# Ken Woody

> Ken Woody is a seed investor at Innova Memphis (Memphis) backing Health Care and Biotechnology. See 44 investments, check sizes, portfolio. Updated Aug 2026.

- Type: Angel Investor
- Fund: [Innova Memphis](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/innova-memphis)
- Location: Memphis, United States
- Total investments: 44
- Last investment: Dec 2022
- Lead investor: 18%
- Last updated: Aug 2026
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kenwoody

Ken Woody is a seed investor at Innova Memphis in Memphis focused on Health Care and Biotechnology. As President of Innova, Ken leads our team focused on finding, funding and growing startup technology businesses in Tennessee and helps them achieve commercial success. Using his extensive operations and sales background, he provides strategic guidance to portfolio companies both in times of need, as well as times of opportunity. Ken currentlyserves on the boards for Cagenix, S2 Interactive, Tensor Surgical, ACT, and BioNova Medical. He was a Director for ExtraOrtho when it was acquired by Zimmer Orthopedics.Before founding Innova Memphis, Ken was Senior Vice-President for Global Sales with Smith&Nephew Orthopedics. Prior to this role, he served as Vice President of Sales for DePuy Spine, a J&J Company. He worked for GE for more than 16 years, serving as a VP and General Manager in Healthcare and Capital businesses. Ken has enjoyed great success as an Army Officer, an entrepreneur and a Fortune 500 Executive. He has successfully owned and operated his own businesses and managed multi-billion dollar global enterprises.He serves on the Entrepreneur Advisory Council at Vanderbilt University’s Center for Technology Transfer and Commercialization, and as a Board Member at Tech 20/20. Ken is also part of the Advisory Panel of the Boyd Venture Challenge at UT Knoxville.Ken received his BS as a pre-med student from North Carolina State University.

## Investment focus

### Industry

| Industry | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Health Care | 6 | 14% |
| Biotechnology | 5 | 11% |
| Medical | 4 | 9% |
| Medical Device | 3 | 7% |
| AgTech | 2 | 5% |

23 industries tracked in total.

### Stage

| Stage | Investments | Share |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Seed | 6 | 14% |
| Convertible Note | 6 | 14% |
| Funding Round | 4 | 9% |
| Debt Financing | 4 | 9% |
| Series A | 3 | 7% |

6 stages tracked in total.

## Investments

| Company | Description | Amount | Stage | Date | Website |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Stony Creek Colors | Stony Creek Colors is engaged in the production of bio-based dyes together with farmers, mills, and brands, in partnership with small farmers in the Southeast U.S. Stony Creek Colors was founded by Sarah Bellos in 2012 and is based in Tennessee, United States. | $4.8M | Series B | Dec 01, 2022 |  |
| Tractor Zoom | Tractor Zoom is committed to helping leaders in agriculture make empowered, data-driven decisions when it comes to buying, selling, financing, and insuring heavy equipment. | $5M | Series A | Oct 03, 2022 |  |
| Ag Manufacturing & Technology | Agtech equipment manufacturer |  | Convertible Note | Dec 21, 2021 |  |
| BioNova | BioNova has acquired a technology from the University of Memphis that involves a spongy material from the outer shells of lobster and shrimp. This material has a natural antibiotic effect and may have an additional antibiotic influence if soaked in antibiotics. BioNova has developed this process to treat post-surgical wounds. | $1M | Series A | May 25, 2021 |  |
| Tractor Zoom | Tractor Zoom is committed to helping leaders in agriculture make empowered, data-driven decisions when it comes to buying, selling, financing, and insuring heavy equipment. | $3M | Series A | Dec 10, 2020 |  |
| Ag Manufacturing & Technology | Agtech equipment manufacturer | $250K | Convertible Note | Oct 26, 2020 |  |
| Ag Manufacturing & Technology | Agtech equipment manufacturer | $1.4M | Seed | Dec 12, 2019 |  |
| Tractor Zoom | Tractor Zoom is committed to helping leaders in agriculture make empowered, data-driven decisions when it comes to buying, selling, financing, and insuring heavy equipment. | $1.5M | Seed | Jul 01, 2019 |  |
| Arkis BioSciences | Arkis BioSciences develops, markets, and sells advanced catheters and minimally invasive instrumentation for neurosurgery. Arkis' proprietary catheters incorporate Endexo, intended to reduce catheter related complications, while the company's instrumentation is designed to be less invasive over a variety of neurosurgical procedures.Altogether, the company's portfolio enables healthcare practitioners the potential to reduce surgical trauma, shorten surgical duration, and reduce treatment complications. | $795K | Convertible Note | Feb 26, 2019 |  |
| otto-js | otto-js automates the hard work of managing script compliance for security frameworks like PCI DSS v4, SOC2, third-party risk, and client-side monitoring. Whether you're an ASV in need of backend gap solutions or a risk manager needing an easy solution to manage your new script compliance and security, otto provides Visibility, Protection andControl that provides covers the gaps in your script compliance auditing, justifications, policy enforcement, monitoring, protection and alerting. Keeping your scripts compliant by default and your evidence up to the minute. Integrates easily with compliance software, ASVs, CDNs, application security suites and PaaS ecommerce platforms. | $4.5M | Seed | Nov 26, 2018 |  |

