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Our Experts

By rewarding innovative thinking and problem-solving, APEX Petroleum Engineering has experienced some of the industry’s highest returns in shale gas.
  • John D. Harkrider

    John D. Harkrider

    Director

  • Bill Anthony

    Bill Anthony

    Director

  • Mitch Kniffin

    Mitch Kniffin

    Director

  • Ted Randolph

    Ted Randolph

    Director

  • Mike Soroka

    Mike Soroka

    President

  • Paul DeBonis

    Paul DeBonis

    Advisor to the President

  • John T. Harkrider

    John T. Harkrider

    CFO

  • Bonner Cardwell

    Bonner Cardwell

    Executive Vice President Operations

  • Justin G. Clark

    Justin G. Clark

    VP Operations

  • Kevin Shaw

    Kevin Shaw

    VP Engineering

  • Jeff S. Jordan

    Jeff S. Jordan

    Technical Advisor Engineering

  • JD Harkrider

    JD Harkrider

    Technical Advisor-Drilling

  • Janice Gregory-Sloan

    Janice Gregory-Sloan

    VP Corporate Development

  • Brian Fakharzadeh

    Brian Fakharzadeh

    VP Corporate Development

  • Howard Rough

    Howard Rough

    Consulting Business Development Manager

John Harkrider

John Harkrider

Director
jd.harkrider@apexpe.com

John Harkrider was with Integrated Petroleum Technology and Texaco prior to APEX. Throughout his career, he has been heavily involved in the stimulation of Oil & Gas wells of all varieties. Additionally, he has been instrumental in the development of real-time fracture simulators and on-site techniques. John has authored over twenty-five technical papers and articles and has taught over thirty industry schools. John holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Petroleum Engineering from the Colorado School of Mines.

Bill Anthony

Bill Anthony

Director
b.anthony@apexpe.com

Bill Anthony has extensive experience in the petroleum industry including completions/workovers, reservoir engineering, production engineering and field operations. Bill’s expertise extends to basically every basin in the United States as well as numerous international locations. Bill was instrumental in the early development of Haynesville Formation completions which carried over to the Eagle Ford Formation during its discovery. These techniques have formed the basis of all current unconventional horizontal well completions. Prior to APEX Bill was with Integrated Petroleum Technology and the Western Company of North America. Bill holds a Bachelor of Science Degree in Geology and an Associate of Science Degree in Petroleum Engineering from Louisiana Tech University.

Mitch Kniffen

Mitch Kniffin

Director
m.kniffin@apexpe.com

Mitch Kniffin has extensive experience in oilfield engineering, management and business development. He has a thorough knowledge of drilling, workover, completions, geologic and geophysical disciplines of the oil and gas industry. Mitch was instrumental in building APEX HiPoint’s microseismic business primarily related to engineering interpretation. Mitch holds two patents in horizontal well completions. Prior to APEX, he was with Schlumberger. Mitch holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry from Kansas State University.

Ted Randolph

Ted Randolph

President
t.randolph@apexpe.com

Ted is a petroleum engineer with over 25 years of experience. He has designed, implemented, and evaluated hydraulic fracture treatments in California, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Arizona, Montana, Texas, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Arkansas, Mississippi, Pennsylvania, Argentina, Hungary, Poland Russia, and China. Ted was involved in the very first Vaca Muerta wells in Neuquen Basin of Argentina as well as some of the first Haynesville completions. He has been involved in the design, execution, and evaluation of many of the unconventional resource stimulations in the world.

Ted worked started his career with The Western Company as a field engineer in the San Juan Basin of New Mexico/Colorado where the focus was Coal Bed Methane stimulation and cementing services. As he was promoted within Western, he was a technical sales representative and in-house engineer where the focus was broadened to include low perm, tight gas reservoirs.

