Management Team

The Inventure management team has proven experience with petroleum fuels and bio-based fuel manufacturing and marketing, market and product development and new business start up management.

Mark Tegen — Chief Executive Officer

Mark brings Inventure over 18 years of petroleum industry manufacturing, marketing and logistics experience. Before co-founding Inventure, Mark was President of Senergy Chemical, which he formed after licensing a novel patent to convert crude biodiesel glycerin into propylene glycol. (The technology won the 2006 Presidential Green Chemistry Award.) Subsequently, Mark has worked diligently to develop the technology, form partnerships with Fortune 50 companies and develop Senergy into a projected $200 million plus revenue, profitable, start up business in less than 2 years. Before forming Senergy, Mark was Vice President/General Manager of Pacific Fluids LLC, the largest bulk marketer and terminal of Biodiesel in the Pacific Northwest. He continues to serve as a steering committee member of the Seattle Clean Cities Coalition, a member of the Washington State Department of Agriculture Biofuels Advisory Committee. Mark received his degree in Business Management from the University of Washington.

Wes Berry — Chief Technology Officer

Wes has over 30 years of chemical engineering experience, from advanced ester processing to uranium recovery; he holds 23 patents. Wes has extensive knowledge in: Ion Exchange/Adsorption System Review; Arsenic Removal from Intermediate Acid; Manganese Recovery from Waste Water; Fine Particle Recovery; Strategic Metals Purification; Metal Salt Recovery from Industrial Process Stream; Phosphoric Acid Ultra-Purification; Industrial-Grade Phosphate Production; Industrial/Food-Grade Phosphate Production; Industrial-Grade Monoammonium Phosphate Production; Animal-Feed Grade Di-Calcium Phosphate Production Evaluation; Fluoride By-product Recovery Electronic Chemical Recycle/Recovery; Luminescent Materials Recovery and Preparations; Precious Metals Fractionation; and Ammonium Thiosulfate Production. His extensive experience with catalytic reactions and esterification/transesterification are critical in the patent pending process that Inventure employs.

William Sutterlin, PhD — Vice President, Technology

Dr. Sutterlin has experience in laboratory management, and has served as a primary investigator for SBIR and STTR awards and an APPA/DEED award. As an analytical chemist, Dr. Sutterlin has experience in trouble shooting, interpretation and method development with the following instrumentation: HPLC, LC/MS, GC/MS, AA, GFAA, GC/FID, NMR, FTIR, ES-MS, MS-MS, UV-Vis, DSC, TGA, and thermally controlled powder X-ray diffractometer. He is part of the United States and Brazil research collaboration in biomass conversion, and is a recipient of the prestigious Presidential Green Chemistry Challenge Award. Dr. Sutterlin received his B.S. in Chemistry from Troy State University and his Ph.D. in Chemistry from University of Missouri.

Board of Directors

Hans Haglund

Hans has over 15 years' experience in company startup and business development. He was involved in developing and raising capital for biodiesel production facilities in the western US. Hans was co-founder of two software companies: Legal Anywhere, which was acquired by Niku Corporation in 2000 (NASDQ:NIKU) and AchieveOne, which merged with Dealplanner Inc. in 2001. Hans is a co-founder of Inventure.

James S.D. Leach

James S.D. Leach is a Director of China Construction Bank (Asia) (formerly known as Bank of America (Asia) Ltd.). He has spent most of his career in Hong Kong working on various appointments with the Kadoorie Family. During this time he was exposed to many privately held and public operations, with a later focus on the Kadoorie family's associated public held corporations, including CLP Holdings, Hong Kong and Shanghai Hotels, and Tai Ping Carpets. James was closely involved from the inception of China Light and Power's international operations in Thailand, India and Australasia. In the early 1980s, he ran a venture capital company which invested in oilfield equipment manufacturing and construction materials. James holds an MBA from Columbia University and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants in England and Wales.

Michael Melnick, PhD.

Michael is a principle at CMEA Ventures. Prior to joining CMEA, he co-founded Cell Signaling Technology, a spinout of New England Biolabs that develops drugs and tools to fight cancer. At Cell Signaling, Mike was responsible for sales, marketing and business development; during his tenure, the company grew to 200 people and $50 million in annual sales.

Advisory Board

Dr. K. Shaine Tyson

Dr. K. Shaine Tyson is executive director of Rocky Mountain Biodiesel Consulting (www.rockymtnbiodiesel.com), and has been working to develop a commercial biodiesel industry in the United States since 1997. She was a project manager for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory from 1989 to 2004, where her projects included review of biomass process and chemical engineering, emission testing, environmental and policy analysis, life cycle assessment, resource assessment, geographic information systems, and economic modeling. From February 1997 to May 2004, Dr. Tyson directed the U.S. Department of Energy's Biodiesel Program. She has used her position and strategic business skills to work with the National Biodiesel Board, US Department of Energy and US Protection Agency, state agencies and emerging developers to craft the biodiesel industry we have today. Dr. Tyson received the Midwest Research Institute's President's Award in 1990, a Clean Cities Award in 1998, and was recognized by the DOE Biomass Energy Program for superior achievement in establishing, promoting, and implementing biomass energy technologies and resources in 2002. She has provided live and written testimony to the U.S. House and Senate, and has authored over 40 publications and reports during her career at NREL.