AgriNovus Indiana, a nonprofit coalition focused on growing Indiana’s agbioscience economy, announced today changes to its board of directors.  

The board unanimously approved the addition of Craig Anderson, president and chief executive officer of Ag Alumni Seed, Dr. Robert Pepper, president of Huntington University and Eric Young, chief financial officer at BiomEdit, to replace outgoing directors.

“To execute a bold vision, you must have great leaders in place,” said Karen Plaut, executive vice president for research at Purdue University and chair of the AgriNovus Indiana Board of Directors. “The additions of Craig, Robert and Eric bring a varied background of skills, perspectives and experiences to our Board that will be critical to our shared vision of growing this agbioscience economy.”

Anderson is the president and chief executive officer of The Ag Alumni Seed Improvement Association of Romney, or Ag Alumni Seed, a non-profit focused on the research, development and marketing of popcorn seed for domestic and international markets. He most recently served as chief operating officer of Dryland Genetics and has also held several key leadership roles, including chief operating officer, for AgReliant Genetics.

Pepper is the fourteenth president of Huntington University, a non-profit university operating three locations including its home campus in Huntington, Ind. and two others in Fort Wayne, Ind. and Peoria, Ariz. Prior, he was the executive director and assistant to the president for innovation and university partnerships at Messiah University, an institution where he served in roles of increasing responsibility since 1993.

Young serves as chief financial officer at BiomEdit, Inc., an animal health microbial biotechnology company leveraging the power of the microbiome and synthetic biology to develop next-generation solutions for livestock and pet health.  He previously led business development strategic growth ventures at Elanco Animal Health and spent 20 years at Eli Lilly and Company across a variety of leadership positions in corporate finance and business development.  Eric has served on the Investment Committee Board for the Indiana Biosciences Research Institute.

The AgriNovus Indiana Board of Directors is comprised of leaders from industry, academia and government. Learn more about our members here.

These changes come as the organization continues a national search for its next President and CEO, a process that is expected to be completed in the third quarter of 2025. Updates to the search can be found here.