ALAMEDA, CALIF. — Dean Banks, the former chief executive officer for Tyson Foods Inc., recently joined the advisory board of Shiru.

Banks plans to help the food ingredient company scale ingredients for its ventures in the plant-based food market. 

“Shiru’s platform for improving ingredients in many different food products is impressive to me, but I’m equally impressed with Shiru’s approach to partnering,” Banks said. “While it is valuable for some companies to make their own branded products, Shiru wants to provide ingredients to large, existing food players, shortening their timeline to reach real impact.” 

Since leaving Tyson in June 2021, Banks co-founded Vergent Bioscience and has been working as an advisor with X, the Moonshot Factory. He also joined the board of directors for a cultured meat venture, Omeat.

Banks worked as president and CEO of Tyson starting in October 2020, when he replaced Noel White. He joined the company as a director in 2017 and became president of Tyson Foods in 2019.

Other advisory board members announced by Shiru included Blaine Templeman, the former chief administrative officer and chief legal officer of Aduro Biotech and Aaron Kimball, former chief technology officer of Zymergen. 

“We’re thrilled to welcome Dean, Aaron, and Blaine to our advisory board and look forward to working together in our mission to feed people more sustainably,” said Jasmin Hume, PhD, founder and CEO of Shiru. “Their expertise in the food and technology industries will provide great benefits to Shiru as we continue to scale the company while discovering and producing next-generation ingredients for leading food companies.”