SUCCESS and Significance
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UNIVERSITY OF ALBERTA S CHOOL OF FALL/WINTER 2008/09 USINESS BWWW.BUSINESS.UALBERTA.CA ALUMNI MAGAZINE SUCCESS AND Significance CELEBRATING THE CENTENARY events 2009 this issue January 29 U of A Calgary Centre Open House he University of Alberta celebrated its Centenary (Calgary) 10:00 am – 2:00 pm in 2008 and hundreds of Business School alumni, #120, 333-5th Avenue SW representing“T eight decades, attended events throughout the year January 29 Eric Geddes Lecture ~ Speaker: Gordon Pitts and throughout the world. The success of our graduates, like (Calgary) Topic: “Money or Mud: Alberta’s our cover story Neil Manning, the significance of their careers January 30 Business Culture in Boom and Bust” and their choices, gives us so much to celebrate. (Edmonton) 8:00 am ~ Chamber of Commerce (Calgary) 8:00 am ~ Royal Glenora Club (Edmonton) In this extended issue you will also read about Mike Loenen, a leader in energy and finance and Lynne Bigam, a leader in retailing January 31 Undergraduate Awards Ceremony and Luncheon and family business. Also featured are an incredible group of wide- (Edmonton) 11:30 am – 1:30 pm ~ Winspear Centre ranging winners of local, provincial, national and global awards. February Eric Geddes Lecture ~ Speaker: Ujjayant Chakravorty Many of our leading alumni continue to be recognized for (Edmonton Canada Research Chair in Natural Resource their entrepreneurial energy and their charitable commitments and Calgary) Economics, Alberta School of Business showing that success and significance do indeed go hand in hand. February 13 Hockey in the Bears’ Den It also became clear that no matter where our alumni (Edmonton) 7:30 pm ~ Clare Drake Arena are throughout the world, the name “Alberta” is February 25 Business Alumni Luncheon something they are proud of and that there is (Toronto) significant brand equity in our current moniker. It was most fitting then that the year also saw March Eric Geddes Lecture the announcement of the School’s $20 million (Edmonton) Author: Brian Nattrass “Preservation of the Name Campaign.” The March 4 Canadian Business Leader Award Dinner momentum, as you will read, continues to build. (Edmonton) Recipient: Hal Kvisle, President and CEO of TransCanada Corporation “Behind every leading economy, there is a leading business 5:15 pm ~ Shaw Conference Centre school” is this year’s tagline. And despite the economic downturn, the University of Alberta School of Business will March 5 Oilers vs Senators – Reception & Game continue to lead as noted in Gordon Pitts’ newly released book (Ottawa) Hosted by UAA “Stampede.” An investment in higher education and lifelong 5:00 – 11:00 pm ~ Pub 101 and ScotiaBank Place learning has never been as important. March 22 Alumni Wine Tasting and Luncheon (Napa Valley, 10:30 am – 2:00 pm Monica California) Cliff Lede Vineyard/25 Degrees Brix Restaurant March 30 or 31 Princeton Developments Ltd. Distinguished U of A Business Alumni Magazine is published twice a year by the (Edmonton) Lectures in Finance University of Alberta School of Business. If you would like an additional free subscription or would like to send in a comment or update your address, March/April MBA Awards Ceremony and Reception please contact us at: April 25 Olympic Village Tour and Presentation External Relations, University of Alberta School of Business, (Vancouver) Richard Damecour, ‘88 MBA 4-40 Business Building, Edmonton, Alberta Canada T6G 2R6 e-mail: [email protected] web site: www.business.ualberta.ca June 4 MBA Convocation telephone: (780) 492-4083 toll-free in Canada and the US: 1-877-362-3222 (Edmonton) 10:00 am ~ Jubilee Auditorium fax: (780) 492-8748 Dean: Michael Percy June 9 BCom Convocation Luncheon Editor: Monica Wegner (Edmonton) 12:30 pm ~ Maple Leaf Room, Lister Centre Design: Greg Miller Backstreet Communications June 20 Alumni Wine Tasting Printing: McCallum Printing Group Inc. (Ontario) Angels Gate Winery ~ Beamsville Cover Image: Neil Manning June 22 Chancellor’s Cup Golf Tournament (Edmonton) 1:00 pm July 8 3rd Annual Stampede Breakfast (Calgary) 7:00 am ~ Ceili’s Pub and Restaurant UNI VERSIT Y OF A LBER TA SCH OOL OF BUSINESS ALUMNI MAGAZINE FALL/WINTER 2008/09 contents FEATURES 2 Alumni Profiles Mike Loenen Lynne Bigam Steven Koles and Jay Baydala Blythe Butler and Rob Duteau DEPAR TMENTS 8 Business Alumni Association Celebrating the Centenary 7 22 School and Campaign News Preservation of the Name 10 Neil Manning 26 Programs and Student News BCom, MBA, PhD 34 Pages in Time Stampede - Gordon Pitts 31 36 Classnotes Leading Alumni 40 48 One Year Out Cameron Linke WWW. BUSINESS. UALBERTA. CA Alumniprofile BY DEBBY WALDMAN An ACE of a Place Mike Loenen After spending nearly nine years buying energy for a consortium of power cooperatives in the United States, Mike Loenen, ‘00 MbA, knows about scarce resources. mong the scarcest, he says, are serves as the