Zach Rubin, vice-president, finance, corporate development and treasurer at Milliken and Company, is one of the 100 leading corporate venturing professionals in our 2026 Powerlist.
Since taking the helm in January, Zach Rubin has built on the foundations of the corporate venture capital unit of Milliken & Company. He took over from Charles Crowell, who had led the ventures unit since 2023.
Rubin was previously vice president of global financial planning and analysis and treasury at Milliken and Company. Prior to that, he was the CFO of Milliken and Company’s healthcare division.
Rubin’s tenure at Milliken Ventures has concentrated the portfolio around domains where Milliken’s technical heritage, such as chemicals, performance materials and advanced manufacturing, creates asymmetric advantage.
Over the past year, the unit has prioritised sustainability and materials innovation, particularly solutions that intersect with regulatory pressure and customer demand for circularity. This includes investments in next-generation additives, recycling-enabling technologies and bio-based materials platforms, including their investment in NanoTech Materials’s $29.4m series A round this April.
Milliken Ventures’ other investments include Pure Cycle Technologies, a sustainability-focused company that transforms plastic waste into a renewable resource; Circ, a textile-to-textile recycling company; Tidal Vision, a chitosan-based sustainable chemicals producer; Orak, a textile flooring maintenance provider; and Numat, an advanced materials company that pioneers the industrial-scale production of metal-organic frameworks.
In the broader corporate venture capital landscape, Milliken Ventures occupies an important niche. It demonstrates that mid-cap industrials can run disciplined, high-impact venture programs without the scale of oil majors or semiconductor giants. Its emphasis on technical diligence, selective deployment and post-investment integration offers a counterpoint to more financially driven CVC models.
Rubin’s challenge now is scaling impact without diluting focus and maintaining strategic coherence while accessing faster-moving innovation cycles. If the past year is any indication, Milliken Ventures is positioning itself not as the loudest player in corporate venture capital, but as one of the most quietly effective.
The GCV Powerlist represents the 100 individuals spearheading the future of the corporate venturing industry.
These individuals excel in terms of their venturing approach and structure, number and quality of portfolio companies and in their contributions to the corporate venturing profession.
Here’s a snapshot of their recent deals:
