byline: Virginia Business

Born in Argentina, Rozanski joined Fortune 500 global management, technology, engineering and consulting firm Booz Allen in 1991 as an intern in Buenos Aires. In 2015, Rozanski was named president and CEO after holding other leadership positions, including chief operating officer, chief strategy and talent officer, and chief personnel officer. He became chairman this year.

Booz Allen employs 34,200 people worldwide and reported fiscal 2024 earnings of $10.66 billion, its best revenue year since it went public in 2010. Rozanski has played a major role in Booz Allen’s strategic initiatives, including the formation of its $100 million venture capital arm in 2022 and the company’s aggressive growth in IT and AI.

Rozanski chairs the Children’s National Medical Center’s board, is vice chair of The Kennedy Center’s The Corporate Fund Board and is a member of United States Holocaust Memorial Museum’s Committee on Conscience. He was a 2022 recipient of the Horatio Alger Award.

In August 2023, Booz Allen announced that it would establish a business services center in Norfolk, increasing its 1,000-person workforce in Hampton Roads by 200 jobs over the next two years.

After nearly four decades of service in the U.S. Coast Guard, Kelly became the sixth president of CNU in July 2023.

Founded in 1960 as Christopher Newport College, a two-year branch of William & Mary, CNU is now a four-year public university that enrolls some 5,000 students in the liberal arts and sciences.

Kelly previously served as the 42nd superintendent of the U.S. Coast Guard Academy. Before that, he was the branch’s assistant commandant for human resources.

A 1987 graduate of the Coast Guard Academy, Kelly has a master’s degree in instructional systems design from Florida State University and a certificate in human resource management.

His awards include the Coast Guard Distinguished Service Medal, Legion of Merit, Coast Guard Commendation Medal, Coast Guard Achievement Medal and the permanent Cutterman’s Pin. 

Kelly was awarded the Federal Government Distance Learning Association Diamond Award and has served as an adjunct professor at Florida State University.

The New York native has served as chair of the Coast Guard Academy’s board of trustees, president of the Coast Guard Mutual Assistance’s board of directors and as a member of the NCAA’s Minority Opportunities and Interest Committee.

With four decades of hospitality experience, Terry has advocated for the Virginia Restaurant, Lodging & Travel Association’s 1,500-plus industry members since joining as president in 2014.

In February, Terry applauded the Virginia General Assembly for passing industry-supported legislation to legalize restaurants serving to-go cocktails, making permanent a measure that started as a temporary means to keep restaurants afloat during the pandemic.

Before joining VRLTA, Terry held marketing and sales leadership roles at Redstone Companies Hospitality, Benchmark Hospitality and Malibu Entertainment Worldwide. He also served as president of Xelerate Group, a marketing agency he launched in 2002.

Over the course of his career, Terry has worked for Hollywood Casino/Pratt Hotel, Marriott Hotels and Resorts, and the Busch Gardens theme park when it was owned by Anheuser-Busch Cos.

He received a bachelor’s degree in hotel and restaurant management from Virginia Tech in 1982. Terry serves on the Virginia Tech Hospitality & Tourism Management Advisory Board.

As president and CEO of BAE Systems Inc., the U.S. arm of British defense giant BAE Systems PLC, Arseneault has overseen developments such as the $5.55 billion acquisition in February of Colorado-based Ball Aerospace. In 2023, BAE Systems Inc. reported $13.6 billion in revenue; it employs 41,000 workers worldwide, including 5,200 former Ball Aerospace workers.

In March, BAE filed a protest with the Government Accountability Office for a $12 billion contract supporting the Air Force’s intercontinental ballistic missile fleet that was awarded to Guidehouse; the contract initially was awarded to BAE. In June, the GAO ruled in BAE’s favor, and the Air Force is now required to re-evaluate the award.

Arseneault has been with BAE since 2000, becoming its chief operating officer in 2014 and adding president to his title in 2019. He became CEO in 2020. He previously ran BAE’s electronic sensor division and originally worked at Sander, a Lockheed Martin company, before it was acquired by BAE in 2000. He also held engineering and program management positions at General Electric and TASC.

Arseneault has a bachelor’s degree in electrical engineering from Worcester Polytechnic Institute and an MBA from Boston University. He is chair of the Defense Industry Initiative’s steering committee.

After 25 years in Silicon Valley working as an executive for Oracle, Microsoft and Cisco Systems, Ipsen was hired to lead higher education tech company Ellucian in 2017. With 3,800 employees worldwide — including 230 in Virginia — Ellucian boasts an annual revenue approaching $1 billion.

In October 2023, Ellucian announced an agreement to purchase United Kingdom-based education services software company Tribal Group in a $210 million deal. In March, it announced the acquisition of edtech company EduNav, and in April, Ellucian announced product innovations for higher ed that include AI-driven lifelong learning.

Ipsen is a University of Virginia alumna who also studied Arabic at Yarmouk University in Jordan. Last year, she was named Digital Revolution Awards’ 2023 Outstanding Leader of the Year for North America and the globe. EdTech Digest named her one of its 2023 Top 100 Influencers. She was also presented a Power of Women Award by ASU+GSV in 2021 and was named a 2022 Gold Globee winner as a Female CEO of the Year.

