CM Venture Capital, a venture capital company based in Shanghai has added two seasoned industry executives as venture partners. CM Venture Capital specializes in hard technologies including new materials, advanced manufacturing, energy and environment, digital industrial. The two venture partners, Dr. Jean-Claude Pierre and Mr. Ryosuke Kuwada both have extensive experiences in large chemical and material companies like BASF and Dupont, both have start-up or venture capital experience, and both had senior management and board-level responsibilities.
CM Venture Capital Managing Partner Dr. Min Zhou commented: “CM Venture Capital is delighted to add two very experienced industry veterans as venture partners. I have personally known Jean-Claude from 2003 and known Ryosuke since 2015, and we have had various successful collaborations on projects, and we share common philosophies on company-building. We are delighted to formalize this relationship so we can all continue to foster innovative start-ups and drive open entrepreneurship paradigm for materials and related industries.”
Dr. Jean-Claude Pierre, Venture Partner
Jean-Claude has an extensive experience in the Specialty Chemical industry in managerial, consulting and investment roles across the globe.
After starting as a chemist with I.C.I. in England, Jean-Claude spent seven years in the US and Germany with BASF where, among other roles, he led their venture capital division. From 2006 to 2015, Jean-Claude spent nine years in China in various managerial and consulting roles in the chemical sector. In 2015, Jean-Claude returned to the UK to lead Scott Bader, a $300m turnover global specialty chemicals company. He left the Scott Bader CEO role in September 2019.
Jean-Claude has a MSc in polymer science, an MBA and a PhD in sustainable systems.
Mr. Ryosuke Kuwada, Venture Partner
A Japanese Citizen, Ryosuke Kuwada is a 30-year veteran in Global electronic materials businesses. He started his career at DuPont Japan (US Chemical Company subsidiary) as a tech service engineer in electronic materials. He has led various display projects such as PDP, FED, SED, LCD as a product manager.
Ryosuke was also the first employee in DuPont electronic materials appointed as Global Business Manager outside of the USA. After 17 years’ service at DuPont, he joined E Ink Corporation in Cambridge, MA (MIT spin out). As Global Sales & Marketing VP, he contributed towards technology commercialization of the Amazon “Kindle Launch” in 2007 as well as a successful Exit (~$400M Merger by a Taiwanese LCD company). At Toppan Printing Corporation (Japanese $15B company), he was appointed as Head (GM) of Corporate Planning Division and was responsible for whole company portfolio management.
After establishing his own consulting company, he plays key role in the industry such as Board of Director at several large corporations like Japan Display Inc. Ryosuke holds a BS from Keio University (Electronics Materials Design) & MBA from Keio University Business School.
