camera suppliers. Co-authored responses to Requests for Proposals (RFP), standing member of Concord’s emergency technical issue resolution “firefighting” team. Co-authored Firmware Standardization & Customization Guide & wrote CD-ROM Standardization & Customization Guide.Firmware Development: Development of firmware for Fujitsu Millennia-2L (FR32) / µITRON & Motorola ColdFire / RTXC-based digital cameras. Ported Internet stack & Point-to-Point Protocol (PPP) to digital camera.

Embedded Systems Engineer (Concord Camera Corporation): See under Concord above.

Embedded Systems Engineer (Concord Camera Corporation): See under Concord above.Digital Hardware Design Engineer (Xerox Corporation): FPGA & PLD design (including VHDL coding, simulation & synthesis), board design for PCI-bus based image processing & communications boards (IEEE-1394 “FireWire”, USB, LVDS & Fibre Channel). Oversight of board layout; technical lead on two image processing/communication interface board projects; setup hardware design processes; performed technology evaluations; aided in ASIC vendor selection; hardware/software integration; hardware debugging; organized & provided hardware design training sessions; assisted EMC/EMI testing. Intel-based PC motherboard design.Embedded Systems Engineer (Eastman Kodak Company): Wrote a bootloader; modified, extended & minimized Windows CE kernel for a Power PC MPC823 based digital camera in RISC assembler & C.