Food and Beverage M&A Angel (Individual) Investors

The following is a list of angel investors specializing in the food and beverage industry:

Alicia Robb

  • Angel Investor: Alicia Robb
  • About: Alicia is an author, researcher, angel investor, and managing partner of two early stage venture funds. She is also a Ph.D. economist specializing in entrepreneurship, entrepreneurial finance, and international development.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Cruelty Free Investing – Research Director
      • For investors who want to align their values with their investing, their website provides an easy way to determine if a company exploits animals.
    • Next Wave Impact – Founder and CEO
      • Increases diversity in early stage investing and high-growth entrepreneurship. It is a global movement to increase women’s participation in angel investing as an asset class. It aims to provide an enriching investment experience, including an investment portfolio in start-ups, education on the investment process, and developing a global angel community of successful businesswomen across the United States, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Asia, and Latin America.
    • SheEO – Activator
      • A global initiative focused on building an innovative new model to finance, support, and celebrate female entrepreneurs.
  • Location: Glenwood Springs, Colorado
  • Contact Information:
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Ashley Hartman

  • Angel Investor: Ashley Hartman
  • About: Ashley starts a meeting with first principles but ensures it ends with a clear plan. She’ll ask tough, clarifying questions to address client challenges and find a solution. Ashley honed these skills through running and scaling her family’s business, financial consulting, and toughing it out at Harvard to earn her MBA. She was vegan before it was cool and is the health and wellness enthusiast on the team, endlessly focused on optimizing habits for peak performance.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Bluestein Ventures – Managing Partner
      • A venture capital fund that invests in the future of food. It looks for game-changing ventures across the food industry that redefine how consumers achieve their health and wellness.
    • Food Foundry – Mentor
      • Supports, connects, and propels innovative start-ups that are reimagining the food industry. It is a Chicago-based growth accelerator program by foodservice innovation hub Relish Works in partnership with food distributor Gordon Food Service and food tech innovation lab 1871.
    • Naturally Chicago – Board Member
      • This locally made program is a groundbreaking initiative to connect Illinois retailers with the region’s emerging and top-performing brands. It is open to all Naturally Chicago brand partners with a particular focus on early stage black, indigenous, and other people of color-owned and women-owned companies. Its mission is to help natural product entrepreneurs increase sales, create jobs, and thrive in the competitive retail grocery segment.
  • Location: Greater Chicago Area
  • Contact Information:
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B. Craig Hutson

  • Angel Investor: B. Craig Hutson
  • About: B. Craig Hutson is an angel investor and entrepreneur with CFO start-up experience, consumer packaged goods/food and beverage sector expertise, and broad finance background. He is passionate about conducting diligence on early stage investment opportunities. As a co-founder of a start-up, B. Craig understands the challenges founders face daily around capital, resources, and time. He mentors consumer packaged goods brands primarily in the “better for you” food and beverage segment.
  • Company Affiliated With:
    • Towerview Ventures – Investment Committee Member
      • A network-powered venture capital with fellow Duke University alums.
  • Location: Wilmette, Illinois
  • Contact Information:

Beatriz Franco

  • Angel Investor: Beatriz Franco
  • About: Beatriz Franco is a managing partner at Vita Vera Ventures, an early stage fund supporting innovations across the food industry while reducing global demands. Beatriz is also a lead investor at Portfolia’s Food and AgTech fund, an angel investor, and an advisor.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Portfolia – Partner
      • Its Food and AgTech Fund invests in tech-driven companies to improve how America’s food is created, produced, packaged, delivered, and shared.
    • Vita Vera Ventures – Managing Partner
      • Invests in early stage food tech innovators who are solving the challenges of the food system. It applies industry-leading insights, personal passion, diverse viewpoints, and a robust network to help support a more sustainable, resilient, and healthy food system.
  • Location: New York, New York
  • Contact Information:
  • Resources:
    • How this former lawyer, banker and AgTech CEO became one of the most sought-after angel investors

