HyPoint makes key appointments as it accelerates development of hydrogen fuel cell technology

HyPoint has appoint­ed three key exec­u­tives to help dri­ve the com­pa­ny’s tech­nol­o­gy devel­op­ment and go-to-mar­ket strat­e­gy, as it aims to bring hydro­gen fuel cell sys­tems to the urban air mobil­i­ty mar­ket.

Join­ing the team are Dr. Bri­an Benicewicz as Head of Sci­ence; John Vogel as Chief Engi­neer of HTPEM (High Tem­per­a­ture Poly­mer Elec­trode Mem­brane) Stack and Rhon­da Staudt as Chief Engi­neer of HTPEM MEA.

All three bring decades of engi­neer­ing and lead­er­ship expe­ri­ence in hydro­gen fuels, poly­mer nanocom­pos­ites, robot­ics, and relat­ed tech­nolo­gies. The news also comes a week after it announced a part­ner­ship with Urban Aero­nau­tics to explore the devel­op­ment of an advanced ver­sion its City­Hawk eVTOL using hydro­gen.

Alex Iva­nenko, Co-Founder and CEO of HyPoint, said: “Deliv­er­ing on the promise of a future with ubiq­ui­tous zero-emis­sion air trans­porta­tion — pow­ered by hydro­gen fuel cells — requires the best and bright­est minds.

“Our expand­ed team shares decades of expe­ri­ence engi­neer­ing and deliv­er­ing next-gen­er­a­tion ener­gy solu­tions to glob­al mar­kets, as well as more than 65 U.S. patents, and togeth­er rep­re­sent a new hydro­gen fuel cell van­guard.”

Benicewicz has held posi­tions as Edu­ca­tion­al Foun­da­tion Dis­tin­guished Pro­fes­sor and Smart­State Endowed Chair in Poly­mer Nanocom­pos­ites, Depart­ment of Chem­istry and Bio­chem­istry at the Uni­ver­si­ty of South Car­oli­na. A hold­er of 50 patents, he is also a pro­fes­sor and direc­tor of the NY State Cen­ter for Poly­mer Syn­the­sis at Rens­se­laer Poly­tech­nic Insti­tute; and var­i­ous sci­en­tif­ic and man­age­ment posi­tions in the pri­vate sec­tor as well as Los Alam­os Nation­al Lab­o­ra­to­ry.

Vogel is respon­si­ble for devel­op­ing the pow­er gen­er­a­tion mod­ule includ­ing stack design, stack mate­ri­als, bal­ance of plant design, and algo­rithm of oper­a­tion. He is an expe­ri­enced busi­ness leader, prod­uct devel­op­er, and inno­va­tor and has been a leader in the alter­na­tive ener­gy indus­try for more than 15 years.

As Chief Engi­neer of HTPEM MEA, Staudt is respon­si­ble for fuel cell devel­op­ment includ­ing design of MEAs, gas­kets, man­u­fac­tur­ing, and tool­ing. She has been a leader in the alter­na­tive ener­gy indus­try for more than 15 years and has held var­i­ous senior man­age­ment posi­tions in oper­a­tions and engi­neer­ing. She is a found­ing mem­ber of Com­bined Ener­gies, where she directs the com­pa­ny oper­a­tions focused on DC to DC con­vert­er tech­nol­o­gy for alter­na­tive ener­gy.

The com­pa­ny also announced that it has joined the Cal­i­for­nia Hydro­gen Busi­ness Coun­cil (CHBC), a mem­ber­ship-based trade asso­ci­a­tion that advances the com­mer­cial­i­sa­tion of hydro­gen in the pow­er pro­duc­tion, ener­gy stor­age, and trans­porta­tion sec­tors.

With its mem­ber­ship, HyPoint joins the likes of Hon­da, Bal­lard, Linde, Plug Pow­er, Nel Hydro­gen and ITM Pow­er.