Leadership Team
Neno Duplan
Founder & CEO
As Founder and CEO of Locus Technologies, Dr. Duplan spent his career combining his understanding of environmental science with a vision of how to gather, aggregate, organize, and analyze environmental data to help organizations better manage and report their environmental and sustainability footprints. During the 1980’s, while conducting research as a graduate student at Carnegie Mellon, Dr. Duplan developed the first prototype system for an environmental information management database. This discovery eventually lead to the formation of Locus Technologies in 1997.
As technology evolved and new guidelines for environmental stewardship expanded, so has the vision Dr. Duplan has held for Locus. With the company’s deployment of the world’s first commercial Software-as-Service (SaaS) product for environmental information management in 1999 to the Locus Mobile solution in 2014, today Dr. Duplan continues to lead and challenge his team to be the leading provider of cloud-based EH&S and sustainability software.
Dr. Duplan holds a Ph.D. in Civil Engineering from the University of Zagreb, Croatia, an M.S. in Civil Engineering from Carnegie-Mellon, and a B.S. in Civil Engineering from the University of Split, Croatia. He also attended advanced Management Training at Stanford University.
J. Wesley Hawthorne
President
Mr. Hawthorne has been with Locus since 1999, working on development and implementation of services and solutions in the areas of environmental compliance, remediation, and sustainability. As President, he currently leads the overall product development and operations of the company. As a seasoned environmental and engineering executive, Hawthorne incorporates innovative analytical tools and methods to develop strategies for customers for portfolio analysis, project implementation, and management. His comprehensive knowledge of technical and environmental compliance best practices and laws enable him to create customized, cost-effective and customer-focused solutions for the specialized needs of each customer.
Mr. Hawthorne holds an M.S. in Environmental Engineering from Stanford University and B.S. degrees in Geology and Geological Engineering from Purdue University. He is registered both as a Professional Engineer and Professional Geologist, and is also accredited as Lead Verifier for the Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Low Carbon Fuel Standard programs by the California Air Resources Board.
Ben Afzal
Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Afzal oversees all of Locus Technologies financial operations as well as the department of human resources. From payroll to budget monitoring to external financial reporting, Mr. Afzal taps his years of financial experience to run the behind-the-scenes backbone of the company. In addition, he is responsible for managing ongoing SaaS subscriptions and agreements and renewals with customers. Prior to Locus, Mr. Afzal was the Director of Finance for Archer Pacific where he managed the finance and operations of the company. Mr. Afzal held the Director of Finance role at VentureOne, a preeminent venture capital database firm.
Mr. Afzal holds a B.S. and MBA degrees from Cornell University.
Mr. Hawthorne holds an M.S. in Environmental Engineering from Stanford University and B.S. degrees in Geology and Geological Engineering from Purdue University. He is registered both as a Professional Engineer and Professional Geologist, and is also accredited as Lead Verifier for the Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Low Carbon Fuel Standard programs by the California Air Resources Board.
Marian Carr
Senior Vice President
Ms. Carr is responsible for managing overall customer solution deployments and customer relationships with Locus’ government and commercial accounts. Her career at Locus includes heading the product development team of the award-winning cloud-based environmental ePortal solution (precursor to Locus Platform) as well as maintaining and growing key customer accounts with Locus’ Fortune 100 enterprise deployments. In addition, Ms. Carr was instrumental in driving the growth and adoption of the Locus EIM platform with key federal and water organizations. She manages customer relationships for both EIM and Locus Platform and is a key contributor to Locus Platform seeded applications for waste and compliance.
Ms. Carr holds an M.S. in Environmental Science from Washington State University and a B.S. in Political Economy of Natural Resources (with honors) from the University of California, Berkeley.
Sandeep Khabiya
Vice President of Software Engineering
Sandeep Khabiya is the Vice President of Software Engineering at Locus. He oversees the R&D organization with responsibilities for product development and the strategic direction of company technology.
Sandeep joined Locus in 2014 as Director Software Engineering and oversaw the development of the Locus multi-tenant, SaaS platform for EHS applications. He also led the initiatives for public cloud deployments and internal deployments of Locus Platform. Prior to Locus, Sandeep spent 14 years in R&D organizations at Hewlett-Packard, Mercury Interactive and Kintana. At HP, he was involved in the development of Project and Portfolio Management suite and the Cloud Service Automation suite as engineering manager and as the functional architect.
Sandeep holds a Masters in Mechanical Engineering from Mumbai university and Bachelors in Mechanical Engineering from Pune University.
Don Ahearn
Vice President of Business Development
Mr. Ahearn oversees all of Locus Technologies business development operations. Mr. Ahearn utilizes over 20 years of focused EHS experience to concentrate efforts in exceeding customer expectations. Don’s approach is to ensure that customer goals and requirements are aligned with Locus’ software solutions. Don not only suggests solutions for current customer challenges, but also explores scenarios where Locus software can yield exponential benefits to our customers. Prior to Locus, Mr. Ahearn amassed solid business development experience across several industries such as Energy (O&G and utilities), Healthcare/Pharmaceutical, Aerospace, Automotive, General Manufacturing, Chemical, food and beverage, and others.
Don holds a bachelor’s in Industrial Engineering from Georgia Southern University with extended studies towards MS at Wright State University and MBA from Georgia State University.
Board Members
Rick Bergquist
Chief Software Evangelist and Board Member
Mr. Bergquist gained renown as a visionary technologist in his position as chief technology officer of the former PeopleSoft, Inc. (acquired by Oracle in 2004). As a founding father of one of the most successful software companies in the world, Mr. Bergquist brings to Locus Technologies advanced understanding of the power of applied technology and the business benefits it can bring to Locus customers. He uses his in-depth technical skills, experience, and technology vision to guide Locus’ commercial deployment of the environmental industry’s first and most comprehensive on-demand environmental software platform.
Mr. Bergquist holds a B.S. in Computer Science (with honors) from California Polytechnic State University and completed the Program for Management Development at Harvard Business School.