Turntide Technologies, developer of breakthrough sustainability technologies, has announced the appointment of Scott Smrdel as its new Chief Technology Officer (CTO) and Executive Vice President of Engineering. Richard Hellinga, who previously held the CTO position, will now lead a new Global Technology and Innovation group.
Smrdel joins Turntide, which has its UK operations in Gateshead and Sunderland, from BAE Systems, where he was the Engineering Leader and CTO of their Ground Vehicles business unit.
He brings a distinguished track record of successfully building, leading, and scaling intelligent hardware organisations, working across the entire product lifecycle.
While at BAE Systems, Scott managed nearly 1,000 engineers to design, build, and deliver combat vehicles to the U.S. military and led operational excellence programmes to provide the highest quality people, processes, and digital tools to the business.
Before BAE, Smrdel spent seven years with GE Power in progressively critical engineering roles, working on leading technology, solutions, and services across the entire energy value chain.
He started in the nuclear business developing next-generation controls, then transitioned to an Engineering Leader role, rotating through multiple business units before leading the development of new analytic solutions for plant and product solutions for GE Power Services and GE Digital.
Ryan Morris, Chairman and CEO of Turntide said: “As the company enters its next stage of growth, we are thrilled to welcome Scott to our leadership team. Scott brings experience delivering mission-critical technologies and machines to highly demanding commercial, industrial, and military segments, and his impressive background leading and scaling engineering teams in complex global industries will be incredibly valuable as Turntide scales our business.”
Scott Smrdel said: “Climate change is the biggest challenge of our time, and Turntide is a mission-driven technology company that is looking to help optimise how humanity uses energy.”
“I am eager to contribute to such an impressive team at this critical moment for both the company and the planet. Turntide’s solutions will help the world accelerate decarbonisation and transition to a net-zero future, and I’m proud to help lead in this effort.”
Richard Hellinga, who has been serving as CTO since 2020, will assume the newly created role of Global Head of Technology and Innovation, where he will focus on developing Turntide’s next-generation electrification solutions.
As CTO, Hellinga scaled the engineering team to more than two hundred people globally and built a strong culture of innovation to deliver sustainability solutions across multiple industries.
Ryan Morris added: “Over the last year, Turntide has launched new solutions that accelerate electrification and sustainable operations in energy-intensive industries, to help businesses and nations reduce carbon emissions.
“Richard has played a critical part in Turntide’s success and ability to scale globally. We are very excited to see him lead a new group focused on innovation and expanding the limits of our next-generation technology that enables decarbonising commercial and industrial applications.”