Join us in 2023
Unlock the secret to scaling new food products that capitalize on trends like alternative protein; cleaner ingredients; food as medicine and sustainability. Build key partnerships and collaborations to ensure you leave your mark on our food system and be part of the revolution for a healthier, more sustainable planet.
Download Agenda
Advisory Board

Mukesh Kasargode

Greg Hocking

Maureen Rinkunas

Chuck Templeton

Andrew Ive

Celeste Holz-Schietinger
Selection Committee
Gwen is a Partner on the Investment Team at Khosla Ventures.
She was previously a Partner at IndieBio/SOSV covering bio and AI. Prior to IndieBio, Gwen was the founder and Managing Partner of Galapagos Ventures, an early stage venture fund focused on the intersection of biology and AI/ML. She was an early investor in SyntheX, Intrinsic Medicine, and Huue. Prior to Galapagos Ventures, she was a Director at StudioX (machine learning venture studio funded by Shell and Boston Consulting Group) and a Venture Partner at Fusion Fund (early stage fund focused on AI/ML, robotics and devices). Gwen was on the Board of Advisors at Singularity University Ventures, an impact-focused accelerator, and helped launch their first batch of startups in the Nordics.
Prior to venture, Gwen spent eighteen years on Wall Street investing in public equities, started her career at Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and was promoted to portfolio manager at a $300 million innovation-themed hedge fund.
Gwen is the author of a chapter in a Physics textbook on lasers, second author on two publications in immuno-oncology, and co-owner of a patent on magnetic resonance. She currently sits on the Advisory Board of the Yale University School of Medicine.
Gwen received her bachelor’s degree in economics (math track) with a minor in computer science electrical engineering from Yale University. She received her MBA from the University of Chicago. Gwen also spent two years at UCSF researching immunotherapy for glioblastomas, and was second author on two publications.

Gwen Cheni
Gwen is a Partner on the Investment Team at Khosla Ventures.
She was previously a Partner at IndieBio/SOSV covering bio and AI. Prior to IndieBio, Gwen was the founder and Managing Partner of Galapagos Ventures, an early stage venture fund focused on the intersection of biology and AI/ML. She was an early investor in SyntheX, Intrinsic Medicine, and Huue. Prior to Galapagos Ventures, she was a Director at StudioX (machine learning venture studio funded by Shell and Boston Consulting Group) and a Venture Partner at Fusion Fund (early stage fund focused on AI/ML, robotics and devices). Gwen was on the Board of Advisors at Singularity University Ventures, an impact-focused accelerator, and helped launch their first batch of startups in the Nordics.
Prior to venture, Gwen spent eighteen years on Wall Street investing in public equities, started her career at Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and was promoted to portfolio manager at a $300 million innovation-themed hedge fund.
Gwen is the author of a chapter in a Physics textbook on lasers, second author on two publications in immuno-oncology, and co-owner of a patent on magnetic resonance. She currently sits on the Advisory Board of the Yale University School of Medicine.
Gwen received her bachelor’s degree in economics (math track) with a minor in computer science electrical engineering from Yale University. She received her MBA from the University of Chicago. Gwen also spent two years at UCSF researching immunotherapy for glioblastomas, and was second author on two publications.

Rahul Ray

Ephraim Lindenbaum
Sarah Williams is a Partner at Rich Products Corporate Venture Fund. Sarah has spent the past 25 years working with food companies as an operator, consultant and investor. In 2003, she was the first hire at f’real foods, a frozen blended beverage company, and held several key leadership roles while building the business from start-up through growth to a successful acquisition by Rich Products in 2012. After a transition period, Sarah worked with the founding team of Food System 6 accelerator to stand-up and run its first entrepreneur cohort focused on health, equity and sustainability in the food system. In 2017, she returned to Rich Products to join the newly established Rich products Corporate Venture Fund. Sarah has an MBA from Duke University and a BA from Princeton University.

