2025 Advisory Board
Anil Achyuta, Managing Director, TDK Ventures Inc.
Anil Achyuta is the Managing Director of TDK Ventures ($350M AUM) that invests globally in early stage deeptech startups. At TDK Ventures, he has reviewed over 2500 start-ups, invested in thirteen companies, and serves on 5 Boards as a Director or an Observer. Of his 13 investments, Anil has 2 exits, 1 M&A (Origin – 3D printing company) and 1 IPO (GenCell – fuel cell company), 1 unicorn (Ascend Elements – battery upcycling company), 3 are in the “soon-to-be-unicorn” club (>$300M+ in valuation – Autoflight (flying car company), Exo (hand-held medical ultrasound company), Verdagy (green hydrogen company), 4 are at $100M+ valuation and the last 3 are early companies growing rapidly. Anil was voted one of the Rising Stars in 2021 by Venture Capital Journal and was ranked #2 Rising Star in 2021 out of 20,000 corporate venture managers globally, in addition to being voted as one of the Emerging Leaders of 2022, which represents top 0.5% in the industry. Prior to TDK Ventures, Anil held leadership roles at Fortune 500 companies including L'Oréal, Johnson & Johnson, GlaxoSmithKline, and Draper. He has a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from Northeastern University and received his MBA from the University of Florida - Warrington College of Business. He has authored over 15 peer-reviewed journal publications and holds 5 U.S. patents. Anil’s thought leadership articles can be found on Medium and YouTube.
Kojo Ako-Asare, Managing Director, Decarbonization Partners | a BlackRock & Temasek JV
Kojo Ako-Asare, Managing Director, is a member of Decarbonization Partners, a joint venture between BlackRock and Temasek that invests in innovative businesses focused on decarbonization solutions that accelerate global efforts towards realizing a healthier planet. He joined Decarbonization Partners in 2022. Kojo has over two decades of transaction experience, including: principal investing, project finance, capital raising, M&A, and real estate development. Prior to joining Decarbonization Partners, Kojo was a Partner at Emerson Collective Ventures (a multi-stage venture firm) where he co-led the organization's Climate Tech investments.
Chris Claxton, Principal, Volta Energy Technologies
Mr. Claxton is an Investment Principal at Volta Energy Technologies, a hard tech venture capital firm specifically focused on batteries, energy storage, and related technologies. He has nearly 20 years of experience in early-stage technology commercialization. He has been on the founding team of several technology start-up companies and has worked as a commercialization consultant to various government agencies including the NIH, NASA, and the U.S. Department of Energy. Before joining the Volta team in early 2020, Chris spent seven years as Sr. Business Development Executive for Argonne National Laboratory, leading business development and technology licensing for the Lab’s advanced electrochemical energy storage R&D program. While at Argonne, he worked alongside the Lab’s scientists and engineers to successfully lead and close deals with companies across the energy storage value chain, including raw material suppliers, battery material manufacturers, cell and pack manufacturers, system integrators, and automotive OEMs in North America, Europe, and Asia. He holds a B.S. in Finance and Marketing from Indiana University.
Cameron Dales, Co-Founder, Peak Energy
Cameron Dales is co-founder of sodium-ion grid storage company, Peak Energy. Most recently, Cam was an operating partner at Eclipse Ventures where he focused on technology investments in the $8T industrial economy. Previously, Cam was CCO of lithium-ion battery company, Enovix, where he was responsible for commercial strategy and operations. He navigated the company from lab start-up through successful public listing and built a $1.5B sales funnel including strategic relationships with all six worldwide “mega-cap” technology companies. Prior to Enovix, Cam served as VP/GM for Symyx Technologies, a $150M revenue public company that developed high throughput robotic tools for the discovery of advanced materials for the world’s leading energy and materials companies. He started his career at Lockheed, where he developed spaceflight qualified hardware for several spacecraft including the first commercial high resolution imaging satellite. Cam holds engineering degrees from Cornell and Stanford and is an inventor on 103 patents.
