Roger W. Burnell | back to Arnell Staff

Education
Mr. Burnell graduated from Cornell University in 1966 with a Bachelor of Science in Electrical Engineering, minoring in Math, Physics and Business Administration. He received a Master of Science from Stanford University in 1967, specializing in communication systems, and was a candidate for the Ph.D. program in Neurocybernetics prior to the disruptions of the Indo-Chinese conflict.

Mr. Burnell has done additional selective graduate work at Stanford, UCLA, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He has taught and/or served on the faculties of Cornell University, Stanford University, Western States College of Engineering, TRW Systems, California State Long Beach, the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA), and has been elected to two National Engineering Honor Societies.

Technical Background
Mr. Burnell has an extensive background in Research, Development, Analysis, Design and Technical Management in both General Engineering and Communications Systems (Aerospace). In the mid 1960's he was a special assistant to the Executive Vice President for Engineering of Burnell & Co., Inc. Between 1967 and 1981 he held various project management positions on the Technical Staff of TRW Systems Group in Redondo Beach, California, and was responsible for major Subsystems on two sophisticated Government Communication Satellite Systems. During 1971, Mr. Burnell moved to Paris, and served as an American scientist on loan to the European Space Research Organization, managing the design of a portion of their Advanced Aeronautical Satellite Program in Velizy, France.

Business Background
After his return in 1972, Mr. Burnell founded Arnell Enterprises, Inc., a diversified Architecture, Engineering and Real Estate Development Company. The firm began by doing general consulting and residential investing and remodeling. In 1972 Arnell began its own in-house construction program, erecting both new apartments and single family homes in Manhattan Beach and Hermosa Beach, California. By 1973, the company was building high-quality custom homes in Manhattan Beach, and received the first of many nominations for Community Beautification Awards.

In 1974 Arnell developed a new tract of custom homes in Manhattan Beach, and at the same time was granted the largest construction credit line at Crocker Bank's Riviera Village Division. The firm then expanded its activities to include residential projects in Playa Del Rey and its first multi-family, condominium complexes in Hermosa and Redondo Beaches. In 1979 Arnell began its exclusive and highly successful line of custom English Tudor and New England Colonial residences in Manhattan Beach.

In 1981 Mr. Burnell became a special consultant to TRW, allowing him more time to manage Arnell's day-to-day operations, and to oversee project development for the firm's new business activities. Thereafter, Arnell commenced major development projects in Boca Raton, Florida, and Scottsdale, Arizona, which included commercial centers ("The Delray Plaza"), large condominium projects (the 180-unit "Scottsdale Haciendas"), and custom residential estates ("The Twenty Estates at Carefree").

In 1982 Mr. Burnell was invited to join Hermenet Inc. of San Francisco by its founder - Dr. Fernando Flores, the prior Finance Minister of Chile - as a Management Consultant, later becoming V.P. for Corporate Development for Dr. Flores' next company, Logonet, Inc. In that capacity, he developed, conducted and supervised specialized management training programs and individualized consulting for a number of the top Fortune companies and their executives in the field of Organizational Communications and Corporate Effectiveness.

Clients have included:

AT&T, The American Society of Testing Materials (ASTM), Baxter Int'l, Bell Laboratories, Adolph Coors Co., Citicorp, Digital Equipment Corporation, Dupont, Exxon, First Interstate Bank, Hewlett Packard, IBM, ITT, Lockheed, The Mt. Sinai Hospital Faculty/Staff (NYC), Marriott Corporation, Memorex, McDonalds, McDonnell Douglas, MCA Corporation, Monsanto, Motorola, NASA, Nutrasweet, Oppenheimer, Prudential, Quest, Security Pacific Bank, Syntex Corporation, TRW, The Universities of Michigan, Texas and Southern California, Wang Laboratories, The World Bank, and a number of City, County, and State governments as well as agencies of the Federal Government.

During this transition, Mr. Burnell adjusted Arnell's focus from that of a development company to a diversified design/development and management/consulting company specializing in select commercial properties. New acquisitions included the North Oaks Plaza in Thousand Oaks, California (1984), the 5000 California Avenue in Bakersfield, and The Reedley Shopping Center near Fresno (1986).

