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Leadership
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Dean Banks

Chief Executive Officer & Board Director
Pedro Langa

Pedro Langa

Chief Financial Officer
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Erin Bakst

Chief People Officer
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Marc Meunier

General Counsel
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Ewan Lamont

Head, Sustainability Solutions
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Dean Banks

Chief Executive Officer & Board Director

Dean’s unique background as an entrepreneur, technologist, innovator, and business executive provides a strong foundation as he stewards Indigo Ag into this next critical phase of growth and profitability, to ultimately realize the full potential of the Indigo Ag platform for companies, farmers, and the planet. 

Dean has been an Indigo Ag Board Member since July 2022.  He previously served as President and CEO at Tyson Foods where he was responsible for charting the long-term vision for the company including steering integration of advanced technologies like artificial intelligence, robotics, and development of alternative proteins throughout its operations. During his four-year tenure with the company, he also served on the Board and executive leadership team. He joined Tyson from the high-tech incubator at Alphabet, the company formerly known as Google [X], where he served on the leadership team and led moonshot projects across multiple industries including sustainable food (as co-founder of Tidal) and robotics (as co-founder of Intrinsic). 

Dean was previously managing partner of SEED Ventures, a group investing in and developing early stage healthcare technologies. He also has served as a consultant to Cleveland Clinic Innovations, SVP of Business Development and Strategic Marketing at OrthoHelix, co‐founder and CEO of Connective Orthopedics, and Vice President at Highland Capital Partners. He currently serves on the Boards of Vergent Bioscience (where he was a co-founder and founding CEO), Meatable, and on the Advisory Board of Shiru. 

Dean is a former platoon sergeant and squad leader in the U.S. Marine Corps. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Marketing and Public Relations from Miami University and a Master of Business Administration from the Harvard Business School. 

“Throughout my career, I’ve had the opportunity to apply leading-edge technologies across complex industries to help businesses adapt, innovate, and grow. With Indigo, I look forward to bringing these skills and experience to help our most essential profession – farming – succeed in the face of unmatched disruptions.” 

 

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Pedro Langa

Pedro Langa

Chief Financial Officer

Pedro leads Indigo’s Global Finance Organization, overseeing Indigo’s business and financial operations to better serve its stakeholders across the globe –⁠ from farmers to investors.

Pedro is an experienced CFO with over 25 years in global leadership roles, specializing in advanced financial analysis, corporate finance, and strategic growth for major corporations like Alibaba and Alchemy Global Solutions. He has managed P&Ls exceeding $5B and led multiple IPOs. His expertise includes financial modeling for forecasting, valuation, mergers, acquisitions (M&A), and scenario analysis, along with global financial statement consolidation across multi-entity, multi-currency environments, compliant with IFRS and GAAP & CAS. He’s skilled in debt and equity financing, liquidity management, and risk hedging strategies.

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Erin Bakst

Chief People Officer

Erin is Chief People Officer at Indigo Ag, responsible for enhancing talent productivity and engagement by improving diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging, creating more efficient operations, and developing high-performing teams to drive business forward.

Erin has worked across talent functions for more than a decade in multiple industries including media, not-for-profit education, multi-level marketing, e-commerce, and high tech. Before joining Indigo in 2023, Erin served as Chief People Officer at Caribou, a fintech startup where she oversaw a robust People & Culture team. Prior to Caribou, Erin ran People & Culture at Vox Media, where she built the department from the ground up and led through multiple acquisitions and integrations. Her prior experience also includes building and managing Employee Engagement and Learning and Development teams at tech startups Opower and LivingSocial. She began her career in Human Resources at Herbalife International as their first International HR Manager.

She holds an MBA from Virginia Tech, a Masters of Global Management from Thunderbird School of Global Management, and a BS from Virginia Tech, where she graduated with honors.

“Indigo’s strong company culture is fueled by its mission and its commitment to our customers and to operational excellence. I’m thrilled to support such a passionate team and continue the company’s important work to better serve its customers, employees, investors, and partners." 

 

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Marc Meunier_Leadership Page_12.22.23 (1)-1

Marc Meunier

General Counsel

 Marc leads Indigo’s legal function and helped build a robust legal framework and innovative IP portfolio to drive growth and execute the company’s vision.

