Cody Slater founded BW Technologies in 1986, a global manufacturer of industrial and commercial gas detection devices with a product line of more than 30 unique instruments. From the Calgary head office, he grew the company’s operations to include offices throughout the world. His impact on one of the country’s fastest growing technology companies was well recognized through achievements that have garnered numerous awards including Canada’s Top 40 Under 40, Alberta’s Most Influential Top 50 People, Ernst and Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year, and the Certificate of Merit for Business Excellence by Industry, Science, and Technology Canada.
Dr. Finbow has been involved in several start-up companies as an investor, director and consultant in Canada, the U.S. and the U.K. He was a founding member of City Technology Ltd., the company that would come to be the predominant designer and manufacturer of the world’s leading range of electrochemical gas sensors. Dr. Finbow assumed the role of Chief Executive Officer in 1989 and oversaw the management buyout of the company in 1993 for $50 million. Following a successful IPO on the London Stock Exchange in 1996 with a valuation of approximately $170 million, he retired from City Technology Ltd. in 1999. Dr. Finbow served as the Chairman of BW Technologies Ltd., alongside Cody Slater, until the sale of the company to First Technology in 2004. He is a graduate from the University of London with a degree in Chemistry.
Barbara Holzapfel is a passionate executive with 20 years’ experience driving growth through marketing and innovation in startups and large enterprise businesses, and across B2B and B2C. She is currently the VP of Microsoft Education, responsible for strategy, marketing and growth of the Microsoft portfolio of devices, education experiences and cloud services for the education segment. Prior to her work with Microsoft, Barbara was Chief Marketing Officer at fintech companies Taulia and Addepar.
Previously, she was the Senior Vice President and Managing Director of SAP Labs North America, where she drove innovation strategies in Mobile, Cloud and Big Data, and incubated various new businesses. Barbara held leadership positions at SAP since 2001, serving as Senior Vice President of Portfolio Marketing, driving growth through thought leadership and Solution Marketing for SAP’s solutions portfolio for large enterprises, SMB and across Analytics, Cloud and Mobile.
Prior to joining SAP, Barbara worked as a management consultant in London and Frankfurt, after spending several years working for The Coca-Cola Company in Atlanta in Global Strategic Marketing. Barbara holds a master's degree in business administration from the Stephen M. Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan and The University of Saarbruecken, Germany.
She serves as a member of the Board of Trustees at the Anita Borg Institute and is a past Board Director of the German-American Business Association, the Silicon Valley Leadership Group (SVLG), and SVForum for Technologists and Entrepreneurs. Barbara has been recognized by German Business Magazine Capital among the “Top 40 under 40”.
Mr. Gilewich is a Chartered Accountant with over 20 years of experience in advising private companies. He was a Partner at PwC in Edmonton until 2011, when he joined the Katz Group. Mr. Gilewich is Senior Vice President, Corporate Affairs and is responsible for corporate investment across the Katz organization. He is involved in financial review and liaising with operational leaders in the pharmacy, real estate and sports & entertainment divisions.
Mr. Hayduk has been a practicing lawyer since 1978. He has worked as an associate with Smith Mack Lamarsh since 2007 and as an associate and partner with Miller Thomson LLP from 1987 to 2006. From 1981 to 1987, Mr. Hayduk was legal counsel at the Alberta Securities Commission. He was also a director of Valentine Ventures Corp., a listed capital pool corporation, from 2006 to 2010 when the qualifying transaction was completed. Mr. Hayduk was secretary of Sawtooth International Resources, a listed oil and gas company, from 1997 to 2006.
Mr. Herdman is a Fellow Chartered Accountant and was formerly a Senior Partner at PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP ("PwC") in Calgary. He worked with the firm's largest Calgary-based public clients with extensive experience in industries including manufacturing, utilities, transportation, mining, oil and gas and financial services. After a 34-year career with PwC, Mr. Herdman retired from practice in 2010. Having previously sat on a number of committees overseeing the practice of accounting in Alberta, and also as a director for a series of not for profit organizations, he currently serves on the board of directors of a number of companies. Mr. Herdman graduated with a Bachelor of Education degree from the University of Calgary.
Cody Slater founded BW Technologies in 1986, a global manufacturer of industrial and commercial gas detection devices with a product line of more than 30 unique monitors. From the Calgary headquarters, he grew the company’s operations to include offices and distribution throughout the world. His impact on one of the country’s fastest growing technology companies was well recognized through numerous awards including Canada’s Top 40 Under 40, Alberta’s Most Influential Top 50 People, Ernst and Young’s Entrepreneur of the Year and the Certificate of Merit for Business Excellence by Industry, Science, and Technology Canada.
