Team

Team

The Nano One team consists of individuals seasoned in financing, capital growth, technology management, chemistry, engineering, materials science, batteries, and intellectual property. Each member brings a unique set of skills, experience, and perspective to the team, and will help establish Nano One’s core technology as the leading platform for the global production of a new generation of battery materials.

Please click on the picture for full bio.

Dan Blondal CEO, Director & Founder

Mr. Blondal has 30+ years of experience as a professional engineer, managing high growth technology in a career that has spanned materials handling, medical devices, industrial printing, nuclear fusion and materials science. Mr. Blondal brings significant experience in systems engineering, physics and business. As Product and Technology Manager at Creo and Kodak, he led strategically vital initiatives valued at $20M annually to leverage software, laser and chemical systems for high-quality printing.

Dr. Stephen Campbell Chief Technology Officer

Dr. Stephen Campbell, PhD, CSci, CChem, MRSC Chief Technology Officer

Dr. Campbell has 25+ years of experience leading industrial automotive research in electrochemical systems. Dr. Campbell served 7 years as Principal Scientist at Automotive Fuel Cell Cooperation Corp. and, he held key roles at Ballard Power Systems as Principal Scientist and Senior Scientist between 1994 and 2008. Dr. Campbell has 20+ patents to his name and adds 20 years of hands-on experience in industrial research developing new technologies through to series production for the automotive sector. Dr. Campbell received his Ph.D. in Semiconductor Electrochemistry from the University of Southampton in 1987 and completed his BSc (Hons.) 1st class in Physical Sciences at Coventry Polytechnic in 1984.

Alex Holmes Chief Operating Officer

Mr. Holmes has spent more than 15+ years as a senior executive with a number of public companies. Most recently, he served as the CEO of Plateau Energy Metals, a public company advancing a world-class hard rock lithium project in tandem with a uranium asset in Peru. Prior to this, Mr. Holmes co-founded a technology start-up, leading it from prototype to commercialization in a short period of time, and was a partner and co-founder of Oxygen Capital Corp. where he led the business development for all affiliated companies. Mr. Holmes holds a M.Sc. in Investment Management, graduating with Distinction from The Business School, City University of London.

Dan Martino CFO and Corporate Secretary

Mr. Martino has 10+ years of experience in accounting, assurance, and financial reporting. Dan started his career providing assurance services and has now transitioned into a senior position at a firm providing contract CFO and financial reporting consulting to public venture companies.

Hamutal Ben Bassat VP Business Development

Ms. Ben Bassat is a business development executive with over 13+ years of experience enabling global growth through strategic collaborations, private investments, devising and implementing market entry strategies and business model analysis. Ms. Ben Bassat has extensive experience in the water and energy markets where she raised capital for start-ups, mature companies and international public bids. Ms. Ben Bassat holds a M.A. in Philosophy and an L.L.B. in Law. During her time practising law, she led various public offerings (TASE, NASDAQ), closed numerous International transactions and M&A activities.

Russell Barton Lead Engineer

Mr. Barton has 40+ years experience in mechanical and electrochemical systems including eighteen years designing parts and systems for fuel cell products. He was instrumental in designing Ballard Power System’s first commercial product, NEXA, taking components of the design from concept to manufactured product. Mr. Barton has worked with Energizer, Poly Fuel, Ballard and Neptune Dynamics and brings a wealth of knowledge to Nano One in energy storage, chemistry and mechanical systems. Russell is known for his innovative solutions and is credited with 40 patents in the US and foreign jurisdictions.

Robin Sweeny Program Manager

Mr. Sweeny is a Professional Engineer with over 30+ years of business-to-business marketing and product management experience in the telecommunications, information technology and material sectors. He has defined, launched and managed the life cycle for several successful products, has prospected and qualified market opportunities, executed marketing campaigns and has been an integral part in all aspects of system sales cycles.

Paul Guedes Corporate Development

Mr. Guedes has 20+ years experience as an entrepreneur, fund manager and senior executive with several public companies. He was President of a family owned construction company for over 10 years before moving to the public markets. Mr. Guedes key focus over the last 14+ years has been centered around renewable energy and climate change in industries like wind energy, wave energy, biofuels, hydrogen and carbon credits. Mr. Guedes received his Bachelor of Commerce from the Michael DeGroot School of Business at McMaster University.

