Stephan Arendt
SAP
Stephan Arendt has been working as a Senior Business Consultant in the Retail space at SAP since 2009.

Primarily his focus has been in the areas of forecasting, pricing software and the analysis of mass data. During the course of an experience spanning over ten years in the retail sector, Stephan has analyzed, enhanced and optimized a number of data-driven software systems from a technical as well as business perspective. He developed a new price optimization system for one of the leading German department stores operating in the fashion and non-fashion segments.

Prior to his work at SAP, Stephan had co-founded and worked as a managing director at Forseason GmbH, a software company specialized in forecasting, disposition and pricing systems. He engaged at the time in several projects as a freelancer.

Stephan holds a degree in Economical Mathematics (Diplom) from the Technical University in Berlin.

He obtained the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in December, 2011.

Bharat Arora
Colt
Bharat is currently an Associate Senior Pricing Manager at Colt, Europe’s leading information delivery platform headquartered in London, UK. His prime responsibilities focus on leading pricing process improvements, globally implementing and supporting strategic pricing initiatives, creating pricing awareness and discipline with the objective of improving price performance across the organization.

With his passionate contribution of almost 6 years at Colt, the business has developed an increased awareness and focus on pricing, as not only a discipline but also as a strategic business lever; resulting in process improvements and strategies that have contributed in improved performance. He has also expanded his expertise in the area of costs and their allocation methods which enable him to drive and implement a sustainable cost collation, definition, apportionment, governance and methodology across Colt’s product portfolio.

Bharat has 8 years of pricing experience with particular expertise within the telecom industry. His hands-on experience in market research, strategic planning and pricing gives him a sound understanding of the relationship between corporate functions and their unique place in the pricing equation. Prior to his work in pricing, Bharat had experience of working in finance and stock broking. Academically, he is a Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) with a background in Commerce.

In his free time, Bharat enjoys travelling and reading the Bible.

Bharat obtained the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in October, 2011.

Ravikant Avva
Siemens

Oren Azar
Walgreens
Oren is currently Divisional Vice President, Contracting & Pricing Strategy, at Walgreens, the largest retail pharmacy chain in the United States.

Marcos Barros
Profit Solutions Consulting
Marcos Barros is one of the partners and the Development Director at Profit Solutions Consulting in Brazil. He is responsible for identifying and developing price strategies and initiatives for our customers, improve efficiency and effectiveness in the price management process, and the development of pricing best practices. He is also responsible for the development and delivery of pricing-related training.

 

Before returning from the UK to Brazil in 2010, Marcos worked for more than 20 years with large corporations in Europe providing training and consulting services. As an IT professional, delivered cutting edge network technology training in 9 different countries for major companies like AT&T, BSKYB (The British branch of SKY television) and Easynet. His holds a Masters degree in Computer Science and a degree in Electrical Engineering, both from the Federal University of Uberlandia, Brazil. Marcos also has four years of experience as a University Lecturer and a strong passion for seeing businesses and people being transformed through education.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in 2011.

Alexandre Benites
Anheuser-Busch Inbev
Alexandre Benites, CPP, has 16 years of international experience (Brazil & US) in Corporate Finance and Revenue Management/ Pricing Strategy, working for multinational companies such as FedEx, The Coca-Cola Company and Anheuser-Busch Inbev. International projects also include a strategic M&A in Belgium, supplier annual negotiation in Chile and price strategy for new service implementation in Mexico.

As the Manager, Pricing Promotions at Anheuser Busch Inbev, main responsibilities include optimize price promotions considering discount depth, competitive response, price pack curve and return on investment. In addition, he tracks promotion performance based on share impact, volume lift and margin contribution.

Alex holds a MBA in International Management at Thunderbird School of Global Management (US), Executive MBA in Finance at IBMEC Business School (Brazil) and a Bachelor of Arts in Economics (Brazil). He is also Fluent in English, Spanish and Portuguese.

He is a member of the Professional Pricing Society and achieved designation as a Certified Pricing Professional from the Professional Pricing Society in December 2011.

Theodore T. Bills
GE
Ted Bills is GE Energy’s Smart Grid Software Pricing Leader (Global) and has been a member of GE Energy’s Pricing team since 2008. Prior to his GE Energy roles, Ted participated in ECLP, which is Jeff Immelt’s Sales & Marketing Leadership Program for high potential sales and marketing professionals. This program entails significant training and challenging assignments across four businesses in two years. He earned this opportunity following his full time MBA program at the University of Virginia.

Before grad school, Ted was in outside sales as a hunter in the telecom industry. Starting at the bottom and cold-calling 100% of the time, he became successful due to persistence, effort, and gaining referrals. However, he returned to grad school because the telecom’s industry collapse significantly reduced the product offering to sell. He worked as a CPA for Ernst & Young before his successful sales career and after earning an undergraduate degree from the University of Notre Dame.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in September of 2011.

Michael Crouch
ARDEX Americas
Michael Crouch is Vice President & Chief Marketing Officer for ARDEX Americas, a manufacturer of high performance engineered cements and specialty adhesives for the building products and flooring industry. As part of his overall leadership role, Mike is the leader of the pricing strategy and implementation team, with the goal of designing and implementing value-based and premium pricing programs that support the overall ARDEX business strategy.

 

Mike lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and has more than 25 years experience in the building materials and flooring industry. He has gained extensive experience in general management and development and implementation of business strategy, both in the U.S. and internationally. He is a graduate of Arizona State University, with continuing education programs at the Center For Creative Leadership and GAP International.

 

Mike achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Spring of 2011.

Dries Debbaut
PWC
Dries is an experienced professional in the area of profitability management. He built his project knowledge in four domains: commercial profitability, product portfolio management, working capital optimization and pricing. His clients are well-known companies from a variety of industries including Building, Food & Beverages, Pharmaceuticals and Manufactured Goods.

During the last years, he became a supporter of the theory that profitability should be managed from an integrated perspective not neglecting cross-departmental interactions. Linking customer and product profitability through a transparent improvement platform should support a shared growth path for both commercial and operational functions. While advising his clients on how to implement this vision, Dries focuses on the different aspects of change management as those still define the success of an improvement track.

Dries lives in Belgium and earned a master’s degree in Applied Economics and a master’s degree in Operations and Information Management from Ghent University. Additionally, he holds a master in Financial Management from Vlerick Management School. Dries is certified in Production and Inventory Management (Apics) and obtained a Black Belt in Lean Six Sigma (University of Amsterdam). He is a member of the Professional Pricing Society and the Finance Vlerick Alumni Association since 2007.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Winter of 2011.

Brian G. Duke
BlueScope Buildings NA
Brian Duke, CPP, is Pricing Manager-Developing Products for BlueScope Buildings NA, a global leader in the metal building manufacturing industry headquarted in Kansas City, MO.

 

Brian has 27 years experience in the metal building industry having worked in engineering, information systems, marketing and finance as a business/product analyst and senior product specialist. He has spent the last 11 years developing, analyzing, and managing product pricing. Brian’s pricing experience includes managing systems pricing and component pricing, developing new product pricing as well as analyzing the results of pricing decisions. Most recently, Brian has played a key role in aligning and integrating pricing systems and policies for multiple business units recently acquired by BlueScope.

