OUR PEOPLE
LEADERSHIP
Kevin Chin has successfully started, bought, built, fixed, scaled up and sold businesses across a range of industries – including software, education, funds management, media, road infrastructure services and solar power. He has exited multiple businesses and successfully led 5 IPOs across the NASDAQ, ASX and NZX exchanges as well as originated 4 fund vehicles (listed and unlisted). After a decade in working life, Kevin’s entrepreneurial journey commenced in 2003 with the start up and scale up of an ice cream business that spanned Australia and South East Asia, before going on in 2004 to lead a consortium to privatise, turnaround and globally scale up the enterprise AI software company, Ruleburst Haley culminating in its acquisition by Oracle in 2008. The story of RuleBurst Haley is chronicled in the book HyperTurnaround! With extensive hands-on experience in strategic and operational management in the SME/emerging companies space, Kevin has served as Chairman, CEO, CFO and COO of various companies across a range of industries, often parachuting in when there is a complex turnaround or growing pains inflection point to deal with.
Kevin’s primary strategic and operational expertise includes the art of scaling up businesses (in particular navigating growing-pains issues and inflection points for enterprises experiencing exponential rates of growth) and leading companies through distressed and complex turnaround situations. His previous experience encompasses investment management (private equity and mezzanine credit), direct funds management (equities in Australia and Asia), fund of funds management (Asia and hedge funds), mergers and acquisitions, corporate finance, litigation support and forensic accounting. Kevin has worked for LFG, J.P.Morgan, PWC and Deloitte.
A global citizen, Kevin has lived and done business in Australasia, Southeast Asia, the United States and the United Kingdom. He currently divides his time between the United Kingdom, South East Asia and Australia. Kevin holds a Bachelor of Commerce degree from the University of New South Wales where he was part of the inaugural cohort of CoOp Scholars in the School of Banking and Finance. He is also a qualified Chartered Accountant (Chartered Accountants Australia and New Zealand) and a Fellow of FINSIA (the Financial Services Institute of Australasia) where he lectured Master’s subjects including Advanced Industrial Equities Analysis and Corporate Finance.
Alex Cuppage is a seasoned investor and operator with deep experience across real asset investing, leveraged finance and financial services. He was a Partner at Silverstripe Investment Management, one of Europe’s leading private financial services investors.
Prior to Silverstripe, Alex led the European investment activities for Sherman Financial Group, a large U.S. private investment office with over $10 billion deployed across real estate, credit, and private equity. Earlier in his career, he held senior roles in banking, restructuring, and asset workout, including managing complex non-performing loan portfolios during periods of market stress.
Alex is also a co-founder of BEAM, an AI-driven financial platform. He holds a BA (Hons) in Business and Economics from Trinity College Dublin and was previously a member of the Milken Institute’s Young Leaders Circle.
Shane Whelan is based in Dublin, where he is leading the establishment of VivoPower’s European office. He is one of Europe’s most experienced real estate and infrastructure asset developers, with a multi-decade track record delivering large-scale real estate and infrastructure projects.
Shane has long-standing relationships with leading hyperscalers and data center operators, including Google, Microsoft, and Amazon, across assets in the EU and UK.
At VivoPower, Shane advises on the scaling of the Company’s Sovereign AI data center infrastructure platform in support of its Power-to-X strategy. He is also responsible for building a high-caliber development, technical delivery, and operational team in Dublin, a key global hub for data center infrastructure talent.
Chris Mallios is a seasoned executive with nearly 30 years of experience in the automotive, technology, resources, utilities and infrastructure industries.
He has held several leadership positions at Nissan Motor Corporation, including as director of global business operations for Infiniti, managing director of Infiniti’s Asia and Oceania regions and director of business development in China. In the latter role, he oversaw the joint venture of Nissan and the Dongfeng Motor Corporation to produce Infiniti vehicles for the world’s biggest automotive market.
His background also includes nearly 5 years as the CEO of CFC Group – an investment and development group that provides distribution, logistics and transport services – and nearly a decade as Asia Pacific CFO for TE Connectivity, a global technology company whose solutions power, among other things, electric vehicles.
Based in Sydney, Chris is a CPA Australia Fellow and holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from the University of New South Wales. He has further completed executive programs as a Graduate member of the Australian Institute of Company Directors and INSEAD’s global top executive leadership AVIRA Programme.
