About us

Introduction to Sundew

Management team

Giovanni Salerno
CEO
LinkedIn

  • Our CEO since 2021, Giovanni has more than 20 years’ experience of industrial biotech in Switzerland, USA, Germany and Denmark and has taken several natural molecules to market for both bio-industrial and pharmaceutical applications.

    Giovanni spent the several years developing nootkatone as an active ingredient for tick control, obtaining the first registration of a new biopesticide active ingredient by the USA EPA in 20 years.

    Giovanni has previously worked at Evolva, GARDP (Drugs for Neglected Diseases Initiative), Dako, Cytomation, Imperial College and Pfizer. He has a PhD in Chemical and Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Trieste. He has worked extensively with US government agencies including the DoD, NIH and BARDA, in particular on resistance to novel pathogens via immune system responses.

Andy Gardiner
Founder, CFO
LinkedIn

  • Andy has worked for nearly thirty years with early-stage biotech companies as CEO, CFO, non-executive director and founder. He has run companies in both crop-protection and plant genetics. He recently took an excursion outside biotech, helping to build digital commerce company.

    Andy is a former board member of Swedish animal/human vaccine company Isconova (acquired by Novavax) and CEO of UK plant-genetics start-up Norfolk Plant Sciences. Other previous roles include: Personal Chemistry/Biotage (Swe), InSecta (UK/Spain), Isconova (Swe) and Immudex (DK). He is a co-founder (with Neil) of Double Bioventures. Andy has an MBA from London South Bank University and a BSc in Physics from the University of Manchester.

Neil Goldsmith
Founder, Chair
LinkedIn

  • Neil is a serial biotechnology entrepreneur with 35 years’ experience of the life science sector, having built companies from the ground up in multiple sectors (industrial biotech, therapeutics, lab instrumentation, sensors & diagnostics, services) and countries (UK, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, USA, India).

    From 2004 to 2017 Neil was founder and CEO of Evolva SA, a pioneering synthetic biology company that scaled multiple products to market, and that went public in Switzerland in 2009. Before that Neil founded, or played a key early role in, amongst others, TopoTarget (cancer therapeutics, IPO Copenhagen), Biotage (microwave chemistry, IPO Stockholm), GX Biosystems (suicide systems for GM microbes), PNA Diagnostics (DNA diagnostics, trade sale to Boehringer Mannheim, now Roche), BIAcore (biosensors, IPO NASDAQ) & Scientific Generics (technology consultancy, IPO LSE). Neil has a 1st class honours degree in Zoology from Oxford University.

Jørgen Hansen
Founder, CTO
LinkedIn

  • Jørgen is a molecular and fermentation biologist who has worked in the biotech sector for more than 30 years. He has led a large number of industrial biotech programmes, and developed multiple fermentation-derived products from lab scale to multi-tonne scale production and launch.

    Jørgen worked for Evolva for 13 years, five of them as CSO where he was responsible for an R&D operation of 120 people worldwide. Prior to Evolva he was with another biotech company, Poalis, developing novel aroma-chemical processes, and before that he held R&D roles with the Danish brewer Carlsberg, including a stint working on a joint Carlsberg-Suntory project.

    Jorgen has a PhD in Yeast Genetics from the University of Copenhagen.

Board

Johan Bitsch Nielsen
LinkedIn

  • Johan is an Investment Manager at Denmark’s Export & Investment Fund (Vaekstfonden) with a focus on direct green deeptech investments. Before moving into the world of venture capital, Johan co-founded and developed a couple of successful software startups, most notably Ditmer and FirstAgenda.

    Johan has board experience in several companies and is a reserve officer in the Royal Danish Air Force. Johan has a Masters in Management Development from Copenhagen Business School. In his spare time, Johan is a licensed pilot.

Nicky Deasy
LinkedIn

  • Nicky is Founder and former Managing Partner at The Yield Lab Europe, one of the largest seed stage agrifood tech impact venture capital funds in Europe, where she headed up the life science and biotech side of the fund's portfolio. She sits on the boards of Microgen Biotech, Micron AgriTech, Solasta Bio and Sundew.

    She was Associate Director at KPMG Corporate Finance where she led the food and beverage team, and Director of Corporate Finance at EY, before setting up Alta Corporate Finance, specialising in raising seed stage venture capital for Irish life science technology companies.

Dr John Carrigan
Linkedin

  • Dr John Carrigan is a scientist with previous experience in academia and  as part of start-up founding teams.  He has spent a number of years exploiting investment opportunities in emerging technologies across the globe, firstly with SOSV and now as Investment Director at The Yield Lab Europe.

    He is an expert advisor to the European Innovation Council and has published peer-reviewed research spanning a range of areas from protein chemistry to bio-based fats and oils. John joined the Sundew Board in April 2022.

Christian Brix Tillegreen
(board observer)
Linkedin

  • Christian is Director of Planetary Health at the BioInnovation Institute in Copenhagen. He has worked with innovative early stage companies for more than ten years, having started his career at Novozymes. Christian is on the Boards of several investee companies, including Biooomix, Cirqle and EvodiaBio.

    Christian has a Masters in the Management of Innovation and Business Development from Copenhagen Business School.

