Leadership

Brendan King is the innovative force behind Vendasta. Responsible for providing the vision, thought leadership, and business strategy, it is Brendan’s ability to focus on the big picture while maintaining quality on the finest details that drives Vendasta’s success. Prior to starting the company, Brendan has many business ventures, including a computer chain which was nationally franchised and was entrepreneurial force behind Point2 Agent, a real estate software company, where he grew its membership to more than 185,000 agents and brokers in 85 countries. He was named one of the Top 50 Saas CEOs by the Software Report in 2019. Brendan and Vendasta are almost synonymous. Both are governed by four core values: Drive, innovation, respect and agility. Brendan is extremely passionate about upholding these values while helping Vendasta on its path of becoming the #1 platform for selling digital solutions to local businesses.

George Leith is Vendasta’s Chief Customer Officer, reporting to Chief Executive Officer, Brendan King. He leads Vendasta’s Sales Guild of more than 200 professionals. These teams are dedicated to ensuring the success of a global stable of vendors, channel partners, and end-users. George provides training, education, and mentorship to an ever-growing base of more than 40,000 Channel Partners, sales leaders, and sales professionals who make up Vendasta’s client base. In 2016, George created the Conquer Local Podcast to help sales leaders, frontline sales professionals, and channel partners in their digital customer journey. The Conquer Local Podcast is entering it’s 4th season and has been ranked in the top 10 business Podcasts on Itunes it is heard in 50 countries with over 10,000 unique listens a month. In 2020 George was recognized as a Top Gun 51 for his work to help Channel Partners all over the world as they transform their platforms and go-to-customer models. George is a founding member of the Toronto Chapter of the Revenue Collective and an advisory board member of Cultivator tech incubator. He also is as a guest lecturer at the Edwards School of Business, MBA program. Prior to Vendasta, George created and led businesses in the Media Industry. As an RAB certified Radio Manager and Marketer, George started his sales career with 15 years in Radio, and then 5 years in the publishing business. He has a passion to help individuals and companies excel as digital sales experts.

Willem Els leads Corporate Business Intelligence and Operations. He has extensive public company experience at Microsoft Corporation and The Walt Disney Studios. He specialized in Finance, Strategy, and Business Intelligence for North America markets; during this time he worked and lived in Toronto and Los Angeles. His last three years at Disney as Vice President of Finance and Planning focused on worldwide emerging businesses and leading the cross-functional Five Year Plan process.

After Disney, Willem joined a private fast growing company with a China-based supply chain and distribution across North-America. He started and led several central planning functions; his last role as Executive Vice President included oversight of Financial Planning, Business Intelligence, Business Integration, and Demand Forecasting of Products and Distribution Channels.

Willem holds a Bachelor of Commerce (Economics) and completed a program in Advanced Managerial Accounting.

Ed O’Keefe is Vendasta’s GM of Marketplace, reporting to CEO, Brendan King. Ed has innovated and driven high double digit growth year over year by operating a marketplace where Channel Partners find, market, provision and purchase products to resell to their SMB clients. This includes both Vendsasta owned & operated white label solutions and a curated ecosystem of best of breed 3rd party vendors. Ed joined Vendasta in 2017 to deliver a vibrant marketplace platform with deeply integrated products across the Martech & IT categories: and expand into the HR, Accounting, Shipping, Security & eCommerce TAM. In 2020, Ed also launched Vendasta into the FINTECH space with a partnership with STRIPE to further monetize the transactions and GMV running through Vendasta’s end to end commerce platform.

Prior to Vendasta, Ed was based in London and worked across 8 countries in Europe to transform a $1.3B Media company to digital, created the Martech market’s first PayPerCall Marketplace, is a founding innovator in the call tracking and call attribution market, and spent 6 years designing and product managing consumer and Pro skis, rackets and scuba equipment for HEAD Sports.

Gib Olander is Vendasta’s EVP of Product and the General Manager of the Platform division. Reporting to CEO Brendan King. Gib and the platform division work to make the Vendata platform the operating system of choice for our Channel Partners activating an army of channel partner users who use the white labeled Vendasta platform to scale their ability to market, sell, fulfil & bill digital products. Gib joined Vendasta in 2019 to help coach and scale our product groups. Prior to Vendasta, Gib spent 20+ years working on and founding companies who deliver digital products that help SMB’s utilize software. He helped invent business listing identity management with Localeze (now Neustar) and invented patented technology in customer satisfaction and natural language processing around consumer reviews with Local Viewpoints (now PowerReviews) Gib holds degrees in Political Science and Public Administration from Augustana College

Jeff Folckemer is Vendasta’s GM of Channel Partner Expansion, and is the GM of Marketing Services. Reporting to the COO, Jeff is responsible for retaining, growing, and servicing the existing customer base of partners. This includes training, selling techniques, and overall understanding of Platform use, as well as Products and Services available to the partners SMB’s (customer base). Jeff joined Vendasta in September of 2018 to help scale and expand partners. Prior to Vendasta Jeff spent 20+ years working at the Hearst Corporation. His mission was to grow digital and help transition Hearst to a digital first mindset. Jeff holds degrees from Cansius College, and various other instutional learning progams included the Hearst Leadership/Management Institute.

Bryan Larson is Vendasta’s Vice President of Design, reporting to CEO, Brendan King. Bryan has been instrumental in the formulation, facilitation, and communication of the organization’s strategic initiatives and future goals. His contributions to product vision, and ability to align and mobilize teams has made a considerable impact on the company’s ongoing success. In addition to his role at Vendasta, Bryan provides consultation and mentorship to startups, is a guest lecturer at numerous post-secondary institutions, and an active public speaker in the tech community. Bryan joined Vendasta in 2013 to instate a scalable, world-class design team, set and govern experience standards, and enhance the corporate brand.

