Avon Hertz (1979–2017) was an American billionaire, businessman and tech mogul who served as the founder and CEO of Coil, the direct rival of Tesla, until his death in 2017. Hertz was responsible for the development of Cliffford, one of the first examples of true Artificial Intelligence, as well as cloning in order to produce an army of mercenaries; these were both created to accomplish Hertz's goals of omnicide by nuclear fire.
Hertz hired Lester Crest, Slugs Piombino, and other criminals to pursue and destroy the mercenary Bogdan and his crew, as they were aware of Hertz's plans and were close to accomplishing their goal of stopping Hertz. However, after Piombino's crew boarded the Ramius, Bogdan managed to convince Crest, the CIA, and Piombino's crew of Hertz duplicity, Hertz had Cliffford activate the Ramius' self-destruct sequence. Piombino's crew and Bogdan successfully escaped, and began working to bring Hertz down.
After sabotaging Hertz's operations, Piombino and his crew assaulted the Mount Chiliad Launch Facility under Mount Chiliad, California, slaughtering many Cliffford Mercenaries and ultimately destroying Cliffford, who became independent of Hertz. Hertz fled the facility on a Mammoth Thruster, though was pursued by Piombino, who ultimately killed Hertz by firing a Thruster missile at him.