Bill Liao (board observer)
Linkedin

  • Bill Liao is a Chinese-Australian-Irish entrepreneur, investor, former diplomat, business mentor, author, passionate leader and speaker, with a distinguished record in business development and community activism. Bill is a co-founder of the CoderDojo movement and of Weforest.

    Bill's career in tech and business encompasses two unicorn companies and launching the world’s first bio-tech accelerator. He is a general partner of SOSV, a venture capital fund of over $1B. Bill is also a founder of the SOSV Momentum Pre-accelerator program. His current focus is Quantum Software.

Advisors

Esben Halkjær Hansen
Co-Founder and
Scientific Advisor
LinkedIn

  • Esben is a molecular biologist with nearly 20 years’ experience developing fermentation-based products and of developing microbial strains. He has lead several projects within this field and taken them from idea phase, though-scale-up and into production.

    Formerly Principal Scientist and Program Manager at Evolva. Esben has a PhD in Molecular Biology/Pharmaceutical Science from the University of Copenhagen.

Simon Porphy
Scientific Advisor
LinkedIn

  • Simon’s key expertise is fermentation science, process development and scale-up. He has more than ten years’ industrial experience, leading several projects from concept stage, through scale-up to the pilot-plant production stage. Previous companies include DuPont and Thermo Fischer. In 2016, he co-founded MicroSynbiotiX with Antonio. Simon holds a Master’s degree in Biochemical Engineering from the University of Auckland.

Antonio Lamb
Scientific Advisor
LinkedIn

  • Antonio is a Swedish molecular biologist and entrepreneur from California with expertise in the animal and human pharmaceutical industries. He is a co-founder of MicroSynbiotiX (now acquired by Sundew), developing plant-based oral vaccines and therapeutics for the aquaculture industry. Antonio obtained his B.Sc. from the University of California, Santa Cruz, his M.Sc. from the University of Basel in molecular biology, and is currently in the Microbiology and Immunology PhD program at the University of Zurich/ETH Zurich. Antonio also works as a scientist at the Novartis Institutes of BioMedical Research, where he conducts CRISPR genetic screening of advanced 3D cell culture models to find new druggable disease targets.

Luc Gruner
Business Development
LinkedIn

  • Luc began his career as a research scientist at Total, before transitioning into business development. He has forty years’ experience in sales and marketing, strategic planning and in C level roles (CEO, CCO, CBO,), having worked in multinationals as well as family-owned and startup companies. Luc spent considerable time working in the water treatment, food & beverage and paper/pulp chemical industries but for more than twenty years has worked in biotech in commercial roles. He has been instrumental in negotiating, acquiring and managing partnering projects in markets such as nutrition, feed, F&B, F&F, healthcare, building an extensive network in Asia including Japan. Previous companies include Evolva, VeriZyme, BimKemi, Hercules, BetzDearborn, WR Grace.

    Luc has a PhD in physical chemistry from the Université Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg and an AMP from INSEAD.

Kurt Buchmann
Copenhagen University
LinkedIn

  • Professor of Parasitology and Aquatic Pathobiology at Copenhagen University. Kurt has been researching parasite diseases in fish for the past nearly 40 years, with experience in pathology, immunology, vaccinology, pathogen/host interactions, disease control and aquaculture. He has developed methods (in vitro and in vivo) to assess the effects of various treatments on a variety of fish diseases. Kurt has a long history of in managing projects and programs (Sustainable Control of Fish Diseases in Aquaculture SCOFDA, Fishnet, Danish Fish Immunology Center and Network DAFINET). He has a PhD in Parasitology from Copenhagen University.

Claus Sternberg
Danish Technical University
LinkedIn

  • Associate Professor, Department of Bioengineering, DTU. Claus’s main area of research is Microbial Ecology and Physiology, with a particular focus on biofilms and bacteria.

    For Sundew, Claus advises on the engineering aspects of scaling up fermentation processes. Claus has extensive experience in collaboration with other academic groups as well as with industry partners.

Elisângela Zeoli
Sales
LinkedIn

  • Elisângela is a pharmacist with a career experience built in innovation process, development of new products, business development and commercial operations. She has worked in the pharmaceutical industry and healthcare .

    Elis, previously worked for the Innovation Centre at the Danish Ministry of Foreign Affairs, helping Danish companies to open doors in Brazil. She has an excellent track record driving dynamic business relations, and managing and developing strategic partnerships in Brazil and Latin America. 

Shane Willis
Sales
LinkedIn

  • Shane graduated from the University of Tasmania with a Master's in Aquaculture and has worked in the aquaculture industry for almost 30 years. He has worked with a range of species, focusing mainly on ornamental fish in farming, importing, exporting, wholesaling, and retailing . He has held senior management positions in companies within the ornamental fish industry, and worked on consultancy projects for various industry, NGO and government groups in Australia, the Caribbean, and SE Asia. Shane has also lectured at the Australian Maritime College and University of Tasmania in aquaculture including biosecurity, fish health management and intensive aquaculture production technology. Shane is the Managing Director of National Aquaculture Training Institute Pty Ltd (NATI), which offers training and consulting services for the aquaculture and ornamental fish industry, and also is the current President of Ornamental Fish International and a Visiting Professor at Shanghai Ocean University.

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