2024 Speakers

Laurent is a serial biotech entrepreneur, investor, and senior executive in the pharma/biotech industry. Laurent is co-founder & CEO of PriveBio Inc. a precision medicine biotech treating cardiometabolic diseases with a pipeline of first-in-class anti-fibroinflammatory and anti-obesity therapeutics. He’s also an Executive Partner with the Biotech VC fund, Apollo Health Ventures. He has contributed to the identification and development of seven novel medicines addressing unmet medical need across multiple disease areas administered to >300,000 patients and generating >$3B in annual sales. Laurent has led business and R&D functions in both pharma and biotech (US and EU), including founding CEO of Kymera Therapeutics (NASDAQ: KYMR), founder and CEO of Parthenon Therapeutics, Head of R&D with Pierre Fabre Pharmaceuticals, and positions of increasing leadership responsibilities on the business and science & clinical fronts at Pfizer, Merck, and Pieris (NASDAQ: PIRS) contributing to the advancement of 21 drug candidates (biologics and small molecules) into clinical development across multiple disease areas and modalities. He has also completed partnering transactions worth over $3B in deal size and raised > $300M. He studied chemistry (B.S. Honors) and molecular pharmacology (PhD) at Vanderbilt University and completed postdoctoral training at UNC/Chapel Hill and Duke University where he was the recipient of a prestigious American Heart Association Fellowship. He is Professor of the Practice at Northeastern University Center for Artificial Intelligence in Drug Discovery and Development (EAI) and on Vanderbilt Board of Visitors Executive Committee. He has co-authored over 80 papers and patents. Laurent serves on Ventus’ SAB and as an independent director on the boards of Naya Biosciences and Ilya Pharma.

Dr. Bach is a pediatric endocrinologist with 30 years of clinical research and pharmaceutical development experience, including extensive global experience building and leading clinical teams that have successfully launched innovative pharmaceutical products into global markets. Most recently, Dr. Bach joined Structure Therapeutics as Chief Medical Officer in June 2021. Prior to that he served as Senior Vice President of Endocrine Medical Sciences at Ascendis Pharma. Prior to this, Dr. Bach was based in Asia, and served as Head of Asia Pacific Medical Sciences and Head of China R&D at Janssen Pharmaceutical Co. Before that, he was Vice President of Research & Development and Scientific Affairs for Janssen Pharmaceutical KK in Japan. For 16 years, Dr. Bach held positions of increasing responsibility in Clinical Research at Merck & Co., Inc., ending his tenure there as Vice President of Clinical Research Operations Worldwide. Dr. Bach has lectured in national and international forums, has numerous publications and served on professional society advisory boards to advance the field of endocrinology and clinical research. Dr. Bach received an M.D. from Baylor College of Medicine, a Ph.D. in pathology from The University of Chicago, and a B.A. in chemistry from Carleton College.

Dr. Johan Baeck, the Chief. Medical Officer at Promontory Therapeutics, brings over 14 years of expertise in immuno-oncology clinical development. His career has spanned both smaller, emerging biotech firms and large pharmaceutical companies, including a notable nine-year tenure at Novartis. Specializing in treatments for liquid and solid tumors, Dr. Baeck’s extensive experience encompasses his fifth role in biotech, demonstrating his seasoned insight into drug development processes. His dual exposure to both dynamic biotech environments and structured big pharma settings equips him with a comprehensive understanding of oncology patient care and therapeutic innovation.

Sofia Baig is an exceptional strategic leader, adept at driving organizational change and delivering top- and bottom-line business growth. She is an expert in strategic account management, global clinical development operations, and delivering transformational change inclusive of people, processes, and technology. Winner of multiple prestigious awards, including recognition as a 2021 PharmaVoice 100 most inspiring leader in the life sciences industry, and as part of a team, receiving the 2022 Catalyst Award for DEI work focused on improving women’s representation in senior leadership.

Arun Balakumaran, MD, Ph.D., is Replay's Chief Medical Officer. With a proven track record of leading teams and an innate ability to prioritize and solve complex challenges, Arun consistently delivers outstanding results. As an MD, Ph.D., and board-certified specialist in Hematology and Medical Oncology, Arun combines his extensive medical knowledge with a Master's in Healthcare Management. His passion for immune therapies and cell and gene therapy has guided his career from laboratory research to clinical development across phases 1 to 4. Arun has demonstrated exceptional leadership throughout his journey, securing breakthrough designations and overseeing successful registration experiences. Most recently, he was the CMO of Allogene, where he led the programs to a pivotal stage in heme malignancy and proof of concept data in solid tumors with gene-edited allogeneic CAR T cells. Before joining Allogene, Arun held the position of Distinguished Scientist and Product Development Lead, Hematological Malignancies at Merck. There, he played a pivotal role in driving the approval of Pembrolizumab in lymphomas. Arun's expertise and insights have also led to his involvement on the scientific advisory boards of diagnostic companies. Arun's thought leadership is evident through his extensive publication record. He has authored over 40 peer-reviewed articles in esteemed journals such as Blood, Stem Cells, Journal of Clinical Oncology, and Nature Medicine. With his wealth of experience and expertise, Arun is poised to make significant contributions as the CMO at Replay, leading the way in driving innovation and success in the field of genomic medicine.

Rita Botelho, a 40-year-old Portuguese product and jewelry designer from Porto, became a passionate advocate for Parkinson's disease research after being diagnosed with Young Onset Parkinson's Disease in early 2023. Her diagnosis, caused by the LRRK2 genetic mutation, inspired her to get involved in multiple research projects and to join groups such as Young Parkies Portugal and the Parkinson's Europe Research Steering Group. In addition to her advocacy, Ms Botelho founded her own jewelry brand, Piino, in 2019. She crafts each piece by hand using precious metals and polymer clay, drawing on her international experiences in Japan, Italy, Switzerland, and Germany.

Dr. Brown is an oncology drug development leader, with more than 16 years of translational, research, and clinical development expertise in the areas of oncology, immunology, and neurology.

Dr. Brown joined Zai Lab from Nurix Therapeutics where he held various clinical development roles of increasing responsibility, most recently he served as Executive Vice President, Clinical Development. Prior to Nurix, he led clinical development programs for a wide variety of products in the areas of oncology, immunology, and neurology for companies including Allogene Therapeutics, Aduro Biotech, and Iovance Biotherapeutics.

In addition to his drug development expertise, Dr. Brown is a trained pediatric oncologist and neuro-oncologist, having served as a physician at Yale University, the City of Hope National Medical Center, and the Children’s Hospital Los Angeles as well as in academic roles at the University of Southern California and the University of California Los Angeles.

Dr. Brown received an M.D. from the Weill Cornell Medical College in New York and a B.S. in Chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Dr. Carrie Brownstein is an accomplished global clinical development leader with 20 years of experience developing products in oncology and other therapeutic areas addressing high unmet medical needs in biotech, and large and small pharma. She has previously served as the Chief Medical Officer (CMO) of Zentalis Pharmaceuticals, where she led global development of small molecules targeting fundamental pathways in cancers, and as CMO of Cellectis Inc. where she led the clinical development of a portfolio of novel, first in class allogeneic CAR-T cell therapies for patients with hematologic malignancies. Previously, Dr. Brownstein held several senior leadership positions including Vice President of Global Clinical Research and Development (R&D), Therapeutic Area Head for Myeloid Diseases at Celgene, and prior to Celgene, she held positions of increasing responsibility at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals and Hoffman-La Roche. During her career, Dr. Brownstein has made significant contributions to the development and commercialization of several products including REBLOZYL, INREBIC, IDHIFA and ONUREG. She is a graduate of Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center’s pediatric hematology-oncology fellowship program and completed her internship and residency training at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. Dr. Brownstein received her M.D. from Tufts University School of Medicine and received her A.B. in Psychology from the University of Michigan.

