Only one week left until the 2016 SFBW Apogee Awards! Are you ready?
On Oct. 27, at the NSU Art Museum in Fort Lauderdale, SFBW magazine will recognize distinguished leaders who hold positions in the C-level of companies.
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Here are the biographies of the Chief Operating Officer Honorees:
COO honoree for Miami Dade: Gonzalo Navarro, ArX Solutions
Navarro leads the architectural visualization firm’s efforts in 3-D computer graphics and virtual reality experiences.
In 1996, he and his brother Patricio founded the architectural firm ArX Arquitectura in Argentina. Navarro led the firm’s entry into the United States in 2003, creating what is now ArX Solutions. He has been in charge of ArX’s entire production, steadily increasing the quality of its products and enabling the company to become one of the world’s leading architectural visualization studios. It is widely used by major developers to help potential customers visualize their products.
Navarro studied architecture in the Universidad de Belgrano in Argentina, where he was recognized as one of the top 10 students of his class, and went on to have a notable career as an architect, winning multiple competitions. He is a pioneer in 3-D computer graphics, having created the first hyper-realistic computer animation and holographic presentation in Argentina in 1991.
In 2015, he was tapped to be a speaker at Autodesk University, where he hosted a master class about the renovation of the Waldorf Astoria in New York.
COO honoree for Broward: David Henshall, Citrix Systems
Henshall joined the company more than 13 years ago as chief financial officer, and as COO, he focuses on building a balanced portfolio of growth investments, maintaining a scalable operational infrastructure, and ensuring disciplined financial decision-making.
During his tenure, Citrix has grown from about $500 million in annual revenue to $3.28 billion in 2015, thanks to business products and services that are in use by more than 400,000 organizations and 100 million users globally.
Henshall has more than 25 years of management experience in the technology sector, and has worked at several of the industry’s leading companies, including Rational Software Corp., Cypress Semiconductor and Samsung Electronics.
He has served as a board member for emerging technology companies Gomez Inc. and Everbridge, as well as the American Electronics Association.
COO honoree for Palm Beach: Howard Wander, Kelley Kronenberg
Wander serves as a principal partner and COO of the full-service law firm. He is the managing partner at its West Palm Beach office, as well as the director of the firm’s property and casualty practice group. Wander also directs the regulated-substance practice group. He concentrates his practice on insurance defense litigation, and property and casualty defense, and focuses on the representation of employers, third-party administrators and insurance carriers.
He maintains an active litigation and trial caseload, in addition to his direct involvement and strategic consultation in the firm’s growth and direction. Wander is rated AV Preeminent by Martindale-Hubbell, which indicates a demonstration of the highest professional and ethical standards, and is the highest rating a lawyer can receive. He has been featured in the Boca Raton Observer, the Palm Beach Post and Smart Business magazine.
