BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Josh Hoffman
CHIEF EXECUTIVE OFFICER AND
CO-FOUNDER, ZYMERGEN
“Taking a powerful idea from seed to scale requires clarity, commitment, and expertise. We have assembled a board of directors that brings all of this and more to the table and is driving Zymergen to a successful future.”
In 2013, Josh joined Zach Serber and Jed Dean in founding Zymergen. Previously, Josh was a partner at Norcob Capital and a managing director in Merchant Banking at Rothschild. He holds an MA in International Relations and MPPM from Yale University, as well as a BA from University of California, Berkeley.
Jay Flatley
LEAD INDEPENDENT DIRECTOR, ZYMERGEN
CHAIRMAN, ILLUMINA
“Zymergen is pioneering technology that shifts society in an exciting new direction.”
Jay served as CEO of Illumina for 17 years before transitioning to his role as chairman. As CEO, he led the company in cutting the cost of sequencing the human genome from $100 million to less than $1,000. He holds a BSc and MSc (Hons) from Stanford University, as well as a BA from Claremont McKenna College.
Steven Chu
PROFESSOR OF PHYSICS AND MOLECULAR & CELLULAR PHYSIOLOGY, STANFORD UNIVERSITY
“Zymergen has figured out how to combine genomics, robotics, and machine learning in powerful new ways to engineer microbes to make renewable next-generation materials in a wide variety of fields.”
Steven served as U.S. Secretary of Energy under President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013. In 1997 he won the Nobel Prize in Physics for research at Bell Labs and Stanford University for the cooling and trapping of atoms with laser light. He holds a PhD and MS from University of California, Berkeley, as well as a BA and BS from the University of Rochester.
Sandi Peterson
PARTNER: CLAYTON, DUBILIER
& RICE, LLC
“In my experience leading biology, pharmaceutical, and science and technology companies, I’ve rarely seen a business with as winning a set of breakthrough capabilities as Zymergen.”
Sandi served as Group Worldwide Chairwoman of Johnson & Johnson and before that as CEO of Bayer CropScience AG, CEO of Bayer Medical Care, and president of Bayer HealthCare Diabetes Care. She was featured in Fortune magazine’s inaugural list of leaders changing healthcare. She holds an MPA from Princeton University and a BA from Cornell University.
Jed Dean
VP OF OPERATIONS AND ENGINEERING AND CO-FOUNDER, ZYMERGEN
“Zymergen was founded at the intersection of biology, machine learning, and lab automation, and we’re using this powerful combination to create new, sustainable materials at scale.”
Jed has developed technology and automation for life sciences at Amyris and at the Stanford Genome Technology Center. He is an inventor on numerous patents on automating microbial engineering. He holds a PhD in Biochemistry from Stanford University and BS in Molecular Biology from Purdue University.
Deep Nishar
SENIOR MANAGING PARTNER, SOFTBANK INVESTMENT ADVISERS
“When a fundamental material building block changes for the better, the company responsible is bound to become one of the most valuable assets of a generation.”
Deep is a seasoned investment partner with more than 20 years of experience in this industry. He served as a former senior director of products at Google and SVP of Products & User Experience at LinkedIn. He has lectured at Stanford University, and he holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.
Matt Ocko
MANAGING PARTNER, DCVC
“Zymergen has the opportunity to be the dominant molecular manufacturing company of the 21st century—and the impact will affect every global citizen.”
In addition to being Managing Partner at Data Collective, Matt is Managing Director of Archimedes Capital. He has three decades of experience as a technology entrepreneur, as an operating executive, and as a venture capitalist, both in the U.S. and in China. Matt holds a BA in Physics from Yale University.
Rohit Sharma
PARTNER, TRUE VENTURES
“Zymergen believes in a better way of working with nature and biology to improve lives. That innovation can be achieved without inflicting cost to the planet.”
Rohit has held SVP and CTO positions at Metro Networks Group. Before that he founded ONI Systems, where he also served as CTO. He holds a PhD and MS in Electrical Engineering from University of Alberta, Canada, as well as a BS from India’s National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra.
