solar summit 2014

Kristen Ardani is a Solar Technology Markets and Policy Analyst for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). She develops and executes analyses of the market for solar technology and the policies affecting wide scale deployment of solar energy. Her recent work has focused on analysis of  non-hardware balance of system costs, also known as soft costs, for residential and commercial PV.  Kristen holds a bachelor’s degree in Latin American studies and international development from Tulane University, and a master’s degree in international affairs and environmental and energy economics from U.C. San Diego.

Vikram Aggarwal is the founder and chief executive of EnergySage, the industry’s leading online solar marketplace for rooftop solar, community solar, and financing. He started EnergySage after more than 15 years of experience with Fidelity Investments, where he specialized in private equity investing, growth strategy, marketing, and new business development. His thought leadership on solar industry innovation has appeared in Bloomberg, Consumer Reports, Forbes, Kiplinger, Money Magazine and Scientific American. He was named to the Boston Globe’s 2016 Game Changers list, one of only two cleantech entrepreneurs included. He holds an MBA from Northeastern University and is a CFA Charterholder.

Mr. BEHAR is responsible for international marketing and innovation at Solairedirect, France’s leading Independent Solar Power Producer.
Marc-Alain’s primary focus is to develop the company’s international footprint, coordinating internal business development activities as well as M&A and strategic partnership. He is also in charge for the design and implementation of innovative business models based on competitive solar power.

Prior to joining Solairedirect, Marc-Alain spent 7 years with strategy consulting firm Booz Allen Hamilton, advising clients in the Energy and Infrastructure sector on a range of strategic and organizational issues. In this capacity he has accumulated direct working experience in than 10 countries across Europe, South-East Asia and Latin America.

Marc-Alain earned his Master of Business Administration (MBA) at INSEAD in France and Singapore and also hodls a MSc. in Management from HEC Paris.

Joe brings years of experience from the solar O&M field and experience in execution of over 1GW of solar O&M contracts. In 2009, Joe was the Commercial Operations Manager at Advanced Energy Inc., managing their O&M sales and contract negotiations. In 2011, Joe led Swinerton Renewable Energy’s technical services team where he managed both the field operations team and the in-house SCADA team after their development of the utility-scale monitoring program, SOLV. Joe now runs MaxGen’s day-to-day operations and is responsible for all company strategies and contracts. MaxGen is an independent, third-party, O&M provider for all power plant facilities. MaxGen currently has over 300MW of O&M contracts in place across the country. As an independent provider, MaxGen can operate at all project levels and for all clients including, financiers, developers and EPC’s. Joe has been a speaker at numerous industry events, most recently at Solar Power Generation USA.

Evelyn M. Butler is UL's global business lead for the energy and industrial systems sector, which includes PV / Solar, wind, inverters, generators, large format batteries, energy storage systems, biofuels and traditional fuels.  She has been with UL for 24 years in conformity assessment, quality registration services, sales/marketing and industry management roles.  For the last eight years, she has had a commercial management focus on developing UL’s energy businesses.  Currently, she is responsible for strategy development, program and service development and management of UL’s energy businesses; these activities include guiding UL’s standards development, creating value-based service offerings through an effective global delivery structure, and leading influential industry/stakeholder outreach.

Evelyn received a Bachelor of Arts in Social Sciences with an emphasis in Business and Law from the University of California at Berkeley and has completed professional post-graduate courses in Business/Marketing Management and Financial Accounting.  She was a Steering Committee member of the US Department of Energy's Solar America Board for Codes and Standards (Solar ABCs) and instrumental on UL’s involvement in several SunShot initiative grant awards.  She is an active partner with many industries associations globally in the technology areas of focus.  Evelyn is UL’s Working Group member with truSolar, an industry consortium working to create standardization and confidence in investment screening of commercial / industrial PV power plant projects.

Evelyn has spoken at numerous industry conferences and seminars on renewable energy technologies, the role of testing and certification in market access, reliability and durability and the technology convergence at a system level, including at past SolarPower International, SNEC in China, Intersolar India, PV Taiwan, Intersolar NA conferences, and at several US DOE technology / industry meetings and events.

