Noah Helman

Lowkey, you gotta hear about Noah Helman. This guy’s the real deal in biotech and startups. He’s the kind of dude who’s been grinding in the science and biz worlds forever, and now he’s changing the game with his company, Industrial Microbes. No cap.

So, Noah’s got this crazy academic background, a Ph.D. in Applied Physics from Stanford and an undergrad from Harvard. That’s some serious brainpower right there. He started out doing the typical tech nerd thing, working as a consultant at Kenan Systems (later part of Lucent), but he wasn’t just about the corporate grind. Nah, he jumped into academia and biotech, doing this postdoc at UCSF, deep in synthetic biology. The dude was already on some advanced shit, merging physics, biology, and tech.

Then, around 2014, he co-founded Industrial Microbes. The goal? Using synthetic biology and fermentation tech to turn greenhouse gases and renewable stuff into sustainable chemicals and materials. Think about it, he’s literally trying to fight climate change with biotech. That’s some next-gen hero move. And he crushed it. They got into Y Combinator’s Winter 2015 batch, which is a pretty sweet badge of honor for any startup.

Before all this, he’d been involved with companies like LS9, where he built some crazy enzyme engineering pipelines, automated, high-throughput stuff that supercharged how to evolve enzymes fast. Basically, he’s a tech wizard in biotech, always pushing the boundaries of what’s possible.

Fast forward, Noah’s been leading the charge at iMicrobes, handling biz dev, IP, and enzyme stuff. They’ve raised over 10 million bucks, starting from grants (including some from the Canadian government, gotta love the global support), then venture capital. That’s no small feat, showing investors believe in his vision.

What’s crazy about Noah? It’s his relentless drive to combine science with real-world impact. Dude’s not just about publishing papers, he’s about building solutions that actually matter. He’s taken his deep knowledge of directed evolution, metabolic engineering, and biotech innovation and turned it into a startup that could seriously help fight climate change.

Bottom line, Noah Helman’s the kind of guy who saw a big problem, jumped into the lab, and then took it to the streets (well, the startup world). He’s proof that if you mix science, grit, and a little bit of venture magic, you can do some real good. That’s why he’s so important. The guy’s not just building a company, he’s building a future.