Our Investors

Manta is supported by investors who share/reflect our commitment to technology innovation. Their confidence gives us energy.

Athenian Venture Partners



Athenian Venture Partners is an Ohio-based venture capital firm, with principals located in Boston, San Diego, and London. The firm has two investment practices covering the information technology/communications and life sciences industries. The firm's five senior managers bring more than 90 years of combined industry and investment experience to these two primary areas of focus and provide significant industry-specific value to Athenian's portfolio companies.

Athenian Venture Partners generally invests in early-stage opportunities and participate in subsequent financing rounds until IPO or sale. Founded in 1997, it currently manages two venture capital funds. Athenian invests in technology-driven companies that hold strong intellectual property in markets with significant growth potential.

Reservoir Venture Partners


Reservoir Venture Partners L.P. is a venture capital firm that brings capital, building acumen and a strong network of advisers to entrepreneurs and their teams. RVP targets investments in seed and early-stage technology companies with an emphasis on biosciences and information technology. The firm is located in Columbus, Ohio, and makes investments without regard to geography, although its primary targets are Ohio and the Midwest.

The Executive Team

Pamela Springer, President & CEO

Springer is responsible for the overall strategic direction, growth and management of Manta. Under Springer's leadership, Manta has developed an agile strategy and has fostered a culture that promotes innovation and speed to become recognized as an industry pacesetter. Recognized as having a sophisticated understanding of growing and developing profitable large-scale business-to-business web sites, Manta integrates various content types and offerings into profitable recurring revenue streams. Manta.com enjoys a comScore ranking as a top-10 business information site with more than 10 million monthly visitors.

For three straight years beginning in 2006, Manta Media Inc. (formerly ECNext) was named one of Business First's 50 fastest growing privately held companies in Central Ohio. Manta also is the winner of TechColumbus' TopCAT Award for the Top Technology Team (2006) and Outstanding Product of the Year (2007) for companies with less than 50 employees.

A veteran executive with more than 20 years' experience growing technology-based companies including re-starts and IPOs. Springer has been involved in raising capital, acquisitions and an IPO. She held leadership positions with a number of companies before joining Manta, including Interliant, Inc., reSOURCE PARTNER, Inc., Litton Enterprise Solutions, and Metatec, Inc. Springer has a BS in business administration from Franklin University, where she graduated Summa Cum Laude.

George Troutman, Chief Financial Officer

Troutman is responsible for the financial strategy of the company and plays a critical leadership role within Manta. He brings more than 20 years of experience in corporate finance, operations, and strategy to Manta.

Prior to joining Manta in February 2008, Troutman served as Chief Financial Officer, Treasurer and Secretary of Pinnacle Data Systems Inc; CFO and Vice President of Pathlore Software Corporation, where he was key in completing multiple acquisitions and helped nearly double the size of the company.

A graduate of Capital University, Troutman also served as a certified public accountant with Ernst & Young for more than 14 years.

Brad Warnick, Vice President, Platform and Technology

Warnick is responsible for Manta's technology group and has led the innovation of technologies and processes that enabled the company to rapidly scale, driving greater than 100x growth in website visitors and page serves. Warnick was instrumental in the creation and launch of Manta.com. Within six months of its 2005 launch, Manta's audience grew to more than six million monthly visitors.

Warnick joined Manta in 2003 with more than 20 years' experience as a technology and product executive for electronic information and ecommerce companies. He has extensive experience creating innovative information products focused on delivering an exceptional user experience, building and managing information product portfolios, and planning and developing technology solutions aligned to business requirements.

Warnick's earlier career experience included roles as director of product management at Sterling Commerce and as vice president of new media solutions at Metatec Inc. He earned a master of science in educational technology, as well as bachelor's degree, from Utah State University.

Peter Morse, Vice President, Product Management and Analytics

Since joining Manta in 2003, Morse has led the innovation of technologies and processes that deliver search engine visibility (organic and paid) to vast amounts of premium content.  Leveraging his advanced statistical background, he has successfully fostered a “test and learn” environment critical to continuous growth and success in this area.  Morse's team also has opened up groundbreaking advertising channels for Manta's publishers to monetize their content assets.

Throughout his career, Morse has used quantitative methods to improve online sales and business processes in both commercial and academic settings. His experience spans a wide range of industries and companies, including work with General Electric, General Motors and Weyerhaeuser. Most recently, he was responsible for upfront design and back-end analysis of online marketing projects for Amazon.com and Bank One.

Morse came to Manta with expert understanding of buyer behavior and site usability. His team explores improvements to search algorithms and results, page structure, price points; launching and measuring email campaigns, ad targeting, and much more. Morse earned a bachelor of arts in math and economics from Saint Olaf College, and earned his Master's of Science and Ph.D. in statistics from Iowa State University.

Katie Brennan, Vice President, Advertising Sales

Brennan is responsible for driving recurring advertising revenue, increasing client growth and retention, evaluating and optimizing campaigns for profitability, as well as managing a team of ad sales executives.

Prior to joining Manta, Brennan was vice president of Brand Development at Media Brains where she conceived and developed Agingcare.com. Brennan also served as a group vice president for Cygnus Business Media, where she managed strategy and the financial growth of 25 media brands in diverse vertical markets.

Brennan spent 23 years with Miller Freeman (a division of United Business Media, now CMP Media). While at Miller Freeman as vice president of Enterprise Media Group, she to provided strategic direction, new product development and profit and loss management for the $23-million product group. She directed all marketing and publishing activities for Unix Review's Performance Computing, Windows NT Systems, Sys Admin, Imaging and Document Solutions, Software Development and Rational Rose Architect Magazines, high tech card decks and corresponding websites.

A graduate of the University of Delaware, Brennan has completed the Marketing Program at the University of London; the Executive Publishing Program at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, and the Executive Management Studies Program at Cornell University.

Marty Vian, Vice President, User Experience

Leading design strategy, interaction architecture, interface and visual design, Vian is Manta's staunchest advocate for the site's users. His role is to promote audience engagement and give them reasons to return often, all the while keeping the site useful and usable and setting the stage for Manta evangelism within the user base. Vian leads and is guided by a team of seasoned design pros continually working to create value for users on the increasingly sophisticated Manta platform.

Before joining Manta in 2008, Vian was chief design officer for Neulogic, a company he cofounded in 1999. Neulogic became the dominant U.S. provider of CMS software as a service in the community philanthropy sector before being purchased in 2006. During his 20+ years of creative and design management, Vian has produced digital media , website and web software UI design for a range of commercial clients including: Lucent Technologies, Barnes & Noble, Caterpillar, Novell and Abbott Labs.

His nonprofit clients have included many of the largest community foundations across the U.S. and in the U.K. such as The Cleveland Foundation, Chicago and New York Community Trusts and The Scottish Community Foundation.

Vian attended The Ohio State University as well as Columbus College of Art and Design.