Brian is a Principal based in San Jose and leads PwC's US Cleantech Advisory practice. He has worked in technology and energy for over 20 years and has extensive experience working with both cleantech clients (e.g., solar, wind, smart grid, energy storage, etc.) and in cleantech solution/project deployment. His areas of focus include strategy, M&A, operations transformation, supply chain, engineering project management, product development, O&M, and sustainability. Prior to the PRTM-PwC merger in 2011, Brian worked in PRTM’s Energy Business Group, where he launched and built the firm’s global renewables practice. Brian has a BS and MEng in Mechanical Engineering from Cornell University and an MBA from the University of Michigan.

JinkoSolar (NYSE: JKS) is a global leader in the solar industry. JinkoSolar distributes its solar products and sells its solutions and services to a diversified international utility, commercial and residential customer base in China, the United States, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom, Chile, South Africa, India, Mexico, Brazil, United Arab Emirates, Italy, Spain, France, Belgium, and other countries and regions. JinkoSolar has built a vertically integrated solar product value chain, with an integrated annual capacity of 8.0 GW for silicon wafers, 5.0 GW for solar cells, and 8.0 GW for solar modules, as of December 31, 2017

JinkoSolar (U.S.) Inc. works closely with top financial institutions and key stakeholders in the solar industry.  Publicly vetted by trusted industry third party laboratories, JinkoSolar is one of the fastest growing and most reliable PV suppliers in the United States and Canada. The North American headquarters is located in San Francisco with 5 regional sales offices.

Mr. Desentis is the Country Manager, Mexico and Business Development Manager for Latin America and the Caribbean of Yingli Green Energy. Mr. Desentis is responsible for the sustained commercial success of Yingli’s regional business and for executing upon the sales and marketing strategy in order to meet or exceed sales and margin targets.

Mr. Desentis  worked as new products development specialist at PREI Latin America and was responsible for the identification, structuring and marketing of new products offered by PREI Latam. He worked on the structure of a Residential CKD, a commercial exit fund and a Chilean Fund. Previously Mr. Desentis duties included management of the joint venture, property prospecting and acquisition, asset management, property sales, as well as the monitoring of the assets of the society.

Before working at PREI Mr. Desentis worked as an customer service analyst at The Dow Chemical Co. where he was responsible of the reporting of sales and ordering of the plastics and chemical business.

Mr. Desentis is a graduate of the Universidad Iberoamericana of México, where he received a Bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering. Mr. Desentis is a Mexican citizen, is fluent in English, Spanish and has basic knowledge of French.

Jeff Dorety is President; Americas for Trina Solar responsible for all phases of sales, operations, financial and back-office support for North, Central and South American markets.  Jeff has worked in Solar PV for eight years including national and global roles with two other manufacturers plus director of sales for commercial projects with an EPC/developer.  Previous to entering the PV business Jeff held a number of senior leadership positions in the telecom & datacom equipment and mobile wireless industries with companies such as Lucent Technologies and T-Mobile and AT&T.  Jeff has over 25 years’ experience in both small and large tech companies managing and leading various sales channels, building high performing teams and running various operational functions.

Diana L. Drysdale was named Vice President - Renewables of PSEG Energy Holdings in January 2010. Since joining the company in 2008, she has been responsible for the strategic growth and operations of PSEG’s unregulated solar subsidiary which includes both development and acquisition of a number of utility scale solar facilities across the country. Ms. Drysdale was named President of PSEG Solar Source in September 2011.

In April 2011, Ms. Drysdale was named Vice President of PSEG Resources, where she assumed responsibility for PSEG Resources’ real estate portfolio of headquarters buildings, multi-tenant office buildings, shopping centers, and single stores located throughout the US which includes 46 properties totaling more than 7.5 million square feet. In this capacity she is responsible for ongoing management and strategic optimization of the portfolio including asset dispositions. She also assumed the lead of Resources’ environmental assets, primarily the Demand Management Company (energy conservation assets) and a co-investment in a flue gas desulphurization plant.

