MESA P2E Conference

Speaker Biographies

Keynote Speaker: Peter Williams
CTO, Big Green Innovations - IBM

Dr Peter Williams is the CTO for IBM's Big Green Innovations unit, whose role is to identify environmentally focused businesses for IBM to either develop or participate in - he is personally responsible for assembling, maintaining and developing the portfolio of businesses included. By background, Dr Williams is a management consultant with well over 20 years experience of bringing technology and business issues together to develop novel solutions and business models. A native of the UK, he has lived in the USA since 1999, and is married with three children. His PhD was awarded by the School of Management at the University of Bath, England, in 1986.

Keynote Speaker: Jan Baan
Executive Chairman & CEO - Cordys; Founder - The Baan Company

Jan Baan, Executive Chairman and CEO of Cordys, has more than 30 years of entrepreneurial and business leadership experience in the software industry. Internationally recognized for his key role in the development of the worldwide enterprise software market, he is a self-made serial entrepreneur. Part of Mr. Baan’s early career was spent as a CFO of a medium sized company, and it was during this time that the idea for the Baan company innovations first took root. As a result, Mr. Baan founded The Baan Company in 1978. In the late 1990s, Mr Baan was as equally successful as a Venture Capitalist focusing on software innovation, particularly in Internet technologies.

Dr. Raj Agnihotri
Yokogawa Corp of America

Dr. Raj Agnihotri is a senior business and technical leader with over 30 years experience in process simulation, design and optimization, process control, process operations, process automation, and IT. He has led organizations and projects, held senior technical positions in Texaco and Honeywell, led the development of refinery technologies in ABB, was Sr. Vice President for CIM/IS and CIO for Reliance Industries and Reliance Petroleum, and most recently North America GM (Operations) for Yokogawa Corp of America. He also led a startup, ProcessBiz, for building product and services for the petroleum and process industries. He is an expert consultant in improving profits and productivity through automation in refineries, chemical plants, and petroleum fuel marketing. Currently he is the SME consultant for building the next generation IT architecture for Chevron Global Manufacturing. He has a Bachelor of Technology from the Indian Institute of Technology, a Masters from the University of California, and a Ph.D. from the University of Houston, all degrees being in Chemical Engineering.

Reed Baker
Vice President, Advantage Industrial Automation

Reed Baker is Vice President and a Principal of Advantage Industrial Automation based in Atlanta, GA, founded in 1989. Advantage Industrial Automation provides solutions by adding value to the leading products in factory automation and control utilizing the manufacturers they represent. They help their customers increase overall equipment effectiveness (OEE) by improving productivity and quality, reducing downtime and waste, and increasing efficiency and safety.

Ioan Batran
Director of Engineering – Controls & Electricity, Coca-Cola Enterprises

Ioan Batran, P.E. holds a B.S. and M.S. in Electronics. He joined Coca - Cola Enterprises in 1995 and is currently Director of Engineering, Controls and Electricity. He developed the Controls and Electricity Standards for CCE and since 2003 he has been instrumental in the development and implementation of a Line Information System which is now implemented in twenty-two plants across USA and Canada.

Dennis Brandl
Chief Consultant, BR&L Consulting

Dennis Brandl is the founder and chief consultant for BR&L Consulting, specializing in Manufacturing IT applications, including Business-to-Manufacturing Integration, MES solutions, General and Site Recipe implementations, and automation system security. He has been involved in automation system design and implementation in a wide range of applications over the past 25 years. Mr. Brandl has written numerous papers and articles on business to manufacturing integration and flexible manufacturing solutions, has a regular column in Control Engineering, and has authored the book “Design Patterns for Flexible Manufacturing”, available through ISA.

