User:Roger.kondrat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
[edit] Biography
Canadian born (1976) web technology and business developer.
Roger was a member of the Canadian Ski Jumping National Senior and Junior teams during the 1990's. Having won many national championships at the junior level.
After retiring from amateur sport at the tender age of 19 years, Roger went to his local college: Mount Royal College (MRC) - www.mtroyal.ab.ca
While at MRC Roger launched a landscaping company (Bugaboo Landscaping, 1997-1999). Running a business and being self-employed was a very enjoyable experience for Roger and seemed to run in the Kondrat family with many members choosing self-employment. In 1999 Roger sold his Landscaping business and launched a new company West17 Media. This was to be Roger's first formal foray into the Internet world. Having been an early adopter of high speed Internet services, this seemed like an ideal choice to build a career. Also in 1999 Roger's work was noticed by a PC retailer Compusmart which hired Roger to maintain the in-store advertising and provide advise on niche technical products e.g. Palm, Pocket PC, Linux (these were very new then). Both Roger's company and Compusmart, Calgary benefited from these synergies.
In 2000 a booming local Internet media company (Cybersurf Corp) brought Roger onboard to research Internet technologies and develop business proposals, as well as advise on investment opportunities. Everyday was a new challenge with companies seeking financing, partnerships, or customers and employees raising product ideas. Eventually the job took over and Roger had to close down West17 Media in May 2000 , sadly just over a year after it was launched.
Late 2001, siting planning issues Roger left Cybersurf Corp to again become self-employed. This time as an Internet systems and services consultant in the form of Coyote Networks. In 2003 Roger began volunteering as a Ski Patroller and enjoyed it so much a career switch was considered. After training for just over a year (2004), Roger realised that the Internet was truely what brought him pleasure while he worked.
Before he went back to work Roger decided to travel the world as he was getting older and knew once he settled back down again on his technology and business development career there would likely be no more opportunities to take a year off, to travel and see the world.
In 2005 having moved to the UK for personal reasons, Roger re-started his career in technology and now resides at the University of Hertfordshire as a technical advisor.