She also serves on Daimler Truck Holding’s supervisory board and the Business-Higher Education Forum’s executive committee. She is a member of the Fast Company Impact Council, Fortune’s CEO Initiative, and Women Corporate Directors.

In April 2023, Riddle was named chairman and CEO of Rolls-Royce North America and president of its defense division. Riddle has more than a decade of experience under his belt with the British aerospace, defense and engineering company.

Most recently, Riddle headed up Rolls-Royce’s global services division, which accounts for more than half of Rolls-Royce’s defense unit’s annual revenues. Previously, Riddle was director of strategy and future programs.

Before coming to Rolls-Royce, Riddle worked for Boeing in defense operations. He is a West Point graduate and former U.S. Army officer.

In 2023, Rolls-Royce Holdings reported $19.75 billion in underlying revenue, up from $16.29 billion in 2022. In May, it was announced that Rolls-Royce Holdings had won a contract to supply technology for a new version of the “doomsday plane” for the American military as part of the Survivable Airborne Operations Center project. With the contract, Rolls-Royce will join other contractors to develop a successor to the U.S. Air Force’s E-4B planes, which can survive a nuclear blast and function as mobile command centers in the event of a national emergency.

Virginia’s Democratic senior senator, Warner is particularly known for chairing the Senate’s Select Committee on Intelligence — and, thanks to a viral pandemic-era video, for making a tuna melt that has been variously described as “cursed” and “an atrocity.”

The co-founder of Nextel and Capital Cellular, with an estimated net worth of $215 million, Warner got involved in politics in the 1990s, when he managed former Gov. Doug Wilder’s gubernatorial campaign. He later chaired the state Democratic Party but lost his first U.S. Senate race in 1996. In 2001, he was elected Virginia’s governor. He is currently serving his third term.

Warner’s biggest successes in recent years include passage of the CHIPS and Science Act, legislation he helped craft that will put $280 billion toward domestic research and manufacturing of semiconductors. In July, Warner made headlines for trying to build a coalition of Senate Democrats to convince President Joe Biden to exit the presidential race following Biden’s disastrous performance in the year’s first presidential debate. Warner serves on the Finance, Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, Budget, and Rules and Administration committees.

In 2022, Jevsevar became CEO of OrthoVirginia, the largest independent orthopedic practice in the state with 150-plus orthopedic specialists across more than 35 locations in Lynchburg, Northern Virginia, Richmond, Southwest Virginia and Hampton Roads. An orthopedic surgeon with more than three decades of experience, Jevsevar specializes in hip and knee replacements.

Jevsevar earned a degree in biology from Saint Vincent College in Pennsylvania and his medical degree from Georgetown University. In 2004, Jevsevar headed back to school for an MBA from Auburn University.

After completing his general surgery internship at the Mercy Hospital of Pittsburgh, Jevsevar did a research fellowship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Massachusetts General Hospital. He completed the Tufts Medicine-Affiliated Hospitals Orthopaedic Residency Program in 1994.

Jevsevar, who also served in the U.S. Air Force, was previously chair and regional vice president of orthopedics for Dartmouth Hitchcock Medical Center and Clinics in New Hampshire, and associate professor at the Geisel School of Medicine at Dartmouth College. He also worked as medical director of the orthopedic clinical program for Intermountain Healthcare in Utah.

Francis joined Beacon Roofing Supply, a Fortune 500 distributor of roofing material, as president and CEO in 2019.

Founded in 1928, Beacon is a distributor of building products, including roofing materials and complementary products, such as siding and waterproofing. It has approximately 8,000 employees and operates in all 50 states and in Canada. In 2023, Beacon reported $9 billion in revenue, and it was ranked No. 429 on the 2024 Fortune 500, up 20 spots from the year before.

Beacon opened 26 new distribution centers around the nation last year, and in July, the company announced it acquired two metal roofing firms in Florida.

A United Kingdom native, Francis earned his bachelor’s degree in mathematics and his doctorate in materials engineering at Swansea University in Wales. He also earned a master’s degree in business administration at DePaul University.

Before leading Beacon, Francis served as president of the insulation business at Owens Corning, a provider of insulation, roofing and fiberglass composite materials. He also was vice president and general manager for Owens Corning’s residential insulation business and vice president and managing director of the company’s glass reinforcements business in the Americas.

Ledesma became the plant manager of DuPont’s Spruance site in 2021 after serving in the same role at its Buffalo, New York, facility.

Built in 1929, DuPont’s Spruance site is the largest of the company’s manufacturing facilities worldwide; it has more than 2,000 employees and produces Tyvek, Nomex and Kevlar.

In May, DuPont de Nemours announced it would split into three publicly traded companies, separating its electronics and water units through tax-free transactions. The “New DuPont” company will focus on the industrial sector, including biopharma and medical devices as well as Tyvek, Kevlar and Nomex. The company expects the separation to take 18 to 24 months.

Ledesma’s earlier career steps were taken at Oxy, where he was production manager in the Corpus Christi, Texas, area and previously in Ludington, Michigan. He also spent more than 10 years at Lafarge Cement.

Ledesma holds a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from University of South Florida and an MBA from DeVry University’s Keller Graduate School of Management.