John Melo Exits Amyris
John Melo is out at Amyris.
The Emeryville, California-based biotechnology company announced Monday that Melo resigned from his longtime role as president and chief executive officer and a member of the board of directors, effective immediately.
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The board has appointed Han Kieftenbeld as interim CEO. Kieftenbeld will also remain the company’s chief financial officer.
“John’s dedication and leadership were instrumental in the evolution of Amyris’ Lab-to-Market technology platform and the development of our diversified consumer brands portfolio. On behalf of the board of directors, I sincerely thank John for his many contributions over the last 16 years,” said Geoffrey Duyk, board chair of Amyris. “We have utmost confidence in Han’s ability to lead Amyris as interim chief executive officer through this critical period of transformation.”
The news initially caused the share price to rise around 4 percent in mid-morning trading to $1.15, but it closed down 9 percent at $1.
The announcement comes as the company cuts jobs as part of its cost saving efforts, having recently tapped PricewaterhouseCoopers to guide its transformation efforts and save $250 million.
“We are making tough choices including the decision to implement a reduction in force which we are executing today. We thank our departing employees for their efforts, dedication and contributions to Amyris,” Kieftenbeld said.
The company did not provide figures for how many employees would be impacted.
In Amyris’ most recent financial results, core revenue came in at $56.1 million for the first quarter ended March 31, down 3 percent compared to the same period a year earlier. Consumer revenue of $34.2 million decreased 1 percent.
Amyris began in 2003 with a $42 million grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation to create a molecule to treat malaria by engineering the genetics of yeast strains and fermenting them in sugarcane syrup in order to convert basic plant sugars to hydrocarbon molecules. The company adapted this technology to develop other “clean” ingredients, including sugarcane-derived squalene, an alternative to that found in deep-sea shark livers, for countless markets.
But earlier this year, Givaudan, the world’s largest fragrance and flavors supplier, acquired certain cosmetic ingredients from Amyris, including its squalane. As part of the deal, Amyris will continue to manufacture ingredients for Givaudan to use in cosmetics.
Now, much of the business is focused on consumer brands, many of them tied to celebrities. Prior to COVID-19, 80 percent of Amyris’ business was in supplying ingredients to other companies, while the remaining 20 percent was its consumer brands, including Biossance. But in an October 2022 interview, Melo told WWD that around two-thirds of the business was devoted to consumer brands and one-third is focused on supplying other businesses. Its brands include Naomi Watts’ menopausal beauty brand Stripes, color cosmetics line Rose Inc. with model Rosie Huntington-Whiteley, hair care brand JVN with “Queer Eye” star Jonathan Van Ness, and beauty brand Costa Brazil with former Calvin Klein designer Francisco Costa.
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