10 of 44 investments shown.

## Co-investors
- [Ag Startup Engine](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/ag-startup-engine) — VC Fund, 3 deals together
- [Ag Ventures Alliance](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/ag-ventures-alliance) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [HPA (Hyde Park Angels)](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/hyde-park-angels) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [Lewis & Clark AgriFood](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/lewis-clark-agrifood) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [Lighthouse Funds](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/lighthouse-funds) — VC Fund, 2 deals together
- [Angel Capital Group](https://shizune.co/investors/profile/angel-capital-group-2) — VC Fund, 1 deal together

## About Innova Memphis

VC Fund · Memphis, United States

Founded in 2007 by the Memphis Bioworks Foundation, Innova is a pre-seed, seed and early-stage investor focused on starting and funding high-growth companies in the Biosciences, Technology and AgBio fields across the state of Tennessee. Innova links capital with great ideas to create groundbreaking products and services.At Innova we invest instart-up companies, help them grow, and then assist them in linking with established corporations for licensing, buy-outs or further investments. We provide the synergy of experienced management, market expertise and venture capital to accelerate the development of new products and services into viable business units that can stand on their own and then take their place with a mature market leader, if desired.Whether an innovation is still on the drawing board or stalled in the market place the Innova staff has the expertise, skills, and experience to envision and create a functioning business unit that is prepared to thrive in the market place. Technical know-how, market-proven staffing, and "just-right" funding assure the greatest chance possible for success.

4 contacts available at Innova Memphis.

| Name | Title | Profile |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Dean Didato | Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/dean-didato |
| Jan Bouten | Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/jan-bouten |
| Ken Woody | Founder, President & Partner | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/ken-woody-2 |
| Nate Smith | Associate | https://shizune.co/investors/profile/nate-smith-728d |

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## FAQ

### What does Ken Woody invest in?

Ken Woody invests primarily in Health Care, Biotechnology and Medical startups, most often at Seed and Convertible Note stage. Most of the 44 investments tracked by Shizune back companies in United States. The Investment Focus section breaks down every industry, stage and country in the portfolio.

### When did Ken Woody last invest?

The most recent investment recorded for Ken Woody closed in Dec 2022. Shizune tracks 44 investments in total for this profile, including round sizes, stages and portfolio companies, all sourced from confirmed public funding rounds and refreshed monthly.

### Is Shizune's investor data accurate?

Yes — every stat on this profile is calculated from confirmed public funding rounds monitored across hundreds of sources since 2020. This profile was last refreshed in Aug 2026 and is updated monthly. Spotted something off? Use the “Suggest an edit” link near the top of the page.

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