BERKELEY, Calif., Oct. 30, 2017 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Lygos, a leading today announced the appointment of Nick Ohler, Ph.D., P.E., as Vice President of Process Development & Manufacturing. Ohler has 13 years of industrial experience in design, development, and scale-up of manufacturing processes, and has spent the last 10 years focused on bio-fermentation processes.
"Lygos has to scale commercial production of our Bio-Malonate™ products from the kilogram to the metric ton and then kiloton scale over the next several years, and Nick has a proven track record of success in translating and deploying innovative technologies at commercial scale," said Eric Steen, CEO of Lygos. "He's an accomplished engineer with a strong focus on delivering product on time, on spec, and on budget. With his expertise, we continue to build Lygos’ capabilities in our mission to deliver environmentally-friendly, cost competitive biotech products to our customers who need them at the kiloton scale.”
“Joining Lygos offers me the opportunity to engineer and design state-of-the-art biotech production facilities that will produce the environmentally friendly products we need for a sustainable future,” Ohler said. “Lygos has a very rich R&D pipeline promising to deliver new products for many years to come.”
Ohler most recently served as Senior Director of Process R&D at the publicly-traded company, Evolva (SWX:EVE), where he led initial manufacturing efforts to produce commercial-scale inventories of a health and nutrition product, built out a new downstream process R+D team and laboratory, and guided the improvement of Evolva’s manufacturing QC processes. Ohler previously designed, developed, and deployed multiple manufacturing processes at Bio Architecture Lab, Amyris Biotechnologies, Symyx and Motorola. He received a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Berkeley, and is a licensed, professional engineer named on multiple patents.
About Lygos, Inc.
Lygos makes microbial-based manufacturing solutions at the juncture of biology and technology that create market-transforming product opportunities. Lygos' first products -- malonic acid and derivatives -- replace low-quality petrochemical products produced at high economic and environmental cost in countries without strong environmental protection programs. Lygos is venture-backed by 50 Years, First Round Capital, IA Ventures, OS Fund, Vast Ventures and the Y Combinator Continuity Fund, along with notable angel investors. Lygos' R&D was originally funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, U.S. Department of Agriculture, and the National Science Foundation. For more information, visit http://www.lygos.com or follow us on Twitter: @LygosBiotech.
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