Marc joined Indigo in 2016, at pre-commercial stage, and built the legal foundation to scale Indigo’s commercial business models and international expansion, setting up entities and JVs in Latin America, Europe, and Asia. Marc has also been instrumental in Indigo’s capital financing and M&A acquisitions.

Prior to joining Indigo, Marc held senior roles at both public and privately held companies, most recently as lead counsel for emerging markets at Johnson & Johnson while based in Dubai, UAE.

Marc holds an LL.M in Banking, Corporate and Finance Law from Fordham Law School, a J.D. from Seton Hall Law School, and a finance degree from Syracuse University.

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Ewan Lamont Headshot-1

Ewan Lamont

Head, Sustainability Solutions

With a proven track record of building and operating agri-businesses around the world, Ewan specializes in identifying, investing in and driving new business opportunities to re-imagine global food and agriculture.

He has expertise in a wide range of production systems – from Indian smallholder to Argentinian mega-farm – testing and harnessing new technologies at scale to boost yields, build soil health and enable sustainable, resilient and tech-enabled supply chains. He is a strong advocate of regenerative agriculture and has worked with many global consumer brands and governments to drive agriculture sustainability and paddock to plate initiatives. 

At Indigo, Ewan manages the Sustainability business unit which enables farmers to monetize practice changes they make on their farms. Working with local agribusinesses and downstream partners, Indigo offers the largest and longest-running Scope 3 and carbon farming programs, founded on a suite of patented technologies and industry-leading quantification algorithms.

Prior to joining Indigo, Ewan was Chief Operating Officer of Myanma Awba, the leading agriculture group in Myanmar, based in Yangon. He has also held various commercial leadership roles around the world with large agribusiness Syngenta with Global HQ, regional and country positions.  
 
Ewan started his career in the finance world, driving cross-border M&A and corporate advisory engagements for blue-chip companies seeking to enter the Chinese market. This included target screening, valuation, due diligence and deal-making, concluding with a number of successful foreign acquisitions of Chinese companies.

Ewan holds an MA from Cambridge University in the UK and an MBA from INSEAD. He has lived and worked across Asia Pacific, Latin America and Europe and moved to the US in 2017 to join Indigo. He is based in Boston, Massachusetts.  

Our Board of Directors

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Robert Berendes

Chairman of the Board
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Dean Banks

Chief Executive Officer & Board Director
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Geoffrey von Maltzahn, PhD

Co-Founder, Chief Innovation Officer, and Board Director
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Deborah Winshel

Board Director
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Andreas Fibig

Board Director
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John Gehring

Board Director
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Nader Bekhouche

Board Director
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Paul Parker

Board Director
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Robert Berendes

Chairman of the Board

 Robert is an executive partner at Flagship Pioneering and chairman of CiBO Technologies and Invaio Sciences as well as a board member at Inari.

Previously, he served as Syngenta’s Global head of business development and member of its executive committee. Before that he was a partner at McKinsey & Co. Robert has a PhD in Biophysics from the Max Planck Institute for Biochemistry and Technical University of Munich and a diploma in Chemistry from the University of Cologne

 

“I am passionate about enhancing plant productivity in a sustainable manner: by harnessing nature’s ingenuity in the plant microbiome, Indigo is uniquely able to do this.” 

 

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Dean Banks

Chief Executive Officer & Board Director

Dean’s unique background as an entrepreneur, technologist, innovator, and business executive provides a strong foundation as he stewards Indigo Ag into this next critical phase of growth and profitability, to ultimately realize the full potential of the Indigo Ag platform for companies, farmers, and the planet. 

Dean has been an Indigo Ag Board Member since July 2022.  He previously served as President and CEO at Tyson Foods where he was responsible for charting the long-term vision for the company including steering integration of advanced technologies like artificial intelligence, robotics, and development of alternative proteins throughout its operations. During his four-year tenure with the company, he also served on the Board and executive leadership team. He joined Tyson from the high-tech incubator at Alphabet, the company formerly known as Google [X], where he served on the leadership team and led moonshot projects across multiple industries including sustainable food (as co-founder of Tidal) and robotics (as co-founder of Intrinsic). 