After leaving The Western Company (BJ Services), Ted worked for Schlumberger as a sales engineer, district engineer, and in-house engineer. This work was focused on cementing, stimulation, and coil tubing services. Ted’s primary focus was the Rocky Mountain region with some exposure to Oklahoma and Kansas reservoirs. He learned the benefit of integrating multiple service lines to determine a better answer for the client. It was during his time at Schlumberger that Ted helped develop 9.5 ppg completion cement slurries.

Ted also worked for NCS Multistage as the Frac Engineering Manager. This experience allowed him to gain unique insights into fracture stimulation treatments as bottomhole pressure/temperature gauges were deployed during stimulation treatments that used the NCS system.

Ted has held several positions with APEX Petroleum Engineering. He started as a Frac Engineer and has been promoted to Operations Manager, on to Vice President of Engineering and President. During his time at APEX, Ted has been involved in hydraulic fracturing treatment design, execution, and evaluation ranging from vertical tight gas wells to unconventional horizontal wells. This experience domestically was from California to Pennsylvania and North Dakota to Mississippi across most of the major basins. Internationally, the experience was in Argentina, Hungary, Poland, Russia and China.

He holds a Bachelor’s of Science Degree in Petroleum Engineering from New Mexico Tech, Socorro, NM.

Mike Soroka

Mike Soroka

President
m.soroka@apexpe.com

Mr. Soroka is a highly experienced reservoir engineer with a career focus on reservoir simulation and field surveillance. He received his Bachelor of Science Degree in Mechanical Engineering from Colorado State University in 2008 and his Masters in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Adelaide in 2009. He has worked globally in a variety of environments including with research labs, operators, and service companies.

In these positions, Mr. Soroka has specialized in advanced field studies and project development. Projects have included extensive hydraulic fracture modeling, CO2 storage, CO2 EOR, hydrocarbon injection, N2 injection, LoSal, WAG schemes, and geomechanical coupling. He has experience across numerous software platforms such as FIELDPRO, ECLIPSE, FrontSIM, CMG, TOUGH2, and VIP. Along with extensive simulation experience, he has also been involved in numerous classical reservoir engineering campaigns such as PVT, SCAL, and PTA design, acquisition, and analysis.

Mr. Soroka is Vice President of Reservoir Engineering for APEX Petroleum Engineering. He leads the reservoir team in simulation-driven reservoir and fracture studies, design optimization, well spacing, and production forecasting.

Paul Debonis

Paul Debonis

Advisor to the President

p.debonis@apexpe.com

Paul DeBonis is Advisor to the President at APEX Petroleum Engineering in Denver, CO. He will be heavily involved in the sales process, leveraging his extensive network of industry contacts; while assisting the BD team in developing new business offerings based on APEX’s current integrated service workflows.

Paul has 37 years of experience in the oil industry mainly focused on developing businesses in the completions engineering segment. He recently completed an 8.5-year career at the KEANE Group where he was one of the founding members of the executive team along with serving as COO and Advisor to the Chairman. While Paul was in the COO role, Keane grew from 80 employees and one frac crew into a multibillion-dollar public company and safety leader in the plug and perf fracturing space. Paul is widely known as an industry leader for the advancement of stage frac’ing focusing on efficiencies at the wellsite, driving down costs, and maximizing production via technology application.

Prior to the KEANE Group, Paul was US President-Pipeline Construction at Big Country Energy Services; US President-Fracturing, Wireline Services, Testing and Flowback Services at Pure Energy; and 23 years at Schlumberger (Dowell) in various business development roles throughout the Rockies. During his tenure at Schlumberger Paul co-authored 2 SPE Papers and was given recognition as one of the inventors of the POWERSTIM process, receiving multiple Chairman Awards.

John T. Harkrider

John T. Harkrider

CFO

jt.harkrider@apexpe.com

John T. Harkrider, CFO, has over 30 years of operational and financial management experience in entrepreneurial operating companies and private equity/hedge fund management. In addition to responsibilities for financial reporting and business forecasting/planning and implementation, John will oversee human resource functions and external administrative relationships.

