Founder of AKUA
Courtney Boyd Myers, a.k.a. “CBM” is the founder of AKUA, a modern brand on a mission to become a household name for sustainable, seagreens-based foods. In April 2019, AKUA launched its first product “Kelp Jerky” and received press in the New York Times, Outside Magazine, Mind Body Green, and more. CBM first got her feet wet in the seaweed world in 2016 when she became an adviser to GreenWave, a nonprofit that supports the regenerative ocean farming industry.
In 2017, CBM raised over $20k for GreenWave in a charity bike race to support ocean farmers and won the Judges Choice Award at Foodbytes by Rabobank in Austin for her presentation of AKUA’s business. In 2018, Forbes wrote about “How Courtney Boyd Myers Is Building The Next Superfood Craze With Kelp” and Fast Company included her on their Most Creative People in Business List “for harvesting a sustainable new snack”.
Her love of food doesn’t stop at the sea, as she is also an investor and partner in Unframed Ice Cream, a Cape Town based ice cream brand that serves up vegan, dairy, and sorbet offerings, and is expanding internationally this year. Unframed has been consistently rated Cape Town and South Africa’s best ice cream.
When she’s not hustling sea vegetables and vegan ice cream, CBM is a Global Community Director at Summit, a community and events company that brings together innovators and creatives for beautiful, immersive, and life-changing events. Over her five years with the organization, she has helped to create events like Summit at Sea, Summit LA, Summit Tulum, which have hosted luminaries like Jeff Bezos, Malcolm Gladwell, Brene Brown, and Jessica Alba. And in 2018, she helped put together Summit’s Culinary Weekend on Powder Mountain with farm-to-table chef Alice Waters and the legendary Sam Kass, the former White House Chef to the Obama’s and our country’s first Senior Policy Advisor for Nutrition.
CBM continues to consult in online marketing as the founder of audience.io, and has worked with clients ranging from food startups like Four Sigmatic to technology platforms like Transferwise and TaskRabbit.
Previously, she was the Features Editor and East Coast Editor of The Next Web, covering New York City start-ups and digital innovation. She was a member of 10 Downing and Tech City’s Advisory Board and a mentor at Seedcamp, Ignite100, and BBCWorldWideLabs. CBM has been named one of Business Insiders’ “30 Most Important Women Under 30 In Tech and one of Business Insiders’s “100 Most Influential Tech Women on Twitter.” She cut her teeth in journalism at Forbes Magazine and Forbes.com.
CBM has lived and worked between dozens of international cities including New York City, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Boston, Panama City, Buenos Aires, Tulum, London, Berlin, Cape Town, Dubai, and Lisbon. She is the creator of two groups on Facebook that have seen immense popularity – Sloane’s List, a 10,000 personal job group, and YesNomads, a curated community of homesharing amongst nomadic individuals.
