Gifford Park Associates

NYU Stern School Westchester/Fairfield County Alumni Chapter “Sustainable Investing- Making an Impact: A Panel of Practitioners” event to be moderated by GPA’s John L. Cusack.

admin — Mon, 15 Aug 2011 00:56:23 +0000

NYU Stern School’s Westchester/Fairfield Alumni Chapter is planning an event on “sustainable investing- making an impact” on the evening of 5 October at the Westchester Renaissance Hotel in West Harrison NY as part of the Chapter’s speaker series to keep NYU alumni up-to-date on what is new in the financial sector. The panelist will include: Marlys Appleton, Vice President, AIG Asset Management and First and Former Chair, AIG Investments’ Sustainability Steering Committee, Roger Frank (MBA ’83), Managing Partner, i3 Advisors, Jake Baker, Senior Eergy Efficiency Analyst for Climate Change, Deutsche Bank. The panel was assembled and moderated by John L. Cusack (MBA’84), President of Gifford Park Associates.

GPA President Selected to Lead NJ Board of Public Utilities “Innovative Technologies” Energy Master Plan Working Group

admin — Sat, 16 Jul 2011 00:35:24 +0000

The New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (NJBPU) President Lee Solomon has asked GPA President John L. Cusack to lead a NJBPU Working Group of a dozen leading energy technology experts from industry, academia, utilities, entrepreneurs, the investment sector and government to review the role and near-term viability of innovative energy technology development and commercialization, and the role of business incubators, in fostering the rapid commercialization of emerging energy solutions in New Jersey, and thus provide input to the next revision of the New Jersey Energy Master Plan. The Working Group is one of four Working Groups set up to develop technical input to the State Energy Master Plan review process. The Innovative Technologies Working Group will hold a series of meetings during July and August and submit a report to NJBPU by 19 September.

Kay Garkusha Joins as Managing Director

admin — Thu, 30 Jun 2011 17:00:54 +0000

Gifford Park Associates is proud to announce that Ms. Kay Garkusha has joined GPA as Managing Director, and will be assisting GPA on a consulting basis, including a working on a market needs assessment and revised business plan project for a not-for-profit technology verification organization.

Kay Garkusha has joined Gifford Park Associates as Managing Director, bringing significant global strategy, operations, financial services and marketing expertise to GPA. Prior to joining GPA, Kay worked for 10 years in the financial industry. Most recently, she was Director of Investor Communications at a $2.5B fund of hedge funds, where she worked on strategic projects. Previously, as Director of Investor Relations at a $2B hedge fund, she had responsibilities in communications, compliance and marketing.

She was Director of Finance and Administration at a global short-rail company during a period of mergers and acquisitions and worked for a start-up tech hedge fund, building out the physical and HR infrastructure. Before joining the financial industry, Kay co-founded a Russian-American joint venture with the State Hermitage Museum that created business lines for the museum and developed traveling exhibitions. She is a past president of the Advisory Board of the Academy of Information Technology and Engineering, and a volunteer at Greenwich Hospital.

Kay graduated from Carleton College with a B.A. in Russian Studies, and is fluent in several languages.

‘Introduction to Renewable Energy’ Course at SUNY-Purchase

admin — Mon, 30 May 2011 17:00:36 +0000

GPA’s President, Mr. John L. Cusack, has just completed teaching this Spring a course “Introduction to Renewable Energy” on behalf of the Environmental Studies Department at Purchase College, part of the SUNY university system. The students enjoyed the insights of the thirty years of experience Mr. Cusack has in evaluating new energy and environmental technologies, and the nuclear disaster in Japan during the semester gave the students a real-life an example of how world events can quicklu change the markets for renewable energy.

John L. Cusack Elected Chair of NJCAT Board

admin — Wed, 20 Apr 2011 17:00:19 +0000

The Board of the New Jersey Corporation for Advanced Technology (NJCAT) announced that it has elected John L. Cusack as Chair of the NJCAT Board.

NJCAT is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to providing energy and environmental innovators with the regulatory, commercial, and technological assistance required to bring their ideas to market successfully. NJCAT identifies, evaluates, and verifies the effectiveness of specific technologies for which the regulatory and commercialization process should be facilitated, and has verified nearly forty energy and environmental technologies over the past dozen years.

FT Investing for a Sustainable Future Conference

admin — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 17:00:27 +0000

Gifford Park Associates was asked by a key client to attend on their behalf the Financial Times “Investing for a Sustainable Future” Conference in New York City.

The event was an excellent opportunity to hear excellent presentations on how the investment is moving sustainability and corporate responsibility issues out of narrow niche markets into the broader financial sectors such as private equity, microfinance, investment research, and asset management.

Oxford Presentation

admin — Sat, 12 Feb 2011 17:00:42 +0000

In early February, Mr. Cusack traveled to Oxford England to give a presentation to the senior management of a well-known sustainability consulting firm on “Sustainability Services for the Financial Services Sector”, which described the emerging opportunities and needs for integrating sustainability into the financial service industry’s operations and investment management decision-making processes, and making sustainability a core part of financial business strategy and culture.

Finance & Sustainability Course

admin — Thu, 20 Jan 2011 17:00:46 +0000

Marylhurst University asked GPA’s John L. Cusack to teach a section of an online course this past Fall entitled “Finance and Sustainability” as part of the University’s MBA in Sustainable Management Program.

While Marylhurst is based in Portland Oregon, the students in Mr. Cusack’s course have ranged from Boston to Key West, from Seattle to Atlanta, and from Texas to Minnesota, and come from a diverse group of business sectors and levels of management.

The positive reviews of the Fall Semester students has led Marylhurst to ask Mr. Cusack to repeat teaching his course in the Winter and Summer semesters as well.

Renewables Investor Ecofin in Institutional Investor

admin — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 16:58:45 +0000

Mr. John L. Cusack was quoted in an article about renewables investor Ecofin in Institutional Investor magazine on 10 December 2010. In this article, there was an entire paragraph on Mr. Cusack’s view as to whether now is a good time to invest in wind energy projects. The full text of the article is available here.

John L. Cusack Quoted in Front-Page New York Times Article

admin — Sun, 07 Nov 2010 16:50:57 +0000

John L. Cusack, President of Gifford Park Associates, was quoted in “Cost of Green Power Makes Projects Tougher Sell”, a front-page article in The New York Times. The article was about fears in the investment world are affecting the financing of renewable energy projects.

Mr. Cusack stated that “investors tell us they’re nervous about all the uncertainty” because “they don’t know what’s going to happen.” In an unprinted portion of the interview, Mr. Cusack continued that “uncertainty is often the best time to invest in green power.” The full text of the Times article is available here.