Calysta named Lori Giver as chief science and sustainability officer. Giver first joined Calysta in 2013 as vice president, Biological Engineering, before being appointed vice president, Research and Development in 2019. In her new role, Lori will join the executive team and will play a key role in fulfilling Calysta’s ongoing commitment to the highest levels of sustainability.
Welcoming Lori into her new role, Calysta’s president, CEO and co-founder, Alan Shaw, said that “this is a very important appointment for Calysta. Lori has played a pivotal role in our story so far and takes up this new position at a very exciting time for the business, with our first commercial-scale production facility to open in China later this year.
Like Shaw, Giver came to Calysta from Codexis, where she held a number of positions including vice president of Systems Biology, senior director of Technology and Innovation, and manager of Market Development. Lori completed post-doctoral studies with 2018 Nobel Prize for Chemistry winner, Frances Arnold. She is an author on numerous scientific publications and over 50 patents and patent applications.
“Calysta’s mission is to make more from less and I am passionate about fulfilling that ambition, which is why this new role is so exciting,” said Giver. “By 2050 there will be two billion more people to feed on planet earth, but many of our existing food production techniques are unsustainable. The status quo cannot continue. We must strive to produce lower-impact foods and feeds if we are to meet global demand. Calysta has a big role to play in addressing this and I will be working hard to improve our sustainability profile even further for current and future products from our proprietary fermentation platform.”
Calysta is developing a family of natural, sustainable and traceable feed ingredients for fish, livestock and pets, produced by fermenting natural gas with naturally occurring bacteria. It requires no arable land, uses no plant or animal matter in its production and uses very little water, supporting global food security and helping feed an increasing population in a sustainable way. The first of these products, FeedKind® protein, is tailored for the aquaculture and livestock markets.
Calysta’s 50/50 joint venture with Adisseo, Calysseo, is in the process of building the world’s first FeedKind commercial production facility in Chongqing, China, with 20,000 tons to come onto the market this year, increasing to 80,000 tons shortly thereafter.