Ms. Drysdale brings broad experience in the energy and utilities sector in both regulated and unregulated businesses in the US and Canada. Before joining PSEG, Ms. Drysdale led the Enterprise Risk Management efforts at Limited Brands and prior to that at Northeast Utilities where she delivered a highly effective integrated ERM framework for both the regulated and unregulated energy businesses. She worked for seven years with ENMAX Corporation in Calgary, Canada where she held the positions of Vice President of Strategy and Risk Management and Vice President and Treasurer. At ENMAX she played a key role in the successful growth and operations of the company which included a number of renewable energy endeavors. Ms. Drysdale also worked for TransAlta Corporation in Calgary, Canada for seven years in various engineering and management roles which included significant experience with the company’s generation plants.

Ms. Drysdale holds a Bachelors degree in chemical engineering from the University of Calgary in Alberta Canada; an MBA from Queen's School of Business in Ontario, Canada; and has completed the Finance for Senior Executives program from Harvard Business School. Since 1993, she has been a licensed professional engineer with the Association of Professional Engineers, Geologists, and Geophysicists of Alberta. She has served on several boards in both the US and Canada and has been a member of the Bloomfield College Board of Trustees in New Jersey since 2008 and the G.I. Go Fund Board of Directors since 2011.

Thomas is a passionate leader in the Solar Energy industry, and prides himself on building lasting teams and facilitating alignment and cohesion of business models across diverse projects and programs. He balances the business capability roadmap with energy sustainability and renewable technology solutions, quality, service, and process simplification to achieve a positive return on assets.

Thomas currently serves as President for Soligent Distribution and is responsible for the day-to-day operational responsibilities of the company. Prior to joining Soligent, Thomas served as a member of the Management Board and ran the Solar Energy Division at Fronius USA for over five years. Before his time spent at Fronius USA, Thomas co-founded and managed joint ventures and conducted multiple successful mergers and acquisitions.

Raffi Garabedian joined First Solar in May 2008 as Director of Disruptive Technologies and was promoted to his current role in 2012. Prior to First solar, he spent over 15 years in the micro-electro-mechanical systems (MEMS) industry, developing new products ranging from automotive engine control sensors to fiber-optic telecommunications switching systems. He was the founding CEO of Touchdown Technologies, Inc., which was acquired by Verigy, as well as Micromachines Inc., which was acquired by Kavlico. Mr. Garabedian earned a Bachelor of Science degree in electrical engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and a Master of Science degree in electrical engineering with a focus on semiconductor and microsystems technology from the University of California-Davis. He is named on approximately 28 issued U.S. patents.

Marcelo Gomez has been with Unirac for eight years. As the Director of Marketing, Marcelo champions Unirac’s brand presence, marketing strategies, communication plans and social media engagement.

Prior to Unirac, Marcelo served as a Marketing Specialist and Creative Designer for the Christian Foundation for Children and Aging. His additional experience includes, three years as a freelance graphic designer, marketing consultant and owner of a graphic design agency.

Marcelo brings more than 15 years of experience of creative expertise, marketing tactics and business acumen to the table. Marcelo continues to advance Unirac’s corporate identity with a multi-tiered MARCOM strategy, to maintain Unirac’s nation & global presence through customer events & tradeshows, a MDF program, print, web, tradeshow, and social media campaigns.  Marcelo holds a Bachelor of Science in mass communications from Benedictine College in Atchison, Kansas.

Tarik Bolat is a Managing Director focusing on acquisitions and corporate strategy and development. Mr. Bolat is responsible for building strategic relationships with asset partners, raising corporate and asset acquisition capital and underwriting RET’s portfolio of assets. Prior to RET, Tarik worked at Accretive, an early-stage investment firm and incubator, and was a consultant with Booz and Company. Prior to Booz, he was a principal at Select Enterprises, a consulting firm that worked with new businesses in the energy sector. Tarik holds a joint BA in Economics and Political Science from Columbia University and an MBA from the Harvard Business School.

Ned has over twenty years of experience in diverse business leadership and has tremendous cross-functional skills. He has extensive experience in project finance, business development, marketing and business planning.

Prior to coming to RMI, Ned was the CEO and founder of Cistern Solutions, a strategy consultancy that specialized in assisting large corporations identify new business opportunities and structure development projects in the emerging renewable and clean energy industries.

