People

 

 

Rock Hankin - Chairman

Mr. Hankin is Chairman of the board of Semtech Corporation (Nasdaq). He also serves as a member of the boards of directors of SPARTA, Inc.; and three privately held corporations: Hoya Photonics, UVDI and SBA Materials. Mr. Hankin is vice-chairman of the Board of the Kavli Foundation and Kavli Institute. Mr. Hankin is a principal of HC Private Equity, through which he initiates and manages investments in operating companies on behalf of his family and others.

Mr. Hankin previously was chairman of the board of House of Fabrics (Nasdaq) before it merged with FabriCenters of America. He also served on the boards of DDL Electronics, Inc. (NYSE); Nichols Institute (ASE), before it merged with Corning; Quidel Corporation (Nasdaq), Techniclone (Nasdaq); Alpha Microsystems (Nasdaq); a U.S. subsidiary of a publicly traded Japanese corporation; Hoya Corporation USA; and five privately held companies: Advanced Bionics Corporation, Kavlico Corporation, La Victoria Foods, Inc., Orthomedics, and VTEK, prior to their being sold. Mr. Hankin has chaired and served on all board committees and is a designated financial expert on the audit committees he presently serves. Mr. Hankin has served on the National Board of Advisors of The Executive Committee, an organization of chief executive officers.

Mr. Hankin was an adjunct faculty member of USC’s School of Law in 2004 and 2005 teaching a joint course to graduate business school and law students regarding lessons learned from the Enron Era. Mr. Hankin participated as a panelist in the 2006 Directors Education Institute sponsored by Duke University’s Global Capital Markets Center. From 1986 to 1998 Mr. Hankin was an adjunct faculty member of the Anderson Graduate School of Management at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he taught a graduate course in business strategy and planning as part of the school's entrepreneurship course of study.He previously held a lectureship position at UCLA's extension university as well as an associate professorship at California State University, Northridge.

Mr. Hankin was a member [2002-2005] of The Irving Team, led by District Judge J. Lawrence Irving (ret.) providing advisory representation to the Regents of the University of California with respect to Enron, WorldCom, Dynegy, and AOL/Time Warner and acting as guardian ad litem in Moore v. Halliburton.

Mr. Hankin received his Bachelor of Science Degree in Accounting (cum laude) from UCLA (1968) and his Bachelor of Laws Degree from the Blackstone School of Law. He is a Certified Public Accountant [inactive] and Member of the Bar, in the State of California.

Mr. Hankin practiced for 18 years in the international accounting and consulting firm of Price Waterhouse, where he became a general partner in 1978 and managing partner of the Warner Center, Los Angeles, office in 1982. Thereafter, as founder and chief executive of Hankin Investment Banking and its affiliate Hankin & Co., a consulting firm, established in 1986, he supervised and led the activities of the firms. Hankin Investment Banking represented buyers and sellers of businesses and accomplished institutional financing for its clients. Hankin & Co. provided a range of strategic consulting services including expert consulting, analysis and testimony in complex business litigation.

 

Richard P. Graff - Audit Committee Chairman

Mr. Graff is a retired partner from PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP where he served as the audit leader in the United States for the mining industry. Since his retirement, Mr. Graff has been a consultant to the mining industry and, most recently, has served as a member of a Financial Accounting Standards Board task force for establishing accounting and financial reporting guidance in the mining industry. Mr. Graff currently serves as Audit Committee Chairman of Merdian Gold, he received his Undergraduate Degree in economics from Boston College and his Post-Graduate Degree in accounting from Northeastern University.

 

Ron Parratt - Director

Mr. Parratt has served as an advisor to Concentric Energy since March 2004. Mr. Parratt is currently the President, CEO and Director of AuEx Ventures, Inc. (XAU - TSX/V), a Nevada based gold and silver exploration company. He is an experienced exploration geologist and exploration manager with over 30 years of mining industry experience. Most recently, he served as Exploration Manager, North America for Homestake Mining Company with responsibilities for all of Homestakes grass roots and mine site exploration activity in North America. Prior to that, he served as Vice President of Exploration for Santa Fe Pacific Gold, Inc. Mr. Parratt had direct involvement in the discovery of several gold deposits with three of these, including Rabbit Creek, Lone Tree and Trenton Canyon, resulting in mines. Mr. Parratt is a member of the Dean's Advisory Board for the Mackay School of Mines. Since 2001, Mr. Parratt has served as a Director of Golden Phoenix Minerals, Inc., (GPXM - OTCBB), a Minnesota Corporation engaged in mineral exploration, development and production in the state of Nevada. Mr. Parratt earned both his Bachelors of Science in Geochemistry and his Masters of Science in Economic Geology from Purdue University.

