Fresh Start’s management team and global advisory board consist of seasoned R&D, regulation, finance, business, and marketing professionals who provide our companies with actionable feedback, and address market trends and requirements as part of an ongoing dialogue. With the firsthand entrepreneurial experience and deep technological expertise of food industry veterans and VC luminaries to guide your journey, You are in extremely capable hands.

TEAM

Eyal Rosenthal

Director

Noga Sela Shalev

Chief Executive Officer

Tammy Meiron, PhD

Chief Technology Officer

Yuval Illuz

Chairman

Daniel Gamsu

Director of Business Development

Hadas Sibony Benyamini Ph.D.

Technology Analyst

Sapir Hashmonai

Marcom & Community Manager

A global advisory board

Prof. Barry Nalebuff

FoodTech entrepreneur

Dean Tilyard

Co founder of Sprout accelerator

Dr. Min Zhidong

Managing Director
Bright Food Intl. Ltd.

David Schwartz

Director PepsiCo

Roland Pirmez

President AMEE Heineken

Dr. Adrian Percy

Ex Head of R&D
Bayer CropScience

Rodrigo Godoi

VP PCE Portfolio Managment Tetra Pak

Eyal Rosenthal

Director

Eyal Rosenthal is the CEO of a cultivated meat startup Ever After.  Previously Eyal was the local partner for Finistere Ventures (global VC fund) in Israel.

Previously Eyal was a Managing Director in Infinity Group, a $600M PE Growth Fund focusing on cross border investments between Israel and China.

Prior to that, Eyal advised the International Finance Corporation (the World Bank Group) on global agritech investments and strategy.

In addition, Eyal was the Chairman at Technolplast Ventures (TASE: TNPV) a publicly traded holding company, a venture partner at the European VC firm RSG Capital, and the CEO of tech company web 2 print.  Before that Eyal was an Investment Manager in UBP in London, UK.

Eyal holds an MSc in Investment Management from City University Business School, London, UK.

Noga Sela Shalev

Chief Executive Officer

Noga has 15 years of experience in product
management, marketing, and business development in the food and foodtech industry, closely acquainted with the local and global foodtech scene, supporting early-stage start-ups from vision to scale. She is experienced in business evaluation of innovative technologies with high emphasis on applicable innovation and has initiated and led industry and startups joint development as well as implementation processes according to industry’s needs and requirements.

 

Beyond her extensive marketing background, as formerly the chief of staff and head of innovation unit in Tnuva, Israel’s biggest food company, she initiated and led corporate level strategic projects in various fields, from operational excellence to corporate strategy, and established the Tnuva group corporate innovation unit and work processes.

 

Noga holds an MBA degree from the Tel Aviv University.

Tammy MEIRON PhD

CTO

Tammy has over 25 years of experience in R&D, production, and technology transfer fields in the life-science, pharmaceuticals, and food industries.


In her last position she led the technology in two leading Israeli FoodTech start-ups, developing plant-based egg substitutes for all egg applications as CTO of Zero Egg; and developing sweet proteins as a non-GMO sugar substitute as the Amai Proteins Director of Food Technology.

Previously, she was involved in numerous startups in the fields of R&D, IP, tech transfer, production Scale-UP, operations, joint ventures with multinational companies, and more.

Since 2013, Tammy teaches a new product development course at the Hebrew University. 

 

Tammy holds a Ph.D. degree from the Hebrew University in Food Science and Technology.

Yuval Illuz

Chairman

Yuval Illuz serves as the Chief Operating Officer at Head of Incubators at OurCrowd, a global investment platform offering a broad range of investment opportunities in emerging startup companies and private market alternatives.

 

Illuz brings a wealth of experience and expertise with an extensive background in technology and business leadership. His career includes notable roles including Operating Member and CTO at SC Ventures, a division of Standard Chartered Bank focused on innovation and disruptive financial technologies.

 

Additionally, he has served as Group CISO and COO for Trust, Data & Resilience at Standard Chartered, and as Executive General Manager and Chief Information Security & Trust Officer at Commonwealth Bank.

Illuz has also built successful startups as an investor and senior executive and acts as Board / Advisory Board member in different companies.

Daniel Gamsu

Director of Business Development

Drawing from over 8 years of experience in venture capital within the life science, medical, and biotechnology sectors, and over 8 years in R&D roles, Daniel possesses a wealth of expertise that he brings to the foodtech industry. He has successfully partnered with funds, incubators, and early-stage ventures, driving growth and launching innovative products. Daniel holds a B.Sc. in Biomedical Engineering and an MBA from Tel Aviv University, enabling him to navigate complex challenges with a unique blend of engineering and business acumen. Within our incubator, Daniel provides invaluable support to our portfolio companies, assisting with fundraising, forging new partnerships, managing daily operations, and much more.

Hadas Sibony Benyamini Ph.D.

Technology Analyst

Hadas is a biology expert with a Ph.D. in Medical Sciences specializing in developmental biology from Bar Ilan University. With over ten years of research experience in plant science and cancer genome instability, she is now fully dedicated to the challenges of foodtech. At our incubator, Hadas plays a crucial role in supporting due diligence and addressing scientific challenges for our portfolio companies. She also manages our lab facilities, ensuring top-notch operations.

SAPIR HASHMONAI

Marcom & Community Manager

Sapir is a people-oriented marketing professional with a passion for food and technology. She manages Fresh Start’s brand, digital assets, public relations, sponsorships, conferences, as well as marcom support for portfolio companies. As a community manager, Sapir leads events from ideation through execution, with a talent for fostering ecosystem collaborations. She graduated with Honors from the Open University of Israel.

Ronny Barak

Business Consultant

Ronny brings 25 years of vast experience in the life science, medical and biotechnology industries as senior executive management, general management, strategic business development, sales and marketing.

As CEO of established companies and as co-founder-inventor, Ronny led startup companies to exit-M&A deals, through regulatory approvals, product penetration and sales ramp up. 

He has rich experience in team management in global and local markets.

Ronny has proven success in funds raising, wide network of contacts with KOL clinicians, researches, industry experts, investors and strategic companies.

Ronny has a Science-Chemistry B.Sc. and a MBA.