Craig Goos

  • Angel Investor: Craig Goos
  • About: An experienced financial services executive and manager of high-growth businesses, Craig knows that rapid growth flows from a business that seamlessly integrates operations with sales, marketing, and technology.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Addita Advisors – Managing Partner
      • A strategic advisory firm focused on business development, client relationship management, and corporate strategy.
    • iSelect Fund – Managing Director
      • An innovative venture capital firm with an investment emphasis on agriculture and food at the nexus of healthcare – nutrition, wellness, and personalized medicine technologies. It invests from seed round through to growth equity and pre-IPO.
  • Location: New York City Metropolitan Area
  • Contact Information:
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Erin Culley

  • Angel Investor: Erin Culley
  • About: Erin Culley is an impact investor who invests in start-ups that seek to take animals out of the supply chain in food, materials, and biopharma. Her secondary focus is on start-ups that aim to mitigate climate change, particularly sustainable alternatives to plastic.
  • Company Affiliated With:
    • Glass Wall Syndicate – Member and Deal Leader
      • A group of venture capitalists, foundations, trusts, non-profits, and individual investors who strive to accelerate the mainstream adoption of products and services that positively affect animals, people, and the planet.
  • Location: Los Angeles Metropolitan Area
  • Contact Information:

Eva Sommer

  • Angel Investor: Eva Sommer
  • About: Eva Sommer is an investor and entrepreneur obsessed with deep-rooted understanding and the design and creation of plant- and cell-based food.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Fermify – CEO and Founder
      • Empowers large food companies to change the world. It provides food companies with a full-service and automated B2B platform to produce casein, the main protein in milk, to amplify their alternative cheese and functional ingredient product quality, sustainability, and speed-to-scale.
    • Peace of Meat – Co-Founder and CPO
      • Developers of a method to produce lab-grown meat from real animal cells that is healthy and nutritious, yet more ethical, hygienic, and sustainable.
    • RIP – Advisor
      • Produces animal-free Asian street food.
    • Unicorn Biotechnologies – Advisor
      • Building next-gen cell culture manufacturing systems to make developing and manufacturing living cell-based products faster and more efficient.
  • Location: Vienna, Austria
  • Contact Information:

Heather Henyon

  • Angel Investor: Heather Henyon
  • About: Heather Henyon has over 18 years of experience in entrepreneurship, emerging markets, angel investing, financial technology, credit, and impact investment.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Dubai Angel Investors – Founding Member, Board Director, and Investment Committee Member
      • A member-led micro venture capital firm of more than 100 like-minded investors, it invests in the seed and Series A rounds of early stage technology companies with high growth potential and typically deploys between $100,000 to $250,000 in the companies it invests in.
    • Mindshift Capital – Founding Partner
      • Focuses on post-seed, early stage companies in the United States, Europe, and the Middle East with gender in mind, ensuring diversity of thought while narrowing the funding gap for female-led ventures.
    • Next Wave Ventures – Investment Committee Member
      • A seed to early stage venture capital firm focused on commercializing university research and advanced technologies.
    • SEKEM Group – Member of the Board of Directors
      • Aims to develop the individual, society and environment through a holistic approach that integrates ecology, economy, societal, and cultural life
    • WAIN – Women’s Angel Investor Network – Founder and Director
      • An investor network for women in the Middle East and North Africa comprised of an ecosystem of women investors who support women entrepreneurs in the Arab world.
  • Location: United Arab Emirates
  • Contact Information:
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Janine Firpo

  • Angel Investor: Janine Firpo
  • About: Janine Firpo is a writer, angel investor, impact investor, and social entrepreneur who has been on a mission to invest her money to align with her values. In partnership with financial experts, she authored Activate Your Money, to help readers transform their relationship with money and break taboos related to women and financial empowerment. She also co-founded Invest for Better, which offers peer-led investing circles.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Invest for Better – Co-Founder
      • A nonprofit campaign that provides resources for women to become effective impact investors.
    • Next Wave Impact – Lead Investor
      • Increases diversity in early stage investing and high-growth entrepreneurship via a global movement to increase women’s participation in angel investing as an asset class. Next Wave provides an enriching investment experience, including an investment portfolio in start-ups, investment education, and the creation of a global angel community of successful businesswomen across the U.S, Europe, Africa, Middle East, Asia, and Latin America.
    • Women with Capital – Instructor
      • A learning community focused on educating and supporting socially progressive women in the many ways to use their wealth for good.
    • Zebras Unite – Board Member
      • A founder-led, cooperatively owned movement for and by founders, investors, thought leaders, and practitioners for creating the culture, capital, and community for people building businesses that are better for the world.
  • Location: Oakland, California
  • Contact Information:
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Jodi Pederson

