CEO Notes
Your Plan Isn't the Problem
Alignment is built in the room, not in the slide deck.
October 13, 2026
Read note →Operator. Advisor. Entrepreneur.
Experienced judgment for consequential moments.
For CEOs, boards, and investors shaping what comes next. Practical counsel at the decisions that define a company’s next arc—turning important technology into a market-leading business, aligning leaders, and building the people, strategy, and operating discipline required to create an exceptional company.
With three decades of building companies, creating markets, scaling leadership teams, raising capital, and commercializing technologies across energy, climate, software, and advanced manufacturing.
-
$500M+
In equity and non-dilutive capital
-
28+ Years
Building and leading technology companies in climate tech and energy
-
1,000+
People led from early stage to commercialization
CEO, COO, founder, operator, acquirer, and board director across energy, climate, AI/software, and advanced manufacturing.
The most important company-building decisions rarely arrive with perfect information.
They arrive when the technology works—but the market is not yet obvious. When growth exposes gaps in the team. When the board and CEO see the future differently. When the story must earn belief from customers, employees, partners, or capital. These are not problems solved by a report. They require an experienced partner who can see the whole system, ask the uncomfortable question, and help turn a decision into action.
That is the work of NextArc Partners.
How I help
I work with a small number of CEOs, founders, boards, and investors at consequential moments—when strategy must catch up to the company, when commercialization or capital readiness is the constraint, or when the board and leadership team need to become a genuine advantage.
The work is candid, practical, and built around outcomes: clearer choices, focused action, and the operating judgment required to shape what comes next.
Learn more about how I can help your endeavor →Three Careers. One Mission.
Build Something Meaningful. Build Industries. Build People.
I began as an entrepreneur, learning to move before every answer was known. I spent the next chapter helping build markets and companies around technologies the world increasingly depends on—demand response, distributed energy, virtual power plants, grid services, and advanced manufacturing. Today, my highest-leverage work is helping the builders: the leaders, teams, and boards responsible for turning possibility into impact.
The mission across all three chapters has remained the same: drive important ideas to become real.
Read the story behind NextArc Partners →Bud’s Leverage Equation
Exceptional companies compound value through three forms of leverage:
Build Great People
The quality of a company rarely exceeds the quality of its leaders. Trust, talent, candor, and accountability multiply everything else.
Solve Important Problems
The best companies focus innovation and execution on problems that create meaningful value for customers, industries, and society.
Stay Curious
Curiosity keeps leaders learning, reveals the unknown unknowns, and creates room for better questions—and better answers.
Notes from the Field
Lessons from boardrooms, factories, customer meetings, capital raises, and the messy middle of building companies.
AI for CEOs
The Windshield Is Big. The Rearview Mirror Is Small. For a Reason.
Remain focused on your North Star.
August 3, 2026
AI for CEOs
AI Strategy for CEOs and Founders - Process Before Prompts
The CEO's role isn't to become the AI expert. It's to build an organization that executes faster than its competitors.
August 2, 2026
Building something special?
The right conversation can change the trajectory of a company. If you are navigating a consequential decision, scaling an important technology, or working to make your leadership team or board a genuine advantage, let’s talk.