The Active Witness Story
Rob is our founder. Rob is a serial entrepreneur and inventor with a passion for technology, and security.
Rob has made several successful patent claims and has spent much of his life inventing, creating, and growing great businesses.
Rob Bakshi, CEO
Earlier in Rob’s career he founded a company by the name of Silent Witness
Silent Witness was an iconic Canadian surveillance hardware manufacturer that helped popularize what is known today as the “CCTV Dome Camera”. After profitably growing revenues in excess of $56 million, Silent Witness was taken over by Honeywell in 2003.
After nearly 20-years and several other successful ventures, Rob is still a passionate inventor. And in 2018, Rob developed a revolutionary new type of Access Control under the Active Witness brand. We now refer to this system as - Sima.
Rob’s vision revolved around 4 simple philosophies
Sima operates on the Active Witness cloud-based software to provide frictionless Access Control as a Service to businesses of all industries. Now, Rob and Active Witness are ready to take on the Access Control market one access point at a time.
01
Ease-of-use & accessibility
Access Control should be easy to use for ALL users. Additionally, biometrics should not be prohibitively expensive.
02
Plug & play installation
The system must be PoE compatible to make installation as easy as possible.
03
Multi-factor authentication
Legacy systems have inherent security flaws. Utilizing both mobile and biometrics provides both security and convenience.
04
Remote access management
Businesses should be able to remotely manage facility access from anywhere, on any device, at any time - SECURELY.
Press Releases
Meet Our Team
Management Team
Rob Bakshi
About
Rob co-founded Silent Witness, a publicly traded company (TSX & NASDAQ). As Chairman & CEO, Silent Witness achieved revenue and profit surpassed $56m and $2.3m, respectively, before being taken over by Honeywell in 2003 for a 55% premium.
Rob also served as CEO of technology company, Apivio (listed on TSX). Apivio was taken over by Nuri Telecom in 2017. Both companies achieved sales close to $60M with profits before being sold.
Vikram Bakshi
About
Vikram is a senior leader with extensive experience in operations, technology, logistics, sales and customer service.
In previous positions, he implemented operating systems and processes that aligned the company with suppliers, distributors and contractors.
Julian Jacobs
About
Julian has extensive experience in DevOps and Full Stack Development with a focus in cloud infrastructure, system optimization and cost reduction.
He served as a Software Engineer at Qualcomm for three years prior to graduating and later went on to develop an IoT app. Once the company received investor funding he would serve as the company’s CTO.
Jonathan Hanna
About
Jonathan has designed, developed, and integrated software for embedded systems in industries ranging from Cellular and Satellite Communications to Point of Sale and Surveillance.
Board of Directors
Rob Bakshi
About
Ken acquired over 135 companies to dominate the Cleaning Products industry in Western Canada [Project Clean], then went on to become a Director of Sun Rype Products as well as a founding Director of Sleeman Breweries (taking both companies public).
Ken serves on the advisory boards of Woodtone Enterprises, Ecotex Linen Services, Task Tools, Capilano Suspension Bridge Group of Companies and several other firms and is the past Advisory Board Chair of Purdy’s Chocolates.
His volunteer activities include past Chair of St. Georges School, Shaughnessy Golf Club and Young presidents Organization. In addition he has served on the boards of BC Sports Hall of Fame and The Canadian Olympic Foundation. He continues to be the CEO of Novas Capital Corp. which is focused on approximately 10 private equity investments at various stages of development.
Joseph Weil
About
Joseph (Joe) Weil is currently the Senior Vice President, Corporate Business Development of an international public company Bunzl Distribution. Joe has been a catalyst in more than $2.0 Billion dollars in successful acquisitions since 2004. Previously, Joe was CEO of Joseph Weil & Sons Inc. a prominent national distribution business, which primarily traded in janitorial, packaging and food service products. Weil also chaired three separate industry distribution consortium boards representing 550 independent distribution businesses in packaging, janitorial, foodservice and safety products.
Joe also served on many industry manufacturer’s advisory boards including Kimberly-Clark, Georgia Pacific, Dow Chemical, 3M, SCA Tissue, Pactiv Corporation. Weil is also involved in many civic and charitable boards and has been the Chairman of the largest Volunteer Led Fund Raiser for the National Multiple Sclerosis Society for the last 40 Years as well as two terms as the Board Chair in Chicago for MS.
Graham Lee
About
Graham Lee is the President and CEO of GSL Group (www.gslholdings.com), one of Canada’s leading commercial/recreational development and operations companies. Graham has developed a business sense and entrepreneurial drive at a young age, selling his Halloween candy at the age of five. After founding several businesses in his teens, Graham created a business plan while working on his UBC degree in the commerce undergraduate entrepreneurship program, which set the stage for RG Properties, a unique start-up real estate development company that he founded in 1989 at the age of 25 and a wholly owned subsidiary of GSL. Driven by his love of hockey and its impact on Canadian culture, Graham focused on Canada’s need to provide better facilities for all levels of hockey. GSL has become the largest privately-owned company developing and operating ice rinks in Canada with its Planet Ice facilities.
GSL Group has long-term real estate holdings in properties developed by GSL, including Planet Ice recreational facilities, multi-use arenas, hotels and shopping centres, residential mixed-use developments, major industrial buildings, construction, the Victoria Royals WHL hockey team, a private airplane charter business, and blueberry farming, as well as operations in food and beverage, concert production, ticketing, ice arena operations, outdoor music festivals, and online fantasy sports Officepool.com.
David Frishman
About
Jonathan has designed, developed, and integrated software for embedded systems in industries ranging from Cellular and Satellite Communications to Point of Sale and Surveillance.
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