Before founding Cistern, Ned was the president of startup firm Simplicity Energy Farms, an advisory and development company working with ranchers and rural communities to develop their renewable energy resources. Preceding Simplicity, Ned was a ten-year executive at Parson Consulting, a management consulting firm specializing in corporate finance and accounting. Ned spent eight years as an officer in the United States Navy, serving aboard nuclear submarines and in the Tomahawk cruise missile program office.

Theresa Jester is the CEO at Silicor Materials. Prior to her current position, she was an entrepreneur in residence at Hudson Clean Energy.

Jester has managed large solar operations and held engineering positions at SoloPower, SunPower, SolarWorld, Shell Solar, Siemens Solar and Arco Solar.

She holds a degree in Mechanical Engineering from California State University, USA.

Mark brings extensive business operations and commercial experience from his global leadership positions spanning more than 20 years. He is the current President and CEO of Alion Energy, in Richmond, California. The Alion Energy Team has executed a fundamental redesign of the way we build and maintain community scale solar. The company combines robotic installation & cleaning technologies with established construction practices to build local, utility scale projects faster for up to 25% less, while producing more energy. The company’s mission is to rapidly lower solar’s LCOE to $0.05/kwh by 2016 and create an economically viable replacement for natural gas in the Americas, Middle East, Africa and Asia.

Andy has over thirteen years of experience spanning the High-Technology and Renewable Energy sectors with ten years of experience in both first and third tier cities in China. Andy is the Chief Executive Officer of Clean Energy Associates (CEA), an advisory firm based in Hong Kong with 15 employees and an operating presence in Shanghai since 2008. CEA serves the needs of solar industry manufacturers, project developers, EPC contractors, and downstream investors in the areas of supply chain management, quality control, technology transfer, and financing solutions for the solar energy sector.

Prior to founding CEA, Andy was the Vice President of Business Development for Trina Solar Limited (NYSE: TSL), a vertically integrated Chinese solar PV manufacturer which he helped to obtain nearly $500M of financing through its IPO and post-public offerings in 2006, 2007 and 2008, respectively. Andy has also served as a member of the Board of Directors for the Solar Energy Industries Association (SEIA) while at Trina Solar.  Previously, he worked in management roles in sales and business development for Dell Computer and Intel in China, respectively. He has a B.A. in Economics from Northwestern University and a Masters of Business Administration from Harvard Business School. He speaks Mandarin fluently and lives with his wife and two daughters in Shanghai, China.

Minh Le is the Director of the Solar Energy Technologies Office within the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), where he helps manage and balance a roughly $1B multi-year portfolio of research, development, demonstration, and deployment programs to achieve the goals of the SunShot Initiative.  The DOE SunShot Initiative is a collaborative national initiative to make solar energy technologies fully cost-competitive with other forms of energy by reducing the cost of solar energy systems by about 75% before 2020. Reducing the total installed cost for utility-scale solar electricity to roughly 6 cents per kilowatt hour without subsidies will result in rapid, large-scale adoption of solar electricity across the United States.  Prior to his current role at the DOE, Minh spent his career in the semiconductor and solar industry developing technologies and scaling new technologies to high volume manufacturing.  Minh earned his B.S. and M.S. degrees from MIT, where he held fellowships with DOE, the Department of Defense, and the Bose Foundation.

As Sr. Director of Business Development & Sales, Alejo Lopez leads NEXTracker’s business development and sales team for Mexico and Latin America. Alejo is an expert in the Latin American energy markets where he has worked extensively for over a decade.  Prior to joining NEXTracker in 2016, Alejo held the post of Country Manager for Hanwha Q CELLS in Mexico, with primary responsibilities of project development, M&A and PPA sales.  Alejo was also a key member of Siliken USA Distributed Generation managing project development and structured finance after working as an advisor with cutting-edge clean-tech ventures including Combined Power, ElectraDrive and others in Silicon Valley.
 
Alejo, a native of Argentina, started his career running large numerical models, fracking wells and poking at the Earth in what he calls being a Reservoir Engineer in Patagonia. He left the dark side after 6 years to pursue an MBA in Finance at the University of San Francisco where he graduated with honors. Alejo also holds an MSe in Petroleum Engineering from UNC Argentina and currently lives in Mexico City.

