Sonepar Canada (Mississauga, Ontario): Paul Lachance has been appointed V.P. of vendor relations. He spent over 23 years at Wolseley Canada (formerly the mechanical division of Westburne), where he was most recently president and CEO. Under his direction, the company more than doubled its annual revenue and established itself as the largest heating and plumbing distribution company in Canada. Sonepar Canada has more than 90 branches within six operating companies — Century Vallen, Gescan BC, Gescan Prairies, Lumen, Osso Electric and Texcan.
Graybar Electric Co. (St. Louis): Andy Ciccone is now district vice president for the company's Tampa district, effective April 1. In total, the Tampa district includes 20 locations and nearly 500 employees. Ciccone started his career with Graybar in 1992 and advanced through several customer service, sales and management roles, most recently serving as director of electrical sales in Graybar's Richmond district. He holds a B.S. business administration degree in marketing from Texas A&M University and is a graduate of the Rutgers-Graybar Supply Chain Management Program.
Rockwell Automation (Milwaukee): Blake Moret is being promoted to senior vice president of the Control Products and Solutions (CP&S) segment and Frank Kulaszewicz is being promoted to senior vice president of the Architecture and Software (A&S) segment. Both positions will report to Keith Nosbusch, chairman and CEO of Rockwell Automation. For the last three years, Kulaszewicz has served as vice president and general manager, Control and Visualization Business within A&S. He has worked at Rockwell Automation for over 25 years and has held several key leadership roles in the drive systems and standard drives businesses. Since late 2007, Moret has served as vice president and general manager, Customer Support and Maintenance in CP&S. He has broad global experience working across the company in sales, services and product groups for over 25 years.
Rockwell made two other appointments. Steve Eisenbrown is now senior vice president, Strategic Development, responsible for global business development, alignment of strategic investments and initiatives as well as the company's multi-year global business process transformation project, and Bob Ruff, most recently senior vice president, CP&S, is president of the company's Asia-Pacific Region. This is one of the fastest growing regions of the company with approximately 30 percent sales growth in fiscal 2010.
National Lighting Bureau (NLB), (Silver Spring, Md.): Howard Lewis, representing the Illuminating Engineering Society of North America (IES), has been re-elected chair of the National Lighting Bureau. Also re-elected to NLB offices were Vice Chair Cary Mendelsohn (Imperial Lighting Maintenance Co.), representing the International Association of Lighting Management Companies (NALMCO), and Secretary/Treasurer James Yorgey, technical applications manager for NLB sponsor Lutron Electronics Co. Inc. Lewis is the president of Lighting Alternatives, a fluorescent fixture manufacturer headquartered in Cherry Hill, N.J. Long-active in IES activities, he recently completed his third, nonconsecutive term as president of the IES Philadelphia Section.
Fulham Co., Inc. (Hawthorne, Calif.): Dr. Michael Bremser has joined the company as V.P. and global product manager of LED Products, including Fulham ThoroLED LED Drivers, LED Lamps and LED Lightbars. Bremser holds a Ph.D. in materials engineering from N.C. State University and has 17 years of experience in blue/white LED development in academic, commercial and international environments. His experience includes R&D, manufacturing and applications engineering for companies including Aixtron and Permlight. He also serves as a technical consultant to the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE).
General LED (San Antonio, Texas): The firm, parent company of AgiLight and GenLED Lighting, has appointed Michelle Huang as chief technology officer to lead the companies' product development and R&D efforts. Huang joins General LED after three years as LED lamps product line manager for North America at Osram Sylvania. She also served as an electrical engineer at Siemens Factory Automation in Beijing, China, and began her career as an electrical engineer at the Beijing Building Design Institute of the China State Construction Engineering Corp. in Beijing.
Yokogawa Corp. of America (Houston): Chet Mroz has been named president and COO of Yokogawa's North American operations. Throughout his career in the industrial automation industry he has run national and international businesses for Foxboro, Texas Instruments and ABB.