Alex Woo, Ph.D.

Alex is the founder and CEO of W2O, a flavor technology firm based in the USA for the past fifteen years. He specializes in creating Better Food with niche expertise in contemporary taste and smell neuroscience and state-of-the-art clean-label plant-based ingredients.

Food and beverage companies hire him to bring food science to their new product development efforts on sugar reduction, salt reduction and multisensory eating experience. Food ingredient firms retain him to lead the creation of plant-based ingredients, particularly taste modulators. Alex also served as Chief Science Officer of Sweeteners for Amyris, a precision fermentation clean ingredient company (2019-2021), and Chief Innovation Officer for Nascent, a stevia sweetener leader (2017-2019). He is currently on the science advisory board for Olfactive Bio, a biosensor startup; Advance International, a marine protein startup; and the board of directors for the World Taste & Smell Association.

Prior to that, Alex had held various R&D leadership positions in companies including Pepsi, Kraft, Starbucks and Wrigley. He led technical teams to achieve business results. Alex holds a PhD in Food Science from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.