Cellular aquaculture supplier BlueNalu is adding two new executives to its leadership team, including a corporate chef.
The San Diego, California, U.S.A.-based company, which is developing seafood directly from fish cells, hired Greg Murphy as its director of corporate development and strategic partnerships, and Gerard Viverito – who is a certified executive chef, restaurant owner, and seafood instructor at The Culinary Institute of America – as its corporate chef and culinary advisor.
“Greg and Gerard bring a wealth of experience and expertise to BlueNalu that is vital for our success, and their addition furthers our drive towards becoming the global leader in cell-based seafood,” said Lou Cooperhouse, co-founder, president, and CEO of BlueNalu, in a press release.
Viverito will “support our efforts at BlueNalu to ensure that our seafood products provide consumers with the sensory experiences that they expect including flavor, texture, and the ability to be prepared in a wide array of applications in foodservice and retail formats,” Cooperhouse said.
Meanwhile, Murphy will secure relationships with partners “that have been successful in this industry and have the same vision of sustainable global food security as we have,” Cooperhouse said.
Murphy has promoted sustainable ocean solutions for almost a decade with experience in policy at the local, state, and national level, according to BlueNalu. He formerly served as executive director of The Maritime Alliance, a nonprofit industry cluster for sustainable ocean technology companies in San Diego County. Most recently, Murphy consulted organizations through his firm, Blue Economy Strategies, and advised elected officials on ocean policy, sustainability, and industry.
“When it comes to the ocean, our action or inaction will define the future of humanity,” Murphy said. “I’m excited to join BlueNalu to help bring a global solution for sustainable seafood to market with strategic partners that align with our core mission.”
Viverito has more than 20 years of experience as an executive chef, instructor, restaurant owner, and hospitality educator. He is an associate professor at The Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park since 2004, where he focuses on a sustainable seafood curriculum, BlueNalu said.
“Cell-based seafood has tremendous implications for the future of the planet,” Viverito said. “As a chef committed to sustainable seafood, I’m excited to have the opportunity to work with seafood that contains no mercury, bones, shells, microplastics, or other contaminants and am very much looking forward to this relationship.”
BlueNalu, which raised USD 4.5 million (EUR 4.1 million) during its seed round of financing in 2018, recently announced a five-phase commercialization strategy to scale up cell-based seafood production in the next five years.