 

In 2005, with strong support from a senior finance manager, Brian worked with Information Systems and the Division Pricing Manager to develop and implement a custom built pricing application tied directly to an Oracle 11i ERP system. The new system provided an efficient tool with which to test, set and adjust product prices. In 2009, after BlueScope acquired additional businesses, Brian’s team was again asked to expand this pricing technology to work with the products of the new firms. He supports three business units; Butler Manufacturing Company, VP Buildings, and HCI Building Systems.

 

Brian is a member of the Professional Pricing Society and achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation in May 2011.

Matthew Earl
Walgreens
Matthew Earl is currently a Market Segment Pricing Manager for Walgreens, working as a pivotal collaboration resource between the Health Plan Sales Team and the Pricing Organization. Walgreens is the nation's largest drugstore chain with fiscal 2010 sales of $67 billion, operating 7,742 drugstores in all 50 states, the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico.

While working with Walgreens for nearly 7 years, Matthew has contributed to the business via complimentary roles within the Operations, Operations Analysis and Improvement, and Pricing organizations. Matthew joined Walgreens via the Option Care acquisition in 2008, having first worked within an Option Care franchise in Carmel, IN.

Prior to his current experience with the Major Chain Retail Drug and Home Infusion markets, Matthew was a pharmacy technician for more than 3 years within a Regional Hospital System, and a pharmacy technician for more than 7 years with a family owned independent community pharmacy.

Matthew has a Bachelor’s Degree of Science in Psychology and a Minor in Economics from the Purdue School of Science at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis. He is an active volunteer for the Indianapolis Sports Corporation, serving roles for NCAA Women’s and Men’s Final Fours, and is looking forward to serving on the volunteer force for Super Bowl XLVI. Matthew is an ongoing participant in the Big10 Hoops Day experience and a participant in several organized athletic leagues. Matthew currently lives in Buffalo Grove, IL.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in the summer of 2011.

Wolfgang Eger
Novozymes
Wolfgang Eger works in Malaysia as Novozymes’ Industry Sales Manager for the Asia Pacific region. With over 15 years of marketing and sales experience, Wolfgang has a wealth of experiences that enable him to develop realistic and achievable pricing strategies. Wolfgang has lived and worked in 8 countries in North America, Europe and Asia, providing him with unique international insights from which he can create and improve pricing processes that truly work for a global company.

Wolfgang regularly trains sales teams to prepare for the implementation of price increases and for specific customer negotiations. The success rates witnessed after his coaching sessions are impressive!

Besides his current sales role, Wolfgang is the Asia Pacific pricing representative within Novozymes. In this function he is responsible for the role-out and implementation of all pricing activities in the Asia Pacific region, and for regional feedback to HQ. Working for a future-focused company also means that Wolfgang has specialized in price setting for revolutionary products, structuring of pricing models, value calculation and value pricing. Wolfgang is one of the few Certified Pricing Professionals currently residing in Asia.

He is a member of the Professional Pricing Society and achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation in Winter 2011.

Ward Elhard
Suncor Energy
Ward Elhard is currently the Director, National Pricing for Suncor Energy, Canada’s premier integrated energy company. In his role, Ward and his team are responsible for developing and managing the pricing tactics, processes, and strategies for Suncor’s Retail and Wholesale businesses that operate under the Petro-Canada brand in Canada, and the companies retail facilities in Colorado that operate under the Shell and Conoco-Phillips brands.

During the six years that he has been in the role, Ward has ingrained a disciplined; process based approach to pricing across all sales channels and has driven alignment around pricing strategies and processes across the organization that has helped to create significant incremental value for the company.

Over his 30 year career, Ward has worked across all areas of the downstream Petroleum business with Suncor and predecessor companies Petro-Canada and Gulf Canada, including roles in Sales, Marketing and Strategic Planning.

Ward has a Bachelor of Commerce degree form the University of Calgary and has completed the Ivey Executive Development Program at the University of Western Ontario.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in the winter of 2011.

Jean-Jacques Enger
SODEXO
To make everyday a better day, Sodexo designs, manages and implements comprehensive service solutions through On-Site Service Solutions and Motivation Solutions across a total of 80 countries throughout the world.

As a part of the Marketing Department in France, he is responsible for training, improving and sharing best pricing practices and helping business units in setting prices.

The PPS workshops and seminars have helped him move towards this goal.

He holds a Master Degree in Management from ISC, School of Management in Paris, France. He lives near Paris, France where he enjoys spending time with his family and playing tennis.

He has been a member of the Professional Pricing Society since 2010 and completed his Certified Pricing Professional designation in February 2012.

Fátima Fagnani
Syngenta Brazil
Fátima Fagnani is the Pricing Operations Manager for the Syngenta Brazil, located in São Paulo, Brazil. Her responsibilities currently focus on locally implementing and developing strategic pricing initiatives with the goal of improving price performance. Under her leadership the business is developing an awareness and focus on pricing as not only a discipline but as a strategic business lever; resulting in process improvements under a Syngenta Global Pricing Program initiative.

 

Fátima has over 15 years experience in Finance function being 11 years at Syngenta, whose position before Pricing Manager was as a Business Controller. She is graduated in Business (1994), post-graduate degree in Economical and Finance Administration (1996) and MBA in Financial and Actuarial Administration at São Paulo University – USP (1998). In her free time Fátima is volunteer in helping homeless people from São Paulo downtown.

 

She has been a member of PPS since 2010 and achieved her Certified Pricing Professional designation in 2011.

Andy Fox
Walgreens
Andy Fox is currently the Manager of Pricing Strategy at Walgreens in Deerfield, IL. Andy is responsible for developing and managing the pricing strategy for all segments of Walgreens' pharmacy business. Andy has 6+ of pricing experience in strategy and implementation. Prior to joining Walgreens, Andy was a Strategy Consultant in Accenture’s Pricing & Profit Optimization practice.

 

He focused primarily in retail industry, but also supported clients in the consumer goods, financial services, nonprofit, communications, government, and healthcare industries. Andy has a Bachelor’s degree in Economics and Political Science from Northwestern University in Evanston, IL and currently lives in Chicago, IL.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Spring 2011.

Jim Geisman
Software Pricing Partners
Jim Geisman is Founder and Principal of Software Pricing Partners. The firm was started in 1982 and, since 1987, has focused solely on developing software pricing models. (More information can be found at the firm’s website, www.SoftwarePricing.com.)

 

Since then, Jim has helped many emerging and established software companies solve some of their toughest pricing problems. Most recently, his company is helping a number of established and emerging software companies make the transition to the on-demand (SaaS) pricing model. He has also helped a number of companies price, structure and negotiate their “big deals”.

 

Before founding Software Pricing Partners, he held marketing management positions at Tektronix and served as the first director of marketing at Apollo Computer.

