Yianni grew up on a farm and was always interested in agriculture. While at Ohio State, he was introduced to a professor of microbiology, Dr. McSpadden Gardener, through an entrepreneurship course. Dr. Gardener was doing cutting-edge work with soil microbes. While working on that project, a friend from law school, Chana Cannon, told Yianni about HLB, a bacterial disease that had already destroyed millions of trees and posed an existential threat to the Florida citrus industry. Yianni approached Dr. Gardener, who introduced him to Dr. Nian Wang at the University of Florida, as the top scientist working on the problem. When Yianni first sat down with Dr. Wang, he was impressed to learn how Dr. Wang had already used a new technology—CRISPR—to develop citrus trees resistant to another disease, citrus canker, and was applying the same technology to cure HLB. Yianni immediately wanted to find a way to work with Dr. Wang and the University of Florida. Soilcea was born. Soilcea has since opened a commercialization-focused lab, signed exclusive licenses with the University of Florida to Dr. Wang’s CRISPR technologies, and signed a non-exclusive agreement for use of the underlying CRISPR technology with the Broad Institute.