Our Team

Experts in travel and technology, the SilverRail leadership team comprises top travel ecommerce experts whose history goes back to the founding days of online travel.

Aaron Gowell, Company Founder & CEO

Prior to founding SilverRail in 2009, Aaron built one of the largest travel technology and distribution companies in the US: National Leisure Group (NLG), a $1 Billion ecommerce leader in vacations & cruise.

NLG pioneered several early online travel technologies including the cruise industry’s first online booking platform and one of the first dynamic packaging systems.

Previously, Aaron honed his survival skills in US Army’s 82nd Airborne and at global management consultancy Bain & Company. Aaron was also a founding member of General Catalyst Partners, a leading venture capital firm in Boston where he was most recently an Entrepreneur in Residence.

Claim to fame: The lowest-recorded combat parachute jump in military history — from 300 feet, at night, into Panama.

Will Phillipson, Company Founder &
Executive Vice President, Product and Carrier Solutions

Will is the co-founder of SilverRail Technologies and driver behind SilverRail's product. Will brings 15 years of travel technology and product experience in a number of successful companies. Prior to co-founding SilverRail, Will was the VP Product Strategy and technical lead for distribution platforms at ITA Software, which involved building a next-generation GDS platform for airline distribution, and advising on aspects of ITA’s forthcoming Airline Reservation, Inventory and re-accommodation Systems.

Prior to the travel industry, Will started several companies focusing on document management, documents on demand and eventually digital rights management. Will has a computer engineering degree from McGill University and has served on various boards, including the Board of Governors of McGill University.

Claim to fame: First solo airline trip to South Africa — at age 5. Since then he has circumnavigated this planet several times.

Asad Khan, Vice President of Engineering

Asad has spent 23 years building and delivering cutting-edge technology products in numerous market-places.

Before joining SilverRail, Asad led n2NCommerce's engineering team, that delivered and achieved acceptance of its hosted Retail Platform at Victoria's Secret for their $1 Billion+ eCommerce operations.

In other prior stints, Asad led the team that built and delivered the first Verilog HDL based logic simulator at Gateway Design Automation (Cadence Design Systems), delivered the world's first professional Video Editing system on Microsoft Windows NT (Avid Media Composer) and led the development of ePrise's innovative unified Enterprise CMS for Intranets that is still installed at 200+ enterprises.

Claim to fame: Took a 1500 mile rail trip in the very first year of his life, obviously in preparation for this stint with SilverRail.

Cameron Jones, Vice President, Commercial

In the role of Vice President, Commercial, Cameron is responsible for business development and commercialising SilverRail’s global rail platform SilverCore that provides corporate and leisure travel sellers access, to multiple rail carriers by connecting via a single API.

Prior to joining SilverRail, Cameron spent 8 years at Expedia Inc. During his tenure with Expedia he held a number of positions in Asia Pacific and Europe focusing on both Supplier Relations and B2B Distribution. Most recently Cameron led business development for EMEA for Expedia’s Affiliate Network.

Cameron also served on the board of directors of Nasdaq-listed eLong, Inc., a leading online travel provider in China from 2004 to 2007.

Before joining Expedia, Cameron was an independent consultant with key customers including Hilton, Starwood and Intercontinental Hotel Group. Cameron also spent 5 years at Starwood Hotels in multiple roles, most recently as director of ebusiness for Asia Pacific.

Claim to Fame: Cameron was one of the last few passengers to ride on top of the Devils Nose Railway in Ecuador before it was discontinued for safety fears.

James Harland, Vice President, Finance and Operations

In his wide ranging role at SilverRail, James covers things from Finance and reporting, through managing relationships with current accounts, as well as marketing across the business.

From his time working in London, James brings a wealth of strategic and financial experience to SilverRail.  James began his career in consulting, working on a number of pan-European growth and distribution strategies.  He then moved to ECI Partners, working as a private equity investor, including assessing a number of online travel businesses.

James holds engineering degrees from Cambridge University and an MBA from MIT Sloan School of Management, where he was a Siebel Scholar and Seley Award winner.

Follow him on Twitter here

Claim to Fame: James was once chased by water buffalo on the Tanzanian plains, and therefore does not recommend the walking safari option.

Our Investors

SilverRail is backed by top-tier investors with highly relevant experience in travel technology. SilverRail resides in investment portfolios alongside some of the industry’s top travel brands.