 

He was also a member of the ARPANET team at Bolt Beranek and Newman where he performed throughput testing of the forerunner of the Internet. He also chaired the Start-Up Clinic activity at the MIT Enterprise Forum of Cambridge for ten years. He has written extensively on software pricing, is widely quoted in the trade press and has also consulted internationally on issues of software pricing and deal structuring.

 

Jim has been a co-founder, director, advisor or mentor to early stage companies. He sits on the Board of the Professional Pricing Society. He holds BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering from Tufts University where he was elected to Eta Kappa Nu, the EE honor society. He also holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Spring 2011.

Henry Greek
Baker Hughes, Inc.
Henry Greek is currently the Pricing Systems Manager for the Completions and Production product line of Baker Hughes, Inc. Henry joined Baker Hughes in 1996 and has spent most of his career in the Pricing Group working on both price administration and pricing strategy.

 

During the course of his career Henry has been actively involved in the development of every major pricing software used by the Baker Hughes Completions product line, including heading the Pricing portion of the product line ERP implementation for the and acting as project manager for the product line Pricing Analytics software implementation. In his current role, Henry leads the team responsible for producing price books and maintaining both list pricing and transfer pricing in the SOR, in close cooperation with the Pricing Strategy Team, Regional Tender Groups, contract administrators, Regional Sales and Marketing Teams, and Corporate Tax (for transfer pricing).

 

Henry is a native Houstonian and received both his BA and his Masters degree from the University of Houston. He has been a member of the Professional Pricing Society since 2007 and completed his Certified Pricing Professional designation in 2011.

 

Prior to joining Baker Hughes, Henry was a History instructor at the University of Houston and continues his interest in History in his spare time.

Hillary Gretton
BD Biosciences
Hillary Gretton is a Pricing Analyst with BD Biosciences. Hillary has been with BD Biosciences for six years and has served in a variety of roles and departments, beginning with Customer Service. By combining this experience with database design, project and change management, and pricing, Hillary has assisted with the successful design and implementation of a segment-wide strategic pricing roadmap. Her daily responsibilities include managing pricing agreements through their lifespan and ensuring departments’ compliance to established discount and pricing guidelines. Hillary is also an SAP Business Information Warehouse (BW) super user and is responsible for building queries for transactional activity data and training California associates obtaining user and super user status.

 

Hillary holds a B.S. in Business Administration from the University of Redlands, California. Her hobbies include reading and computer-related geekery. She achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Spring 2011.

Adrian Grigorita, CPP
Caterpillar
Adrian Grigorita, CPP, is the Machine Pricing Operations Manager for Caterpillar in the Europe, Africa and the Middle East regions. Adrian leads a team of 17, with activities ranging from the Annual Price Plan and Sales Budget management to Strategic deal support and discounting process execution.

He has been with Caterpillar for over 10 years, in a variety of roles – Product Business Analyst, Industry Sales Representative, Strategic deals and Value Estimation consultant. Adrian has an MA in International Economics, from the Graduate Institute of International Studies (HEI), in Geneva, Switzerland. His focus was microeconomics, with advanced research on discrete choice demand models.

He has an extensive international background, having lived and worked in several countries.

Adrian has achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in February 2012.

Michelle Griffith
ProBuild Holdings
Michelle Griffith is currently the Director of Pricing at ProBuild Holdings, the nation’s largest supplier of building materials to national builders, local contractors and do-it-yourselfers. In this role, she is developing a new pricing team charged with instituting pricing guidelines, providing sales support, and identifying margin opportunities in local markets across the United States.

Prior to joining ProBuild, Michelle spent ten years in various pricing roles in the high tech industry. In addition to driving effective pricing strategies, she has developed corporate pricing processes and policies, implemented effective pricing analytics, and led pricing automation initiatives. In her leadership role at a satellite imagery company, Michelle introduced the concept of value based pricing, developing new product pricing models designed to increase margins by aligning pricing with customer value. She takes a special interest in sales support and believes building solid business partnerships and rapport with the field is critical to the success of any pricing strategy. She has spent significant time educating product management, sales teams, and executive management on the benefits provided by value based pricing approach.

Michelle holds a Bachelors degree in Finance from the University of Colorado at Boulder and a Masters in Business Administration from Regis University.

Alan Henderson
Siemens Energy, Inc.
Alan Henderson is a Pricing Analyst with Siemens Energy, based in Orlando, FL. His goal is to apply value based pricing strategies to the service parts division. His responsibilities include implementing pricing tools, developing pricing strategies for various product families and communicating the value of these strategies to key stakeholders.

Alan has worked for Siemens Energy since 2001 in a variety of roles. Prior to joining the pricing team, he worked as a customer analyst administering and analyzing customer satisfaction surveys.

Alan holds an MBA and BS in Business Administration from the University of Florida. He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) designation through the Professional Pricing Society™ in March 2012.

Thornton James
Rollins, Inc.
Thornton James, CPP (Certified Pricing Professional), is currently serving as Senior Pricing Analyst at Rollins, Inc., parent company of Orkin Pest Control, LLC and other subsidiary Pest Control Service companies. His responsibilities include: Development of Commercial B2B Pricing Strategy, Residential Pricing Strategy Implementation, Development of Key Performance Indicators related to Pricing Initiatives for Executive Management and maintenance and continued development of Pricing Technology Resources.

 

Prior to joining Rollins, Thornton was a Project Manager at an Atlanta-based venture capital firm where he led a number of projects including the development of a Sales Inventory Tracking System which bridged data from multiple sources in order to calculate sales commissions for sales representatives at a Financial Services startup. He also gained valuable operations experience while he managed a team as they conducted an inventory of a film library valued at $8 million.

 

Prior to this experience, Thornton worked a stint in Human Resources Consulting specializing in Defined Benefit Pension Plans. While in consulting, Thornton administered pension plans of companies with combined revenue of over $11.5 Billion.

 

Thornton earned his B.B.A. in Finance from Georgia State University. It is also noteworthy to mention that Thornton was a National Achievement Scholarship Finalist.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in February 2011.

Siddhartha Jariwala (Sid)
Vistaar Technologies
Siddhartha Jariwala (Sid) is currently working as Principal Business Consultant at Vistaar Technologies, an innovator of price and revenue management solutions. Vistaar’s pricing software enables companies to achieve pricing best practices through price analytics, price optimization, price list management, and deal management.

 

He has more than 12 years of experience of which more than 7 years has been in the area of Data Analytics and Business Research applied to pricing solutions in Industrial (B2B) domain like Electrical/ Electronics/ Lighting Products, Home Appliances, Resins, Industrial/Medical Equipment etc. Apart from this, Sid has over 5 years of Process Engineering, Product Development, and Quality Systems Implementation experience in the core engineering and manufacturing domain.

 

Prior to joining Vistaar, Sid worked for more than seven years with Genpact (earlier known as GE Capital) at its Bangalore based Analytics Center of Excellence in a service delivery role requiring operations and customer relationship management. He led a team of 30+ associates and consultants on a variety of analytics projects requiring expertise in statistics/ statistical modeling, business research and heuristics based analytical tools. Sid provided leadership to the organizational efforts for development of pricing competency which included pricing training, knowledge management and solution development in pricing domain.