Patrick Burnett, MD, PhD, FAAD, is the chief medical officer and a senior vice president at Arcutis Biotherapeutics, a publicly held medical dermatology company developing novel treatments for patients with immune-mediated skin diseases. In the past five years, Arcutis’ team has grown from three to more than 140 and its market capitalization has expanded from $150,000 to well in excess of $1 billion. The company is rapidly advancing a pipeline of potential therapies, with its first New Drug Application for a plaque psoriasis treatment currently under review with the FDA and multiple clinical trials underway for conditions including atopic dermatitis, seborrheic dermatitis, and scalp and body psoriasis. Prior to joining Arcutis in 2020, Dr Burnett served as Chief Medical Officer at Verrica Pharmaceuticals, and previously as Associate Vice President of Clinical Development at Sun Pharmaceuticals, where he oversaw the dermatology and rheumatology pipeline. Earlier, Dr Burnett served at Novartis in roles that included Global Program Medical Director. He is a board-certified dermatologist and was a member of the medical faculty at Vanderbilt University Medical Center as an assistant professor of dermatology from 2004 to 2010. Dr Burnett holds an MD and PhD in neuroscience from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine and a BS in biology and biochemistry from the University of Iowa. Arcutis is based in Westlake Village, California.

Alessandra Cesano, MD, PhD is the Chief Medical Officer at ESSA Pharma since July 2019. 

Previously she was the Chief Medical Officer of NanoString Inc from July 2015 until June 2019 where she focused on the development of translational and diagnostic multiplexed assays for the characterization and measurement of mechanisms of immune response/resistance.

Prior to joining NanoString, Dr Cesano was Chief Medical Officer at Cleave Biosciences, Inc and before then she served as Chief Medical Officer and Chief Operations Officer at Nodality, Inc, where she built and led the R&D group, while providing the overall clinical vision for the organization. Between 1998 and 2008, Dr Cesano held various management positions at Amgen, Biogen Idec and SmithKline Beecham Pharmaceuticals, where she helped to advance various oncology drugs through late stage development and FDA approvals. 

Early in her professional career Dr Cesano spent 12 years conducting research in tumor immunology, including nine years at the Wistar Institute, an NCI Basic Cancer Center connected with the University of Pennsylvania.

She also holds membership in several professional and scientific societies including ASCO, ESMO, ASH, EHA, AACR and SITC. In the latter she serves as co-chair in the SITC Industry Committee, Associate Editor for the Biomarker section of JITC and is an active member of the SITC Biomarker Working Group.

Over her career she has been an author on over 140 publications. Dr Cesano received an MD summa cum laude, a Board Certification in Oncology and a PhD in Tumor Immunology from the University of Turin.

Scott Chetham Ph.D. is an experienced healthcare entrepreneur who is currently the CEO and co-founder of Faro Health. Scott leads the strategy for the Faro Health platform, which is designed to power clinical development by connecting data to decision making in a fundamentally new way. Previously, he was the Head of Clinical Research Operations and Data Management at Verily Life Sciences, formerly known as Google Life Sciences. This multi-faceted strategic and operational role involved leading the clinical strategy, clinical teams, process development and operations for all clinical projects of the company, including Google and Google[x]. Scott has also served as a Venture Partner at Versant Ventures, CTO and Co-founder of Intersection Medical (sold to ImpediMed), and VP Clinical Affairs (ImpediMed). In these latter two roles he was responsible for clinical research strategy and operations.

Dr Daniel Chung is the Chief Medical Officer for SparingVision, an ocular genomic medicine company, focusing on gene agnostic gene therapy and CRISPR gene editing approaches to combat blinding diseases. Prior to his recruitment to SparingVision, Dr. Chung was the Ophthalmology Therapeutic Leader for Spark Therapeutics, Where he led the medical affair group and contributed to areas of clinical development and operations, marketing, commercial, patient advocacy, pre-clinical research and development and business development. Dr. Chung was intimately involved with the development of Luxturna, the first gene therapy approved by the FDA and EMA for use in a blinding genetic disease.

Prior to joining Spark Therapeutics, at the Scheie Eye Institute, University of Pennsylvania, working in retinal gene therapy. Also serving as a sub-PI on the RPE65 gene therapy clinical trial at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP), and made major contribution to the development of the Phase 3 MLMT novel endpoint, was PI of the MLMT study, and the RPE65 Natural History Study. He completed his ophthalmology residency at Summa Health Systems in Akron, Ohio. He then completed fellowships in pediatric ophthalmology and ocular genetics research at the Cole Eye Institute at the Cleveland Clinic, and in retinal gene therapy at the National Eye Institute/NIH in Bethesda, MD.

Richard Colvin, MD, PhD, has served as chief medical officer of bluebird since March 2021. Dr Colvin joined bluebird in 2018 and was medical lead of the thalassemia program and led clinical research and development prior to becoming CMO. Since Dr Colvin has been CMO, bluebird submitted and gained FDA approval for beti-cel and eli-cel. Prior to bluebird, Dr Colvin was an executive director in translational medicine at Novartis where he led early-stage anti-infective drug development programs. Dr Colvin clinically trained at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital and remains on faculty at Harvard Medical School. He sees patients in the Infectious Diseases clinic at MGH. Dr Colvin received his MD and PhD from Duke University School of Medicine.

Marcus Conant, MD is a physician who treated thousands of HIV patients in the early 80s while running the inpatient dermatology service at the University of California San Francisco. Before anyone recognized the virus or understood that it was about to become a global epidemic, Conant took the lead in forming the Kaposi’s Sarcoma Research & Education Foundation in 1982, which later became the San Francisco AIDS Foundation. He conducted early clinical trials, persevering despite seeing 94% of patients die during the epidemic’s first years. His clinical experience sensitized him to the suffering caused by the disease. As a physician with a holistic perspective, Conant’s work expanded beyond the strictly clinical, to include education, research, and advocacy. Marcus is currently a clinical professor emeritus at the University of California Medical Center in San Francisco. Conant has published more than 70 articles on the treatment of AIDS, testified in front of Congress multiple times, and is a powerful advocate for the LGBTQ community.

Dr Simon Cooper is currently the Chief Medical Officer at Keros Therapeutics. He has also been CMO of Kadmon Holdings, Inc and Anokion. He has spent almost 25 years in drug development, and has had key roles in the approvals of SKYRIZI® (risankizumab), KEVZARA® (sarilumab), BENLYSTA® (belimumab), COSENTYX® (secukinumab) and RITUXAN® (rituximab). He received his medical degree from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in the United Kingdom before undertaking his higher medical training in Oxford, UK.

Peg Crowley-Nowick is a well-respected expert in the pharmaceutical industry, bringing nearly 30 years of experience in medical affairs and clinical research. She has successfully led late-stage biotech and pharmaceutical companies through multiple product launches across several therapeutic areas, such as oncology, cardiovascular and diabetes. Dr Crowley-Nowick's patient-centric view and drive for improved patient care and outcomes have propelled her to shape Lumanity Medical Affairs based on not only scientific integrity but also continual collaboration with emerging medical stakeholders. Earlier in her career, Dr Crowley-Nowick held academic appointments, establishing her scientific credibility in the research and medical communities. Later she joined industry and gained valuable experience at all levels of responsibility within Medical Affairs, first at Berlex Laboratories, and then Bayer Healthcare Pharmaceuticals. Dr Crowley-Nowick founded Zipher Medical Affairs which was acquired by Lumanity in 2021. Dr Crowley-Nowick received a PhD from the University of Alabama at Birmingham in the field of immunology and an MBA from Simmons School of Management.

Sophia Davis has 30+ years in the biopharmaceutical industry, with most of that time dedicated to recruiting physician executives as well as other leadership team members. Since founding BioDirectors in 2014, and her role as a Principal in BioPharm Physicians from 2015-2021, her professional focus has been finding Board Members and Chief Medical Officers for biotech companies. She has recruited high caliber Board Members for growing biotech and pharma companies ranging from Pre-Series A all the way through publicly traded commercial stage companies with multiple marketed products.