financial risk management that commodity markets are extremely MBAs who understand the energy arm for about 35 giga-watts of generation volatile. You need look no further than industry.A That’s why the U of A’s Natural and load for 16 energy cooperatives your local gas pumps where prices have Resources and Energy (NRE) MBA in the United States. To put that into been rising and falling over the past six specialization is so important he told perspective, ACES is responsible for months like carts on a roller coaster. students during his long anticipated providing power to 15 million people “Hourly power prices can hit multi- November trip to Edmonton where he from Maine to California and from the thousand dollar figures very quickly” delivered two well-attended lectures in Pacific Northwest to Florida. Mike says. “The market humbles one as many days at the Alberta School of ACES, which deals in power, natural quickly as the mark-to-market swings Business. Mike was also accompanied by gas, coal, emission allowances, and on a multi-hundred million-dollar deal his daughter Rebecca, whose excitement renewable energy credits, is almost are sizeable.” to see her cousins on the family farm exclusively on the buy side. Mike’s job was scarcely containable ! The NRE program prepared Loenen is to craft, solicit, break down and for that unpredictability. “Andre (Plourde) “A NRE specialization is a scarce and negotiate power supply offers in an and Joseph (Doucet) have fashioned a required commodity in the US energy attempt to ascertain the fair market gem in the rough in this program,” he industry,” he says. “What this industry value and portfolio fit. Given that says. “People realized when they came out needs is 50 NRE programs. What you’re the value of energy sources seems to that they had a high-calibre education. learning here is an excellent inter- change almost by the second, that’s a You look back and you can’t help but be disciplinary approach to energy.” considerable challenge. appreciative for what you experienced.” Mike is the Manager of Structured “As my youngest son once put it, Mike was in the first NRE class which Products at ACES Power Marketing, ‘Dad deals with messy, expensive energy graduated in 2000. Then, as now, the a suburban Indianapolis company that things,’ Mike says, adding the obvious: curriculum included public policy, energy 2 ALBERERTA SCHSCHOOL OF BUBUSINESSSINESS • Fall/Winter 2008/09 economics, and finance as well as insight into the importance he says. “The Albertan economy promptly went red hot, the of understanding the different personalities represented in the Alberta real estate and Canadian dollar skyrocketed, and I energy industry. made the fateful choice of applying for a green card, which “A plant engineer looks at an inefficient peaking power cascaded into a multi-year journey.” plant a lot differently than an environmentalist or a politician Mike isn’t entirely sure how President-elect Barack Obama’s would,” Mike says. “Many disparate groups sit at the energy administration will affect the energy industry, but there’s table, and they generally communicate poorly with each other. no denying that there will be changes with the Democrats The NRE program helped facilitate an ingrained appreciation controlling all three legislative branches of the government. of these differing viewpoints.” “Carbon regulation is likely coming in the US, and Mike, who has degrees in math and economics from the everyone has been gearing up for it,” Mike says. “Despite the University of British Columbia, enrolled in the program press in the US and Canada, the Americans have actually been because he wanted to train for a career where he could draw studying and debating emissions policy for the past decade.” on his passion for politics, history, and economics. “The Coal-fired generation construction has slowed markedly in global energy market is where nations collide with each the US, as all the players anticipate regulatory change. “They’re other, cooperating and competing on many levels,” he says. primarily focused on building natural gas-fired and renewable Canada’s energy industry was in tough shape when Mike generation,” Mike says. graduated. He wrote job letters to the top 100 energy firms and As for wind generation, Mike says “it’s an excellent received only one response. The situation in the United States addition in small regional quantities. Unfortunately, was much more encouraging due to the onset of deregulation wind generation causes many unintended system-wide in the power markets. consequences when overbuilt. The wind doesn’t always blow when you need it to such as like during the daily evening peak in the summer months. You need to build a system that will cost-effectively cover the system load peak. Wind is an intermittent resource and you can’t readily hedge potential future wind gusts.” Indeed, you can’t hedge much when it comes to energy - except for the people involved.