 

Sid holds a Mechanical Engineering (B.E.) degree from Delhi College of Engineering (DCE) and has done MBA with an emphasis on Marketing & Finance from IIT Delhi. Sid is also a Certified ISO 9000 Quality Systems Auditor and is 6-Sigma DMAIC Green Belt Certified.

 

Sid achieved his CPP designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Jan 2011.

Steve Kemp
NIBCO Inc
Steve Kemp has 15 years of B2B pricing experience in various industries including online information services, financial self-service, information systems infrastructure, and industrial manufacturing.

 

Currently Steve is Director of Pricing & Profitability for NIBCO INC. He accepted this newly created position in 2008 and established a pricing function for the company. As a pricing leader Steve has worked in the areas of price strategy, bid desk operations, policy development, price analytics, global pricing, and Vendavo pricing software implementation. He also has experience in financial planning & analysis, forecasting, financial modeling, and supply chain management. Prior to attending business school he practiced as a licensed structural engineer.

 

Steve has a BS from the State University of New York at Buffalo and an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business where he was named George Hay Brown Marketing Scholar.

 

Steve is a Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) and a Certified Management Accountant (CMA). He resides in Indiana with his wife and two children.

YongHyun Kim
Syngenta
YongHyun Kim, CPP, has been employed at Syngenta AG for 4 years taking on Pricing Operations and Project Management Officer.

Korean Syngenta Young Talent is the proven passionate strategic management officer with Pricing capabilities, Performance analytics, Balanced ScoreCard(BSC) in commercial and financial perspectives.

He implemented Pricing Operations beyond silos (Marketing, Sales, Finance, and IS) and has been supporting other countries' Pricing projects: Brazil, China, India, Japan, Indonesia, Thailand. Based on his previous 3 years IT programming and 2 years Project Management experience, he can accelerate Pricing Journey in South Korea among 90 countries at Syngenta.

He studied International MBA in Food and Agribusiness at Royal Agricultural College, UK and BS of Civil Engineering in Yonsei University, Seoul. He owned Sun Certified Java Programmer and 2010 KR BSC Best Practitioner too. He is still looking forward to his sustainable career path in Food, FMCG, Pricing Consultancy at Asian Market.

YongHyun obtained the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in 2011.

Erin Kusmiesz
Johnson & Johnson
Erin Kusmiesz is the Strategic Pricing Manager for the Skin Care Business in Johnson & Johnson.

Since March 2011, Erin has been focused on establishing in-house pricing capabilities and optimizing pricing strategies. Erin joined Johnson & Johnson in 2000 as a member of the Financial Leadership Development Program (FLDP). After completing FLDP in 2002, she held various Finance positions at Janssen before promotion to Financial Manager, Sales & Marketing at Ortho-McNeil in 2004.

In 2007, Erin joined the Consumer group as Finance Manager, Global Supply Chain. Erin earned a BS in Accounting and MBA from Rider University.

She is a Certified Management Accountant (CMA) and achieved the Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) designation from the Professional Pricing Society in November 2011.

Bogie Kim
USSA
Bogie Kim is currently the Pricing Lead for the Enterprise Underwriting & Pricing Advanced Analytics team at USAA, a Fortune 200 financial services company serving the military and their families. In his role, he is responsible for managing pricing and product optimization efforts across multiple lines of business from insurance to banking. Organizing and driving cross-functional teams from product management to marketing and pricing functions are a core component to his position while also championing analytic innovation and pricing fundamentals within the heart of the organization.

Prior to USAA, Bogie spent 7+ years as an officer in the United States Air Force. He began his career as a physicist performing research in LADAR technology, and managing systems advancement projects in support of munitions guidance. He then moved on as a modeling and simulation analyst testing various scenarios involving electronic warfare operations. He was later selected to manage an IT operations team supporting high-powered computational analyses.

Bogie graduated from the University of Portland, Oregon with a Bachelor of Science degree in Physics. He is currently blessed with a loving wife and 3 wonderful children.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in the fall of 2011.

David Kergoat
Stikeman Elliott LLP
David Kergoat is a Management Analyst with Stikeman Elliott LLP. Stikeman Elliott LLP is one of Canada's leading business law firms, with offices in Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa, Calgary and Vancouver as well as in London, New York and Sydney.

 

David has over 4 years of experience in the legal services with a strong emphasis on financial analysis, project management and revenue management. In line with the emerging trends in the legal services industry, David has created an automated profitability calculation tool and developed Project Management tools and methodology within the organization. He also improved discounts approval process management and discounts monitoring.

 

He is currently working at developing the pricing and revenue management functions within the organization. Thanks to his implication in efficiency initiatives, internal restructuration projects and financial background, David has an excellent understanding of the relationship between corporate functions and their place in the pricing equation.

 

Prior to his experience in the legal services industry in Canada, David worked as a Team Leader at Hertz Europe Financial Headquarter in Dublin, Ireland, and got recognized for his leadership and creativity (Best Team Leader of the European market in 2007).

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Spring, 2011.

Artur Kocharyan
Sophos Inc
Artur Kocharyan is a Product Manager at Sophos Inc, based in Oxford, UK. Trusted by more than 100 million users in 150 countries, Sophos is a global leader in security and data protection.

 

Artur has over 15 years of experience in high tech industry including more than 10 years in global product management at leading Information Technology companies.

 

Artur’s current responsibilities include pricing strategy. Artur holds MBA from INSEAD, France and Diploma in Computer Science from State Engineering University, Armenia.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in April, 2011.

Michael Krämer
Evonik Industries AG
Michael Krämer is currently working as Business Coach at Evonik Industries’ Marketing & Sales Excellence in Hanau, Germany. He graduated as Chemical Engineer at the University of Karlsruhe and started with Evonik in 1999. Prior to his current assignment he had been working for Evonik in R&D, process technology, engineering and project management.

Evonik, the creative industrial group from Germany, is one of the world leaders in specialty chemicals. Its activities focus on the key megatrends health, nutrition, resource efficiency and globalization. In 2010 about 80 percent of the Group’s chemicals sales came from activities where it ranks among the market leaders. Evonik benefits specifically from its innovative prowess and integrated technology platforms. Evonik is active in over 100 countries around the world. In fiscal 2010 more than 34,000 employees generated sales of around €13.3 billion and an operating profit (EBITDA) of about €2.4 billion.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) designation from the Professional Pricing Society in February 2012.

John Kutcher
Fiserv
John Kutcher is Vice President of Strategic Pricing for Fiserv. Known for his good rapport with Sales and Product Management, he has helped his companies drive bottom-line results, improving revenue and profits. John has built and led the pricing function at companies and has set pricing strategies, conducted primary pricing research, and created proprietary pricing tools that have streamlined operations.

 

He has coached and led pricing managers and pricing analysts. John has priced for Fortune 500 Companies and for both U.S. and International markets. Winning complex multi-million dollar agreements, he has leveraged internal systems to optimize contribution margins, mined public sources for market price intelligence, and has advised executives on price setting and value capture.

