Management Team
Our Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and Director, David Boris, has, over 30 years of Wall Street experience in SPACs, M&A and corporate finance. Our President and Director, Taylor Rettig, has over 20 years of investing and operational experience.
David Boris, CEO
David Boris has been our Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and Director since April 2025. Mr. Boris served as Co-Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and as a director of Forum Merger Corporation (“Forum I”) from its inception in November 2016 until Forum I’s business combination with ConvergeOne (formerly Nasdaq: CVON) in February 2018 and served as a member of ConvergeOne’s board of directors from the business combination until ConvergeOne’s acquisition by CVC in January 2019 at $12.50 per share. Mr. Boris served as Co-Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and as a director of Forum Merger II Corporation (“Forum II”) from its inception in May 2018 until Forum II’s business combination with Tattooed Chef (formerly Nasdaq: TTCF) and continued to serve on the board of directors of Tattooed Chef until June 2024. Mr. Boris served as the Co-Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and as a director of Forum Merger III Corporation (“Forum III”) from its inception in June 2019 until Forum III’s business combination with Electric Last Mile Solutions (formerly Nasdaq: ELMS). Most recently, Mr. Boris served as the Co-Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and as a director of Forum Merger IV Corporation (“Forum IV”) from its inception in March 2019 until its liquidation in July 2023.
Mr. Boris served as Senior Managing Director and Head of Investment Banking at Pali Capital, Inc., an investment banking firm, from 2007 to 2010. Mr. Boris served as a Managing Director for Morgan Joseph & Co., an investment banking firm and one of the earliest underwriters and advisors to SPACs, from 2001 to 2007. Mr. Boris served as President of Ladenburg Thalmann Group Inc. from 1999 to 2000 and was also Executive Vice President and Head of Investment Banking at Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc. from 1998 to 2000. He is an active member of the Young Presidents’ Organization (YPO), an organization with over 25,000 members who are in the top position of a qualifying company or division and are directly responsible for all operations of such business or division.
Taylor Rettig, President
Taylor Rettig has been our President and Director since April 2025. Mr. Rettig brings a diverse set of experiences from his career as a private equity investor, chief executive, general manager, and investment banker. Most recently, Mr. Rettig served as the President for Marubeni Growth Capital US, a role he served from 2023 to 2025. Previously, Mr. Rettig served as the Chief Operating Officer and Head of Corporate Development for Atlas Crest from October 2020, until its business combination with Archer Aviation Inc. (NYSE: ACHR) in September 2021. During his time at Atlas Crest, Mr. Rettig reviewed over 100 acquisition opportunities, prior to executing a definitive agreement with Archer Aviation. Prior to this, Mr. Rettig served as the Chief Executive Officer of Draper James, a lifestyle brand founded by Reese Witherspoon from 2017 to 2020 and served as an advisor until 2023.
Mr. Rettig was also a Partner at JH Partners, a San Francisco based investment firm, a role he served in from 2014 to 2020, and previously served in various senior investment professional roles with JH Partners from 2007 to 2013. During his two terms with JH Partners, Mr. Rettig led control and significant minority equity investments in public and private businesses across the branded consumer and media sectors, achieving successful outcomes of the investments he led, including selling a portfolio company, Image Entertainment, Inc., to RLJ Acquisition Inc., a SPAC, as part of a three-party merger. From 2013 to 2014, Mr. Rettig served as the Chief Strategy Officer of Alex and Ani, a rapidly growing trend jewelry business, into which Mr. Rettig had previously led a significant growth equity investment on behalf of JH Partners. Mr. Rettig became the Chief Strategy Officer of Alex and Ani in 2013, helping guide the Company to an exit valuation of $1+ billion. He was also a member of the board of directors for Greats, a digitally native Brooklyn-based sneaker brand, from 2017 to 2019 up until its sale to Steve Madden (NASDAQ: SHOO). Other notable companies Mr. Rettig has invested in include Figs (NYSE: FIGS), J. McLaughlin, and RG Barry.
Mr. Rettig began his career as an investment banker with Pali Capital Inc. and Morgan Joseph & Co., where he worked with Mr. Boris as a key member of the teams that helped to reintroduce the SPAC product to the market beginning in 2004, assisting with the underwriting of and advisory work related to business combinations for numerous SPACs. Mr. Rettig is an active member YPO and received his A.B. in Politics from Princeton University.
Board of Directors
Alexander Harstrick
Alexander Harstrick is a General Partner at J2 Ventures, a Boston-based venture capital firm managing over $250 million in assets and focused on the intersection of national security, healthcare, and emerging technologies. Before that, from 2018 to 2022, Mr. Harstrick was part of the Department of Defense’s Defense Innovation Unit, where he helped build its human systems investment practice and stood up National Security Innovation Capital, a direct investment program focused on hardware. He also served as a program manager at AFWERX, the U.S. Air Force’s strategic acquisition and innovation platform, ultimately helping deploy nearly $2 billion in defense funding to cutting-edge startups. He briefly held a role at KKR before founding J2 Ventures to pursue mission-aligned investing full time. From 2014 to 2018, Mr. Harstrick was also commissioned as an intelligence officer and deploying with a special operations joint task force to Iraq and Afghanistan. From 2013 to 2018, Mr. Harstrick also launched and led venture investing efforts at Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey, spearheading strategic investments in high-growth healthcare companies. Mr. Harstrick holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a B.A. in Hispanic Studies and Political Science from Columbia University.
Chris Licht
Chris Licht most recently served as Chairman and CEO of CNN Worldwide. From 2007–2022, Mr. Licht served in various executive media roles, including as Executive Vice President of Special Programming for CBS (2016–2022) where he consulted on various content for divisions across the corporation, as Executive Producer and Showrunner of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert for CBS (2016–2022), where he oversaw both creative and operational re-launch, as Vice President of News Programming and Executive Producer of CBS This Morning for CBS (2011–2016) where he led the launch of one of CBS’ most successful morning shows which had 50 consecutive months of ratings growth, as Executive Producer of Morning Joe for MSNBC (2007–2011) where he was also a co-creator and original Executive Producer. Mr. Licht also served as Executive Producer of various programs such as of Tooning Out the News for Paramount+ (2020–2022), of The God’s Honest Truth for Comedy Central (2017–2022) and of Our Cartoon President for Showtime (2017–2020) which he was also the co-creator. Mr. Licht also serves on the advisory boards of Robin Hood Foundation, the Newhouse School of Syracuse University and The Second City. Mr. Licht holds a BS in Broadcast Journalism from Syracuse University and has won multiple awards for his work, including multiple Peabody Awards, DuPont Awards and Emmy Awards.
Ted Zagat
Ted Zagat is an entrepreneur and technology investor. Mr. Zagat is currently building a new business. In 2016, Mr. Zagat co-founded Rimeto, the best-in-class enterprise directory product. Slack purchased Rimeto in 2020. From 2020 to 2022, Mr. Zagat led a new Slack business unit responsible for upgrading and monetizing Slack profiles for large customers. Prior to Rimeto, from 2011 to 2016, Mr. Zagat worked at Facebook, where his team developed Facebook’s and Instagram’s first Video products, which grew to a multi-billion dollar revenue stream during his tenure. Ted also managed Facebook’s commerce and payment products. From 1999 to 2007, Ted helped lead Zagat Survey, the user generated guide to restaurants and other leisure activities. As President, he transformed the company to a digital media business (acquired by Google in 2011). Mr. Zagat is an angel investor and advisor in leading companies like DoorDash, StubHub, Stripe (via Payable acquisition), Gusto, OpenTable and K2 Space. Mr. Zagat holds an AB degree from Harvard College and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
