Leadership
Dwight Anderson
Dwight Anderson launched Ospraie Management, LLC (“Ospraie”), in 1999 in partnership with Tudor Investment Corporation before establishing Ospraie as an independent firm in 2004. Ospraie is an asset management firm that actively invests in commodity markets and basic industries worldwide. Prior to joining Tudor, Mr. Anderson was Managing Director at Tiger Management in charge of the Basic Industries and Commodities Group.
Mr. Anderson has managed multiple investments in the agricultural space, including Teays River Investments, one of the largest U.S. farmland management companies and Gavilon, a provider of agricultural products and services. He previously served as a Director of Adecoagro, one of the largest South American agro-industrial companies in which Ospraie was an early-stage investor and assisted Adecoagro through its initial public offering (“IPO”). Mr. Anderson also previously served as a Director of Gavilon, the commodity trading and merchandising arm of ConAgra Food Inc., which was acquired by Ospraie in 2008.
Mr. Anderson serves on the investment committee of Pandion Mine Finance, LP (“Pandion”), an investment manager focused on the metals and mining industry, and on the Board of Directors of Concord Resources Limited (“Concord”), a global metals merchant business, and Virtus Precision Tube LLC, a copper and aluminum tube fabrication business.
Carl Casale
Carl Casale is a non-executive Director, Independent Director, and Member of the Audit Committee and Independent Directors at Syngenta.
Mr. Casale spent twenty-six years working for Monsanto Company, starting as a sales representative in 1984 and after several sales, marketing, business development, and business leadership roles concluded his tenure as Chief Financial Officer. In 2011, he left Monsanto to become CEO of CHS, Inc., which is the largest farmer-owned cooperative in the United States.
Thomas Wiltrout
Mr. Wiltrout was a member of the American Seed Trade Association’s Board of Directors and also served on the Board of Directors of Agri Institute, Indiana’s premier agricultural leadership program.
Bob Woods
Jason Mraz
Jason Mraz is the Co-founder and President of Ospraie Management. Since 2010, Mr. Mraz has been focused on Ospraie’s business development and private investments. He organized and lead the development of the Ospraie Ag-Science team and Platform with the catalytic investments in Beeflow in late 2017 and Marrone Bio in early 2018.
From 1999 to 2009, he ran all trading activities for Ospraie. In addition, Mr. Mraz was the Co-Portfolio Manager for Ospraie Real Return, and Ospraie Real Return Enhanced Funds actively managed long-only commodity index funds with $1.5bb AUM.
Mr. Mraz’s career has been focused on the financial markets for over 30 years since he joined JPMorgan in 1989. He began his career trading foreign bonds and currencies and spent his last four years at the bank as a long bond sector trader on the U.S Treasury desk. In the summer of 1999, Mr. Mraz joined Dwight Anderson to form Ospraie in partnership with Tudor Investment Corporation.
He currently represents Ospraie Ag-Science on the Board of Directors of Beeflow and IGS-Intelligent Growth Solutions.
Scott Baglio
Scott Baglio is the General Counsel and Chief Operating Officer at Ospraie Management. Mr. Baglio has worked with Ospraie for many years, both directly and as the Managing Partner of ParkRiver Fund Solutions, a spinout of Ospraie’s middle and back office which was established to provide non-investment infrastructure to a platform of asset managers (hedge, private equity, venture, and real estate funds).
In that role Mr. Baglio oversaw the day-to-day activities of the platform and advised on numerous venture capital and private equity transactions, including on behalf of OAS. Previously, Mr. Baglio worked as a Senior Attorney covering Alternative Investments in Morgan Stanley’s Global Wealth Management Group. He also held positions in the Investment Management Group of Schulte Roth & Zabel and the Private Equity Group of Weil, Gotshal & Manges. Mr. Baglio holds a JD from the Fordham University School of Law and a BA from Boston College.
