by Lynne Huntting
Kevin Kalkhoven finally testified as a defendant in the ongoing JDSU insider trading civil case in Oakland District Court on Thursday, and was on the stand for most of the session.
One of four defendants, the co-owner of the Champ Car World Series, PKV Racing, Cosworth Engines and Pi Group was examined by his lead attorney, Michael Shepard and cross-examined by the plaintiff's Barbara Hart.
Kalkhoven is a former CEO of JDSU, and was a venture capitalist before being recruited by the same head-hunter who asked him to turn around several other companies. He would typically stay a couple of years at a firm as CEO before moving on, and admits that he enjoyed it.
Kalkhoven was asked to be CEO at Uniphase, an fibre-optics telecommunications company based near Silicon Valley, which wasn't doing as well as it could making gas lasers for such things as supermarket scanners, so he looked for other opportunities. When Kalkhoven started, the company was private. He took it public in 1994 and, as part of his employment, received stock options.
Uniphase started acquiring other companies which had technology, intellectual property, scientists and other experts and products. Some acquisitions failed but, whenever Uniphase was involved in an acquisition, the 'window' was closed to Kalkhoven for selling stock. Up to June 1998, Uniphase dealt mainly with active technology and, at that point, Kalkhoven began discussions with Dr Josef Strauss, CEO of JDS Fitel, which Kalkhoven characterised as having a reputation for making the best 'passives' in the business.
"We had the best actives, so we could make it one-stop shopping for large companies if we merged, and it would relieve some of the pressure Uniphase was experiencing in meeting the demand of its customers," he revealed.
