CRM Scammer Profile: Paul Johnston, Entellium CEO

The future was looking bright for Entellium as revenues continued to show dramatic increases from year to year. Millions of dollars in investment money was already secured and business appeared to be booming. Entellium, a provider of CRM software for a number of small and medium-sized businesses, was on track to take on the bigger CRM Software giants such as Netsuite and Salesforce.com in the competitive CRM software market.

The company’s fortunes took an abrupt turn as the truth behind Entellium was uncovered. Everything came to a sudden end as the CEO and CFO of Entellium abruptly resigned as the secrets these two executives were keeping were revealed.

Paul Johnston appeared to be a respectable hard-working man. He had previously worked for Apple and had started Entellium in 2000 in Malaysia. He has two sons and a wife whom he had met in Asia. As the company grew, he was able to eventually move Entellium headquarters back to the United States. The company was doing well and the number of employees at Entellium continued to increase. He even took the opportunity to secure funding from a number of VCs to help fund his rapidly growing company.

However, things took a rapid turn for the worse as the truth behind Paul Johnston and Entellium was uncovered. Apparently, Paul Johnston tricked VCs into investing in Entellium with a number of false financial statements that overestimated revenue by millions. Although much of this money appears to have gone into the business, it was also noted that Paul Johnston used company funds and credit cards to fund family vacations all over the world. In addition, he provided himself with a number of six digit bonuses and personal loans that were all taken out of the company money. Now authorities are trying to track over 9 million dollars that was wired to the company office in Malaysia. However, the presence of an office in Malaysia is now being questioned as well.

Johnston’s fraudulent activities also were uncovered outside his business. Over the years, he had accumulated numerous material items due to the comfortable salary he paid himself. He had a million dollar home, drove a porsche and made over 1 million dollars in his time as Entellium CEO. Yet, with all this, he still reported fewer assets than a homeless person living on the street.

The many employees who relied on him were let down as they abruptly lost their jobs. Also, his family will lose a father and husband as well. as he is now facing 20 years behind bars as well as a substantial fine for wire fraud.

For more information on this previously unknown, but now infamous CRM Software CEO, you can find articles about him here and here.

Tags: crm, CRM Scammer, Entellium CEO, Entellium Software, Infamous CEO, Paul Johnston, Wire Fraud