Diane Pierotti

Chief Financial Officer, EBRC

Diane brings over 35 years of research program development and successful program funding efforts in excess of $3B, strategic planning and executive management experience. Diane was instrumental in EBRC’s successful launch in 2016 following the sunsetting of SynBERC. In this role, she coordinated the development and submission of the proposal that led to the Department of Defense (DoD) 2020 award to create the Bioindustrial Manufacturing and Design Ecosystem (BioMADE) Institute, a USA Manufacturing Institute and served as BioMADE’s Chief Financial and Operating Officer until 2024.

Diane is a graduate of UC Berkeley where she spent the majority of her career serving in many roles including as the Deputy Director of the QB3 Institute and Assistant Vice Chancellor for Research overseeing Research Enterprise Systems and the development of large-scale science initiatives. At Berkeley, she conceptualized, developed and shepherded large-scale science efforts and programs through successful resource procurement, launch and on-going operations. Notable efforts launched include the National Center for the Workplace, QB3 Institute, the Center for Computational and Genomic Biology, and the NSF-funded SynBERC,. Diane led Berkeley’s coordination efforts to establish the Stanford Underground Research Facility (SURF) and oversaw the successful proposal development establishing the Energy Biosciences Institute (EBI), a $500M award – the largest university-industry agreement in the nation’s history.

Following her time at UC Berkeley, Diane held positions at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory’s Biological Systems and Engineering (BSE) Division and Joint BioEnergy Institute (JBEI). She oversaw the development of three successful JBEI renewal proposals and coordinated large-scale proposal efforts. As Director of Research Advancement, Diane coordinated JBEI’s successful competitive renewal proposal and as BSE’s Deputy Operations Director and JBEI’s COO, Diane oversaw an annual budget of over $30M, a 65,000 sf research facility, EH&S, outreach and communications, lab operations and business services.

Diane also spent two years as Director of Institutional Philanthropy at Planned Parenthood Northern California (PPNorCal), the nation’s fifth largest affiliate serving 20 counties and providing services to 150,000+ people. She more than doubled their annual institutional philanthropy support. Diane has founded and served on the Boards of a number of non-profit organizations. She currently serves on the Board of Directors for Calidad Industries, a 501-C-3 providing training and employment opportunities for adults with physical, mental or psychological impairments.