With over 25 years of HR leadership experience, Jacqui is a seasoned and qualified member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD). She has worked across a diverse range of industries including electric vehicle (EV) automotive, mechanical engineering, and construction, bringing deep insight into both unionised and non-unionised environments.
Throughout her career, Jacqui has held senior leadership positions where she has successfully led high-performing HR teams. She is known for building motivated, engaged workforces and fostering positive organisational cultures. Her expertise spans employment law, change management, strategic workforce planning, employee engagement, culture and wellbeing, and talent acquisition.
Passionate about helping organisations reach their full potential, Jacqui partners with businesses to align their people strategy with their growth ambitions, driving transformation and long-term success.
Board of Directors
Advisory Council
Professor Hugh Durrant-Whyte is Chief Scientist & Engineer for the state of New South Wales in Australia, and a world-leading authority on robotics, automation, machine learning, and the application of all three.
He previously served as Chief Scientific Advisor to the UK Ministry of Defence (2016-2018), CEO of National ICT Australia (NICTA) (2010-2014), and Director of the Australian Research Centre (ARC) of Excellence for Autonomous Systems (1995-2010). He was a Professor and ARC Federation Fellow, and the founding Director of the Australian Centre for Field Robotics (ACFR) at the University of Sydney. He has published over 300 research papers, graduated over 70 PhD students, and won numerous awards and prizes for his work, including being named 2010 New South Wales Scientist of the Year and receiving the 2017 Sargent Medal from the Institute of Engineers Australia.
In his career, Professor Durrant-Whyte has worked with many major companies and co-founded three successful start-ups. He is particularly well known for his work with Patrick Terminals in delivering the automated container terminals in Brisbane and Port Botany, and for his work with Rio Tinto in pioneering the automated “Mine of the Future,” including its driverless trucks.
Hugh is an honorary Fellow of Engineers Australia (HonFIEAus), a Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (FIEEE), a Fellow of the Royal Academy of Engineering (FREng), a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science (FAA) and a Fellow of the Royal Society of London (FRS).
Adam Traidman is a Silicon Valley serial entrepreneur with a proven track record of multiple successful exits and over $300 million raised across various technology ventures. He was the Founder and CEO of BRD, a pioneering crypto wallet company acquired by Coinbase. He also served as CEO of SBI Mining Chip and SBI Ripple Asia, and held a board position at Ripple Labs. With experience leading more than five startups to exit as CEO, his leadership spans blockchain, fintech, and deep tech sectors. Adam began his career as a semiconductor engineer at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Caltech.
Rachel Pether is a globally respected leader in the sovereign wealth fund and institutional investment community, with deep expertise spanning digital assets, capital markets, and global investment strategy.
Based in the UAE for nearly two decades, Rachel currently serves as Head of Middle East at 3iQ, one of the world’s largest digital asset managers, and as a Senior Advisor to the Sovereign Wealth Fund Institute (SWFI). She has advised sovereign wealth funds, pension funds, and institutional investors across the Middle East, Europe, and Asia on capital allocation, digital asset adoption, and strategic partnerships.
Previously, Rachel held senior leadership roles at Mubadala, one of the world’s largest sovereign wealth funds, where she was closely involved in global investment initiatives and institutional capital deployment.
Rachel brings to VivoPower deep connectivity across sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and institutional investors, as well as a strong understanding of the convergence between sovereign AI infrastructure, digital assets, and long-term capital formation. Her appointment strengthens VivoPower’s strategic positioning in the Middle East, a priority growth region for the Company.
Eric Achtmann is an entrepreneurial executive and board member with a history of exponential value creation in challenging growth and transformation environments. Eric’s established track record of success driving innovation, transformation, and growth spans multiple industries in multi-billion-dollar publicly traded and private companies including Airbus, BMW, Dana, McDonnel-Douglas, McKinsey, and Whitbread PLC/Costa Coffee.
Eric has an uncommon ability to successfully integrate and leverage business, finance and technology; manage, synthesize and steer complex concepts to commercial success; create and deliver novel products/solutions; and align diverse peoples, cultures and functions to deliver exceptional results. Most recently, this is exemplified by his role at Whitbread PLC/Costa Coffee where, in 2011 when Whitbread was stagnating, he proposed and delivered a world leading, award winning, IoT-enabled fresh drinks system. This system yielded 125 patents/claims, entered production within 6 months, has been deployed globally and transformed Costa’s growth trajectory, significantly contributing to its $5.1 billion sale to Coca-Cola in 2019.
