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Sykes L. Yeates is a Director at GEC. His responsibilities include evaluating and executing new investments and growing our companies.
Sykes has over seven years of energy experience. Prior to joining GEC, Sykes was an analyst in the energy investment banking group of Wells Fargo Securities, where he worked on mergers & acquisitions, strategic advisory, and capital markets transactions.
Sykes graduated magna cum laude from Texas A&M University with a B.B.A. in Finance and Business Honors.
Travis C. Acker is an Associate at GEC. His responsibilities include evaluating and executing new investments and growing our companies. Prior to joining GEC, Travis was an analyst in the investment banking group of Texas Capital Bank, where he worked on mergers & acquisitions, strategic advisory, and capital markets transactions.
Travis graduated from Texas A&M University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Agricultural Economics
Portfolio Company Directorships:
Kimberly L. Bell is a Partner of GEC. Her responsibilities include originating and evaluating new opportunities and supporting the growth of GEC portfolio companies.
Kimberly has over 20 years of technical energy investing experience. She was previously a founder of Vendera Resources, an institutionally-backed series of energy investment funds. As President of Vendera, Kimberly served on the investment committee and built and led the technical team. Prior to Vendera, Kimberly held corporate development and A&D positions with Hunt Petroleum Corporation and Five States Energy in Dallas. She began her career as a production engineer with Union Pacific Resources.
Kimberly graduated from the Colorado School of Mines (BS, Chemical Engineering and Petroleum Refining), and has an MBA from Southern Methodist University. She is a registered professional engineer in the state of Texas, and is certified by the SPE. She is a member or board member of several industry organizations, and is a member of the steering committee of the Houston Women in VC.
Jonathan B. Fairbanks is the Managing Partner of GEC. In the decade before starting GEC in 2008, Jonathan was a founder and director of the following public companies: Seajacks International, Scorpion Offshore, Floatel International, Chiles Offshore, and Hercules Offshore.
Jonathan is a member of the board of the Richard M. Fairbanks Foundation in Indianapolis. He previously chaired the board of the Contemporary Arts Museum of Houston and IDEA Public Schools of Houston and in Washington he served as a trustee of the Center for Strategic & International Studies and the Middle East Investment Initiative. Jonathan is a member of YPO Gold and CEO. He received a B.A. degree in political science from Denison University and read European history at St. Peter’s College, Oxford University.
Portfolio Company Directorships:
Alexander Chmelev is a Partner of GEC. His responsibilities include originating, evaluating, structuring and executing potential investments and supporting the growth of GEC portfolio companies.
Alexander has over 15 years of energy and industrial services experience. He previously worked for Quintana Energy Partners where he focused on energy private equity investments in upstream, midstream and downstream oil and gas markets. He also worked at Piper Sandler (Simmons Energy) advising energy executives in mergers, acquisitions and capital markets transactions. Alexander began his career as an engineer at Baker Hughes.
Alexander graduated magna cum laude from Texas A&M University with a Bachelor of Science in Computer engineering and earned an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Portfolio Company Directorships:
Flowco Inc.
Stage Completions
Cumulus Digital Systems
Objective Laboratory Analysis
SolarKal
Rebound
Patrick T. Yip is a Managing Director of GEC. His primary responsibilities include sourcing acquisition opportunities, evaluating new investments and supporting the growth of GEC portfolio companies.
Patrick has over 15 years of energy and industrial services experience. Prior to joining GEC, Patrick was a key member of Halliburton’s Corporate Development group where he initiated and executed international oilfield services transactions. He previously served as an executive director at Cerberus’ SGI Frontier Capital. He also served on the board of ADG Scaffolding Engineering in Beijing. He began his career as an equity research analyst in New York and Beijing.
A native Houstonian, Patrick is also fluent in Chinese and experienced in cross-border capital formation and M&A in emerging markets, including China / Hong Kong. He graduated with honors from Washington University in St. Louis with a B.A. in Economics and earned his MBA from New York University.
Portfolio Company Directorships:
Flic Financial
Flowco Production Solutions
Locus Bio-Energy Solutions
Rebound