Dr. Dezube is the Chief Medical Offer of Mustang Bio, a company whose mission is to develop the next generation of gene and cell therapies. Dr. Dezube joined Mustang in June 2021 from Alkermes, Inc, where he served as Vice President and Clinical Head of Oncology. While at Alkermes, Dr. Dezube oversaw the advancement of the company’s interleukin-2 variant from Phase 1 to registrational studies for the treatment of cancers. Prior to Alkermes, Dr. Dezube spent more than 9 years with Millennium (now Takeda Oncology) and Tesaro (now GlaxoSmithKline), where he held positions of increasing responsibility related to the development of their oncology pipelines.  Fields of industry focus included lymphoma, myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS), acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), ovarian cancer, breast cancer, melanoma, and renal cell cancer. Earlier in his career, Dr. Dezube was an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School/Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center where he served as an Attending Physician for more than 20 years.  There he served on the Board of Trustees and was the Director of the Experimental Therapeutics/Phase 1 unit, Director of AIDS Oncology, and Deputy Director of the Cancer Center Clinical Trials Office.  He is triple board certified- internal medicine, hematology, and oncology and has authored more than 200 publications on PubMed.  He completed his internal medicine residency training at Tufts/New England Medical Center and hematology-oncology fellowship at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center/Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Dietz leads clinical development & research and regulatory affairs for Shape Therapeutics, Inc, a preclinical stage company developing breakthroughs in RNA editing, next-generation AAVs, and disruptive gene therapy manufacturing. After completing medical school at the University of Minnesota, pediatric residency at Seattle Children’s Hospital, and hematology, oncology, and stem cell transplantation fellowship at the University of Minnesota, he spent 6 years in clinical and academic research practice overseeing pediatric stem cell transplants, designing clinical trial protocols, and as an investigator in early CAR T-cell trials for pediatric leukemia. He moved into industry with bluebird bio, Inc. where he oversaw late-stage clinical trials and was part of the teams that obtained regulatory approval in the EU and US for ex-vivo lentiviral vector gene therapies. In addition to building regulatory strategy and clinical development capabilities at ShapeTX, he has been chosen as a member of the ARM Gene Therapy Advisory Group, participates in the BIO Regenerative Medicine Committee, and has been a champion of DEI initiatives throughout his career.

Dr. Dominis is currently a VP, Global Medical Officer at PPD, a clinical research company and part of Thermo Fisher Scientific. He has joined PPD in 2022, focusing on biotech business, as a creative strategist with broad knowledge of early to mid-stage clinical development, in Strategic Planning, Regulatory Planning, Operations and Business Development.

Dr. Dominis has previously served as SVP Medical Affairs, and Head of Sales for North America at a British CRO Ergomed/Prime Vigilance. During his 11 years at Ergomed/PV Dr. Dominis has obtained several managerial roles – spanning from medical, operational and commercial focus. During his time at Ergomed/PV he has worked out of European, Asian and US offices, contributing development of each of these regions and contributing to the company’s growth and preparation of a successful IPO. During his CRO career he has guided and coordinated multiple clinical projects that have led to marketing approvals of oncology, endocrinology and rare disease products.

Before CRO experience Dr. Dominis has worked as a medical director in pharma and as a physician/investigator across several clinical trials, and on products that have successfully reached the market. Dr. Dominis is an MD with a specialty in OB/GYN and PhD with a focus in diabetes in pregnancy.

Dr. Leonard Dragone has over twenty years of experience in preclinical, translational and early clinical development, with a focus in autoimmune disease. He most recently served as chief medical officer at Sonoma Biotherapeutics establishing it as a clinical stage company where he built the Clinical development, Translational and Data science organizations. Previously, Lenny held leadership roles in early clinical development at Janssen Biopharma, Merck Research Laboratories, and Genentech, where he advanced preclinical, investigational new drug (IND) filings and early clinical programs. In these roles, he focused on establishing cross-functional teams that defined patient disease heterogeneity, biomarkers and trial inclusion criteria, with the goal of enabling trials that can optimally define the value of new medicines for patients. Lenny received his M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of Rochester before completing his pediatric residency and pediatric rheumatology fellowship training at the University of California San Francisco (UCSF). He was also an associate professor of pediatrics and immunology at the University of Colorado and National Jewish Health in Denver, where he ran a National Institutes of Health-funded basic science laboratory, publishing more than 30 peer-reviewed articles. Lenny remains clinically active as a Volunteer Associate Professor of Pediatric Rheumatology at UCSF.

Dr. Jakob Dupont is a global expert in oncology and other therapeutic areas with over 25 years of experience developing therapies and programs dedicated to addressing high unmet medical needs. Prior to joining Sofinnova Investments, Dr. Dupont was Global Head of Research & Development and Executive Vice President at Atara Biotherapeutics. Prior to Atara, he served as Chief Medical Officer at Gossamer Bio. Before Gossamer Bio, Dr. Dupont served as Vice President and Global Head of Breast and Gynecologic Cancer Development for Genentech/Roche. Dr. Dupont has made significant contributions throughout his career, he has received numerous grants and awards, contributed to 12 regulatory approvals, 13 successful IND filings, co-authored 47 peer-reviewed publications, and has 18 patents.

Elliot Ehrich, MD, is Chief Medical Officer at LifeMine Therapeutics. Over the course of 25+ years in pharma and biotech, he has led or directly contributed to the discovery, development, and successful registration of 8 medicines across a spectrum of therapeutic areas.

Dr Ehrich joined LifeMine from Skyhawk Therapeutics, where he served as President and led research, drug discovery, and drug development activities. Prior to Skyhawk, Dr Ehrich was a Venture Partner at 5AM Ventures.

Dr Ehrich had previously spent 18 years at Alkermes, Inc, where he served as Executive Vice President of Research & Development and Chief Medical Officer. During his tenure, Dr Ehrich led the discovery, development, and, ultimately, the FDA registration of a series of medicines for multiple therapeutic indications, including schizophrenia, alcohol and opioid dependence and multiple sclerosis.

Dr Ehrich began his industry career in the clinical pharmacology and pulmonary-immunology groups at Merck Research Labs Elliot received a BA in Biochemistry from Princeton University. He was then a pre-doctoral fellow in molecular genetics at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany. He subsequently received an MD from Columbia University and completed an internship and residency in internal medicine at Stanford University. After residency, Dr Ehrich continued at Stanford and completed a clinical fellowship in immunology and rheumatology followed by a Cancer Research Institute-sponsored postdoctoral fellowship in T Cell biology.

Joseph Elassal, MD is Chief Medical Officer of Ankyra Therapeutics. He has over a 15 year career in the pharmaceutical industry with his most recent position serving as a Senior Director for Medical Affairs at Regeneron where he was leading efforts on cemiplimab and other immunotherapy approaches for patients with cervical and non-melanoma skin cancer. He has also served as Senior Medical Director at Replimune overseeing early stage clinical development of oncolytic viruses in a variety of solid tumors. Prior to that, he served as Deputy Vice-President at the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) where he lead regulatory policy efforts for biosimilars as well as cell and gene therapies including implementation of the Biosimilars User Fee Act (BsUFA II). Dr Elassal earned his MD from Eastern Virginia Medical School and MBA from Columbia Business School. He completed his internship and residency at Columbia University/New York Presbyterian Hospital and is certified by the American Board of Internal Medicine.

Leo Faoro is a medical oncologist that serves as Quanta Therapeutics' Chief Medical Officer in November 2022. Leo previously served as Senior Vice President and early clinical development lead at Exelixis, a commercial oncology-focused biotechnology company, where he was responsible for providing strategic leadership to expand the company’s early clinical pipeline and advancing its development candidates into the clinic. In his prior role as vice president of clinical development (late-stage) at Exelixis, Leo led the development of the company’s GI/Thyroid franchise for cabozantinib (Cabometyx®), including pivotal and post-marketing studies across oncology indications and regulatory approval filings, and achieving FDA approval of cabozantinib (Cabometyx®) in metastatic differentiated thyroid cancer under Breakthrough Designation. Prior to Exelixis, Leo served as Vice President of clinical development at OncoMed Pharmaceuticals, an oncology-focused biotechnology company, where he led the early clinical development of the company’s pipeline, including two first-in-human studies, through to its reverse merger with Mereo BioPharma. Leo began his clinical development career in positions of increasing responsibility at Genentech where he had global clinical development responsibility for bevacizumab (Avastin®), including in lung, prostate, breast and renal cell cancers. Leo earned a medical doctorate from the Universidade Federal do Parana in Brazil. He trained in internal medicine at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota and completed a medical oncology fellowship at the University of Chicago. Additionally, Leo holds a Master's in Business Administration from Columbia University and the University of California, Berkeley.

