The Team

Scott N. Miller, CEO & Co-Founder

Scott N. Miller is the CEO and Co-Founder of Dragon Innovation. Scott has extensive experience in all aspects of Far East manufacturing development, engineering, production, system quality assurance, operations, contract negotiations, costing and sourcing, hiring and team building.

Prior to founding Dragon Innovation, Scott spent ten years at iRobot. As the Vice President of Asia Pacific, Scott was based in Hong Kong and China and responsible for founding, scaling and leading the Hong Kong, China and India teams as integrated parts of iRobot’s global product development engine. Products include the Roomba and Scooba Robots (over 3,000,000 units sold worldwide), as well as Looj and ConnectR. Upon his return to the States, Scott served as iRobot’s Vice President of New Product Development leading a 60-person global product development team that was responsible for developing and delivering the next generation products for the Home Robots Division.

Other notable projects spanning Scott’s twenty-year career include multiple toys for Hasbro (robotic dinosaurs and the robotic baby doll My Real Baby, and a full-sized robotic Triceratops dinosaur powered by a Corvette engine for Disney Theme Parks. In addition to running Dragon Innovation, Scott serves as an Adjunct Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Olin College and teaches the Mechanical Design and Design for Manufacture courses.

Scott is an avid sailor and captains a J/80 sailboat during racing season. He has sailed from Boston to Portugal through two hurricanes and also from Boston through the Panama Canal to Tahiti. Scott holds a Bachelor degree from Dartmouth College and a Master of Science from MIT.

Herman Pang, President & Co-Founder

Herman Pang is the President and Co-Founder of Dragon Innovation. Herman serves as the Far East in-country liaison, leveraging his strong network of vendors to lower costs, improve quality and accelerate time-to-market. One of the many highlights of his 15-year career in Far East manufacturing was starting the iRobot office with Scott.

During his tenure, Herman served as Managing Director of the iRobot Far East office with three major functional team leaders reporting to him: Operation (Supply Chain management, Costing and Sourcing); Engineering (New Product Development, Design for Manufacturing) and; China Quality (Quality, Sustaining and China business relationship). Products launched during Herman’s tenure include Roomba and Scooba floor-cleaning robots, Looj gutter-cleaning robots, and ConnectR.

Prior to joining iRobot, Herman held the position of Far East Project Leader for Hasbro’s first generation FurReal Friends. This product launched a new brand and a series of line extensions that has sold millions of pieces worldwide. Herman gained his keen insight on factory operations while leading an automobile supply factory to obtain QS 9000 verification—a new quality standard for the automobile industry and the only one in China and Hong Kong at that time.

Herman holds a Bachelor degree from the Technical University of Nova Scotia (Currently Daltech, Dalhousie University). He looks forward to helping our clients solve Far East manufacturing challenges and bring their products to the Market.

Dan Long, General Manager

As the General Manager (PRC), Dan Long is responsible for leading the China team. In addition, Dan works with our clients to create their manufacturing quality plan by first understanding their product requirements. He translates this knowledge into the function, life, abuse, transportation, and final inspection quality plans in cooperation with the CM’s quality team, which he uses to oversee all aspects of the quality testing. Dan is based full time in China and always on the front line.

Dan derives his engineering, quality control, operation and managing experience from 16 years of working with US based companies in the Pearl River Delta area of China. Prior to joining Dragon Innovation, Dan served as the Assistant Director of the China office for iRobot for six years. Dan worked at Hasbro for five years leading the quality team to prepare test plans, perform product testing and evaluation, product sign-off for production, shipment quality assurance and customer complaint follow-up. Dan started his career as a Mechanical Engineer for Tiger Electronics, the company that invented Furbie. At Tiger, Dan was responsible for project schedules, product design reviews, solving technical problems, and keeping production running smoothly.

Dan holds a Bachelor degree in Mechanical Engineering from Wuhan Institute of Science and Engineering, and Six Sigma Green Belt and recently received his MBA at Sichuan University.

Adam Craft, Vice President of Manufacturing Engineering and Project Management

As VP of Manufacturing Engineering and Project Management, Adam leads our clients through the Request for Quotation (RFQ) process and then facilitates the New Product Introduction (NPI) process and transition to steady state manufacturing. Adam is the primary US-based contact for clients working with a factory or ready to start the manufacturing process.

Previously, Adam served as the Vice President of Global Product Engineering for Hasbro. Adam served in this role for four years, but ultimately spent eleven years with the corporation. In addition, Adam spent five years at iRobot leading R&D, Product Engineering and Mechanical Engineering over the course of his tenure, with a key role in successfully launching the next generation Roomba.

