Board of Directors

Tod Johnson

Tod Johnson is board chair for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Johnson is the co-founder and managing director of Duo Partners Consulting, LLC, a New York-based investment and consulting firm. He was previously executive chairman of NPD and led the company from 1971 until the NPD/IRI merger. Considered an innovator in his field for more than 50 years, Johnson has led many industry initiatives with POS data, consumer data, and online data collection, and is the lead patentee on the methods patent for in-home scanning. His research expertise is in the areas of brand loyalty and brand equity. He was elected to the Market Research Council Hall of Fame in 2011.  

Johnson has been a chairman, vice chairman, secretary, and director of the Advertising Research Foundation and was a founding chairman and director of the Council for Marketing and Opinion Research. He also serves as a vice chair of the Carnegie Mellon University Board of Trustees, chair of the Executive Committee of the Metropolitan Opera, a board member of the Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, and chair of the board of CivicScience, a Pittsburgh-based new survey technology firm. He was CEO and founder of Media Metrix from 1995 to 2001 and is a past member of the JPMorgan Chase Regional Advisory Board.  

Norm Alpert

Norm Alpert is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Alpert is a founding partner, president, and co-head of investments at Vestar Capital Partners. He is also on Vestar’s Management Committee, which oversees investment strategy and firm operations. Alpert began his career in 1980 as a commercial banker at Manufacturers Hanover Trust Company as a member of the Special Finance Division. He joined the Management Buyout Group at The First Boston Corporation in 1984, before leaving in 1988 to launch Vestar Capital Partners.

During his time at Vestar, Alpert has served as a director on over 30 corporate boards. In addition to the IRI/NPD Board, he currently serves on the boards of Accanto Behavioral, Friday Health Plans, and Quest Analytics. Alpert is also a trustee emeritus of both Brown University and White Plains Hospital, is president of American Friends of Shalva (the association for mentally and physically challenged children in Israel) and serves on the board of the National Rowing Foundation.

Jeffrey Ansell

Jeffrey Ansell is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Ansell is strategic executive advisor at Vestar Capital Partners since 2017. Previously, he was chair, president and CEO of Sun Products Corporation, a leading North American fabric and household products company and former Vestar portfolio company. Ansell played a critical role in the successful sale of Sun Products to strategic buyer Henkel AG for $3.6 billion. Prior to joining Sun Products, Ansell served as CEO and board member of Pinnacle Foods Group, a company of iconic food brands. He began his career at Procter & Gamble and in his 25-year career held positions of increasing responsibility spanning multiple business units and geographies. He was appointed Corporate Officer and member of P&G’s Global Leadership Council in 2001.

Before the IRI/NPD merger, Ansell served as a member of the IRI board for over a decade, including four years as board chair. He presently serves as Board Chair of Dr. Praeger’s Sensible Foods since Vestar’s majority investment in 2021. Ansell also serves as Board Chair of Pet Honesty, a leading manufacturer of high quality pet wellness supplements, a Board Member of Roland Foods, and Board Chair of the American Kennel Club Museum of the Dog, located in New York City.  

Joseph Ghobrial

Joseph Ghobrial is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Ghobrial joined Hellman & Friedman (H&F) in 2014 and rejoined the firm in 2018 after business school. He is currently a Director at H&F, as well as Board Member for Applied Systems and IRI/NPD, and he was active in H&F’s investments in Ellucian, PointClickCare, Renaissance Learning, and Genesys. Prior to H&F, Ghobrial was employed by the Technology Investment Banking Group at Goldman Sachs in San Francisco.

Philip Hammarskjold

Philip Hammarskjold is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).
  
Hammarskjold is the executive chair of Hellman & Friedman, is chair of the Firm’s Investment Committee, and is a member of the Compensation Committee. He previously served as H&F’s CEO from 2009 to 2017 and its co-CEO in 2018, after originally joining the firm in 1992. Prior to H&F, Hammarskjold was employed by the Corporate Advisory Department of Dominguez Barry Samuel Montagu in Sydney, Australia, and by the Merchant Banking Department of Morgan Stanley & Co. in New York.  

