Herman DeBoard’s Bio

Herman C. DeBoard III (born Jan 17, 1972) is an American businessman, private investor, and Disabled American Veteran.

Born in Huntington, WV on Jan 17, 1972, Herman grew up in rural Mason County, WV. For 3 short years of his teenage life he lived in NW, TN. Growing up poor, and the product of a broken home, he learned how to work hard, take care of himself, and became an accomplished athlete and student.

He Served in the United States Air Force from 1992 to 1996. While in the USAF, he trained as a Crew Chief at Sheppard Air Force Base in Wichita Falls, TX. For his permanent duty station, he was stationed at Pope Air Force Base, NC.

While at Pope he worked as an Isochronal Inspection Specialist for the Lockheed C-130 Hercules Airlift Aircraft with the 23rd Wing Flying Tigers. While on Active Duty, he was awarded the National Defense Service Medal, and achieved the rank of Senior Airman – Below the Zone. On March 23, 1994 two 23d Wing aircraft, an F-16 and a C-130, collided in the base’s landing pattern. After the two crew members of the F-16 ejected from their damaged fighter, the unmanned aircraft crashed into an aircraft parking ramp and hit a C-141 transport aircraft parked on the ramp. The resulting fireball and flaming wreckage killed 24 United States Army paratroopers who were waiting nearby to load the transports and injured almost 100 more paratroopers in what is known as the Green Ramp disaster. DeBoard was on duty supporting the rescue and cleanup efforts, after which President Clinton came to personally present an award to the 23rd Squadron for their combined efforts in assisting with the Disaster.

In September 1994, 23d Wing Flying Tiger C-130s, including DeBoard’s Squadron, participated in what was to be the largest combat personnel drop since World War II, Operation UPHOLD DEMOCRACY. They were to assist in dropping more than 3,000 paratroopers from the 82d Airborne Division onto Port au Prince Airport, Haiti. The invasion force was recalled at the last minute after word that the Haitian president had resigned upon hearing that the aircraft were on their way. The 75th Fighter Squadron‘s A-10s were also involved in UPHOLD DEMOCRACY. The squadron deployed their aircraft to Shaw AFB, South Carolina, where they were scheduled to launch close air support operations for the invasion force before recovering in Puerto Rico.

While at Pope, DeBoard also worked under Sr. Management as the Technology Administrator for the 23rd Wing Maintenance Flight, a cross-training effort. Working under the then, youngest Chief Master Sargent in the Air Force, gave him the unique ability to learn from an extremely professional and motivated leader. DeBoard left the USAF as an E-4 with an Honorable Discharge in 1996 as a Disabled American Veteran and lifetime member of the DAV.

After leaving the Air Force, DeBoard returned to college at Marshall University in 1996 to earn his Bachelor’s Degree. Carrying 17 hours per semester, he finished his Bachelor’s Degree in two and half years, graduating on August 13, 1999. Hungry for more, he immediately applied for and was accepted to the Marshall University Graduate Program earning an MA in Communication Studies while working as teaching assistant, teaching two classes per semester of the University Required course titled Public Speaking. He graduated on December 12, 2000 with a Master of Arts in Communication Studies.

After graduating, DeBoard accepted a position as a State Liaison for the Centers for Disease Control stationed at the WV Department of Health as a Public Health Educator and was quickly promoted to the Program Manager III level where his research was published in the 2001 NIC Journals ¹

He then moved to Colorado Springs, CO in March of 2002 to take the position of Chief of Communications at Schriever AFB. in the Emergency Communications Center. After two years, he transferred to Fort Carson to take the position of Director of Functional Technology. He had quickly climbed the ladder of success in the Government and felt he was no longer being challenged.

