Elizabeth Bachert is a Sr. Director, Worldwide Business Development at Pfizer in Groton, CT, where she has supported business development activities for the past 10 years. She is currently responsible for the search and evaluation of clinical stage oncology business opportunities for Pfizer’s Oncology Business Unit. She has contributed to several oncology-focused business transactions including collaborations, licenses, out-licenses, mergers and acquisitions. Elizabeth began her career at Pfizer in the Global R&D operations as a Research Scientist in the Drug Metabolism Department, where she led the design and conduct of preclinical pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic studies for projects in the cancer, respiratory, immunology, inflammation, and infectious diseases areas. Elizabeth holds a BS and PhD in Pharmaceutics from the University at Buffalo.
Mark Benedyk is President and CEO of Telephus Medical LLC, a company dedicated to maintaining bone health in patients who have undergone arthroplastic surgery. Prior to joining Telephus, he was Managing Partner at Rila Partners LLC, an advisory firm providing business development, strategic planning and corporate development services to biotechnology and specialty pharmaceutical companies.
Dr. Benedyk is a member of the Board of Directors of the Center for Drug Research and Development Ventures, Inc., the Translational Medicine Advisory Board of the CNS Regenerative Medicine Foundation, the Advisory Board of Amarantus BioSciences and the Strategic Advisory Board of KemPharm, Inc.
Prior to Rila, Dr. Benedyk was Head of The Pfizer Incubator LLC (TPI), a unit of Pfizer Global R&D, where he was a member of the Boards of Managers of TPI and the portfolio companies Fabrus, Wintherix and RGo Bioscience LLC, each of which was funded and incubated by TPI. At TPI he vetted new investments for Pfizer, facilitated interactions with Pfizer principals and managed daily operations of TPI. He was also a member of the White Space and Rare Disease Working Groups within the Pfizer Specialty Care Business Unit.
Previous to joining Pfizer, Dr. Benedyk was Vice President of Business Development at Ascenta Therapeutics, a clinical-stage oncology company. There he led licensing negotiations for Ascenta, managed the patent portfolio in the early years of the Company and was part of the executive team that secured $50 million for Ascenta's Series C financing.
Before coming to Ascenta Dr. Benedyk has held executive positions at Optimer Pharmaceuticals, Rila Bioconsulting, Farmal, Aurora Biosciences (now Vertex Pharmaceuticals), Elan Pharmaceuticals, and Argonex Corporation. Dr. Benedyk received his Ph.D. in Genetics and Developmental Biology from The Rockefeller University, where he was a Lucille P. Markey Graduate Fellow. He received his B.S. in Microbiology and Botany from the University of Michigan.
Jeffrey P. Brennan joined Targacept in September, 2003, and serves as Senior Vice President of Business and Commercial Development and Chief Business Officer. Mr. Brennan has more than 25 years of pharmaceutical industry experience, and has held Executive Management positions at Sanofi-Synthelabo, Inc., from 1996-2003.
Throughout his career, Mr. Brennan has demonstrated success in both strategic development and key operations roles. He has developed and expanded the capability and capacity of sales and marketing teams, strategic market research and business analysis divisions, product life cycle management and business development departments.
Mr. Brennan received a B.S. in Marketing from Central Connecticut University. He has been a member of the Licensing Executive Society (LES) since 1991 and is a former Board member of the Health Care Committee for the LES. He is currently a member of the American Marketing Association. Mr. Brennan has completed over 35 mid- to late-stage business development deals and has been involved in more than 25 product launches in his career. As a member of Sanofi's Executive Management team, he played an instrumental role in helping the company achieve a nearly 10-fold increase in sales, profits, sales force and headquarter expansion.
In his role as Targacept's Senior Vice President of Business and Commercial Development and Chief Business Officer, Mr. Brennan is a member of Targacept's Executive Committee and is playing a key role in turning ""Science into Business"" through key partnerships with AstraZeneca & GlaxoSmithKline.