Dean was previously managing partner of SEED Ventures, a group investing in and developing early stage healthcare technologies. He also has served as a consultant to Cleveland Clinic Innovations, SVP of Business Development and Strategic Marketing at OrthoHelix, co‐founder and CEO of Connective Orthopedics, and Vice President at Highland Capital Partners. He currently serves on the Boards of Vergent Bioscience (where he was a co-founder and founding CEO), Meatable, and on the Advisory Board of Shiru. 

Dean is a former platoon sergeant and squad leader in the U.S. Marine Corps. He holds a Bachelor of Arts in Marketing and Public Relations from Miami University and a Master of Business Administration from the Harvard Business School. 

“Throughout my career, I’ve had the opportunity to apply leading-edge technologies across complex industries to help businesses adapt, innovate, and grow. With Indigo, I look forward to bringing these skills and experience to help our most essential profession – farming – succeed in the face of unmatched disruptions.” 

 

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Geoffrey von Maltzahn, PhD

Co-Founder, Chief Innovation Officer, and Board Director

Geoffrey von Maltzahn joined Flagship Pioneering in 2009 and serves as general partner. He is an inventor, entrepreneur, CEO, and the co-founder of multiple groundbreaking companies that integrate biology and data science to transform human health and sustainability.

Geoffrey has co-founded companies that have, in aggregate, achieved over $10 billion in public and private market capitalization. Through his role in Flagship Labs, the company’s innovation foundry, Geoffrey has created companies that include Quotient TherapeuticsTessera TherapeuticsGenerate:BiomedicinesIndigo Agriculture, Sana Biotechnology (NASDAQ: SANA), and Seres Therapeutics (NASDAQ: MCRB). These are pioneering, respectively, somatic genomics, Gene Writing™, generative biology, carbon farming and plant microbiome products, engineered cells and cell-specific gene therapies, and the first human microbiome therapeutics.

Geoffrey currently serves as CEO of Quotient Therapeutics, board chair of Tessera Therapeutics, chief innovation officer and board director of Indigo Agriculture, board director of Generate:Biomedicines, and as CEO of multiple new stealth therapeutics and sustainability companies. Geoffrey has served as founding chief executive officer of several Flagship companies including: Tessera Therapeutics, where he led the development of its pioneering Gene Writing™ technology; Cobalt Biomedicine, which he led from inception to merger with Sana Biotechnology; and Indigo, where he led the development of the company’s plant microbiome platform and the discovery of the company’s first commercial products: Indigo Cotton, Indigo Wheat, Indigo Corn, and Indigo Soy, which are now used on millions of acres. Previously, Geoffrey was the chief technology officer of Seres Therapeutics, where he led the discovery of SER-109, the first microbiome therapeutic to report positive Phase 3 data, and built out the company’s discovery platform.

Geoffrey has deep expertise in genome engineering, the microbiome, bioengineering, and nanotechnology. He is listed as an inventor on over 200 patent applications and patents, and he has co-authored more than 20 peer-reviewed articles. Geoffrey has received a number of awards and honors, including Bloomberg 50's Ones to Watch; Business Insider’s 30 Biotech Leaders Under 40; Endpoints 20 Biopharma Leaders Under 40; Fierce Pharma’s Most Influential People in Biopharma; Codex’s World’s Top 50 Innovators; Boston Chamber of Commerce Ten Outstanding Young Leaders; the prestigious Lemelson-MIT Student Prize, awarded to the most innovative students at MIT; the National Inventors Hall of Fame Graduate Student Prize; the Biomedical Engineering Society Graduate Research Award; and the Harvard-MIT Martha Gray Prize. Geoffrey and his inventions have been profiled by ForbesThe Economist, CNN, Bloomberg, WIREDFast Company, Business Insider, Scientific AmericanPopular ScienceBoston Globe, TechCrunch, Barron’s, Endpoints, Fierce Biotech, MIT Technology Review, and other media.