After 13 years of total government service, DeBoard decided to enter the private business world. His first endeavor was to accept the position of Chief Information Officer for Giant 5 Funds, an upstart mutual fund company with global aspirations. His official title was Chief Information Officer (CIO), where he worked as a Technology Officer for the funds. He, along with 5 others on the team, was featured in Colorado Biz Magazine January 1, 2007²

In 2009, DeBoard decided to strike out on his own as a serious Entrepreneur.³ His first endeavor was a unique greeting card company for men called Malemark, Inc. that he founded on June 20, 2009. He personally designed 100 apologetic greeting cards, that he had started writing during a Gender Communications Course at Marshall University. The cards were simple apologies such as “I’m sorry for being an Ass“. To get the company off the ground, he raised a couple hundred thousand dollars, signed a Managed Services Agreement with a company in Colorado⁴ and hit the ground running around the country promoting the funny greeting cards⁵ .

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The cards were picked up on a few media outlets around the country⁶ which made them a big success overnight. This gave Malemark access to dozens of retail distributors around the country such as Fry’s Electronics who set up specialized displays in 34 brick-and-mortar stores in nine U.S. states: California (17 stores); Texas (8); Arizona (2); Georgia (2); Illinois (1); Indiana (1); Nevada (1); Oregon (1); and Washington (1). They also had distribution in Danny’s Family Stores in Arizona including Scottsdale and Phoenix locations. In addition to being a greeting card store for men, DeBoard was leading the company through promoting a sustainable greeting card movement⁷

It was then that he set his sights on the biggest of the Big Box Giants…Target, Best Buy and Walmart. It was at a meeting in Minneapolis, MN with Target Buyers where his biggest light bulb to date went off. He wanted to sell his Malemark Greeting Cards in Target. Target stated they had an exclusive deal with a card company already, but if he were to do something with digital music, they would reconsider. So DeBoard went back to the drawing board and created what he referred to as “The Paper Record” He started with a prototype of a famous song by Frank Sinatra. The front of the card read “Thinking of You”, and the inside read “…and the way you look tonight”. Also inside the card was a “Liquid Clix” Quick Read (QR) Code, that when scanned, played the song “The Way You Look Tonight” by Frank Sinatra. And it was that invention, one which he filed his first patent, that naturally evolved Malemark into Liquid Spins in June of 2010 ^8 9 10 11

So he filed a Patent for Liquid Spins – particularly, “The process of distributing digital media using QR Codes printed on apparel and other merchandise”. DeBoard then printed a few dozen prototypes of t-shirts, paper records and a very clever temporary tattoo that allowed someone to wear their favorite song on their skin so others could scan them with a smart phone and get the song. He called these Liquid Skins. He worked directly with major record labels such as UMG, Capitol Record, Curb, Big Machine, Sony, Warner. Next he set up an office on Historic Music Row in Nashville, TN.

The local news was excited to have another innovative company in Colorado Springs¹²  Next, on August 2011, he launched Liquid Spins Records and signed Tim Rushlow as the label’s first artist.^{13 14 15 16}  November 29, 2011, he, via Liquid Spins Records, released the first single for Rushlow titled Unfinished Symphony¹⁷ 

At this point, the Board of Directors for Liquid Spins, Inc. had decided to take the company public¹⁸ and it was around that time that the company caught the eye of MAXSOUND CORPORATION, a public company with a unique audio technology. On December 2012, Liquid Spins was acquired by MAXSOUND^19 20

Before leaving Liquid Spins, Herman purchased the original assets of Malemark Greeting Cards back. He has since relaunched the greeting card company in January 2014 at www.malemark.com.

Following the sale of Liquid Spins, DeBoard founded The X Music Group in January 2012. He started by hiring The John Stewart as the audio engineer, who was made famous for remastering²¹ The Grey Album²² .

Continuing to grow XMG, DeBoard signed The World Famous Tony Williams, who is most noted for signing on multiple albums for Kanye West and Jayzee. Continuing the momentum, he signed Mickey Factz²³ and Coles Whalen²⁴ all to the XMG record label.

April 21st, Herman DeBoard was the 2013 Keynote Speaker at the root 40 music festival with Johnny 5 from The Flobots²⁵. On June 2013, DeBoard stepped down as CEO of The X Music Group and took a short sabbatical to determine what path to take next in his career.

