Management

Michael L. Catto
President and Chief Executive Officer

Mr. Catto brings strong leadership to TekGar, LLC and extensive experience managing growth companies. Most recently, Mr. Catto was the Executive Vice President of Operations for Biohtera, Inc., a start up Biotech Company that has two INDs in Phase 2 trials. Previously, Mr. Catto was President of Niro Atomizer Food and Dairy, Inc., a U.S. subsidiary of the Danish company Niro A/S. He also managed his own Engineering and consulting businesses in which he specialized in engineering and operations related to food, dairies, pharmaceuticals, and municipalities and worked internationally on numerous design/build projects. As President and CEO of Catto Enterprises, LLC, Mr. Catto successfully built multiple companies that included trucking, engineering, construction and international development. He began his career in R&D at Kraft Foods.

Dr. Doug Van Thorre
Vice President and Chief Technical Officer

Prior to becoming a founding partner in TekGar, LLC in November of 2006, for the preceding six years, Dr. Van Thorre has been working exclusively in the research and development area of the extraction and manipulation of carbohydrates for a broad range of renewable resource or “green chemistry” applications.  This research and subsequent discoveries led him to the founding a Company, Biorefining, Inc., in 2000, one that is completely devoted to the maximum processing and utilization of annually renewable resources.  At Biorefining, Inc., Dr. Van Thorre was issued two patents and had fourteen patent applications pending.

Dr. Van Thorre served as a consultant for several medical injection plastic molding companies designing high precision, compression injection molding techniques for stress-free, optical lenses for arthroscopic and endoscopic medical applications.  During the same period, he also served as a consultant to several companies in the area of environmental recovery and reclamation with emphasis on natural biopolymer usage to recover feed/food products from water waste streams. One particular company included Biopolymer Engineering, Inc., now named Biothera, Inc. where Dr. Van Thorre served as VP of Science and Technology and as a consultant between December 1996 and May 2001. 

Dr. Van Thorre began his career building a successful private dental practice that he operated for 11 years, and was one of the first private dentists in the nation to be named a clinical investigator for the FDA regarding the application of dental lasers in private dental practice.

Milton Printemps
Director of Central American Operations

 

Nicholas Catto
Director of Information Technology

A recent graduate of the University of South Carolina with a degree in Information Management and Technology Systems, Nicholas is well versed in many technologies such as database administration, networking, computer support, programming, and web development. Between 2004 and 2006, he worked as a data center operator and pc support technician for Spartanburg Regional Hospital , which was awarded US News' 2006 Top Wired Award. Nicholas is now employed with the University of South Carolina Upstate as a web developer , where he is responsible for updating and maintaining over 2500 web pages. In 2006, he implemented a content management system into the university's website, which allows Nicholas to train and manage a group of more than 20 users who make website updates. Nicholas also runs his own freelance website, www.mrcatto.com, where he specializes in web and other graphic services for his growing client base.