Whit Martin, Chief Operating officer (CEO), brings a strong background in finance and business transformation to GCES and also serves as VP, Corporate Development at Archaea.    Before joining GCES and Archaea, Whit served in senior financial and development roles for Air Liquide, including Global Head of Mergers and Acquisitions, based in Paris, from 2017-2020 and head of M&A for the Americas from 2014-2017.  While at Air Liquide, Whit led some of the largest and most transformative transactions in the company’s history.  Before joining Air Liquide, he served as VP of Corporate Finance and Treasurer of Voltaix, a high-growth advanced electronic materials business.  In this role, he managed the financial development and growth of Voltaix from 2003 to 2013.  Whit also has a background in investment banking with Credit Suisse and ING Barings in their New York offices.  He received a BA from Tufts University and an MBA from the Owen School at Vanderbilt University.  Whit will help lead the transformation of GCES into a world-class leader in air pollution control solutions.   

Paula Flowers, Vice President, Marketing and Sales comes to us most recently from UOP, a Honeywell Company, and previously at Air Liquide.  She has a wealth of experience developing markets in renewable energy, hydrogen, and equipment.  Paula has a BS in Chemical Engineering from Penn State and an MBA from the University of West Florida..  Paula will oversee the marketing and sales functions, leading our brand transition to a world leader in environmental solutions

David Smith, Chief Financial Officer (CFO), has held accounting and finance roles in both small and large companies, most recently Air Liquide.  David has been instrumental in implementing new accounting, procurement, and cash management systems at GCES.  David graduated from Purdue University with a BS in Economics and has an MBA from Ball State and a CPA. David will continue to modernize GCES’s financial accounting practices and systems to ensure transparency and accuracy.

Mr. Cary Allen recently joined GCES as Technical Director, filling the role previously held by CEO, Mr. Chad Clark. Graduating from Ohio University as a chemical engineer in 1991, he has spent the last 3-decades specializing in the air pollution control field. Mr. Allen has experience in many roles within the industry, including roles in Engineering Lead, Business Development, Project Management, and Applications Engineering. As Technical Director at GCES, Mr. Allen is tasked with product development, providing our application engineering team with technical support, and project oversight from conception to completion. With his wife of 25-years, and 4 sons, Mr. Allen and family join our Conroe team from Southfield, MI. A forever-student, he has Customer Excellence training by Mercuri International, Effective Negotiating training by Karass, and has completed the Project Management Course offered by the National Society of Professional Engineers. His love of learning and how things work has been passed on to his sons, two of which are in school to become engineers, themselves, and plan on joining their dad in the pollution control industry. His two younger sons, twins, will be juniors in high school this fall. He is an avid reader, sci-fi movie enthusiast, and Texas Hold’em fan. He also enjoys cooking and golf, though he is admittedly not great at either. Mr. Allen and his family look forward to immersing themselves in the Greater Houston community.

Kirill Andreev, Chief Operating Officer (COO), has held various roles in projects, proposals, technology, and corporate strategy, most recently at Air Liquide. He previously worked in a startup, designing and manufacturing skidded gas processing equipment, and brings broad leadership experience in operations, spanning project development, execution, engineering, and manufacturing.  Kirill is originally from Russia, where he earned an MSc in Mechanical and Process Engineering from Moscow State Technical University.  Kirill will lead GCES operations, implementing tools and processes to enable the transformation required to meet ambitious growth goals.

Mr. Jay Swoboda, a proud Aggie, husband, and father, is the General Manager here at GCES. With over 30 years in the industry, his approach is hands-on, and needless to say, it works. He can regularly be found on the manufacturing floor, checking in on production and his team. Mr. Swoboda expanded the GCES Excellence Inspection System in the production shop for quality control; this system has since expanded to other areas of the company, and has improved communication, quality control, teamwork… and the result has not gone unnoticed by customers, who often rave about the GCES process, which includes regular checkpoints and communication. Mr. Swoboda has degrees from Texas A&M and attended Harvard Business School, has over three decades of engineering, operations, manufacturing, and service experience building heavy industrial equipment, and holds United States Patent Number 4,384,901 for an automated pipe cutting/beveling system. Mr. Swoboda’s efforts extend beyond the walls of GCES and into the community, where he volunteers for many organizations, including the Lions Club, as a career development mentor, and as an advocate for education alongside his wife, who works in the local schools.