Vince Thomas

Founder & Chief Executive Officer
“Get your mind right.”

Top Skills: Providing strategic direction and initiatives to the Billhighway team while promoting a collaborative, creative, and open environment in which team members can thrive.

Highlights Reel: In 2011, Vince was named Ernst & Young Entrepreneur Of The Year, an award that recognizes entrepreneurs who inspire others with their vision, leadership and achievement while building successful, growing and dynamic businesses, as well as being honored with the Crain’s Detroit 40 Under 40 Award. Vince has led Billhighway in obtaining a Michigan Economic Development Corporation Mega Award for tax credits in the amount of $1.1 million. Under his direction, Billhighway has also been recognized as one of the “101 Best and Brightest Companies to Work For” in 2012 and an 2012 Automation Alley Technology Company of the Year nominee.

Over the past several years, Vince has invested his time and resources in a number of startups and emerging companies in the local area. He currently sits on the EMU College of Business Advisory Board, Corp! Magazine Advisory Board and is a member of the ASAE and the Center for Association Leadership, the Michigan Society for Association Executives and the Association of Fraternity/Sororities Advisors. Vince earned his bachelor’s degree in Finance from Eastern Michigan University where he played baseball for 4 years.

Doug Gregory

Chief Executive Officer-Elect
“Who is John Galt?”

Top Skills: Focused on strategic growth and empowering the Billhighway team to accelerate our positive impact on financial solutions and fundraising development in the nonprofit world.

Highlights Reel: Starting as employee #12, Doug helped pioneer Plex OnLine, a cloud-based ERP system for manufacturing — the first multi-tenant software-as-a-service (SaaS) ERP system on the market in 2000. As COO, he implemented the ERP system at over 500 plants worldwide, ranging from startups to multi-billion dollar manufacturing companies, averaging 30% annualized growth. While a programmer by trade and a strategist at heart, Doug’s leadership of the 100+ programmer team received many workplace excellence awards driven by his belief in a dynamic, employee-centric culture. He graduated from Wayne State University with a BA in computer science.

Aaron Schmid

Chief Product Officer
“All luck is… is when hard work and preparation meets opportunity.”

Top Skills: Leads product and technical development of Billhighway financial technology by leveraging his CPA expertise in new product development—from the creation of product features to the product launch.

Highlights Reel: As a management consultant for Deloitte Consulting, he was the lead practitioner in seven full-scale ERP implementations, specializing in the financial management suites of major ERP vendors, such as PeopleSoft. As a major component of each engagement, Aaron assisted his clients through “best practice” financial transformation and business process reengineering efforts. His clients included organizations such as American Express, Bear Sterns, Alticor, BorgWarner and USFilter. Aaron is a graduate of Michigan State University with a bachelor of accounting, and an MBA in finance and information systems.

Contact Aaron
Email: ASchmid@billhighway.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/pub/aaron-schmid/11/68b/154
Phone: (248) 273.0074

Steve Robert

Chief Information Officer
“It’s not about making the right decision but making the decision right.”

Top Skills: Leverages his extensive systems experience to identify and implement innovative solutions, while overseeing the technical infrastructure and system architecture required to scale the business.

Highlights Reel: Steve was responsible for building a financial platform from the ground up, during the company’s startup – which continues to serve as the foundation for rapid year-over-year growth.

Steve is a self-motivated leader with a results-driven philosophy. He’s an information junkie who strives to interpret the climate of the internet economy to maximize opportunities and create value. Steve enjoys the diversity CIO responsibilities offer; business/technology alignment and the delicate balance between a 30k foot vision and strategy session to the occasional 2” deep-dives into various technical rabbit holes.

Corp! Magazine named Steve an entrepreneur of distinction and a 2009 Michigan top executive and presented his company the 2010 Business of Science and Technology Award for excellence in technology. Lawrence Tech University recognized Steve as a Leader & Innovator in 2011 and Crains Business Detroit recently recognized Steve as one of Metro Detroit’s Top CIOs in 2012. He’s also a board member for Midwest Technology Leaders and actively coaches, speaks and blogs about startups, technology and entrepreneurship.

Contact Steve
Twitter: @stevenRobert
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/stevenrobert

John Schelske

Chief Operations Officer
“There’s got to be a better way.”

Top Skills: Oversees all operational departments with the mentality that there’s always a better way to get things done, he brings extensive experience and knowledge to Billhighway.

Highlights Reel: John’s extensive experience includes time as an operations improvement and information technology consultant, an information technology director for an engineering contractor, and an executive-level resource for a packaged software vendor. Additionally, he spent a major part of his career with Deloitte, where he was a partner in their consulting practice. John has invested his time and resources in the community. He has been a member of the Board of Directors, and served as Treasurer at the Birmingham Athletic Club. He has served on various committees at Holy Name Church, and was a member of the business advisory board for Kettering University. John earned his Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Kalamazoo College and a Master’s degree in Business from the University of Michigan.

Michelle Lange

Chief Marketing Officer
“Do well, by doing good.”

Top Skills: Leads all brand building and marketing activities based on discovering the deep consumer and marketplace insights that will most resonate with the Billhighway brand offerings.

Highlights Reel: Prior to Billhighway, Michelle founded The Walsh Institute, focused on accelerating business growth in Michigan, where jointly securing a multi-year investment from the Blackstone Foundation and launching Blackstone LaunchPad was a huge win. She has worked with local and global entities such as GM, Louis Vuitton-Moet Hennessey, Dow and ConAgra. As the founder of SilverTree, she helped non-profits and local businesses identify and realize their growth opportunities. While at GM, Michelle launched Chevrolet midsize cars with $5.5 billion in yearly sales. She earned her Master’s in Communications and Bachelor’s in Business from Michigan State University and is an adjunct marketing professor at Walsh College. Additionally, Michelle has been recognized by Advertising Age and BrandWeek as a top marketer in the U.S.

Contact Michelle
Email: mlange@billhighway.com
LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/askmichellelange

Tracy-Ann Palmer

Chief Growth Officer
“Always give and care more than people expect!”

Top Skills: Tracy-Ann Palmer leads our growth team in its mission to expand and serve the nonprofit sector with her extensive understanding and experience with nonprofits and membership association organizations.

Highlights Reel: Billhighway is in great hands with Tracy-Ann. She has extensive experience in channel and sales management as well as founded her very own nonprofit called “WeBuildCharacter”, focused on mentoring, succession planning and leadership in Michigan. Prior to Billhighway, she was the Senior Alliances Manager for the salesforce.com foundation and was responsible for all channel strategy and management working with non-profits and higher education. She is extremely dedicated to the community and served on the board for Michigan Council for Women in Technology for 7 years, and built numerous community events at ARZIKA which she founded in 2005. Tracy-Ann has had a long and prosperous career with several global companies, including Nu Metro and Marcus Evans. Tracy-Ann was born in Zimbabwe, and lived in South Africa where she received her education in Business Management.

Tom Bomberski

Chief Finance Officer
“Make every day count.”

Top Skills: Oversees all finance, corporate and client accounting functions, while working with the leadership team on a sustainable plan for growth. Leads the development of strategic and performance objectives and sets policies, standards and operating philosophies at Billhighway.

Highlights Reel: Tom brings deep experience in financial management, business process improvement, accounting and internal controls, and finance technology implementation to his role. Prior to joining Billhighway, Tom was a Senior Manager with Deloitte Consulting’s Finance practice. During his career, Tom has led several large finance transformation programs working with both large global and middle market organizations. Tom is a CPA, CISA, and PMP and earned his undergraduate degree in Accounting and MBA in financial information systems from Michigan State University.