  • Angel Investor: Jodi Pederson
  • About: Jodi Pederson works in impact and change consulting, angel impact investing, and non-profit advising to create positive transformation by empowering youth and female investors and entrepreneurs. She strives to help female entrepreneurs access capital and support women in the angel investment ecosystem. Jodi is skilled in developing relationships and driving the discipline necessary to succeed across multiple industries and programs.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Amplifica Capital – Limited Partner
      • Invests in women in early stage technologically innovative companies leading the transformation toward a digital, clean, and sustainable future in Spanish-speaking Latin America to generate excellent returns.
    • Cartier Women’s Initiative – Global Programs
      • An annual, international entrepreneurship program that aims to drive change by empowering women impact entrepreneurs.
    • Kachuwa Impact Fund – Limited Partner
      • An investment cooperative and public benefit corporation focused on owning and operating “impact real estate” and investing in privately held “impact companies.”
    • Next Wave Impact – Investment Committee Member
      • Increases diversity in early stage investing and high-growth entrepreneurship via a global movement to increase women’s participation in angel investing as an asset class. Next Wave provides an enriching investment experience, including an investment portfolio in start-ups, investment education, and the creation of a global angel community of successful businesswomen across the U.S, Europe, Africa, Middle East, Asia, and Latin America.
  • Location: Wilson, Wyoming
  • Contact Information:

Loui Blake

  • Angel Investor: Loui Blake
  • About: Loui Blake is a London-based entrepreneur, public speaker, and angel investor in the plant-based sector. He opened Erpingham House, the UK’s largest vegan restaurant, before co-founding Vegan Dough Co. In 2022, he was named CEO of Miami Foods.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Dirtea – Angel Investor
      • Offers delicious mushroom teas, coffees, and blends for natural energy, focus, calm, and immunity.
    • Erpingham House – Managing Director and Founder
      • A plant-based restaurant with locations in Norwich, Brighton and Edinburgh.
    • Miami Foods – CEO and Angel Investor
      • “Plant-based made good” Miami Foods develops healthy plant-based food products for food service and retail, servicing thousands of restaurants and stores worldwide.
    • Vegan Dough Co. – Founder
      • A vegan pizza delivery brand.
  • Location: London, England, United Kingdom
  • Contact Information:
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Marcia Dawood

  • Angel Investor: Marcia Dawood
  • About: Marcia currently serves as the Chair of the Board of the Angel Capital Association (ACA), a professional society for angel investors in the U.S. and globally. She is also an investor in several early-stage private companies. In addition to her investing, Marcia is a venture partner with Mindshift Capital and a part of the investment committee for Next Wave Impact Fund.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Angel Capital Association (ACA) – Chair of the Board
      • The professional society of angel groups and private investors supporting high-growth, early-stage ventures.
    • The Angel Next Door Podcast – Podcast Host and Founder
      • A podcast that explores what happens behind the scenes of angel investing.
    • Coralus – Activator
      • Formerly SheEO, Corlus co-creates new economic and social models by distributing crowdsourced support.
    • Golden Seeds – Managing Director
      • An investment firm dedicated to delivering above-market returns through the empowerment of women entrepreneurs and the people who invest in them.
    • Mindshift Capital – Venture Partner
      • Focused on post-seed early-stage companies in the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East, they invest with a gender lens, ensuring diversity of thought while narrowing the funding gap for female-led ventures.
  • Location: Charlotte, North Carolina
  • Contact Information:
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Maximilian A. Schwarz