Sarah Williams
Sarah Williams is a Partner at Rich Products Corporate Venture Fund. Sarah has spent the past 25 years working with food companies as an operator, consultant and investor. In 2003, she was the first hire at f’real foods, a frozen blended beverage company, and held several key leadership roles while building the business from start-up through growth to a successful acquisition by Rich Products in 2012. After a transition period, Sarah worked with the founding team of Food System 6 accelerator to stand-up and run its first entrepreneur cohort focused on health, equity and sustainability in the food system. In 2017, she returned to Rich Products to join the newly established Rich products Corporate Venture Fund. Sarah has an MBA from Duke University and a BA from Princeton University.

Ashley Hartman

Melissa Gordon

Roxanne Tully

Nate Crosser
Past Attendees
2023 Innovation Showcase
Our Innovation Showcase is back!
Focused on highlighting disruptive emerging innovations within the food sector, eight applicants will be hand-picked by our Selection Committee, and benefit from presenting in front of our audience of industry leaders and investors.
Applicants can relate to any aspect of Function Ingredients, Alternative Animal Products, Biotech, Fermentation, Enabling Tech, Sustainable Ingredients and/or Products. Eight of these applicants will then be selected by our Selection Committee members to present their company and products at the Summit, followed by a live Q&A from both our investor panel and audience.
Following the showcase, audience members will select their favorite start-up in a live vote, and the winner of the Food Innovation & Investment Summit showcase will be crowned ‘Audience Choice Winner’.
We're very excited to announce that the Audience Choice Winner will receive a 5-hour consultation session with Christopher Bryant who leads the ECP Living Lab research, courtesy of EC Program. The runner-up will receive a 3-hour consultation session.
Application Deadline: March 31, 2023
Apply Now
OUR INDUSTRY LEADING SPEAKER FACULTY

Craig Wilson

Greg McParland

Gwen Cheni
Gwen is a Partner on the Investment Team at Khosla Ventures.
She was previously a Partner at IndieBio/SOSV covering bio and AI. Prior to IndieBio, Gwen was the founder and Managing Partner of Galapagos Ventures, an early stage venture fund focused on the intersection of biology and AI/ML. She was an early investor in SyntheX, Intrinsic Medicine, and Huue. Prior to Galapagos Ventures, she was a Director at StudioX (machine learning venture studio funded by Shell and Boston Consulting Group) and a Venture Partner at Fusion Fund (early stage fund focused on AI/ML, robotics and devices). Gwen was on the Board of Advisors at Singularity University Ventures, an impact-focused accelerator, and helped launch their first batch of startups in the Nordics.
Prior to venture, Gwen spent eighteen years on Wall Street investing in public equities, started her career at Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, and was promoted to portfolio manager at a $300 million innovation-themed hedge fund.
Gwen is the author of a chapter in a Physics textbook on lasers, second author on two publications in immuno-oncology, and co-owner of a patent on magnetic resonance. She currently sits on the Advisory Board of the Yale University School of Medicine.
Gwen received her bachelor’s degree in economics (math track) with a minor in computer science electrical engineering from Yale University. She received her MBA from the University of Chicago. Gwen also spent two years at UCSF researching immunotherapy for glioblastomas, and was second author on two publications.

Abigail Storms

David Tze

Claire Schlemme
Claire Schlemme is an ardent environmentalist who saw a need to fix a broken food system in order to protect the planet. Claire’s lifelong interest in food and nature began to intertwine when she was diagnosed with cancer in her early 20s. This experience made her passionate about understanding the links between food and health, both of our environment and our own bodies. She co-founded Boston’s first organic juice company with the aim to connect local farmers and city-dwellers through nutritious and delicious foods. This experience exposed her to two primary challenges: food waste and the lack of affordable nutrition. Committed to finding solutions at the intersection of food, sustainability, and accessible nutrition, Claire launched Renewal Mill. Prior to diving into entrepreneurship, Claire was an environmental consultant at Industrial Economics, Inc. in Cambridge, MA. She holds a BA from Wellesley College and a Master of Environmental Management from Yale University.