 

Prior to Fiserv, John spent twelve years in pricing for FIS (Fidelity National Information Services, Inc.), Metavante Technologies and the Marshall and Ilsley Corporation (BMO Financial Group).

 

He holds a Bachelor’s degree from Marquette University and studied pricing strategy and tactics at the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business and the University of Wisconsin-Madison School of Business. He has been recognized by the American Marketing Association as a Professional Certified Marketer (PCM) and is a Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) and member of the Professional Pricing Society.

Ben Mack
ARDEX Americas
Ben Mack is the Director of Marketing for ARDEX Americas (Aliquippa, PA), a global leader in the development and manufacture of high-performance building products providing consistent solutions to the most complex installation problems for substrate preparation, flooring installation, tile installation, concrete moisture remediation, decorative finishes and concrete repair systems.

With over 20 years in the building materials industry and serving ARDEX since 2003, Ben is responsible for New Product Development and Introduction Process (NPI) for ARDEX Americas. He also directs and guides the Marketing, Communications, Product Segment and Business Development teams while also acting as the Global Corporate Unit lead for Key Account Management. Prior to his current role, Ben has held positions managing National Accounts, Segment Selling, Architectural Services and Contractor Loyalty.

Ben is a graduate of the University of Pittsburgh, with continuing education programs at GAP International (Philadelphia, PA) and the University of Chicago, Booth School of Business where he holds a certificate in Strategic Marketing Management.

Ben has also achieved the certification of Concrete Field Testing Technician Grade 1 through the American Concrete Institute (ACI). In addition, he is a local and national member of the Construction Specification Institute (CSI) and has conducted numerous technical presentations as a continuing education provider for the American Institute of Architects (AIA).

Ben achieved the Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) designation through the Professional Pricing Society™ in December 2011.

Jana Blazevic Marcelja
STeP Ri
Jana Blazevic Marcelja is a business consultant for STeP Ri, a company established by the University of Rijeka in order to facilitate the commercialization of research & development created within the scientific community and to foster cooperation between the Academia and the business sector.

Prior to joining STeP Ri, Jana served as a product manager at Kvarner Vienna Insurance Group – a company founded by the County of Rijeka and then taken over by Wiener Städtische Allgemeine Versicherung A.G. (afterwards Vienna Insurance Group), one of the strongest European insurance companies. She was one of the developers of two complementary IT software projects: one for the accounting and technical departments and one for the sales department (internet application). She has been the project manager for several important company projects having responsibility for both their coordination and the organization of the legal framework for their realization.

Jana has a BA of Economics from the Faculty of Economics. She has completed several trainings including a Professional Training held in Wiener Städtische Allgemeine Versicherung AG from May to July 2003.

Megan McAvoy, CPP
Johnson Controls
Megan McAvoy, CPP, is part of the Finance and Accounting Rotational Program at Johnson Controls for their Building Efficiency business based out of Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The rotational program challenges young professionals by placing them in five different roles over a two and a half year period.

Megan is currently half way through the program leading a transition team in Europe. Johnson Controls delivers products, services and solutions that increase energy efficiency and lower operating costs in buildings for more than one million customers. Megan graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee with dual degrees in Accounting and Finance with a minor in Journalism and Mass Communication.

She achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in January of 2012.

Ahmed Megahed
Wipro Technologies
Ahmed Megahed is an experienced professional in the pricing and profitability management arena, his depth of experience includes developing and documenting pricing and marketing strategies as well as business/pricing process improvements for major companies. Most recently, Ahmed is helping manage the Pricing & Profitability Solutions practice at Wipro Technologies. His efforts include building the pricing consulting team globally, managing the relationships with vendors, and showing clients how to leverage pricing to increase profitability.

Prior to his current role, Ahmed worked for Baker Hughes, PROS Pricing, and Hewlett-Packard. Ahmed's strong technical and business acumen allows him to inherit distinctive skill sets revolving around business/marketing strategy and information technology, including: innovative problem solving, best practices, proven leadership, account management, solid negotiation tactics, and exceptional communication with C-level executives. Ahmed holds an MBA and a B.Sc in Computer Engineering from the University of Houston, graduating with high honors.

Ahmed is a Texas Business Hall of Fame Scholar and is also fluent in the Arabic language. He is a member of the Professional Pricing Society and achieved designation as a Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) in 2012.

Christopher Miller
Sunny Delight
Christopher Miller, Sales Finance Manager, Sunny Delight Chris joined Sunny Delight Beverages in 2006, where he currently manages trade finance across the grocery, mass, and alternative channels.

 

Since 2000, Chris has also worked for Kraft Foods before joining the Sunny Delight team in 2006. During his years at Kraft, Chris worked on various accounting functions from manufacturing to international derivatives.

 

In Chris’s current role, he manages the company’s trade promotion management system. As the Sales Finance Manager, Chris has helped integrate the acquisitions of Veryfine and Bossa Nova and lead the process to revamp customer profitability across the organization.

 

Chris works with the sales force on customer planning and incremental requests. Chris has a MBA from DePaul University and also has his CPA.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Spring, 2011.

Chris Noble
Walgreens
Chris Noble is currently Vice President of Pricing for Walgreens, responsible for pricing strategy and execution for the company's pharmacy, health, and wellness businesses with revenues exceeding $45 billion per year.

 

During the past 13 years with Walgreens, he has held a variety of roles including Business Unit Financial Officer, Director of Mergers & Acquisitions, and Real Estate Manager. While working in financial roles, Chris earned the Chartered Financial Analyst (CFA) designation. Additionally, during his tenure in a real estate capacity, he earned the Certified Commercial Investment Member (CCIM) designation.

 

Chris is a native of Amboy, IL and received a BA degree from Augustana College in Finance and Marketing. He currently resides in Mount Prospect, IL with his wife and two sons, Graham and Benjamin.

Levente (Lee) Nyari

Levente (Lee) Nyari has held strategic pricing leadership roles at Cincinnati Bell, Dealer Tire, and Barnes Distribution. Lee has over ten years of experience in financial analytics and marketing strategy, mostly related to strategic pricing positions.

 

Lee also has a solid consulting background through management and senior consulting roles at Deloitte and at The Valen Group, a boutique marketing strategy consultancy. Lee has received several awards for developing and implementing innovative pricing and marketing strategies in B2B and B2C environments for tangible products and subscription-based services in varying stages of the product lifecycle, in inflationary and deflationary markets.

 

His pricing experience covers projects focused on value-based pricing, price elasticity, bundling strategies, pricing through distribution channels, pricing analytics and execution software, pricing process reengineering, list/discount price structure development, new product pricing, and product line pricing for profitable growth.

 

Lee is a Certified Pricing Professional, a Certified Public Accountant, and is fluent in French, Hungarian, and English. He is a summa cum laude graduate of Thomas More College, a beta gamma sigma graduate of the University of Cincinnati, and holds an MBA from Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University.

Kristian Olsson
ABB
Kristian is Head of Commercial Processes for the Control Technologies Business Unit of ABB. In this capacity, he spearheads the unit’s pricing strategy - from conceptualization to tactical implementation and fulfillment.

