Hartford Business Journal

HARTFORDBUSINESS.COM | SEPTEMBER 22, 2025 13 Invest in Connecticut's Green Economy with a Green Liberty Bond or Note Why choose a Bond? • Purchased through a broker • $1,000 minimum and no maximum investment • Climate Bond Certified • Term lengths vary • An offering is coming soon • Learn more at www.GreenLibertyBonds.com * Before purchasing any Bonds, contact your tax advisor to determine any applicable federal, state and local tax consequences. These Bonds may not be sold, nor may offers to buy be accepted prior to the time the Official Statement is delivered in final form. Under no circumstance shall this announcement con- stitute an offer to sell or a solicitation of an offer to buy, nor shall there be any sale of the Bonds in any jurisdiction in which such offer, solicitation or sale would be unlawful prior to registration or qualification under the securities laws of any such jurisdiction. The Bonds will only be sold by means of an Official Statement. The Connecticut Green Bank offers Green Liberty Bonds and Green Liberty Notes to provide a way for residents, businesses, and institutions of Connecticut and beyond to invest in growing our green economy and to help complete clean energy projects. With Green Liberty Notes and Bonds*, practically everyone can take action with investments of any size. Why choose a Note? • Purchased online • Minimum investment of $100 • Certified Green Bond • One year term • Offered quarterly • Learn more at www.GreenLibertyNotes.com Invest in our 14th Note to earn 4.5% (open September 2025) "We think now is an environment when we should be investing," O'Keefe said, pointing to the state's long-running Manufacturing Assistance Act, which provides loans and grants to help companies expand and modernize, and the newer Strategic Supply Chain initia- tive, which focuses on strengthening Connecticut's role in key industries by bolstering local suppliers and resilience. "This is hundreds of millions of dollars that we are investing on behalf of the taxpayers in the state of Connecticut to again foster our continued growth." CT ties Patel served for 10 years as the president and board director of Eppen- dorf Manufacturing Corp. in Enfield, the operations arm of a German life sciences instrumentation maker, where he oversaw the company's North Amer- ican manufacturing operations. He stepped away from the role in 2023, and for the past two years has been advising technology startups through Yale Ventures and the Univer- sity of Connecticut's Technology Incubation Program. He moved to Connecticut in 2013 to join Eppendorf, settling in Simsbury, where he still lives. But the state was already familiar to him. His first job was with Intel, working in semiconductor lithography, which brought him to the company's Wilton site. He remained there for two years between 1996 and 1998, before heading to Stanford to help found Sensant Corp., a medical device startup developing 3D ultrasound imaging technology. After seven years of devel- opment, he and his co-founders began drawing interest from major industry players as the technology reached the pre-commercial stage. The company went on to be acquired by Siemens, and Patel stayed on to integrate the company into Siemens Healthcare's ultrasound division based in California. After that, Siemens relocated him to Knoxville, Tennessee, as general manager at Siemens Molecular Imaging. Patel spent his early years in Zambia, the child of Indian immigrants. He returned to India for high school, and then earned a bachelor's degree in chemical engineering from Mangalore University in India. He came to the U.S. first in the late 1980s for graduate studies at U.C. Davis, where he earned a master's degree in chemical engineering. He would also go on to earn a master's in electrical engineering at Stanford. He also holds an MBA from the Wharton School of Business at the University of Pennsylvania. Patel and his wife, Rima, have two children — a daughter in high school and a son who is a freshman at Middlebury College. 'Fairly specific' needs Patel said he became aware of the state's search for a new chief manufac- turing officer through John Bourdeaux, CEO at AdvanceCT, and was introduced to O'Keefe at DECD. He said he applied and went through a standard interview process to win the position. He sees the mix of experience that he has amassed over his career as critical to the role he's about to undertake. "Connecticut has small companies, midsized companies, large companies. And in my role I look forward to working with all of them to listen to them and to understand what their needs are — and their needs are going to be fairly specific," he said. He doesn't yet have a firm prescrip- tion for where he'll take his new posi- tion, setting himself a 90-day listening period before he builds on the work of his two predecessors. But he does bring an awareness of current challenges particularly around technology shifts, including artificial intelligence, autonomous systems, automation and robotics. "A lot of great work's already been done," he said. "The momentum is behind Connecticut. So, the ques- tion is, how do we continue building that momentum?" Gov. Ned Lamont, Kirti Patel and DECD Commissioner Daniel O'Keefe. HBJ Photo | Harriet Jones

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