Board of Directors
| Nancy Buese | Seán Sebastian | Erik Straser | Dan Verser |
| Ross Pillari | Martin Lagod | Paul Batcheller | |
| Charles Shaver | Ullas Naik | Jim Imbler |
Nancy Buese | Independent Board Member, Audit Chair
Nancy brings 20 years of financial leadership to the ZeaChem Board. She currently serves as senior vice president and chief financial officer of Denver-based MarkWest Energy Partners L.P. (NYSE: MWE), a leading provider of midstream services in the natural gas industry. Previously she was the chief financial officer for Experimental and Applied Sciences (EAS), a nutrition products manufacturer and distributor. At TransMontaigne Inc., Nancy was vice president, overseeing financial and operations accounting. Prior to these appointments she was a partner at Ernst & Young LLP, and worked in the firm’s Denver, London, New York and Washington, D.C., offices over a 10 year period.
Currently, Nancy serves as a Board Member and Audit Committee Chair to UMB Financial Corp.
Nancy is a graduate of University of Kansas, where she earned a B.S. in Accounting and Business Administration. She is also a Certified Public Accountant (CPA).
Ross Pillari | Independent Board Member
Ross has 35 years of experience with Standard Oil of Ohio and BP in the United States, Europe and Australia. From 2001 to 2006, he served as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of BP America., and as Region Head & Group Vice President, BP plc., the senior executive for BP in the Western Hemisphere. Previous positions include Group Vice President, Global Marketing, from 1997 to 2001, where he was accountable for retail, commercial/industrial, and convenience store marketing and operations in the U.S., Europe, South Africa and Australasia. Previous positions included Chief of Staff for Group Research & Engineering, BP plc, and Chairman of the Netherlands Refining Co., a BP/Texaco joint venture in the Netherlands.
Since 2008, Ross has been an advisory board member on energy and utilities related projects to CVC Capital Partners, Inc, a leading global private equity and investment advisory with offices in 20 cities around the world. In addition, he is Chairman of the Finance Advisory Board for School District 203 in Naperville, Illinois and is a member of the Case Western Reserve International Affairs Visiting Committee.
Ross graduated with a B.A. in Economics from Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio and is a graduate of the Stanford Executive Program.
Charles "Charlie" Shaver | Independent Board Member
Charlie has three decades of experience in the chemicals industry, most recently serving as president of The TPC Group, Inc. (TPCG) from 2004 until April, 2011. As a leading privately held olefins producer, major products included butadiene, isobubtylene, and gasoline blendstocks sold directly on a global basis. Prior to joining TPCG, he was Vice President and General Manager at Gentek/General Chemical Inc., responsible for managing all chemical operations. As vice president and general manager of performance products at Arch Chemicals, Inc., he oversaw all company operations. He also served as president and chief operating officer of Molten Metal Technology, Inc. Charlie began his career with Dow Chemical, serving over 16 years in a series of diverse operational and business roles. His last role was that of Director of Manufacturing, Engineering and Technology for the Epoxy and Intermediates global business unit within the company.
Charlie is currently on the boards of directors for US Silica and EP Minerals. He is also a board member to the Texas A&M University College of Engineering advisory council. In addition, Charlie currently serves as an Operating Partner for Golden Gate Capital, a private equity group in San Francisco.
Charlie is a graduate of Texas A&M University, where he earned a B.S. in Chemical Engineering.
Seán Sebastian | Birchmere Ventures
Seán Sebastian is Birchmere's founding partner, establishing its first fund in 1996. During his 16 years of active venture capital investing, Birchmere has made multiple successful investments resulting in IPOs and M&A exits, most notably Cvent, Renal Solutions, Plextronics, FreeMarkets, Neolinear, Safeguard Interactive, and Knova Software. Seán is actively involved in the development and growth of numerous companies, also serving as a past or current director of CyOptics, Lightningcast, LogicLibrary, MediaSite, and Precision Therapeutics.
Seán has over 25 years experience in technology commercialization, management consulting, systems integration, and financial services. Prior to founding Birchmere, he directed advanced technology commercialization activities at General Electric Information Services. At American Management Systems, he consulted on applied artificial intelligence systems for various public and private sector clients. Seán also served on active duty in the U.S. Air Force.
Seán is past President of the Pittsburgh Venture Capital Association and served on the Pittsburgh Technology Council's executive committee. He is a frequent guest lecturer on entrepreneurship and venture capital at Carnegie Mellon University and University of Pittsburgh. He holds a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and an MBA from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
Martin Lagod | Firelake Capital
Marty is a managing director and co-founder of Firelake Capital Management LLC. From 1997 to 2001, Marty worked in the energy technology sector. He was the co-founder and CEO of Solo Energy Corporation, a start up energy technology company based in Alameda California. Solo Energy developed microturbine and clean combustion reciprocating engines for the distributed power market.
For the previous 19 years, he was an intellectual property attorney based in Silicon Valley. He was a partner in the Palo Alto office of Phoenix based Brown and Bain until 1995 and at Cooley Godward LLP in Palo Alto from 1995 to 2001. In his law practice, he represented companies ranging in size from new start ups to Fortune 100 sized public companies and addressed a wide variety of technologies including gas turbines, photovoltaics, semiconductors, wireless systems, telecommunications, software medical devices, and new materials.