Mike Brooks
Venture Executive, Chevron Technology Ventures

Mike Brooks is a Venture Executive at Chevron Technology Ventures, looking to invest in early-stage companies with technologies applicable to Chevron Corporation. Previously, he led Chevron Global Refining activities to develop the IT architecture for supporting operational activities of refineries and their supply-chain interactions. He was previously EVP and co-founder of INDX Software, where he led development and marketing of a successful model-based integration product. Mr. Brooks’ 25+ years in “process” range from chemical plant operations management, refinery planning and scheduling, instrumentation and control projects, advanced control applications, plus development of Control Systems, Process Information Management Systems, and Graphical User Interface products.

Sreenivasa Chakravarti
Automotive Lead – Manufacturing Center of Excellence, Tata Consultancy Services Ltd.

Sreenivasa Chakravarti is the Automotive Lead Consultant in the Manufacturing CoE, a part of the Manufacturing Industry Solutions Unit of TCSL. He is responsible for driving business perspective in TCSL relationships with global automotive clients, mentoring large transformation programs & domain consulting projects, and developing contemporary industry solutions.
Mr. Chakravarti has over 16 years of experience, including eight years of cross-functional experience in the automotive industry and the balance as a consultant, six years of which have been with TCS. Apart from a Bachelor of Technology degree, Mr. Chakrayarti holds a Management degree from the prestigious IIM (Indian Institute of Management).

Chris Damsgard
Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence Solutions Manager, General Mills

Chris Damsgard has invested 10 years with General Mills in roles that span R&D, Quality & Regulatory, and Engineering. In his current role within Controls & Information Systems Engineering, Mr. Damsgard is both designing and managing the launch of new EMI solutions across General Mills to provide the supply chain with wide visibility into 100+ data stores from standard toolset. This has involved not only the strategy for portals, reports, and dashboards, but also the architecture of a unified data model and underlying system expertise – a role that has brought him deep into the world of IS.

Robert DiStefano
President and CEO, Management Resource Group, Inc.

Robert DiStefano is President and CEO of Management Resources Group, Inc., MRG, an engineering and business consulting firm founded in 1987 and dedicated to the increase in clients’ profit through the deployment of innovative reliability and asset management strategies. An accomplished executive manager with over 30 years of professional engineering, maintenance, reliability, management and consulting experience, specializing in translating technical and engineering tactics into strategic corporate financial terms, and advising and coaching senior managers in innovation, deployment and measurement of strategic physical asset management initiatives that transform company culture and financial performance.

Marlene Eeg
President, Tempo Resources Inc.

Marlene Eeg, founder of Tempo Resources Inc., is a manufacturing industry consultant helping clients identify and solve business issues involving ERP, PLM, MES, Quality and Shop Floor Automation. Previous employers included BDO Seidman, LLC, Rockwell Automation, Northwest Analytical, and Siemens. Previous positions included Food & Beverage Industry Leader, and currently guiding other regulatory industries with solutions for process improvement to support Lean and SixSigma. She is an active member in MESA, Society of America (ISA), Society of Manufacturing Engineers (SME) and others, where she participates in industry events as speaker and industry associate. She is a mentor for women in business.

Dean Forrester
Assistant Vice President, SAIC

Dean Forrester is senior technical architect with Science Applications International corporation (SAIC). He has 13 years of experience with Oil and Gas companies including EDS, Halliburton, and SAIC in the design and implementation of IT systems, including major “next generation oil field” programs. He earned degrees in Physics and Instrumentation, Systems Analysis, and Design, and a Masters in Business Administration from Napier University.

Julie Fraser
Principal Industry Analyst, Cambashi Inc.

Julie Fraser has over 20 years experience as a manufacturing systems industry advisor, marketer, speaker and consultant. She leads US operations for Cambashi, providing independent research and analysis on the business reasons to use IT. Prior to joining Cambashi, she ran Industry Directions, an analyst firm focused on enterprise, supply chain and plant floor applications. Previously, she was VP Marketing for Baan Supply Chain Solutions, Senior Analyst on Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) and Integration at AMR, and editor-in-chief of the CIM Strategies newsletter. She is an active member of MESA International, and a member of APICS and Phi Beta Kappa.