 

 

Andrew K. Simpson - Director, CEO and CFO

Mr. Simpson became Concentric's CFO in August 2006 and its CEO in June 2008. Previously, Mr. Simpson was CEO of Silver Assets, Inc., an OTC BB silver mine company. Mr. Simpson's turnaround of that company was the subject of a March 1999 Mining Engineering article. Mr. Simpson spent 13 years in London and New York (Merrill Lynch and others) as an investment banker, including project finance, mining, energy and corporate deals. He has a Wharton MBA in finance. Previously, he worked for the Office of Economic Research Federal Home Loan Bank Board (DC), and for the antitrust and international monetary directorates of the European Union (Brussels). Mr. Simpson was co-author with Lynn Oates--now Concentric's President-- of the February 2000 Mining Engineering article "Using Option Pricing to Predict Market Values of Publicly Traded Mining Companies."

 

Lynn F. Oates - President and VP Finance

Lynn Oates CPA became Concentric's VP Finance in August 2007 and its President in December 2007. Mr. Oates was instrumental in executing Concentric's finance function turnaround and audit activities. Mr. Oates has Chemical Engineering (BS) and Accounting (MS) degrees from the University of Arkansas and a master's in taxation from Golden Gate University. He was previously an audit manager for Arthur Anderson, then served as CFO for several companies including a division of an NYSE listed company where he had Sarbanes Oxley oversight. With Andrew Simpson, Concentric's CFO, Mr. Oates co-authored in 2000 in Mining Engineering the first published description of the use of option math to value the common stocks of publicly traded companies.

 

 

J. Stewart Hollingsworth, P.G. - Advisor

Mr. Hollingsworh was previously a Director of Concentric Energy. Mr. Hollingsworth is an exploration geologist and exploration manager with over 35 years of uranium mining experience. He worked for 27 years with Union Carbide (1959-1986) primarily exploring for uranium, and most recently as their Director of Exploration and Exploration Manager. During his tenure at Union Carbide, uranium reserves and resources of approximately 30 million pounds were discovered and delineated. Mr. Hollingsworth has worked all over the world during his career, but with an emphasis on the U.S., Canada, Australia, and South Africa. His experience spans the exploration and mining side of the business. He holds a degree in Geological Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines.

 

Pete Ingersoll, C.F.A. - Advisor

Mr. Ingersoll was previously a  Director of Concentric Energy. Mr. Ingersoll has more than 47 years of experience as a financial analyst in the metals and mining industry. Mr. Ingersoll is a Chartered Financial Analyst, a member of the New York Society of Security Analysts, the American Institute of Mining Engineers and a past President and retired member of the Nonferrous Metals Analysts of New York. He holds a B.A. degree from Williams College and an M.B.A degree from the Harvard Graduate School of Business Administration. From 1959 to 1992, he worked on Wall Street as a financial analyst in the metals and mining industry for a number of firms including Salomon Brothers (1982-1987) and Lehman Brothers (1987-1992). For nine consecutive years, clients voted him a member of the Institutional Investor All-Star Team for Gold and/or Nonferrous Metals Industries. Mr. Ingersoll served on the Board of Directors of Getchell Gold Corporation, a Nevada-based mid-size gold producer, from 1994 until its acquisition by Placer Dome in May of 1999. He also served on the Board of Directors of Stillwater Mining Company, a Montana-based producer of platinum and palladium, from May 1997 to December 1998. He is currently a Director of E-VAT, Inc., a research and development company developing an electrochemical process for recovering gold without the use of cyanide. Since September 2004, he has been a Director of Piedmont Mining Company, Inc. (PIED Pink Sheets), a North Carolina corporation engaged in acquisition and exploration of mineral properties in the state of Nevada.

 

Arden Larson - Consulting Metallurgist

Mr. Larson has been a Consulting Metallurgist to Concentric Energy since January 2004. Mr. Larson is an experienced exploration geologist and manager with over 30 years of mining industry experience. He is also very experienced in metallurgy and has developed several innovative processes for mineral extraction. He is the founder of E-VAT, Inc., a start-up company developing a patent-pending non-cyanide vat leach system to recover gold and uranium. He has been the President and founder of other gold mining and exploration companies, including Saratoga Mine, Inc. He is an experienced miner and has worked on projects in precious metals and base metals, including gold, silver, lead, and uranium. Mr. Larson has a B.S. degree in Geology from the University of Colorado.

 

 

Ralph W. Kettell II, P.E. - Founder

Ralph W. Kettell II, P.E., founded Concentric in 2001 and acquired the claims and data records that are the foundation of today's Anderson Project. As Chairman and CEO through 2006 Mr. Kettell hired company officers and staff and raised capital to fund drilling and administrative activities. Mr. Kettell transferred operating and corporate governance control to management at the end of 2006. He remains the Company's largest shareholder and is founder or cofounder of several other mining ventures.