Rhett is Founder, Chairman, and CEO of DEALTEK, Ltd. He specializes in acquisition, development, expansion, and location strategies for headquarters, data centers, manufacturing plants, distribution centers, and other operating facilities. Rhett has negotiated, advocated, and closed deals for many Global 500, Fortune 500, start-ups, scale-ups, and other companies around the world. He has advised them throughout their decision process in both domestic and cross-border initiatives. Their initial capital investment has totaled over $40 billion, and they have received incentives and other savings worth millions of dollars. In some engagements, he instead has represented governments and their agencies which are recruiting or retaining economic development projects.
His global experience includes the entire business and project development process: entity, joint venture, and strategic alliance formation; strategic planning; feasibility analysis; transaction structuring and contract negotiation; capital investment and finance; permitting and zoning; facility construction and operations; technology licensing; utility and other infrastructure installation; company-community relations and communications; project information management; incentive package design and negotiation (such as legislative changes, enterprise zones, and foreign-trade zones); and public hearings and executive sessions.
Rhett brings to each consulting engagement a rare perspective from his combined background in business, real estate, finance, tax, entrepreneurship, and innovation. Award-winning DEALS ® software, which he invented, originated by applying this combination of disciplines to model alternative capital investment and operational scenarios, to discern and capture savings from them, to optimize and maintain project flexibility, and to make fast but informed decisions.
After founding DEALTEK in 1999, Rhett had a several-year stint at Google leading the acquisition and development of strategic data center assets in various parts of the world. He also held similar strategic development responsibilities at Amazon. Before founding DEALTEK, Rhett served as Chief Operations Officer at a bank, directed a corporate consulting practice at a Big 4 firm, and practiced law at a major international law firm. Rhett holds law licenses in Virginia, Washington, D.C., and New York. He also holds a real estate license in Virginia.
He frequently presents programs on negotiations, economic development, entrepreneurship, and innovation. He has authored numerous articles and co-authored four books including The Entrepreneurial Engineer: How to Create Value from Ideas (Cambridge University Press). In addition to leading an entrepreneurship and innovation institute at Cornell University, he also has served on the Cornell (Ithaca, NY), Cornell Tech (New York City, NY), and Syracuse University faculties, teaching entrepreneurship and innovation courses.
Rhett also has been involved in many professional, civic, and community activities. Among them, Rhett has served as President of a local Rotary Club, Board Chairman of a county-wide chamber of commerce and of an area arts council, District Chairman and Council Treasurer of the Boy Scouts of America, and Board Member of a regional technology alliance, education-related foundations, and other non-profits. He holds a United States Soccer Federation coaching license and has coached youth soccer.
Rhett received a Bachelor of Science in Management (finance major) with honors from Tulane University, a Doctor of Jurisprudence from the College of William and Mary, and an Executive MBA- level Certificate in International Business from Georgetown University. He also completed the Economic Development Course at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.