Rich Riley has served as Co-Chief Executive Officer and a member of the board of directors of Origin Materials since October 2020. Mr. Riley has been an advisor to and investor in Origin since 2010. From April 2013 to January 2019, Mr. Riley was the Chief Executive Officer of Shazam Entertainment Ltd, a leading mobile music application that was acquired by Apple Inc. in 2018. Mr. Riley served as an industry advisor to KKR & Co. L.P., a leading global investment firm, from 2013 to 2022. Mr. Riley was an executive at Yahoo! Inc. from Jan 1999 to Sept. 2012 with roles including EVP, Americas and SVP & MD, EMEA Region. He joined Yahoo! when it acquired Log-Me-On.com, where he was the Co-Founder and Managing Member. Mr. Riley began his career as an investment banking analyst at Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette. Mr. Riley was a finalist for Ernst & Young's Entrepreneur of the Year Award, Featured in Forbes 40 under 40 Ones to Watch and included three times in Billboard Magazine's Power 100 list. Mr. Riley is a Trustee at St. Luke's school, a member of the advisory Board for the Entrepreneurship Department at the Wharton School and a member of the Executive Board of Boy Scouts of America, Connecticut Yankee Council. Mr. Riley received a B.S. in economics with concentrations in finance and entrepreneurial management from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
Ryan Smith co-founded Origin Materials in 2008 and has served as Chief Technology Officer since inception. Mr. Smith has deep expertise in intellectual property protection, chemical and materials technology strategy, business development, and new product development within the chemical industry. Mr. Smith received a B.S. in Chemical Engineering from the University of California, Davis.
Mako Masuno has over 9 years of experience with Origin Materials and over 20 years of experience in the chemistry industry. Dr. Masuno has strong expertise in natural product biosynthesis and biomimetic synthesis, pathway development and optimization, and structure/property relationships which Dr. Masuno developed during his time as a professor in the chemistry department at Sacramento and Westmont colleges in California. Dr. Masuno was a significant contributor to the development of Origin Materials’ furanic platform process and scale-up to para-xylene production. Dr. Masuno currently has 14 publications, 4 pending patents, and 5 provisionally filed patent applications. Dr. Masuno is responsible for the overall research and development of Origin Materials’ technology. Dr. Masuno has a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from UC Davis, and a B.S. in Chemistry from Westmont College.