Dr Feldman is currently Professor of Oncology and Director of the Early Phase Clinical Trial Program at the Montefiore Einstein Cancer Center. His research centers primarily on developmental therapeutics in cancer, with a focus on antibody-based therapeutics. His clinical background is in hematology and medical oncology with specific training in stem cell transplantation and expertise in the management of patients with myeloid malignancies. In addition to 30+ years in the academic world, He has been Head of Development and Chief Medical Officer at several leading biotech companies, heading the pre-clinical and clinical development of immuno-oncology agents, including bi-specific and multi-specific antibodies in both hematologic malignancies and solid tumors.

Dr James Ferguson is Chief Medical Officer at Matinas BioPharma.

He received his undergraduate degree (cum laude) from Harvard College and his medical degree from the University of Pennsylvania. He did a residency in Internal Medicine at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, where he also spent a year as a Hypertension Fellow. He did additional subspecialty Cardiology training at Beth Israel Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, and then spent a year as junior faculty in the Cardiology Department at Beth Israel.

Dr Ferguson then moved to the Texas Heart Institute, where he spent the next 21 years, serving as the Associate Director of Cardiology Research and Co-Director of the Cardiology Fellowship program at St. Luke’s Episcopal Hospital and the Texas Heart Institute, as well as Associate Professor of Medicine at Baylor College of Medicine, and Clinical Assistant Professor at the University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston.

In 2008 he left the world of academia for a position as Vice President of Medical for Surgical and Critical Care at The Medicines Company. In 2010 he moved to AstraZeneca, where he served in a variety of Development and Medical roles, with both Global and US responsibilities, and, ultimately, as Vice President for External Relations for the Cardiovascular Therapeutic Area in the US Medical Organization. In 2016 he moved to Amgen to lead the Cardiovascular TA for US Medical; his responsibilities subsequently expanded to include the broader CV and Bone Therapeutic Areas. Dr Ferguson joined Matinas BioPharma as Chief Medical Officer in February of 2019.

Dr Ferguson is a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology, a Fellow of the American Heart Association, and has published extensively on a variety of topics in Cardiovascular Medicine.

He currently resides in Somerville, New Jersey.

Peter Francis is a highly experienced biotechnology executive and an ophthalmologist clinician- scientist with expertise in ophthalmic genetics and retinal disease. He graduated from medical school in the U.K. and undertook residency in London. He obtained his PhD in ophthalmic genetics from University College, London and is fellowship trained in Retina. Peter has almost two decades of experience in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries where he has led a number of gene therapy products from discovery to early-stage clinical development. Most recently he served as Chief Scientific Officer at 4D Molecular Therapeutics, a leader in AAV-based gene therapy and was prior, their first Chief Medical Officer and Head of Translational Research. Previously, Peter was Chief Medical Officer at RetroSense Therapeutics, the first visual optogenetics company which was successfully sold to a large pharmaceutical company. Peter is a member of the Macula Society, the American Ophthalmological Society and the American Academy of Ophthalmology. He has held academic faculty positions at St. Thomas’ Hospital, London and Casey Eye Institute, OHSU, Portland, OR. He has published about 100 peer-reviewed articles.

Dr Anna Frostegård is a globally educated, board-certified physician holding MD summa cum laude. She obtained her PhD in Experimental Medicine at Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. Dr Frostegård served as Assistant Professor at the Unit of Immunology and Chronic Disease at Karolinska Institutet. She has an active career in both medical science and biotech. She is the co-founder and currently the Chief Scientific and Medical Officer in Annexin Pharmaceuticals AB (publ), a First North/Nasdaq listed biotech company. Dr Frostegård has over 15 years of “first-hand” leadership experience in discoveries of biologic drug candidates and transition of academic inventions into a drug development process, biotech startups, IPO, financing, pre-clinical and early clinical development of biologic drug candidates as well as in strategic work related to building asset and intellectual property portfolios, in- and out licensing. Therapeutic areas of expertise are inflammation & immunology, autoimmunity and cardiovascular disease. She is the co-inventor on several granted patents and patent applications related to therapeutic use of Annexin A5 in human disease. She has co-founded 5 companies within EU. She is a board member in 4 companies. She consults academic researchers and investors on effective interactions between academic inventors and biotechnology industry. She advises on early stage investments in biotechnology. Dr Frostegård holds several awards for scientific communication. She is a professional member of the American Heart Association.

Chuck Gelb leverages his broad experience of over two decades in the pharmaceutical and Clinical Research Organization (CRO) sectors to offer critical perspectives on sponsor requirements, guiding the global sales force effectively. Working closely with marketing, business operations, and client-facing teams, he orchestrates commercial strategies to align with Phastar's broader vision and meet the evolving needs of Phastar’s customers. With a background in both science and business, he is passionate about applying lateral thinking and not just delivering “a solution”, but the “right solution” to optimize outcomes. He possesses an MBA with a focus in Pharmaceutical Management, a Master's in Biotechnology, and a Bachelor’s in Biochemistry.

Kenneth A. Getz, MBA, is the Executive Director and Professor at the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development, Tufts University School of Medicine, where he conducts research focusing on drug development management and operating strategies and tactics; protocol design practices; and global outsourcing, investigative site and patient recruitment practices and policies. He is also the chairman of CISCRP – a nonprofit organization that he founded to educate and raise public and patient awareness of the clinical research enterprise. A well-known speaker at conferences, symposia, universities, investor meetings and corporations, Mr Getz has published extensively in peer-review journals, books and in the trade press and writes a bi-monthly column nominated for a Neal Award in Applied Clinical Trials. He holds a number of board appointments in the private and public sectors including WCG and ORA and serves on the editorial boards of Pharmaceutical Medicine and Therapeutic Innovation and Regulatory Science. Mr Getz received an MBA from the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University and a bachelor’s degree, Phi Beta Kappa, from Brandeis University. Mr Getz is the founder of CenterWatch, a leading publisher in the clinical trials industry.

John Goldberg is the Chief Medical Officer for Rafael Holdings, Inc., a biotechnology company focused on investing in and developing novel therapies for cancer. Prior to this role, John was the Chief Medical Officer at Oncorus, an oncolytic virus and RNA medicine oncology drug developer. In collaboration with the scientific and manufacturing teams, he was responsible for driving the clinical studies of Oncorus’ viral immunotherapies, and for ongoing development and regulatory strategies. He is a seasoned biotech executive and drug developer with 18 years of clinical trials experience across academia and industry. Other prior roles include Senior Medical Director at H3 Biomedicine, where he led the clinical trial of H3B-8800 (first spliceosome modulator in clinic), clinical development at Agenus, and the leadership of the pediatric oncology Phase 1 program at the University of Miami. John’s immunotherapy experience includes first-in-human neo-antigen vaccines, dendritic cell vaccine and GVAX trials, as well as checkpoint inhibitors and costimulatory agonists. He is a  pediatric oncologist with 18 years of experience treating children with cancer and enrolling patients in clinical trials. John received his pediatric hematology oncology training at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Children’s Hospital Boston, and his general pediatrics training at the University of Rochester. John is a graduate of the University of Massachusetts Medical School and the college of the University of Chicago where he concentrated in the biological sciences.

Sonal brings more than 17 years of industry experience, including leadership roles at AVROBIO, CRISPR Therapeutics and Rubius Therapeutics. She has built and led translational research and medicine teams across multiple therapeutic areas, including oncology and rare diseases. In addition, Sonal’s specialties include clinical trial design and execution, medical monitoring, and clinical data management and interpretation, including biomarker strategies. Sonal earned her PhD in cancer research from the University of Bradford in the UK, and her medical degree from the Government Medical College, Surat in India.

