Trenchless Technology Leadership at RedZone

Corporate Leadership

Eric Close - President and CEO
Wilson Farmerie - Chairman
Brian Zolkos - Chief Financial Officer
Scott Thayer - Chief Technology Officer
Brian Bannon - VP, Sales and Estimating
Phil Spano - VP, Software and Reporting
William "Red" Whittaker - Chief Scientist
Ralph Petroff - Executive Consultant
Melinda D. Rombold – VP, Human Resources

Leadership Bios

Eric C. Close – President and CEO  
Mr. Close leads the overall strategy and direction of RedZone. He has extensive experience building and managing both product and serviced based emerging companies. Prior to RedZone, he co-founded and successfully sold 2 companies: PartsZone, a provider of parts for lifts, and ProLine Services, a provider of railcar manufacturing and maintenance. He also helped finance and successfully sell Blue Fish Labs, Inc., a Pittsburgh software developer. Mr. Close also served as a management consultant for Coopers and Lybrand. From 1991 to 1995, Mr. Close served as a design engineer, product line manager, and sales engineer at Performance Controls, Inc., a motion control and robotics company.

Mr. Close received the 1999 Western Pennsylvania Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award. He is the primary inventor on two patents and has three patents pending. He holds a B.S. in Electrical Engineering from Lehigh University and an M.B.A. from Carnegie Mellon University.

Wilson Farmerie – Chairman
Mr. Farmerie is a very active chairman, providing continuous direction and leadership in all phases of RedZone’s operations. After a successful engineering and management career with Jones and Laughlin Steel, he co-founded three steel companies: MetalTech (2004), NexTech (1990), and GalvTech (1996) where he held various engineering and business management positions. The three companies were combined to form The Techs, which was later sold to The Jordan Company in 2004, where Mr. Farmerie served as president until Steel Dynamics acquired the company in 2007 for $360M. Mr. Farmerie is a board member of the University of Pittsburgh Swanson School of Engineering, where he received a B.S. Mechanical Engineering in 1968.

Brian Zolkos – Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Zolkos is responsible for directing the company’s financial and administrative organization, including treasury, IT, investor relations, and human resources. Mr. Zolkos has over 15 years of experience in finance, including 10 years with Intel Corporation where he held a variety of leadership positions in product management, technology development, capacity planning and supply chain optimization. Prior to Intel, Mr. Zolkos was a relationship manager in PNC Bank's corporate banking division. He has extensive strategic planning, financial analysis and reporting experience. Mr. Zolkos holds an M.B.A. from Carnegie Mellon University and a B.S. from Pennsylvania State University.

Scott Thayer – Chief Technology Officer
Dr. Thayer sets RedZone's technical direction. Dr. Thayer was previously a systems scientist at Carnegie Mellon University and the Director of the Subterranean Robotics Group and the Software Systems Group. His main focus is on the development of systems and sub-systems to promote the advancement of subterranean robotics including mapping and exploration in extreme environments, multi-robot coordination and Adaptive Multi-Robot, Multi-Operator Work Systems. He has published 46 technical papers and has lead several applied research projects on the field of robotics with several military contractors including Crane, General Dynamics Robotic Systems, Boeing and Lockheed Martin. He has also been awarded several funding projects from Darpa, NSF, NIOSH and Office of Naval research. He holds a BS in Electrical Engineering, an MS in Mechanical Engineering and a PhD in Electrical Engineering from the University of Tennessee.

Brian Bannon – VP, Sales and Estimating
Mr. Bannon is responsible for RedZone's sales, business development and services. Mr. Bannon brings over 17 years of business building and construction experience to the team. Previously, Mr. Bannon owned and operated a $15 Million construction company. In business seventeen years, Mr. Bannon's company has become one of the most accomplished union asbestos abatement and selective demolition contractors in the state of Connecticut. His extensive and varied experience has made the company best in class in several types of construction and field service related tasks. Mr. Bannon performed undergraduate studies at the University of Connecticut and has participated in several industry specific certification and management programs.

Phil Spano – VP, Software and Reporting
Mr. Spano directs the use of software technology throughout the entire delivery cycle and assures that RedZone provides the best possible inspection information to its customers. Before joining RedZone, he was VP of Software Development and Product Support and was a key contributor to the innovation and commercialization of many of McKesson’s products. Mr. Spano had a 15-year career at McKesson Automation in various engineering and product management positions, helping to grow the division from a Pittsburgh-based startup (Automated Healthcare) to a world leader in automated pharmacy dispensing and workflow management. He is an inventor on 6 patents.

Prior to Automated Health Care, Mr. Spano was an engineer at Duquesne Light’s nuclear power operations and at Cimflex Technowledge, a pioneering developer of factory automation solutions for high technology manufacturing. Mr. Spano graduated from Carnegie-Mellon University in 1982 with his Bachelor's in Mechanical Engineering, where he was a designer on the first direct drive manipulator robot.

William L. "Red" Whittaker – Chief Scientist
Dr. Whittaker co-founded RedZone and serves as its Chief Scientist. A world-renowned researcher and developer of mobile robots and associated components, Dr. Whittaker is the Fredkin Research Professor of Robotics at the Robotics Institute of Carnegie Mellon University. He is also Director of the Field Robotics Center, which he founded in 1986.

Dr. Whittaker has received numerous awards, including Pittsburgh's Man of the Year in Technology (1994), Carnegie Mellon's Teare Award for Teaching Excellence, and Science Digest's Top-100 U.S. Innovators, for his work in robotics (1987). He has served on several select review panels, including the National Academy of Sciences Peer Review Committee, National Research Council Commission, Aeronautics and Space Engineering Board, and National Academy of Sciences Committee.

Dr. Whittaker is a member of the Center for the Commercial Development of Space, Space Studies Institute, American Nuclear Society Robotics and Remote Systems Division, and American Association for Artificial Intelligence, of which he is a Fellow. He holds a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Princeton University, and an M.S. and a Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from Carnegie Mellon University.

Ralph Petroff – Executive Consultant
Mr. Petroff is a globally-known water systems entrepreneur who has testified as a water conservation expert 4 times before the US Congress, and has given keynote speeches at numerous water conservation conferences. He has spent the last two years in Australia and the US West and Southwest, learning how water agencies and governments deal with acute water shortages. In the process, he has visited over 100 water agencies. As co-founder and CEO, Mr. Petroff helped grow ADS Environmental Services to the worldwide market leader with 55 offices in 12 countries. ADS was sold to Swedish conglomerate Axel Johnson AB. Independent estimates show that ADS saved its clients at least $15 billion in water and wastewater construction and operation costs. He has been interviewed in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post, Newsweek, Business Week, Forbes, The Economist, the Financial Times, Christian Science Monitor, and was featured in a double cover story in USA Today. His Op-Ed columns have appeared in USA Today and regional papers. Mr. Petroff graduated (cum laude) from Stanford University in 1975.

Melinda D. Rombold – VP, Human Resources
Mrs. Rombold is responsible for the Human Resource and People Development function. Mrs. Rombold has over 15 years of human resource leadership experience in all aspects of people development and driving organizational strategy. Prior to joining RedZone she held the position of HR Director for Del Monte Foods leading integration and change efforts for the acquired Heinz business units. Before that she was HR Director for Tuscarora Incorporated, a division of SCA. In this role she partnered with senior leadership to drive rapid growth efforts via acquisition and assisted in the establishment of a progressive HR function within the organization. Mrs. Rombold holds a Master’s in Human Resource Management from St. Francis University and B.S.B.A from Robert Morris College.

RedZone is led by a balanced team of wastewater industry experts and successful executives from leading technology-based companies.

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