In scope are process automation products across all served verticals globally. Since Kristian assumed this role, pricing has increasingly moved from an operational task to a strategically driven process, all the while increasing senior management’s understanding of pricing as a competitive imperative.

Key initiatives include strengthened reporting and analytical capabilities, as well as the introduction of more clearly defined and enforceable market segments. Prior to this role, Kristian served in various sales positions in ABB in the past 10 years, including Regional Sales Manager, Account Manager and Global Business Development Manager, with postings in Europe and Asia.

Kristian holds a MSc in Automation and Mechatronics from Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden. He is presently based in Singapore.

Matthew B. Phillips
GE
Matt is currently the Lead Pricing Analyst for Smart Grid product lines within Digital Energy, a division of GE Energy, in Atlanta, GA. Within this role he drives Pricing initiatives across multiple business functions to maximize value through the Development, Delivery, Execution, and Measurement pricing process. This includes the development and integration of pricing tools to drive recognition of the opportunities for pricing improvement.

Throughout his 16 year career, he has held various roles in Sales, Business Development, Telecommunications Network Design, and Pricing. The last six spent in pricing organizations with functional responsibility for both Strategic and Tactical Pricing efforts. He started his Pricing career overseeing a multi-million dollar Regional product set and has grown into his current role with Global pricing initiatives across a $1B+ portfolio.

Matt received his Bachelor’s degree in Mathematics from Auburn University and completed his MBA at Kennesaw State University. Additionally, he holds a Six Sigma Green Belt Professional certification.

He has been a member of the Professional Pricing Society for over 6 years and achieved designation as a Certified Pricing Professional from the Professional Pricing Society in October, 2011.

Frank Pepe
IEEE, Inc.
Frank Pepe, CPP, is the Director of Strategic Pricing and Analysis at IEEE, Inc. in Piscataway, NJ. He has been with IEEE for 10 years and is responsible for customer pricing, sales budgeting and forecasting, IP enforcement, and strategic analysis.

 

Prior work experience includes stints at ADP, Prudential Investments and Bloomberg Financial. He has a BS in Finance and an MBA, both from Rutgers University.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Summer 2011.

Mayur Rao
Colt Technology
Mayur is Lead Analyst Pricing at Colt Technology Services, Europe’s leading information delivery platform headquartered in London, UK. In his current position, Mayur supports the Strategic Pricing for the Voice Products portfolio. He has significantly improved the Voice Products Pricing by developing robust processes, policies & tools. He specialized in developing unconventional, innovative pricing tools and methodologies for Bid Pricing & Sales Community. Mayur is also actively involved in Voice Cost management programme to drive efficiency in the overall pricing process.

Prior to his current experience, Mayur has worked with WNS Global Services a leading global Business Process Outsourcing company headquartered in Mumbai, India. At WNS, Mayur had worked for a UK based Global Pharmaceutical customer where he worked on pricing of life sciences products across different therapy areas in the European region. He has extensively worked upon wide variety of pricing analytics covering; Launch sequencing, Cross-referencing risks, Parallel trade risks, and comparative pricing analysis under the challenging EU Pricing & Reimbursement environment.

Mayur has 7 years of work experience in various industries like Telecom, Pharmaceutical, Financial and Education Sectors. He is MBA from Delhi University & holds Bachelor degree in Physics & Mathematics.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in November 2011.

Akash B. Rathod
Hewlett Packard
Akash is Sr. Manager, Product Strategy & Pricing at Hewlett Packard responsible for enterprise services portfolio globally. Akash has led several key projects such as designing global pricing framework for Application Services, deal data analytics, pricing enterprise service offerings using value-based approach and improving share-of-wallet to boost the portfolio’s profits during tough economic conditions. Previously at American Airlines (AA), Akash was responsible for financial planning, budgeting and profitability analysis for American’s 20 airport destinations in Europe and Asia-Pacific.

 

Prior to AA, Akash had 5 years of management consulting experience at Accenture and Capgemini Ernst and Young in their CRM practice. Akash has consulted with clients in optimizing their business processes and performance using his proficiency in business process modeling and analysis in functional areas such as sales, marketing and customer service.

 

Akash lives in Dallas, TX and earned his BS degree in chemical engineering, he also holds an MBA degree from Southern Methodist University. Additionally, he is certified in CRM-Siebel applications and Cognos business intelligence software. Akash has been involved in the Professional Pricing Society since Spring 2008.

 

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Winter 2011.

Jason Reed, CPP
PAREXEL
Jason Reed, CPP, is a Strategic Pricing Manager with PAREXEL International and is based in Raleigh, NC. PAREXEL is a clinical research organization that works with a number of major pharmaceutical and biotech companies. As a part of this role, Jason works with strategic partners to set help set pricing for clinical studies.

Prior to joining PAREXEL, Jason has spent time with other clinical research organizations in both Pricing and Pricing Systems groups.

He has a BS and an MBA from East Carolina University in Greenville, NC. Jason achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in the Spring of 2012.

David Schnetzer
Consultant
David Schnetzer is a marketing professional specializing in pricing strategy and administration. For five years he served as director of pricing for Match.com, a leading internet subscription business where he developed pricing into a competitive advantage and key profitability driver for the company. David has been involved in all aspects of pricing including quantitative and qualitative analysis, best practice identification and implementation, strategic product pricing, and channel pricing. His clients come from a variety of industries including telecommunications, e-commerce, mobile e-commerce, online learning, and background intelligence.

 

Prior to his focus in pricing, David was a financial analyst for Fortune 500 companies. His hands-on experience in finance, business development, market research, strategic planning, mergers and acquisition, and pricing give him a keen understanding of the relationship between corporate functions and their unique place in the pricing equation.

 

David holds a B.A. degree from Indiana University, Bloomington and an MBA degree from the American University in Washington, DC, with a concentration in Finance. He is conversant in Japanese.

Irshad Shafique
Nokia
Irshad Shafique is a Global Executive with 15+ years of experience developing and executing global marketing & pricing strategies and tactics to optimize revenue, market share and profitability for leading technology companies. His area of expertise is to drive growth for leading technology companies through insightful pricing stategies and tactics.

He has held various positions in pricing, market/business development, strategic planning, financial planning & analytics in various industries including Wireless, Telecommunication, Consumer Brands, Internet, Advertising and Fragrances & Flavors manufacturing. Irshad’s experience includes developing strategic frameworks, processes, tools, governance , dashboards/KPIs, building cross functional teams, change management, value based pricing, competitive intelligence, customer segmentation, revenue optimization, yield management, product lifecycle, channel management, market research tools.

He has a solid background in B2C, B2B, B2B2C and ecommerce environments. Currently he is the Global Head of Pricing for Nokia (a global wireless solution, devices, software and services provider) where he created the pricing function and delivered top-level pricing strategy to sustain company’s global market dominance. He previously held various pricing/strategy/marketing positions for companies such as Virgin Mobile, Yahoo!, Givaudan and AT&T Wireless.