Adam Johnson VP External Affairs

Mr. Johnson brings over 20+ years of experience advising corporate and government leaders. Over his career, Mr. Johnson has worked on public policy, government relations and communications for some of Canada’s leading energy, infrastructure and transportation companies as well as key associations. He has helped with large development projects, secured the support of governments and implemented effective community engagement.

Before joining Nano One, he was a senior partner at the Earnscliffe Strategies – one of Canada’s leading strategic communications and government relations firms. Mr. Johnson has worked in the Government of Canada, serving as a Director of Parliamentary Affairs to a Minister of Industry. Selected by his peers, he served as the founding President of the Public Affairs Association of Canada – BC (PAAC-BC).

Paul Matysek Chairman and Director

Paul Matysek M. SC. Chairman and Director

Serial entrepreneur, geochemist and geologist with over 40 years of experience in the mining industry. Since 2004 as CEO or Chairman, Mr. Matysek has primarily focused on the exploration, development and sale of five publicly listed companies, in aggregate worth over $2 billion. Most recently, he was Executive Chairman of Lithium X Energy Corp. which was sold to Nextview New Energy Lion Hong Kong Limited (“Nextview”) for $265 million in cash. He was awarded EY Entrepreneur of the Year for Mining & Resources in September 2018.

Dan Blondal CEO, Director & Founder

Mr. Blondal has 26 years of experience as a professional engineer, managing high growth technology in a career that has spanned materials handling, medical devices, industrial printing, nuclear fusion and materials science. Mr. Blondal brings significant experience in systems engineering, physics and business. As Product and Technology Manager at Creo and Kodak, he led strategically vital initiatives valued at $20M annually to leverage software, laser and chemical systems for high-quality printing.

Dr. Joseph Guy Director

Dr. Joseph Guy is a President of Patent Filing Specialist, Inc. and a Patent Agent focusing on complex technologies including material science, electronic components, pharmaceuticals and medical products. He has more than 23 years of experience prosecuting patents and serving as expert witness on intellectual property matters. Dr. Guy was awarded a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee in physical inorganic chemistry with a focus on organometallic complexes. Dr. Guy has authored numerous references in peer-reviewed journals and has written and prosecuted over 1000 U.S. and foreign patent applications, with more than 300 issued U.S. Patents and numerous foreign patents.

Lyle Brown Director and Audit Committee Chair

Mr. Brown is a CPA, CA and holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of British Columbia. Mr. Brown has been a partner since 1991 in the accounting firm of Culver & Co. in Vancouver, British Columbia, serving clients in a wide range of industries, and is familiar with the reporting requirements of public companies. Mr. Brown has served on numerous board of directors for both private and public companies.

Gord Kukec Lead Director

Mr. Kukec works with Senior Management to develop and implement commercial strategies as well as annual business plans. He has 30+ years experience in senior executive roles responsible for innovating and adapting commercial and IT strategy at various international Canadian corporations. Since 2010 Mr. Kukec has been an independent advisor, consultant and board member focused on how emerging environmental and information technology developments, such as climate change and cybersecurity, impact business transformation, corporate strategy and board governance. He currently sits on the board of BC Ferry Services Inc. and Solshare Energy Corp. Mr. Kukec received his BA, Economics from University of Calgary, MBA from Queen’s University, is certified in Governance of Enterprise Information Technology from ISACA (CGEIT) and is a holder of the Institute of Corporate Directors Director designation (ICD.D).

Carla Matheson Director

Ms. Matheson is a Chartered Professional Accountant (CPA, CA) with over 10 years experience in in a variety of public and private industries, specializing in business development, mergers and acquisitions and financial reporting. Ms. Matheson is currently the Chief Financial Officer of Plank Ventures Ltd., an investment company targeting investments and business opportunities in the technology arena, with a focus on early-stage start-up companies that have developed a customer and revenue base and are seeking funding for expansion. Most recently, she was Chief Financial Officer of Tiny Capital, where she was responsible for the strategic oversight of the technology-heavy portfolio. This oversight included on-boarding new acquisitions, development of core financial and operational processes as the primary point of contact for portfolio CEOs experiencing periods of high growth. Throughout her career, Ms. Matheson has been on both buy- and sell-sides having closed 30+ majority acquisitions, 50+ minority/venture type transactions, raised over $150M in capital via both debt and equity markets and deployed over $60M in capital.