Eric is a dual US/German citizen who began his career as a design and software engineer with BMW and Airbus. He was selected as part of the US Congress’ Lean Aerospace Initiative where he focused on lean manufacturing for the F/A-18 Super Hornet Strike Fighter at the highly regarded McDonnell-Douglas Phantom Works. After completing his MS, Aero- & Astronautics and MBA in Finance from MIT, Eric was recruited by McKinsey, initially with a focus on M&A. Shortly after starting, Eric pioneered McKinsey’s advanced product development activities (DTC/DTV) aimed at delivering extraordinary profitability and cultural transformation through cutting-edge product improvement and re-design. These activities evolved into one of McKinsey’s highly successful service lines, generating billions in value. Thereafter, Eric was recruited away from McKinsey to co-found PolyTechnos Venture-Partners, an early stage $300 million pan-European tech and life science venture fund, where Eric served as a Managing Director for over a decade. Since PolyTechnos, Eric has engaged in the creation of numerous companies, including ReClimate (data analytics for renewable energy). At Dana Inc. (NYSE: DAN), Eric worked closely with the CEO and executive team to define and drive key strategic innovation initiatives.
Since 2016, Eric has led a management and advisory firm, Global Capital Group (“GCX”), based in Germany that partners with global clients to “pivot, repurpose, innovate and transform” their businesses. Passionate about innovation, people development and social responsibility, Eric is a frequent speaker and university lecturer (professor), and a US Air Force AFWerx and Techstars Mentor, as a well as a member of the Boston Committee on Foreign Relations. He is a Founding Member of Meggitt PLC’s Technology Advisory Board (LSE: MGGT), Expert Advisor to the European Commission, and Senior Advisor at McKinsey, amongst other roles.
Chris Kim brings extensive experience in corporate strategy, venture capital, investment management, and business model development, combining capital support with hands-on mentorship for high-growth startups and technology ventures. He has led several high-impact initiatives, including the Cybersecurity Venture Fund, which aims to strengthen global technological competitiveness and innovation.
Prior to this, he held senior roles in Strategy and M&A at Hyundai and Mitsui, where he played a key role in driving corporate growth, strategic planning, and cross-border investments across Asia and beyond.
With a strong background in venture capital, corporate strategy, and governance, Chris provides valuable insight and guidance as a board advisor focused on innovation, growth, and sustainable business development.
Edward ‘Eddie’ Hyams has over forty-five years of experience as an entrepreneur and a senior executive in energy, clean technology and energy efficiency.
At Englefield Capital, Eddie co‐led the Renewable Energy Fund, investing in solar, wind and biomass developments in Europe, joining Englefield after the fund had backed his management team to achieve the first structured financing of a portfolio of renewables assets in the UK. Subsequently Edward has supported innovative businesses and management teams with personal investment and insights in environmental and clean technology businesses. In 2014, Eddie was one of the two original angel investors in UK EV truck business Tevva Motors, and served as Non-Executive Chairman from 2018 until earlier this year.
Eddie has also held a number of senior executive roles in energy including Managing Director at Eastern Group PLC and Engineering Director at Southern Electric PLC. Eddie was a Non‐Executive Director of the UK Energy Saving Trust (UK-EST) following the electricity and gas privatizations in the UK in the early 1990s. Eddie re‐joined the UK-EST as Non‐Executive Chairman in 2005.
Edward is a Chartered Engineer with a degree in Electrical Engineering from Imperial College, London and a Diploma in Accounting and Finance from the Association of Certified Chartered Accountants. Eddie has completed executive programs at Harvard Business School in Finance and at Stanford University in Strategy and Organization. In 2002 Eddie was named “Best Business Leader” in the Sage UK business awards for his leadership as CEO in an innovative energy e-business.
Philip von Wulffen is an experienced investor and entrepreneur with a strong track record across private equity, fund management, and large-scale asset development in Europe. He is currently Chief Executive Officer and a Board Member of OGDC EU, where he leads the development of power-secured land and data centre infrastructure across key European markets.
Previously, Philip was Co-Head of the JAB Consumer Fund, where he was responsible for global investment strategy, capital deployment, and portfolio management. Earlier in his career, he worked in investment banking at The Blackstone Group and in management consulting at Boston Consulting Group, advising on M&A, restructuring, and corporate strategy.
Philip holds an MBA from Columbia Business School and brings deep expertise in capital formation, land banking, and platform-scale asset development. He is based in Vienna, Austria.