Hammarskjold currently also serves on the boards of Cordis and Caliber. Additionally, he is chair of the UCSF board, the vice chair of the Princeton board of trustees, and serves on the board of advisors of the International Rescue Committee. He previously served as a director of numerous portfolio companies, including AlixPartners, Catalina, Change Healthcare (formerly Emdeon), Digitas, DoubleClick, GeoVera Insurance Group, Goodman Global, Grocery Outlet, Texas Genco, and Young & Rubicam.  

Blake Kleinman

Blake Kleinman is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Kleinman joined Hellman & Friedman in 2001 and focuses on the software, internet, financial services, and information services sectors. He was active in H&F’s investments in Arch Capital, Axel Springer, Gartmore Investment Management, IRI, IRIS Software, Mondrian Investment Partners, NPD, Scout24, SSP, ProSiebenSat.1 Media, and Wood Mackenzie. Prior to H&F, Kleinman worked in the Mergers, Acquisitions and Restructurings Department at Morgan Stanley & Co. in New York.  

Kleinman is also currently a director of Allfunds, AutoScout24, and TeamSystem. He was formerly a director of Gartmore, IRIS, Scout24, SSP, and Wood Mackenzie.  

Peter Masucci

Peter Masucci is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).
  
Masucci is managing director at New Mountain Capital and joined the company in 2004. He was previously associated with Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co., where he focused on private equity investments across several industries. From 1997 to 2000, Masucci was an analyst in the Mergers and Acquisitions and Corporate Finance Departments of Goldman Sachs, where he evaluated and executed a number of strategic transactions.   
  
Masucci also serves as board chair or director of 3E, Homrich Berg, and Lincoln Investment. He previously served as the chair of SNL Financial and ACA Compliance Group and was the lead director or director of Blue Yonder, Deltek, DRB Systems, InComm, Inmar, Legends Hospitality, OneDigital, Sparta Systems, and Valet Waste.  

Dimitri Panayotopoulos

Dimitri Panayotopoulos is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Panayotopoulos is a former vice chair of Procter & Gamble, where he was responsible for the full portfolio of P&G’s brands and business units representing more than $80 billion of global revenues. Following his 37-year career at P&G, which spanned many of its international operations, he became a senior advisor at Boston Consulting Group.  

Panayotopoulos also serves on the boards of British American Tobacco Company and JBS Foods International, and previously was a board director of Logitech International.  

Kirk Perry

Kirk Perry is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Perry serves as the president and CEO of IRI and NPD. He joined IRI in May 2021, leading the company through its successful merger with NPD in August 2022. Perry is a seasoned consumer products and brand strategist with more than 30 years of CPG and technology experience at two of the world’s largest and most respected companies, Procter & Gamble and Google. At Google, Perry served as president of Global Client and Agency Solutions, with responsibility for driving Google’s global revenue and growing its relationships with the world’s largest advertisers and advertising agencies. He previously spent 23 years at P&G in several roles of increasing responsibility, culminating in a position as president of Global Family Care, in which he led growth and innovation at the company’s multibillion-dollar global paper business. 

Perry also serves on the boards of The J.M. Smucker Company and Chick-fil-A, Inc., and is a member of the Cincinnati Innovation District Advisory Council. He also had several prior board affiliations with several nonprofit organizations, including The Ronald McDonald House, The CityLink Foundation, City Team, The United Way Campaign Cabinet, March of Dimes (national and regional), the University of Cincinnati Foundation, and the University of Cincinnati’s Bicentennial Commission. 

Karyn Schoenbart

Karyn Schoenbart is a board member for Circana (formerly IRI and NPD).

Schoenbart is the co-founder and managing director of Duo Partners Consulting, LLC, a New York-based consulting and investment firm. She served as CEO of NPD prior to her integral role in the successful NPD/IRI merger. Under her leadership, NPD was named one of the Best Companies to Work For in New York State and was recognized as one of the most respected firms in its industry. Schoenbart has received numerous awards recognizing her impact as a female business leader and wrote the book “Mom.B.A: Essential Business Advice from One Generation to the Next” based on the business lessons she has learned.

She currently serves on the boards of Arpalus, CivicScience, Revuze and Stylitics, and was previously on the board of the Retail Industry Leaders Association (RILA). Schoenbart also serves on the advisory board of The Resolution Project, a nonprofit organization that develops socially responsible young leaders.