Mr Jimmy Tao is the CEO of unicorn startup, a serial entrepreneur, columnist, best-selling author and he has held operating roles at five start-ups and is an angel investor in 20 companies. Awards include Technology Pioneers by World Economic Forum, Grand Prix of the International Exhibition of Inventions of Geneva and WIPO medal for inventors. Before joining Vitargent International Holdings Limited as the Managing Director & CEO, he has founded or funded 5 companies over the past 15 years who grew the businesses from scratch and one of the companies, Novanic Electronics was acquired by Shenzhen Riland Industry and later listed on SHE (Shenzhen Stock Exchange, China) in 2010.

Among the fields in which he has been actively involved as an executive, board member or investor are ranging from power electronics, molecular biology, Alzheimer’s drug discovery, analytical chemistry to electric bike mid drive system and many others.

His personal interest and motivation have always been in working with innovative technologies and bright minds to make a world a better place. He is a frequent guest lecturer in universities including London Business School, Columbia Business School, KU Leuven, Sardegna Ricerche, The Helmholtz-Centre for Environmental Research GmbH, CUHK Business School, HKU Business School and HKUST to share his experience in innovation management, commercialisation of patents and external financing as a seasoned entrepreneur. Mentoring over 30 young professionals, students and founders who want to start their businesses with social missions all over the world. He is also a guest speaker frequently invited to and featured at numerous influential private & professional events in local and global theatres such as Business of IP Asia Forum (BIP Asia) and Unreasonable Impact Word Forum (London). His feature interview on entrepreneurship and angel investing by PRESSLOGIC has been viewed over a million times.

He received his BSc from the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology and holds a Master of Philosophy degree in Engineering from University of Cambridge. He is also a Clinton Global Initiative Commitment Scholar, AOAC Research Institute Advisory Council Member, Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) Innovation & Technology Advisory Committee, Advisor of Our Hong Kong Foundation (OHKF), Founding President of the HKSTP Startups Alumni Association (HKSTP-SAA) and selected as 1 of 14 Unreasonable Impact Asia Pacific Program leaders by Barclays.

(Updated as at Aug 2021)