Newsmakers

Mack has recently added four new employees at the headquarters plant: Ed Balzer, supplier engineer; Simon Leavitt, quality engineer; Dan Jacon, tool design engineer; and Anastasia Satterthwaite, program manager. Charles Storey, manufacturing engineer, has joined the Cavendish plant.

Ed Balzer brings to the procurement department 30 years of experience in the telecom, automotive, medical and aerospace fields. Prior to Mack, Balzer worked as a quality engineer for General Dynamics AIS (Pittsfield, Mass.), performing software and hardware development for naval fire control and guidance programs. He earned a bachelor’s in engineering with a concentration in mechanical engineering from Stevens Institute of Technology (Hoboken, N.J.). A native of New Jersey, Balzer has lived in Mexico and Hungary, and now resides in Bennington, Vt., with his wife, Aniko, and their five cats. He enjoys reading, gardening, and relaxing by his fire pit.

Simon Leavitt, newest member of the quality team, joins Mack from Bob White Systems Inc. (South Royalton, Vt.), where he worked as a product development engineer with responsibilities ranging from concept to pre-product launch. Before that, he was a solar systems designer at ReKnew Energy Systems (South Royalton), designing custom solar systems and installing photovoltaic and solar hot water panels. A graduate of Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology (Terre Haute, Ind.), Leavitt holds a degree in mechanical engineering. He currently makes his home in Bennington, Vt. Much of his free time is spent with his wife, Amber, and son, Calvin, but he also enjoys skiing, biking and playing ultimate Frisbee.

Dan Jacon joins the Application Development Center from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (Troy, N.Y.), where he worked as a lab research assistant studying the affect random copolymerization has on the crystallization of polymers. He was also an engineer on a capstone design project sponsored by WMS Gaming, a Chicago-based manufacturer of slot machines, video lottery terminals and software to help casinos manage their gaming operations. Prior to that, he was a snowboard instructor at Jiminy Peak (Hancock, Mass.) for five seasons. Jacon holds a bachelor’s in materials science and engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He currently resides in Averill Park, N.Y., where he enjoys working on his car. Now that he works in Vermont, Jacon looks forward to snow and carving some new trails on Mt. Snow.

Anastasia Satterthwaite is serving as program manager on several medical device accounts for MackMedical, the company’s medical products group. Most recently, Satterthwaite was a program and account manager for Plasan Carbon Composites (Wixom, Mich./Bennington Vt.), where she managed launching, current, and service part production projects, including the Dodge Viper and Chevy Corvette programs. During her 14-year tenure with Plasan, she held a number of sales-related positions with increasing levels of responsibility. A graduate of Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts (North Adams, Mass.), Satterthwaite holds a degree in corporate communication. In her free time, she enjoys hiking and acting in local theater. Satterthwaite currently resides in North Bennington, Vt., with her fiancé, Jonathan Gauthier, and their yellow lab, Pepper.

Charles Storey, manufacturing engineer, has recently joined Mack in Cavendish, Vt. Storey earned a bachelor’s degree in mechanical engineering with a concentration in biomedical engineering and a minor in pure mathematics from the University of Vermont (Burlington). During his academic career, Storey served on a team that designed and built a foot-operated XY positioning table for use in the manufacture of 3D tracking sensors. Storey is certified as a National Ski Patroller, Vermont Emergency Medical Technician, National Registry EMT, and an American Red Cross CPR/First Aid instructor, and was a member of UVM Rescue during college. Originally from West Hartford, Conn., Storey now lives in Plymouth, Vt., where he enjoys fishing, hunting, backpacking and skiing. He plans to rejoin ambulance and ski patrol soon.