Kat Amrhein

Veronica Fil
Veronica Fil is a former behavioral economist; an author; and the co-founder of Grounded Foods Co.-- a company that creates high-nutrition dairy alternatives from one of the world's most sustainable superfoods, hemp.

Kevin Benmoussa
Kevin is currently the CFO of Aleph Farms - a food company that grows high-quality animal products that are good for people, the planet and animals. Kevin was previously Chief Financial Officer at The Vita Coco Company, where he was responsible for expanding the company’s global finance functions before leading the company’s initial public offering in 2021. Prior to that, he held numerous corporate leadership positions at Nestlé Waters North America, Inc. and PepsiCo Inc. where he drove growth and profitability through M&A, strategic alliances and business development.

Scott Tassani
Currently, as President of Meati Foods, a Boulder, Colorado start-up and innovator in alternative protein solutions, Scott is spearheading a growth strategy to achieve $1B in net sales by 2025. His fundraising impact led Meati to convert a $150M Series C and more than double the company's market valuation.
Tassani previously served for nearly 30 years at The Pillsbury Company and General Mills, where in his last five years, he was the President and Chief Customer Officer for the brand’s $11 billion North America business. During his tenure with General Mills, he delivered winning strategies and premier commercial execution for leading consumer brands, including Cheerios, Annie’s, Yoplait and Nature Valley.

Andy Kleitsch

Sarah Williams
Sarah Williams is a Partner at Rich Products Corporate Venture Fund. Sarah has spent the past 25 years working with food companies as an operator, consultant and investor. In 2003, she was the first hire at f’real foods, a frozen blended beverage company, and held several key leadership roles while building the business from start-up through growth to a successful acquisition by Rich Products in 2012. After a transition period, Sarah worked with the founding team of Food System 6 accelerator to stand-up and run its first entrepreneur cohort focused on health, equity and sustainability in the food system. In 2017, she returned to Rich Products to join the newly established Rich products Corporate Venture Fund. Sarah has an MBA from Duke University and a BA from Princeton University.

Rahul Ray

Alyon Steinhart
Aylon Steinhart is the co-founder and CEO at Eclipse Foods, a startup on a mission to create a more sustainable, healthy, and humane food system. Eclipse is building the future of dairy using micelles (the microscopic "magic" of milk) to create plant-based products that are indistinguishable from conventional dairy in taste, texture, and functionality. Eclipse has raised over $60M from investors including Y Combinator, the chairman of Beyond Meat, and the founder of Reddit, and has launched the first-ever plant-based milkshake offered at a national restaurant chain (Smashburger).
Prior to founding Eclipse, Aylon worked at the Good Food Institute, the leading non-profit in alternative proteins. There, he incubated dozens of startups and advised investors and strategic partners including Kraft Heinz, Kellogg's, and more on the alternative protein space.

Scott Hine
Scott Hine has over 30 years of experience in the consumer, agriculture and consulting industries. Before joining The EVERY Company, Scott held a variety of roles in leading organizations including Kraft Foods, Accenture and Novus International, where he was Chief Innovation Officer, VP of Global Operations, and VP of Products and Solutions. His life and expertise span four continents and include leadership of global growth, diversification, M&A and EBITDA improvement. Scott holds a bachelor’s of science in Chemical Engineering from the University of Michigan and an MBA from the Ivey Business School at Western University in Hong Kong.

Celeste Holz-Schietinger

Mukesh Kasargode

Irina Gerry
Irina is a purpose-driven entrepreneur and marketing leader, on a mission to transform the food system and drive widespread adoption of sustainable ways to feed the world. She is a Chief Marketing Officer at Change Foods, a precision fermentation food tech company, creating animal-free dairy products.
Prior to joining Change Foods, Irina spent 5 years working on two of the largest plant-based food and beverage brands, Silk and So Delicious. Irina has over a decade of experience in consumer marketing space with global giants, Procter & Gamble and Danone, as well as business strategy and operations with Deloitte. Irina holds an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Greg Hocking