Jones W. Bryan, PhD, has served as Vice President of Business Development since 2005. From 2000 to 2005, he served as Vice President of Business Development for Shire Laboratories Inc. Dr. Bryan was Director of Business Development for Pharmaceutics and Clinical Supply Manufacturing for AAI. He began his career with Schering-Plough in Pharmaceutics and Formulation Development. Dr. Bryan earned his BS in zoology from Clemson University, his PhD in pharmaceutics from the Medical University of South Carolina, and Executive Management Certificate from the University of North Carolina Kenan-Flagler Business School. He is a member of the Licensing Executives Society and serves on Clemson University's Spiro Institute Entrepreneurship Advisory Board.
Ms. Hemmie Chang, Partner Foley Hoag LLP. Hemmie chairs Foley Hoag’s Licensing & Strategic Alliances Group where she focuses on complex collaboration and licensing transactions. She has over two decades of experience advising both pharmaceutical and emerging biotech companies, recently advising on the Metamark Genetics-Janssen Biotech early stage discovery collaboration deal in cancer (up to $365 million) announced in December 2011, an early stage discovery and equity investment deal with a European partner closed in December 2011, and a development and supply agreement for the U.S. subsidiary of a major Japanese conglomerate signed in November 2011. She is currently advising on research development deals with GSK, Merck and Sanofi, and various in-licenses from UCSF and other academic institutions.
Margarita Chavez has 15 Years of deal-making experience. She has been with Abbott Biotech Ventures since June 2010, with investments in the US and Europe. Margarita joined ABV from Abbott’s Global Pharmaceutical Licensing & Acquisitions, where she worked on a number of strategic transactions since 2007. Before that, Margarita was Senior Counsel in the Abbott Legal Division. Before joining Abbott, Margarita practiced as a corporate and securities lawyer in Silicon Valley with the firm of Brobeck Phleger & Harrison, where she represented startups, venture funds and investment banks in financings, M&As and IPOs. JD 1997; BS 1994
Christine de los Reyes has over twenty two years of pharmaceutical experience and most recently was founder and Managing Director of BiotechPartnering Solutions, a business development consulting firm that advises life science companies on partnering strategy, search for potential partners, coordination of technical evaluation and due diligence, deal structure and transaction negotiation. In this capacity, she has had numerous clients and executed several licensing transactions. She is also on the advisory board of the Neurotechnology Industry Organization, a non-profit trade association that represents companies involved in neuroscience, academic neuroscience research centers and brain-illness advocacy groups.
Prior to starting her own company she was Executive Director of Licensing & Development at Pfizer, where she spent twelve years in their licensing group with a focus on in-licensing in several therapeutic areas including neuroscience, infectious diseases, immunology, dermatology, and ophthalmology. Christine completed 11 in-licensing and one out-licensing transaction. She also was responsible for external search activities for new opportunities and led multidisciplinary teams conducting technical evaluation, due diligence, and financial valuation for licensing, co-promotion and M&A transactions with biotech and pharma companies. While at Pfizer, she also held senior positions in their US and international marketing and medical groups.
Christine began her career as Assistant Professor of Pharmacology teaching undergraduate and graduate level courses in clinical pharmacy at the University of Texas. From there she became Director of Clinical Research at Mt. Sinai Medical Center in New York, before joining Pfizer in 1989.
Christine earned her Doctorate in Clinical Pharmacy from the University of Texas, a Master’s in Business Administration from St. Joseph’s University, and a Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy degree from Wayne State University.
Luke Düster is a Principal at Capital Royalty, a healthcare focused investment management firm. Capital Royalty works directly with leading healthcare companies, research institutions, and inventors to provide customized financing structures to meet their unique needs. Since joining Capital Royalty in 2009, Mr. Düster has focused on investment sourcing, performing due diligence, and structuring investments. Prior to joining Capital Royalty, Mr. Düster was a Vice President at Harris Williams & Co., where he provided mergers & acquisitions advisory services to corporations across a broad range of industries. Mr. Düster received a bachelor’s degree from the University of Colorado at Boulder and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania.