Marty holds a B.A. in Economics (with Honors) from the University of North Carolina (Chapel Hill) and a J.D. from Vanderbilt University. He serves on the Advisory Board for the Center for Sustainable Enterprise at the Kenan Flagler Business School at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill. He also serves on a Stakeholder Board for Genencor, Inc. responsible for reviewing the Company's Annual Sustainability Report.
Ullas Naik | Globespan Capital Partners
Ullas is a Managing Director based in Globespan Capital Partners' Palo Alto office. He leads Globespan's Cleantech investment practice and also focuses on investments in Internet/Enterprise Infrastructure companies. Ullas is passionate about identifying future technology trends and partnering with entrepreneurs to build significant sustainable value within those trends. His experience as an entrepreneur and as an investor has taught him that working with strong teams and adapting intelligently to change is the only way to create and sustain long term business value.
Prior to Globespan, Ullas served as Managing Director of JAFCO Ventures in the Boston office. Before that, he served as a Senior Vice President in the Technology Research Group at First Albany, where he was named a "Wall Street All-Star" by Fortune Magazine and recognized by The Wall Street Journal as one of the top technology analysts in the country.
At First Albany, he led the public financings of companies, including IDT Corp. (IDTC), Critical Path (CPTH), Forrester Research (FORR), Mainspring (MSPR, then acquired by IBM), NaviSite (NAVI), and USWeb (USWB, then acquired by MarchFirst). While at First Albany, Ullas was an active angel investor in leading technology companies, including Arbinet (ARBX), Critical Path (CPTH), Ecora, InterTrust (ITRU), iRobot (IRBT) and others. Prior to First Albany, Ullas started his career as an entrepreneur as the founder and operator of a specialty chemicals trading company in India.
Erik Straser | Mohr, Davidow Ventures
Erik is a General Partner at MDV, where he leads investments in energy. Prior to MDV Erik worked at Interval Research Corp., a technology incubator funded by Paul Allen, and at Los Alamos National Laboratory as a technical staff member. While pursuing a PhD in mechanical engineering at Stanford, Erik led an interdisciplinary project between the electrical, mechanical, and civil engineering departments to develop a next-generation monitoring system for critical facilities. He holds a U.S. patent from his research work. From 1996 to 1998, he served as president of the Business Association of Stanford Engineering Students (BASES), Stanford's largest student group focused on entrepreneurship and technology management.
Erik serves on the advisory council of the Stanford Precourt Institute for Energy Efficiency, as well as on the advisory boards of the Stanford Technology Ventures Program (STVP), NVCA Cleantech Council, and Cleantech Venture Network. He is a winner of the 2006 World Technology Award for Finance, presented by the World Technology Network, in association with the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), Dow Chemical, Cisco, TIME magazine, Fortune magazine, Science magazine/AAAS, Red Herrring, and CNN.
Erik earned a bachelor's degree in engineering from Harvey Mudd College and both doctoral and master's degrees from the Stanford University School of Engineering.
Paul Batcheller | PrairieGold Venture Partners
Paul Batcheller is a Partner at PrairieGold Venture Partners where he oversees all aspects of the firm's investment activities, from sourcing, structuring and negotiating investments to serving as a board member for portfolio companies. He currently serves on the boards of iCentera, Game Plan Technologies and Augusta Systems. Prior to joining PrairieGold, Paul served as an advisor to Senator Tom Daschle, where he worked on economic policy, science and technology issues. He received his B.A. in economics from Macalester College.
Jim Imbler | President & CEO, ZeaChem Inc.
Jim is an accomplished senior executive with experience in directing multi-billion dollar energy, petroleum, refining, chemical, and trading operations. In addition, he is an entrepreneur who has led new businesses in startups focused on commodities, business services, and software. Jim has been President and CEO of FuelSpot, a venture-backed Internet trading platform for fuels; Fuels Management, a coal upgrading business; and CEO Equity, a leveraged buyout firm. Jim was also SVP of Business Development for Evergreen Energy, a publicly-traded company with technology for upgrading coal. Prior to these assignments, Jim was President of the Koch Petroleum Group, where he was responsible for the refining, pipeline, energy and petroleum, asphalt, and trading businesses. He started his career with FMC, where he held a variety of engineering and management positions. Jim holds a BS in Chemical Engineering and an MBA, both from the University of Kansas.
Dan Verser | EVP, R&D, Founder, ZeaChem Inc.
Dan is an experienced venture manager with deep industry experience in product development in the chemicals and biotechnology sectors. He is co-inventor of the ZeaChem technology. Prior to ZeaChem, he identified and evaluated venture investments for Koch Industries. Prior to that, he was President of Chronopol, Inc., a unit of Coors Brewing Company, where he started up and ran a new polymer materials business based on polylactic acid, a renewable-derived, biodegradable polymer. Before Coors, he was a project manager with Bechtel, where he was responsible for international technology transfer and process design for a major project-financed agribusiness & biotechnology project. Before Bechtel, he was President & CEO of Engenics, a startup bioprocess development company, and held a succession of executive leadership positions at Gould, Inc. Dan has numerous patents, a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Princeton, and an MBA with High Distinction from Harvard Business School.
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