Baycrest Global Solutions Inc.

David Kassie has been Executive Chairman of Canaccord Genuity Group Inc. since May 2010 and was Chairman and CEO from April to October 2015. David was Principal, Chairman and CEO of Genuity Capital Markets (November 2004 to May 2010) at which time Genuity was acquired by Canaccord Financial. He is the former Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of CIBC World Markets and the Vice Chairman of CIBC (1979 – 2004).
 
Mr. Kassie has extensive experience as an advisor, underwriter and principal.  He sits on a number of corporate boards. Mr. Kassie is actively involved in community and charitable organizations and is a Director and former Chairman of Baycrest Health Sciences, Chairman of Baycrest’s commercialization activities and was formerly on the Boards of the Toronto International Film Festival Group, the Hospital for Sick Children and Ivey School of Business.
 
Mr. Kassie holds a B.Comm. (Honours) in Economics from McGill University, 1977 and an MBA from the University of Western Ontario, 1979.

Secretary, Baycrest Board of Directors
Chair, Finance & Audit Committee

Barry Cracower is the former CEO of Baycrest Global Solutions and a senior executive with solid marketing and management credentials. As founder and president of Rexall Pharmacy and Vice President of the Katz Group, he was instrumental in developing the organization into Canada’s second largest drug store chain.
 
Mr. Cracower has extensive experience in the retail sector where he was founder of the Steals People, Canada’s first retail computer store. In addition Mr. Cracower was senior Merchandise Manager of the T. Eaton Co. and Vice President, General Electric.  Currently, as the President of Marketing Alternatives he does consulting to consumer product and service companies.
 
He is a seasoned board executive currently serving on the boards of Jewish Community Centre (JCC), The Heart and Stroke Foundation and The Partnership for Stroke Recovery Research, where he is Chair. In addition to Baycrest, the Partnership includes other hospital research centres from across the country. He also serves on two private company boards.
 
Mr. Cracower has a BCom from Concordia in Montreal and an M.B.A. from Columbia University in NYC and has received his ICD.D designation from the Institute of Corporate Directors.
 
Mr. Cracower is a member of the Baycrest Board of Directors.  In addition, he serves as Treasurer and Secretary, as well as Chair of the Finance & Audit Committee.
 

Noah is a technology entrepreneur. His most recent venture, Checkout 51, is a mobile app that helps shoppers save money on their groceries, and offers packaged goods brands real-time consumer insights and strategic targeting that they can't get anywhere else. Checkout 51 was acquired by News America Marketing (NAM), a division of News Corporation, in July 2015.

Post-acquisition, Noah ran NAM’s digital businesses and innovation unit, and oversaw the development/launch of Freedom, a new business that enables packaged goods brands to easily run sophisticated, data-enriched campaigns at massive scale.

Previously, Noah co-founded GigPark, an online social media platform that allows users to find local businesses through recommendations from friends. In August 2009, GigPark was acquired by Canpages, the largest independent directories publisher in Canada (since acquired by Yellow Pages Group).

Prior to GigPark, Noah was the Founding Publisher of Dose, a national daily newspaper and digital media business backed by CanWest that he took from 0 to 340,000 daily readers in less than a year. Targeting young adult Canadians, Dose reached 10% of 18-24 year olds in its markets every single day.

With an MBA from Harvard Business School and a Bachelor of Commerce from McGill University, Noah has experience in corporate strategy / business development at both Time Warner and MTV Networks in New York. He started his career as a media investment banker at Salomon Smith Barney (now Citigroup) in New York and grew up as a child actor in Toronto.

Noah is married with 3 amazing kids (Chase, Lincoln & Britton) and works with a few non-profits, which includes his role as a Vice Chair of the Baycrest Foundation, Co-Founder of The Brain Project, and Co-Chair for the SixPoints Jewish Venture Philanthropy Fund.

