Joe Hinrichs retired as President of Ford Motor Company’s global automotive business in March, 2020. His Ford career included roles as President of Global Operations, President of North America & South America, President of Asia Pacific & Africa, Chairman & CEO of Ford China, and head of Global Manufacturing & Labor Affairs. Hinrichs was named the top Operations Executive in the global automotive industry by Automotive News and KPMG for 2019. Prior to Ford he was a Partner at private equity group Ryan Enterprises LLC and spent ten years at General Motors in various engineering and manufacturing leadership roles. Hinrichs currently also serves on the board of directors of technology startup WaveSense LLC and previously served on the board of Rivian Automotive LLC and Ford Motor Credit Company. Hinrichs has an electrical engineering degree magna cum laude from the University of Dayton and an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Andrea Abt is focused on an international portfolio of non-executive and supervisory board positions since 2014. She has served on audit, remuneration, ethics and compliance and nomination committees of company boards in a wide range of industries from packaging in the pharma industry through distribution in the building sector and infrastructure financing to oil and gas services, mining and manufacturing. She previously served almost 30 years in international management and leadership roles in a wide variety of challenging environments in the Daimler Benz and Siemens groups: building organizations, consolidating, turning them around in the areas of transportation (rail and aerospace), logistics, IT and more traditional manufacturing businesses. Her background includes leading teams in sales, services, as Chief Financial Officer and most recently, Chief Procurement Officer and Head of Supply Chain Management of global organizations ranging up to 9 billion € purchasing volume and 2,000 employees.
Currently, she also serves as Non-executive director of Polymetal International plc (member of remuneration and audit & risk committee), Non-executive director John Laing Group plc (chair of remuneration committee, member of nomination committee), Non-executive director of Petrofac Ltd (member of nomination, remuneration and compliance & ethics committee), as well as a supervisory board member of Gerresheimer AG (member of audit committee).
Andrea Abt graduated from the University of Bonn in 1985 with a degree comparable to an M.A. in Language and Literature. She holds an MBA from Rotman School of Management, University of Toronto in 2000.
Andrew Axelrod founded Axar Capital Management LP, a private investment management firm, in April 2015 and serves as its Managing Partner and Portfolio Manager. Before founding Axar Capital Management, Mr. Axelrod worked at Mount Kellett Capital Management LP, a private investment firm, from 2009 to 2014. At Mount Kellett Capital Management, he was a Partner and Co-Head of North America Investments. Prior to joining Mount Kellett Capital Management, Mr. Axelrod worked at Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. L.P. from 2007 to 2008 and The Goldman Sachs Group, Inc. from 2005 to 2006. Mr. Axelrod currently serves on the Board of Directors of American Gilsonite Company, BlueStem Group, Exide Technologies EMEA, Livestyle Entertainment, JAKKS Pacific, The J.G. Wentworth Company, Payless Holdings and as Chairman of StoneMor Inc. Mr. Axelrod graduated magna cum laude with a B.S. in Economics from Duke University.
Patrick J. Bartels Jr. is the Managing Member of Redan Advisors LLC, a firm that provides fiduciary services, including board of director representation and strategic planning advisory services for domestic and international public and private business entities. Prior to founding Redan Advisors LLC, Mr. Bartels was a senior investment professional with 20 years of experience. His professional experience includes investing in complex financial restructurings and process-intensive situations in North America, Asia and Europe in a broad universe of industries. Mr. Bartels has served as a director on numerous public and private boards of directors with an extensive track-record of driving value-added returns for all stakeholders through governance, incentive alignment, capital markets transactions, and mergers and acquisitions.
From 2002 to December 2018, Mr. Bartels served as a Managing Principal at Monarch Alternative Capital LP, a private investment firm that focused primarily on event-driven credit opportunities. Prior to Monarch, he served as Research Analyst for high yield investments at INVESCO, where he analyzed primary and secondary debt offerings of companies in various industries. Mr. Bartels began his career at Pricewaterhouse Coopers LLP, where he was a Certified Public Accountant. He holds the Chartered Financial Analyst designation.
Mr. Bartels received a Bachelor of Science in Accounting with a concentration in Finance from Bucknell University.
Stefan Stübing is President & Chief Executive Officer, for Exide Technologies, a global provider of stored electrical-energy solutions for transportation and industrial markets, and is responsible for leading Transportation and Industrial operations globally. Mr. Stübing has more than 30 years of experience in leading Finance, Treasury and cost accounting teams in the battery industry. He joined Exide in 1995 through the acquisition of the CEAC group and served as Vice President Finance for the EMEA region from 2011 to 2018. Mr. Stübing held various Finance Director level roles within Exide from 1999 to 2010 leading the EMEA Transportation, Global Original Equipment and German Finance teams. Mr. Stübing holds a Finance and Accounting Degree from the Friedberg economics business school.