Portland Pacesetters: February 2, 2007

Daily Journal of Commerce (Portland, OR), Feb 2, 2007 by DJC Staff

ENGINEERING

Murray, Smith & Associates Inc., Engineers/Planners has hired Thomas C. Lindberg has to its Everett, Wash., office.

Lindberg, previously president of Flowater Engineering, received a Bachelor of Science degree in mechanical engineering from Washington State University in 1986 and spent 16 years with RH2 Engineering, where he most recently directed the comprehensive planning and analysis group. He is a recognized water system engineering specialist, having completed over 20 comprehensive water system plans and serving over 30 municipal clients throughout Washington.

He is the current president of the King County Subsection of the Pacific Northwest Section of the American Water Works Association and has received AWWA's Outstanding Services Award. Lindberg is a licensed professional engineer in the state of Washington. He will assume broad project management and business development responsibilities for MSA's Northwest Washington service area.

FINANCE

West Coast Bank has promoted Bill Malak to senior vice president of employee development.

West Coast Bank's executive vice president of commercial banking, Xandra T. McKeown, was recently elected president of Doernbecher Children's Hospital foundation board and was also appointed to the Oregon Health & Science University Foundation.

Malak is responsible for planning, organizing and directing the employee development functions and activities for West Coast Bancorp and all affiliates and has worked for West Coast Bank since 2000.

Malak graduated from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and formerly served on the Eugene Symphony board

McKeown has led West Coast Bank's commercial banking group since 2000. She serves, or has served, on the High Desert Museum trustee board, the Clackamas Women's Services leadership council, Government Relations Committee for the American Bankers Association, Junior Achievement board of directors, NW Business for Culture and the Arts, and Oregon Bankers Association committees. She earned a B.A. from Whitman College and an M.B.A. from the Oregon Executive Program.

RETAIL

Hood River Distillers, the Northwest's largest importer, producer and marketer of distilled spirits, has announced the promotion of Erik Svenson to vice president of sales/Western Region, USA and Clater Mottinger to vice president of sales/Eastern Region, USA.

Due to the company's rapid growth in the past five years, Svenson and Mottinger are assuming the roles and responsibilities previously held by Ken Kossler, vice president of sales, who retired Jan. 1 after a 40-year career in the distilled spirits business.

Svenson's previous position with HRD was as director of sales, Northwest Region. He has been with the company for more than two years after a 20-year career with Diageo, Louis M. Martini and E.J. Gallo Winery, all in California and the Northwest states. Svenson is located in HRD's Beaverton office.

Mottinger, who will continue to reside in Virginia, has directed East Coast sales efforts for HRD since 2002. Mottinger served for the previous six years as a commissioner to the Alcohol Beverage Control board, appointed by the governor of Virginia.

Kossler has been with HRD since 1987 and was promoted to the vice president/sales position in 2000 when the company had six sales representatives promoting HRD's brands in seven states.

Kossler, who moved to Oregon from Pittsburgh at age 3, was a member of the first David Douglas High School graduating class. He also majored in business and engineering at Portland State University.

TECHNOLOGY

Software company Abacast, an international leader in real-time streaming solutions, has announced that Douglas R. Palin Jr., CEO of Infinity Internet, and Kathy Long Holland, co-founder of Long Sherpa Design, a not-for-profit publicly funded business advisory corporation, have joined the board of directors of the five-year- old company.

Palin brings extensive experience in the Internet business to the 10-member board. Prior to becoming CEO of Infinity Internet, he founded Pacifier Online Data Service, which became the largest privately held Internet service provider in the Northwest, and was president, Western Region, for US/Net, following Pacifier's sale to that company. The Vancouver resident is a computer science graduate of Portland State University.

Long Holland, besides co-founding ECO-D/OMBI, is an expert in entrepreneurship. She has lectured at Stanford's Graduate School of Business, the School for Entrepreneurial Leadership at the University of California and is a lecturer at the University of Oregon Health & Science University. A former Nike executive, Long Holland holds an M.B.A from the University of Oregon.