Charlie Gifford
Chief Manufacturing Consultant, 21st Century Manufacturing Solutions LLC

For the past 25 years, Charlie Gifford has developed advanced manufacturing systems in a wide variety of industries: aerospace, electronics, automotive, food & beverage, telecommunications energy, and life sciences. He is a nationally recognized expert in combining Lean Manufacturing practices with Production Management Systems. His background includes hands-on design, design supervision and team leadership in Production Transformation. As an industry leader in professional organizations such as ISA, Supply Chain Council and MESA International, he has contributed to and taught many manufacturing operations standards, such as ISA-88, ISA-95, Next Gen MESA and SCOR models. He has published over 35 papers on the subject of production management best practices. Most recently as Chairman of the ISA-95 Best Practices Working Group, he was the Chief Editor and Contributing Author for the book, Hitchhikers Guide to Manufacturing Operations Management: ISA-95 Best Practices Book 1.0. As well, he was awarded the 2007 MESA International Outstanding Contributor Award.

Greg Gorbach
Vice President, ARC Advisory Group

As ARC’s Vice President of Collaborative Manufacturing, Greg Gorbach is an acknowledged industry leader in Collaborative Manufacturing, Operations Management, and MES. He provides clients in a number of manufacturing vertical markets, including Medical Device, Aerospace, Automotive, High-Tech, Life Sciences, and CPG, with strategic advice in dealing with boundary-crossing business processes. Mr. Gorbach’s primary areas of focus are Collaborative Manufacturing, Operations Management, MES, Plant Information Visibility, Business Process Management, and the synchronization of plant systems with CRM, ERP, PLM, Supply Chain and other business systems. Just prior to joining ARC, Mr. Gorbach was a Product Manager at an MES software company. He brings over 20 years of hands-on experience to ARC, with direct experience within manufacturing organizations, as well as extensive experience with suppliers to manufacturers.

Dr. Michael Grieves
Director – PLM Institute, Oakland University

Dr. Michael Grieves is a world renowned authority on Product Lifecycle Management (PLM). He has written and lectured extensively on the topic. Dr. Grieves’ works include the seminal work on PLM, Product Lifecycle Management: Driving the Next Generation of Lean Thinking (McGraw-Hill, 2006). Dr. Grieves has over 30 years of executive experience in public and private companies. Dr. Grieves is a Director of the Purdue University PLM Center of Excellence and co-founded the PLM Development Consortium at the University of Michigan. Dr. Grieves has a B.S.C.E. from Michigan State University, an MBA from Oakland University and a doctorate from the Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve University.

George Jurkovich
Senior Vice President of Operations, Bay Valley Foods, LLC

George Jurkovich is senior vice president of operations for Bay Valley Foods, a $1.5 billion food producer of private label foods. He is responsible for the manufacturing, contract manufacturing, supply chain, R&D, agriculture, and quality assurance of the company. His expertise ranges from strategic operations consolidation, supply chain simplification, and strategic negotiations to continuous improvement via various measurement methodologies and tactical goal setting. For more than 25 years, Mr. Jurkovich has worked in the consumer packaged goods manufacturing industry and has previously held positions with H.J. Heinz Co., Heinz North America, Foodways National Division, Ore Ida Foods Division, and Perrigo Company, among others.

Steven Kaplan
Global MES Administrator, Murata Power Solutions

Steve Kaplan has been with MPS for 32 years, holding various manufacturing positions. As the Global MES Administrator, he is responsible for the design, development, implementation and daily activities of all MES operations in multiple manufacturing facilities. A key to the success of MES at MPS is understanding what metrics to measure and presenting them in a useful format. Mr. Kaplan holds degrees in both Electronic Engineering and Computer Science from Wentworth College in Boston.

Steven Kaylor
VP Operations, Sechan Electronics, Inc.

Steven Kaylor has over 25 years experience in the design of manufacturing systems. His formal education includes a bachelor’s degree in physics from Millersville University with continuing studies in manufacturing in-process control systems, program management, lean manufacturing, theory of constraints, and six-sigma. Product areas include the manufacturing of precision munitions, integrated circuit fabrication equipment, and high reliability communications components. He has been responsible for the implementation of manufacturing systems allowing a less than one part per million defect escape rate, and lean, high velocity processes.

