Our Board of Directors

Geoffrey Duyk — Partner, Managing Director of TPG Biotech, Chairperson Elevance Board of Directors

Prior to joining TPG in 2004, Dr. Duyk served on the Board of Directors and was President of Research and Development at Exelixis where he led a 550+ person group focused on the discovery and development of small molecule therapeutics. Prior to Exelixis, he was one of the founding scientific staff at Millennium Pharmaceuticals. As Vice President of Genomics at Millennium, Geoff was responsible for building and leading the informatics, automation, DNA sequencing and genotyping groups as well as the mouse and human genetics group. Prior to his tenure at Millennium, Dr. Duyk was an Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School (HMS) in the Department of Genetics, and an Assistant Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). While at HMS, Dr. Duyk was a Co-Principal Investigator in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded Cooperative Human Linkage Center. Dr. Duyk has been and continues to be a member of numerous NIH panels and oversight committees focused on the planning and execution of the Human Genome Project.

Dr. Duyk holds a PhD and MD from Case Western Reserve University. He completed his medical and fellowship training at the University of California, San Francisco. While at UCSF, Dr. Duyk was a fellow of the Lucille P. Markey Foundation and was awarded a post-doctoral fellowship from HHMI.

Dr. Duyk serves on the Board of Directors of Replidyne, Macrogenics, Aerie, FoldRx, Amyris, Galleon, Moksha8, ShangPharma, Agria, Elevance and JCR.

Dr. Duyk is a council member of the National Human Genome Research Institute at NIH. He also serves on the Scientific Advisory Boards of the NHGRI DNA Sequencing Advisory Panel, Chair of the KOMP (Global Mouse TKO project), ESC (Expressed Sequenced Consortium), Co-Chair Advisory Panel Cancer Genome Anatomy Project, Program in Genomics Applications (NHBLI); the Bioethics Advisory Group at Case Western Reserve University; the Spinal Muscular Atrophy Foundation; WIL Laboratories; VLST; and FoldRx.

Dr. Duyk is a former member of the Board of Directors of Avidia, recently sold to Amgen.

K’Lynne Johnson — CEO of Elevance Renewable Sciences Inc.

K’Lynne has worked in the oil and petrochemicals industry over 19 years for Amoco, BP and Innovene. During this time she has held a variety of roles in general business management, e-commerce, supply chain optimization, HR management, strategy development, leadership development, and organizational design and effectiveness. Prior to her current role as CEO of Elevance, K’Lynne was Senior Vice President of the Global Derivatives operating company within Innovene. Her responsibilities included P&L accountability for multiple global commodity and specialty chemicals businesses with revenues of $3 billion and 1,100 employees across North America, Europe and Asia. The Global Derivatives business was one of three operating companies within Innovene, one of world’s largest global petrochemical and refining companies with 2005 revenues of $26 billion and 8,200 employees. K’Lynne has a master’s degree in organizational behavior from Brigham Young University’s Marriott School of Management and a BS in organizational psychology.

Robert Frost — Partner, Naxos UK

Robert is a Partner with Naxos UK and prior to joining Naxos, he was a Managing Director in charge of the London office of Allianz Capital Partners GmbH and instrumental in the development of its private equity, mezzanine and infrastructure activities. Prior to this, Robert was part of the founding team of Nikko Principal Investments Limited and was part of the original Nomura Principal Finance Group. Robert has an MBA from the London Business School, more than 15 years of private equity experience and has board level responsibility with several companies internationally.

Véronique Hervouet — Senior Vice President, Investments, Total Energy Ventures

Leveraging on more than twenty years of experience in the oil and gas industry for Elf and Total, with responsibilities in the areas of business (petrochemicals and technical polymers), strategy (chemicals) and R&D (exploration and production, refining and marketing), Véronique has been actively shaping the corporate venturing activity of Total, initiated in 2008.

She currently serves on the board of Gevo, on the Steering Committee of the Bioenergy Program of the French National Research Agency and on the Advisory Board of Demeter, a European Cleantech Fund. She is chairing the Steering Committee of the European Biofuels Technology Platform.

Véronique Hervouet is a graduate Engineer from Ecole Centrale de Lyon (France) and holds a Master of Science in Materials Science and Engineering from Cornell University.

William E. McGlashan Jr. — Managing Partner of TPG Growth

Bill is a founding Partner of TPG Growth, the growth equity and smaller buyout investment platform of TPG, the global private investment firm. With more than $2 billion under management, TPG Growth targets investments in technology, life sciences, renewables and consumer companies utilizing growth equity, public equity and leveraged buyout structures.

Prior to joining TPG in 2004, Bill was the Chairman and CEO of Critical Path (NASDAQ: CPTH). He joined Critical Path in April of 2001 to undertake a major financial and operational restructuring of the company.