  • Angel Investor: Maximilian A. Schwarz
  • About: Maximilian is a first check investor in SynBio and TechBio, food, and decarbonization. He partners with purpose-driven founders in synthetic and computational biology, food tech, and industry decarbonization at the nucleus (Pre/Seed) of their journey.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Apoha – First Check Investor and Board Observer
      • A group of scientists and product specialists who build computers that can taste, smell, and feel.
    • Farmless – First Check Investor and Board Observer
      • Decouples food production from arable land by feeding microbes with green methanol to produce abundant proteins.
    • Nucleus Capital – Founder and General Partner
      • Provides the initial capital for purpose-driven entrepreneurs who solve systemic challenges to planetary health.
    • Ordinary Seafood – Founding Investor
      • Creates the next generation of delicious, sustainable seafood using biotechnology and food science.
    • Rhizocore Technologies – Investor and Board Observer
      • Enhances the climate resilience and CO2 sequestration potency of forests.
  • Location: Berlin Metropolitan Area
  • Contact Information:
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Michal Klar

  • Angel Investor: Michal Klar
  • About: With an operating and investing background, Michal backs alternative protein founders in the Asia Pacific and supports founders of plant-based, cell-based, and fermentation start-ups. His mission is to accelerate this industry to address environmental sustainability and food security.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Better Bite Ventures – Founding Partner
      • An alternative protein VC fund investing in Asia Pacific startup founders.
    • Future Food Now – Founder and Editor-In-Chief
      • Offers business news and deep dives into plant-based, cell-based, and precision fermentation in the Asia Pacific.
    • GREENEST – Investor
      • Greenest aims to contribute to building the plant-based food space in Asia by creating the next generation of plant-based meals to improve the nutrition, taste, and environmental footprint of food.
    • PHYX44 LABS – Investor
      • Created Dairy 2.0, cell-derived, nature-identical alternatives to traditional dairy products with the same taste, yet with healthier, low carbon footprints.
  • Location: New Zealand
  • Contact Information:
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Mike Keriakos

  • Angel Investor: Mike Keriakos
  • About: Mike is an entrepreneur and start-up CEO with a demonstrated history of scaling companies in diverse categories. He took everydayhealth.com from a kitchen startup to the floor of the New York Stock Exchange.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Curacity – Co-Founder and Founding CEO
      • A content measurement and monetization platform driving direct hotel bookings from premium content creators and platforms.
    • Designer Revival – Partner/Advisor to the CEO
      • A luxury vintage resale for sustainable consigning and shopping.
    • Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator – Venture Partner
      • New York’s leading technology accelerator and early-stage venture capital fund.
    • QUI Tequila – Co-Founder and Advisor to CEO/President
      • Made in small batches in the highlands of Jalisco, Mexico, each batch is aged for three and a half years in hand-selected American Whiskey and French Bordeaux barrels, giving QUI the rare “extra-añejo” designation. After aging, QUI is filtered and redistilled to create the world’s first platinum extra-añejo tequila.
    • REBBL Inc. – Founding Investor
      • Produces plant-based beverages with herbs to nourish the people and the planet.
  • Location: New York City Metropolitan Area
  • Contact Information:

Ryan Grant Little

  • Angel Investor: Ryan Grant Little
  • About: Ryan is the founder of ClimateTech and an advisor, angel investor, and podcast host.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • BioCraft – Investor
      • The leader in safe, sustainable, and cruelty-free cultured meat to replace conventionally farmed meat for pet food.
    • Juicy Marbles – Investor
      • Produces prime plant meats.
    • Marble – Investor
      • A deep tech venture studio that solves hard climate problems.
    • New School Foods – Investor
      • Whole-cut seafood, made from plants to advance the transition to a sustainable, alt-protein food system.
    • RGL Strategic – Works with start-ups, corporates, foundations, and high net-worth individuals to create and scale impact, with a focus on climate tech and capacity building.
    • Sound Funding and Another ClimateTech Podcast – Podcast Host and Founder
      • Talks with founders, activists, investors, academics, and legislators working to solve the climate crisis, lessen environmental impact, and create a better world.
  • Location: Vienna, Austria
  • Contact Information:
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Seth Bannon