In 1990 he founded Human Resource International, dedicated to providing diversified services to corporate management in the emerging field of Ontological Design. With over 21,000 students, he still periodically teaches and consults for corporations and Executive Managers in this field, and is the author of a forthcoming book on this subject, entitled "Communication and Commitment - Rediscovering the Foundation of American Business."

Since 1992, Mr. Burnell has allocated a majority of his time to overseeing Arnell's commitment to remodel and fortify its commercial investments into a long-term annuity portfolio. In December 1994, he became the Founder and Executive Director of RollerDome, Inc., a diversified Roller-Sports Facility whose charter facility was opened in Thousand Oaks, California in 1995. He received numerous offers to expand, and franchise this business, including from well-known professional hockey figures. Through the RollerDome project Mr. Burnell became nationally known in this field, and offered consulting services "pro bono" to assist many similar businesses around the country. In 1998, having relocated to Northern California, Arnell completed the acquisition of the Menlo Office Plaza - an entire city block of downtown Menlo Park, California. In June 2000, Arnell announced its new business plan, directed toward designing and developing high-quality Office Plazas in prime mid-peninsula communities, which soon resulted in the Award-winning Camino Altos Plaza (Los Altos), the Award-winning Alliance Plaza (San José), the innovational mixed-use Seville Plaza (Mountain View), the commercial mixed-use (introducing private medical condominiums) Fremont Corners Plaza (Sunnyvale), the new, high tech, LEED Gold, Award-nominated Bryant Park Office Plaza (Mountain View), and a forthcoming transformational undertaking in the Silicon Valley, which is currently referred to as "Tech Plaza."

Along the way, Arnell became involved in the restoration of two 100-125 year-old historical buildings in downtown San José, for which it was honored to receive the San José Downtown Association's "Golden Nail Award." Arnell next worked on a major renovation for a strategically-located shopping center in Sunnyvale, followed by several mid-peninsula residential projects between Los Altos and Menlo Park. In 2011 Staff became involved in a unique project for rehabilitating the historical, 125 year-old Pearson House as part of a visionary Mountain View Museum project, which undertaking metamorphized during a complex entitlement process, eventually giving rise to the ultra-modern, downtown-transforming - and now iconic - Bryant Park Plaza, which has been featured on two television series.

Personal / Community
Mr. Burnell lives with his wife of 34 years, Joelle - a recently retired fashion and interior designer, and until recent years, his two daughters, in their 'dream home' which they designed and built in 1986 in the charming community of Los Altos Hills, California. He has been long active in local government, serving the cities of both Los Altos and Los Altos Hills in a number of capacities, including Chairman of Community Relations for thirteen years, Chairman of Community Awards for fourteen years, Chairman of the government's Education Committee, founding sponsor and Chair of the new Public Art Committee; and founder and Chairman of many special projects and Task Committees, which posts have included City Webmaster, and Editor of the City Newsletter.

In 1994 Mr. Burnell was awarded a United States Congressional Citation by Congresswoman Anna Eshoo in recognition of a number of his voluntary Community activities. He has been an active member of the Los Altos Chamber of Commerce, the Los Altos Village Association, the Palo Alto YMCA, and as a one-time thespian and musician, the American Musical Theater of San José. He is a Founder of the Los Altos Community Foundation, a Member of the Advisory Board to Women's Initiative, a recent member of the Board of Directors of the San José Property-based Business Improvement District (PBID), and an active member of the Los Altos Golf and Country Club.

In 2001 he arranged and endowed a full-ride, Four-year Scholarship at Columbia University, continuously awarded to a select and deserving student of European roots and humble means, in honor of his father Lewis and in recognition of his college relationship with Columbia. Having graduated as Class President and Valedictorian from New York's Steyvesant High School class, Lewis only attended college through the generosity of a scholarship specially created for him by Columbia's Dean. He then worked his way through Columbia while helping to support his widowed mother and family, eventually being able to graduate with the same two honors that he had held at Steyvesant.

