Laura Black
Managing Director

Telephone: (650) 561-1241
Email: lblack@needhamco.com

Laura Black joined Needham & Company in 1999. Laura has over 20 years experience in high-technology, business strategy and finance. At Needham, she has served as a senior banker on over $5 billion of public financings and M&A advisories, including several transactions in the IT infrastructure market. She previously served as head of corporate finance at Black & Company, where she raised over $500 million of public equity capital for Pacific Northwest companies and completed numerous M&A and strategic advisory assignments. Laura previously served as director of M&A for TRW Avionics & Surveillance Group (ASG), where she evaluated acquisition candidates, managed direct investments and divestitures, and raised venture capital to back spin-off companies. She began her career at TRW as a hardware and systems design engineer. She earned an MS in Management from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business and also holds an MSEE from Santa Clara University and a BSEE from the University of California at Davis.

Samir Desai
Managing Director

Telephone: (212) 705-0486
Email: sdesai@needhamco.com

Samir Desai joined Needham & Company in 2002. Samir’s experience includes a wide variety of equity, debt and private placement financings and advisory assignments for a large number of technology clients over the last 10 years. At Needham, his primary focus is on software and services companies. Samir has been the lead advisor on a number of IPOs, follow-on and private placement offerings, as well as buy-side and sell-side M&A transactions related to a large number of enterprise, application, network and infrastructure software companies. Prior to joining Needham, he was a vice president in the Technology Investment Banking Group at Credit Suisse First Boston/Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette, where he focused on clients in the Enterprise Computing, Software and Internet Consulting Services sectors. Prior to CSFB/DLJ, Samir worked at Cowen & Company, in its Technology Investment Banking Group. He also worked at Salomon Brothers Inc, in its Mergers and Acquisitions Group. He earned an MBA with Honors from the University of Chicago, Graduate School of Business and a BA in Government and Economics cum laude from Dartmouth College.

Nitin Doke
Vice President

Telephone: (650) 561-2224
Email: ndoke@needhamco.com

Nitin Doke joined Needham & Company in 2012. Prior to joining Needham, Nitin provided finance leadership in corporate development, strategic planning and operational finance at Intuit. Prior to Intuit, Nitin gained over 5 years of experience covering software stocks with Institutional Investor ranked teams at JP Morgan and Morgan Stanley. As a research analyst, he covered companies in the infrastructure software, enterprise applications and SaaS sectors. Nitin received his MBA from University of California, Davis, MS in Engineering from Duke University and Bachelors in Engineering from Victoria Jubilee Technical Institute, Mumbai.

Brandon Rasmusson
Vice President

Telephone: (650) 561-2249
Email: brasmusson@needhamco.com

Brandon Rasmusson joined Needham & Company in 2006. In his tenure at Needham & Company, Brandon has executed over 35 transactions including multiple private and public financings, buy- and sell-side acquisitions and broad financial advisory work across the technology ecosystem. For the last several years he has focused on growth companies in the Internet & Digital Media and Software sector with deep expertise in consumer centric businesses. Prior to joining Needham, Brandon graduated from the Leavey School of Business at Santa Clara University, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Commerce degree in Finance and studied economics and accounting.