Brad Mattson is CEO of Siva Power, a solar technology company based in Silicon Valley. Mattson is a renowned semiconductor entrepreneur and the only person to date who founded and scaled two publicly-traded semiconductor equipment companies. Prior to Siva Power, Mattson was a partner for Vantage Point Capital Partners where he led the firm’s solar portfolio. Mattson is an E&Y Entrepreneur of the Year, has been named as one of the top 50 most influential people in the semiconductor industry, and authored The SOLAR PHOENIX: How America Can Rise from the Ashes of Solyndra to World Leadership in Solar 2.0.

Mr. Mendelsohn has over 20 years of experience in the energy industry.  He is currently a Senior Financial Analyst with the National Renewable Energy Lab where he organizes the solar industry to improve access to capital and evaluates financing innovations and policies designed to spur private investment in renewable energy.  Prior to joining NREL, Mr. Mendelsohn was an economist with the Massachusetts DPU and an executive consultant for Levitan & Associates located in Boston.    Mr. Mendelsohn holds a B.A. in Computer Science from Ithaca College and a M.S. in Energy Management and Policy from the University of Pennsylvania.

Todd provides freelance product marketing expertise for solar power, utility controls, and emerging technologies. As Affiliate Partner with Envect such ventures often include strategic planning and embedded marketing services for renewable energy companies launching products in North America. His current role developing inverter test services for PV Evolution Labs stems from this Affiliate network.

Previously, Todd helped incubate and launch Advanced Energy’s Solaron line of high-efficiency inverters, now known as the NX series. In 5 years as AE Marketing Director he helped grow revenue from $0 to $100M annually and was widely known for advocating LCOE as key metric for solar value. Responsibilities as Director spanned portfolio strategy, product marketing, advertising, sales training, negotiations, and alliance management.

Todd has BSEE and MSEE degrees from The Ohio State University, holds a U.S. Patent related to digital photography, and supports COSEIA and various entrepreneurial organizations in Northern Colorado.

Jim Morgenson is the director of strategic accounts at SMA America, the U.S.-based subsidiary of global solar technology leader SMA Solar Technology AG, headquartered in Germany.

In his current role, Morgenson is responsible for SMA America’s sales activities in North America for strategic global and key accounts across the residential and commercial market segments.

Morgenson joined SMA America in 2009 and had a significant impact on the success of SMA’s Sunny Central utility-scale business in North America including managing sales, application engineering, and project management teams with a focus on design collaboration and fulfillment solutions for large projects. In Morgenson’s most recent role, he achieved breakthrough industry results in the commercial segment for adoption of 1000VDC and distributed architectures.

Paul has over 20 years experience in both entrepreneurial and multinational high technology companies. Most recently, Paul was the CEO of Crimson Microsystems, a fabless semiconductor company specializing in large scale SONET ICs for the telecommunications industry, with customers worldwide. Prior to Crimson, Paul was the CEO and co-founder of Accelerant Networks, a semiconductor company that designed and developed intelligent multi-gigabit transceivers. Accelerant was acquired by Synopsis, Inc (Nasdaq: SNPS). Paul has a B.S. in Computer Science and an M.B.A. from the University of Southern California.

Tuan Pham is the President of PowerFin.  Throughout his career, Tuan has focused on areas where energy and finance converge. Prior to founding PowerFin, Tuan worked at HelioVolt, a thin-film solar technology company, and covered energy and chemical companies at Morgan Stanley and Banc of America Securities in New York. During his time in leveraged finance, he worked on multi-billion dollar transactions and was recognized as a leading analyst by Institutional Investor magazine. Tuan’s experience also includes time at the Austin Clean Energy Incubator and Strategic Value Partners, a $5 billion hedge fund, where he served as a Director overseeing energy and industrials investments. He holds the CFA charter, a BSBA with honors from the University of Tulsa, and an MBA from the University of Texas, where he was a Venture Fellow. Tuan also has served on the Austin Local Solar Advisory Committee, a City Council-appointed committee to devise a plan for citywide solar development.