Fayez Kharbat
Engineering Specialist, Saudi Aramco

Fayez Kharbat has over 18 years of experience in the Automation and Control industry. Fayez's area of expertise covers enterprise integrated solutions, advanced process control, and process automation systems. He is the chair of the Manufacturing Enterprise Solutions Association (MESA) Continuous Process Industry Special Interest Group and the MESA Middle East Working Group. He has a bachelor degree in Electrical Engineering from Texas A&M University. Mr. Kharbat has worked for Honeywell International as a technical consultant and for Aspen Technology as a senior engineer prior to joining Saudi Aramco. Presently, he is an engineering specialist at the Process & Control Systems Department / Process Control division.

Tom Knight
Founder & Chief Strategy Officer, Invistics

Tom Knight is the founder of Invistics. Invistics provides solutions to help high-mix manufacturing companies implement lean manufacturing. As Chief Strategy Officer, Mr. Knight guides the company's strategy, organization and operations, and serves as a member of the Board of Directors. Prior to founding Invistics in 1999, Mr. Knight spent 10 years improving supply chains as a manufacturing executive at Alcoa and Siemens, and received three degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). Mr. Knight has authored numerous articles on improving manufacturing performance and serves on the National Science Foundation’s Small Business Innovation Research Advisory Committee.

Chetan S. Makam
Director, Office of Business Process Excellence, Haemonetics

As Director of the Office of Business Process Excellence at Haemonetics Corporation, Chetan Makam evaluates and improves business processes to accelerate sustainable growth and forges strategic partnerships with customers through value-added solutions. He builds and deploys customized Six Sigma, Lean, Process Consulting, Marketing and Sales Training programs to strengthen customers’ businesses and has realized savings in the tens of millions of dollars for his customers. Mr. Makam’s professional expertise spans industries; namely performance chemicals, building materials, ITO consulting, medical devices, blood banks and business areas such as research/product development, manufacturing/operations, technical sales, product management, strategic marketing and strategy development.

Dr. Karl B. Manrodt
Associate Professor in the Department of Management, Marketing & Logistics – Georgia Southern University

Dr. Karl B. Manrodt is an Associate Professor in the Department of Management, Marketing & Logistics at Georgia Southern University. Research interests revolve around the role of information in logistics systems, performance measurement and technology. In addition to serving as the editor of the Journal of Transportation Management, his publications have appeared in such journals as the Supply Chain Management Review, Transportation Journal, the International Journal of Physical Distribution and Materials Management, Interfaces, and the Journal of Business Logistics. His research on top shippers has appeared in Logistics Management for the last 16 years.

Michael McClellan
Principal, Collaboration Synergies Inc.

Michael McClellan has over 30 years of experience serving and managing manufacturing enterprises. He has held a number of positions in general management, marketing, and engineering, including President and CEO for companies supplying capital equipment and material management systems. In addition to numerous articles and whitepapers on manufacturing systems, he has written two books, Applying Manufacturing Execution Systems, which defines and explains manufacturing execution systems and Collaborative Manufacturing: Using Real-time Information to Support the Supply Chain, the first definitive examination of collaborative manufacturing concepts. He is also a major contributor to a new book on business process management titled, In Search of BPM Excellence. Mr. McClellan served over six years on the MESA Board of Directors.

Greg Millinger
Workflow/SOA Manager, GE Fanuc Intelligent Platforms

Greg Millinger is the Workflow / SOA manager for GE Fanuc Production Management Software. He has 20+ years of experience in Production Management and has led more than 40 installations in industries ranging from discrete to process. Prior to joining GE, Mr. Millinger was director of engineering at Activplant. He was also a manufacturing solutions consultant at Deloitte, Vice President of a control systems integration firm and plant manager. Mr. Millinger holds a B.S. in Computer Science and began his career in the U.S. Navy, serving in locations around the world.