Irshad holds an MBA in Finance & Marketing from Southern New Hampshire University.

He obtained the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in 2011.

Patrick Sheehan
Xerox Corporation
Patrick is currently a strategic pricing manager with Xerox Corporation, focusing on Xerox Light Production Class Printers and MFPs. His responsibilities include but are not limited to developing worldwide pricing recommendations for the Xerox light-production class printers and MFPs, internal and external reporting analysis, maintaining an internal competitive database, and other pricing and analytical functions.

During the past 12-years within Xerox, Patrick has worked as a Windows Software Engineer, focusing on the print and scan driver install technology; Software Project Manager coordinating engineering resources; Marketing Intelligence Analyst, responsible for providing activity and revenue share reporting and analysis; and Post Sales Marketing Manager, working to both improve profitability and increase customer user registration rates.

Patrick holds a Master’s in Business Administration from Marylhurst University, along with a Bachelor’s of Science in Software Engineering from Oregon Institute of Technology.

He currently resides in the beautiful Pacific Northwest, with his wife, and two children.

The year 2011 was a banner-year for Patrick, not only having achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation in November 2011, but also having trained-for and completing his first marathon – the 40th annual Portland Marathon in October 2011.

Rodrigo Siqueira, CPP
Syngenta Crop Protection Ltd
Rodrigo Siqueira, CPP, has been employed at Syngenta Crop Protection Ltd for 10 years taking on a variety of roles within the Pricing Operations, Marketing GTM-S, Supply Chain and Production Planning. He is currently responsible for managing Pricing Transactional Data, Market Data and Consistence and Efficiency analysis and Pricing policies and processes. He is a Specialist in Production Administration, Undergratuaded in Business Administration and Data Technical Processing.

 

Recently, he has studied Marketing and Sales Excellence at Syngenta and Applied Econometric at FIPE. In 2009 and 2008, he offered a strong support to Marketing manager to build a 5-years plan including Firm and Market Assumption and Pricing. Period during which Siqueira worked with Competitive Intelligence Managers to restructure the assumptions matrix for standard products focusing on determining the market’s size using econometrics models, so the company was able to achieve its revenue target and earn Market Share.

 

As part of the Supply Chain team, helped on achieving greats results such as the considerable reduction of Inbound lead time from China, KPI standardization from Supply Latin America, development of new way of production with a MIX between Market-to-order and KANBAN, that increased the company's Stock Attendance and reduced Stock's costs. The PPS seminars (online courses) and webinars have helped him move towards this goal as well as the CPP's.

 

Siqueira obtained the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in 2011.

Darryl Smith, CPP
Farm Credit Canada (FCC)
Darryl Smith, CPP, is the Pricing Strategy Manager at Farm Credit Canada (FCC), Canada’s leading agricultural lender and a federal Crown corporation. FCC provides financing, insurance, software, learning programs and other business services to producers, and agribusiness and agri-food operations. Darryl has been with FCC since 2003 in various roles within the Marketing division. His current responsibilities include chairing the Pricing Committee, which regularly reviews pricing activity and strategy, as well as the organization’s margins. Prior to working at FCC, Darryl worked at the Royal Bank of Canada for 13 years in credit risk and as a commercial lender.

 

In 2008, Darryl project managed the creation and implementation of price optimization at FCC. During this time, Darryl worked closely with the Pricing Committee and senior executives to help FCC make strategic decisions during the financial crisis of 2008 and 2009, which resulted in his appointment to work on pricing strategies and management full time.

 

Darryl has a B.Sc. (Agr) majoring in Agricultural Business from the University of Guelph and a MBA from Athabasca University. He achieved Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in January 2011.

Ken Soles
Elliott Group
Ken Soles is the Pricing Manager for the Service Parts operation located in Jeannette, Pennsylvania. The Elliott Group is a leading manufacturer of turbo-machinery. Primary markets include power generation, refineries, and chemical production.

He is responsible for establishing and creating the service parts pricing management function at Elliott. This includes concept, strategic planning, and implementation. His accomplishments include the creation of a Global Price Book based on part families and their descriptive attributes. Ken’s team was the recipient of the Presidents Achievement Award for creation and implementation of the Global Price Book. Ken has travelled to Singapore and Tokyo as a key member of the Global Parts Pricing Council.

Prior to working in pricing, Ken worked as a customer service team leader with Elliott in the Service Parts Group. He also has additional customer service and logistics experience with Leybold Vacuum Products, a manufacturer of vacuum pumps.

Mr. Soles received a BS in Business Management from Point Park University located in Pittsburgh, PA. He graduated with Cum Laude honors. Ken has been a member of The Professional Pricing Society since spring 2006.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in November of 2011.

Thomas Splitt
Walgreens
Thomas Splitt, CPP, has been employed by Walgreens for 15 years. Walgreens continues to be a leader in the Healthcare Industry.

His roles within the organization have included Contracting, Sales and most recently Pricing and Strategy. In his role he is responsible for the overall Pricing Strategy as it relates to 3rd party prescriptions for retail, mail, specialty and special projects like Flu and Immunizations.

He has a Bachelors Degree from the University of Wisconsin and a Masters Degree from Webster University in St. Louis, MO.

He achieved the Certified Professional Pricing designation in the Fall of 2011.

Shelialla Stokes
PayPal
Shelialla Stokes is a Global Pricing Product Manager at PayPal where she is responsible for managing both tactical and strategic pricing initiatives and opportunities.

Prior to joining PayPal, Shelialla worked as a Sr. Pricing Consultant at Vendavo US & Vendavo Europe. At Vendavo, a leading provider of enterprise-wide price and margin management solutions, she established a track record of successfully implementing strategic pricing and deal negotiation initiatives across a number of verticals such as high-tech, cpg, manufacturing, and chemicals. Her experience with Vendavo and now PayPal, have helped her gain a deeper understanding of pricing from both a B2B and B2C perspective. All in all, she has 10+ years of experience in multiple disciplines; pricing, enterprise software solutions, process analysis, operations, project management, product management, and consulting.

Shelialla holds a BS in Computer Science from Santa Clara University in California and an MBA from IE Business School in Madrid, Spain.

She achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in winter 2011.

Olivia Tam
Hewlett Packard Company
Olivia Tam is currently a price setting IT manager for Hewlett Packard Company. She has over 20 years of Information Technology (IT) professional experience, including 10 years of international management experience in enterprise-wide applications. She has portfolio planning and has tight partnership with business sponsors to support multi-year application roadmaps in providing value-added pricing capabilities and building pricing IT applications.

 

She has been an advocate in transformational price setting initiative. She manages different worldwide IT teams for many projects to support IT optimization and Business Innovation programs. Her recent projects include Data Center Consolidation, Adoption of R/3 technology in Pricing Applications, Creation of System-of-Record to centralize pricing information and calculation for the company, Sarbenes-Oxley (SOX) Compliance Program, and Launch of Price Optimization Program. She manages an international team in the full development life cycle of the pricing applications.

