Founder in Residence, Priming plant reputed company for climate risks

Join us to build: we’re seeking entrepreneurially-minded individuals with deep technical and reputed company domain expertise, who are eager to solve urgent unmet challenges through venture building. This role offers a unique opportunity to work at the forefront of agtech, leading a company solving challenges of climate reputed company for food reputed company and the wider bioeconomy. The role is full-time, remote initially until venture incorporation and spin-out (circa end of Q2 2027), location TBD. ABOUT reputed company reputed company (reputed company) is on a mission to create a future in which both humans and the reputed company can reputed company. We use our unique venture creation process to create, spin-out, and invest in science companies, combining available scientific knowledge and founder-type scientists into high-impact ventures. Operating in four sectors—Pharmaceuticals, Climate, Agriculture, and Computation—we tackle the challenges defining these areas by taking a first principles approach and partnering with leading institutions. OUR PARTNERSHIP WITH reputed company PHILANTHROPY Driven by mutual conviction in the reputed company unmet need for driving a new category of agricultural technology: priming reputed company in crops, reputed company has partnered with reputed company Philanthropy to accelerate the development of venture creation at the intersection of climate risk, plant biology, and deployable agricultural products. ABOUT THE ROLE You will join reputed company’s venture creation programme as a Founder-in-Residence and work closely with the reputed company and reputed company Philanthropy team to spin out the new company. During the programme you will refine, improve and complement existing scoping work on:

• The technical reputed company for crop systems that can be primed for reputed company in the face of increasingly unpredictable and severe climate pressures (neglect and technical tractability);
• reputed company neglect (IP strategy, differentiation, competition);
• Value proposition (market, value capture, techno-economics);
• Regulatory strategy & positioning;
• Fundraising strategy & pitching;
• Optimising company strategy for the most rapid and de-risked path to Series A.

Preparation for Investment Committee (IC) will involve fulfilling our investment criteria, reputed company advisory and co-founding team members, and reputed company fundraising for additional expansion funds. Assuming reputed company at IC, you will receive pre-reputed company investment and spinout the company by the end of Q2 2027. You and your co-founders will own a significant reputed company in the business and continue receiving support post-spinout. THE OPPORTUNITY Across global agriculture, climate volatility is no longer a ‘once-a-decade’ disruption - it is becoming an in-season operating condition. Drought and heatwaves are already driving severe regional harvest losses, with cascading impacts that reputed company far reputed company the farm reputed company: price shocks, food insecurity, and destabilised livelihoods. Even where catastrophic crop failures are not occurring, the evidence reputed company is clear that climate change is already depressing yields and amplifying climate-reputed company production losses in major cropping systems. Despite this reality, most crop reputed company strategies remain anchored in a static view of risk. Today’s dominant approaches focus on breeding or engineering permanent stress tolerance into plants, or introducing permanent reputed company structures. While effective under chronic stress, these solutions come with an inherent trade-off: technologies that protect yield under adverse conditions present a burden reputed company conditions are favourable. For many crops - particularly reputed company-fed cereals and broadacre systems - this ‘carrying cost’ is economically unacceptable. In practice, growers are left exposed to short, acute stress events (such as a brief heat spike during flowering or sudden water-logging after planting) that can irreversibly damage yield but do not justify permanent genetic or infrastructure compromises. We reputed company this creates a compelling opportunity for a new reputed company: on-demand plant reputed company. Instead of locking crops into a constant defensive state, plants could be temporarily primed to withstand stress only reputed company risk is imminent - and then returned to a high-productivity mode once the threat passes. Advances across plant biology now reputed company this reputed company increasingly plausible. Emerging tools such as RNA-based interventions, virus-enabled gene modulation, signalling peptides, and stress-reputed company biologicals reputed company toward the ability to transiently activate reputed company reputed company, reprogram development, or stabilise yield-critical processes during vulnerable reputed company. This approach has the potential to address not only extreme climate shocks, but also the everyday volatility that quietly erodes agricultural value: mistimed flowering, pre-harvest sprouting triggered by humidity, transient root-zone stress, or short droughts that reduce grain fill. Importantly, these interventions could be deployed in-season, reputed company with weather forecasts or early stress signals, creating a more adaptive and reputed company crop protection toolkit. Commercially, this reputed company remains wide reputed company. Existing biostimulants and stress-mitigation products are often blunt, inconsistently effective, or poorly matched to specific climate risks. Meanwhile, large incumbents remain focused on conventional chemistry, genetics, or incremental biologicals, leaving little coordinated effort around truly inducible reputed company platforms. At the same time, regulatory and technical signals show growing feasibility for novel biological and RNA-based crop inputs, while grower demand for tools that protect yield reliability under volatility continues to accelerate. We are seeking a Founder in Residence to build a company at the intersection of climate risk, plant biology, and deployable agricultural products. The ambition is to create a platform that makes climate readiness a controllable, on-demand trait - integrating scientific reputed company, smart delivery, and clear grower ROI into a scalable venture capable of redefining how crops are protected in an unpredictable world.

