Category Archives: Industrials

Testing and Engineering services company moves back to Houston

Leave a reply

A year after TIC Solutions moved its corporate office from Tomball to Hollywood, Florida, it has now moved it back to the Galleria area.

The company provides asset integrity, engineering and geospatial services. It has revenues of $1.8 billion and an enterprise value of $3.1 billion.

TIC was formed from the merger of two publicly-traded companies in August 2025, Acuren (based in Tomball) and NV5 (based in Florida). Acuren shareholders ended up with 60% of the combined company, NV5 40%. The combined entity was renamed TIC Solutions and the head office moved to Florida.

Acuren was originally formed in 1974 as Longview Inspection. In July 2024, it was taken public by a SPAC, Admiral Acquisition Corp for $1.9 billion. NV5 traced its origins back to 1949 in California and went public in 2013. Both companies were highly acquisitive.

At the time of the merger, the CEO of Acuren, Tal Pizzey, became the CEO of the combined company, though he was actually based in Edmonton, Canada. The CEO of NV5, Ben Heraud, became the COO of the combined company. He is based in California. Mr. Pizzey voluntarily resigned in March 2026 and Mr. Heraud took over as CEO.

Kristin Schultes, the CFO of Acuren, became the CFO of the combined group. She is based in the Houston-area.

There have been a number of companies that have moved their head office to Houston area in 2026. Expand Energy and Devon Energy are the two largest, but there have been a few other smaller companies (Ainos, Barnwell Industries and Olenox Industries).

SEC filing – 8-K – Quarterly results

 

 

 

 

Sugar Land Industrial Services company appoints new CFO

Leave a reply

Team Inc has appointed Clint Roeder as its new CFO. He replaces Nelson Haight, who had been in the position since June 2022.

Team, based in Sugar Land, provides specialty industrial services and has revenues of over $900 million but a market capitalization of only $77 million. The company appointed Gary Hill as its new CEO back in January.

Mr. Roeder was the CFO at PrimeFlight Aviation Services for six years until April 2026. PrimeFlight, also based in Sugar Land, has 18,000 employees in over 235 airports around the world. Prior to that, he was the CFO at Nine Energy Services, joining them a month before the company went public in January 2018. As an aside, Nine Energy appointed a new CFO last month.

Mr. Roeder will receive a base salary of $500,000.

Mr. Haight, previously the CFO at Key Energy Services, will receive a severance of $603,750, representing 15 months of salary, to be paid over 15 months. He will also receive a pro-rated bonus for 2026 worth approximately $166,000, to be paid before January 31, 2027. His restricted stock units will also vest, worth around $315,000.

Finally, Mr. Haight’s performance share units will continue to vest in accordance with their terms. If targets are met, the payout would be 92% of the value had Mr. Haight remained employed. According to the proxy filed in April, the market value of those performance share units was $1.8 million at December 31, 2025 (assuming performance targets are met).

SEC filing – 8-K – Team CFO Roeder appointment

 

Sugar Land Industrial services company replaces CEO

Leave a reply

Team Inc, based in Sugar Land, has appointed Gary Hill as its new CEO. He replaces Keith Tucker, who steps down, effective January 31, 2026.

Team provides specialty industrial services and has revenues of nearly $900 million but a  market capitalization of only $63 million.



Mr. Hill is currently the Chief Operating Officer at Shermco Industries, a PE-backed electrical testing company, based in Irving, TX. He also has plenty of experience at other specialty industrial companies.  He will receive a base salary of $750,000. Mr. Hill also gets restricted stock units worth $562,500 that will vest over three years and performance stock units worth $1.3 million.

Mr. Hill is expected to relocate to the Houston-area by mid-2027. He will receive a relocation grant of $100,000 and $3,000 per month for temporary housing for up to 18 months.

Severance

Mr. Tucker joined Team in 2005 and became CEO in November 2022 after an eight-month spell as interim CEO.

The press release issued by the company stated that this was a planned leadership transition. However the SEC filing states that the company expects to enter a severance and consulting agreement with Mr. Tucker. That suggests it wasn’t that well planned. The filing did say that Mr. Tucker’s departure is not the result of any disagreement on any matter relating to the Company’s operations, policies or practices.

