SUSTAINABLE
ENERGY
STORAGE

Robert Piconi is Co-Founder, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Energy Vault, responsible for the overall vision, strategic direction and operational performance of the company. Robert’s experience includes prior Executive leadership roles in Fortune 100 public companies across various industries including Diversified Energy (Amoco/British Petroleum), Telecommunications (Bell Labs Lucent Technologies), and Security/Network Management Software (Danaher Corporation). Within the private sector, he also founded and developed several innovative Healthcare service and medical device companies within the European market which were later acquired by Private Equity funds and/or large industry conglomerates. Robert completed his BS/BBA undergraduate studies at the University of Notre Dame and his graduate MBA studies at Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management.

Andrea Pedretti is Co-Founder & Chief Technology Officer of Energy Vault, responsible for technology innovation. Energy Vault creates highly disruptive and innovative solutions for long duration, utility-scale energy storage that, for the first time, enables renewables to deliver baseload power 24/7 below the cost of fossil fuels. Prior to Energy Vault, Andrea founded and served as Chief Technology Officer in multiple solar and renewable technology companies. Andrea holds over 25 patents worldwide for a variety of applications in energy storage, solar thermochemical science for solar fuels, and civil engineering. Andrea completed his Masters of Science (MS) in Engineering at Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule (ETH) Zürich, Switzerland.

David Hitchcock is interim Chief Financial Officer of Energy Vault responsible for all internal and external financial functions, the oversight of Energy Vault’s public company accounting and financial reporting, as well as capital markets activities.

David brings more than three decades of operational financial leadership experience, including significant capital markets and M&A expertise. David most recently served as Chief Financial and Administrative Officer of Syniverse Technologies (Syniverse), a leading global services provider to the mobile telecom industry. During David’s eight years as CFO, Syniverse, he supported them making the successful transition from a public company (NYSE) to private company through the 2011 sale to The Carlyle Group. Syniverse revenue increased from over $300 million in 2007 to more than $900 million in 2014 through a combination of organic and inorganic growth while maintaining strong, consistent margins and significantly expanding its workforce and revenue base outside of North America, having played a critical role in the Company’s sale to The Carlyle Group in 2011. Prior to Syniverse, David held senior finance and operational roles at Lucent Technologies, including Corporate Controller and Business Vice President for Lucent Worldwide Services, CFO for the Global Supply Chain Network organization ($6B+ scope in manufacturing and procurement), and CFO of North America for the post-merger combination of Alcatel-Lucent.

David currently serves as an Advisor to Astra Capital Management and is a Board Member and Chair of the Audit Committee for Communications Technologies Services, LLC, an Astra portfolio company. David earned a BS in Accounting and an MBA from Wake Forest University and is a Certified Public Accountant.

Marco Terruzzin is Chief Product Officer of Energy Vault, responsible for product vision and strategy. Marco is a product innovator and internationally recognized expert in climate change mitigation strategies (200+ renewable energy projects, $3 billion in power purchase agreement), with proven track record of growing businesses at the intersection of clean-tech (renewable energy + environmental markets) and digitization. Founding advisor (Energy Block chain Consortium), Diversified Energy Sector (E.ON Climate & Renewables, GE, Evolution Markets, Roland Berger Management Consulting). Marco holds an MSc in Mechanical Engineering and a PhD in Energy Economics from the University of Padua (Italy), and earned his MBA from the University of Virginia Darden School of Business.

Laurence Alexander is Chief Marketing Officer of Energy Vault, responsible for global deployment of the marketing communications strategy for the company. Laurence has held Board positions and Executive Leadership Roles leading global brand strategy across a range of business sectors. His professional experience includes Marketing/Sales Enablement (Early WMC); Platform CMO – Security/Network Mgmt. (Danaher Corporation), Telecom (Emblaze, World Online, Genie, British Telecom, o2, SAB). Laurence is renowned for his relentless energy, delivering unparalleled rates of commercial and investment growth for multiple business. He has led and successfully managed several businesses from start up, M&A, and IPO into public companies and into trade sales. Laurence studied in Brighton (UK) and obtained an HND in Business Studies.

