Vanessa Colella is Citi's Chief Innovation Officer and Head of Citi Ventures, focused on harnessing the power of Citi to help people, businesses, and communities thrive in a world of technological, behavioral, and societal change. Deeply integrated with Citi colleagues, clients, and the innovation ecosystem, Citi Ventures accelerates and discovers new sources of value by exploring, incubating, and investing in new ideas.
Before assuming the role of Chief Innovation Officer, Vanessa led venture investing and D10X for Citi Ventures, and previously ran marketing for Citi's North American Consumer Bank. She joined Citibank in 2010 from U.S. Venture Partners (USVP), where she was an entrepreneur-in-residence. Prior to USVP, Vanessa was Head of NA Marketing and then SVP of Insights at Yahoo, where she was responsible for developing and executing the company's consumer data strategy. She was previously a Partner at McKinsey & Company.
She was recognized on the Global Corporate Venturing Powerlist in 2017, 2018, and 2019, and was named to Institutional Investor's Fintech Finance list from 2015- 2018. Her work conceiving and launching CitiBike led Citi to win Advertising Age's 2013 Creativity Award and the Gold Pencil in 2014.
Vanessa received her masters' degrees from Columbia University and M.I.T. as well as a Ph.D. from M.I.T.'s Media Lab. A charter member of Teach for America, she is a published author and lecturer, taught courses at the Santa Fe Institute, and previously served as a research fellow at Rockefeller University. She holds an S.B. degree in molecular biology from M.I.T. and currently serves as a member of the Corporation's Visiting Committee for the Media Lab. She resides in San Francisco with her husband and son.