"PerfectWave was founded in June 2002. Like other companies started by Wilkes, it is headquartered in ADCS's offices in Poway. Wilkes is president of the company, and Gelwix is vice president and chief operating officer.
PerfectWave's main product, based on technology developed at the Scripps Research Institute, is a system that can filter extraneous sounds out of a telephone or radio communication. Its backers say the system is particularly useful in a battlefield situation, blocking explosive background noises from interfering with conversation.
According to attorney Pat Shea, a former San Diego mayoral candidate who served as PerfectWave's outside counsel in 2002 and 2003, the company spent the first year of its existence engaged in patent disputes with other firms and engineers who received rights to similar technologies developed by Scripps Research Institute.
Shea said the disputes were resolved in late 2003. Within months, PerfectWave won a Navy contract to improve voice communications and speech recognition. The Navy was unable to provide details of the contract yesterday.
Even before PerfectWave's patent disputes were resolved, it was donating money to key politicians in Washington.
On Sept. 20, 2002, three months after the company was founded, it donated $15,000 to Delay's Texas PAC. By the end of 2003, Max and Ellen Gelwix made more than $50,000 in political contributions, mostly to key Republican officials in the House leadership or the House Appropriations Committee.
Among other contributions, the Gelwixes donated $10,000 to DeLay's Americans for a Republican Majority PAC; $11,000 to Future Leaders PAC, headed by Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Redlands, who chairs the House Appropriations Committee; $10,000 to Rely on Your Beliefs PAC, headed by acting House Majority Leader Roy Blunt of Missouri; and $10,000 to Superior California Federal Leadership Fund, headed by Rep. John Doolittle, R-Granite Bay, who is on the Appropriations Committee.
The same month that Wilkes launched PerfectWave, he hired Alexander Strategy Group – composed of DeLay insiders – as his lobbying group on Capitol Hill."
at least they have a product.
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