George has 20+ years of experience in planning and managing successful global purchasing, outsourcing agreements, and vendor management engagements for world-renowned multinational companies including AbbVie, McDonald’s, BP Amoco, and Baxter International among others.

He has the skill to counsel and lead clients through complex and difficult procurement projects. He understands important business drivers behind the procurement effort. George uses his experiences to secure key elements of project while mitigating client risk and dividing complex project into clearly defined deliverables.

Since 1995 George has led major engagements in sourcing, procuring, and leasing IT hardware including servers and desktops, software, services including hosting and SaaS services, telecommunications including satellite services, network/security infrastructure, and outsourced services. He has extensive experience negotiating with major IT vendors including Oracle, IBM, Cognizant, Capgemini, DxC (Sogeti/CSC) and Tata.

George worked at McDonald’s as Senior Global Sourcing Manager leading over 400 procurement projects, including a data center and the selection of an offshore consultancy. He achieved noteworthy results and significant savings for McDonald’s business.

Sel led the procurement effort for a new corporate HQ building ¾ million square foot with a $300M construction budget and achieved a 20% savings/$8M on the $40M IT budget for the project.

He also successfully managed multiple competitive RFP processes for vendor selections and contract negotiations for a variety of products and services for a global insurance company.

John LaSusa is a Strategic Sourcing professional with over thirty-five years of experience.  John’s experience has included work with Fortune 500 companies in the Telecommunications, Insurance, and Human Resources Outsourcing sectors.

John has extensive management experience in the area of Information Technology Products and Services, however he has also been involved in sourcing efforts involving Professional Services, Consumer Products and Services and various commodity products and services. He has also worked in non-procurement roles such as Business Development, Sales, and Corporate Real Estate Management.

John is a skilled negotiator that has led many cross functional teams through tough negotiations on multi-million dollar expenditures.  He prides himself on his ability to collaborate with his internal clients to ensure the objectives of the prospective purchase are achieved, often within tight time constraints.

John has extensive knowledge of contract language including IT licensing terms and conditions, Master Agreements, Statements of Work, Amendments etc. and has worked with Corporate Legal teams to resolve contractual disputes and the development of language needed for specific projects.

With John’s aforementioned skillsets, he has managed and been instrumental in the development of new procurement teams and mentored members of existing teams. He has extensive experience with process re-engineering including the development of standardized procedures, which often included the conversion of manual processes into automated functions.

John’s broad based skillset provides the Maxelerate team with an exceptional Strategic Sourcing professional who is well suited to address a wide variety of initiatives.

As a former Senior Attorney with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Robert is a highly accomplished legal professional with a record of achievement managing legal affairs for both public and private companies.

He provides strategic legal and business advice in the following areas:

Robert is highly experienced in drafting and negotiating agreements, and has deep experience providing strategic legal advice for startup companies.

Mike Spera has more than 30+ years of experience in negotiations and the development and management of the global sourcing function. He has led wide ranging negotiations for a Fortune 5 company and was instrumental in building a global technology procurement function for a Fortune 50 company. At each engagement, he led the cultural change towards utilizing the leveraged sourcing process.

In the Benefits category Mike has negotiated with industry leaders in medical insurance, pension services, wellness and pharmacy benefits and audits.

Mike also has a substantial book of work in technology and is a recognized Microsoft licensing expert.

Mike has a track record of multi-million dollar sustained savings across the portfolio of his work.

Al has provided consulting services to corporate clients in design and development of IT solutions for more than 20 years. He has experience with the development of trading floor systems for pricing of real-time bond trading, solution development for insurance underwriting systems, and supplier data analysis for a global restaurant chain.

Al is an analytical and innovative data analyst with multifaceted experience in software construction, system migration, database management and coding. He is a highly accomplished programmer dedicated to conceptualizing and re-engineering manual and inefficient processes to improve performance, increase security, and minimize downtime. He focuses on the bottom line and seeks innovative solutions to challenging problems to maximize profitability.

Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer and Application developer with deep experience in:

Maxelerate Senior Consultant, Tony is an accomplished Procurement professional with 20+ years’ experience in contract management and contract negotiations with the following: Professional Service Agreements including Statements of Work, fixed price agreements with deliverables: Time & Materials arrangements, software license agreements, SaaS Agreements, outsourcing agreements, Non-Disclosure Agreements, purchasing agreements and contract amendments.

He brings a wealth of knowledge to the Contracting Management process, with an extensive career protecting global brands with a strong focus on policy, compliance, and resolving complex business issues in major industries. (Automotive, Banking, and Aerospace & Defense).

