Wayne Danson, Chair
Wayne Danson is a sophisticated and talented C-level executive with over 35 years of experience in international and corporate taxation, financial advisory services including investment banking and mergers and acquisitions (M&A), business strategy, corporate finance, including tax structuring and planning, turnaround consulting and entrepreneurship. His leadership, professionalism and business strategy skills include both advisory and senior management roles for public and privately-held organizations. As a former Partner in large multinational accounting firms and a former Chief Executive Officer of one of the largest reverse logistics organizations in the country, Mr. Danson’s technical and corporate finance abilities combined with his entrepreneurialism, visionary and dynamic leadership skills have proven to be a successful combination.
Since 1999, he has been President and Chief Executive Officer of Danson Partners, LLC, a financial advisory and business consulting firm, specializing in corporate finance, mergers and acquisitions, business strategy, management consulting, interim CEO/CFO and turnaround consulting, as well as sophisticated tax services. From 2004 to 2010, he was President, Chief Executive Officer and Director of Encompass Group Affiliates, Inc., a publicly traded logistics organization that he founded and grew to over $100 million in sales. Prior to forming Danson Partners, LLC, he held partnership and leadership positions with PricewaterhouseCoopers (in NY and Washington, D.C) and Ernst & Young (in NY and Washington, D.C.), where he was a Managing Tax Partner.
In 2011, Mr. Danson co-founded JDAP Capital Advisors, LLC a private investment management firm with a strategic focus on the U.S. equity options market using a relative value/market neutral investment strategy. Besides investment management services through the JDAP Capital Fund, JDAP Capital Advisors, LLC also provides trusted and experienced wealth management and investment advice to high net-worth individuals, family offices, retirement plans and fund of funds.
In 2009, he was a regional finalist in the 2009 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Program and in 2010 was appointed a national judge in the Distribution and Manufacturing category for the 2010 Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Program.
Mr. Danson is currently the Chief Financial Officer and Treasurer of EOM Pharmaceuticals, Inc. a New York based clinical trial biopharma company with a first in-class dual acting broad spectrum immunodulator providing therapeutic treatment for systemic illness due to intense inflammatory immune reactions to diseases such as Covid-19, cancer cachexia, rheumatoid arthritis and other inflammatory disorders.
Mr. Danson is currently the lead Independent Board Member and Audit Committee Chair of Optigenex, Inc. a publicly traded company in the nutraceutical/health supplement industry.
Mr. Danson is currently a member on the Strategic Advisory Boards of Red Lion, LLC a cybersecurity service and software platform company and Safe Luna, an Israeli medical device start-up which is developing a unique remote sensing device for infants in order to combat SIDS and other infant heart/respiratory disorders. Mr. Danson previously served as Director and Audit Committee Chairs of Spectacular Solar Inc. a publicly traded solar energy engineering and installation company and Badu Holdings Inc. an innovative software and hardware product and service provider to telecommunication and enterprise companies. Mr. Danson previously served as Chairman of the Board of Directors for Encompass Group Affiliates, Inc. and a director of Herborium Group, Inc., a publicly traded small cap company. He currently is Chairman of the Board and CEO of the chILD Foundation, a 501(c)(3) charitable organization established to raise awareness of and funds to develop cures for all forms of children’s interstitial and diffuse lung diseases.
Mr. Danson graduated with honors from Bernard M. Baruch College with a BBA in Accounting and was a MBA candidate in Taxation. He is a certified public accountant and a member of the American Institute and New York State Societies of Certified Public Accountants as well as Beta Gamma Sigma, the national business honor society, among other organizations. He is a frequent lecturer on business and financial matters and has authored various tax technical papers.