About Us

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Our Story

The vision of a smooth running business is what unites the Finale Inventory team.  Coming from a background of well-funded Silicon Valley companies, the founders of Finale Inventory wanted to follow a different path: start small.

The founders started working hands on with small and medium sized businesses to understand their inventory management needs, and to write an inventory management solution that could be tailored to solving their problems.  The first customers were fireworks companies. Why? Because when dealing with explosives you can be put in jail if your inventory records are off. So accurate inventory management is really important.

To a degree, inventory management needs are the same for broad categories of companies, and the body of knowledge about inventory management as a business function is well understood.  But there are nuances. When it comes time to pick or receive orders, do stock takes, deal with kits, handle lot IDs, serial numbers, multiple shipments, returns, barcodes and the litany of fine grained issues, the nitty gritty details really matter, and they are not the same across all companies.

That’s the challenge.  How do you build a SaaS inventory management solution that makes warehousing, purchasing and selling run smoothly for all the nitty gritty details even though those details are different for different companies?  Having grown up from working hands on with small and medium sized companies, to now working with Fortune 500 companies and e-commerce companies shipping a million orders in a month, the Finale team has built a SaaS inventory management system that is precisely adaptable to the finest detail.  Coupled with offering free, world class on-boarding, training and support, the solution helps companies get ever closer to the vision of a smooth running business.

History

  • 2009   Predecessor company Finale Fireworks launches its product at a fireworks convention in Mason City, Iowa.
  • 2010   Listening to customers, Finale learns that inventory management is at the center of fireworks businesses.  Team begins development of inventory management system.
  • 2011   First customers start using the system which will become Finale Inventory.  Recognizing each business has unique workflows and processes, the team focuses on building a system that adapts to our customers needs.
  • 2013   Responding to inquiries from e-commerce companies looking for an inventory management solution, Finale integrates with ShipStation to begin servicing e-commerce companies.
  • 2014   Finale Inventory incorporated as an independent company dedicated to creating an inventory management system that helps companies achieve smooth running operations.
  • 2015  First Fortune 500 company deploys Finale Inventory.
  • 2015  Second Fortune 500 company deploys Finale Inventory.
  • 2016  Third Fortune 500 company deploys Finale Inventory across multiple departments and 3 continents.
  • 2016  Fourth Fortune 500 company deploys Finale Inventory.
  • 2018  Largest e-commerce client ships 1 million orders in a single month using Finale Inventory.
  • 2018  Fifth Fortune 500 company deploys Finale Inventory.
  • 2019  Expanded our barcode application hardware compatibility to support Android OS
  • 2020  Sixth Fortune 500 company deploys Finale Inventory.
  • 2022  Launched new QuickBooks Online integration enabling customers to reduce costs and run their operations faster.

Leadership

Our founding team has extensive experience starting companies and leading product development at both startups and large software companies.

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Will Harvey, CEO

Will Harvey, co-founder and CEO, has founded multiple previous companies, including Sandcastle (acquired by Adobe Systems), There.com, and IMVU.  Will earned his BA, MA and PhD from Stanford in Computer Science. Will got his professional start as a software engineer in high school, writing Gold and Platinum selling video games Zany Golf, Immortal, Marble Madness, and Music Construction Set at age 15.

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Chris Hondl, CTO

Chris Hondl, co-founder and CTO, leads the engineering team.  Chris has over 30 years of industry experience, most recently as VP of Engineering for Core Mobility where he had responsibility for systems serving hundreds of thousands of mobile phone customers.  Chris earned his BS in Mathematics and MS in Computer Science from Stanford University.

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Chinh Nguyen, VP

Chinh Nguyen, co-founder and VP,  leads the revenue, sales, and business operations functions.  Chinh has over twenty years of software experience, most recently as SVP of Product Management and User Acquisition at IMVU, an avatar-based social community.  Chinh earned a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Kettering University, an M.S. in Electrical Engineering from the University of Dayton, and an M.B.A. from Carnegie Mellon University.  Chinh enjoys growing heirloom tomatoes (often unsuccessfully), riding his road bike, watching his daughter play competitive soccer on the weekends, and following his beloved Buckeyes. Go Bucks!

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Pauline Shiu, VP

Pauline Shiu, VP,  leads the marketing strategy and partnership programs.  Pauline has over fifteen years in the digital marketing, SaaS and ecommerce industries. In her time with companies like Macy's, WeddingWire and Zentail, she has successfully grown businesses by first understanding the customer and then through innovative campaigns that extended brand reach and optimized the marketing and sales funnels. Pauline earned her BA in Communications from Purdue University. In her spare time, Pauline enjoys traveling, paddleboarding, yoga and cheering her children on from the baseball and softball sidelines.