Senior Management

Eytan Uliel

Chief Executive Officer

Eytan has assumed the position as Chief Executive Officer from 27 May 2021, having previously served as the Company’s Commercial Director since 2014. Eytan is a finance executive with significant oil and gas industry experience. He has significant experience in mergers and acquisitions, capital raisings, general corporate advisory work, oil and gas industry-specific experience in public market takeovers and transactions, private treaty acquisitions and farm-in / farm-out transactions. He has held executive roles in various ASX and SGX listed companies.

Prior to working with Challenger Energy, from 2009 – 2014 Eytan was Chief Financial Officer and Chief Commercial Officer of Dart Energy Limited, an ASX listed company that had unconventional gas assets (coal bed methane and shale gas) in Australia, Asia and Europe, and Chief Commercial Officer of its predecessor company, Arrow International Ltd, a Singapore based company that had unconventional gas asset primarily in Asia and Australia. He holds a Bachelor of Arts (Political Science) and Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degree from the University of New South Wales, and was admitted as a solicitor in the Supreme Court of New South Wales in 1997.

Nathan Rayner

Chief Operating Officer

Nathan is a qualified Petroleum Engineer with over 20 years experience leading technical and operational teams globally. Nathan’s early career has included engineering and technical management positions with Santos, Origin, Addax Petroleum and Arrow Energy where he was the General Manager of Petroleum Engineering leading up to the acquisition by Shell and PetroChina. Since 2010 he has been the Chief Operating Officer of a number of publicly listed oil and gas companies including Dart Energy (China, Indonesia, India and UK), Sunbird Energy (South Africa) and Armour Energy (Australia). In each of these roles he has been responsible for the safe delivery of all exploration, appraisal, development and production operations.

Dr. Parbodh Gogna

Regional Director Caribbean

Dr. Gogna is a skilled doctor with 30 years of active medical practice. He has provided senior leadership across military, civilian and federal government environments. His experience in trauma/emergency, communicable disease management, cross border and multicultural affairs have complemented his senior leadership roles across government central agencies, public health and private sectors.

Most recently at the Australian Department of Home Affairs, he was Chief Medical Officer to 14,000 employees. This role was central to strategic planning and coordination on repatriation, immigration, border protection, domestic security and law enforcement issues for the initial and build-up periods of the Covid-19 pandemic.  Prior to this Parbodh was Director of Medical Services at a domestic Queensland hospital leading a team of over 100 multi-disciplinary healthcare providers. He has served in Afghanistan as a Regimental Medical Officer – Special Air Service Regiment (rank of Captain).

Randolph Hiscock

New Business Director

Randolph (Randy) Hiscock has 30+ years Upstream experience acquired through various technical and managerial roles with Shell, Talisman and EnCana (PanCanadian). He has Masters of Science / MBA degrees from Memorial University in Canada.

Randy joined Bahamas Petroleum Company after 10 years with Shell as the Manager of New Ventures & Business Development, Americas based in Houston and The Hague.

Previously, Randy was VP Exploration Latin America for EnCana (PanCanadian) and was located in Calgary for 19 years.

He has worked extensively in Latin America and the Caribbean for ~ 20 years, leading to major offshore discoveries in Guyana and Brazil. Also, he stewarded new county entries in Brazil, Venezuela, Guyana, French Guyana, Colombia and Argentina and has evaluated over 300+ new venture opportunities.

Geoffrey Leid

Trinidad & Tobago Country Head and GM

Geoffrey Leid is a corporate consultant/adviser with a particular focus on oil and gas development projects. His extensive experience in the acquisition and funding of resource projects in Trinidad spans ten years. An attorney by profession, Mr. Leid has specialised in real estate, corporate mergers and acquisitions and he sat on numerous boards in the real estate, telecommunications and energy sectors throughout the Caribbean. Mr. Leid holds undergraduate degrees in Economics and Administrative Studies from York University, Canada and obtained his LLB in the United Kingdom. As a member of Grays Inn, he was called to the Bar in England. Mr. Leid is also a member of the Certified Public Accountants in Canada.

Gagan Khurana

Commercial Manager

Gagan is a corporate adviser with over 20 years of experience in M&A, Corporate Finance, Origination and Executive Management, including over 10 years in the oil and gas industry in executive management, deal origination and advisory capacity. He was previously VP – Corporate & Commercial at Dart Energy from 2010 to 2015, where he worked with BPC’s current Chief Executive Officer, Commercial Director and Operations Director.

He holds an MBA from the National University of Singapore and is a fellow member (FCCA) of the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants, UK, and CA (Singapore).

Benjamin Proffitt

Finance Director and Company Secretary

With a physics degree from Imperial College London, Ben Proffitt qualified as a Chartered Accountant in 2007 with BDO, working in their audit team with a focus on AIM-listed resource clients.  In 2008 Ben joined Renewable Energy Holdings plc to manage their wave energy intellectual property development in Australia before joining BPC plc in 2010.

Senator Hon. JoBeth Coleby-Davis

Legal Counsel

JoBeth holds an LLM in Energy Law and Policy from the University of Dundee in Scotland.  She gained her dual Bachelor of Law degree with Business Management at Keele University, UK and completed her bar vocational course at Nottingham Trent University.

JoBeth has excellent knowledge of the legal system in The Bahamas, including the Petroleum Act and Regulations. She is responsible for compliance and risk management of Challenger Energy licences, Government relations and works closely with the management team to advise on legal and commercial risks associated with day to day business operations.  She is also a member of AIPN and regularly attends conferences to remain aware of new developments in International Petroleum Law and Contracts. JoBeth is currently a Senator in the Upper House of the Government of the Commonwealth of The Bahamas.

Roberta Quant

Environmental Scientist

Roberta Quant has a Masters degree in Environmental Engineering, and a Masters and Bachelors degree in Ocean Engineering. She holds a Bachelors of Law (LLB) degree and was admitted to the England & Wales Bar and The Bahamas Bar in 2015.

Roberta has been employed in the environmental field for seventeen years having previously worked with the Bahamas Environment, Science and Technology (BEST) Commission where she provided advice to the Government on environmental issues and policy development. At Challenger Energy she is responsible for ensuring that health, safety and environmental policies and plans are prepared and maintained to the highest standards (EIA, EMP, EA, Emergency Response) and to communicate the Company plans broadly within the island communities and to the Government of The Bahamas.