Dr. Lisa Dyson has a diverse background in management, business consulting, technology development and scientific research. As a management consultant at The Boston Consulting Group, Dr. Dyson worked with executives of multi-national corporations to develop high-impact strategies and execution plans to expand into new markets, facilitate post-merger integrations, define international governance models, and identify millions of dollars in operational cost inefficiencies. Dr. Dyson has experience in a number of industries, including transportation, travel, automotive, packaging, retail, telecommunications, and energy. In addition, Dr. Dyson enjoys building and leading entrepreneurial teams to develop new technologies. Previous startup experience includes developing a social networking platform that was used in a national election campaign and building a technology that received funding from Microsoft. Dr. Dyson has a strong technical background and has been awarded a number of honors in connection with her technical work. Dr. Dyson has conducted research in Bioengineering and Physics, including energy research, at Stanford University, the University of California, Berkeley, Princeton University, the University of California, San Francisco, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories. Dr. Dyson has a PhD in Physics from MIT, where she conducted research in String Theory, was a Fulbright Scholar at the University of London, where she received an MS in Physics with an emphasis in Quantum Fields and Fundamental Forces, and has degrees in Mathematics and Physics from Brandeis University.

Dr. John Reed is Kiverdi’s Founding CTO and the inventor of our core technology. Dr. Reed is an expert in chemical and biological energy storage and conversion technologies and has over 15 years of experience in the research and development of clean energy technologies. Dr. Reed has a strong multi-disciplinary background in a number of scientific disciplines including biology, physics, material science and applied mathematics. He has conducted research at leading institutions including the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratories and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories. He has authored more than a dozen articles published in international peer-reviewed journals, has been an invited speaker at scientific conferences including APS and DARPA, and is an inventor on several patent applications, including patent applications on microbial carbon capture. Dr. Reed earned a PhD and an MS degree in Material Science and Engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as well as degrees in Biology and Material Science from UC Berkeley. He has developed a unique approach to carbon mitigation that is a hybrid chemical and microbial process for the capture and recycling of inorganic carbon into high energy density biofuel and chemicals using conventional bioreactors without reliance on food-based agriculture.

John has been acting CFO for Kiverdi since June 2011 and brings over 26 years of financial and operational experience. His experience extends across numerous leadership positions in both large and emerging growth companies. John’s prior experience includes managing partner at the financial consulting firm TechCFO, providing strategic, financial and operating advice to emerging growth companies. Prior to that, John held leadership positions at several companies, including; Chief Operating and Financial Officer of Looksmart, a publicly traded online advertising company, Chief Financial Officer of Gap Inc. Direct, The Gap’s ecommerce division, and Chief Operating and Financial Officer of Business.com, an online business directory and advertising firm. John also held the Chief Financial Officer role at Peoplemover, where he and Ali first worked together, as well as a variety of financial roles at The Walt Disney Company and Citicorp Securities. He began his career in public accounting with Deloitte Haskins and Sells and holds a B.B.A. in accounting from the University of Notre Dame. John and his wife, Julie, live in the East Bay with their two children, Jimmy and Lauren, and their two dogs, Radar and Rocky.

Dr. Itzhak Kurek has 20 years of experience in metabolic engineering, plant photosynthesis and cellulose biosynthesis. Dr. Kurek joined Kiverdi from DuPont/Pioneer Hi-Bred International, Inc. where he led the improvement of key enzymes in the carbon fixation pathway, by directed evolution and rational design, in agricultural and industrial crops. Dr. Kurek has extensive expertise in developing novel high throughput screenings for enzymatic activity, small molecules detection and protein identification. Dr. Kurek held positions at Maxygen Inc. and Verdia Inc. He received his Ph.D. and M.Sc. in Plant Sciences from Tel Aviv University and completed his postdoctoral research at the University of California, Davis. Dr. Kurek has also conducted research at the Technical University of Munich, John Innes Center Norwich and C.N.R.S Bordeaux. Dr. Kurek has authored 20 publications and is co-inventor on multiple patents in directed evolution and high throughput screening of small molecules. Dr. Kurek is currently also a visiting researcher at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratories.

Dr. Henrik Fyrst has more than 15 years of experience in the field of lipid biochemistry. Dr. Fyrst joined Kiverdi from Children’s Hospital Oakland Research Institute where he directed studies on the regulation of lipids and the role of lipid signaling in development and disease. Dr. Fyrst has a strong background in the field of lipid metabolism obtained through studies in simple organisms such as bacteria, yeast, worms and fruit flies as well as in mammalian systems. He has extensive expertise in developing methods for purification and analysis of lipids using HPLC, GC and MS instrumentation. Dr. Fyrst received his Ph.D. and M. Sc. from the University of Southern Denmark, Odense, Denmark, where he studied proteins involved in fatty acid biosynthesis, regulation and transport. He received his post-doctoral training at Children’s Hospital Oakland where he later became an established scientist. Dr. Fyrst has authored more than 20 articles published in international peer-reviewed journals and is the co-inventor of multiple patents.

Jason has extensifve experience leading strategic engineering, finance, business development, innovation, and partnership groups.  Most recently, Jason led a management consulting group, Raymond Hugh, focused on helping companies of all sizes identify and execute against new growth strategies.  Prior to that, Jason led the Open Innovation & Partnering groups at Clorox, where he initiated and led governance of more than 25 strategic partnerships to drive new growth opportunities for Clorox.  Jason has also led M&A and strategic investment activity at McKesson in San Francisco, and before that was with Procter & Gamble in a variety of roles spanning engineering, manufacturing, R&D, and Finance. Jason earned his Bachelor's in Chemical Engineering from Purdue University and his MBA from The Darden School at the University of Virginia.