Charlotte Guzzo is the Co-Founder and COO of Sano Genetics, a 360° platform that combines genetic testing, recruitment, and long-term engagement, accelerating enrollment and simplifying operations for precision medicine teams driving breakthroughs for patients.

Wendy Harman is a dynamic leader in healthcare innovation, specializing in the biopharmaceutical and diagnostics sectors. With over two decades of experience in product development and commercial strategy, she has established herself as a trusted expert in new product planning, commercial and patient insights and launching groundbreaking products. She currently is serving as the Vice President of Product/Marketing at Tasso Inc.

Throughout her career, Ms Harman has played a pivotal role in driving innovation and delivering impactful products to patients worldwide. Her extensive commercial expertise has been instrumental in helping guide R&D functions and clinical development teams through the drug development cycle to ensure new products are focused to deliver on the unmet needs of patients.

Her passion for advancing patient care extends beyond the boardroom. She is deeply committed to fostering patient engagement and empowering healthcare leaders to prioritize patient needs in their strategic initiatives.

As a guest on the Patient Engagement: Practical Approaches panel, Ms Harman brings a wealth of expertise and strategies to patient engagement to the table. Her focus and approach for driving positive change and fostering meaningful patient insights will encourage attendees to rethink their approach to asset development to embrace patient-centered models.

Scott Harris has served as Chief Medical Officer of Altimmune (NASDAQ: ALT), a publicly traded company developing next generation peptide therapeutics for obesity and liver disease, since 2019. He has 20 years of experience of development in gastroenterology, hepatology and metabolism therapeutics. He co-founded Lyric Pharmaceuticals in 2015, where he raised a $20.8 M Series A financing round and served as its Chief Medical Officer. Dr Harris also served as Chief Medical Officer of Avaxia Biologics and Ocera Therapeutics, and he headed clinical development at Napo Pharmaceuticals, where he authored the ADVENT study, the first Phase 2/3 adaptive trial to result in a drug approval (Mytesi®, 2012). He has collaborated with the FDA Division of Gastroenterology and the American Gastroenterological Association on sponsored forums on drug development and clinical trial design. Dr Harris has an MD from Harvard Medical School. He completed medical residencies at John Hopkins Hospital and the University of Pennsylvania and a Gastroenterology and Hepatology Fellowship at Yale University School of Medicine. He serves on the scientific advisory board of Protagonist Therapeutics and RedHill Biopharmaceuticals and holds a seat on the faculty of Georgetown University School of Medicine, where he teaches a graduate course in drug development.

Donna Higgins is Founder & CEO of The Higgins Group, Inc, one of the oldest and most successful search firms in the life sciences. Founded in 1998, the firm has grown exclusively through referrals as a result of Ms Higgins’s simple but powerful business philosophy: to develop lasting relationships with a select group of clients by doing great work. This drive for excellence infuses every aspect of the firm’s work due to a culture that values superior results, exceptional teamwork and doing the right thing. Although her team has diverse backgrounds and experiences, all of The Higgins Group consultants, researchers and associates share Ms Higgins’s energy, optimism, integrity and grit.

Over her 30 years’ in the life sciences, Ms Higgins has gained a global reputation for her insight, expertise and integrity. Prior to starting her own firm, Ms Higgins was Vice President & Life Science Practice Lead for Howard Fischer Associates International where she rapidly built the life science practice by consistently exceeding her clients’ expectations. Before becoming a search professional, Ms Higgins worked on commercial teams at both ends of the life sciences spectrum, dividing a decade between Abbott Laboratories, a Fortune 50 pharmaceutical company, and Immunex, an emerging biotech company at the time.

Ms Higgins holds an MBA from Drexel University and a BA from Penn State University. Committed to lifelong learning, she joined the Coaching Certification Program at Columbia University to continue sharpening the strategic coaching she provides to clients and candidates. She is an Advisory Board member for Life Sciences Cares and the Association of Women Entrepreneurs, and a Board member for Big Brothers Big Sisters Independence Region and AchieveAbility. She also serves as adjunct faculty at the Center for Positive Leadership, where she is a frequent speaker on women in business. Ms Higgins divides her time between the company’s Philadelphia and Boston offices.

Dr. Jeff Humphrey is an oncologist and physician-scientist with longstanding experience as both CMO and CEO in big and small pharma. Currently, he is founder and CEO of Charged Biotherapeutics. Previously he served as CMO of Constellation, Magenta, and Kyowa Kirin where he also served as Chief Development Officer and President of the US and EU research organization. He previously held executive positions at Bristol-Myers Squibb, Pfizer, and Bayer. Dr. Humphrey has 30 years of cancer research and drug discovery experience, with 20 years of experience leading departments and organizations developing cancer drugs from pre-IND to post-launch. Jeff has been involved in numerous IND and NDA/BLA/MAA regulatory submissions in the US and EU leading to FDA and EU approvals from Nexavar® to Poteligeo®, Nourianz®, and Crysvita®. He has published more than 30 peer-reviewed papers in molecular biology and clinical research during his industry and academic career. Dr. Humphrey is a graduate of Harvard and CWRU medical school. He completed his medical residency at The Johns Hopkins Hospital and post-doctoral human genetics and medical oncology fellowships at the US NIH and NCI.

Serena Hung is the former Chief Medical Officer of Arkuda Therapeutics, a biotechnology company that focuses on lysosomal dysfunction in neurodegenerative diseases. She joined Arkuda in April 2020. She is a board-certified neurologist with subspecialty training in movement disorders. She has approximately 20 years of clinical research experience both in industry and academia, including leadership roles in Phase I through Phase III development with successful INDs, BLA/NDAs. She has experience in multiple therapeutic areas in CNS and rare diseases including Parkinson’s disease and other movement disorders, Huntington’s disease, dementia, ALS, ataxia, and multiple sclerosis. Previously she worked at Wave Life Sciences and Biogen, where she assumed roles of increasing scope and responsibility. She holds a medical degree from Wake Forest University School of Medicine, and a BSE in chemical engineering at the University of Michigan.

She is a Board Director at the National Ataxia Foundation.

Karen Ivester has over twenty-five (25) years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry and is a Registered Nurse (RN) with a master’s degree. She has spent twenty-three (23) years working in Oncology clinical research and drug development across CROs, biotech, pharmaceutical, community-based research, and academic cancer center environments. She has an insider’s view of operations within multiple clinical research centers. She has extensive experience in leading high functioning Project and Clinical Operations teams in portfolio delivery of highly complex trials (Umbrella, Basket, Immuno-Oncology and Cell & Gene Therapy). She is PMP certified and has taught and mentored project managers, research nurses and other research personnel as they gained clinical research experience and certifications. Karen is also a Certified Life Coach and uses this knowledge to mentor and develop teams and individual contributors.

Dr Gurdyal Kalsi brings more than 20 years of experience in global clinical development, medical affairs, investment strategy and regulatory affairs to Asklepion Pharmaceuticals, LLC. Most recently, Dr Kalsi served as the SVP/CMO of Tissue Gene, where he headed medical, clinical and regulatory development functions in cell and gene therapeutics and helped IPO its lead asset in Knee OA on the KOSDAQ. Prior to his time with Tissue Gene, Dr Kalsi served as Corporate Vice President for Clinical Development & Medical Affairs at Emergent BioSolutions Inc. At MDS Pharma, he was the head of Medical Affairs and Regulatory Affairs. Dr Kalsi held executive leadership positions with ICON plc in clinical development and medical affairs. He began his pharmaceutical career at Lundbeck A/S in Copenhagen, Denmark. Dr Kalsi received his medical degrees in surgery and medicine from Glancy Medical College (GMC), followed by postgraduate training courses in public health medicine at St George’s Hospital in London and Pharmaceutical Medicine postgraduate training at Cardiff University, UK. He is a member of the British Association of Pharmaceutical Physicians and Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine, Royal Colleges of Physicians.