 

Prior to her focus in Pricing Applications, she was responsible for a diverse set of enterprise-wide applications, including banking applications, order management, inventory management applications, and revenue-recognition applications. She was the global support manager of a variety of applications with teams across the globe. She has extensive working experience in both Asia and United States.

 

Olivia has a Bachelor of Science degree in Computer Science. She has been an active PMP (Professional Management processional) since August 2003.

 

She can speak fluently English, Mandarin, Cantonese and some Japanese.

 

She achieved Certified Pricing Professional (CPP) Designation from the Professional Pricing Society in March 2011.

Adam Terry
Walgreens
Adam Terry has worked in Franklin, TN for Walgreens since October 2008. During this time, he has been a Pricing Analyst, Sr. Pricing Analyst, and now serves as the Employer Pricing Manager. Prior to this, he was the Service, Maintenance, and Warranty Manager for Universal Safety Response and was a Claims Analyst for AIM Healthcare.

Adam completed his undergraduate degree in Finance/Economics from David Lipscomb University in 2004 and completed his MBA from there in 2011.

Freda Tsang
Reed Business Information
Freda Tsang is Global Pricing Analyst for Reed Business Information, a multinational online and offline business publisher under Reed Elsevier Group plc. In her current position, Freda manages worldwide strategic pricing projects and delivered significant financial upside. These pricing projects cover the entire portfolio of the company, e.g. magazines, conferences, consulting services, lead generation, recruitment services, education and professional online solutions. She specialised in developing pricing strategies, restructuring price models, setting value-based pricing, developing processes and tools to improve sales effectiveness.

 

Prior joining, Freda has over 4 years' experience in marketing analysis and strategic consulting and based in 5 countries in Asia, Oceania and Europe. She recommended and implemented successful marketing and sales strategies in various industries e.g. Media, Entertainment, Natural Resources, Public Policy and FMCG. Previous employers include McKinsey & Co. and Bombardier Inc.

 

Freda holds a first class Master’s degree in International Economics from Berlin School of Economics in Germany. She also earned a Bachelor’s degree in Management of International Business and Marketing from the Chinese University of Hong Kong. She has also led teams in winning international marketing competitions. She is also one of the six students in the world awareded with PACIBER Diploma for outstanding multicultural knowledge and skills.

Andreas Weinert
SAP
Andreas Weinert is working as a Project Lead for Cross Topics within SAP Productivity & Lean, part of the Chief Process Office. To ensure effective and efficient execution of SAP’s strategy, Andreas is responsible to drive selected topics across different units and board areas in SAP. As a certified business process expert, he analyzes current development structures, processes and taxonomies to create an alignment between development and sales by defining actionable concepts and proposing specific measurement processes.

Prior to joining SAP AG, Andreas spent three years in business consulting focusing on business analytics and strategic pricing. Having been engaged in various pricing and optimization projects, Andreas has played a key role in improving the markdown process of a major fashion retailer. In recognition of his achievements in 2010, he got awarded with the highest level of distinction a member of the SAP Services organization can earn.

He holds a first class Master of Mathematics degree from the University of St. Andrews and a Master of Science degree with distinction from the University of Edinburgh.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in June 2011.

Dr. Andreas Wenning
Evonik Industry AG
Andreas Wenning is a Business Coach of Pricing Management at Evonik Industries AG. He develops pricing strategies, analyzes price developments and gives suggestions for improving price management, which are individually coordinated for the various business lines of Evonik Industries.

Having worked at Evonik Industries and its predecessor companies since 1994, Andreas previoulsy served in several senior technical positions in R&D, technical service and technical marketing in the coatings, adhesives and inks business. Prior to the work on global pricing projects, Andreas was the Technical Director for specialty binders in the Coatings & Additives Business Unit at Evonik.

Andreas holds a Ph.D. in chemistry from Münster University/Germany and numerous certificates in business and management skills, in the coatings sector including the education to the European Adhesive Specialist (EAS), and in chemicals management and occupational health and safety.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in spring 2012.

Steve Wilkins, CPP
Eclipse Inc.
Steve Wilkins, CPP, is currently the Corporate Pricing Manager for Eclipse Inc., (a global leader in manufacturing industrial heating & drying applications), based at the headquarters in Rockford, Illinois. Steve joined Eclipse in 2008, where he is responsible for definition, implementation, and delivery of global pricing. He developed a global list price and discounting process to address: product positioning, economic differences, cultural differences, customer perception differences, and the product life cycle.

Before joining Eclipse, Steve was the Pricing and Programs Manager for Pentair Inc., (a global leader in water solutions and technical products), where he worked for twenty-one years.

Steve holds an M.B.A. from University of Wisconsin-Whitewater.

David A. Wollner
Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC)
David Wollner is a Subcontracts Administrator at SAIC where he develops, negotiates and administers subcontracts typically of medium to high dollar value, risk and complexity, consistent with client requirements and procurement policies/procedures.

 

David has more than twelve years professional experience with leading organizations focused on contracts & pricing, managed markets, and network relationships. Mr. Wollner received a BS in Finance from Miami University and an MBA from Loyola University Chicago. Additionally, he holds the designation of Certified Professional Contracts Manager (CPCM) from the National Contract Management Association.

 

David achieved the Certified Pricing Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Summer 2011.

Chris Villa
USAA
Chris Villa has spent his career in Product Management and Pricing roles within the financial services industry. Currently, he is an Enterprise Underwriting and Pricing Manager at USAA, a Fortune 200 financial services company serving the military and their families. With core expertise in Property and Casualty Insurance, Chris manages cross-functional relationships with pricing, product development, market research, marketing, sales, and operations to achieve market and financial goals.

He has experience in strategic product planning, product development, pricing, sales, and marketing. Chris has filed several patents and has driven innovative pricing and product enhancements throughout his career.

Prior to USAA, Chris was a Pricing Analyst at Progressive Insurance, located in Mayfield Village, OH. In this role he was responsible for segmenting auto insurance risk through risk-based pricing in order to grow market share and maximize profit.

He achieved the Certified Pricing Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in Fall 2011.

Tamara Zellmer
Parker Hannifin
Tamara Zellmer is a Pricing Coordinator for the Parker Hannifin Pneumatic Division North America. She is responsible for collecting and evaluating data supporting the division’s price to resistance strategy. Also, she assists in proactively analyzing and making pricing recommendations with consideration to customer value-based marketing, competitive markets, and company costs affecting the business plans and profitability across the Controls Business Unit.

 

Prior to joining the PDN Pricing Team three years ago, Tamara began her career at the Parker Hannifin Brass Products Division in 1997. She started on the production floor holding various positions ranging from material handler to machine setup eventually accepting a position in the accounting department. Her experiences in accounting laid the foundation for her eventual transition into the pricing field. Tamara graduated with Magna Cum Laude honors from Western Michigan University, earning a Bachelor’s of Business Administration degree. She is also a member of Beta Gamma Sigma International Business Honor Society, Phi Kappa Phi Honor Society, and the Phi Theta Kappa International Honor Society.

 

Her most recent achievement is earning the Certified Pricing Professional designation from the Professional Pricing Society in April 2011.