The Clas-SiC team comprises some of the best and most experienced talent in the industry. Our expertise combines a wide range of SiC engineering, project management, business and customer service disciplines. Further information on our senior management structure can be found below.


Our Team

USA

Carl Johnson

Executive Chairman

Carl founded II-VI Incorporated (Saxonburg, Pennsylvania USA) in 1971 to develop and manufacture II-VI compound semiconductor materials for optics and electro-optical applications in the then emerging, high-power laser arena. He served the company as its Principal Executive Officer and a Director for 36 years and continued as its Board Chairman for an additional 7 years.
During his career at II-VI, Carl oversaw and participated in or helped motivate company efforts to:

  • Develop and deploy the commercial scale manufacturing of highest-quality, laser-grade Cadmium Telluride (1971), Zinc Selenide (1975), Zinc Sulfide (1985) and diamond (2004)
  • Develop and deploy the commercial scale manufacturing of highest-quality,electronic-grade 3 inch (2004), 100 mm (2007) and 150 mm (2012) diameter SiliconCarbide substrates.
  • Since 2007, Carl has been active as a Primary Equity Investor and Director in 3emerging, technology-based businesses and serves as Board Chairman at two of those entities.

Carl attained a Bachelors Degree from Purdue University (USA) in 1964, the Masters Degree from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (USA) in 1965, and a Ph.D. Degree from the University of Illinois (USA) in 1969, all in the field of Electrical Engineering.

Carl Johnson

Ranjit Pandurthi

Non-executive Director

Ranjit Pandurthi is the Chief Executive Officer and Managing Director of Archean Chemical Industries Ltd., a leading chemical manufacturing company based in Chennai, India. With an MBA from The University of Chicago, Ranjit has been instrumental in driving the company’s growth and innovation since he took on the role in 2018.

Under his leadership, Archean Chemical Industries has expanded its market presence and diversified its product portfolio, becoming a key player in the global chemical industry. Ranjit brings a wealth of business and manufacturing experience to the Board of Clas-SiC.

Ranjit Pandurthi

JD Brookhart

Non-executive Director

JD Brookhart, a managing director at CJ&M Holdings, holds a finance degree from Colorado State University.

He began his career as an award winning sales executive at Xerox and was recruited to advance his career in medical equipment sales and then engineering software sales. He made a life-changing decision and spent the next 18 years coaching football in the NFL and at the highest level of college. He was a coordinator and head coach at a number of prestigious schools. He now directs CJ&M Holdings and their pursuit of supporting start-up companies.

JD also serves as a Board member for several for profit and non-profit entities. He lives in Denver, Colorado with his wife and 4 sons.

JD Brookhart

Bill West

Non-executive Director

Bill has over 40 years of experience in financing private companies through the management of a series of venture capital funds and in providing investment banking advisory services to both investors and company founders.

Bill West

UK

Jen Walls

Director and Chief Executive Officer

Jen has over 30 years Semiconductor Industry experience with operational and managerial positions in Process Engineering, Process Development and Business Management.

Jen has successfully led many SiC projects and was key in the early industry SiC engagements in the UK. She is an Engineering and MBA graduate and is a certified 6‐sigma green belt practitioner.

Jen Walls

David Clark

Chief Technology Officer

David has a strong background in process engineering and process development, with more than 24 years of silicon process integration, device
engineering, process development and yield engineering experience at Raytheon Systems. David moved into Silicon Carbide process integration and device engineering in 2004 and has experience across many SiC device technologies including Schottky diodes, PiN diodes, MOSFET’s, JFET’s,
BJT’s, CLD’s and MESFET’s. During David’s tenure at Raytheon, he worked on a number of successful SiC process developments leading to successful
manufacture of 1000’s of SiC device wafers.

David has a first class honours degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering as well as a Post Graduate Certificate in Advanced Silicon Processing and Manufacturing Technologies. He has authored or co-authored more than 10 SiC processing papers, is joint inventor of one SiC related patent and has 3 other SiC related patent submissions pending. David joined Clas-SiC in 2017 as Principal Technologist, with oversight of Clas-SiC’s technology roadmap and technical direction.

David Clark

Scott Forrest

Chief Financial Officer

Scott brings over 30 years’ experience to the Clas-SiC team as CFO, Finance Director & Senior Management Team member, previously working in Fabrication & Engineering / Oil & Gas and Renewables industry, undertaking a key role as Finance lead in the business operations and strategy as part of the Board of Directors whist managing and delivering on the reporting requirements of the company and ensuring the day-to-day running of the finance, compliance, HR departments.

Scott Forrest

Gordon Wood

Facilities & EHS Manager

Gordon brings over 30 years engineering experience from both the Semiconductor and Medical Industries with both operational and managerial positions in Equipment Engineering and Facilities Engineering.

Gordon has successfully led many facilities projects and ensured the day to day running of the facilities delivering on both the hard and soft services.

Gordon Wood

Supporting Customer Innovation through Prototyping and Accelerated R&D cycle times  

From concept to prototype to manufacture.