Day 86 of 100 · Synthetic Biology

Ginkgo Bioworks

Four MIT PhD students and their professor decided to make biology programmable.

Started atMIT
Founded2008
FoundersJason Kelly, Reshma Shetty, Barry Canton, Austin Che & Tom Knight
CountryUSA

How it started

They turned a lab discipline into an industrial platform and listed publicly.

The lesson for your campus A PhD cohort is a founding team waiting to be asked.

Why every campus needs an Innovation-Hub

Why we are telling this story

The next company on a list like this one has not been founded yet. Right now it is a student in a lecture hall with an idea nobody has asked about, and no room to build it in. Innovation-Hub is that room: a permanent space inside your institution where students from every department explore, experiment, collaborate and prototype.

See how to start one on your campus →

Ask the Founder

Pick a question — or write your own — and get a grounded answer about how Ginkgo Bioworks was actually built.

Opens ChatGPT in a new tab with your question ready. Answers are generated by AI from publicly reported information — they are not statements by the founders. Always check anything important against an original source.

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The next one comes from your campus

Innovation should not be an annual event. It should be a permanent room where students are allowed to build. Bring an Innovation-Hub to your institution.

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