Stephen Kanes is a Neuropsychiatrist with a career in basic neuroscience, clinical psychiatry and neuroscience drug development spanning more than 30 years. Prior to joining EmbarkNeuro he was Chief Medical Officer of Sage Therapeutics, where he led the successful clinical development of ZULRESSO® (brexanolone), the first-ever treatment approved for Postpartum Depression (PPD), along with the buildout of the development organization and Sage Therapeutics’ broad neuroscience portfolio. Earlier in his career, Dr Kanes was Executive Director in Clinical Development in the Inflammation, Neuroscience and Respiratory therapeutic areas at AstraZeneca, and a faculty member of the University of Pennsylvania Department of Psychiatry. In addition to his role at EmbarkNeuro, Dr Kanes is currently a member of the Board of Directors of Verge Genomics. Dr Kanes received both his PhD in Molecular and Cellular Pharmacology and his MD from the Stony Brook University Renaissance School of Medicine and completed his residency training in the Yale University School of Medicine Department of Psychiatry.

TBA

Dina Katabi is the Thuan and Nicole Pham Professor of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at MIT. She is also the director of the MIT’s Center for Wireless Networks and Mobile Computing, a member of the National Academy of Engineering, and a recipient of the MacArthur Genius Award. Professor Katabi received her PhD and MS from MIT in 2003 and 1999, and her Bachelor of Science from Damascus University in 1995. Katabi's research focuses on innovations in digital health, applied machine learning and wireless sensors and networks. Her research has been recognized with ACM Prize in Computing, the ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award, two SIGCOMM Test-of-Time Awards, the Faculty Research Innovation Fellowship, a Sloan Fellowship, the NBX Career Development chair, and the NSF CAREER award. Her students received the ACM Best Doctoral Dissertation Award in Computer Science and Engineering twice. Further, her work was recognized by the IEEE William R. Bennett prize, three ACM SIGCOMM Best Paper awards, an NSDI Best Paper award and a TR10 award. Several start-ups have beenspun out of Katabi's lab such as PiCharging and Emerald.

Dr. Katz is the Chief Medical Officer of TriSalus Life Sciences, a biotech company focused on developing novel immunotherapy approaches for liver and pancreas tumors. He maintains a part-time role as a surgical oncologist with Brown Surgical Associates and the Warren Alpert Brown Medical School. Dr. Katz attended the New York University School of Medicine, receiving the Alpha Omega Alpha Award. He then completed his general surgery residency at the New York University Medical Center. Dr. Katz completed Fellowships in Immunology and Surgical Oncology at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, where he served as the Chief Administrative Fellow. He has served as the principal investigator for five solid tumor CAR-T trials, including four for liver metastases and one for peritoneal carcinomatosis. Dr. Katz has received research grants from numerous societies and the NIH and DOD, in addition to multiple industry partners. He has spent nearly two decades studying how to treat liver immune dysfunction to enable immunotherapy in cancer patients with unmet medical needs. His overarching career goal is to develop novel immunotherapy treatments for presently incurable liver and pancreas tumors.

Dr. Randall Kaye has over 30 years of experience in the medical field and has served as Chief Medical Officer since March 2022. Prior to joining Longboard, Dr. Kaye was Chief Medical Officer of Neurana Pharmaceuticals, a biotechnology company focused on the treatment of neuromuscular conditions.  He previously served as Chief Medical Officer of Click Therapeutics, Inc., a leader in digital healthcare innovation, where he was involved in the development of software as a prescription medical treatment for a number of chronic debilitating conditions. Prior to Click, he served as Chief Scientific Officer of SSI Strategy Holdings LLC, where he oversaw clinical development, medical affairs and pharmacovigilance. In conjunction with his role at SSI Strategy, he was Chief Medical Officer of Axsome Therapeutics, Inc. Earlier in his career, Dr. Kaye held the positions of Chief Medical Officer of Avanir Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (acquired by Otsuka Pharmaceutical Co.) and Vice President, Medical Affairs of Scios Inc. (acquired by Johnson & Johnson) and InterMune, Inc. (acquired by Roche Holding AG). He also held clinical development and medical affairs positions at Pfizer Inc. Dr. Kaye earned an M.D., M.P.H. and B.S. at George Washington University, completed his pediatric training at UMASS Medical Center and finished his academic training as a postdoctoral Research Fellow at Harvard Medical School.

Seemi Khan, M.D., M.P.H., M.B.A., Chief Medical Officer of Alkeus Pharmaceuticals, Inc., (Cambridge, MA) is an accomplished executive who worked across multiple therapeutic areas. Dr. Khan is an internist and nephrologist with expertise in rare disease, immunology and rheumatology. She completed her residency and fellowship at Tufts Medical Center program and served as an Assistant Professor of Medicine at Tufts University School of Medicine prior to joining pharmaceutical industry. She has an M.P.H. from Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and an M.B.A. from Brandeis University. 

Prior to joining Alkeus, she served as Senior Vice President and Chief Medical Officer at Reata Pharmaceuticals, which was later acquired by Biogen. Dr. Khan was instrumental in the approval and launch of the first treatment for Friedreich’s ataxia by Reata Pharmaceuticals. During her career, she oversaw multiple clinical programs from early stage to late stages. She played pivotal role in driving clinical development strategy. She led multiple therapeutic areas and functions across early and late stages of drug development. Dr. Khan held leadership positions at Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma America, Quark Pharmaceuticals, Abbott and AbbVie.

Albert Kim is a physician-scientist with more than 23 years of interdisciplinary experience in novel therapeutic product development, translational science, and clinical medicine. He is currently a Venture Partner at RA Ventures, part of the RA Capital ecosystem. Most recently, he was Chief Medical Officer at Cytel, Inc. where he led clinical and medical development interests across business units including the award-winning Solara© software platform for clinical trial design and served as general manager for the Therapeutics Development Team consulting group of over 80 colleagues. 

Prior to Cytel, Dr. Kim held leadership roles of increasing responsibility at Novartis and Pfizer across early and late clinical development programs. During his Pfizer tenure, he served as Vice President, Clinical Research Head for the Internal Medicine Research Unit and oversaw clinical research efforts for the legacy neuroscience portfolio and cardiometabolic diseases including NASH, diabetes, obesity, heart failure, and cachexia. He chaired the Cardiovascular Safety Advisory Council and was a clinical safety advisor to the Pfizer Comirnaty® development team and to the Pfizer internal Covid 19 pandemic response team. 

Dr. Kim earned his undergraduate degree in biomedical engineering from Harvard, MD and PhD degrees from UCLA, completed internal medicine residency at Brigham and Women's Hospital, cardiology fellowship training at Massachusetts General Hospital, and clinical cardiac electrophysiology training at UCSF. His efforts at Novartis and Pfizer contributed to development programs for Ilaris® (IL-1Rß mAb), Gilenya® (S1P modulator), bococizumab (PCSK9 inhibitor mAb), clesacostat (hepatic ACCi small molecule), ervogastat (DGAT2i small molecule), Comirnaty® (Covid-19 mRNA Vaccine), ponsegromab (GDF-15 mAb), and danuglipron (GLP1-RA small molecule), a body of work supporting numerous enterprise milestones and authorship on publications in the New England Journal of Medicine, Science Translational Medicine, and Nature Medicine. He also previously worked at the FDA in the Division of Cardiac Devices as a medical reviewer and project lead for the industry guidance document on catheter ablation for atrial fibrillation. Dr. Kim achieved board certification in internal medicine, cardiology, and clinical cardiac electrophysiology and practiced clinical medicine for 18 years. He has held academic appointments in the VA Boston Cardiac Electrophysiology Section, at Boston University, and Harvard Medical School and is a Fellow of the American College of Cardiology (FACC) and the Heart Rhythm Society (FHRS).