Shane Grennan is a Canadian Chartered Professional Accountant and a Fellow of Chartered Accountants Ireland. He has a broad range of accounting, finance and audit experience in diversified industries across North America and Ireland. Prior to joining Blackline, Mr. Grennan worked as the Controller of a natural gas subsidiary of Mitsubishi Corporation and with PricewaterhouseCoopers as a Senior Manager in their audit and assurance practice. He offers a broad range of experience that includes financial reporting, performance measurement and analysis, operational efficiency identification and establishing and maintaining an internal control framework.
Sean currently holds the position of Chief Revenue Officer at Blackline Safety, where he is responsible for the generation of all revenue from product sales and recurring service revenue. He oversees teams contributing to revenue generation, including data science, product management, user experience design, sales, client success and customer care. Prior to Blackline, Sean facilitated roles in product management, project management, engineering and engineering management at BW Technologies and Honeywell, as well as designing optics solutions for a life sciences start-up. Sean received a BSc in Electrical Engineering from the University of Calgary in 2002.
Christine Gillies currently holds the position of Chief Marketing Officer at Blackline Safety, where she manages the marketing and communications programs and strategy for Blackline. She oversees the marketing teams including demand generation and marketing operations, channel marketing and brand marketing. With over 20 years of marketing experience, Christine has held a number of leadership roles with numerous rapidly growing global technology and SaaS companies. Prior to joining Blackline, Christine served as Director of Product and Client marketing for Calgary software company, Benevity. Christine was also instrumental in developing technology product strategy and roadmaps during her time at SMART technologies, where she held the role of Product Line Manager, Technology Product Management. Christine earned her MBA in International Business from the University of Calgary in 2003.
Kevin Meyers currently holds the position of Chief Operating Officer with Blackline Safety, after joining the company from his position of VP of Operations at Imaging Dynamics Corporation (IDC), a publicly listed company on the Toronto Venture Exchange. Prior to IDC, Kevin worked as the VP of Operations for BW Technologies, Ltd for 8 years. BW Technologies was formerly listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange before its acquisition by First Technology (2004) and finally Honeywell (2006). Kevin was instrumental in bringing new technologies in-house to reduce cost and improve margins on several of their product lines.
Brendon currently holds the position of Chief Partnership Officer at Blackline Safety, where he is responsible for Blackline Catalyst, a global partner program that exists to accelerate growth and innovation as enterprises around the world transform digitally. He co-founded Blackline Safety in 2004 and has supported its early growth as a technology leader, and in recent years, oversaw its marketing communication programs. Prior to Blackline, Brendon worked for Calgary-based CSI Wireless (now Hemisphere GNSS). As its Product and Marketing Manager, he developed relationships with various international organizations and managed the company’s precision product portfolio. Brendon was awarded a B.Sc. in Geomatics Engineering from the University of Calgary in 1996.
Barry Moore currently holds an executive position as Vice President of Product Development, and has been responsible for bringing the entire suite of Blackline products to market as well as the design and operation of the Blackline Safety Network infrastructure that delivers Blackline’s service offerings. He has also served as Vice President of Product Development for BW Technologies, Ltd., formerly listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange prior to its acquisition. Mr. Moore holds a diploma in Industrial Design from Fanshawe College in London Ontario and is the recipient of an Ernest C. Manning Award for Innovation.
Gavin is the Managing Director for Blackline Safety Europe, and has been active in the world of safety and gas detection for 30 years. He has worked with companies such as City Technology, Det-Tronics, Crowcon, Alphasense, BW Technologies and GfG Europe. Gavin holds a BSc. In Applied Chemistry from Leicester Polytechnic (now DeMontfort University).
Glen Silver currently holds the position of VP Sales, North America at Blackline Safety, where he is responsible for all new sales and Blackline’s distribution network. He is responsible for the overall growth strategy of the North American sales organization and the execution of Blacklines go-to-market plan. Prior to joining Blackline in 2018, Glen held progressively senior leadership roles with Newell-Rubbermaid, W.W. Grainger and Compass Group PLC where he led high performing sales teams to consistently deliver strong revenue growth. Glen received a B.Comm degree in marketing from the University of Calgary.
