Our Team

Russ Patridge, Principal
Russ Patridge is a principal of Ridge Communications, Inc. as well as a 35-year veteran of the telecommunications industry. Since 1986, he has held senior management positions, deploying and operating networks in domestic and international environments. Russ' experience managing network deployments and operations is twofold. He gained valuable insight into the operations of traditional carriers and then went on to form his own consulting start up organization. This rare combination of long-term experience and knowledge of available industry resources has enabled Ridge Communications, Inc. to "partner" with clients to provide a unique grouping of services in the most effective and efficient manner possible. Russ holds a MBA from the University of Illinois.


Mike Patridge, Principal
Even prior to acquiring his Electrical Engineering degree at Ohio State University, Mike gained valuable wireless telecom experience during the summers as a Field Engineer in Argentina and RF Engineer working for Ameritech in Columbus, Ohio.   After graduation, Mike was employed by GTE (now Verizon) as a Radio Frequency (RF) Engineer before moving on to start-up company Alpine Cellular as the RF Director.  Mike then transitioned to another start-up company, Tacit Communications, where he continued to manage RF while also performing Project Management as well as Site and Infrastructure deployment.  In 2002, Mike was one of two Principles to start Ridge Communications.


Steve Weingardt, General Manager, Southern California
Steve began his 45 year career in telecommunications in 1975 as a cable tv installer for Times Mirror Cable in Long Beach CA.  Between 1975 and 2000 Steve’s career in the cable television industry progressed to technician, construction supervisor, construction manager, project manager, and general manager, with stops throughout California at Sonic Cablevision, Group W Cable, Century Cable¸ Falcon Cable, and Comcast. 
 
In 2001, Steve started managing cellular and DAS projects for Worldbridge Broadband, Cable Engineering Services, , and Crown Castle.  Steve retired from Crown Castle in 2015 and joined us at Ridge Communications, opening Ridge’s Southern CA office.  Steve now manages Ridge’s outside plant and ODAS engineering and construction services throughout California.

Wes Rigsby, General Manager Southeast
Wes began his career as an installer of telecommunications equipment for GTE in Florida.  From there he moved in to Operations Supervision of Microwave Networks.  Later as fiber optics began to replace microwave, Wes followed the technology to fiber optics network design.  GTE then took advantage of his expertise in both Operations and Engineering and Wes became an Account Manager working with Interexchange carriers and Fortune 500 Companies.  In 2001, Wes retired from Verizon (GTE was merged into Verizon) but then began working for Ridge Communications where be eventually became the General Manager responsible for the South East Engineering and Installation.