John Fesko is Director of Business Development at Roche Molecular Diagnostics, where he manages partnering efforts in companion diagnostics. Prior to Roche, John worked for Novartis, where he held roles in business development, strategy and product management in their diagnostics and pharmaceutical divisions. Prior to that, John worked for the venture fund MPM Capital where he helped launch the diagnostics company Primera BioSystems. Before that, John was first employee at the personalized medicine company InVivoScribe Technologies. John holds a BS in Biochemistry and Economics from the University of Notre Dame and an MBA from MIT Sloan.
Josh Franklin has served as Vice President, Strategy and Business Development for Cornerstone Therapeutics since March 2011. Prior to this position he served as Vice President, Sales and Marketing, September 2008 through February 2011, Before joining Cornerstone, Mr. Franklin served in a variety of marketing positions at Ther-Rx Corporation (a subsidiary of K-V Pharmaceutical Company) from July 2003 to September 2008, including most recently as Vice President, Marketing. Prior to joining Ther-Rx Corporation, Mr. Franklin held various marketing roles with Biovail from January 2002 to July 2003 and the Ross Products Division of Abbott Laboratories from August 1999 to January 2002. Mr. Franklin is a U.S. Army veteran and holds a B.S. in Business Administration from Methodist University and M.H.A. and M.B.A. degrees from The Ohio State University.
Patrick Gallagher is Vice President, Business Development for Noven Pharmaceuticals, a specialty pharmaceutical company in Women’s Health and CNS/ADHD, with expertise is transdermal drug delivery. Prior to joining Noven, he served as Senior Vice President, Business Development, Marketing & Sales at Acusphere. Previously, he served as Vice President, Corporate Business Development at Mylan Laboratories. Earlier, he served in Business Development and Marketing roles at Bristol-Myers Squibb and Johnson & Johnson. As a corporate development and strategic planning consultant, he has also helped pharmaceutical, biotech and medical device industry clients develop and successfully execute critical business initiatives. Mr. Gallagher holds a B.Sc in Business Administration from LaSalle University and an MBA from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
Carlos is responsible for identifying, evaluating, negotiating and transacting deals for the Latin America region as well as providing the regional commercial voice into global deals. He has been with AstraZeneca since 2006. Carlos joined directly into the company’s business development team as a Senior Finance Director, leading all financial elements of the global deals closed by AstraZeneca. In 2009 he moved to Miami to lead the Latin America region’s business development activities.
Prior to AZ Carlos worked for various investment banking groups as deal lead and lead negotiator on behalf of clients in many industries. He started life as an accountant with Price Waterhouse.
Carlos has extensive expertise in corporate finance, deal structuring and investment banking. Carlos holds a BA in Economics from Manchester University, is a chartered accountant, a member of the ICAEW, and he is licensed by the FSA to advise on investment business.
Harry Glorikian heads Scientia Advisors with 20 years of experience in the health care and life science industries. He is known worldwide as a leader in helping companies streamline their operations and accelerate their growth.
Having held senior management positions at Applied Bio Systems, Signet Laboratories, in Massachusetts, and at X-Cell Laboratories, Inc., in California, Harry has deep commercial background in diagnostics, molecular biology, proteomics, cellular biology and biodefense. His unique understanding of technologies, operations and strategy from both customer and industry player perspectives has shaped Scientia's sophisticated framework and proprietary analytic tools.
A sought-after speaker, Harry has addressed the National Institutes of Health, Molecular Medicine Tri-Conference, World Theranostics Congress and other audiences, worldwide. He has authored numerous articles for industry publications, appeared on CBS Evening News and been quoted by Dow Jones, the Boston Globe, BioWorld Today, Los Angeles Times, London Independent, Medical Device Daily, Science Magazine and many other media outlets.