According to the proxy statement filed last year, Mr. Tucker is entitled to receive a continued salary for 18 months (his current annual salary is $750,000) for involuntary termination without cause.

[Edit 02-09-26 The company has now finalized the severance package with Mr. Tucker. In addition to the 18 months salary, he will also receive his 2025 bonus (not quantified). In addition he will enter a 12-month consulting agreement worth $375,000. Mr. Tucker’s unvested stock units will immediately vest and unvested performance units will continue to vest at 78% times the performance criteria.]

PE Investment

In September 2025, Stellex Capital Management, a New York-based private equity firm, invested $75 million in Team through a private placement of preferred stock. Most of money raised was used to pay down debt. As a result of the transaction, Stellex got to nominate two members to the Company’s eight-person Board of Directors.

The company has been struggling for many years following $538 million spent in 2015-2016 on a couple of acquisitions that went pear-shaped very quickly. It’s only in the last couple of years that the company has managed to eke out a small operating profit. However, that’s been swamped by interest and other non-recurring charges. Sounds like Stellex are flexing their muscles.

SEC filing 8-K – Team CEO appointment

 

 

KBR to spin off government services business

Leave a reply

KBR has announced that it will split itself into two and spin off its Mission Technology Solutions Segment (‘MTS’) into a new publicly-traded entity. The new KBR will continue with its Sustainable Technology Solutions business (‘STS’).

As part of the its plan, the company announced the following management changes;

  • CEO Stuart Bradie will become the CEO of the new KBR.
  • Mark Sopp, the current CFO, will transition into a new role overseeing the team responsible for spinning off MTS.
  • Shad Evans, the current SVP of Financial Operations will become the new CFO of legacy KBR, effective January 5, 2026. Once the spin-off is complete, he will become the CFO of the new KBR.
  • The company has engaged a search firm to help select candidates to lead MTS.

The STS segment focuses on process technologies in ammonia & syngas, chemicals & petrochemicals, clean refining and circular solutions (i.e recycling plastics). For the 6 months to June 2025, the segment had revenues of $1.1 billion and EBITDA of $253 million or 23.2%.

The MTS segment primarily works on logistical and systems support for governments (US, UK and Australia). For the 6 months to June 2025, the segment had revenues of $2.9 billion and EBITDA of $291 million or 10.1%.

In late 2024, activist investor, Irenic Capital Management (run by a former Elliott Management manager) took a 1% stake in KBR and advocated for a split. It argued that the two segments had different growth and margin profiles and that concerns over the government business meant that STS was undervalued. Although Irenic has since sold off its stake, the Board of KBR evidently agreed.

KBR currently has a market cap of $6 billion.

It’s Deja Vu all over again

The company has been through this cycle before. KBR was created in 1998 when MW Kellogg merged with Halliburton’s construction subsidiary, Brown & Root to form KBR. Halliburton spun off KBR into a separate public company in 2007 after concerns that KBR’s results were dragging down its overall profitability. At the time, KBR was doing a lot of work for the US government in Iraq.

Mr. Bradie joined KBR as CEO in 2014 and started the process to exit the company from its high risk and low-margin Engineering & Construction business. This was completed in 2020. He also made a number of acquisitions, primarily in the MTS segment.

Shad Evans, the new CFO, joined the company in 2018 as CFO of Technology Solutions and was promoted to CFO of the STS segment in 2024. Prior to KBR, he worked at Leidos Holdings. Mr. Evans will receive a base salary of $575,000.

The company expects to complete the spin-off by mid-to-late 2026.

SEC filing – KBR Investor presentation

 

 

Waste Management CFO to step down after 8 years

Leave a reply

Devina Rankin, the CFO of WM, formerly known as Waste Management, is to step down in November 2025, after 23 years at the company and 8 years as CFO. She will be replaced by David Reed, currently VP and Business Partner for the West Tier operations of WM.



Ms. Rankin will stay on as an executive advisor through March 2026. After that, she will leave the company to focus on her ‘long-standing passions for education and not-for-profit service’.

WM has revenues of $22 billion and a market capitalization of $92 billion. It is the largest player in the North America waste and recycling market with a nearly 20% market share. The company recently expanded into healthcare waste with the $6.9 billion acquisition of Stericycle in November 2024.