Mr. Harkrider has been the Chief Operating Officer and Chief Compliance Officer for BlackGold Capital Management LP (an affiliate of KKR & Co.), an energy-focused credit hedge fund managing up to $2b AUM. He was responsible for firm operations, maintaining third-party service provider relationships as well as general legal and compliance functions. He was also a member of the Risk and Valuation Committees. Prior to BlackGold, he was a Managing Director and Chief Financial Officer at Kenmont Capital and Kenmont Investments, a $500 million credit hedge fund focused on the energy, power and transportation sectors. In addition to managing the business operations of the firm, he was also responsible for general legal and compliance, financial reporting, investor relations and the due diligence and monitoring of private equity funds. Mr. Harkrider had previously been the President of a subsidiary operating company of then publicly traded Consolidated Graphics, Inc. where he was responsible for stabilizing and turning around the distressed acquisition. He has been a Regional Controller for Hines Interests Limited Partnership, a fully integrated international real estate investment and management firm, and he began his career Arthur Andersen LLP in the Financial Services Division. He is a CPA and received a B.B.A. degree in Accounting from Stephen F. Austin State University.

John T. Harkrider

Bonner Cardwell

Executive Vice President Operations

b.cardwell@apexpe.com

Bonner Cardwell …

Justin G. Clark

Justin G. Clark

VP Operations
j.clark@apexpe.com

Justin G. Clark is Vice President of Operations at APEX Petroleum Engineering based out of Denver, CO. He leads the field engineering division and works to implement hydraulic fracture designs and improve onsite efficiency and overall well completions. He has worked in hydraulic fracturing discipline for over a decade with exposure to vertical and horizontal wells in several basins and formations throughout the United States.

Justin started his career working for Halliburton Energy Services as a Technical Professional (Field Engineer) in the Permian Basin in 2007 and joined APEX Petroleum Engineering in 2010 (becoming SIGMA³ Integrated Reservoir Solutions in 2012).

Mr. Clark holds two BS degrees in Biology & Physical Anthropology from Iowa State University and is currently accepted at the University of North Dakota in Petroleum Engineering and a full member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE).

Kevin Shaw

Kevin Shaw

VP Engineering
k.shaw@apexpe.com

Mr. Kevin Shaw is Vice President of Engineering at APEX Petroleum Engineering in Denver, CO. He leads office based engineering projects ranging from small single well fracture designs to full field studies. He has 9 years of experience in the oilfield with a primary focus in hydraulic fracture stimulation.

Mr. Shaw started his career as an Associate Technical Professional (Field Engineer) for Halliburton in the Williston Basin. After that, he worked on the operator side for Koch Exploration as an Operations/Compliance Engineer, learning about the day to day operations of managing gas fields across Colorado, Utah, and Wyoming.

Mr. Shaw joined APEX in 2013 (formerly Sigma Cubed) as an on-site Stimulation Engineer. He has monitored frac jobs across the United States from California to Pennsylvania, as well as internationally in Russia.

Mr. Shaw has a BS Degree in Chemical Engineering from Colorado School of Mines. He is a full member of the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE).

Jeff S. Jordan

Jeff S. Jordan

Technical Advisor Engineering
js.jordan@apexpe.com

Mr. Jeff S. Jordan is a versatile petroleum engineer with 39 years of experience and a demonstrated pattern of accomplishment. He has widespread experience in the petroleum industry including drilling, completion/workovers, hydraulic fracture stimulation, acid stimulation, reservoir engineering, facilities/production engineering and field operations. Mr. Jordan received a Bachelor of Science degree with Special Distinction in Petroleum Engineering from the University of Oklahoma in 1980. He is a registered Professional Petroleum Engineer in Louisiana, Colorado, and California.

