Zenyatta Ventures Ltd's Profile

Management & Directors

• Dr. Bharat Chahar

  VP of Marketing Development

  Bharat Chahar, Ph.D. is a chemical engineer with more than 30 years of carbon research and development experience with ConocoPhillips based in Houston, Texas. Dr. Chahar obtained a B.Tech. (Chemical Engineering) from Indian Institute of Technology at Delhi, INDIA; a M.Sc. (Chemical Engineering) from University of Alberta, Edmonton, CANADA and a Ph.D. (Chemical Engineering) from Rice University, Houston, Texas, USA.

  From 2002 to 2013 Dr. Chahar was Global Marketing and Product Manager for CPREME® Graphite Materials at ConocoPhillips and Phillips 66. He led the creation and development of this new business to produce and supply graphite anode material for Lithium-ion batteries. At the time, CPREME® graphite was the largest North American based supplier of anode materials for Lithium-ion batteries with customers across the three major continents – North America, Europe and Asia. As the leader of this business since its inception, he was responsible for all aspects of starting this endeavor including strategic direction for marketing, sales, research & development, intellectual property and manufacturing scale-up. The CPREME® graphite anode material was considered the benchmark by leading manufacturers in the Lithium-ion batteries for high power batteries such as those needed for the automotive market. The CPREME® graphite business was able to achieve the premier status in the industry despite the fact that the Lithium-ion battery manufacturers and their suppliers were largely based in Asia and ConocoPhillips had no market presence until 2006.

  From 1998 to 2002 Dr. Chahar was Manager of Carbon Business and Director of Carbon Products Development at CONOCO Inc. This position focused on Conoco’s efforts to develop new carbon products and manage development of heavy oil upgrading technologies. In this assignment, he was responsible for developing and implementing strategy for growing Conoco’s new carbon product portfolio and extending carbon capabilities.

  At the Carbon Products Development group he was responsible for providing technology support for the Global Specialty Coke business and developing new carbon products. The group consisted of about 25 scientists and technicians with variety of backgrounds. He also worked with the Carbon Fibers Business team to find synergistic opportunities to market fibers with other carbon products. Dr. Chahar also led the effort to evaluate and recommend steps to successfully commercialize a new upgrading technology at Conoco’s joint venture in Venezuela. He also led efforts to develop strategic enterprises in the areas of Hydrocarbon Processing and Heavy Oil Technologies encompassing both Upstream and Downstream aspects of the heavy oil value-chain.

  Phillips 66 (formerly ConocoPhillips and Conoco) is the largest global producer of petroleum needle coke and is the only manufacturer with two production facilities; a plant in South Killingholme, UK and a plant in Lake Charles, Louisiana, USA. Phillips 66’s two plants represent the majority of world petroleum needle coke capacity which is used to make ultra-high purity synthetic graphite for various applications.