Our leadership team

The people who make up Control­ant's leadership team bring a wealth of experience to their roles, helping the company towards achieving its ambitious vision: to unleash the power of people and technology to deliver zero-waste supply chains for our partners and the planet.

Our executive team

Gísli Herjólfsson
Co-Founder, CEO, interim CCO
Gísli Herjólfsson co-founded Controlant and has driven the company's strategy and growth for the last 17 years. He has a Master's in Electrical Engineering from the University of Iceland.
Erlingur Brynjúlfsson
Co-Founder, CSO
Mr. Brynjúlfsson co-founded Controlant and serves as its Chief Strategy Officer since 2023. Erlingur previously served as Chief Technology Officer since 2007, and as Chief Product Officer 2022-2023. Mr. Brynjúlfsson holds Bachelors and Masters degrees in Electrical Engineering from the University of Iceland.
Gudmundur Árnason
CFO
Mr. Árnason has served as Controlant’s CFO since 2015. He holds a Bachelors degree in Business Administration from Reykjavik University.
Anna Karlsdóttir
CQO
Ms. Karlsdóttir has served as Controlant's Quality Officer since 2015. She holds an M.Sc. degree in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Iceland.
Carsten Lützhøft
CPO, interim CTO
Carsten Lützhøft has extensive experience of Process Digitalization in the global manufacturing and supply chain sectors. He also serves as board member and advisory board chairman in scale-up companies within the aviation and health tech industries.

Board of Directors

The Board of Directors (the Board) comprises five non-executive directors at a time and two alternates. Alternate Board members are Magnús Magnússon and Svanhvít Gunnarsdóttir. All members of the Board of Directors were elected at the Annual General Meeting on the 16th of June 2023.

Søren Skou
Chairman
Søren holds an MBA with honors from IMD, Lausanne Switzerland and a graduate diploma in marketing from Copenhagen Business School. He is Vice Chairman of telecommnications equipment maker Nokia OY and Chairman of The Maersk McKinney Moller Center for Zero Carbon Shipping. Previously he was the CEO of A. P. Moller Maersk, where he had a career in shipping and logistics spanning almost 40 years. Søren is globally recognized leader in Shipping and Logistics.
Ásthildur Otharsdóttir
Vice-Chairman
Ásthildur holds an MBA degree from Rotterdam School of Management in the Netherlands as well as a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from the University of Iceland. Ásthildur is a partner and investment manager at Frumtak Ventures and a Board member in various portfolio companies in the Frumtak portfolio, including the Chairman of the Board of Kaptio, Treble Technologies and Empower, as well as board member of Business Iceland. Ásthildur has been a director of the Board of Controlant since 2021.
Steve Van Kuiken
Board Member
Steve recently retired as a Senior Partner from McKinsey & Company. Over his long career at McKinsey, he founded and led the firm’s Healthcare Technology practice and later founded and built their technology transformation practice, McKinsey Technology, a fast-growing $2B global business. He was also a long-time leader in the Life Sciences practice, serving large, global pharmaceutical and medical product organizations. Prior to McKinsey, Steve was Vice-President of IT at Baxter Healthcare and Senior Manager at Andersen Consulting. He has a B.A. in Economics and History from Hope College.
Kristin Fridgeirsdottir
Board Member
Kristín holds a B.Sc. degree in Mechanical and Industrial Engineering from the University of Iceland, M.Sc degree in Financial Engineering and PhD in Philosophy from Stanford University. Kristín currently works full time as the CFO of Sýn hf. and was previously a Adjunct professor at London Business School as well as an independent management consultant. Kristín is the former Chairman of the Board of Hagar hf., former vice Chairman of the Board of TM hf. and Kvika banki hf. as well as being a former Board member of Distica hf. and Eik hf. Kristín has been a director of the Board of Controlant since 2020.
Trausti Þórmundsson
Board Member
Trausti holds a M.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Iceland and a B.Sc. degree in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University. Trausti is a technology leader with 20+ years' progressive experience in R&D in voice processing, audio processing and digital communication, currently working full time as a Hardware Engineer at Google. Trausti is a co-founder of Controlant and has been a director of the board since 2007.

In loving memory of Stefán "Stebbi" Karlsson

The kindness, generosity, and humility of our dear friend, co-founder, and colleague will always remain a cornerstone of our company and culture.