Brett Prior is a Director of Global Business Development at SunEdison, where he focuses on project acquisitions, developer partnerships, and innovative financing structures.

Prior to joining SunEdison in 2013, Brett was a Senior Analyst at PHOTON Consulting and GTM Research, where he focused on project finance and utility-scale solar.

Before joining the renewables industry, Brett spent six years as an equity research analyst with mutual fund managers in New York and Honolulu.
Brett has a BA from Yale, an MBA from London Business School, and is a CFA charter holder.

Brendon Quinlivan leads the Solar Sales Origination efforts for Constellation across U.S. markets, including the negotiation and execution of all power purchase agreements, solar leases, and late-stage project acquisitions.

During his solar career he has developed more than 100 MWs of distributed generation solar in North America.  Previously, Mr. Quinlivan served as the Director of Commercial Sales at SunEdison. He was responsible for Commercial and Industrial customer business development efforts throughout the U.S. and Canada.  Prior to entering the solar energy industry, Mr. Quinlivan spent eight years in the commercial/industrial real estate development and management industry in the Mid-Atlantic region.

Mr. Quinlivan earned a Bachelor of Science degree from Pennsylvania State University.

Mr. Rubin serves as President of AES Distributed Energy Solutions, which owns and operates distributed energy solar projects within the US strategic business unit of AES.  As President, Woody is responsible for AES’ growth efforts in the U.S. energy market for deployment of distributed energy solutions across AES’ platform.

Previously, Mr. Rubin served as Senior Vice President of business development and prior to that, as General Counsel for AES Distributed Energy Solutions.  Prior to joining the company Mr. Rubin practiced law in the New York City offices of Chadbourne & Parke LLP, Hunton & Williams LLP and in the Denver, CO offices of Holland & Hart LLP.  

Mr. Rubin has a J.D. from the College of William and Mary and a Bachelor’s degree from the University of Colorado.

Chad Sachs is the CEO of Radian Generation where he leads the strategic direction for a company that provides asset management services for over 150MWs of operating solar plants.  Before founding Radian in 2013, he has held senior executive positions at leading developers in the commercial dg and utility sectors including MMA Renewable Ventures, Fotowatio Renewable Ventures and SunEdison.  He has raised over $1.1 BN of financing for solar projects since 2005, including tax equity, permanent debt and construction financing.

Prior to working in the solar industry, Mr. Sachs worked at JPMorgan Partners, the private equity arm of JPMorgan Chase, where he focused on growth equities and LBOs, and as a financial analyst for Credit Suisse First Boston. Mr. Sachs holds a M.B.A. from the Stanford Graduate School of Business and a B.S. in International Economics from Georgetown University.

As Chief Strategy Officer, Tanguay leads the Loanpal innovation group, identifying new business opportunities and market growth potential by leveraging new technology, and optimizing advancements in the consumer leading platform.

Prior to Loanpal, Tanguay served as President of Solar City – in the largest residential solar company in the world, overseeing 10,000 employees. At SolarCity, he led operations alongside Hayes Barnard and helped grow the business 5x to 40% of market share (10 times the size of the nearest competitor). Additionally, this growth was achieved with the best safety and quality track record, and lowest cost structure.

Additionally, Tanguy co-founded Vivint Solar, a residential solar provider that quickly became the 2nd largest in the market. Tanguy also spent 3 years in investment banking at Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley, London, and also served 8 years as Vice President of the private equity group at TPG in London, Singapore, Hong Kong and San Francisco.

Dru Sutton leads the North American Technical Marketing group for SolarEdge; he focusses on highlighting the benefits of DC power optimizers with SolarEdge inverters.  Since joining the solar industry in 2005, Mr. Sutton has worked in Engineering, Applications, Sales, and Marketing at several international companies involved with Solar Installation, Module Manufacturing, Distributed Module Electronics, and Inverter Products.  Dru installed a grid-tied solar electric system on his California home in 1998 and has a Bachelor of Science in Engineering from the University of California, Davis.

Larry Truong is Director of Business Development for Power-One Renewable Energy Solutions LLC.  In his capacity, Larry is responsible for leading strategic planning, product portfolio development, and business development activities for Power-One’s PV market in the Americas.