Andrea Lamond currently holds the position of Director, Sales Enablement at Blackline Safety, where she is responsible for the strategic direction of teams that provide information, content, tools and processes that help salespeople sell more effectively. These teams include Demand Generation & Marketing Operations, Sales Development, Channel Management, Sales Engineering, Contracts Management, and Customer Care & Service. Prior to Blackline, Andrea held production and process engineering roles in oil and gas production and field operations at Encana Corporation. Andrea received a BSc in Chemical & Biological Engineering from the University of British Columbia.
Sherrie currently holds the title of Director of Global Safety Operations. Sherrie started her career in the Courier industry at Purolator Courier where she was the Senior Manager of the Collections and Customer Service team for Western Cda and coached a large team of call center agents. She won various company nominated Tour de Force awards over her years for her commitment to Customer Service and ongoing support to internal Sales teams. Her career later took her into the Advertising industry with Telus Advertising which then became part of the Eastern based Yellowpages Group. There she held various Senior Sales Management positions coaching Sales teams to continual double digit growth where she won numerous awards including 7 years of Presidents club. Coaching successful and motivated teams with a focus on efficiencies and continued growth are Sherrie’s daily driving motivators.
Kirk Johnson is Blackline’s Director, Product Management where he overlooks Blackline’s complete suite of cloud-connected products and services. Kirk and his team work to ensure that Blackline remains at the forefront of connected worker innovation as enterprises around the world transform digitally and increasingly adopt cloud-connected technology. Prior to working at Blackline, he designed personal gas detection instrumentation at BW Technologies by Honeywell. Kirk received a BSc in Electrical Engineering from the University of Calgary.
Mark Haylett is Blackline’s Operations Director for Europe. Based at our Colchester facility in the UK, Mark heads up the European teams for Operations, QA, Customer Care, Sales Engineering, Service, Deployment, Onboarding, Compliance and Training. He joined Blackline in 2018 as one of our first UK Regional Sales Managers with over 20 years’ experience in the safety industry, in sales, operations, training and technology. From there he became our European Product Marketing Manager, using his expert product knowledge to define new product sales targets and drive their successful launch into the market. His focus now is on refining our operations model, people and processes to meet customer demand as we continue our strong growth trajectory in Europe.
Phil Benson is Blackline Safety’s Director of User Experience. He and his team are responsible for the design of product and service interfaces, customer support material, training and Blackline’s employee experience. Phil is an industrial designer who has designed industry-leading safety products for BW Technologies by Honeywell, plus interactive learning and collaborative products for SMART Technologies. His focus at Blackline is to lead unified user experiences that tell a story, build confidence through thoughtful designs and increase brand loyalty. His team continually pushes the envelope of what’s possible for connected safety user experiences in the industrial safety industry.
Rob Herring currently serves as Director of Operations at Blackline Safety. Unlike many businesses in North America, Blackline has in-sourced its manufacturing operations, using a lean philosophy. With over 20 years of operational management and supply chain experience, Rob oversees the manufacturing, supply chain and logistics departments. Having been with Blackline for eight years, Rob previously held positions with local tech companies Imaging Dynamics and SMART Technologies.
Ryan Fernandez leads Blackline Safety’s Enterprise IT to provide secure, cost effective, reliable and integrated technology solutions to expand business value within the organization and to its customers. Having worked in IT for over 20 years, he brings a broad array of experience from a diverse group of industries including airports, telecommunications, transportation, education and oil & gas. Having started two successful companies, Ryan has an entrepreneurial style that lends itself to quick agility and adaptation, while keeping perspective on budgets. He holds several accreditations in the field of technology including from the University of Calgary, University of Southern California, University of Phoenix and Calgary’s SAIT.
John Moura currently holds the position of Director of Software Operations & Development at Blackline Safety where he is responsible for directing software teams, leading software innovation and driving platform capabilities and reliability to further support end customers. Prior to Blackline, John led software development organizations for companies including Pason Systems, ShawCor and SMART Technologies. John teaches Project Management and Agile at University of Calgary and received a Bsc in Mathematics from University of Rio de Janeiro.
Neil Campbell is Blackline’s Director of International Sales & Marketing, focusing on developing business and cultivating distribution throughout international markets, including Latin America, Africa, Middle East, Asia and Australia. He brings over 30 years of experience in international sales and gas detection, having worked with Envent Engineering, Boreal Laser, BW Technologies by Honeywell and BW Technologies. Neil was awarded a B.Comm degree in Marketing from the University of Alberta.