Joe Lowry Strategic Advisor

Joe Lowry has 20 years experience in senior roles with leading lithium producers and an extensive network in the global cathode supply chain network. Mr. Lowry has worked for top lithium producers in the US, Japan and China, and has extensive worldwide market experience, a large contact base and a good pulse on the lithium market. Mr. Lowry is widely respected and known as one of the world’s experts in the lithium sector. After a two-decade tenure working in senior positions in leading international lithium companies, Mr. Lowry formed Global Lithium LLC as an advisory firm in 2012. Global Lithium LLC has been successfully supporting lithium producers, users, investors, hedge funds and governments.

Dr. Byron Gates Strategic Advisor

Dr. Byron Gates collaboratively assists the company in determining correlations between structure, function, and properties of new lithium ion battery materials. Dr. Gates is a Tier II Canada Research Chair in the Department Chemistry at Simon Fraser University, investigating the surface and interface chemistry of nanomaterials and is the Head of the Centre for Soft Materials in 4D LABS, a materials research institute at SFU. Dr. Gates’ work includes a series of analytical and materials studies to prepare and analyze the surface chemistries of nanostructured materials. Dr. Gates received his M.Sc. and Ph.D. from the University of Washington working with Professor Younan Xia and was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University working with Professor George M. Whitesides.

Robert Morris Strategic Advisor

Robert is the Managing Director of Morris Consulting Corporation, a consultancy and advisory firm providing services to the base metals industry. Founded in 2019, the company’s clients include top tier mining and trading companies. Robert has more than 15 years’ experience as a senior executive in the mining industry, most recently with Vale, where he was Executive Vice-President, Sales and Marketing, Base Metals. Robert was instrumental in developing Vale’s strategic direction relating to the company’s electric vehicle strategy. Specifically, how to position Vale’s vast nickel and cobalt assets towards the production of essential battery materials. While based in Tokyo he was president of Vale’s Japanese subsidiary Vale Japan Ltd., managing the company’s nickel production assets and leading the sales and business development activities covering nickel and cobalt specialty products. Prior to Vale, Robert was Managing Director at Umicore Greater China responsible for marketing Umicore’s line of cathode battery materials to the China market. Robert is also a non-executive Director at Giga Metals Corporation, a mining company, developing one of the world’s largest undeveloped nickel and cobalt sulphide deposits that is geared toward supplying the future demand for battery metals to fuel the growing electric vehicle industry.

Dr. Yuan Gao Strategic Advisor

Dr. Yuan Gao is an accomplished executive with a successful track record leading businesses throughout the lithium-ion battery supply chain. He is also a globally recognized innovator and expert in lithium-ion battery cathode materials, including LFP, NMC, LCO and LMO with 100+ patents, dozens of publications, and innovations at the core of today’s lithium-ion batteries. He is the Vice Chairman of the board of Pulead Technology, a respected producer of cathodes for lithium-ion batteries, having served as President and CEO from May 2014 to Sept 2019. In addition, Dr. Gao also serves as a member of the board of directors for Lithium Americas Corp. Previously, Dr. Gao served as Vice President at Molycorp Inc., and as Global Marketing Director and Technology Manager at FMC Corporation (USA). He completed a PhD in Physics from the University of British Columbia and did post-doctoral research on lithium metal oxides at Simon Fraser University in Professor Jeff Dahn’s laboratory. He has also completed an executive education program at The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.

Honorable Frank R. Fannon Strategic Advisor

Frank is currently the managing director of Fannon Global Advisors, a strategic advisory focused on geopolitics, the energy transition, and market transformation. He is also a non-resident senior advisor at the Center for Strategic & International Studies, non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, and a visiting senior fellow at the Center for Technology Diplomacy at Purdue.

Prior to his time at the State Department, Frank established BHP’s U.S. Corporate Affairs function as a Managing Direction and served as Chief U.S. Advisor to the BHP Foundation, focused on transparency and governance, environmental resilience, and education equity. Prior to BHP, Frank led government affairs for Murphy Oil Corporation where he facilitated new country entry in multiple regions and developed the industry’s first point-of-purchase consumer energy campaign. Previously, he served as counsel to the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, where he drafted, negotiated and helped pass key legislation. Frank also served as counsel to Senators Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R-CO) and Pete V. Domenici (R-NM).

Frank holds a J.D. from the University of Denver College of Law, M.A. in International Affairs, Economics & Trade from the University of Denver Korbel School of International Studies, and B.A. from Radford University.

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