Harry holds an MBA from Boston University and a BA in Biology from San Francisco State University. He serves on many advisory boards and is an avid inventor who has several patents and patents pending in the US and abroad.
James Hattersley has over 24 years of successful leadership experience in biotechnology & pharmaceutical life sciences. From 1986 to 1995 Jim was responsible for drug delivery and NCE research at Alza Corporation and Abbott Laboratories. Since 1995 Jim has led strategic business growth including execution of several transactions of significant value at Eurand, Antares, and Sun Pharma Industries. Career interests include NCE drug development, alliance management, and corporate development involving specialty drug products. In his current position, as Vice President of Business Development at Sun, Jim leads a dedicated team of experts seeking acquisition, licensing, and partnership candidates capable of executing the parties’ financial and therapeutic objectives.
Mr. Hurley is Director of Strategic Alliances at Duke Translational Research Institute within the Duke Translational Medicine Institute. He has over 20 years of experience in technical, clinical and regulatory strategy and operations related to new drug and device development. Mr. Hurley has worked in both industry and academia in executive level technical and regulatory leadership positions in academic/biotech, consulting and CRO businesses, thus brings both perspectives to management of collaborative alliances. At DTRI, he is responsible for guiding the collaborative research relationship between industry partners and Duke Translational Medicine faculty and staff. In this role, he assists Duke in discovering new and more efficient ways to bring the best of Duke and our sponsor collaborators to bear in translating basic discoveries into new therapies.
Felix Karim Ph.D. was Vice President of Business Development at KAI Pharmaceuticals (a wholly owned subsidiary of Amgen Inc.) and led the business development efforts since 2008, including a regional license in Japan with Ono Pharmaceuticals for KAI-4169 in September 2011 and the subsequent acquisition of KAI Pharmaceuticals by Amgen in July 2012 for $315 million in cash up front.
Felix has more than 13 years of R&D and business development experience, and has led several therapeutic programs that have attracted major pharmaceutical partnerships. Among his other responsibilities at KAI, Felix led the KAI-4169 project team where he played a pivotal role in the discovery of KAI-4169 and co-led the commercial/market assessment for the program.
Prior to joining KAI, Felix was at Celera Genomics and Exelixis Inc. While at Exelixis he launched and led two therapeutic programs and played an integral role in business development efforts for these programs, which were partnered with Glaxo-Smith Kline and Genentech, respectively.
Felix holds a bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry from University of California, Berkeley and a Ph.D. from the Department of Human Genetics at the University of Utah Medical School and completed a post-doctoral fellowship at Berkeley with Gerry Rubin (co-founder of Exelixis).
Thomas M. Luby, Ph.D. is the Sr. Director of Research Ventures at Shire HGT. Tom has approximately 20 years of global drug development experience across many aspects of early-stage R&D. This includes management of research groups, leadership of program development teams, identifying and completing in-licensing/out-licensing transactions, and creation and oversight of external collaborations and alliances with both academic and industry partners. In his current role at Shire HGT, Tom is focused on the creation of novel partnering structures to manage and fund early external research and development programs to stages where they can be internalized by Shire for later-stage development and commercialization. Tom did his graduate studies in Immunology at Tufts University followed by post-doctoral work in yeast genetics at Harvard School of Public Health.
Will McCarthy has more than 15 years of life sciences business experience. In his current role at Halozyme Therapeutics Will leads Business Development. Before joining Halozyme in 2007, Will was at Biogen Idec where he was Finance Lead on the Rituxan alliance with Genentech. Will’s prior experience includes leading the New Product Planning function at Neurocrine Biosciences and senior roles at IMS Health and Cambridge Pharma Consultancy, where he assisted pharmaceutical clients on issues relating to pricing and market access in the US and the EU.