Before joining Power-One, Larry spent 3 ½ years with Schneider Electric Renewable Energies (formerly Xantrex Technology, Inc.,) first as Regional Sales Manager, and then as Director of Business Development with major focus in the emerging utility-scale PV power plants.  During this time, Larry contributed to the company’s early successes with multi-megawatt utility scale installations in the Southwest US and Ontario, Canada.

Prior to Schneider Electric, Larry spent 12 years with American Power Conversion Corporation (APC,) a world’s leader in IT and telecommunication power infrastructure.  In his capacity as General Manager for Southeast Asia, Larry established APC’s legal entities in 6 countries, and grew the company’s business from a new entrant to the top market share position.  The company also won more than 25 industry awards, and was recognized as one of the top 5 IT brands in the region during Larry’s tenure.

Larry holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Rhode Island, and an MBA degree from the University of Chicago.  He also attended advanced executive development courses in marketing and management at the University of Chicago, the University of Michigan, the Center for Quality of Management, and the Singapore Institute of Management.

Mr. Vargas joined Morgan Stanley in 2011.  He is the Head of Residential Solar and member of the origination and structuring team at MS Solar Solutions Corp.  Mr. Vargas started his career in the Investment Banking Divisions of JP Morgan and Banc of America Securities in New York.  In 2005, Mr. Vargas joined Lennar Corporation, where he held a number of management positions in Lennar Ventures, Lennar Financial Services and its distressed debt subsidiary, Rialto Capital.  Mr. Vargas was active in the development of Lennar’s Green Strategy and successfully launched one of the first Residential Solar Leasing Funds in California.

Mr. Phil Vyhanek joined Solectria Renewables in 2010 based on the solid performance and growth since 2005 and in anticipation of the incredible opportunities in the PV market. Mr. Vyhanek comes to Solectria Renewables after holding senior management roles with Laird Technologies, Cushcraft Corporation and Honeywell where he developed expertise in strategic planning, sales, operations, engineering and finance for technology companies. He has a proven track record of delivering results and is experienced in driving systems key for rapid business growth. Mr. Vyhanek is a graduate from the University of Wisconsin with a Degree in Engineering and has an MBA from the University of Michigan.

With over a decade and a half in the solar and storage sectors, Josh serves as NEXTracker’s Storage Integration Director for the NX Flow Solar and storage product. He began his solar career at Akeena Solar, one of the leading turnkey residential and commercial solar contractors from 2002 to 2009. Shortly after joining the Akeena team in 2005, Josh took on a supervisory role within the company’s operations departments, opening several remote offices nation-wide and scaling the company’s staffing and infrastructure needs upon Akeena’s IPO filing. Joshua managed the engineering, drafting, and project management teams, supporting over 20 MW of both residential and small commercial PV systems over a 3-year time period.
Josh’s energy storage career began as a co-founder of Green Charge Networks, where he secured a $10M grant by the US DOE to deploy 8 micro-grid and utility-interactive solar + energy storage + electric vehicle chargers projects for the purposes of optimizing behind-the-meter electricity usage. After exiting Green Charge Networks (now owned by Engie) in 2013, Josh has gone on to develop grid-connected energy storage and micro-grid projects with NRG’s Station A team and NEXTracker’s integrated energy storage program, where Josh has played many roles in the development of energy storage products and services, including business, finance, policy, project, product, hardware, and software development.

Josh has been an instructor at UC Berkeley Extension and currently offers solar engineering training and educational resources through SepiSolar. Joshua is fully certified by the North American Board of Certified Energy Practitioners (NABCEP-certified Solar PV Installer) and has extensive experience training and scaling Project Management and Design teams within the solar PV integration industry. Josh holds a BA in Astrophysics from UC Berkeley and holds a patents (see: Load Isolation Consumption Management Systems and Methods (US 20130285446 A1).

