Jim Gambino’s experience includes executive positions in multinational specialty chemical companies Rohm and Haas Company, Elementis Specialties, and RHEOX Inc. where he developed and managed disruptive high profit businesses and product lines that achieved market share leadership. Jim has extensive business & technology management and market development skills over a broad business portfolio that includes coatings, oil field chemicals, inks, plastics, paper, textiles, cosmetics, lubricants, cleantech, and nanotechnology. He has also successfully led joint venture and licensing negotiation teams in the U.S. and Far East.
Jim holds a Chemical Engineering Degree from Polytechnic Institute of Brooklyn and an Executive MBA from Wharton School. Jim is past Director, Commercial Development and Marketing Association (CDMA) and past Trustee, Board Member of the CDMA Educational Foundation (CDMAEF). In 2008 Jim won the CDMA Golden C award for marketing excellence. He has also served as Trustee for the Chemist Club of New York.
His most recent corporate assignment was Vice President, Technology Commercialization Group, Physical Sciences, Ben Franklin Technology Partners of Southeastern PA, creating pathways to commercialization for new companies, entrepreneurs and researchers by building consortia and regional initiatives with universities, government and private partners. Jim was also responsible for developing and managing Ben Franklin’s Regional Energy Strategy, seeded with funding from the Commonwealth’s Alternative Energy Development Program. He also served as Associate Director, Deployment and Commercialization, for the Greater Philadelphia Innovation Cluster for Energy Efficient Buildings (GPIC), the nation’s first energy innovation cluster funded by the DOE and other Federal Agencies.
Steve Talis’ diversified career spans the research lab, marketing, finance, mergers and acquisitions, strategic planning, and manufacturing at Rohm and Haas Company, Johnson & Johnson, and ARCO Chemical Company. This background provided the basis for Steve’s entrepreneurial venture- a successful specialty plastics manufacturing and worldwide marketing company. As CEO and majority shareholder, he managed the corporate functions plus licensing, foreign sourcing, and new product development. More recently Steve was COO of StarTrak LLC – a wireless communications company.
Steve graduated from LaSalle College with a BS in Chemistry and earned his MBA in Marketing and Finance from Temple University. He has received certifications in Plastics Technology and Sales and Marketing from NYU and Mergers and Acquisitions from Northwestern University. He also serves on the Ben Franklin Technology Physical Science Investment Review Committee.