  • Angel Investor: Seth Bannon
  • About: Seth Bannon is an entrepreneur and investor in early-stage impact start-ups, from a company engineering microbes to produce industrial chemicals sustainably, to a company building small satellites to cover the earth in internet, to a company culturing meat to eat – and more.
  • Company Affiliated With:
    • Fifty Years – Founding Partner
      • An early-stage VC firm based in San Francisco backed by the founders of tech company valued between $1B and $100B who want to support the next generation of entrepreneurs and founders who aim to solve the world’s biggest problems with technology.
  • Contact Information:
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Shayna Harris

  • Angel Investor: Shayna Harris
  • About: Shayna has spent her career at the intersection of food, sustainability, and innovation, driven by a deep personal belief that food is a human right that should positively impact all it touches. She connects with people authentically and personally, from the farmers she lived with and learned from in southern Mexico, Brazil, and Cote d’Ivoire, to the Mars, Oxfam, and Farmer’s Fridge boardrooms. Shayna is also a builder and now pays it forward by supporting the next generation of entrepreneurs at Supply Change Capital.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • 99 Counties – Board Observer and Investor
      • A nationwide marketplace connecting consumers to local farms to buy chemical-free, regenerative meat while empowering farmers to diversify their operations and reclaim their independence from Big Ag.
    • Aqua Cultured Foods – Board Observer and Investor
      • The developers of a technology that creates an alternative seafood option through fermentation, launching them as a first mover in the refrigerated sector as an alt seafood analog to Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods.
    • Forbes – Contributing Writer
      • A global media, branding, and technology company focusing on news and information about business, investing, technology, entrepreneurship, leadership, and affluent lifestyles.
    • PartnerSlate – Board Member and Investor
      • A leading discovery and connection platform in the consumer packaged goods (CPG) industry, connecting brands with manufacturing and packaging partners.
    • Supply Change Capital – Co-Founder and Managing Partner
      • An investor in early-stage, high-growth food tech businesses, and culture-first brands.
  • Contact Information:
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Silla Scheepens

  • Angel Investor: Silla Scheepens
  • About: Silla is a fund manager, impact and sustainable food investor, and strategic advisor with a solid strategy, marketing, and sales track record in consumer-driven environments. Driven by growth and change, she enjoys contributing to transforming the food system and the evolution of start-ups by advising on positioning, strategy development, business model canvas, go-to-market strategy, consumer target groups, branding, and communication.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Impact Fund Investments – Limited Partner, International Impact Funds
      • As an impact investor, Silla participates in funds driving positive change to food and environmental transformation.
    • New Dawn Capital – Founding Partner with Brother, Maartin Scheepens
      • An early stage investment fund focusing on plant-based food, advising on positioning, strategy and channel development, consumer target groups, branding, and communication.
    • Future Food Fund – Partner
      • A specialist food and agriculture VC fund that invests in Series A and seed companies in Western Europe to positively impact the sustainable future of food and agriculture.
  • Contact Information:
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Smoke Wallin

  • Angel Investor: Smoke Wallin
  • About: Smoke is an accomplished leader and international business builder focused on M&A in the CPG, cannabis, health and wellness, food and beverage, distribution, hospitality, and technology industries. He has served as CEO for various businesses, was involved in M&A and financing, and acquired, created, and sold over 50 brands and companies. Smoke’s primary strength is building teams and creating the conditions for success with employees, boards, investors, customers, and other stakeholders.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Adastra Holdings Ltd – Board Member
      • A leader in innovative ethnobotanical and cannabis science products.
    • Dignity Moves – Board Member
      • Reimagining scalable solutions in transitional housing for those experiencing homelessness.
    • STS Capital Partners – Managing Director and Partner
      • A global M&A firm specializing in divestitures, mergers, acquisitions, strategic consulting, and financial advisory services for mid-market private businesses.
    • Taliera – Executive Chairman
      • Smoke founded Taliera in 2006 to create, advise, incubate, acquire, and grow new and existing brands and businesses by combining his core brand-building expertise, relationships, and capabilities with leading-edge technologies and innovative business approaches.
    • Vencanna Ventures Inc. – Board of Directors
      • Aims to provide capital, liquidity, and expertise to early-stage jurisdictionally compliant cannabis initiatives, thereby providing our investors with a high-growth cannabis investment strategy.
  • Contact Information:
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Sonalie Figueiras

