Management
Dr. Sean Guest
President & Chief Executive Officer
Dr. Guest (Ph.D., Geology) has been working internationally in the oil and gas industry for 30 years. Prior to joining Valeura, he was the CEO of two private junior companies. Pexco Energy, a $700 million company held production and exploration assets in the Australia-Asia region and East Africa. During his tenure, Pexco was producing ~10,000 boepd from its assets in Indonesia and Australia. While running Pexco, he resided in Jakarta, Indonesia and oversaw the company’s first operated development of an oil field in Sumatra. The company also expanded their gas production in Australia with the development of a new offshore gas field and upgrades and debottlenecking of the associated onshore gas plant. Prior to his CEO roles, he also worked for Woodside in Australia and Libya, and for Shell in the Netherlands, Australia and Malaysia. He started his career with Schlumberger working in Egypt.
Education: B.Sc. Geological Engineering, Queen’s University, 1985; Ph.D. Geological Sciences, 1993
Yacine Ben-Meriem
Chief Financial Officer
Mr. Ben-Meriem, is a finance professional with over 15 years experience in oil and gas investment banking and finance, most of which have been focused on Southeast Asia. Before joining Valeura as CFO, he was a founder of Panthera Resources, a start-up E&P company focused on Southeast Asia, which became Valeura’s key partner in pursuing its two Gulf of Thailand acquisitions. Prior experiences include increasingly senior resource-oriented positions with ABN AMRO and Standard Chartered in Singapore, in addition to earlier-career roles with Ernst and Young.
Education: MBA, INSEAD
Dr. Grzegorz (Greg) Kulawski
Chief Operating Officer
Dr. Kulawski is a seasoned executive leader, with 25 years of upstream oil and gas experience. His international career prior to joining Valuera has been with Shell, including the roles of Deputy CEO and Production Director of Sakhalin Energy, Vice President of Safety for the Shell group globally, and General Manager and Director of Shell’s onshore and shallow water assets in Nigeria. He has substantial experience in brownfield production operations and greenfield developments including key health, safety and environment-related responsibilities. Mr. Kulawski has a proven track record in leading international and multi-cultural teams through complex projects including major facility turnarounds and integrating new businesses.
Education: B.Eng. (1st class honours) Electronic & Electrical Engineering, University of Birmingham, 1993; Ph.D. Electronic and Electrical Engineering, 1998
Kelvin Tang
Executive Vice President, Corporate, General Counsel, Corporate Secretary
Mr. Tang has worked in the international oil and gas industry for over 18 years. Prior to joining Valeura, he was most recently the Head of Business Development of Hibiscus Petroleum and before that, the CEO of KrisEnergy, a Singapore-listed predecessor company to Valeura’s initial interests in Thailand. Prior to his CEO role, Mr. Tang served as KrisEnergy’s Chief Operating Officer and, preceding that, their General Counsel. Previous roles included General Counsel at Pearl Energy and Aabar Petroleum (which was acquired by Mubadala), as well as various legal and investment-oriented positions earlier in his career.
Education: LLB. National University of Singapore, 1999
Tilak Nithiyeswaran, P.Eng.
President and Country Manager, Valeura Energy (Thailand)
Mr. Nithiyeswaran is a professional engineer and accomplished leader within the upstream oil and gas industry. He brings deep experience built through senior leadership positions covering both oil and gas-oriented businesses in Canada and abroad. Most recently, he served as Chief Operating Officer for CNOOC North America, after having held leadership roles with the same company overseeing oil sands operations, health, safety, and environment, and serving as the company’s Chief Information Officer. Prior to his roles with CNOOC in Canada, he served as President and General Manager of Husky-CNOOC Madura, managing an offshore natural gas joint venture in Indonesia. Earlier in his career, Mr. Nithiyeswaren gained diverse cross-industry experience within the financial services, hi-tech contract manufacturing, and mining sectors.
Education: B.A.Sc. Electrical and Computer Engineering, University of Toronto 1999; Navigator – Executive Development Programme, Saïd Business School, University of Oxford 2015.