Adam has extensive experience in product development ranging from toys and healthcare to animated creatures and robotic devices, from concept through production. He has led and partnered with globally dispersed teams throughout the US, Hong Kong, England and China.

William Drislane, Vice President, Engineering

As Vice President of Engineering, Bill works closely with our clients to get them ready for manufacturing, taking them through design review and cost estimation steps, providing pre-manufacturing support, and advising them as they make their decisions on production volumes, pricing, and manufacturing strategies. Bill is also Dragon’s US-based authority on Quality and Reliability Engineering.

Bill was most recently VP of Quality at Euro-Pro, and prior to that, Director of Quality at iRobot’s Home Robots division. He is also an experienced design engineer with 20 years experience working in technically demanding industries such as semiconductor capital equipment.

Beth Macdonald, Vice President, Operations

As Vice President of Operations, Beth Macdonald works on new product initiatives with the goal of expanding Dragon’s core business and presence. Beth oversees much of the day to day operations for Dragon including website management and social media presence, promoting both Dragon initiatives as well as those of our clients. Beth spends considerable time researching market trends, keeping the Dragon Innovation team up to date on new developments within the rapidly evolving Hardware scene and their potential impact on the growth of Dragon and the success of our clients.

Beth has over 15 years of experience working with clients ranging from the Life is good Company to running Live Nation Entertainment’s Northeast Marketing Department in the role of Vice President. In the course of ten years, Beth promoted thousands of live concert and entertainment events while at the same time overseeing public relations, sponsorship partnerships and the development of online advertising and promotions for her division.

Beth holds a Bachelor of Science degree from Cornell University.

Kristin Coyle, Entrepreneur Liaison

Kristin Coyle is the Entrepreneur Liaison for Dragon Innovation. Based in the USA, Kristin connects with entrepreneurs interested in working with Dragon Innovation to learn more about their products and manufacturing strategy and helps them find the best go-forward plan to achieve their goals.

Kristin comes to Dragon from six years at iRobot, most recently as the Senior Human Resources Specialist, developing HR programs and implementing them across the company. She also managed the internship program and coordinated the recruiting and new hire processes, bringing on the next generation of robotics engineers. She supported the Home Robots engineering team during the release of the iRobot Roomba 500 series and other programs.

Kristin holds a Bachelor’s Degree in International Relations from Wheaton College.

Karen Lau, Operations Manager

As the Lead Costing and Sourcing Engineer at Dragon Innovation, Karen is responsible for helping clients and Contract Manufactures meet cost targets, locating unique components, “pulling-in” lead times, and identifying alternate component sources.Karen began her career at Viasystems Asia Pacific Ltd in the field of component sourcing during which time she developed a strong vendor network that she has continued to grow throughout her career. Karen then joined iRobot in 2006 and was responsible for costing and sourcing for the Roomba Robotic Vacuum Cleaner, Scooba Robotic Wet Floor Cleaner, Looj and ConnectR. To expand her knowledge of the supply chain from product development to product manufacturing, Karen joined Early Light Industrial Co., Ltd, the largest toy manufacturer in China, in 2008 as a Costing Engineer. Working closely with customers, such as Mattel & MGA, and the factory engineers, Karen developed the skills necessary to meet customer’s cost targets while maintaining the original design intent and quality requirements.

Karen graduated from the Hong Kong University of Science & Technology and holds a bachelors degree in Industrial Engineering and Engineering Management.

Fred Zhang, Electrical Engineering Manager

Fred is based full time in Shenzhen China and uses his extensive experience in consumer electronics to assist clients in the handover, pre-production, and production phases with the following tasks:

Electrical Design Review, Schematic Review, PCB Layout Review, Electrical Test Procedures, Alternate Component Selection, Component Vendor Evaluation and Qualification, Project Management, Problem Solving, Failure Analysis and Corrective Action, Supply Chain Analysis.

Prior to joining Dragon Innovation, Fred served 9 years at Namtai Electronics Ltd. as a Project Leader and Electronics Supervisor. At Namtai, Fred oversaw electronic product development for numerous consumer products including an electronic dictionary, headsets, and portable speakers. Fred has also held positions with IDT Electronic LTD overseeing hardware product design as well as Tianshan Electronic Equipment Company within the product design department.

Fred holds a Bachelor of Engineering degree from Northwest University of China, where he majored in semi-conductor engineering.

David Cao, Senior Project Manager

David is based full time in China and serves as a Project Manager in addition to the Engineering Manager for Dragon Innovation. Before joining Dragon Innovation, David served as the Engineering Manager for iRobot’s Home Robots China Office. He led the team focused on pre-production engineering, manufacturing and sustaining engineering that included quality, tooling, process control, fixture setup and packaging. Prior to joining Dragon Innovation, David worked at Hasbro for five years as a Quality Engineer. He has 16 years experience working in the Pearl River Delta.

