Dr. Jan-Olaf Willums has been a serial entrepreneur and early stage investor in various technology companies, including Computas (Artificial Intelligence), Avenir (Software) , REC (Solar), Think (Electric cars), Move About (Electric mobility) and ZEM (batteries for the offshore and shipping industry). He was co-founding director of the World Business council for Sustainable Development.
Jan-Olaf Willums has a M.Sc. from the Swiss Institute of Technology (ETH) and a joint D.Sc. in Ocean Engineer and International Management from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he lead a Deep Ocean Mining project and was working in the Mid Ocean Dynamics Experiment (MODE I) headed by MIT and Harvard.
He became the first Marine Policy & Ocean Management Fellow at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Cape Cod. Today he is on the advisory Board of the European Development Bank (EBRD) and member of the Maritime Battery Forum.