Rishikesh (Rishi) brings a truly unique and diverse background to his role, making him a remarkable source of insights to his clients. From human health to environmental toxicology, Rishi’s combination of scientific and business experience allows him to provide both deep technical expertise as well as practical business and scale-up advice.
His nearly twenty years of professional experience includes executive leadership at SYLVIS Environmental, where he led a team of project managers, biologists, and agrologists to deliver consulting projects to a wide range of clients. Projects ranged across the green and circular economies, including repurposing waste streams (residuals) to a beneficial product, phytoremediation, and aligning clients’ environmental and social strategies with their ESG strategies.
A natural leader and connector, Rishi is passionate about new and disruptive technologies and the entrepreneurs behind them. Having pursued his own science-based start-up, he is well aware of the challenges involved in technology/biology-based ventures, and the vast amount of information that entrepreneurs need to succeed. He has led primary and secondary market research, gap analysis, benchmarking, and competitive intelligence initiatives for large and small clients, and is keen to share his advice and learnings with others.
With a true analytical mind, Rishi has applied his extensive scientific background in a range of roles and projects, including human health initiatives such as preclinical drug discovery for hematological and neurodegenerative diseases, biomarker discovery for human diseases, and in investigating the mechanism of toxic action of legacy environmental toxins (phthalates, brominated flame retardants). He has published several key mechanistic original research articles and has developed the IP for a therapeutic formulation for Alzheimer’s disease.
Rishi’s professional experience is founded in an exceptional academic record, including a Bachelor of Science (Chemistry), a Master of Science (Biochemistry), a PhD (Molecular Biology & Genetic Engineering), and an MBA (Global Energy Management & Sustainability).