First Signals

Helping Leaders Transition into the Asia-Pacific Bioeconomy

What is First Signals?

First Signals is a networked initiative helping leaders, innovators, and decision-makers co-develop an Asia-Pacific economy aligned with Nature and the People stewarding it.

How That Gets Done

Building Relationship & Knowledge

Relationships and Networks are critical to innovation and transition, especially when the systems don't exist yet or the path is unclear. Part of First Signal's work is finding the unorthodox and unexpected partners to collaborate, innovate and help drive together your projects and programs. Evan and Friends have put together networks with anywhere between 5 to 32 partners to test new products, generate and establish evidence, or implement new programs.

Entrepreneurship-In-Residence (EIR)

Advising often fails because it doesn't have a stake in the success of a program or the right context, within and outside of an organization. First Signals works to embed an entrepreneur within your organization to drive results, based on trust, cadence and strategy. This comes from experience. Evan's built the thing, from 0 to 1, in 3 bioeconomy sectors: seaweed, cardboard recycling and horticulture. He's scaled production facilities by 6x, handled 12+ tons of recycling and knows how to build systems while operating them.

Orchestrating Systemic Funding

We need to fund change, transition and growth well. Based on over a decade of experimentation and experience, First Signals is offering an orchestration capacity for funding systemic change or growth. This isn't just hype; Evan has helped move over $300k into systemic change and provided guidance and direction for $10m more.

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The bioeconomy isn’t built in boardrooms..

It’s built by teachers, farmers, foresters, researchers, land stewards and innovators. First Signals backs the people on the ground, wherever the Pacific touches.

Meet the Founder

For ten years, Evan has built bioeconomy ventures around the Pacific Rim: a seaweed biorefinery that scaled 6x, a community enterprise that diverted 40+ tons of material and moved food and work to 100+ Native Hawaiian families, and a Hawaiian-led production facility that cut water use by 95%. He now embeds with Indigenous, Pasifika and locally-led organizations and enterprises to turn their knowledge into long-lived working offerings.