Previously, he co-founded and served as Chief Executive Officer of Vectis Group, a venture corporation that capitalized and built companies in emerging markets, in partnership with leading U.S. technology businesses.

Bill also co-founded and served as President of Pharmanex Inc., a leading phyto-pharmaceutical and dietary supplement company with annual sales of approximately $500 million in 20 countries and significant operations in the People’s Republic of China. The company was sold to NSE (NYSE: NUS) in 1999. Prior to Pharmanex, he was a senior associate with Bain Capital and Information Partners.

Bill earned a BA with honors from Yale University and an MBA from the Stanford Graduate School of Business. He is a member of Young Presidents’ Organization in the San Francisco Barbary Coast chapter, and serves on the Advisory Council for the Yale School of Management as well as the Boards of XOJet, David’s Bridal, AgraQuest, SuccessFactors, Elevance, the Bay Area Discovery Museum and Backroads.

Carole Piwnica — Director, Naxos UK

Carole Piwnica is the Founding Director of Naxos UK. A member of the bar of New York and of Paris, she has practiced law in the US and France, specializing in mergers and acquisitions. Thereafter, she has spent fifteen years in various senior management roles in food and drinks and agricultural processing, including as Chairman of the Amylum Group and Vice Chairman and Director of Tate & Lyle. She also holds a number of independent board positions, including Aviva plc, Louis Delhaize, Eutelsat and Sanofi-Aventis.

Robert B. Shapiro — Managing Director, Sandbox Industries

Robert is Co-Founder and Managing Director of Sandbox Industries, a development firm that creates, launches and manages new business concepts. Sandbox Industries also manages venture funds, including the BlueCross BlueShield Venture Partners fund.

He was formerly Chairman and CEO of Monsanto Company. Upon the merger of Monsanto with Pharmacia & Upjohn, he served as Chairman of the newly-formed Pharmacia Corporation.

Previously, Robert was President of Monsanto’s Agriculture Group, Chairman and CEO of The NutraSweet Company, a subsidiary of Monsanto, and President of the NutraSweet Group of G.D. Searle & Co., where he previously served as Vice President and General Counsel. Before joining Searle, Robert was Vice President and General Counsel of General Instrument Corporation. Prior to this, he practiced law in New York City; served in government as Special Assistant to the General Counsel and later to the Undersecretary of the U.S Department of Transportation; and served as a professor of law at Northeastern University in Boston and the University of Wisconsin in Madison.

Robert has served on the boards of the New York Stock Exchange (later NYSE Euronext), Citigroup Inc., Rockwell International, Silicon Graphics Inc., and Sequus Pharmaceuticals. He currently serves as a director of Theranos Inc., Darkstrand Inc., Sapphire Energy Inc., and Elevance Renewable Sciences.

He has also served on the President’s Advisory Committee on Trade Policy, and on the White House Domestic Policy Review of Industrial Innovation. He is a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Robert is a 1959 graduate of Harvard College and holds a JD from Columbia University School of Law.

Mark Tomkins — formerly of Innovene USA LLC

Mark Tomkins has served as the senior financial officer at several large companies. He was Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Innovene, a petroleum refining and chemical polymer business and subsidiary of BP, from May 2005 to January 2006, when Innovene was sold to a strategic buyer. From 2001 to 2005 he was Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Vulcan Materials Company, a publicly traded construction materials and chemicals company. From 1998 to 2001, Mark was Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Chemtura Corporation (formerly Great Lakes Chemical Corporation), a publicly traded specialty chemicals company. From 1996 to 1998, he was Vice President of Finance and Business Development for the polymers division, and Vice President of Finance and Business Development for the electronic materials division of Honeywell Corporation. From 1990 to 1996, Mark worked at Monsanto Company in various management level finance and accounting positions, including Chief Financial Officer of the growth enterprises division.

Mark received a BS in business, with majors in finance and management, and an MBA from Eastern Illinois University. Mark is a CPA, and a director of W.R. Grace & Co., and CVR Energy Inc.

W.D. (Don) Johnson–Retired DuPont Senior Vice President

Johnson served as DuPontʼs senior vice president of human resources and as a member of the office of the CEO from 2008 until his retirement in December 2010.

Johnson served at DuPont in various international and domestic leadership roles for 36 years before his retirement in December 2010. As group vice president for global operations and engineering, he was responsible for all DuPont manufacturing and engineering after leading DuPont’s global Nylon business.

As vice president and general manager, Johnson led DuPont’s Global Kevlar® and Nomex® business. He also guided DuPontʼs Japanese wholly owned and joint venture businesses.  Earlier in his career, he led DuPontʼs European Kevlar®, Tyvek®, Sontara® and Typar® businesses.

Johnson currently serves on the Board of Directors for Christiana Care Health Systems, the leading provider of health systems in Delaware.

Johnson received a Bachelor of Science degree in applied mathematics and Master of Science and PhD in mechanical engineering and fluid mechanics from North Carolina State University.