Shortly thereafter, he was approached by the Board of Directors for Spherady, Inc., a technology company that was having difficulty launching due to internal issues and technology issues. They had been moving slowly for 3 years prior, and at that point had no revenue and no technology in the marketplace. DeBoard accepted the challenge and was given the position of CEO for Spherady. He began by battling through the turmoil that can sometimes exist in a startup that had not quite started. He utilized his connections, marketing skills, and business acumen to launch Spherady into a revenue producing private social network.  In less than one year, the company was soft-launched and producing revenue with notable clients from the NBA, NFL, Hollywood and more.

In 2015, DeBoard ended a 6 year journey by releasing his first novel, The Great Wall of Silence. The novel takes readers on a political thrill ride as a reporter uncovers a 600 year old plat by the descendants of Genghis Khan to once again rule the entire world. The novel is available for sale in all major bookstores under the pen name H.C. DeBoard including Amazon, iTunes, Barnes and Noble and many others.

Herman continued working as a consultant until late 2019, when he developed his latest concept called Huvr. Huvr develops technology that gives users virtual access to mobile locations and virtual events without them physically being there. They do this by using mobile devices, static cameras and unmanned aerial systems, or micro-drones. Herman believes his company will make huge impacts against ethnocentrism and poverty around the world. Huvr has aspirations of going public in the coming years.

Sources

1. http://www.immunize.org/nslt.d/n25/n25.pdf – Published in the CDC National Immunization Coalition Conference in Atlanta in 2001
2. Title: Giant 5 Funds built on basics: investment firm runs 23,000 mutual funds through performance filter., Author: Chryss Cada, Publication: ColoradoBiz, Magazine/Journal, Date: January 1, 2007, Publisher: Thomson Gale, Volume: 34 Issue: 1 Page: 13
3. Bloomberg Business Week .com
4. http://www.nbcnews.com/id/39218813/ns/business-press_releases/t/accredited-members-holding-corporation-announces-managed-fee-services-agreement-malemark-inc/
5. http://www.markhound.com/trademark/search/i09oNBANu
6. Article by PCMAG.com
   http://appscout.pcmag.com/none/269599-hallmark-meet-malemark
7. Sustainable Greeting Cards Movement
   http://asklof.com/turtledove/company_assessment_malemark.html
8. Naturally Evolved Malemark, Inc. into Liquid Spins, inc. in June 2010 – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liquid_Spins
9. http://www.prweb.com/releases/2012/6/prweb9613994.htm
10. www.liquidspins.com
11. http://google.brand.edgar-online.com/EFX_dll/EDGARpro.dll?FetchFilingHtmlSection1?SectionID=8367166-146556-156807&SessionID=R3WNFHPq9TIPX97
12. Sunday March 11, 2012, Colorado Springs Business Section for Liquid Spins, http://gazette.com/article/134858
13. August 29, 2011, former front man for Little Texas signs with Liquid Spins Records http://www.musicnewsnashville.com/tim-rushlow-signs-with-new-company-liquid-spins-records/
14. http://www.allaccess.com/christian/industry-snap/q/id/3713
15. http://www.musicrow.com/2011/08/inking-big-oshea-caitlin-rose-dean-alexander-tim-rushlow/
16. http://www.lawinsider.com/contracts/6YYt3myKDkoq0UnQ1PXklj/liquid-spins-inc/0/2011-11-10
17. http://www.musicnewsnashville.com/liquid-spins-artist-tim-rushlow-releases-unfinished-symphony-today
18. http://www.nasdaq.com/markets/ipos/filing.ashx?filingid=7993272
19. http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/online-music-retailer-liquid-spins-to-be-acquired-by-max-sound-173290221.html
20. www.maxsound.com, ticker MAXD, http://finance.yahoo.com/q?s=MAXD, http://www.getfilings.com/sec-filings/121009/Max-Sound-Corp_8-K/f8k100212ex99i_maxsound.htm
21. http://www.forbes.com/sites/leorgalil/2012/11/28/the-story-behind-the-newly-remastered-version-of-the-grey-album/
22. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Grey_Album
23. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mickey_Factz
24. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coles_whalen
25. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Flobots