Introducing Ahmed Eleshaky

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Ahmed was born in Virginia but has lived in more places than most, including Egypt, London, Dubai and Kuwait. This provided him a unique opportunity to experience different cultures and new people growing up. He developed a natural curiosity to understand how people think and the impact of belonging to a community.

This curiosity extended to systems and how they work, specifically Aerospace and Automotive systems. His involvement in high school robotics made for an easy decision to study Mechanical Engineering. Ahmed took his talent to Penn State University, where he could be close to family. He was eager to apply what he was learning in the classroom to the real world. He joined the BAJA SAE club, an intercollegiate design competition run by the Society of Automotive Engineering, and contributed to research with different professors on Dynamic Systems. He also found time to tutor students in Calculus, Chemistry, Physics and Arabic.

All of these experiences helped him land his first internship with Delphi, an Automotive Tier One supplier. Ahmed worked on the validation process of designs that were going into mass production. He focused on compressor systems, including the variable displacement compressor for Chrysler. After completing this internship, and his degree in just 3.5 years, Ahmed was excited to accept a full-time position at MAHLE, global Automotive Tier One supplier which acquired Delphi. He worked as a Development Engineer leading product testing and validation for HVAC units. Ahmed became very interested in Electric Vehicles because they had new regulatory and performance requirements, as opposed to the traditional internal combustion engines, and was assigned to work on Lucid Motors HVAC.

Shortly after, he was promoted to lead an Engineering team focusing on thermal management products for Honda and he embraced the opportunity to learn more about how a product is designed from start to finish. While leading a global team of 10 people to execute on current business, he also led a new acquisition project with Honda for a global vehicle platform. This position sparked his interest in program management and how products are fully brought into global operations, sold through sales teams and managed within production. He was promoted ahead of schedule into this position and owned the full implementation of projects from start to finish, focusing more on the business side of automotive on a segment of products. He had a desire to see the bigger picture and how his role impacted the growth and profitability of the company.

Ahmed was then assigned the lead role to relocate various products to new plants, setting up processes for the first time and developing relationships with global customers. He developed connections with internal and external teams in Brazil, Japan and Germany and helped them navigate challenges and constraints to ensure everyone was aligned and satisfied with the outcomes of the project. These conversations pulled on his strengths and his passion for helping people, learning how they think and negotiating with various stakeholders to propose creative solutions that give everyone a win.

As if these positions did not already display Ahmed’s natural leadership abilities, he also co-founded and launched the Young Professionals group at MAHLE with then colleague and current Ikonos Co-Founder, Allie Hagmeyer. They both recognized the challenge that the automotive industry was facing in retaining young and ambitious professionals. They saw a need to create a community for individuals in a company to share knowledge and collaborate across departments. The program grew from 10 to 150 people within three years, accelerating education for new colleagues and bridging the gap with more experienced employees.

A consistent theme of Ahmed’s career has been seeing an idea grow and develop into something tangible. With this in mind, he found the opportunity to work at a startup very intriguing. It was an easy decision to accept an offer from Ikonos that would combine his desire to help others, better understand how complex things work and impact a company's growth. (Not to mention the added bonus of working with Allie again!) He joined Ikonos in February 2022 as the Senior Program Manager, helping companies coordinate analytics projects across their organizations and align organizational strategy to analytic priorities. Most importantly, he makes sure Ikonos’ work has a meaningful and positive impact for its customers.

Ahmed’s personal passions are reading business and professional development books, meeting new people, enjoying the outdoors, hiking and CrossFit. He’s also a member of  Toastmasters, which allows him to continuously improve his communication and leadership skills. His other professional interests include Venture Capital and E-mobility.