Dr. Phyllis Genther Yoshida was formerly the senior fellow for energy and technology at the Sasakawa Peace Foundation USA. Prior to joining Sasakawa USA, she served as deputy assistant secretary for Asia, Europe, and the Americas at the US Department of Energy (DOE), coordinating bilateral and multilateral relationships. She served as the lead shepherd of Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation’s Energy Working Group and on the Board of the Indo-US Science and Technology Forum. She also served as DOE’s director of the FreedomCAR and Fuel Partnership, a government-industry cooperative research partnership. In 2017, she established Pimmit Run Consulting LLC, which provides energy and technology analysis and services to the private and public sectors.

Dr. Yoshida has written extensively on Japanese and international science, technology, and energy issues. She also has held policy and research positions over her career at the US House of Representatives, the Japan Economic Institute, George Mason University, and the US Department of Commerce. As director of the Department of Commerce’s Asia-Pacific Technology Program, she received the Commerce Department’s Gold Medal for expanding US access to foreign science and technology and Silver Medal for work creating the International Intelligent Manufacturing Systems Partnership.

She received her bachelor of arts from Carleton College, and master of arts and PhD from the George Washington University. She was the first recipient of Japan’s GARIOA/Fulbright Fellowship, under which she studied in 1983-1984 at the University of Tokyo and conducted research on Japan’s automobile industry.