Geoffrey was awarded a PhD in biomedical engineering and medical physics from MIT under the mentorship of Sangeeta N. Bhatia, MD, PhD; an MS in bioengineering from the University of California, San Diego; and an SB in chemical engineering from MIT.

“Agriculture offers the potential for both gigaton-scale CO2 emissions reduction and gigaton-scale sequestration of CO2 that is already in the atmosphere. We simply need to give growers the incentives and tools to do this at scale.” 

 

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Deborah Winshel

Board Director

 

Deborah is an influential business leader whose strategic vision has shaped and expanded operations at diverse corporations and non-profit organizations. With extensive experience advising organizations on balancing social and financial considerations and outcomes, she brings to Indigo a deep understanding of the broad sustainable investment and corporate governance environment to further the company’s efforts to enable positive environmental impact on a global scale.

Deborah is the former Global Head of Social Impact at BlackRock, where she was responsible for launching the firm’s sustainable investing and ESG platform and establishing BlackRock as a leader in the field. She also oversaw the firm’s cornerstone philanthropic investment in climate technologies driving to net zero as part of her efforts to unify and lead the firm’s approach to social impact investing. 

Following a successful investment banking career at JP Morgan, Deborah transitioned to the non-profit world to apply her financial and strategic perspective to help purpose-driven organizations find innovative and effective ways to scale and grow business operations, beginning with the Metropolitan Museum of Art. There, as Executive VP and CFO, she assumed responsibility for operational and all finance functions. Later, as President and Chief Operating Officer of The Robin Hood Foundation, she led the organization’s most important strategic imperatives, driving sustainable growth and cementing the Foundation as a leader in the field of venture philanthropy and a pioneer in impact investing.

Today, in addition to her work as a member of the Faculty of the Harvard Business School, she serves on the Board of Directors of The Shed, was a founding board member of Immigrant Justice Corps, and was a founding member of the Financial Stability Board’s Taskforce on Climate-Related Financial Disclosure.

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Andreas Fibig

Board Director

A global business leader with more than 25 years of international pharmaceutical, ag, and food industry experience, Andreas Fibig has a track record of generating successful results in highly competitive developed and emerging growth markets. His background and extensive network across both European and U.S. ag and food markets will accelerate Indigo’s growth as it catalyzes change in the global ag and food ecosystem.

Before joining Indigo’s Board, Andreas served as Chairman and CEO of International Flavors & Fragrances, Inc. (“IFF”), an industry leader in food ingredients, beverage, scent, health, and biosciences. For those seven years, he was responsible for worldwide operations, representing nearly $11B in annual revenues and over 24,000 employees. At IFF, Andreas led the company through a transformational period, which included overseeing the integration of DuPont Nutrition & Biosciences into the company, leading the organization’s heralded sustainability efforts (conception and implementation of the “Do More Good” plan), and driving strong sales growth.

Prior to IFF, Andreas served for many years in various senior leadership roles at Bayer AG and Pfizer, giving him extensive experience in international business, product development and strategic planning. Andreas also served on the Boards of Directors for Bunge Limited (NYSE: BG), a leading global agribusiness and food company, and Novo Nordisk (NYSE: NVO), a leading global healthcare company. Andreas brings to Indigo valuable knowledge of the global agricultural trading business and how it operates within the broader ag and food supply chain.

As a member of the board, Andreas provides insight and support as Indigo expands access to its sustainability solutions for Consumer-Packaged Goods and corporate customers around the world.

 

“I’m excited to join the Indigo board at this pivotal moment. The company’s record of progress in science and technology – successfully producing the world’s first crop of registry-issued ag carbon credits at scale, expanding industry-leading biological seed treatments, and developing second-generation digital merchandising solutions – is helping set the standard for a new class of sustainability solutions,”

 

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John Gehring

Board Director

John Gehring has extensive financial and business leadership experience and has a deep background in the food industry, having spent 15 years in a variety of leadership positions with Conagra Brands, one of North America's leading branded food companies.