Howard Wenger serves as SunPower president, business units, with global responsibility for the company’s residential, commercial and utility power plant business.  He is currently focused on leading the company’s evolution to become a customer-centric energy company, combining distributed generation and energy services.  Wenger also serves as president of SunPower Corporation, Systems, the company’s turn-key power systems group.  Previously, he was executive vice president and a member of the board of PowerLight Corporation, which was acquired by SunPower, and he held management positions at PG&E, AstroPower and Pacific Energy Group, a company he co-founded.  Wenger is passionate about making the sun the leading source of energy globally.  He has worked for more than 30 years in the solar and utility power field, authored dozens of papers and public policies to mainstream solar, and developed software programs and tools that are still used today to design and engineer solar power systems.  Wenger holds a B.A. in Environmental Studies from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and an M.S. in Engineering from the University of Colorado, Boulder, and currently serves as a board member of Advanced Energy Economy.

Abe Yokell is Managing Partner and co-founder of Congruent Ventures, an early stage venture firm that backs companies in the sustainable technology ecosystem. 

Prior to co-founding Congruent Ventures, Abe spent 13 years at RockPort Capital, helping the RockPort team build nearly half of its portfolio, with a primary focus on business models and software solutions that address climate change challenges.  While at RockPort, he was responsible for opening the West Coast office in 2007, where he helped lead investments in energy fintech, residential solar, companies focused on blending software and hardware, data analytics platforms, urban transportation solutions, and energy storage companies.

His RockPort board seats included Renovate America, RePower, Qnovo, Flywheel, and EcoFactor, and he was previously involved with Enphase Energy (NASDAQ: ENPH), Streetline Networks (acquired by Kapsch), Recurve (acquired by Tendril), and Eka Systems (acquired by Cooper Power), among others.

Scott Clavenna has been leading high-tech market research firms for over 15 years. In his capacity as a trusted analyst and consultant, Scott has helped dozens of companies enter and succeed in complex and intensely competitive markets worldwide. He also has authored more than 30 reports that helped define important emerging market segments in optical and broadband communications.

Prior to founding Greentech Media, Scott was chief analyst at Heavy Reading, the market research arm of Light Reading, the dominant online media company in the telecommunications market. CMP bought Light Reading in 2005. Before creating Heavy Reading, Scott founded PointEast Research, providing strategic consulting and market intelligence to a broad mix of startups, venture capitalists and major suppliers in the communications/IT industry, and worked as director of research for Light Reading. In 1997, Scott co-founded Pioneer Consulting, which quickly grew into the leading market research firm covering the optical and broadband communications industry.

Eric Wesoff is Editor-at-Large at Greentech Media. Prior to joining GTM, Eric Wesoff founded Sage Marketing Partners in 2000 to provide sales and marketing-consulting services to venture-capital firms and their portfolio companies in the alternative energy and telecommunications sectors. Mr. Wesoff has become a well-known, respected authority and speaker in these fields.

His expertise covers solar power, fuel cells, biofuels and advanced batteries. His strengths are in market research and analysis, business development and due diligence for investors. He frequently consults for energy startups and Silicon Valley's premier venture capitalists.

MJ Shiao currently serves as the Director of Community Solar at Arcadia Power, where he works to connect residential customers with community solar projects developed by Arcadia Power's partners. Before Arcadia, MJ held various positions at Greentech Media and Wood Mackenzie, including leading GTM Research, a 30-person team tracking, analyzing and forecasting the evolution of the solar, energy storage and grid edge industries.  MJ is a leading expert in the transformation of the electricity sector. He has spoken at numerous conferences, testified in front of the U.S. International Trade Commission on solar trade issues and quoted in the Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Bloomberg and Buzzfeed. Before joining GTM Research, MJ managed and designed several MWs of residential and commercial PV projects. He holds a bachelor's in electrical engineering from the University of Delaware, where he was named a National Truman Scholar. A believer in the social benefits of solar power, MJ has also researched, installed and tested rural off-grid PV in India and Thailand.

Nicole Litvak is a Solar Analyst at GTM Research with a focus on the downstream US solar market. In addition to tracking the competitive landscape of installers, financiers, and technology providers in the residential and commercial market segments, Nicole serves as editor of PVNews, the solar industry's longest running market research periodical. Nicole has prior internship experience in corporate sustainability, solar water heating, and business development. She graduated from Brandeis University magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa with majors in Economics and Psychology.