Roger's own current passions include the country of Spain (he has traced a vein of his relatives to Barcelona, circa 1492), where he spends 3-4 weeks each year studying and immersing himself in the indigenous language and culture), tennis (an avid singles player), and music (a one-time clarinetist, pianist, and singer, he is currently 'brushing up' and expanding his childhood music collection into a library of diversified, re-mastered, studio music). A few years ago he surprised himself and many friends by becoming an accomplished dog trainer, raising and leading one of their Golden Retrievers, "Curry," through over 60 AKC (American Kennel Club) performance events, while earning a series of impressive awards, including twenty-four First-place blue ribbons, and thirteen individual AKC Titles.

Mr. Burnell has become licensed as a General Building Contractor, Real Estate Broker, Deep Water Diver, Commercial Multi-engine Jet Pilot, FAA Certified Flight Instructor, and has recently received fulfilled a 20-year desideratum by acquiring and becoming trained to fly the "Eclipse 500" Business Jet - a Hi-technology, single-pilot-certified, business aircraft - designed from advanced jet technologies that were founded, funded, and inspired by a unique NASA Research and Development program, and which are now powered by a pair of remarkably lightweight turbo-jet engines, developed by Pratt & Whitney (P&W) of Canada.

In 2014, he also received his FAA Jet Type-rating Certification for the new Embraer Phenom 100E Corporate Jet, also propelled by advanced Pratt & Whitney engines, which became relevant in support of Arnell's growing ensemble of expansive business responsibilities, which, in 2015, included Quebec and Montreal in eastern Canada in 2016 came to include both Central and South America, and in 2017-2019 expanded to include New Mexico, Texas, Illinois, WDC, New York City, and the southeast U.S. (Tennessee Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama, and Georgia).

Next Steps
Between 2014 and 2019, Mr. Burnell has led a new Arnell expansion through its launching of five new divisions: the Aviation, Equine Sports, National Investments, Academic Philanthropy and Automotive Divisions, two of which are concentrated in Biotechnology and Human Health. The Aviation group is currently developing its third jet aircraft, and specializes in Corporate Jet Charter services. The Equine Sports Division oversees "Arnell Sporthorses," which acquires, develops and successfully competes highly promising specialty horses in the Olympic category known as "Three-Day Eventing." This new program is already well on its way, with its principal competition rider recently being named #2 in the USA. The Investment Division acquires carefully-selected projects and business interests in diverse areas of the country, currently including Illinois, Indiana, Massachusetts, New York, Maryland, Florida, Mississippi, Alabama, Texas, Arizona, Utah and California.

Between 2016 and 2018, the Arnell investment portfolio further expanded into the non-real estate business world, with a major placement into diversified tech-startup sponsor COTA Capital of San Francisco, becoming the primary angel investor behind the rapidly growing "Southeast AutoPLEX Group” based in Gulfport, Mississippi, and then a key investor in New York's "Rejuvenan" – a revolutionary bio-tech medical startup company currently leading the way in PPM – Precision Personal (wireless) Medicine – and whose undertakings are promising to revolutionize what has been previously accepted as "conventional health care" - first nationally, and then globally. In tandem with that exciting effort, the Burnell's have just endowed a full Professorial Chair at Cornell University's state-of-the-art, New York City campus on Roosevelt Island, known as "Cornell Tech," made possible through the tireless efforts of then Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Through its alliance with both The Technion (of Haifa, Israel) and New York's Weill-Cornell Medical School, "The Tech" is already establishing itself at the leading edge of its mission. The "Roger & Joelle Chair in Integrative Medicine and Technology" will help provide and oversee pertinent and practical research and academics in applied PPM health care, and its many extensive applications, while incorporating the newly emerging fields of “machine learning,” “deep medicine,” epigenetics, and telemerology. In mid 2019, the company is expanding its “Angel” wings by affiliating with Hia Technologies, in order to bring the exciting field of Natural Language Processing (NLP) into the very front-end human interface of its Bio-Medical activities, which are soon to be blended together with the deep constructs of its work in Ontological Design.