John most recently served as Interim Chief Financial Officer at Lamb Weston Holdings, Inc., a spinoff from Conagra Brands. Prior to this, he held several leadership positions at ConAgra Foods, acting as the company’s Executive Vice President and CFO up until August 2016. After joining the company in 2002, John stepped into a variety of roles, beginning as ConAgra’s Vice President of Internal Audit and becoming, in turn, Acting CFO, Senior Vice President, and Corporate Controller. Leading up to his long tenure at ConAgra, John was a Partner at Ernst and Young, spearheading the company’s business risk services in the Ohio Valley area.

Early in his professional career, John was an Auditor with PepsiCo and KPMG Peat Marwick. He earned his B.A. in Business Administration from Miami University’s Richard T Farmer School of Business Administration.

“I’ve been in the business of food for years, but I haven’t seen a company quite like Indigo, whose desire to transform agriculture — in a way that rewards both growers and consumers — really excites me. I’m looking forward to being a part of the Company as it continues to push large-scale change in food production and nutrition.” 

 

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Nader Bekhouche

Board Director

 Nader Bekhouche is currently heading the Growth Equity investment team at Investment Corporation of Dubai, the principal investment arm of the Government of Dubai, which he joined in October 2015. Nader set up this activity and has responsibilities for developing and executing the overall strategy.

Nader has served as an Observer of the board of directors of Inari Agriculture, the Boston-based company which uses its proprietary AI-powered predictive design and multiplex gene editing toolbox to create high performing plant varieties to sustainably improve agriculture, since June 2019. Nader has also served as a member of the board of directors of FreshToHome, India’s largest fully integrated omnichannel brand in fresh fish and meat, since September 2020. More recently, he has also served as an Observer of the board of directors of Wholsum Foods, the parent company of the award-winning children's food brand Slurrp Farm and the adult’s focused supergrain food brand Millé, since February 2022. Nader also serves on the limited partners advisory board of several venture and growth focused investment funds. Before joining ICD, he worked in investment banking at Bank of America Merrill Lynch from July 2010 until September 2015.

Nader holds a Master’s in Management from the EDHEC Business School in France and a Master of Science in Finance from the EBS Oestrich-Winkel in Germany. Nader is a Kauffman Fellow.

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Paul Parker - Flagship

Paul Parker

Board Director

Paul Parker, Managing Partner, is a member of the Office of the CEO and Co-Chair of the Operating Committee for Flagship Pioneering, helping to drive value, impact, and effectiveness across the organization. Paul leads all capital solutions efforts at Flagship, including portfolio value realization, funds and company-level capital raising activities, and building and managing Flagship’s relationships with Limited Partners as well as strategic and financial investors.

Paul has over 35 years of prior experience in banking, pharma and biotech, as well as in mergers and acquisitions (M&A), corporate strategy and organizational leadership. He has worked across multiple sectors and geographies, built and managed several multi-billion-dollar businesses, and led teams of several thousand employees.

Prior to joining Flagship, Paul was a Corporate Officer, member of the Company Leadership Team, and served as Senior Vice President, Strategy and Corporate Development for Thermo Fisher Scientific. In this capacity he held a number of enterprise-level operating roles, including having responsibility for Corporate Strategy, Corporate Development, Strategic Capital, Integration Management, Corporate Social Responsibility, and Government Relations. He previously served as Co-Chairman of the Global Mergers and Acquisitions Group for Goldman Sachs & Co. and served on the firm's Partnership Committee. Prior to Goldman Sachs, Paul held senior positions at Barclays Group Plc where he served as Co-Head of Corporate Finance and Chairman and Head of Global M&A. He was previously an investment banker at Lehman Brothers in several senior leadership positions, ultimately serving as Chairman and Head of Global M&A. Paul served on the Investment Banking Executive Committee for both Barclays and Lehman Brothers. Earlier in his career, Paul held positions at other financial institutions, including J.P. Morgan & Co.

Paul is a Board member for Indigo Ag, a Flagship founded company. He previously served as a Board member of The Clorox Company from 2020-2024.

He earned an MBA with Distinction from Harvard Business School and a bachelor's degree in international studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

About Indigo Ag

Our mission is harnessing nature to help farmers sustainably feed the planet

About Indigo Ag

Our mission is harnessing nature to help farmers sustainably feed the planet

About Indigo Ag

Our mission is harnessing nature to help farmers sustainably feed the planet