Executive & Advisory Team

Robert Kaplan
Professor, Harvard Business School

• Professor, Harvard Business School (1984 to present)
• Dean, Carnegie-Mellon University (1977 to 1983)
• Co-developer of both activity-based costing and the Balanced Scorecard
• Authored or co-authored 14 books, 18 HBR articles, and more than 120 other papers
• Accounting Hall of Fame (2006), Lifetime Contribution Award (AAA 2006, IMA 2008)
• Financial Times 2005 list of Top 25 Business Thinkers; Accenture Institute for Strategic Change 2002 and 2003 Top 50 Thinkers and Writers on Management Topics
• Serves on several corporate and nonprofit boards

• Professor, Harvard Business School - Studies management challenges in platform-based businesses that exploit network effects
• DBA (98), MBA (83), and BA (79) from Harvard University
• Eleven years as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company. Co-head of McKinsey's Media and Entertainment Practice during the early 1990s
• Member of the Board of Directors of Harvard Student Agencies, the world's largest student-run corporation, and was a Director of OneMain.com, one of the ten largest U.S. Internet Service Providers prior to its acquisition.

• Senior Lecturer, Harvard Business School
• Harvard College (1972, magna cum laude in History), Harvard Law School (1976, cum laude), Harvard Business School (1976)
• Worked as an attorney for three years, in commercial and investment banking for nine years, and for the international media group Bertelsmann for twenty years; from 2001 to 2008 he was a member of the Executive Board of Bertelsmann
• Chairman and CEO of Random House, the world's largest trade book publisher (1998 to 2008)

• President of Sisma Companies, an investment holding company with interests in manufacturing, real estate, land remediation and information technology
• Formerly President and co-founder of IDMD Manufacturing Inc./Array Marketing Group, a global designer and manufacturer of point of purchase displays, merchandising systems and store environments specializing in the prestige luxury market
• Member of YPO; served on the executive for six years most recently as Chairman
• Vice-Chair of the Board of Governors, Crescent School
• Board Member of The Dorchester in New York, and a mentor under the YPO/Harvard Business School Entrepreneurship Program

• 24+ years providing capital to mid-market companies; Along with Ken Rotman, led the way to the growth and success of Clairvest’s private equity investment business
• Formerly one of three partners managing the Canadian Mezzanine Fund, a successful $48 million private equity limited partnership sponsored by Gordon Capital Corporation
• Held progressive management positions with the mid-market senior and junior debt capital groups of National Bank of Canada and Citibank Canada
• Member of the Board of Directors of Clairvest Group Inc., Casino Marina del Sol, Casino New Brunswick and N-Brook Mortgage Group.

• Extensive expertise in negotiating and executing M&A transactions in the manufacturing, real estate and technology sectors, including numerous cross-border transactions.
• Worked for 9 years at Magna International Inc.; responsible for overall management of a variety of technology-related divisions. Included responsibilities for joint venture operations involving partners such as Asea Brown Boveri and NGK of Japan; also responsible for investigating various joint venture, acquisitions and new business opportunities

• Formerly CEO of NexCycle, an industry leader in North America (NA) and ultimately the second largest glass recycling company, one of the top ten plastic recycling companies and the second largest manager of beverage container deposit systems in NA
• Director of Corporate Development at AGRA Industries Limited, A diversified management company with core businesses in Engineering, Construction, Systems Integration and Resource Recovery and Recycling
• Marketing Co-coordinator at SCI-TEC Instruments, dedicated to the development of remote sensing instrumentation for upper atmospheric research and industrial markets.
• Member of WPO and YPO

• 20+ years of key financial experience
• Formerly Managing Director in the $1.2 billion private investing arm of a Schedule I Canadian bank; built and managed team responsible for $200 million mezzanine fund.
• A principal responsible for originating, structuring and managing subordinated debt financings at a private, $300 million fund company
• Held vital roles responsible for managing debt and capital pools on behalf of pension funds and life insurance firms

• Founder and President of Sierra Building Group Inc.
• In business since 1985, Sierra Building Group is a residential real estate development company which has developed land in the GTA, Collingwood, Muskoka and Houston, Texas. Sierra Building Group has built over a thousand homes on the lands which it has developed.
• Currently involved in Commercial / Retail investments throughout Ontario and the United States.