Mr. Jordan worked for Chevron USA as a Drilling Engineer, and later as a Reservoir Engineer in the 1980s for Chevron’s operations in the Rocky Mountain, Mid-Continent, and Western Regions. He then worked as a petroleum engineer for several oil & gas operating companies in California, Texas, and Colorado before becoming a petroleum engineering consultant in the late 1990s. Mr. Jordan performed drilling and completions engineering services as a consultant in Algeria (Ghadames Basin) and Venezuela (Orinoco Basin) as well as multiple basins in the USA. In 1999, he founded APEX Petroleum Engineering with 3 partners and helped build it into an internationally recognized petroleum engineering firm.

Mr. Jordan has performed drilling engineering, completion engineering, well intervention engineering, and operations engineering services for various clients in USA, Bahrain, Kuwait, Qatar, Oman, Russia, Australia, Spain, and Bolivia. Domestically he has drilled and completed wells in California, Colorado, Wyoming, Utah, New Mexico, Montana, North Dakota, Texas, Oklahoma, and Louisiana. His offshore experience includes work in the GOM (USA) and the Persian Gulf (Qatar).

Mr. Jordan has extensive experience in hydraulic fracture stimulation of shale reservoirs in both domestic and international locations. His experience includes work with deep, tight, high pressure, high temperature, and high H2S wells. He has drilled and completed extended reach horizontal wells and multi-lateral wells with multi-stage fracture stimulations in multiple US shale plays (Haynesville, Eagle Ford, Permian, Bakken, Marcellus, Monterey, Woodford, etc.).

Mr. Jordan is active in the Society of Petroleum Engineers (SPE), having served as SPE Denver Section Chairperson in 2003-2004 and was the SPE Rocky Mountain Petroleum Technology Conference Chair in 2006.

JD Harkrider

JD Harkrider

Technical Advisor-Drilling
jd2.harkrider@apexpe.com

JD Harkrider is the newest member of the APEX Petroleum Engineering technical team bringing over 15 years of drilling, production, and reservoir engineering experience to the company. JD has been primarily focused on US unconventional basins which is a perfect fit to APEX’s current business model.

JD began his career at El Paso Corporation before joining Devon Energy in 2006. At Devon JD held a number of high responsibility positions across Devon’s Texas operations. In 2018 JD joined Matador Resources as a Sr. Drilling Engineer focused on Matador’s Delaware Basin holdings in New Mexico.

Mr. Harkrider has a Bachelor of Science Degree in Petroleum Engineering from The University of Texas at Austin.

Janice Gregory-Sloan

Janice Gregory-Sloan

VP Corporate Development

j.gregorysloan@apexpe.com

Janice has over 30 years of diverse experience in the Oil and Gas industry, following her graduation from the University of New Orleans with an M.S. in Geology. Her experience ranges from working as a petroleum geologist finding oil and gas, working in oilfield services to promote the use of technology to find oil and gas and now selling integrated geoscience and engineering services to companies to support their asset development. During her career, Janice worked for Amoco Production Company, WesternGeco, Schlumberger SIS, Schlumberger Data and Consulting Services, Schlumberger Well Services, Schlumberger Wireline and APEX Petroleum Engineering. In her last role at Schlumberger, she was the Sales Manager for Microseismic and Borehole Seismic for North America. She is currently in a business development role at APEX Petroleum Engineering.

Brian Fakharzadeh

Brian Fakharzadeh

VP Corporate Development

b.fakharzadeh@apexpe.com

Brian is a seasoned business development leader with over 25 years of successful management and entrepreneurial leadership. Since 2014 Brian was VP of Development and Operations at Western Energy Alliance, an oil and gas trade organization based in Denver. While at WES he was responsible for building and maintaining a sizeable membership, allowing him to forge influential relationships with executives in the industry. Prior to WES, Brian was Director of Corporate Development at Jacam Chemical Company, a leading manufacturer and service provider of oilfield chemicals. Before Brian began his career in the oil and gas industry, he spent over 13 years as an entrepreneur owning several businesses in the Denver area.

Howard Rough

Howard Rough

Consulting Business Development Manager

h.rough@apexpe.com

Howard is …