Chris Wiese is Chief Operating Officer of Energy Vault, responsible for Product Realization. Chris’s experience includes prior executive leadership roles in Fortune 100 public companies across various industries including RFID Barcode Scanning/Mobile Computing (Zebra Technologies), Network Emulation & Testing (Spirent Technologies), Security/Network Management (Danaher Corporation), and Telecommunications (Bell Labs, Lucent Technologies, Alcatel). Chris completed his undergraduate and post graduate studies at the University of Wisconsin with a BS and MS in Mechanical Engineering, and then entered into Doctorate studies at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken NJ.

Gonca Icoren is Chief People Officer at Energy Vault responsible for global people strategy including culture and employee experience, talent and performance management, learning and development, as well as compliance.

Gonca’s experience includes prior executive leadership roles in Biotech and Pharmaceuticals industry (Amgen, Actavis, Pfizer) and human resources consultancy work in the Financial sector (PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Turkey).

Gonca completed her Bachelor's degree in International Relations at Middle East Technical University - Ankara, TR and earned her Executive MSc, International Human Resource Management at Cranfield University - Cranfield School of Management - London, UK.

Energy Vault welcomes John G. Jung as the President of Energy Vault Solutions responsible for developing and building the company's business and capabilities in system integration and AI.

John's prior experience includes as Founder, President, and CEO of Greensmith Energy, a turn-key systems integrator responsible for delivering over a third of the total US capacity of energy storage in 2016. Deploying over 100 systems in twelve countries with a 100% safety record, Greensmith provided industry-leading technologies including a battery-agnostic platform and proprietary software using Al to some of the largest utilities, independent power producers and industrials globally, and was acquired by Wärtsilä in 2017. Prior to Greensmith, John led several VC-backed B2B startups in distributed computing and vertical marketplaces including Pantellos which served 21 of the 25 largest electric utilities in North America, and served on the Board of the Energy Storage Association. John also led a strategy practice for A.T. Kearney and is a Partner at Cota Capital and an Independent Director at Elum Energy.

John holds a B.A. in Pure Science and Economics from Western University, and an MBA in Strategy and Finance from Ivey Business School.

Energy Vault welcomes Akshay Ladwa as the Chief Engineering Officer of Energy Vault Solutions responsible for technology innovation and creating customer centric solutions.

Akshay’s experience includes executive management roles in Energy Storage, Integration, project management and Engineering (BrightNight, Wärtsilä, and Greensmith), Mechanical Systems Engineer (GE Energy Storage), and PV System Design and Development Engineer (Solar).

Akshay holds a Masters of Science in Mechanical Engineering from Laurence Technological University, and a Bachelors of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from Visvesvaraya Technological University.

Kevin Keough serves as Senior Vice President of Corporate Development responsible for working with the executive management team to set the strategic plan and to drive all M&A activities.

Kevin has led corporate development at Danaher, Tektronix, Netscout, and Inet Technologies across a broad range of high growth segments. At these businesses, he was responsible for their long-range growth strategies and driving complementary mergers and acquisitions that accelerated and amplified execution success.

Kevin applied his knowledge of the rigorous Danaher Business System, DBS, to successfully deploy more than $5B of capital to achieve numerous accretive transactions that expanded addressable market sizes, exploited white space opportunities, consolidated attractive segments and added key growth technologies and business assets.

Kevin holds a degree in electrical engineering from the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, Georgia.

Josh McMorrow is Chief Legal Officer of Energy Vault responsible for overseeing Energy Vault’s legal, regulatory, IP and compliance functions, as well as all legal aspects of its strategic and commercial partnerships as the company continues to scale its operations and expand its global footprint.

Josh joins the Energy Vault leadership team as a Senior Legal Executive with broad international experience in the energy, industrial gas, construction, and chemicals industries. Josh has been recognized as one of the top 100 GCs in three countries (United States, Switzerland, and Germany) as well as being named General Counsel of the Year for Energy. He has managed legal teams on six continents and is focused on building, and being part of, powerful legal teams that partner with the business. Most recently, Josh led the IPO of Atotech Limited on the NYSE in February 2021, and subsequently led the sale of the company to a strategic buyer in July 2021.

Josh McMorrow graduated with Honors from the University of Texas School of Law and completed his undergraduate degree in International Business at Trinity University, graduating cum laude.