Sam Jaffe, Senior Director, Business Development, Addionics
Sam Jaffe is the Senior Director of Business Development at Addionics, an Israel-based manufacturer of current collectors for batteries. Sam has more than two decades of experience in the battery industry as an analyst at IDC Energy Insights, Navigant Research (now Guidehouse), Cairn ERA (a battery market research company he founded in 2015) and E Source. Sam’s expertise ranges from battery cost modelling and battery market forecasting to due diligence for battery-related investments. At Addionics, he is tasked with helping to establish a U.S.-based factory by 2025. He lives in Boulder, Colorado.
Dong-Su Kim, CEO, LG Technology Ventures
Dong-Su Kim is the CEO and board member of LG Technology Ventures. He has over twenty-five years of investment, strategy, planning, and technology experience. As the founding CEO, Dong-Su established the fund structure, hired key people, and initiated investment operations. Under his guidance, LG Technology Ventures manages over $400 million of fund assets and invests in early-stage information technology, automotive, manufacturing, life-sciences, energy, and advanced materials companies. Portfolio companies include AmazeVR, Lygos, May Mobility, and Ridecell. Dong-Su has earned an M.A. and a Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Princeton University, and a B.S. with Honors in Applied Physics from California Institute of Technology.
Hansol Kim, Managing Partner, Bricks Capital Management
Bricks Capital Management is a private equity firm focused primarily on electrification and battery industry leaders in North America. The Bricks team harnesses the core values learned from direct battery industry experiences and the best practices working in leading financial institutions. Hansol Kim is a co-founder and a managing partner of Bricks Capital Management. Prior to Bricks, Hansol spent most of his career in the battery and electrification sector working at leading companies such as Apple, LG Energy Solution, and VW's Electrify America. Hansol focuses on identifying growth opportunities and necessary partnerships in the commercialization of key battery technologies. He combines his extensive network, wealth of industry experiences, and a creative mindset to support high-potential technologies into production.
Emmanuel Lagarrigue, Partner & Global Co-Head of Climate, Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co.
Emmanuel Lagarrigue (New York) joined KKR in 2022. He leads the firm's global investments in climate. Mr. Lagarrigue has a wealth of experience in sustainability, the energy transition and the transformation of large businesses. Prior to joining KKR, he was one of the founding partners of BeyondNetZero, a General Atlantic fund focusing on growth equity opportunities in decarbonization technologies. Previously, Mr. Lagarrigue was an Executive Committee member at Schneider Electric, holding the positions of Chief Strategy, Chief Sustainability and Chief Innovation Officer. Also at Schneider Electric, he held several P&L and general management positions in Europe, South America, Asia and the United States over 20 years. Mr. Lagarrigue serves on the board of JBT Corporation and is the Chairman of the board of trustees of Menorca Preservation, an NGO dedicated to environmental causes in the Balearic Islands.
Annie Liu, Chief Commercial & Strategy Officer, Mangrove Lithium
Annie Liu is a seasoned executive, having spent 20+ years in building and leading teams across stages from product incubation to rapid growth and scale-up in mature markets. Annie was the Executive Director at Ford (Model E). Prior to her role at Ford, Annie forged and managed Tesla’s multi-billion-dollar strategic partnerships and sourcing portfolios that support Tesla’s Energy and Battery business units including Battery, Battery Raw Material, Energy Storage, Solar and Solar Glass, including raw materials sourcing efforts such as lithium for battery cells. Earlier in her career, she held various leading manufacturing and procurement roles at Microsoft launching advanced technology products. Annie is a co-founder of Alto Group Inc, a trusted advisor and counsellor to many of the world’s influential businesses in the EV value chain. Annie is also currently a Non-Executive Director with ASX Listed Vulcan Energy Limited, and a Non-Executive Director with ASX Listed Alpha HPA Limited.
