picoChip today announced it has appointed Iain Silvester to be its chief financial officer (CFO). Silvester joins the company from holding the position of finance director at Bristol, UK-based video compression technology specialist Motion Media PLC, where he managed the company's flotation on the official list of the LSE (London Stock Exchange).

Jonathan Brooks, non-executive chairman of picoChip and himself formerly CFO and director of ARM Holdings, commented on the appointment, "We are delighted to welcome Iain. His experience and credentials, particularly in helping to bring a technology start-up to maturity, are an ideal match for a rapidly-growing high-tech company like picoChip."

Iain Silvester, added, "picoChip is an exciting opportunity with strong technology leadership. I am delighted to be joining such an experienced management team at this critical time in the company’s growth cycle."

Iain Silvester is a chartered accountant, and began his career with Ernst & Young. In 1994 he joined IBAH, Inc, a NASDAQ-listed clinical research organisation, where he became international CFO, responsible for financial control and management of all non-US operations. Prior to joining Motion Media he was finance director of Chemical Design Holdings plc, an AIM-listed drug discovery software company, and managed it’s subsequent acquisition by Oxford Molecular Group. Motion Media was floated on the London Stock Exchange in 2000, capitalised at £140m, and was acquired in 2004.

picoChip has developed the world’s highest performance DSP tuned for wireless, and is a supplier of complete reference designs for WiMAX and HSDPA. The company has already scored ten design wins with key strategic players, including Tier One manufacturers, and is fast becoming the industry standard for next-generation wireless infrastructure. It recently announced the launch of the first commercially available WiMAX basestations using its picoArray™ technology, which is being deployed in basestations in Airspan Networks' AS.MAX family of WiMAX products.