Leadership Team

Our leadership team represents decades of industry experience coupled with entrepreneurial spirit and passion for natural chemistry.

Stephen Doktycz

Chief Executive Officer

Steve started as the interim CEO in 2019 and officially took the helm at Vantage™ in 2020. Before joining Vantage, he spent more than 27 years at The Dow Chemical Company in various globally focused leadership roles in strategic planning, finance, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate development, including Corporate Director and Global Director, Corporate and Strategic Development. He then served as the Senior Vice President of LyondellBasell and most recently as Senior Advisor to H.I.G. Capital, LLC, a leading global private equity and alternative assets investment firm.

Steve has a Ph.D. in Chemistry from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana, an MBA from Northwestern University and a B.A. in Chemistry from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

Mark Valentino

Chief Financial Officer

Mark joined Vantage as Chief Financial Officer as of December 2022. Mark brings more than 25 years of progressive experience across all areas of finance in global public and private equity owned organizations. Prior to joining Vantage in 2022, Mark served as CFO at Ascensus Specialties, a global specialty chemical company supporting life science, electronics and other specialty industries. He has also supported the pharmaceutical industry as CFO of Adare Pharma Solutions, as CFO at PeroxyChem which was successfully sold to Evonik, and as Global Finance Director/Treasurer for PQ Corporation, a manufacturer of inorganic, specialty chemicals.


Mark holds a B.S. in accounting from Seton Hall University in New Jersey; an MBA from Monmouth University in New Jersey; and an M.S. in Taxation from Villanova University in Pennsylvania. As a certified public accountant, he also serves as an adjunct professor for undergraduate and graduate finance at Villanova University.

Pamela Lam

Chief Technology Officer

Pamela has been the Chief Technology Officer at Vantage since 2021. Previously, Pamela worked at Henkel Consumer Goods, most recently as VP of Research and Development for the Laundry Home Care business. Her achievements at Henkel included overseeing all facets of product development for consumer brands, implementing technology strategies, leading the R&D integration of a large acquisition, serving as the R&D lead to major customers and building high-performing teams.

Pamela earned a B.S. in Chemistry from The State University of New York at Albany and an M.S. in Chemistry from Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J. She is on the board of directors for the Household Commercial Products Association and a committee chair for the American Cleaning Institute.

Ali Butler

General Counsel

Ali joined Vantage in 2022 as its first General Counsel. She has more than 20 years of experience serving as a strategic advisor to public and privately held companies across a number of industries. Most recently, she was the Deputy General Counsel at Bright Machines, a software and robotics company focused on the manufacturing industry. Prior to making the switch to in-house counsel, she was a partner at Mayer Brown LLP in the Corporate & Securities practice.


Ali received her B.A. from University of Rochester and her J.D. from University of Michigan Law School.

Matthew Conti

Chief Human Resources Officer

Matthew has a history of designing and implementing programs to recruit great talent, invest in the development of diverse workforces and improve employee engagement, all of which support continued Vantage’s growth plans. At previous companies, including Ingredion, Ametek and Precision Castparts Corp., he has led HR operational excellence and talent acquisition for global, multi-site operations, including during acquisitions.
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Matthew graduated from Kalamazoo College in Michigan with a B.A. in Economics and Business. He completed an interdisciplinary program in Economic Policy at the University of Michigan Graduate School of Public Policy and holds an MBA from the London Business School.

Alberto Laveran

Senior Vice President

Alberto consulted for Vantage before officially joining us in 2020 to lead our LATAM Region and our Vantage Performance Materials™ business. He spent more than 20 years with Dow Chemical Company, holding various roles in finance, business analysis and strategic planning and, most recently, as the Hydrocarbons Business Director for LATAM. His positions have entailed moves to Switzerland, Belgium and the U.S.
 
Alberto completed a six-year undergraduate/graduate degree program at the School of Economic Sciences at the University of Buenos Aires, as well as graduate work in business economics from Universidad del Sur.

Bill Powers

Senior Vice President

Bill leads Vantage Operations and comes with a wealth of experience leading and improving large chemical operations and teams with safety being the top organizational value. He has worked as an operations consultant for the TriVista Business Group and as Vice President of Operations for DSM Chemicals North America. Bill also spent 25 years at Dow Chemical Company, progressing through continually more senior positions in the organization. 

