Riverlake Partners' Strategic Advisory Committee supports the firm's strategy and its professional investment team. Our Strategic Advisory Committee is made up of individuals that provide business experiences that are helpful to the management of our Funds as well as our portfolio companies. Riverlake Partners' Strategic Advisory Committee provides general strategic insight, industry perspective, transaction sourcing, and management contacts. The Strategic Advisory Committee significantly enhances the Fund's ability to recognize value when originating investment opportunities.
Riverlake Partners, through its Advisory Board and network of Limited Partners, many of whom are recognized senior business executives, provide valuable contributions as members of our portfolio companies' boards of directors.
Meet Our Board:
| James Conaty | H. H. Haight | Robert Hole |
| M. Mead Montgomery | James Richardson | Melford Carter |
James Conaty
Mr. Conaty is Chief Executive Officer of Advanced Decorative Systems, Inc. ADS is recognized as one of the leaders in production of technical automotive instrument dials and appliqués. He is also a Director of two large chemical manufacturing companies: The HallStar Company and VanDeMark Chemical. HallStar is a leader in the ester chemistry industry, and VanDeMark is North America's leading producer of custom and specialty chemicals used by the pharmaceutical, agricultural-chemcial, polymer, and fine chemcial industries. He also serves as an Advisor to Waveland Internatinal Capital Partners, a private wealth management firm, and Smith Whiley and Company, a mezzanine debt and private equity fund firm.
Previously, Mr. Conaty was the President of HB Fuller's $1.2 billion global adhesives unit where he managed production and technical sites in 38 countries. Prior to that he was President and Chief Executive Officer of EFTEC, HB Fuller Automotive's global automotive joint venture with EMS-CHEMIE, with headquarters located in the United States and Switzerland.
Mr. Conaty graduated from Syracuse University's Slocum School of Business.
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H.H. Haight
Mr. Haight is Chief Executive Officer and founder of Argo Global Capital. Argo Global Capital, with offices in Boston, Montreal, London, and Hong Kong, is a private investment company focused making growth investments in earlier stage companies.
Prior to founding Argo Global Capital, in 1983 Mr. Haight helped co-found and was Managing Director of Advent International Corp., one of the world's largest private equity investment firms with more than US $6 billion under management, operating in 30 countries from 12 offices with more than 85 investment professionals. While at Advent, Mr. Haight was responsible for operations in Canada and the Pacific Rim and 27 portfolio investments. Prior to Advent, Mr. Haight founded or acquired 11 companies in a number of fields including forest and consumer products, many of which had operations in Asia, Latin America and Canada .
In addition to his leadership responsibilities at Argo, Mr. Haight is currently a director of On Mobile Systems; Real Vision Technology; Chinatron; Cerebrus Solutions; and ArgNor. Mr. Haight received his M.B.A. from Harvard Business School and his B.S. from the University of California at Berkeley.
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Robert Hole
Mr. Hole is the Chief Executive Officer and owner of Haakon Industries Ltd. Haakon is recognized as one of North America’s leading industrial, institutional and high-end commercial custom air handling and air conditioning designer and manufacturers. Since purchasing Haakon in 1982, Mr. Hole transformed a money losing business through organic and acquisition growth strategies to include four manufacturing plants located in the US and Canada with integrated custom engineering and proprietary software production systems capabilities.
Prior to acquiring and leading Haakon, Mr. Hole worked as a mechanical contractor with Haakon and as a Canadian Chartered Accountant and tax specialist with KPMG.
In addition to his leadership responsibilities at Haakon, Mr. Hole is currently President of JEB, Inc. (a diversified industrial holding company), and a director of Epsilon Industries, Inc. and Laidlaw Inc. Mr. Hole graduated from University of British Columbia.
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M. Mead Montgomery
Mr. Montgomery is Managing Partner and co-founder of Montgomery, Shelton & Co. Montgomery Shelton is an operationally oriented private investment company focused on acquiring smaller businesses. Since 1984 Mr. Montgomery has actively managed diverse set of companies in industries including specialty mail-order, plumbing and piping distribution, apparel manufacturing, industrial equipment, printing and home electronics. In addition to strategic and operational support Mr. Montgomery was interim CEO for Elan Home Systems and Herrschners.
Prior to the founding Montgomery Shelton, Mr. Montgomery worked in executive positions and as a board member of Quaker Oats Company, Heizer Corporation, Supermarkets General Corporation, and as a partner at McKinsey & Company.
In addition to his leadership responsibilities and philanthropic activities, Mr. Montgomery is currently a director of Codel Entry Systems, Regency Windows, and Advanced Decorative Systems. Mr. Montgomery received a M.B.A. and a B.S. in Civil Engineering from Cornell University.
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James Richardson
Mr. Richardson currently serves as a Director of three publicly traded companies: Digimarc, an intellectual property licensing company; FEI Company, the leader in nanotechnology equipment; and Epicor Software, an enterprise software company; and one private company. His board experience since 2001 includes service as a board chair, independent lead director, chair of audit and compensation committees, and corporate governance committee membership. He also provides strategic financial consulting advice to select companies.
Prior to his various board positions, Mr. Richardson spent 24 years as a senior financial and operating executive with five high technology companies including WebTrends, Network General, Logic Modeling, Advanced Logic Research, and Floating Point Systems. He has extensive experience in operations, internal and external financial matters, and governance and legal affairs. Prior to embarking on his business career, he practiced public accounting and law.
Mr. Richardson is Vice Chair of the Board of Directors at Lewis and Clark College and is also a member of the Board at St. Mary's Academy in Portland. He received his BS in Business Administration and Accounting and JD from Lewis and Clark College and Law School, respectively, and received his MBA from the University of Portland.
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