Christina Khoo
Christina is the Director of Emerging Science, Nutrition and Regulatory Affairs, Ocean Spray Cranberries. She leads a team responsible for providing scientific substantiation for the development of functional health products and regulatory guidance for messaging and claims. During her tenure, Christina successfully obtained the first FDA qualified health claim for a food (cranberry) to help reduce an acute urinary tract infection, as well as novel foods and GRAS approvals. Christina also leads the emerging science team, spearheading several projects with start-up companies, evaluating technologies from farm to fork to help accelerate innovation and sustainability initiatives.
As an influencer, she has taken on roles in cross sector initiatives. She is Chair of the IAFNS Bioactives committee and the Cognitive Health working group. She serves as Treasurer of the National Berry Crops Alliance board and Vice Chair of the Juice Products Assn Board. Christina participates actively in the National Academy of Science, Engineering and Medicine Food Forum as well as the Tufts Friedman School Food and Nutrition Innovation Institute as the co-chair of the Food is Medicine working group, where she collaborates with cross sector partners to work on important food and nutrition issues.
Christina received her doctorate at the Food Science and Human Nutrition Department, University of Florida and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard School of Public Health.

Barb Stuckey
Barb has been at Mattson since 1997 and is currently Chief Innovation &
Marketing Officer at North America’s most successful independent developer of
foods and beverages for the retail food and chain restaurant industries. Barb is
known as a taste, food trend, innovation, consumer insights, and product
development expert.
As part of Barb’s role in the innovation projects that make up her daily job, she is
required to taste food and figure out how to make it better. After more than 2
decades doing this, she’s honed her tasting skills and ability to help others make
food taste better. She shared this insight with the world in 2012 when her book
Taste What You’re Missing was published. In 2013, the paperback edition was
released (under the simplified title Taste).
Barb was instrumental in helping The San Francisco Cooking School integrate
the science of taste into their curriculum. She now teaches the Fundamentals of
Taste to each entering class. Barb is also a contributor to Forbes.com where she
writes about the food industry.
Barb lives with her hypertaster husband, two artisan cats, and splits her time
between San Francisco and Healdsburg, in the heart of Sonona wine country.

Nate Crosser

Samah Garringer

Audrey Gyr
Audrey is a Startup Innovation Specialist at the Good Food Institute (GFI), an international nonprofit focused on creating a healthy, just, and sustainable food system through plant-based, fermentation-derived, and cultivated protein innovation. She consults with alternative protein startups on all areas of building a business including fundraising, commercialization, and go-to-market strategy. Audrey manages GFI’s Business of Alt Protein Seminar series and was the author of the 2021 State of the Industry Report on Fermentation. Audrey holds a B.S. in Animal Sciences and Development Sociology from Cornell University. She joined GFI after several years of working at transformative organizations in the fields of financial technology, sustainable agriculture, and higher education.

Rachel Yarcony
Strong leadership with 20 years of hands-on experience, managing companies, leading strategic processes, sales and marketing of products in Food & Pharmaceuticals industries.
Rachel was V.P. Marketing at Teva pharmaceuticals, VP Business development at Tambour, Business Manager at Nestle and Marketing Manager at Strauss group.
Rachel has proven success in bringing new products and breaking-through innovations to fruition in leading companies in highly competitive industries.
Rachel is a Grand EFFI Winner, for the effective marketing activity of the year 2012 – Nestle, the launch of a new snacks category “Shtuchim pretzels”.
Rachels holds B.A. in Psychology & Communication from Tel-Aviv University and MBA (with honors) from ESG in France.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/rachelyg/?originalSubdomain=il
In 2019 Rachel founded myAir food-tech, a personalized functional food company specializing in stress management.
myAir develops stress-relief nutrition backed with machine learning technology for deep personal profiling, offering a long-term personal stress management routine.
In a world where we manage our diet and sports, we must start managing our stress. Stress is the epidemic of our era, and personal nutrition is part of the solution.

