Kendell Lang

Kendell Lang is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Fusion Farms, an innovative

hurricane-protected aquaponic and hydroponic indoor vertical farm designed for the re-
utilization of vacant or abandoned buildings in Puerto Rico. Fusion Farms has been in the

formulation stages for decades, starting from Mr. Lang’s Bachelor of Science degree in biology
from college where he completed his senior thesis on aquaculture. That early exposure to
technology innovation applied to nature has kept alive the vision and passion which today has
culminated in Fusion Farms.
Mr. Lang’s personal background: Lang grew up in the Skagit County of northwest
Washington state, a community where Agriculture is still the largest industry with revenues of
more than $300 million generated from local farms comprising more than 90,000 acres and
employment consisting of picking fruits and vegetables like blueberries, raspberries, tulips,
daffodils, pickling cucumbers, specialty potatoes, apples, cucumbers, strawberries, and green
beans. Of all his summer jobs, his favorite was a stint as a tractor driver and pea combine
harvester. He vividly remembers jumping off the tractor, grabbing a bunch of pea pods, jumping
back on again, and munching his way through the freshest peas possible. The fresh grassy smell
of the peas embedded a lifelong connection to farming.
As a child, Lang remembers days at Grandma’s house, picking fruits, berries, or vegetables at the
local u-pick farm, before gathering for an evening meal featuring something from the harvest.
One day might be jam from strawberries or apple sauce, another might be canned peaches or
green beans. If it wasn’t fresh out of the ground that morning, then it was canned from some
previous harvest. He remembers stacking cans in his grandma’s underground garage which
doubled as a makeshift root cellar, which was just the right temperature to store the tinned foods
over winter.
Looking back on the way he grew up – close enough to smell the peas in their shells, to wash the
dirt from the farm off his hands after a day’s harvesting, to admire the views of miles and miles
of flowering tulips and daffodils, and to taste the fruits of his labor at dinner every evening –
Lang realize how far we’ve managed to distance ourselves from our food sources. It was this
foundation that kept Lang a hobby gardener throughout his professional career, as well as being a
constant researcher keeping track of agriculture technology advances.
Mr. Lang’s professional background: Mr. Lang is a former Managing Director of Corporate
Real Estate at KPMG Peat Marwick, the world’s largest professional services firm, and
managing director at BDO Seidman, the international accounting and consulting organization.
He also launched The BioPlex Group, Inc., which ultimately became Alexandria Real Estate
Equities, Inc. (NYSE:ARE), and helped launch BioMed Realty Trust, Inc. (NYSE: BMR).

His businesses grew and evolved into two of the leading providers of real estate and real estate
services to the life science and university communities. From an initial concept seeded by Lang,
the leadership of the management team has proven that a special-purpose REIT was the right
vehicle to meet the needs of an emerging market. In January 2016 BioMed Realty was acquired
and taken private by Blackstone Real Estate Partners for $8 Billion.
Mr. Lang has consulted in every segment of corporate real estate occupancy and has built an
expertise to meet the needs of corporations in acquiring or developing facilities for use as pilot
plants, wet labs, research and laboratories. 22 of the Fortune 50 companies and numerous other
Fortune 500 companies throughout the U.S have engaged him.
Mr. Lang has a Bachelor of Science in Biology (BS) from Pacific Union College and is a
Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer (MCSE). He holds numerous certificates of completion for
various platform specific software applications. He is also certified as an Emergency Responder
for city-wide emergency operations. Kendell enjoys surfing, golfing, mountain biking, roller
hockey, water and snow skiing, cooking and extensive international travel. He most recently
became a Certified Aquaponics Designer through the International Aquaponics Association.
Mr. Lang’s philosophical background: The shift to mega-farms and global food distribution
has already happened and people have become disconnected from their food sources. Most kids
today don’t know where their food is actually grown, how fruits and vegetables get to the grocery
store, or how few nutrients actually remain once they’ve arrived. With postage-size lots on
homes crammed together in massive urban sprawl, not many people have space or the time to
maintain home gardens and, all in the interest of “progress”, people have allowed themselves to
become dependent on a food system about which they know virtually nothing.
The key event that kick-started Lang’s journey of discovery and of learning about food sources
and nutrients was when his wife was diagnosed in 2001 with glioblastoma multiform or GBM.
With 95% of patients perishing within a year of diagnosis, GBM is considered the very worst
kind of brain cancer. It was a horrific experience but it motivated our family to learn about
organic, raw, non-GMO, pesticide-free, and herbicide-free food sources and how, in spite of the
abundance we see on supermarket store shelves, it’s incredibly hard to find fresh nutritious
produce that actually meets that description. When his wife passed away in 2007, the impact of
that loss put Lang on a mission to focus on food as medicine which ultimately became the seed
for Fusion Farms.
It is a part of our mission with Fusion Farms Puerto Rico to not only reduce the Puerto Rico’s
dependence on imported food and to become “Food Sovereign”, but to promote “Food Security”
and encourage healthier diets with hyper-local, high-nutrient food production through education
and awareness throughout the world so no one’s food travels 1,500 food miles. Our current food
system is seriously failing our communities and we intend to be IMPACT Players to change that
situation.