Prior to Vendasta, Bryan held positions with Yardi Canada and Point2 Technologies in the area of brand and design. He earned a B. Ed. degree from the University of Saskatchewan and holds certifications in scrum and UX management.

Jean Parchewsky is Vendasta’s VP of People Operations. She is responsible for ensuring Vendasta is continually attracting, developing, and retaining an amazing team. Jean joined Vendasta in 2015 to lead the implementation of people programs and to grow the inspiring culture at Vendasta. Vendasta has been named Company of the year, the Best Place to work, and Canada’s Top 100 Employers, along with other numerous awards for being an innovative and highly people-focused workplace.

Jean is an alumna at the University of Saskatchewan with a degree in Psychology. She spent 20 years growing retail brands in Canada such as Zara, Esprit and Target before moving into technology. With over 500 employees, Jean leverages her education in psychology and expertise in leading effective teams to ensure employees do not come to Vendasta just to work but are able to be their best and live out their passions.
Jean is involved with the SaskTech Board and has been a speaker at Edwards School of Business, the University of Saskatchewan, Co. Labs and various Technology events.

Janessa Yeomans is the General Manager of Vendasta’s Vendor Division. Focused on the entire lifecycle of Vendors in Vendasta’s Marketplace, Janessa leads the team that powers Channel Partners with new products and services they can offer to local businesses, while ensuring the success of vendors in Vendasta’s ecosystem. The Vendor Division’s goal is to make Vendasta the channel of choice for vendors who sell digital solutions to local businesses.

Prior to Vendasta in 2014, Janessa held positions with Shaw Cable in the areas of training and development and sales. She is an alumni from the University of Saskatchewan with a B. Comm degree.

Shakya Abeywickrama is Vendasta’s VP and Divisional GM of white-label Marketing Services. one of North America’s largest digital agencies. Focused on providing world-class service digital marketing offerings to local businesses, Shakya leads the division of five cross-functional teams with over 140 employees in website development, social media marketing, digital advertising, digital reputation management, and product marketing, helping over 600 channel partners support over 6,000 local businesses with their digital presence. A born and raised Sri Lankan, Shakya has called Saskatoon, Canada home for more than a decade. She is an alumni from the University of Saskatchewan and Edith Cowan University with bachelors in business specializing in marketing. She’s a leader who is passionate about female empowerment, gender equality, and diversity in the workplace and community.

During her volunteer hours, she serves on the board of SODS (a settlement agency for new immigrants), and also supports the emerging local tech community in Saskatchewan by working as a Tech Start-up Mentor for the provincial tech incubator Co.Labs. Shakya is intensely customer-focused with an intuition for consumer patterns and trends. She connects people across divisions and ideologies to drive innovation throughout Vendasta, and brings a contagious brightness to each project.

Roy Pereira is an entrepreneurial spirit and innovative force. As the General Manager of the SMB product division at Vendasta, Roy is responsible for envisioning product-led solutions for SMBs and their channel partners. His passion for technology and people-oriented products means that his heart and his brain lead the way. He is the founder and former CEO of CalendarHero, an AI-powered meeting and appointment scheduler. In October 2021, CalendarHero joined the Vendasta-owned product suite, making company history as Vendasta’s first-ever acquisition.

Roy Pereira has founded and led several tech startups based in Silicon Valley and Toronto. While at Cisco in California, Roy was an integral part of the team that launched the security business unit, generating more than one billion in annual revenue. As an inventor, Roy holds patents on remote access IPSec VPN software. In 2007, Roy started the world’s first Facebook marketing agency. In 2009, he started his fifth startup, known as Shiny Ads, to help the world’s top digital publishers better monetize premium ad buys and, in the process, invented an alternative to RTB called “automated guaranteed.” Shiny Ads was later acquired by Rubicon Project (NYSE-RUBI), based in Los Angeles, in 2014.

Ian Jones is Vendasta’s Vice President of Revenue. He leads Vendasta’s Sales and Customer Support teams of more than 140 professionals, driving a growth and customer-centric mindset. Ian is responsible for shaping and executing the strategies that deliver Vendasta’s revenue growth targets as well as the world-class customer experience we aspire to deliver each and every day. Ian started with  Vendasta in August 2020, and made the journey across the pond from Wales to join the team at our Canadian HQ in January 2021. He quickly picked up Canadian business culture, and has brought many new processes and ideas to Vendasta. 

Prior to joining Vendasta, Ian spent seven years working for Archant, one of the UK’s oldest and largest independent publishers, where he led the development of the Digital Marketing Services and Digital Sales Teams. He also spent almost 10 years working in the financial services industry, and enjoyed a brief stint in consultancy. Ian earned his Bachelor’s Degree in Biology at the University of Hull in 2002, and his Executive MBA from Cranfield University in 2019. Between his accent and his experience, Ian is a skilled, empathetic leader that Vendasta is lucky to have.

Peter is Vendasta’s General Counsel, representing us on all legal fronts. His skill is diverse and expansive, and he is notably organized. Peter has been involved in a wide range of corporate and securities matters, including mergers and acquisitions, takeovers, corporate reorganizations, joint ventures, cross-border transactions, stock exchange listings, initial public offerings, public and private financings, and securities regulatory issues. He is a good combo of serious and fun, and can deliver legalese in English.

If you’re going to ask him “if he’s heard the one about…” the answer is probably yes. Peter has decades of experience, and has practiced corporate commercial law for more than 20 years, advising companies in Canada, Europe, Asia, and the US. Peter has a JD and MBA from the University of British Columbia and is a current member of the British Columbia Law Society and Alberta Law Society.