David holds a hold a Bachelor degree of Mechanical Engineering from Jilin University of Technology.

Billy Cheung, Senior Project Manager

Billy is based full-time in China and serves as a Project Manager. He is fluent in English, Cantonese and Mandarin and brings years of experience working on complex integrated electro-mechanical systems with US-based companies.

Prior to joining Dragon Innovation, Billy served for six years as the Quality Manager at iRobot’s Home Robot Division where he led the quality team for manufacturing process control, final shipment inspection, new project design review, testing, production set up, and fixture review.

Billy was also responsible for handling compliance certifications for international markets.Before iRobot, Billy worked at Hasbro for six years as a QA Engineer where he was responsible for supporting new projects from prototype through pilot run, testing and production. He created the quality assurance and test requirements and conducted the factory production audits. Billy was a QA Engineer with IDT for two years, overseeing the quality process for SMT, wave soldering, assembly, testing and inspection. Billy is certified as an ISO system auditor. In addition, Billy served as a Production Engineer at Astec Electronics for two years, and as an Electronic Engineer for Chuanbei Electronics for four years.

Billy holds a Bachelor in Electronics Engineering from the University of Electronics Science and Technology.

Billy Lin, Project Manager

Billy Lin is an experienced Project Manager, who was most recently at Sportscraft. Prior to that, he worked at MGA and Little Tykes as a Project Manager focused on developing indoor sporting products through all stages of the process. Billy also has extensive experience from Lego and SAE/SFIT, focusing on new product development and quality plans. He has deep domain knowledge of SPC tools and Quality Assurance, and is fluent in English, Cantonese, and Mandarin.

Billy holds a Bachelors in Electrical Engineering from Huaqiao University.

Owen Zou, Project Manager

Owen is based full time in China and serves as a Project Manager. Before joining Dragon Innovation, Owen served for five years as the Senior Quality Engineer for iRobot’s Home Robots China Office. He focused on the new project development quality assurance including the QA testing validation, failure analysis, production line and QA testing fixtures, manufacturing process control, and final shipment inspection.

Owen worked at Hasbro for seven years as a Quality Engineer where he was responsible for new projects from prototype through pilot run, testing and production. He created the quality assurance and test requirement and conducted the factory production audits. Prior to Hasbro, Owen was a QA Engineer in Johnson Electric, responsible for creating process quality control specifications, failure analysis, FMEA, and Statistical Process Control.

Owen has 16 years experience working with US companies in the Pearl River Delta of China and holds a Bachelor degree of Mechanical Engineering from the Southwest Jiaotong University.

Shaun Salzberg, Engineer

Shaun is Dragon’s Engineer and resident Maker. With experience gained at MIT’s Media Lab, Shaun is versed in 2D/3D modeling, electronics design, circuit board production, 3D printing, laser cutting, CNC milling, molding and casting, woodworking, metalworking, and the product design process at large. Shaun is responsible for Dragon’s “on the road” meet ups, hackathons and conferences.

Prior to the Media Lab, Shaun spent three years at two early stage NY Startups: as a web and mobile developer at drop.io, a file sharing service eventually purchased by Facebook and as a member of the QLabs team, a startup incubator. At QLabs, Shaun worked with a small team to conceive of, prototype, and launch a new web startup every six weeks.

Shaun graduated Summa Cum Laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia University in 2008 with a major in Computer Science and a minor in Economics. In his free time, Shaun fences, plays drums, and Makes (projects which range from making games and puzzles to voice-activating his apartment).

Nicole Fu, Sourcing Assistant

As the Sourcing Assistant, Nicole helps clients and Contract Manufactures meet cost targets as well as locating unique or alternate component sources. Nicole also coordinates client visits to the Far East.

Nicole comes to Dragon Innovation from MakerBot where she initially helped to run the Far East office in Shenzhen, China including the coordination of travel, expense management, meeting coordination, service contract negotiation as well as employee hiring. She was then promoted to the position of Sourcing Assistant where she worked with OEM to organize the Bill of Materials, as well as driving cost improvements and component sourcing. Nicole is passionate about volunteering and has worked with many major events including the 2010 Guanzhou Asia Games, the 2009 8th Asian Swimming Championship, the 2009 AKF Senior Karatedo Championships as well as working with the Equestrian/Swimming Karatedo Federations of Asia. Her main responsibilities included travel coordination, administrative assistance, tour guiding, as well as serving as an interpreter.

Nicole graduated with a B.A. in English from South China Normal University.