Steven Amendola, Inventor
Steve invented and patented GST's battery technology and co-founded the company Grid Storage Technologies. Steve is also the inventor and founder of Reaction Sciences (RSI), a silicon processing technology that reduces silicon costs by more than 60% compared to the industry standard silicon processing methods (RSI has been funded by the Quercus Trust and has started manufacturing at its plant in Easton, PA.) Steve also founded the company Millennium Cell to develop the technology for fueling vehicles with hydrogen. Steve managed the company (which grew to 50 employees and later went public) before leaving to develop new technologies in 2002. Steve has been awarded more than a dozen U.S. patents, with approximately 20 additional patents pending and many corresponding foreign patents related to new fuels, turbines, diesel fuels, hydrogen production. Steve's area of specialty is large scale power storage. He has a deep knowledge and decades of experience evaluating and developing related technologies.
Michael Oster, CEO
Michael's experience includes real estate, emerging markets, technology and renewable energy. Prior to GST, Michael launched Clean Energy Holdings as a vehicle to develop solar power and invest in energy technologies. He has developed several of the largest commercial solar power systems in New Jersey in partnership with a major European utility. Michael co-founded and was the first investor in Grid Storage Technologies. Michael began his career in strategy and business planning for IBM and later joined the international management consulting firm of A. T. Kearney. In 1991, Michael moved to Russia as privatization was starting and built what was one of the largest real estate investment and development companies in Moscow and St. Petersburg. In 1994, Michael established the first institutional real estate investment fund in Russia in partnership with the AT&T pension fund, and developed numerous successful projects. In the last decade, Michael formed and capitalized an early stage venture capital firm in New York City. He was one of the original partners to launch the global energy technology firm OILspace, where he populated the board and investor group with OPEC oil ministers, US cabinet members and other energy industry leaders.
Steve Hellman, President
Steve Hellman joins GST as President after a long career of building new companies, largely in energy and real estate.
Steve began his energy career with Glencore, the largest commodities trading company in the world, where he built six successful companies in oil production and refining. Thereafter he created his own energy trading company which grew to $8B in revenues, and he also built a shipping company with 27 tankers. He later created an energy technology company (together with Michael Oster) which provides optimization and data services to hundreds of major oil and energy companies (clients include BP, China Oil, ExxonMobil and Gazprom). In recent years he acted as an Advisor to the US State Department where he worked with Heads of State and Senior Ministers throughout Eurasia to resolve energy conflicts and to develop a strategy for Eurasian oil and gas infrastructure development. Steve also independently built a $150M commercial real estate business.
Steve speaks Russian and Chinese, is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and holds an MA (Industrial Engineering) and a BS (Political Science, Slavic Languages) from Stanford University (Phi Beta Kappa, 1987).
Ben Rogers, Chief Strategy Officer
Ben joined Grid Storage Technologies from Goldman Sachs' Global Natural Resources Group within the Investment Banking Division. While at Goldman, Ben's responsibilities included both an execution and a coverage role of regulated utilities, merchant power assets and alternative energy companies. Ben's alternative energy areas of focus included renewable energy and smart grid technologies. Before joining Goldman, Ben worked for several years at Cinergy Corp., now part of Duke Energy. While at Cinergy, Ben worked in various groups including the Power Trading Group focused on trading in the Northeast markets, Financial Planning and Analysis, and Corporate Development. Before joining Cinergy, Ben worked for five years at Enron Corp. in Houston. While at Enron, Ben worked in various power and natural gas related roles within Enron Capital and Trade (ECT). His main responsibilities included power plant development, power and natural gas origination and structuring, power trading and corporate development. Ben brings to GST a broad and deep set of experiences and relationships that range from regulated utilities, merchant power assets and markets, electricity and natural gas structuring and alternative energy businesses.
Phil Black, Vice President - Engineering & Manufacturing
Phil's experience covers 20-years of innovation in the fields of industrial design, product engineering and manufacturing design. His creative and analytical methods have resulted in many breakthroughs for GST, including contributions to several pending patents. Prior to starting a successful Industrial Design consultancy, Phil managed the Industrial Design department at JLG/Oshkosh, which resulted in many award winning vehicle designs and advancements in the mobile equipment industry. He also designed high-speed equipment for the food and beverage packaging industry, and serves on an advisory board at the Pennsylvania College of Technology. His vehicular design and high volume manufacturing experience is well suited to lead GST's Engineering and Manufacturing efforts. Phil received his degree in Industrial Design from the Art Institute of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA. He is also a Six Sigma professional, with a significant cost savings and quality improvement record across many industries.
