About Peter Bell
This is a potted history of my career and
some of the stuff I have gotten up to during my life. I have tried to keep
this section as entertaining as possible rather than publishing a boring
resume.
Born in Cape Town, South Africa, and
educated in England, I am an engineer by training and a marketer by
profession. I am married, have two cats, and am a citizen of
both Britain and the USA. Am an avid snow skier during the winter and
keen sailor / windsurfer whenever the wind speed is up.
Currently I am
working on the
Multi Functional Rural Fuel
Platform, a humanitarian effort.
Distribution Drive – Dallas, Texas - USA
Founded
Distribution Drive in 2003 and co-founded the BioWillie brand of biodiesel
with the legendary Texas entertainer, Willie Nelson, in 2004. Distribution
Drive was acquired by a NASDAQ listed company in 2005.
Flagship Systems, Inc. – Dallas, Texas -
USA
Was the co-founder & CEO of Flagship
Systems, Inc., the publisher of the accounting software system, Flagship.
I started Flagship with my friend and business partner, David Parsley by
buying the Flagship accounting package from the Sage Group's Dallas based DacEasy subsidiary. Our successes included running a profitable business
for 9 years, generating many successful system sales, being the first
accounting software to offer its product as a rental application via the
Internet, recruiting an
international dealer base, managing up to 20 people in diverse roles and
successfully raising venture capital.
Earlier life
I left South Africa in 1979 and was
educated as an Engineer in England. My first entrepreneurial attempt was right after
school with a venture called Bell Hydro Power. After college, I went to the USA for the first time
and shared a house with a bunch of Kiwi's and spent a year as a ski bum in
Aspen Colorado. Working nights at Avis rent-a-car and skiing during the
day made for a very special year in the Colorado Rocky mountains. I then
spent the off season driving from coast to coast until I ran out of money
and went back to England. This eye opening trip created the desire to come
back to permanently live in America. On
return from the USA, I worked for a light manufacturing company in the
Midlands of England before joining a small software Value Added Reseller,
returning to the US in the mid 1990's.
The Book
I hope to complete a book one day
detailing all the weird and wonderful things that have happened to me
during my career as an entrepreneur, the title is "The Trials and
Tribulations of the Small Business Man". I hope this will be a book that
helps the next generation of entrepreneurs realize what they are in for
and helps them fill in the gaps that a formal MBA leaves out.