Sharad Nigam
Associate Consultant – Manufacturing Center of Excellence, Tata Consultancy Services Limited

Sharad Nigam, a consultant with over 12 years of experience works in the Manufacturing CoE of Tata Consultancy Services. A graduate in Production Engineering, he has been working in areas such as Total Industrial Engineering, New Product Introduction, Quality management System, Operational Excellence, and Business Process Consulting. He has worked as a Quality Head at Samtel, Six Sigma Black Belt at GE Capital and Planning Engineer at Denso. As a Manufacturing Business Consultant, he has done several breakthrough projects in Discrete Manufacturing Industry domain across the globe, and currently is leading the Next Generation Quality Management System initiative at Cummins Inc.

David Noller
Manufacturing Solutions Development, IBM

Dave Noller has 25 years experience in developing software for applications in manufacturing and enterprise integration. During his career, he has worked on manufacturing systems within IBM, and with customers in both Pharmaceutical and Automotive manufacturing. As the architect, he has designed and implemented Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) for IBM, and middleware aimed at enterprise application integration. Mr. Noller is a member of APICS where he is CPIM certified and is a member of the MESA Technical Committee. Mr. Noller has a Bachelor of Science degree in Engineering Mathematics and Computer Systems from the University of Central Florida and a Master of Science in Industrial Engineering from Purdue University.

Randy Okubo
Technical Manager, 3M IT Supply Chain Solution Center

Randy Okubo is a Technical Manager with the Process Integration Team within 3M’s IT Supply Chain Solution Center. This team provides integration between process control systems from Engineering and Corporate IT applications – and helps to define standards and best practices in this area. Mr. Okubo’s 27 year career with 3M has included positions ranging from product development, process engineering and process technology to Corporate IT. He has more than 20 years of experience in plant floor systems and has been in IT for the past 12 years. Mr. Okubo holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from Caltech.

Anil Parasharami
DY General Manager, TATA Motors

During his last 29 years with Tata Motors, Anil Parasharami has worked in various functions such as Manufacturing, Vehicle Assembly and Foundry. He has had a unique opportunity to have hands-on training in reputed Automobile companies in Japan for two years. Driving KAIZEN, the Lean Manufacturing initiative in TATA Motors, he has gained experience from more than 900 cross functional team based exercises in a wide range of manufacturing disciplines relating to Truck and Car operations. He has also shared this information with Tata Motors channel partners dealers and vendors across the country. He has presented case studies at various forums nationally and internationally.

John Phillips
Director – Standards Integration, Cummins Inc.

John Phillips is the Director of Standards Integration for Cummins Inc. in Corporate Quality. His responsibilities include improvement and support of the Cummins Operating System (COS), integrating standards to support COS, and process assessment and improvement. Mr. Phillips has been with Cummins for 11 years. Prior to that, he worked for a Japanese electronics manufacturer in production, quality management and quality systems as well as for an importer, spending a year in Thailand as an export manager. Mr. Phillips has achieved Quality Manager and Quality Engineer certification with ASQ and has a Bachelors Degree in Industrial Management from Clemson University.

John Rassieur
Systems (GIO/MES) Horizontal Leader, Global Business Services, Globally Integrated Operations/Manufacturing Execution, IBM

John Rassieur is an Associate Partner and leader for Globally Integrated Operations (GIO)/ Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) horizontal within IBM Global Business Services. He has over 30 years of industry experience leveraging technology to enable manufacturing transformation that focuses on improving operating asset performance management and associated supply chain optimization solutions. He has developed and implemented enterprise supply chain and manufacturing productivity improvement strategies for various industrial verticals. Mr. Rassieur has led diverse IBM teams focused on supply chain and manufacturing productivity. He has held various leadership positions in industry and consulting, providing a unique insight on supply chain and manufacturing operations issues, often global in scope.