Bill has a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from West Virginia Institute of Technology. 

Farheen Qadir

Executive Vice President

Farheen has more than 20 years of experience in international business management with personal care companies. Before joining Vantage, she held the position of Personal Care Business Director, North America for BASF during which time she led sales, marketing, technical service, research and development, and product performance teams in the U.S., Canada and Mexico. Other roles with BASF and Colgate-Palmolive included responsibilities in commercial operations, product portfolio management, supply chain management and production planning.
 
She received her B.S. and M.S. degrees in Chemical Engineering from Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and an MBA in Multinational Management and an M.A. in International Studies from the University of Pennsylvania.

Michael Sabatelli

Senior Vice President

Michael started with Vantage (formerly Unichema International) as a Technical Sales Representative in 1998. He then moved into the Strategic Account Manager role and assumed the leadership position of Sales Director in 2011. Soon thereafter, Vantage named him Business Director before promoting him to Senior Vice President of Sales and Marketing of Vantage Oleochemicals™ in 2015.

Michael holds a B.S. in Chemical Engineering and an MBA from West Virginia University.

Alexander Snell

Senior Vice President

Alexander leads the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) region for Vantage. Prior to joining Vantage, Alexander served at FoamParter AG as a member of the Board and Executive Vice President Region Europe. From 2002 until 2018, he held various leadership roles at Clariant AG, including Business Director Industrial Applications & Base Products where he led a sales team across Europe, Middle East and Africa. He also spent four years in India executing Clariant´s regional strategy.
 
Alexander has a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from the University of Münster, Germany, and a B.A. in Business Administration with an emphasis in business economics from Fernuniversität Hagen, Germany.

Bob Stefansic

Senior Vice President

Bob leads Vantage’s global integrated supply chain, sourcing and procurement function. With more than 35 years' of manufacturing, quality, operations and supply chain experience, Bob has built his career with industry leaders including Ingredion, James Hardie Building Products and AkzoNobel Chemical Company. He joined Vantage in 2022.


Bob holds his B.S. in Chemical Engineering and MBA from the University of South Carolina and completed business and executive leadership programs at the University of Cambridge and Center for Creative Leadership. He serves as Executive Advisory Board Emeritus at the University of Wisconsin Grainger Center for Supply Chain Management.

Jan Willem Tinge

Executive Vice President

Jan has a strong background in understanding and delivering customer-focused value propositions for businesses that combine both equipment and product. He also has leadership and team-building capabilities, as well as experience in sales management. In his most recent position before Vantage, Jan was the VP, Global Marketing Facilities & Machines for Diversey.

Jan is originally from the Netherlands and now lives in the U.S. He holds an M.S. in Industrial Engineering and Management Science from Eindhoven University of Technology and is fluent in English, Dutch and German.

Tim Wilson

Senior Vice President

Tim has spent his entire career helping companies successfully navigate periods of transformational growth and change. Most recently as a partner at The Boston Consulting Group in Chicago, Tim has worked alongside C-suite executives of Fortune 500 consumer packaged goods companies to develop successful innovation- and growth-focused strategies. Tim has served directly as Chief Transformation Officer with several companies, leading teams in implementing programs that delivered enterprise-wide value and transformational organizational effectiveness.
 
Tim earned both his MBA and his B.A. in English from Northwestern University.

Sumeet Verma

Senior Vice President

When Sumeet joined Vantage™ in 2021, he already had a deep understanding of our commercial operations. As Executive Vice President for the Mensana consulting group, he worked with our leaders to further our Commercial Excellence initiatives and business strategy. Sumeet has spent more than a decade in various leadership roles with consulting companies, driving sustainable change in large-scale organizations and delivering tangible financial results. He has led teams to bring both operational and commercial improvements in a variety of industries. He currently leads commercial integration for Vantage’s acquisition of JEEN International and BotanicalsPlus.

Sumeet earned his Honors in Business Administration through the Richard Ivey School of Business at Western University in Canada and lives in Toronto.

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