We understand the forecast and know how to navigate the changing tides

Kristina Simmons has built, advised, and invested in leading brands, establishing herself as a trusted partner with proven venture and operational experience. At lululemon, she was an early member of the “web team,” playing a pivotal role in launching e-commerce and managing social media and digital channels, making lululemon a pioneer in these spaces. She later led Emerging Products and Concepts, focusing on innovative initiatives such as digital products, strategic partnerships, and international expansion. Kristina then joined Andreessen Horowitz as a partner, where she supported market development, helping portfolio companies evolve into renowned brands and connecting them with global leaders. Her career path then led her to an early-stage food startup, transitioning later to advising and angel investing. At Khosla Ventures, she served as Chief of Staff and investment partner, serving on boards from Seed to Series D. Recognizing the need for a more founder-centric approach in venture capital, Kristina founded Overwater Ventures to create more value and support for early-stage companies.

Maria is an advisor on the Overwater Ventures team, and also serves as an investor, operator, and board director with more than 25 years of experience building and scaling consumer and healthcare businesses. Maria served as CEO and Board Member of Thinx, where she transformed the company into a global women’s health brand and led its successful acquisition by Kimberly-Clark in 2022. Earlier in her career, she held executive leadership roles at eBay, Yahoo, Thomson Reuters, Dow Jones, Fab.com, and Disney, bringing deep expertise in building trusted consumer brands and scaling companies globally.

Ivy Ross is the Chief Design Officer for Consumer Devices. Ivy and her team created the design language for the Google hardware products that launched in 2017, winning over 240 design awards over the last three years. Business Insider recently named her one of the 15 Most Powerful Women at Google and in 2019, she was voted number 9 out of 100 Most Creative People in Business by Fast Company. Ivy is the co-author of New York Times Best Selling Book, “Your Brain on Art: How the Arts Transform Us”, working on groundbreaking work across creativity and neuroscience. Previously she held executive positions ranging from head of marketing to head of product design and development and president at Calvin Klein, Swatch, Coach, Mattel, Old Navy, and the Gap. She has served on the board of directors for companies including Willow, Smithsonian Design Museum, Cooper Hewitt, and the design board at Proctor & Gamble. Ivy is passionate about turning ideas into real businesses.

Vijit is the CEO and co-founder of Adaptyx, one of Overwater’s portfolio companies. He was previously a Co-Founder-In-Residence at Deep Valley Labs and a partner at Khosla Ventures for almost five years, where he invested in and helped build deep tech startups in biotechnology, healthcare, additive manufacturing, food technology, computation, and photonics. Kristina and Vijit have worked together across multiple companies and boards. Prior to Khosla Ventures, Vijit was co-founder and CEO of Solar Junction, which commercialized the world’s highest efficiency solar cells at that time. He was also an early employee at Translucent, which developed new materials solutions for silicon photonics and electronics applications. Vijit received M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Electrical Engineering from Stanford University and a B.S. in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences from UC Berkeley. He holds over 15 publications and 4 patents.

Carolyn Coles-Devine is the Head of Platform and Operations at Overwater Ventures, where she plays a pivotal role in scaling the firm’s infrastructure, supporting portfolio founders, and deepening relationships across teams. With a focus on operational excellence and founder success, Carolyn leads Overwater’s platform strategy, delivering hands-on commercialization support, establishing high-impact connections, and driving initiatives that help early-stage companies grow faster and stronger. Prior to joining Overwater, Carolyn spent over 20 years leading transformative growth across globally recognized consumer brands. She held senior executive roles at lululemon athletica, Canada Goose, and Northern Reflections. A builder at heart, Carolyn is known for scaling teams, systems, and strategies with intention.
She brings a deep passion for supporting ambitious, mission-driven founders and believes that breakthrough innovation thrives when paired with empathetic, execution-oriented support.

Dr. Alan Mardinly is Director of Biology at Science Corporation and is a cofounder of the Company. His focus is on optogenetic therapies for vision restoration and biohybrid brain implants, including neuroscience and stem cell engineering. Alan has 20 years of experience in neuroscience research, working across biology and neuroscience from stem cells to brain implants. He received his BA in Biology from the University of Chicago in 2006 and his PhD in neurobiology from Harvard University in 2013, where he studied how experience-induced transcriptional programs control synaptic plasticity in inhibitory neurons, published in Cell and Nature. Alan then went to UC Berkeley where he developed holographic optogenetic approaches to stimulate the brain with spatial and temporal precision, published in Nature Neuroscience and Nature Communications. Alan co-founded Sculpted Light in the Brain, which became the flagship conference series for optics in neuroscience. Alan left academia to join Neuralink in 2018 as a member of the technical staff and was promoted to the leadership team six months later. He served in that capacity until leaving to co-found Science in July 2021. Alan currently manages the Life Sciences Division at Science.

Dr. Alan Ashworth is an advisor at Overwater Ventures. He is President of the Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center at the University of California, San Francisco and Senior Vice President for Cancer Clinical Services at UCSF Health. Ashworth was a key member of the team that discovered the BRCA2 gene in 1995, which is linked to an increased risk of breast, ovarian, and other cancers. In 2005, his lab and collaborators described a way to exploit genetic weaknesses in cancer cells with mutated BRCA1 or BRCA2 genes using synthetic lethality, leading to PARP inhibition as a new approach to cancer treatment. Four PARP inhibitors have since been approved by the FDA for the treatment of ovarian, breast, pancreatic, and prostate cancers based on this work, which Nature recognized among the top cancer discoveries of the 21st century. He continues to develop new cancer treatments using genetic principles.

Ashworth has received numerous awards recognizing the translational and clinical impact of his work. He is an elected member of EMBO and a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the American Association for Cancer Research, and the Royal Society. His honors include the ESMO Lifetime Achievement Award, the David T. Workman Memorial Award, the Meyenburg Foundation Cancer Research Award, the Genetics Society Medal, the Susan G. Komen Brinker Award, and the Basser Global Prize. He is the scientific co-founder of Tango Therapeutics and serves on the board of directors of CytomX Therapeutics.