Featured Speaker: Shahnoz “Nozi” Hamidi

Ms. Hamidi is an experienced board member and a successful strategy and marketing executive who has run industrial products and services businesses. She is an outside member of the Board of Directors of 1910 Legacy Enterprises, an ESOP company owning White Electrical, an industrial electrical contractor, and Axis Energy, an engineer-procure-construct firm specializing in renewable energy.

Ms. Hamidi is particularly known for her ability to guide the creation of enterprise strategy and identify M&A/divestiture options. As an example, she was a key architect in redefining the enterprise growth strategy of Ashland Inc., a global multibillion-dollar oil refining & diversified chemicals company that transformed to a specialty chemical pureplay with significantly higher EBITDA. During her tenure at Ashland as a P&L leader, marketing leader and corporate strategist, she routinely apprised the Board of Directors on market opportunities, including the justification for key acquisitions for the water treatment and paper chemicals business (now privately held Solenis). While running the $50MM P&L of the commercial & institutional (C&I) water treatment chemicals and services business of Ashland, she managed the carve-out and divestiture of the service-intensive C&I segment to privately held Rochester Midland Corporation. The divestiture helped refocus the remaining business and fund an acquisition strategy for the industrial water and pulp & paper segments.

At the business level, Ms. Hamidi has significant experience using go-to-market strategies to accomplish revenue growth and customer retention. As VP of Marketing at BWA Water Additives, a ~$350MM global industrial water treatment and desalination chemicals business (now privately held Italmatch), she led the expansion of BWA’s essentially two product line business into the emerging US hydraulic fracking market. In addition, she established exclusive positions with leading channel partners to the frac market, ultimately growing BWA’s overall oil & gas position into a $50 MM business.

A chemical engineer and M.B.A. by training, Ms. Hamidi is a founding member of Atlanta’s Private Directors’ Association (PDA) and is completing the PDA certificate in private company governance. She continues her successful career in revenue growth through strategy and marketing as President of strategXconsulting LLC, her independent consulting business and has recently launched NBK PROS Corporation for her new, entrepreneurial ventures

Board expectations and management: Panel Discussion