Horizon Growth's New Era: CEO Shuffle Cements Year-Long Strategic Pivot

VANCOUVER, BC – June 05, 2026

On the surface, the press release from Horizon Growth Strategies Corp. this week was a standard piece of corporate housekeeping. A new CEO, Mark Schipperheijn, takes the helm; the former CEO, Gary Monaghan, transitions to a director role; and Scott Davis, a director, steps off the board to become the official Chief Financial Officer and Secretary. It’s the kind of C-suite shuffle that happens every day.

But for those watching the quiet evolution of this Vancouver-based company, these changes are anything but routine. They represent the final, public-facing maneuver in a deliberate, year-long strategic overhaul designed to transform the company from the ground up. This isn't just a change in leadership; it's the capstone on a new corporate identity, marking the end of one chapter and the calculated beginning of another.

A Pivot Plotted in Plain Sight

To understand the significance of this week’s announcement, we have to rewind the clock just over a year. In May 2025, the company wasn't even called Horizon Growth Strategies. It was known as Global Carbon Credit Corp., a name that reflected its singular focus on the highly speculative voluntary carbon market. On May 13, 2025, the company announced not just a name change, but a fundamental shift in its mission.

The firm declared its intent to diversify beyond carbon credits and deploy its capital into a broader portfolio of "emerging growth industries." Crucially, it also signaled its ambition to pursue a listing on the Canadian Securities Exchange (CSE) as an "investment issuer." This was the moment the pivot truly began. The same announcement that introduced the new name and strategy also brought two of this week’s key players into the inner circle: Mark Schipperheijn was appointed Chairman of the board, and Scott Davis was named Chief Financial Officer.

Viewed through that lens, the latest appointments are not a reaction, but the execution of a long-term plan. Schipperheijn, having overseen the strategic shift as Chairman for the past year, now steps into the CEO role to drive it forward. Davis, already handling the finances, formalizes his executive position by adding the Corporate Secretary title and stepping away from his director duties. This is a company aligning its leadership structure with its new, forward-looking strategy.

Clarifying Roles for a New Horizon

The executive restructuring does more than just install a new leader; it creates a much cleaner governance structure, a critical prerequisite for a company seeking to attract new capital and secure a stock exchange listing. By having Scott Davis resign as a director to focus purely on his executive duties as CFO and Secretary, the company creates a clearer separation between the board's oversight function and the management team's operational responsibilities. This is a move that governance experts and potential institutional investors tend to favor.

Meanwhile, elevating the Chairman to CEO centralizes strategic execution. Schipperheijn is no longer just guiding the board; he is now directly responsible for implementing the growth strategy he helped architect. This consolidation of vision and authority can be a powerful catalyst for a small company navigating a major transition.

Yet, the company isn't wiping the slate clean. Retaining former CEO Gary Monaghan on the board is a savvy move. It ensures continuity and access to his institutional knowledge, providing a bridge from the company's past to its future. This balanced approach—bringing in new operational leadership while retaining historical context at the board level—suggests a carefully managed transition designed to maximize stability while pursuing aggressive new goals.

From a Speculative Past to a Diversified Future

Horizon's journey has been anything but linear. Incorporated in 1952 for resource exploration, it languished for years, even seeing its stock trading suspended in 2002. Its revival in 2021 as Global Carbon Credit Corp. was a bet on the burgeoning ESG movement. However, operating in the voluntary carbon market is notoriously difficult. With around $4 million in working capital as of spring 2025 but a history of negative cash flow, the company faced the challenge of scaling in a volatile sector.

The pivot to an "investment issuer" model is a pragmatic response to this reality. Instead of betting the farm on a single, speculative operational business, Horizon Growth now aims to act more like a venture capital firm, using its capital to invest in a portfolio of promising companies across various growth sectors. This strategy diversifies risk and allows the company to leverage its financial resources without needing to build a massive operational footprint itself.

The recent financial filings show small but positive signs, with a recovery on carbon credit inventory and a modest gain on sales in early 2025. But the company's reliance on equity financing underscores the urgency of its transformation. It needs a compelling story to attract the next round of investment, and a story about a diversified portfolio of emerging growth assets is often more appealing to a broader investor base than one about a niche carbon credit play.

The Road to the Public Market

Ultimately, all these moves point toward one overarching objective: a successful listing on the Canadian Securities Exchange. A new listing requires a clear strategy, a credible management team, and a clean governance structure. Over the past year, Horizon Growth Strategies has been methodically checking each of those boxes.

The leadership team is now firmly in place, with clear roles and a mandate to execute the new investment strategy. The corporate narrative has been rewritten, shifting focus from a single volatile market to the broader, more enticing potential of "emerging growth." The path ahead is still challenging; successfully identifying and funding high-growth companies is no easy task. But with this deliberate restructuring, Horizon Growth has given itself a new map and a new set of drivers, positioning itself not just to navigate the road ahead, but to finally accelerate.