Leadership
Mark Shu, Managing Partner
Mark is passionate about the power of innovation to shape our future. He is a fact-based leader who is inquisitive and possesses a blend of marketing, technical and commercial development experience which has been used to consistently transform innovative ideas into commercial realities.
Prior to founding TCG, Mark was a product executive at Ogin, Inc. where he developed and commercialized a revolutionary wind turbine technology with industry leading efficiency. Before joining Ogin, he led technology strategy at GE Renewable Energy, where he advised business leaders by developing investment cases for advanced energy technologies. He was entrusted to implement growth strategies resulting in internal development programs, equity investments and acquisitions. Mark began his tenure at GE as a system integration leader, where his process mindset was refined, leading to documentation of GE's first design practice for wind turbine product development, and later the innovation practice for GE Renewables. Mark began his career as an engineer in the aerospace industry and has also developed risk management products, technology ventures and managed a private foundation.
Mark holds doctorate and masters degrees in mechanical engineering from Washington University in St. Louis, and a bachelors degree in mechanical engineering from Missouri University of Science and Technology. He has been certified through GE's development programs in leadership, innovation and growth, and Six Sigma quality management, and serves as a mentor for MIT's Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation.
Thomas A. Wagner, Partner
Tom is passionate about energy, technology and responsible use of natural resources. He is a mission-driven executive who embodies hands-on leadership in formulating and implementing operations strategies that result in consistent success in diverse settings.
Before joining TCG, Tom was Chief Product Officer at Ogin, Inc. where he led product development for a revolutionary distributed wind turbine. Prior to Ogin, he was Chief Technology Officer at Nordic Wind Power, where he led development of low-cost wind turbine technology for distributed generation applications. Tom has held senior executive positions in several gas turbine technology companies including GTE and Hess Microgen. He began a 20 year career at GE as an engineer, and as General Manager of Wind technology led GE's first steps in building a $10B renewable energy product line.
Tom lives on the same farm where he was born and raised. Early in life he learned the importance of technology and processes in managing natural resources. Today he continues to feed this interest in his spare time by advancing farm technology using solar power and precision agriculture.
Tom is a distinguished graduate of Cornell University with a bachelors in mechanical engineering. He also holds a Masters degree in engineering mechanics from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.
A. James Wang, Partner
AJ is a polymath who has built businesses around a unique blend of experience in engineering, business and law. He began his career as a mechanical engineer at McDonnell Douglas working on human machine interface technology. Later, AJ developed his approach to innovation at Mentor Corporation where he led the R&D division and commercialized numerous breakthrough medical devices in highly regulated markets.
His solo law practice provides the creative latitude to generate customer value using multiple facets of his expertise in law, business and technology. For a recent law client for instance, in addition to setting up businesses overseas to provide intellectual property protection and minimize tax burden, AJ also identified opportunities for production automation. Guided by return on capital trade-offs and his experience in manufacturing technology, AJ engineered a production automation system that provided much welcomed improvements in production reliability, throughput and net margins.
AJ is a USPTO registered patent attorney and has a special interest in intellectual property rights pertaining to China and India. He is a civic-minded leader, serving the city council in Creve Coeur, Missouri for over a decade, and the greater St. Louis metro area on the municipal courts subcommittee of the Ferguson Committee for Racial Equality.
AJ holds graduate degrees in engineering from Washington University in St. Louis and Illinois Institute of Technology, an MBA from Washington University's Olin Business School and a JD from Saint Louis University. His academic profile includes advanced law studies at Cambridge University's Trinity College and instructing graduate courses in international business and contract law.