Lise Kjems, M.D., Ph.D., brings a remarkable 20+ year career in R&D spanning a broad range of therapeutic categories, including liver disease, endocrinology, rare disease, autoimmune, gastrointestinal and infectious diseases. She has a proven track record in leading high performing teams and delivering on complex programs, with deep experience in development from first-in-human studies through product approval. Holding previous executive leadership positions at notable pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, Dr. Kjems is highly experienced in delivering novel and effective therapies to patients in need.

Prior to joining Ocelot Bio, Dr. Kjems was the Chief Medical Officer at Cyclo Therapeutics where she led its global program evaluating Trappsol® Cyclo™ in Alzheimer’s and rare disease. Before Cyclo Therapeutics, Dr. Kjems was essential in bringing Albireo Pharma’s drug Bylvay® through its Phase 3 program in progressive familial intrahepatic cholestasis (PFIC) to FDA and EMA approvals, as well as launching pivotal Phase 3 trials for Bylvay in biliary atresia and Alagille syndrome. Earlier in her career, she held various positions of increasing responsibility at Aldeyra Therapeutics, Intarcia Therapeutics, Ionis Pharmaceuticals, Johnson & Johnson and Novartis.

Dr. Kjems received her M.D. and her Ph.D. in Physiology from the University of Copenhagen Medical Faculty Denmark. She was an invited guest research fellow at the University of Southern California, Keck School of Medicine, and an industrial research fellow at Novo Nordisk A/S Bagsvaerd Denmark & University of Copenhagen.

Lori leads the Medical and Scientific Affairs Practice at Putnam. Her expertise includes multi-stakeholder engagement, center of excellence profiling, organizational design, strategic medical launches, integrated medical evidence ideation, omnichannel strategy, and digital health platforms, including digital therapeutics, AI algorithms, and software as a medical device. Lori has experience in rare diseases including Duchenne muscular dystrophy, hemophilia, growth hormone deficiency, cardiac amyloidosis, acromegaly, sickle cell disease, and primary hyperoxaluria as well as oncology, infectious disease, cardiology, critical care, neurology, and endocrinology. Prior to Putnam, Lori had a Medical Affairs strategy consultancy, built the Medical Affairs division at CDM and later became President. Earlier in her career she gained experience in medical education and MSL training at Bayer, and clinical research at the University of Minnesota. Lori holds an RPh from the University of Iowa, a PharmD from the University of Minnesota, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in critical care and infectious diseases at the University of Minnesota.

Dr. Aaron Koenig is the Chief Medical Office of Delix Therapeutics, a neuroscience company developing novel neuroplasticity-promoting therapeutics for psychiatric and neurological conditions. Dr. Koenig received his MD from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine and completed a residency in Adult Psychiatry at Western Psychiatric Institute & Clinic, where he also served as a Chief Resident for Research. Dr. Koenig completed a clinical fellowship in Geriatric Psychiatry at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, followed by a post-doctoral research fellowship in Psychiatric Genetics and Translational Research at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. A diplomate of the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology (ABPN), Dr. Koenig has been involved in clinical and translational research throughout his career, with a particular focus on the development of treatments for neuropsychiatric disorders with high unmet need. Prior to joining Delix, Dr. Koenig served as Vice President of Early Medical Science at Sage Therapeutics and helped oversee clinical-stage programs targeting a range of neuropsychiatric and neurodegenerative disorders. Prior to Sage, Dr. Koenig served as a clinical investigator at the Massachusetts Alzheimer's Disease Research Center and practiced as a clinician in the MGH Memory Disorders Unit in the Department of Neurology at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Nerissa C Kreher, MD, MBA is an accomplished physician executive and pediatric endocrinologist with strong biotech experience in Clinical Development and Medical Affairs. Her expertise is in the development of therapies for patients with rare diseases across multiple therapeutic areas. She has participated in corporate growth of multiple biotech companies via VC fundraising events as well as IPOs. She previously served as CMO at Tiburio Therapeutics and AVROBIO. Currently, Nerissa is the Chief Medical Officer at Entrada Therapeutics and serves on the Board of Directors of Rezolute Bio.

Emma Lane is a Global Patient Engagement Lead for gene therapy at UCB Pharma and is also Honorary Associate Professor in Neuropharmacology at Cardiff University. She started out with a PhD in the neuropharmacology of Parkinson’s disease at King’s College London, subsequently taking an opportunity at Lund University in Sweden to develop research in cell therapies. After moving to Cardiff University School of Biosciences as a post-doctoral researcher, she then established a successful preclinical research group modelling ATMPs in Parkinson’s. Ms Lane also led the LEARN Study group, exploring the patient experience of clinical trials, specifically in pharmacological and ATMP-based products for neurodegenerative diseases. This work included co-production of resources with trial participants to improve communication around trial delivery to enhance future recruitment and retention. Throughout her academic career she built a strong network in patient engagement in her preclinical and clinical research. In her role at UCB she now works in Early Evidence Strategy seeking to bring patient engagement early in the drug development pipeline.

Dr. Lasser is a seasoned biopharma executive with over 25 years of experience in the CNS space, spanning clinical practice, academic research, large pharma and biotech. Most recently, he held an executive role at Sage Therapeutics, where he led the development of zuranolone (ZURZUVAE®) in depressive disorders. Before that, he was the Chief Medical Officer at MedDay Pharma. Prior to joining MedDay, he was the Head of Neurodegenerative disorders at Roche, where he oversaw the Phase 2 and 3 programs for gantenerumab through 2017. Earlier in his career, Dr. Lasser held various roles at pharmaceutical companies, including managing the medical launch and lifecycle of lisdexamfetamine (VYVANSE®) at Shire, the first medicine for treating Binge Eating Disorder, the launch of the first long-acting injectable atypical antipsychotic RISPERDAL CONSTA® at Johnson & Johnson, and developing iloperidone (FANAPT®) at Novartis in the late 1990’s. Dr. Lasser completed his Geriatric Psychiatry fellowship at the National Institute of Mental Health, and his residency in psychiatry at McLean Hospital. He obtained an M.B.A from the University of Pennsylvania Wharton School of Business, a M.D. from Boston University School of Medicine, and a B.A. in Biochemistry from Dartmouth College.

Mr James Lewis has over 18 years’ experience as a specialist Contract Recruiter.

Mr Lewis has placed over 600 Contractors in over 30 Countries globally.

For the last 7 years, Mr Lewis has led the Global Contract Division at Barrington James. Focusing on niche positions, rather than volume recruitment, Mr Lewis has built a team of Market Specialist consultants, who recruit through a personal network rather than a Database and Social Media.

The Barrington James Medical Division places CMO’s, Senior Clinical Development professionals, Research Physicians and MSL’s across the Americas, throughout Europe and The APAC Region. Our Network is built on face to face relationships as long term sponsors and members of the BIO International and Bio-Europe community. We have unrivaled global access to the top talent in the Biotech space.

Dr Gen Li is the President and Founder of Phesi Inc., a global provider of patient-centric data analytics that deliver smarter trials and faster cures. Dr Li has extensive experience in clinical development, having previously worked at Pfizer and Pharmacia, where he significantly contributed to the Centre for Medicines Research (CMR) International database for pharmaceutical R&D performance. His work inspired him to create Phesi - ensuring the insights held from historical data, or data collected from failed clinical trials were not lost. Under Dr Li’s leadership, Phesi has supported a number of landmark trials including Keytruda with its integrated solutions that accelerate drug development and commercialization. Phesi continues to disrupt the industry with its Trial Accelerator™ platform using artificial intelligence and global real-world patient data to generate Digital Patient Profiles, Digital Twins and Digital Trial Arms. Phesi delivers actionable insights for trial design, planning and execution, enabling pharma and biopharma companies to optimize protocol design, improve enrollment and reduce patient and investigator site burden and cycle times

Manoj Malhotra, M.D., is the chief medical officer at Ovid Therapeutics. As a member of the Company’s leadership team, Dr. Malhotra endeavors to strengthen Ovid’s capabilities in identifying and developing new medicines for resistant epilepsies and will support our mission to meaningfully help people affected by these devastating conditions.

