Trucking Announcements: New CEOs at Velociti, Motiv

Every week, TruckNews.com lists notable moves, promotions and awards in the trucking industry.

This week was full of executive meetings with industry veterans joining some of the industry’s leading companies. While Grant Naslund was named chief operating officer at Arnold Bros. Transportation, IntelliTrans has hired Jim Bell as chief technology officer. Meanwhile, Velociti CEO Deryk Powell was promoted to CEO of the company, which led to other appointments in the company’s executive leadership, and Scott Griffith joined Motiv Electric as CEO.

Naslund rose through the ranks at Arnold Bros.

Grant Naslund has been promoted to chief operating officer at Arnold Bros. Transport based in Winnipeg, Man. He joined the company in September 2023 as chief operating officer.

Prior to joining Arnold, Naslund was vice president of operations for three years at Quebec-based CAT and held the position of director of operations for the east at Bison transport.

Velociti appoints the CEO and appoints other members of the management team

Velociti president and chief operating officer (COO) Deryk Powell has been promoted to the new position of the company’s chief executive officer (CEO).

In his new position, Powell will oversee all of the company’s operations, taking over from Michael Kahn, who will continue to serve as Velociti’s executive chairman.

Powell began his career at Velociti in 1994 as vice president of sales. At the time, the company was known as Central States Special Products. From 1995 to 2004 he served as the company’s general director, and in January 2004 he was appointed chief operating officer. Powell became president of the company nine years later.

His latest appointment is complemented by other changes to Velociti’s management team.

Tim Kats, executive vice president and general manager, will now serve as chief operating officer, and Jim West will be promoted to chief information officer.

“During his tenure as president, (Powell) has demonstrated his talent for leading a collaborative management team and a customer-focused enterprise,” Kahn said in a news release. “I am confident that Velociti, led by Deryk, Tim, Jim and their senior leadership team, is poised for continued rapid growth.”

Scott Griffith joins Motiv

Motiv Electric announced that Scott Griffith has been named the company’s CEO and board member.

He has spent the last 30 years founding, leading, scaling and advising leading technology-enabled and disruptive companies operating at the intersection of technology and mobility.

Immediately prior to joining Motiv, Griffith served as General Manager of Autonomous Vehicles and Mobility at Ford Motor Company, where he oversaw the development of Level 4 autonomous vehicles.

He also served as Zipcar’s CEO for over 10 years, leading the company from its early days.

His other experience includes serving as an independent director at EVgo, as a resident director at General Catalyst Partners, and as president of Envoy Global and TrueMotion, the latter of which was co-founded by Griffith and acquired by Cambridge Mobile Telematics.

IntelliTrans hires Bell as chief technology officer

IntelliTrans, a multimodal transportation management company, announced that Jim Bell has joined its executive team as chief technology officer (CTO).

He will lead the company’s technology initiatives to enhance existing and future transportation management solutions, bringing 25 years of technical experience to his new position.

Bell most recently served as senior vice president of engineering at Transcendent, an operations management software company, where he led the technology roadmap, development, testing and infrastructure of enterprise inventory management, asset management and supply chain optimization software.

His other leadership experience includes serving as vice president of platform and API engineering at Greenway Health for three years and serving as vice president of software development at Aptean.

“Jim is a visionary technologist with a proven track record of building world-class teams and innovative processes at leading SaaS and technology-enabled services companies,” said Chad Raube, president of IntelliTrans, in a press release. “Our goal is to lead the way in excellence in the bulk and less-than-truck TMS industry, and Jim’s deep expertise and strategic insights will be instrumental in achieving these goals and enabling our customers to succeed.”