Matthew Meyer is the Chief Business Officer for XDx. Mr. Meyer has over 15 years of business development, marketing and commercial legal experience in the domestic and international life sciences industry. Prior to joining XDx, Mr. Meyer was Vice President, Business Development and General Counsel at Cerimon Pharmaceuticals where he led the in-license and partnering of prescription products to treat pain and inflammation. Prior to that, Mr. Meyer held senior management positions at Draeger Medical Systems, the U.S. subsidiary of the German-based global medical device company, most recently serving as Vice President and General Counsel. Prior to Draeger, Mr. Meyer held positions of increasing responsibility at Novartis Pharma AG in Basel, Switzerland, including serving as Head of Global Marketing Channel Innovations, a role in which he helped foster greater marketing and sales effectiveness through the use of innovative technology-based initiatives. Previously, Mr. Meyer was the Vice President, Global Business Development and Legal Affairs at Allscripts’ Physician’s Interactive division, which was a leader in online marketing programs to physicians, and spent five years as a commercial and transactional attorney at Pfizer Inc, working in New York, Connecticut and the United Kingdom. Mr. Meyer graduated cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa with a Bachelor of Arts degree from Cornell University. He earned his Juris Doctor degree from Villanova University School of Law.
Dr. Nelson is a founder, Director, President and CEO of Epic Sciences. Dr. Nelson is a biotechnology executive with over 20 years of scientific, operational and commercial biotech experience. Dr. Nelson has played an integral role in a number of start-up companies including Epic Sciences, Amalyte Pharmaceuticals, Bluechiip, Acidophil, Angiosyn, Anadys Pharmaceuticals, and Aurora Biosciences Corporation. He has helped raise over $80 M in private equity for a number of companies and has spearheaded both in- and out-licensing negotiations. He has been an author of numerous peer-reviewed scientific publications, a Principal Investigator on multiple NIH grants, a scientific reviewer for NIH grant applications, and a speaker at many national scientific and commercial meetings. Dr. Nelson trained for four years at NHGRI at the NIH and received his Ph.D. in Genetics from the University of Minnesota.
Oleg Nodelman is the Founder and Managing Director of EcoR1 Capital, LLC a San Francisco-based, value-oriented healthcare investment fund. EcoR1 capitalizes on opportunities in the biotechnology sector and mitigates risk through a highly engaged investment process, emphasizing the value of identifying and recruiting premier human capital in all aspects of corporate management and scientific leadership. Prior to EcoR1, Mr. Nodelman was a portfolio manager at BVF Partners L.P., one of the oldest dedicated biotechnology hedge funds. At BVF, Mr. Nodelman's responsibilities included all aspects of the business including opportunity generation, deep diligence, portfolio management and trading. Prior to joining BVF in 2001, Mr. Nodelman was a consultant with Mercer Management Consulting (now Oliver Wyman), a consulting firm focused on strategy, operations, risk management, organizational transformation and leadership development. At Mercer, he worked with senior management from companies in a variety of industries to develop and implement long-term strategy and build shareholder value. Mr. Nodelman is on the Board of Addex Therapeutics (SIX: ADXN) and a is member of the President's Council at the Gladstone Institute. He holds a Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service with a concentration in Science and Technology from Georgetown University.
Brian is Senior Director, Strategic Investment Group (SIG), for Shire Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Brian has over 18 years operating experience in the biopharmaceutical industry, the last 9 years spent with Shire Pharmaceuticals. While with Shire, Brian has held responsibilities in a variety of roles within the organization, the most recent being as an initial member of the SIG, Shire's corporate venture arm. Brian began his affiliation with Shire in 2002 as Director of Finance for Shire's North American Development group in Maryland. In 2004 he established the first US Investor Relations group, based out of Philadelphia. After three years running US Investor Relations, Brian transitioned to an alliance management role and spent two years overseas helping establish geographic expansion strategies. Prior to joining Shire, Brian held a strategic planning role for Celera Genomics, was Controller for a start-up Contract Research Organization, and worked as a program planner and financial analyst for Otsuka Pharmaceuticals, Inc.