Kunal Sinha, Global Head, Recycling, Glencore
Kunal Sinha is the Global Head of Recycling at Glencore and is based in the firm’s New York office. In this role, he oversees a global business that recovers critical metals, such as Copper, Nickel, Cobalt, and (expected in the near term) Lithium, as well as precious and platinum group metals, from post-consumer and post-manufacturing “resources” such as electronics, lithium-ion batteries, end of life automotives, etc. Specific to lithium-ion batteries, he is responsible for Glencore’s effort to accelerate the circularity of critical minerals, by enabling recycling and refining as well as second life and end of life solutions for our customers. He also serves as a non-executive director of Li Cycle, a leading lithium-ion battery recycler. He started with Glencore in Baar in 2012 in the Copper team, and subsequently served as the CEO of NorFalco, Glencore’s Sulfuric Acid marketing subsidiary – another sustainability focused business for the group, before taking over the Recycling business. Prior to joining Glencore, Kunal worked for 6 years in Management Consulting at ZS Associates. He holds an MBA from the London Business School, an M.S. in Systems Engineering (Robotics) from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and a B.Tech. in Mechanical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), Kharagpur.
Kyle Teamey, Managing Partner, Planetary Health, RA Capital Management
Kyle Teamey joins RA Capital as a Managing Partner, Planetary Health. Kyle's primary responsibility at RA is to lead investments in private companies that are developing innovative solutions to address climate change and environmental sustainability. Prior to joining RA, Kyle was a Partner at Breakthrough Energy Ventures (BEV), where he led investments and served on company boards that span the utilities, energy storage, chemicals, agriculture, automotive, recycling, and consumer products sectors. Prior to BEV, Kyle was a Principal at In-Q-Tel, the strategic investment arm of the CIA and US Intelligence Community, where he invested in early stage manufacturing, materials, energy, computing, and defense companies. Kyle was also the CEO and co-founder of Liquid Light, developer of a proprietary process to make major chemicals from CO2, which was sold to Avantium in 2016. Kyle also recently retired as a Colonel in the US Army Reserve after 24 years of service. He holds a BA in Environmental Engineering from Dartmouth College (1998), an MA in International Finance and Energy Policy from John Hopkins University (2008), an MS in Materials Science from Columbia University (2012), and a Masters of Strategic Studies from the Army War College (2020).
Danijel Visevic, General Partner & Co-Founder, World Fund
Danijel Višević is a General Partner at World Fund. He is a recognized climate tech thought leader, policy professional and journalist by vocation. Before co-founding World Fund, he was Director of Communications at Project A Ventures, co-founder of Zetra Project and Krautreporter. Danijel was also co-responsible for the audio-visual appearance of Angela Merkel for nearly half a decade.
Scott Walbrun, Principal, BMW i Ventures
Scott Walbrun is a principal venture capital investor at BMW i Ventures, the independent venture capital fund managed on behalf of BMW Group based in Silicon Valley, where he focuses on Series A & B investments around the future of mobility, energy, artificial intelligence. In this capacity, Scott has served on the board of eight companies. He also serves as a mentor and workshop leader for hundreds of startups through various accelerator programs across the country. Prior to joining BMW i Ventures, Scott provided M&A and capital markets advisory as a member of Jefferies’ Technology Investment Banking team. Scott joined Jefferies after completing his MBA at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business. While completing his MBA, he worked at Kinzie Capital Partners evaluating private equity investments, as well as at the Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation supporting the commercialization of science-based and deep tech companies. Prior to business school, Scott managed Strategic Finance and FP&A at Truck Hero (a TA Associates portfolio company) and began his career in Fiat Chrysler’s Finance Leadership Development Program.
Michal Wolkin, Former Director, GM Ventures, Battery & Electrification
Dr. Michal Wolkin is the former Director of GM Ventures Battery and Electrification fund and is currently at stealth mode. Michal has two decades of experience in venture investments, technology evaluation and product insertion. She has been serving as a board member in public and private companies. Michal has a PhD in Applied Physics and has been developing and implementing disruptive innovation in frontier technologies for 3M, PARC, and NASA. Prior to GM Michal was a partner at GFT Ventures.