Mr. Reed joined the company in 2017 as VP and Treasurer. Prior to joining WM, he worked at LyondellBasell, Kimberly-Clark, Citigroup and Wachovia.

The base salary of Mr. Reed will increase to $700,000.

By market capitalization, WM is the largest Houston-area company outside the big three E&P companies (ExxonMobil, Chevron and ConocoPhillips). You can see the complete list of companies here.

SEC filing – WM CFO succession

 

Team Inc appoints new CFO

Leave a reply

Team Inc, based in Sugar Land, has appointed Nelson Haight as its new CFO. He joins from Key Energy Services, where he had been CFO since June 2020. He replaces Susan Ball, who resigned in November 2021.



Team provides testing, inspection and repair services to industries such as refining and power, though the company describes itself as a ‘global leading provider of integrated, digitally-enabled asset performance assurance and optimization solutions’.

The company has had a rough few years following a couple of disastrous acquisitions made in 2015-2016 for $538 million that went south very quickly. At the end of March 2022, the company had shareholders’ equity of $27 million and long-term debt of $501 million.  In the first quarter, the company made a net loss of $32 million on revenues of $219 million.

Amerino Gatti, who had been CEO since 2018, left the company in March to be replaced by interim CEO, Keith Tucker. Mr. Gatti received a severance payment of 18 months of salary ($1.275 million in total, to be paid over 12 months) plus a 12-month consulting contract of $39,583 per month.

The company hired Alvarez and Marsal in 2017 to assist in identifying cost-saving opportunities. After Ms. Ball left, Matt Kvarda, an A&M employee, had been acting as interim CFO.  Since the beginning of 2021, the company has paid A&M nearly $12 million dollars in consulting fees, which includes the interim CFO services.

Mr. Haight will receive a base salary of $450,000. He also received a signing bonus of $25,000 and a guaranteed bonus for 2022 of at least $150,000.

No word on Mr. Haight’s replacement at Key, which is now a private company. In 2020, an out-of-court restructuring resulted in the lenders receiving 97% of the new equity of Key.

SEC filing – Team CFO appointment

CFO resigns at Sugar Land industrial company

Leave a reply

Luca Paciolo – circa 1500 – “The Father of Accounting”

Susan Ball has resigned as CFO of Sugar Land-based Team Inc, effective November 12, 2021. The company has retained an executive search firm to find a replacement. It is expected that Ms. Ball will enter into a consulting agreement to assist in the transition.



Team provides testing, inspection and repair services to industries such as refining and power. It has a market capitalization of $100 million.

A poisoned chalice

Ms. Ball was appointed CFO in December 2018. Prior to that, she was CFO at CVR Energy, another company based in Sugar Land, though Ms. Ball got a relocation package when she joined Team (presumably from Kansas City where CVR used to be based). When she was appointed, the market capitalization of Team was $500 million. I noted in my blog post at the time that she had her hands full, namely;

  • The company had made two big acquisitions in 2015-2016 for $538 million that turned out to be a disaster (especially Houston-based Furmanite). $325 million of this was paid in cash.
  • The company botched an ERP implementation. Spent $47 million on Microsoft Dynamics AX before going live in March 2017!
  • Hired Alvarez & Marsal in late 2017 to assist in identifying cost saving opportunities.

Some of these issues still plague the company. In 2020, the company wrote off another $192 million in goodwill impairment from those big acquisitions. That’s on top of the $75 million taken in 2017.

Alvarez & Marsal are still engaged by the company, though their role is winding down. To date, the company has spent about $30 million in professional fees associated with their ‘ONETEAM’ program. I presume most of this went to A&M.

The company has had internal control issues as well. In 2019, it disclosed that an employee in the Netherlands (a Furmanite subsidiary) had overridden controls that resulted in misappropriation of assets over a number of years.

Debt refinanced

Team currently has shareholders’ equity of $167 million, though its balance sheet still has goodwill and intangible assets valued at $187 million.

Long-term debt amounts to $351 million. Under Ms. Ball’s watch, the business was refinanced in late 2020. The first tranche ($93 million) is not due to be repaid until 2023. $250 million is due in 2026. That’s given the company some breathing room as it tries to sort out its business.

SEC filing – Team CFO resignation