Brian received a B.B.A. from the University of Notre Dame and an M.B.A. from the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland.
David joined Zymeworks in 2007 and has held positions of increasing responsibility in Business Development and External Research & Development. David was one of the key members on the team that initiated and closed Zymeworks' research and license agreement with Merck & Co. and he is currently serving as the alliance manager for the collaboration. David was also instrumental in establishing Zymeworks' external research capabilities with partners such as the National Research Council and the University of Victoria.
David obtained his Ph.D in Chemistry at the University of British Columbia and is an inventor of Zymeworks’ Azymetric™ and AlbuCORE™ therapeutic platforms.
Michal Preminger is the Executive Director of the Harvard Office of Technology Development at Harvard Medical School (HMS). In this role, she is responsible for the strategy and execution of HMS' industry relations and commercialization of all technologies emerging out of research at HMS. Prior to joining Harvard, she held a number of business development and technology development positions at Compugen (NASDAQ:CGEN), most recently as Vice President of Protein Therapeutics, responsible for the business management of the company's emerging drug discovery pipeline. Previously, Michal held several marketing and business development positions in the hi-tech industry, among others for Lucent Technologies.
Michal holds an undergraduate degree in Medicine from the Hebrew University School of Medicine, a PhD from the Weizmann Institute of Science, and an MBA from INSEAD in Fontainebleau, France.
Stephen M. Simes has served as Vice Chairman, President, Chief Executive Officer and a director of BioSante Pharmaceuticals, Inc., since 1998.
From 1994 to 1997, Mr. Simes was President, Chief Executive Officer and a Director of Unimed Pharmaceuticals, Inc., (currently a wholly owned subsidiary of Abbott Laboratories) a company with a product focus on infectious diseases, AIDS, endocrinology and oncology. From 1989 to 1993, Mr. Simes was Chairman, President and Chief Executive Officer of Gynex Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a company which concentrated on the AIDS, endocrinology, urology and growth disorders markets. In 1993, Gynex was acquired by Savient Pharmaceuticals Inc. (formerly Bio-Technology General Corp.), and from 1993 to 1994, Mr. Simes served as Senior Vice President and director of Savient Pharmaceuticals Inc. Mr. Simes's career in the pharmaceutical industry started in 1974 with G.D. Searle & Co. (now a part of Pfizer Inc.).
Kevin Skol leads the business development activities at Isis Pharmaceuticals as the Director of Business Development. Kevin is primarily responsible for implementing Isis’ innovative partnering structures including its Preferred Partner Alliance model and Satellite Company strategy which now includes over a dozen technology and drug development collaborations. Prior to Isis, Kevin was a marketing director, neuroscience at Valeant Pharmaceuticals leading its migraine franchise. Kevin also spent several years in business development at Valeant where the team completed the $280M acquisition of Xcel pharmaceuticals and numerous other transactions including product acquisitions, co-promotions, in-licenses, out-licenses and divestitures. Prior to Valeant, Kevin was Vice President of Corporate Development at Digital Gene Technologies, a private genomics based company, who oversaw Corporate Development and the Investor Relations team. Kevin was responsible for identifying, initiating, closing and managing strategic alliances with pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies. Prior to DGT, Kevin served in the New York-based business development group at Elan, a publicly held biopharmaceutical and drug delivery company. In that position, Kevin helped direct U.S. business development activities, specializing in drug development and drug delivery partnerships and joint ventures between Elan and a wide range of U.S. biotechnology companies that completed over 50 transactions. Kevin personally closed eight licensing and joint venture transactions totaling over $100 million in revenue. Kevin was also a key member of the team that built and managed Elan's significant portfolio of investments assisting with the management, fundraising and business development needs of the portfolio companies.
