He has lived in Kenya and Canada, and throughout his career, has had the opportunity to travel the world from Dublin, Ireland to Bangkok, Thailand.

Born and raised in Nairobi, Kenya, Mr. D’Souza began attending college there at Strathmore College before moving to Canada to continue his college education. Mr. D’Souza received a scholarship to Lakehead University, Thunder Bay, ON, where he obtained his Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering. After completing his undergraduate studies, Mr. D’Souza co-authored two papers about land mobile satellite systems, which Aerospace & Electronic Systems Journal published. While completing his MBA degree from Schulich School of Business at York University Toronto, ON, Canada, he attended various HVAC courses at Humber College, Toronto.

In 1994, Mr. D’Souza started working as a product tester at Canatal International Mississauga, ON, Canada, which produces precision air-conditioning systems. From there he moved through various positions in technical, sales, and production management areas.

Canatal serves a global market, which gave Mr. D’Souza the chance to travel extensively through Asia Pacific, the U.S., and the British Isles.

“This helped me form a broad perspective in terms of the realities of product applications outside of North America,” says Mr. D’Souza. Through this travel, he learned the value of a “global perspective.” He tells APPLIANCE, “In that environment, one must be able to ‘think global’ with respect to manufacturability, but ‘think local’ in terms of product design features, competition, and service, which often requires a trade-off.” The challenge, he adds, was trying to discover when and where to make that trade-off.

Mr. D’Souza left Canatal in 2004 in pursuit of opportunities as a contract consultant. In doing so, he was led to the position of director of Operations at Desert Spring Products in Mississauga, ON, Canada, a manufacturer of air-quality products. This position involves production management as well as new product research and development. Mr. D’Souza looks forward to moving beyond his background of electronic control systems and basic HVAC processes to work on new technologies.

The most rewarding aspect of his new position is developing and launching new products that give an OEM the competitive advantage. “Products are the core of an OEM’s competitive strategy and to have a direct impact on successfully achieving its strategic objectives is extremely satisfying,” says Mr. D’Souza.

He is also a strong believer in an open door policy and cross-organizational communication.

Over the years, these philosophies have helped him obtain an understanding of a wide variety of positions and areas in an organization. This, he says, has allowed for effective communication among all levels of the company, from finance to sales.

When he is not on a business trip or at the office, Mr. D’Souza enjoys traveling for personal enjoyment, reading, watching movies, and spending time with his family.