Joel Harris

Investment Stage

Focus Areas

About Investor

Joel Harris is Co-Founder and CEO of Genvax Technologies, developing herd-specific, prescription mRNA and nanoparticle vaccines for the livestock industry, with an initial focus on swine influenza and African swine fever. He also serves as Executive Director of Ag Startup Engine, a pre-seed stage investment group focused on midwest agricultural innovation, investing between $25K and $500K in agtech, energy tech, robotics, analytics, IoT, climate tech, and biotech. Before Genvax, he was Business Development Manager at Vitalize Venture Group and Director of Product at GlobalVetLINK. He previously co-founded and served as COO, CIO, and VP at Harrisvaccines, an international animal health vaccine company he and his father sold to Merck Animal Health in 2015. He holds a BA in Economics from the University of Iowa and a Post-baccalaureate Certificate in Narrative Communications from Northwestern University. He is based in the Greater Chicago Area.