David Green is a semi-retired business person with a broad background in numerous aspects of real estate.  Both alone and with various family companies, David has developed, built and managed multi-family residential buildings, industrial buildings and office buildings in Toronto and South Florida.   David is currently active in community affairs, having served in Board of Directors and/or Committee capacities the UJA, Baycrest Health Sciences, Miles Nadal JCC, YMCA-GTA and Canadian Friends of Kishorit.  He is the founder and chairman of Canadian Friends of Rambam Health Care Campus (Haifa).  David holds an M.A. degree in Urban Geography from the University of Chicago.   He is a 5^th dan Karate student of the late Masami Tsuruoka.  David enjoys fishing and cottage life and lives in downtown Toronto with his wife, Daphne Wagner and children Lita and Michael.

Mr. Jacob has been working in the motion picture exhibition industry since 1987. Prior to assuming his current position as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Corporation in 2003, Mr. Jacob was Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of Galaxy. Prior to founding Galaxy, Mr. Jacob represented Alliance Atlantis Communications Inc. as Head of Integration during 1998 and 1999. From 1987 to 1998, Mr. Jacob held various positions with Cineplex Odeon Corporation as Vice President, Finance, Chief Financial Officer, Executive Vice President and, ultimately, Chief Operating Officer. In addition to his role as a Director of the Corporation, Mr. Jacob also serves as a director and member of the Audit and Risk Committee of Rogers Communication Inc.

He is the Chairman of the National Association of Theatre Owners (NATO), an executive committee member of the Global Cinema Federation (GCF) as well as a member of the Board of Directors of the Movie Theatre Association of Canada. He also serves as a director and member of the audit committee of the Toronto International Film Festival.

Mr. Jacob is an active community member, currently serving as a member of the Board of Directors at Toronto’s Baycrest Centre for Geriatrics, where he also sits on the Executive Committee and is a member of Baycrest’s Finance and Audit Committee. Along with his position at Baycrest, Mr. Jacob is a founding director of the Canadian Children’s Literacy Foundation as well as a member of the Board of Governors for Mount Sinai Hospital. He holds an MBA from the Schulich School of Business as well as the accounting designations of Fellow Chartered Professional Accountant (FCPA), Fellow Chartered Accountant (FCA) and Fellow Certified Management Accountant (FCMA). He also holds the ICD.D designation from the Institute of Corporate Directors. In 2010, Mr. Jacob was appointed a Member of the Order of Canada, in 2013 he was recognized as Canada’s Most Innovative CEO by Canadian Business Magazine, in 2014, he was recognized as Canada’s Most Admired CEO, Enterprise, by Waterstone Human Capital and in 2019 he received the ICTA Global Cinema Innovation Award

Sheldon Levy is a higher education leader and visionary with a passion for innovation, entrepreneurship and the digital economy. Sheldon has been an instrumental figure in Canada’s innovation ecosystem in the last decade, spearheading the creation of such organizations as Ryerson’s Digital Media Zone (DMZ), the Brookfield Institute for Innovation + Entrepreneurship, and Scale Up Ventures, Inc.

As President and Vice Chancellor of Ryerson University from 2005 to 2015, Sheldon drove the creation of the Digital Media Zone (DMZ), an early-stage incubator for student entrepreneurs which has since become an international success. He is also a founder and advisor to Ryerson Futures Inc., an accelerator that has exported the DMZ concept to such locations as Calgary and Mumbai.

From 2015 to 2017 Sheldon served as Ontario’s Deputy Minister of Advanced Education and Skills Development, where he helped prioritize innovation and entrepreneurship throughout Ontario’s postsecondary education and training system. In 2017 he became CEO of NEXT Canada, an organization that provides mentorship, education, networks and funding to Canada’s most promising entrepreneurs.

In December 2018, Sheldon was appointed Special Advisor to Canada’s Minister of Small Business and Export Promotion, Mary Ng, on the issue of scaling up small and medium-sized businesses.

Sheldon recently joined the Board of Directors of Baycrest Health Sciences.

Sheldon previously served as President of Oakville’s Sheridan College from 1997 to 2001, overseeing the growth of its renowned animation department during the early years of computer-generated imaging. Sheldon’s other prior positions have included Vice President Finance and Strategy, University of Ontario Institute of Technology; Vice President of Governmental and Institutional Relations, University of Toronto; and Vice President Institutional Affairs, York University. Sheldon recently received The Order of Canada.

