Bayer Growth Ventures (BGV), the corporate venturing arm of Germany-headquartered life sciences and agricultural products group Bayer, hired Derek Norman (pictured) as a vice-president last month.
Norman was formerly head of Syngenta Ventures, Switzerland-based agribusiness Syngenta’s corporate venturing unit. Syngenta Ventures managing director Colin Steen will assume Norman’s previous duties.
Norman joined Syngenta Ventures in 2009 as a managing director and was included in Global Corporate Venturing’s 2016 Rising Stars list. He ascended to lead the unit four months later and featured in GCV’s Powerlist later the same year.
BGV was known as Monsanto Growth Ventures until Bayer bought its parent company, agrochemical producer Monsanto, in mid-2018.
Bayer already ran an investment vehicle called Leaps by Bayer which focused on incubating life sciences startups. Its team now runs BGV, making seed-stage investments in developers of health and nutrition technologies, like its predecessor.
Photo courtesy of Derek Norman.