Scott Romano
Download Agenda
Our agenda is now available to download! Discover brand new speakers, sessions, and discussions today...
Download Agenda
2023 Partners
Founding Partner
Botrista Technology
Website: https://www.botrista.co/
A 2022 Kitchen Innovation Award winner, Botrista provides beverage solutions to foodservice operators by leveraging easy-to-use equipment (the DrinkBot) alongside a line of pre-packaged ingredients to deliver a variety of craft beverages, including infused teas & lattes, flavored lemonades, iced coffees and more! Operators can now offer high margin items without the complexity or investment in a full bar. Our system takes up just 5-sq ft and enables customizable drink recipes at the touch of a button. We automate the portioning, dispensing and mixing process to deliver a fresh and consistently blended product in under 20 seconds.
Media Partner
Just Food
Website: https://www.just-food.com/just-food-magazine/
Just Food, the digital magazine from the team behind leading food industry website just-food.com, brings you the latest food industry news, analysis, interviews and exclusive data. Taking an in-depth look at consumer and market trends, as well as developments in products and ingredients, this magazine is essential reading for decision-makers and buyers in the food industry. The Just Food digital magazine is published bi-monthly and free to read online in the web browser of any device – whether you’re on a desktop, tablet or mobile phone.
What is Cultivated Meat?
Website: https://www.whatiscultivatedmeat.com/
WhatIsCultivatedMeat.com is an initiative of the Educated Choices Program, a nonprofit organization that provides educational programming on food systems to classrooms and communities worldwide. This comprehensive, evidence-based resource explores the science of cellular agriculture and cultivated meat, answering the most frequently asked questions by teachers, students, and the public.
Protein Report
Website: https://www.proteinreport.org
Protein Report is the digital publication and industry platform dedicated to advancing the world’s understanding of protein – the business, science, and culture of how protein is produced, distributed, and consumed. It is the only publication entirely dedicated to protein, and the only information resource committed to facilitating an inclusive dialogue around protein industry challenges and solutions among stakeholders from all sectors and backgrounds. Established in 2018, Protein Report serves a diverse global readership of scientists, startup founders, food industry professionals, agriculturalists, investors, researchers, policy makers, consumers, and other stakeholders with an interest in protein, food, agriculture, and science.
New Protein
Website: https://www.newprotein.net/
newprotein.net is a new on-line resource for food technologists worldwide tasked with the challenge of formulating foods and beverages using alternative sources of protein. Find the right products for your new product development projects using our specially designed search functions.
To keep up-to-date with the latest alternative protein news get our free weekly newsletter which includes updates on products, services, webinars, training courses and conferences.
Partner With Us
Based on your objectives, we can create bespoke packages designed specifically for you – from presenting your expertise on the main stage, to hosting a private dinner. You can partner with us showcase your brand and make valuable new connections. Opportunities predominantly lie in 3 main categories: Thought Leadership, Branding & Networking.
To discuss your objectives and partnership opportunities please contact [email protected]
Interested in a media partnership?
We'd love to hear from you and how we can support one another to connect with the industry. Contact [email protected]
REGISTER
Sending Your Team? Group Discounts Available!
Applicable for Primary Market, Service Provider and Industry Rates Only. Not available for Academic or ‘Start-Up’ rates
Book a Team of 3+ - Save an Additional 10% Off
Book a Team of 5+ - Save an Additional 15% Off
If you would like to register a team of 3 or more, please email [email protected] for your discount coupon code before registering. PLEASE NOTE: Discounts cannot be combined with Early Bird Pricing or any other discount or offer. If you have any questions about your registration, please call us on +44 (0)20 3696 2920
Ticket price will increase in
About Kisaco Research
Kisaco Research produces, designs and hosts B2B industry conferences, exhibitions and communities – focused on a specialized selection of topic areas.
Meet industry peers that will help build a career-changing network for life.
Learn from the mistakes of your peers as much as their successes—ambitious industry stalwarts who are happy to share not just what has made them successful so far but also their plans for future proofing their companies.
Note down the inspired insight that will form the foundation for future strategies and roadmaps, both at our events and through our online communities.
Invest both in your company growth and your own personal development by signing up to one of our events and get started.