Anthony (Tony) Melman is a highly accomplished Senior Executive, Entrepreneur, Advisor, and Board Member with more than 35 years of success across the financial services, strategic acquisitions, healthcare, technology, transportation and gaming sectors. His broad areas of expertise include business development, global strategy, corporate finance, private equity, due diligence, growth, and mergers & acquisitions.

Tony holds a key leadership position as the Chairman of NuMiner Global and the Chairman & CEO of Nevele Inc. where he provides strategic business and financial advice to a wide range of businesses. He also served as the CEO of Acasta Capital and as the CEO of Acasta Enterprises.

Prior to Acasta, Tony served for over 22 years as Managing Director and Partner of Onex Corporation where he led many of the major acquisitions, and made an enormous contribution to Onex's success, creating billions of dollars in value for Onex shareholders and co-investors. He negotiated the acquisition of Sky Chefs, a leading provider of food services to major airlines and was involved in the acquisition and roll-up of ProSource Inc. a major player in the US food distribution industry. He was the driving force behind the acquisition of Celestica Inc. which generated enormous value for Onex and its shareholders. He also structured Onex’s bids for Labatt Breweries and Air Canada and arranged substantial and innovative related financings. During his tenure, Onex grew from $50M to more than $15B in assets under management, becoming one of Canada’s largest companies during his tenure.  

Prior to joining Onex, Tony was the Head of Global Project and Acquisition Financing for the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce where he was in charge of worldwide merchant banking, project financing, acquisitions, and other specialized financing activities.

Tony is a Founder and key member of the Board of Baycrest Global Solutions and previously served for five years as Chair of The Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care, one of the world's premier academic health sciences centers focused on aging. He was appointed Chair of the Board of Directors of Cogniciti Inc., a for-profit joint venture created by Baycrest and MaRS Discovery District.

He also served on the Board and was Chair of the Finance Committee of CP Rail, having joined with Bill Ackman CEO of Pershing Square and the ‘Directors for Change’. He was previously on the Board of the Ontario Lottery and Gaming Corporation as a director and Chair of the Budget and Finance Committee.  and the University of Toronto Asset Management Corporation. He was instrumental in the growth of the Childhood Cancer Charitable Council of the Pediatric Oncology Group of Ontario (POGO) and a member of the Board of Governors of Mount Sinai Hospital.

Tony obtained a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemical Engineering from the University of the Witwatersrand, a Master of Business Administration degree (Gold Medalist) from the University of Cape Town, and a Ph.D. in Finance from the University of the Witwatersrand.

David Posluns possesses more than 30 years of experience in finance, business, and technology development, and has established many global business relationships.

Mr. Posluns serves as Chairman and Managing Director of Cedarpoint Investments Inc., a private equity and alternative investments management firm. He is a board member of NXM Labs Inc, a Blockchain based IOT Cyber Security Firm, and is a board observer of Telmediq Inc, a healthcare communications Technology company (now Perfect Serve). He formerly served on the board of 4Tell Inc. until 2016 when it was acquired. In addition, Mr. Posluns has developed and financed real estate projects in the commercial and self-storage sectors.

Mr. Posluns serves on the advisory committee of The Rising Tide Seed Fund in San Francisco, California.

Mr. Posluns is currently Chairman of the Investment Advisory of the Baycrest Hospital Foundation and the past chair and current member of the Jewish Federation of Toronto Endowment Fund Advisory Board. He also sits on the Board of Cogniciti and Baycrest Global Solutions.

Mr. Posluns holds a BS in Economics from the University of Pennsylvania, Wharton School, and a Master’s Degree in Finance from the University of Chicago.

Dr. William E. Reichman, an internationally-known expert in geriatric mental health and dementia care, is President and CEO of Baycrest, one of the world’s premier centres focused on aging, seniors’ health and residential care and brain function. Baycrest is home to both the largest research institute and the most comprehensive innovation accelerator in the global senior care industry. Dr. Reichman also serves as President and CEO of two commercial subsidiary firms, Cogniciti and Baycrest Global Solutions. He holds an academic appointment as Professor of Psychiatry in the Faculty of Medicine, at the University of Toronto.
 