Jan Snoeij
Principal Consultant, Logica

Jan Snoeij was active in assisting companies to improve their production and business performances by making use of information systems (CIM - Computer Integrated Manufacturing) and of robotics (FPA - Flexible Production Automation) in the 1980s. He has a broad experience in many different industry segments, including textiles, clothing, metals, steel, automotive, electronics, food and pharmaceuticals. Since 1999 Mr. Snoeij has been a principal member of the consultancy team of Logica's MES Centre of Excellence. Currently, Mr. Snoeij is a member at large of the MESA International Board, chair of the MESA Europe Board and chair of the EMEA Expansion Committee. He has recently published the ninth report of the "MES Product Survey".

Mark Sutcliffe
General Manager, CDC Software’s CDC Factory

Mark Sutcliffe graduated from business school in economics and consumer behavior. His career started in advertising at Saatchi and Saatchi, moving to Nestle, and then becoming a founding member of Mercia Software, which became a “Top 100” software company. He founded MVI Technology in 1991, basing a unique packaged consulting model for food corporations around the principles of the Toyota Production System. MVI was acquired by CDC Software in 2006 and re-launched in 2007 as CDC Factory. As head of the CDC Factory division, he continues to drive strategy and the boundaries of productivity for food production and consumer products companies.

Peter Skarzynski
Managing Director and Founder, Strategos

Peter Skarzynski is a Managing Director and a founder of Strategos, a strategy-consulting firm focused on helping companies grow. As a practitioner, Mr. Skarzynski has helped senior managers set strategic direction, chart new revenue opportunity and build innovation capability. His experience cuts across industries and includes manufacturing, retail, consumer products, and technology companies. His primary focus has been to help client organization renew their core business through competence leverage and break-through business concept innovation. Additionally, Mr. Skarzynski's writings on innovation are widely published across periodicals, and recently he co-authored the book, Innovation to the Core (HBSP, 2008).

John Theron
Vice President of Product Management – Incuity, a Rockwell Automation Company

John Theron is Vice President of Product Management at Incuity, a Rockwell Automation Company. Mr. Theron is responsible for product management and product marketing, and coordinates all product related activities from requirements definition through development and QA to product positioning and release.

Mr. Theron was CEO of Ptm, the company that developed the technology for Wonderware's Industrial SQL Server product, and subsequently headed product marketing at Wonderware. He has also served as CEO of Blue Owl Technologies, an energy management software company, as Director of Product Management for Quest Software’s enterprise database solutions, and as Vice President of Product Management at XPrime, a business intelligence company.

Tim Thomasma
Managing Enterprise Architect, Capgemini

Tim Thomasma is an IT architect, manager and Six Sigma blackbelt who leads the global planning, design and implementation of business critical systems. He is adept at shaping strategy and leveraging technology to strengthen corporate performance. Mr. Thomasma has served in several technical leadership roles: with the Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering at the University of Michigan – Dearborn; the Product Development Systems and Plant Floor Systems organizations at Ford Motor Company, and with IBM Global Services. Currently he leads a group of systems architects who focus on plant and enterprise systems for Capgemini’s global outsourcing and technical services clients.

Patrick Weber
Systems Consultant, Energizer Battery Manufacturing

Patrick Weber is a Systems Consultant with Energizer Battery Manufacturing and is based in Westlake, Ohio. He has accountability for Industrial Controls and MES applications, and has been with Energizer for 27 years. Mr. Weber has a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering and a Masters in Business Administration.

Bryan Zigler
Product Lifecycle Management Engineer Product Definition Technology - Boeing
Phantom Works

Bryan Zigler works for Boeing Phantom Works in West Hills California. He holds a BS degree in Mechanical Engineering from New Mexico State University and a MBA and MS in Engineering Management from Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. Mr. Zigler spent six years as a system analyst at Boeings Rocketdyne division deploying factory execution systems and supporting the Manufacturing Planning, Execution and scheduling systems. Mr. Zigler joined Phantom Works in 2004 and lead initial requirements definition for the Boeing 787 program final assembly shop floor information system. He currently leads the Phantom Works Enterprise Manufacturing project investigating and developing technology related to 3D visualization, Service Oriented Architecture and business process modeling.