With his deep experience with negotiation strategies, Tony has managed several outsourced contract management teams consisting of attorneys and contract management specialists. In these roles he developed the framework for contract compliance in accordance with corporate policies and was instrumental in the creation and development of standard contract guidelines, adhering to established industry KPIs and metrics.

Tony is adept at assessing the business risks associated with prospective proposals and resulting contracts, and clearly communicating potential risks with all stakeholders to allow for optimal decision making and favorable agreements. He also has broad experience providing advice to key stakeholders and members of the contract teams on legal and contractual and regulatory issues during the contracting process.

In addition to Contract Management activities, he has served as the primary interface for Information Technology issues to ensure compliance with the OCC directives and policies.

Maxelerate Senior Consultant, Ann Crawford, is a strategic sourcing and procurement professional and a solutions-oriented corporate attorney, with a record of building strong relationships with team members and internal customers to achieve business objectives and minimize risk.

Ann’s 20+ years of combined contracts experience is unique in that it encompasses both legal and procurement experience, having significant contract review and negotiation experience in each of the following roles:

• Assistant Vice President/Senior Procurement Consultant for global commercial insurance provider performing sourcing and procurement activities across all categories with a focus on financial services vendors
• Enterprise Transactions Corporate Counsel for global commercial insurance provider
• Business Unit Attorney for Fortune 100 consumer package goods company
• Contracts Paralegal and Contracts Law Clerk for Fortune 100 consumer package goods company
• Senior Paralegal and Contracts Manager for Fortune 100 beverage producer

Given this diverse experience, Ann is adept at reviewing and negotiating both business and legal terms in virtually all categories of contracts and is known for being able to accurately capture such negotiations with appropriate contract language. In addition, Ann has deep experience managing company procurement spend, having negotiated contracts for as little as $10,000 for a speaker appearance, for example, to over $35 million for essential information technology consulting services. Recently, Ann led a multi-departmental team on a successful multi-state compliance and SAP enhancement project, resulting in $600,000 savings annually to the client.

In addition to contract transactions from both the legal and procurement vantage points, Ann has experience and expertise in advertising and promotions, risk assessment and mitigation, real estate, corporate governance, compliance, due diligence, policies and procedures, Screen Actors Guild issues, antitrust, intellectual property, licensing, and data privacy and protection.

Ann thrives in a fast-paced environment, effectively managing a high volume of competing priorities and diverse transactions, from simple consulting to complex global or technology transactions.

Maxelerate Senior Consultant Carol Newman is a Strategic Sourcing professional and legal executive with 25+ years of experience in the contract management and procurement space. She has held legal leadership roles in a wide variety of industries, including technology, software, e-commerce, communications, engineering, manufacturing, franchise, and food services, and has 20+ years serving as the contracts liaison and point person to all functional departments (domestic and global), including procurement, supply chain, operations, quality control, sales, finance, accounting, engineering, and human resources for large corporations, limited partnerships, and privately held companies.

Carol’s deep and extensive experience with corporate transactions as both an attorney and corporate procurement advisor makes her an invaluable member of the Maxelerate team, adding a unique perspective and a wide variety of direct knowledge of all types of corporate agreements. She is also a proactive, versatile, commercially adept business partner with a wide depth and breadth of experience and a proven track record of sol id leadership, strategic, analytic, communication, management, negotiation, interpersonal, and collaborative skills. Carol has broad hands on experience drafting, negotiating, and reviewing a wide variety of contracts and corporate transactions, including supplier, distribution, vendor, sales, asset purchase, capital equipment, outsourcing, alliance partner, leases, software licenses, indemnity, joint development, source code escrow, confidentiality/non-disclosure agreements, ownership of intellectual property, joint ventures, professional and consulting services, website privacy statements and terms of use, notices, field trials, consignments, bailments, and employment agreements in multiple arenas including engineering, manufacturing, R&D, IT infrastructure management as well as hardware, software and application development and FDIC financial institutions.

Carol’s subject matter expertise includes the following:

• Corporate Transactions Employment Law Litigation Management
• Contracts Intellectual Property M&A/Due Diligence
• Regulatory Compliance Data Privacy/GDPR Corporate Governance
• Policies Procedures Cybersecurity Strategic Planning
• FCPA/UK Bribery Act Data Breaches Budgeting
• International Law Customs/Trade Controls Financial Analysis
• Ethics/Code of Conduct Real Estate Risk Management