  • Angel Investor: Sonalie Figueiras
  • About: With the title of “Asia’s Green Queen,” Sonalie is an editor, angel investor, entrepreneur, futurist, and trend forecaster. She is also a climate and sustainability expert, food systems expert, and sustainable packaging expert.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Better Bite Ventures – Venture Partner
      • Invests in alternative protein start-ups in the Asia Pacific.
    • Food for Climate League – Advisor
      • A trailblazing, women-led nonprofit working to make climate-smart eating the norm by creating toolkits, programs, and campaigns founded in original behavioral science research to shift the perception of climate-smart eating and drive engagement.
    • Green Queen Media – Founder and Editor-in-Chief
      • An award-winning impact media platform advocating for social and environmental change, the leading sustainability news outlet in the Asian region, and a global reference for the alternative protein industry.
    • Source Green – Co-Founder and CEO
      • A climate tech SaaS and sourcing platform with proprietary software that helps brands quit using plastic and explore sustainable next-gen materials across their supply chain.
  • Contact Information:
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Stephanie Peritore

  • Angel Investor: Stephanie Peritore
  • About: Stephanie is an entrepreneurial, creative, and commercial professional, business strategist, and start-up operator and investor who thrives on innovative ventures and technology, creating disruptive brands, leading trends, and generating revenues.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Alma Angels – Angel Investor
      • A community of investors who have pledged to invest in female-founded start-ups to reduce the gender gap in tech. Members share deals, conduct due diligence in groups, and sometimes co-invest.
    • Angels Cube – Founding Member
      • Gathers value-add private investors backing European tech champions from seed to Series A, and beyond. We have backed some of the most successful European start-ups and regularly co-invest with the best VCs in Europe.
    • Kelp Ventures – Managing Partner
      • Focuses on impact and environment, social, and governance (ESG) investing. An active angel and early stage investor in several companies within the foodtech, alt protein, future of food, sustainable agriculture, climate, and clean energy.
    • Mindful Bites – Founder and Managing Director
      • An innovative brand of transformational snacks inspired by the principles of mindful eating.
  • Contact Information:
  • LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/stephanie-peritore

Sue Bevan Baggott

  • Angel Investor: Sue Bevan Baggott
  • About: Sue is a strategic and global innovation leader, executive coach, angel and impact investor, speaker, and board member with a proven track record for uncovering deep human insights and making connections that lead to impactful innovations and breakthrough business results.
  • Companies Affiliated With:
    • Cloverleaf – Board Of Directors
      • On a mission for every team to thrive with people doing work that energizes them, Cloverleaf’s Automated Coaching uses assessment data to provide digital nudges to everyone in an organization to improve performance, increase managerial effectiveness, strengthen cross-functional collaboration, and inspire personal development.
    • IncludeHealth, Inc. – Board Of Directors
      • A digital platform for musculoskeletal providers to extend personalized, measured care beyond the clinic on any device.
    • Mindshift Capital – Advisory Committee
      • Focused on post-seed early-stage companies in the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East, ensuring diversity of thought while narrowing the funding gap for female-led ventures.
    • Next Wave Ventures – Lead Investment Committee / GP
      • A seed to early-stage venture capital firm of founders, investors, and operators focused on commercializing university research and advanced technologies.
    • Power Within Consulting, LLC – Founder and President
      • Works closely with clients to accelerate their success by delivering highly impactful, insight-driven business and innovation strategies.
  • Location: ​​Cincinnati, Ohio
  • Contact Information:
  • Resources:
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