Karin Rotem, PhD
Dr. Karin Rotem is seconded to Physic Ventures by PepsiCo as a full-time member of the Physic operating team. Both Physic and PepsiCo share a mission statement grounded in Consumer Health & Wellness and Sustainability. Karin focuses on the Food and Nutrition Investment Sector. She is also responsible for creating new touch points between Physic and PepsiCo core business sectors including: Beverages, Foods, Nutrition, Health Policy, Scientific and Regulatory Affairs, Long Term Research, and Corporate Wellness.
Karin has 10 years of experience working in R&D in the Consumer Goods industry. She specializes in Product, Process, and Package design and commercialization. She has been with PepsiCo for over 8 years and has developed core competencies in thought leadership, strategic planning and execution, team architecture and dynamics, and consumer insights driven innovation.
Most recently, Karin moved back from China where she started up the PepsiCo R&D Center in Shanghai. There she built a state-of-the-art R&D lab, a strong and sustainable R&D team of PRC Nationals, and was responsible for launching locally relevant and differentiated beverages for the China market as well as seeding an innovation pipeline for the future. Prior to China, Karin championed the New Product Commercialization process for Asia creating a link between the PepsiCo Headquarters R&D Center and the Asia Business Units. She has spent time in the Commercialization Engineering Group focused on Domestic and International Project Management and in the Water Technology and Quality Group focused on purification, surface chemistry, and packaging materials. Karin spent 3 years with Nestle R&D focused on Process and Package Innovation for the Food Service Division. While at Nestle, she spent 6 months on assignment in Paris leading a Technical Feasibility assessment for a new product category for the French Market. During her studies, Karin took on special assignments with IBM and Merck in their Chemical Analytical Lab and Corporate Environmental Group, respectively.
Karin earned her PhD in the field of Ab Initio Quantum Chemistry from the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of Massachusetts Amherst and her BS in Chemical Engineering from Lehigh University.