Pamela G. Marrone, PhD
Dr. Marrone holds several hundred patents and is a well-recognized, distinguished leader in the biologicals industry. She is the founder of the Bioproducts Industry Alliance, a trade group which has grown to more than 150 companies. Through her Chestnut Bio Advisors and her association with Global BioAg Linkages and Primary BioAg Innovations, she advises several food and agtech companies, five founded and led by women, currently serves on the UC Davis Ag & Environmental Sciences Dean’s Advisory Council, and was an alumni-elected Trustee of Cornell University (2016-20). She is on the Executive Committee and is Treasurer of the Association for Women in Science and is a board member of the Foundation for Food and Ag Research. She has a B.S. in entomology with Honors and Distinction from Cornell University and a Ph.D. in entomology from North Carolina State University.
Yogesh Mago
Nathan Ebeling
Partnering with two other firms, Mr. Ebeling’s co-led Ospraie’s investment in Five Rivers, where he currently serves as head of the compensation committee.
Mr. Ebeling also serves on the Board of Directors of Virtus Precision Tube LLC and Shay Capital Holdings, LLC. Prior to joining Ospraie in 2005, Mr. Ebeling was a Vice President in the J. Aron Commodities Group at Goldman Sachs. Mr. Ebeling was first a Field Artillery Officer and was later promoted to Captain while stationed at Fort Lewis, Washington from 1996 to 2000.
Christopher Papouras
Mr. Papouras received a B.S.E degree in Chemical Engineering from Princeton University in 1989. Mr. Papouras graduated magna cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi. Following Princeton, he attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and simultaneously received his M.Sc. in Management and M.Sc. in Chemical Engineering in 1991 (Leaders for Manufacturing Fellow).
Mr. Papouras serves on the Board of Directors of SEACOR Holdings, Inc., and is a member of the Audit and Compensation Committees. SEACOR is a publicly traded, diversified holding company with interests in domestic and international transportation and logistics and risk management consultancy. In addition, Mr. Papouras serves as an advisor to Tennor Holdings, BV, a global investment holding company that invests in private and public companies and serves on the Advisory Board of Avangard Innovative. Avangard is a premier waste and recycling optimization company. In addition, Mr. Papouras served on the Board of Directors of ERA Group, Inc., and served as Chairman of the Audit Committee, and as a member of the Compensation Committee. Era Group is a publicly traded company that operates helicopter services throughout the world. In addition, Mr. Papouras has served on multiple boards for startup technologies in the Oil & Gas industry.
Mr. Papouras resides in Houston, Texas. He is active in YPO (Young President’s Organization), and local mentoring programs, both as a mentor and mentor recruiter. Mr. Papouras serves as the Board Member (former Board Chair) of the Boys & Girls Club of Greater Houston, and is a Board Trustee of KIPP (Knowledge is Power Program) Houston Public Schools.
Lee Vetsch
Mr. Vetsch is a graduate of North Dakota State University where he graduated magna cum laude in 2019 with a degree in Finance and Economics. While at NDSU, Mr. Vetsch worked as a research assistant in the finance department where he created automated risk management models, optimization portfolios, and statistical tests on public agriculture companies for contribution in academic literature and agriculture consulting.
Zach Morse
Zach Morse is an analyst at Ospraie Management and focuses on business diligence and business development for OAS. At Ospraie Management, Mr. Morse has helped lead the fundamental analysis of natural gas, crude oil, refined products, and other energy markets. In addition, Mr. Morse has executed market and company due diligence for private equity opportunities, including the acquisition of Fluid Quip Technologies with GPRE, a potential equity investment in a distressed European alloy manufacturer, and a potential natural gas storage asset purchase.
Prior to Ospraie Management, Mr. Morse was an analyst in the Recapitalization and Advisory Services Group at Sandler O’Neill where he advised companies, creditors, and financial sponsors across a variety of industries on restructurings, recapitalizations, and M&A. In addition, Mr. Morse was a Research Associate at Archstone Partners, an institutional fund of hedge funds with more than $4B under management. He was the primary coverage analyst for hedge fund investments totaling more than $800MM. Mr. Morse has a bachelor’s degree in Geosciences from Princeton University, where he graduated cum laude in 2010.