Stef van Grieken

Stef van Grieken is the co-founder and CEO of Cradle, a fast growing company that makes it easier to engineer proteins with help from Generative AI. Scientists use Cradle’s software to engineer better bio-based products such as chemicals, food, materials, medicines and diagnostics, quicker and more efficiently. Cradle serves many of the largest biotech companies in the world such as Johnson & Johnson, Novo Nordisk and IFF. The company recently closed a $78m Series B led by IVP.

Previously, Stef was part of the leadership team at Google Research & Machine Intelligence where he was responsible for various infrastructure, developer and applied artificial intelligence projects. He has also been a co-lead of a successful Google X project and a lead on Google Maps and Android. His work was awarded with the ‘Time Magazine Top Website 2012’ the ‘European Public Sector Award’, ‘2024 Rising Star by Founders Forum’, as well as being named ‘Alumnus of the Year 2024’ at his Alma Mater, University of Groningen.