Dr. Reichman is the current President of the International Psychogeriatric Association and is a former president of the American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry and the Geriatric Mental Health Foundation. He has advised the World Health Organization and several levels of government in the United States, Canada and China on the impact of an aging society on health care demand and the mandate to support innovative approaches to service delivery. He has been instrumental in the development of Canada’s new National Dementia Strategy and co-chairs the federal panel overseeing its implementation across the nation. He is a passionate advocate for building innovation capacity in the senior care sector and speaks across the globe on this theme to care providers, policy makers, academic audiences and industry.
 
Dr. Reichman was the founder and inaugural Chair of the Seniors Quality Leap Initiative, a collaborative of prominent eldercare organizations and their affiliated universities in the United States and Canada, working together to advance the effectiveness of long-term care across the globe.  
Among honors received, Dr. Reichman was named among the Best Doctors in America and Canada, and has been recognized by the New Jersey Society on Aging as Gerontologist of the Year. He was awarded an honorary Doctor of Laws degree from Canadian-based OCAD University for his work in advancing innovation in seniors care. Dr. Reichman is a recipient of a Telly Award for an educational documentary film that he co-created and hosted entitled, Reflections of Memory Lost: Understanding Alzheimer’s disease.

Dr. Varley is a clinician leader and executive advisor at the intersection of business and healthcare,
with responsibility for the strategic and day to day success of major corporate engagements. 

• Primary Care physician with subspecialty work in Addiction Medicine and Chronic Pain, practicing across urban inner city and rural settings at the front lines of the opioid crisis. Clinical interest areas include women’s health, mental health, substance use, healthcare systems and management, women & leadership development
• Physician Lead of Advisory Services at Cleveland Clinic Canada, holding P&L responsibility and advising cross industry executives. Member of Senior Leadership Team which includes developing annual strategic and financial planning , succession planning, setting of corporate policy, talent management, risk management as well as monitoring of corporate performance against business plans and KPIs. Published ESG thought leader (Harvard Business Review, Fortune, Globe and Mail, National Post)
• Clinician leader with unique management background that combines the rigour of medicine with corporate training excellence of management consulting. Deep experience at McKinsey & Company across broad spectrum of international corporate mandates including due diligence, corporate finance , operations, human resources & talent, enterprise strategy and organizational agility as well as digital transformation. Work experience further includes sustainability, People Risk, executive resilience, corporate & community partnerships, DEI and governance
• Master in Public Health from Harvard University, MD & CCFP from McMaster University and BSc from Western University. Work experience at Harvard Business School, University of Toronto and SickKids Hospital, and Adjunct Lecturer at the University of Toronto’s Institute of  Health Policy, Management and Evaluation (IHPME)

Mr. Weisz is currently working with Auberge Resorts Collection as their Executive Advisor. He provides advice and direction to the Board and the Senior Management Team to help them develop and execute a strategic plan for Auberge Resorts Collection to become a global luxury brand.
 
Randy has extensive experience in all aspects of the development and operation of luxury hospitality companies and their properties. Most recently, he has been involved in designing and building a new luxury brand with a view to global recognition and expansion. Over the years he has been involved in    structuring and implementing transactions involving more than 75 hotel and resort properties worldwide and multiple corporate transactions in the hospitality industry.
 
Previously, Randy held the position of Executive Vice President Business Administration and General Counsel at Four Seasons Hotels and Resorts, where he was responsible for managing the worldwide business and legal affairs of the company relating to property investments and other corporate initiatives. Randy was a member of the Management Committee of Four Seasons, responsible for running their business affairs worldwide, and was involved in all of the corporate transactions critical to the emergence of Four Seasons as a globally recognized hospitality brand.
 
He is a graduate of the Law School of the University of Western Ontario and previously practiced corporate and commercial law as a Partner of Goodmans LLP in Toronto, Canada.