People in Business People in Business (March 24, 2004)

Cashin Company expands to Palo Alto

Cashin Company is opening a new sales office in Palo Alto at 400 Hamilton Ave. in mid-April with real estate veteran John Lazar as manager and vice president.

Mr. Lazar has 45 years of experience in Bay Area real estate. He managed Coldwell Banker's downtown office supervising a team of 65 agents and, before that, was owner and partner in Palo Alto-based Cornish & Carey until 1997.

Mr. Lazar is a graduate of UC Berkeley with an MBA from Stanford University.

Geeslin joins Francisco Partners

Keith Geeslin has joined Menlo Park-based Francisco Partners, a $2.5 billion technology-buyout fund, as a new general partner. His last 20 years were spent with Silicon Valley's Sprout Group. In 2003, Forbes magazine named him one of the top 50 venture capitalists in the world, the firm said.

Mr. Geeslin holds a master's degree in engineering-economic systems from Stanford, and a master's in philosophy, politics and economics from Oxford University.

Phelps named managing director

Dennis Phelps has been named a managing director of Institutional Venture Partners, a Menlo Park venture capital company. At IVP, Mr. Phelps invests primarily in software, Internet, wireless and technology-enabled services companies.

Kana names senior vice president

Jim Kelly has been named senior vice president of North American sales for KANA, a Menlo Park-based customer-service software company, announced Tom Doyle, president of KANA. Most recently, Mr. Kelly was vice president of worldwide sales at Kanisa, a Cupertino-based customer-service software company.

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