Wilfrido applies his more than 30 years of experience in the refining industry to his role as a Senior Consultant at Solomon. With extensive hands-on experience in the refining industry’s technical, operations, maintenance, and business planning areas with such companies as Lagoven, S.A., Petróleos de Venezuela S.A., and Citgo, he is able to provide a unique perspective to the issues facing Solomon’s clients to help them improve their performance.

Wilfrido holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from Universidad del Zulia, Venezuela and a Master of Business Administration from The University of Tulsa.

Ken began his career in the Refining Industry in 1975 as a Senior Engineer with Exxon. Today, he oversees Solomon’s Latin America consulting efforts, focusing on helping clients achieve long-term sustainable improvement by maximizing margins on existing assets. Prior to accepting this position, Ken served as Director of Latin America Power Generation Operations, striving to expand Solomon’s Power Generation CPA and consulting services in the Caribbean, and Central and South America.

Ken’s entire 30-year professional career has focused on consulting and project development in Latin America. He has assisted in numerous management consulting assignments, project development, and due diligence for asset acquisitions in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Brazil, Peru, Bolivia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, Venezuela, Colombia, Jamaica, and Mexico. Ken is fluent in English, Dutch, and Spanish.

John began his career in 1968 as a Chemical Engineer with Mobil Oil Corporation (Mobil). Today, he is a Project Manager at Solomon, responsible for managing and participating in projects involving refinery performance improvement, mergers and acquisitions, expansion analysis, yield and operating cost improvements, cash flow projection, and crude oil valuations. Prior to joining Solomon, he held positions at Mobil and Getty Oil Company, and was a consultant at Turner, Mason & Solomon.

During his career, John’s responsibilities have ranged from engineering to supervisory positions. At Solomon, he has developed a linear programming model database, analyzed yield accounting and operating procedures to improve refinery profitability, and developed and conducted Solomon’s first benchmarking study for Fluid Catalytic Cracking processes. John has a Professional Degree in Chemical and Petroleum Refining Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and a Master of Business Administration degree from the University of Southern California.

Andy has been serving the Refining and Chemicals Industries since 1960 when he began his career with BP. Today, he serves Solomon as a refinery management and performance benchmarking expert. Andy holds a special interest and expertise in refinery management, operations, maintenance, site appraisal, and performance development issues.

In addition to general refinery management, he has held head office and site posts covering most manufacturing and associated activities, and has participated in projects around the world involving all aspects of refining and LNG. He has a wide knowledge of Solomon benchmarking processes and his work is focused on client appraisal and improvement programs. He also currently serves a one of the main presenters of the company’s performance analysis presentations throughout Europe.

José’s experience in the refining industry began in 1972 as a refinery process engineer with Southwestern Oil & Refining Company. He now manages Solomon’s Latin American Operations, responsible for helping broaden Solomon’s client base in Latin America. Prior to accepting these responsibilities, José assisted clients in various aspects of business such as valuation of refineries for sales and mergers, profitability forecasts, yield analysis, and organizational effectiveness.

While José started as an engineer, he also has considerable experience in asset management. José was instrumental in producing fuels, lube, and olefin comparative performance studies, as well as client training. He has been influential in helping Solomon develop a good understanding of client needs and cultural barriers. José is a chemical engineer and holds a Bachelor of Science degree from the University of Mexico, and is fluent in Spanish and Portuguese.

Russell has been serving the Refining Industry since 1990 when he began his career as a Senior Engineer with Conoco. Today, he oversees Solomon’s consulting efforts in the Refining Industry, focusing on helping Fuels Study clients achieve sustainable improvement by maximizing margins on existing assets. Prior to accepting this position, Russell led Solomon’s APC/Automation practice, co-authoring the Worldwide Refining APC/Automation Study. Additionally, Russell participated as a team member on performance improvement initiatives in the Refining Industry, serving the role as process control expert and light oils processing expert.

Throughout his career, Russell has focused on using mathematical and statistical techniques to develop innovative and profitable solutions for clients. Although he often uses complex analyses to solve problems, one of Russell’s greatest assets is his ability to discover issues, define problems, and develop solutions using thorough and respectful interview techniques, the information from which he is then able to clearly communicate to the client. Russell is a licensed PE in the state of Oklahoma (#17368).

As Product Manager, Taylor is currently managing Solomon Profile® II, a software service for refineries to monitor their Solomon key performance indicators (KPIs) on a monthly basis. In addition, Taylor is heavily involved in new product development. Other projects include facilitating the FCC Study, programming tools utilized in Performance Analysis Workshops (PAWs), and developing Solomon’s new Tank Utilization Modeling service (TUMs). Taylor also spends time working in the Pipeline vertical as well.

Before joining Solomon in 2003, Taylor worked for a diverse range of organizations, including HSB Reliability Technologies, and RateIntegration, Inc. Taylor holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Nuclear Engineering from the University of Tennessee and a Bachelor of Science in Physics from Roanoke College in Salem, Virginia. Taylor has a certification in Maintenance and Reliability from the University of Tennessee as well.

As Executive Vice President, Dave has more than 20 years of experience in engineering, operations, and management in the petrochemical and refining industries. He is currently responsible for Solomon’s Comparative Performance Analyses and economic evaluations for refineries, petrochemical plants, terminals, and liquid petroleum and natural gas pipelines throughout the world. Prior to joining Solomon in 1995, Dave began his engineering career at Dow Chemical in 1982. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Texas A&M University.

As Vice President – Chemicals, Claire Cagnolatti is responsible for all benchmarking studies in the areas of chemicals manufacturing as well as contributing to Solomon’s performance improvement consulting with refining and petrochemical clients.

Prior to joining Solomon Associates in 1994, Claire spent 14 years in chemical and petrochemical plant operations for Occidental Chemical Company, Allied Corporation, and Stauffer Chemical Company. She has presented more than a dozen technical papers at conferences around the world since 2002, on topics ranging from energy and greenhouse gas issues to maintenance and reliability. Claire holds a Master of Business Administration from Louisiana State University and a Bachelor of Science in Chemical Engineering from Louisiana State University.

Doug joined Solomon with more than 30 years experience working for petrochemical organizations and an additional 5 years experience with heavy equipment design and engineering. He brings to Solomon considerable expertise with business process re-engineering, multiple SAP and other CMMS implementations, mechanical design, rotating equipment design and maintenance, construction and startup of chemical process plants, personnel performance management, and general management techniques.

During his time with Solomon, Doug has gained extensive experience in reliability information and management systems, maintenance information systems, custom application development, configuration, training, and functional analysis, and excels at business process engineering. He has led cost-reduction petrochemical projects with the goal of improving maintenance effectiveness to world-class standards. Doug is a Registered Professional Engineer in the state of Texas (#77255) and holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering.