Sylvester Spencer-Lee is Senior Vice President in Advancement at XPRIZE, where he leads a cross-functional team focused on bringing in resources needed for the organization to scale in its next chapter of growth. Reporting to the Chief Advancement Officer, he works closely with leadership, prize designers, fundraising and operations teams with the goal of growing XPRIZE's impact through successful prizes from concept to fundraising to launch.

A trained environmental toxicologist, Sylvester formerly worked at the US National Parks Service in Molokai, Hawaii as a Marine Biologist monitoring coral reefs and freshwater ecosystems before co-founding two companies. Inspired by the opportunity for innovation in ocean science and education, in 2013 he founded a technology and media 501(c)3 non-profit, The Hydrous, which is still in operation today based out of San Francisco, CA. Leveraging technologies like photogrammetry and virtual reality, The Hydrous has led over 3M "virtual dives" with people who might never have the opportunity to see the ocean, and is backed by Meta, Autodesk, Lenovo, National Geographic and the United Nations.

Most recently Sylvester was the Co-founder and Co-CEO of Emerge, a deep tech startup focused on the ambitious goal of building a new paradigm of human communication through the sense of touch, enabling mid-air touch via ultrasonic beamforming (imagine physically holding your grandma's hand from across the world, on a video call), where he led fundraising of over $47M as well as key strategic partnerships with Disney, Sony and LG.

Sylvester's passion for social impact and love of nature stems from his upbringing in the Deep South as a child of Chinese-Singaporean immigrants. He is a former co-chair of the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council for Spatial Computing, a former Forbes 30 Under 30 class of 2018, a former Young Alumni of the Year at the University of Mississippi, and board member of The Hydrous.

When not working he can be found playing music, being the outdoors (he has spent a month of his life underwater across 500+ scuba dives) or rock climbing at local crags. He and his wife are proud parents of a senior German Shepherd rescue and reside in Los Angeles, CA. A lover of books, philosophy and of Daoism, Sylvester can be found surfing in California and Hawaii occasionally.