Prior to joining Elan, Kevin spent a number of years at Goldman, Sachs & Company as a financial analyst within the Structured Finance and Real Estate Groups. He performed in-depth analyses and advised companies involved in the telecommunications, metals, healthcare, railroads, sports management, real estate, and financial industries. Kevin serves as a member of the Board of Directors of Ingredient Innovations International (3i), a nutraceuticals company based in Ohio. Kevin holds a BA in Economics from Yale University and an MBA from the Harvard Business School.
Dr. Stoll is the Principle for the Strategy Operations Business Unit at Scientia Advisors. Scientia Advisors is a growth strategy consultancy specialized in healthcare. Over the last several years, Dr. Stoll has focused on developing Scientia Advisors as a leading partner to the pharmaceutical industry. His leadership allowed the Strategy Operations Business Unit to achieve over 200% growth over the past 2 years. The underlying concept behind the service offerings is to help enable clients through evidence based decision-making and strategic planning. The majority of Dr. Stoll’s clients are top 15 pharmaceutical companies. During the past six years, Dr. Stoll has developed expertise for pipeline prioritization services and commercial planning across a wide range of disease areas. Prior to joining Scientia Advisors, Dr. Stoll was an Engagement Manager in the consulting division of IMS Health. Dr. Stoll was also an Assistant Professor at the University of Florida for 2 years before leaving academia for consulting career. He earned his Ph.D. from Drexel University with specific focus on healthcare and decision-making.
Jeff Walsh joined bluebird bio as Chief Operating Officer in May 2011. Jeff has more than 25 years of experience with high-profile public and private life sciences companies with responsibility for financial management, business development, program management, commercial development and legal functions. Before joining bluebird bio, Jeff was the chief business officer of Taligen Therapeutics where he led the financial management and corporate development of the company and played a key role in the growth of the company and the sale of Taligen to Alexion Pharmaceuticals in January 2011 for up to $478 million. Jeff started his career at SmithKline Beecham in finance and worldwide business development roles. He subsequently held senior-level business development, finance and operations roles at Allscripts (MDRX), PathoGenesis (PGNS sold to Chiron for $700 million), EXACT Sciences (EXAS) and Inotek Pharmaceuticals. Jeff received his M.B.A. from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University and his B.A. from Yale University.
Jim Weissman joined Dicerna as chief business officer in January 2012. Mr. Weissman has more than 25 years in the life sciences industry, with extensive international management experience in biotech and pharmaceutical general management, product development, licensing, business development, marketing and M&A activities. Prior to Dicerna, he was vice president of business development at MannKind Corporation (Nasdaq: MNKD), responsible for leading the company’s activities related to licensing, new products and strategic planning. Prior to MannKind, Mr. Weissman held leadership positions in both business development and marketing at Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in Tokyo, most recently as senior director of specialty marketing. In this position, Mr. Weissman was responsible for the sales, profit and strategic targets for the company’s CNS, endocrinology, ophthalmology, oncology and diversified portfolios. Mr. Weissman holds a Bachelor of Science from Bates College in Maine.
Dr. Steven Xanthoudakis earned his doctoral degree from the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at McGill University in 1990. Following his post-doctoral training with Dr. Tom Curran at the Roche Institute of Molecular Biology in New Jersey, he assumed a faculty position as a Research Investigator in the Department of Neurogenetics at Hoffman La Roche. He was recruited back to Montreal in 1996 to join Merck Frosst Canada as a Senior Research Scientist where he focused on advancing several early stage drug discovery programs in the neuroscience, respiratory and cardiovascular areas. Since early 2007 he has been involved in coordinating Merck and Co's Canadian R & D out-reach program. In his current position as Director, Licensing and External Research for Merck Research Laboratories, his primary role is to build lasting relationships with both the biotechnology and academic research communities and to help foster partnering opportunities which fit with Merck’s strategic research and development goals across all therapeutic and technology areas. Dr. Steven Xanthoudakis is based out of the Merck Frosst Centre for Therapeutic Research in Montreal, Canada.