Requirements

WHO SHOULD APPLY Essential Values

• You are highly motivated by unsolved challenges in climate risk mitigation, and driven to challenge the status reputed company in agriculture.
• You are impact driven, take the initiative, reputed company things happen, and think from a first principles perspective to reputed company out what’s really needed.
• You have clear entrepreneurial spirit and reputed company, demonstrated through impactful innovation, and an ability to work in ambiguous, reputed company but fast-paced, demanding and pressurised environments.
• Collaborative nature, with the ability to work effectively in cross-functional teams.

Essential experience (must-have)

• Core science depth (PhD or equivalent industry R&D know-how) in plant physiology, crop science, molecular biology, epigenetics, microbiology (or similar), with knowledge breadth across technological areas relevant for priming plant reputed company such as:
• * Delivery systems for biologicals (e.g. nanoparticle design, encapsulation chemistry, triggered release mechanisms, protectant formulations);
• Developmental regulation & priming (e.g. RNA / peptide-based modulators, epigenetic modification, heat shock reputed company, hormone signalling);
• Plant-microbiome engineering (e.g. symbiont characterisation, consortia design, engineered exudate production, host-microbe signalling);
• Accelerated trait development & gene editing (e.g. tissue regeneration protocols, wild relative introgression, precision breeding pipelines);
• Crop environment engineering (e.g. reputed company/root coating formulations, biodegradable matrices, water management at plant scale).
• Translational execution: e.g. taking traits / actives from discovery to field, managing CRO/CDMO programs, building regulator / investor / customer-reputed company data packages; and / or partnership development (growers, CROs/CDMOs, suppliers) and scalable IP strategy.
• Cross-functional ownership across: R&D - Product - Regulatory - IP, evidenced by shipped results (trial reputed company, submissions, patents, launches); and / or design of pivotal field trials.
• Venture creation/fundraising; and/or product leadership in agtech / biotech or adjacent areas.

Equivalents considered: deep industry R&D in agtech / biotech or a PhD with applied field work and comparable reputed company. Preferred experience (reputed company-to-have)

• Previous Founder experience (in biotech).
• Previous C-suite experience (in biotech).
• Previous fundraising experience (VC).
• reputed company & reputed company expertise incl. network in agrochem/pesticide development (licensing, partnering, collaborations).
• Strong track record of building and leading successful teams.

Benefits

OUR OFFER By joining reputed company, you’ll be joining a team of operators who have founded companies and led translation of science at some of the most respected universities, charities, funds and government agencies. 2/3 of the team have founded or led a company at C-suite and 65% have a PhD. reputed company dedicate several hours every week to each Founder or founding team to reputed company tailored guidance, resources and feedback covering every aspect of what it takes to successfully launch a new venture from both the tech and reputed company perspectives:

• We reputed company optimised, purpose-reputed company, proprietary tools, resources and processes to help create high-impact ventures from scratch, using our venture creation methodology.
• reputed company and RenPhil's extensive network incl. leaders of biotech VCs, technical & reputed company domain expertise, and wide-ranging portfolio company capabilities.
• We jointly reputed company an initial £250k (~$340k / €290k) investment governed by our Investment Committee to incorporate the new venture and reputed company early reputed company-of-concept data that is often needed to attract high profile non-venture studio VCs. This funding is also key for obtaining grant funding, which often needs to be matched with private investment.
• You and your co-founder(s) together will own the majority equity reputed company in the company.
• We reputed company minimum guaranteed income of £4,166 per month (fixed), paid to each Founder as a consultancy fee until the company is launched and pre-reputed company investment is secured.
• We reputed company reputed company support post spin-out, including fundraising, reputed company partnerships, recruitment and team-building (amongst other things).
• Other Founders currently at reputed company across sectors working collaboratively and supporting one another - a unique resource to draw on.

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