Don Smith

Board Member

Don, an accomplished senior executive with international experience, is a BSc. Engineering Graduate of Imperial College, London.

A “reformed engineer”, he spent the first 8 years of his career at BT Research Labs, which led to a move to Canada in the late 70’s to begin the marketing and general management phase of his career with Mitel. At Mitel he was an Executive Vice President from 1981, with global responsibility for Sales and Marketing when he left in 1986.

He then became President of AIT Corporation, a company focused on automated border control, which he led to 90% world market share and took public in 1993.

In 1996 he was founder and CEO of Cambrian Systems, and became VP & GM of OPTera Solutions when the company was acquired by Nortel Networks in December 1998. He was promoted to President – Optical Internet in January 2000.

In April 2001, Don returned to Mitel as CEO, with responsibility for achieving leadership in the emerging market for IP based business communications solutions. He took the Company public in 2010 and retired in January 2011.

Now, as General Partner at Wesley Clover, Don is focused on building successful growth companies by working with and mentoring the entrepreneurial technology investments in the Wesley Clover Portfolio.

In 2010 Don was recognized as ‘CEO of the Year’ by the Ottawa Business Journal and Telfer School of Management at Ottawa University. He is a member of the Courage Campaign of the Ottawa Regional Cancer Foundation focused on raising funds for cancer research and clinical trials.