Dr. Malhotra is a trained neurologist with a specialty in epilepsy. Over his career, he has supported or led more than 10 mid-to late-stage epilepsy clinical trials in rare diseases, including Dravet and Lennox-Gastaut syndromes, and other neurologic diseases. Before joining Ovid, Dr. Malhotra served at Eisai’s Neurology Group leading global medical affairs for its epilepsy and multiple sclerosis businesses. He was a Global Senior Medical Director at Mallinckrodt Pharmaceuticals autoimmune and rare disease unit and held senior roles at Takeda supporting its Alzheimer’s program and within Novartis Medical Affairs. Throughout his career in industry, Dr. Malhotra developed expertise in rare neurological diseases.

Prior to his career in industry, Dr. Malhotra completed his residency in neurology and his fellowship in neurophysiology at the Cleveland Clinic Foundation, after which, he went on to become the Chief of Neurology at Kaiser Permanente. Dr. Malhotra’s experience as a treating physician and as a pharmaceutical executive brings deep medical expertise to Ovid and the community we strive to serve.

Mathai Mammen, M.D., Ph.D., is an experienced drug discovery and development leader, team builder and company builder. He is currently CEO, president, and chairman at FogPharma. Previously, Mathai was a member of the executive committee at Johnson & Johnson, where he served as executive vice president of pharmaceuticals, R&D. During his tenure, he spearheaded a significant and successful evolution of Janssen’s R&D, one of the largest R&D organizations in the world. Under Mathai’s leadership, Janssen R&D executed 40+ acquisitions and licenses and 350+ strategic partnerships and collaborations. A central pillar of his strategy was data science, which he used to couple recent revolutionary advances in data, computation, and algorithmic approaches to every aspect of discovering and developing medicines. Mathai led his team to global approvals of eight new medicines, including TremfyaTM, Darzalex FasproTM, BalversaTM, CarvyktiTM, RybrevantTM, PonvoryTM, SpravatoTM and TecvayliTM, with many additional global approvals for expanded indications of marketed products. Prior to his role at Johnson & Johnson, Mathai served as senior vice president at Merck, where he was responsible for multiple research areas, including cardiovascular, metabolic, and renal diseases, immunology, oncology and immuno-oncology. Before Merck, he led R&D at Theravance, Inc., a company he co-founded out of graduate school based on his work at Harvard University with Dr. George Whitesides. Under his leadership, Theravance advanced a robust pipeline of multiple development-stage compounds resulting in BREOTM, ANOROTM, YUPELRITM, TRELEGYTM and VIBATIVTM. Mathai holds an M.D. from the Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (HST) and a Ph.D. in chemistry from Harvard University.

Julie Martin, MSc, Lean Certified - CEO & Co-Owner is a 17-year industry veteran who has led Scimega as CEO for 5 years. Her passion for Scimega’s business and team stems from knowing its expert oncology clinical development services add distinct value to industry stakeholders at a time when it’s needed most. As CEO, Ms Martin's vision is to secure the company’s long-term success by leveraging her in-depth industry expertise and business acumen. She equates that success with setting a clear vision for the organization’s continued sense of purpose. Her leadership, and collaboration with the managing Board of Directors, combined ensure the business excellence upon which Scimega has built its reputation. Ms Martin plays a vital role in promoting Scimega’s expertise and showcasing Canada’s attributes as a formidable partner in global oncology drug development with an evolving Lean methodology.

Michael E. Meyers, is Vice Chairman, Head of M&A and Strategic Advisory Services at H.C. Wainwright & Co. Mr. Meyers has ~30 years of public health, investment banking, venture capital, asset management and operating experience in healthcare, with an emphasis on the life sciences and health care delivery. Over the course of his career, Mr. Meyers has advised on ~ $150 billion of strategic and financial transactions, the latter spanning the capital structure, including royalty financings. Previously, Mr. Meyers was Head of Investment Banking with T.R. Winston & Company; CEO and CIO of Arcoda Capital Management; Managing Director, Partner and Member of the Board of Global Biomedical Partners AG, a life sciences venture capital firm; Director of healthcare investment banking with Merrill Lynch & Co.; Vice President of Health Care Investment Banking with Cowen & Company; and a research associate with Hambrecht & Quist. Mr. Meyers serves on the Board of Trustees of the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, and the University of Southern California’s Board of Councilors for the Stevens Center for Innovation and School of Dramatic Arts. Mr. Meyers holds an M.P.H. in Health Policy and Management from Columbia University, and an A.B. in Biology from Brandeis University.

Miras Search Partners was founded by Cliff Miras in 2022 with the aim to become the trusted “go to” strategic search partner and career advisor, respectively, by the clients and candidates (Talent) the firm works very closely with.

Over the past 20+ years, Mr Miras has built two boutique pharmaceutical and biotechnology specialty Executive Retained Search and Recruitment Firms that have been recognized as both a “Top 40 Life Sciences Search Firm” and as one of America’s “Top 250 Executive Search Firms” by Hunt Scanlon: he has done this with Miras Search Partners that he founded in 2022, and with Cornerstone Search Group that he co-founded and led from 2000 to 2021.

In addition to his accountabilities for building, leading, and managing the overall activities for these firms over the past 20+ years, he has also led the successful development of M.D. Specialty Practices that have helped early/later clinical development and commercial stage companies of varying sizes hire M.D.s at all levels for roles as CMOs, Therapeutic Area Heads, Global Program Leaders, Clinical Development Leads, and Global/US Medical Affairs Leadership roles.

Mr Miras has extensive hands-on experience planning, leading, managing, executing and completing Retained Search and Recruiting assignments from A to Z (from intake through planning, strategy, research, outreach, interviewing, qualifying, presenting, negotiating, gaining acceptances, and handling counteroffers, resigning and onboarding) for a broad range of positions, at various position levels and in multiple functional areas: Discovery, Clinical R&D, Program Management, Project Management, Clinical Operations, Clinical Data Management, Medical Affairs, Drug Safety, Pharmacovigilance and Risk Management, Regulatory Affairs, Medical Writing and others.

Dr. Yan Moore joined Omega Therapeutics as Chief Medical Officer and brings deep experience in clinical drug development. Prior to Omega, he served as Senior Vice President, Head of Oncology Therapeutic Area at Ipsen Pharmaceuticals, and before that as Chief Medical Officer and Senior Vice President of Clinical Development and Research and Development at Anchiano Therapeutics (previously BioCanCell Therapeutics).

In these roles, Dr. Moore was responsible for identifying and executing research and development objectives in areas of oncology and immune-modulatory therapies, managing clinical and preclinical drug development (pre-IND to Phase 1), scientific and development strategy, creation of internal drug development engines to support the overall portfolio strategies and managing global medical affairs strategy. 

Previously, Dr. Moore held several senior roles of increasing responsibility at Ariad Pharmaceuticals, Sanofi Oncology, GlaxoSmithKline, and Bristol-Myers Squibb, among others. As a clinician, Dr. Moore spent time at Sapir Medical Center, Meir Hospital and Edith Wolfson Medical Center.

Dr. Moore has over 20 years of experience in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries. Dr. Moore received his medical degree and Bachelor of Medical Sciences from the Sackler School of Medicine at Tel Aviv University, MBA from the LeBow College of Business at Drexel University and completed the Advanced Management Program at Harvard Business School.

Neely Mozaffarian, MD, PhD, is the chief medical officer at Atomwise, a privately held company based in San Francisco that is developing novel, AI-driven therapies for autoimmune and autoinflammatory diseases. Prior to Atomwise, Dr. Mozaffarian was CMO at GentiBio, Pathway Area Stronghold Leader and VP Immunology at Janssen/J&J, and led teams in global drug development for large and small molecules across clinical trial phases 1-4 at Ichnos/Glenmark, Gilead Sciences, Eli Lilly & Co., and AbbVie/Abbott. She received her MD and PhD in Microbiology and Immunology from Albert Einstein College of Medicine in NY, followed by Internal Medicine residency and Rheumatology fellowship at the University of Washington in Seattle, where she performed research on immune abnormalities in systemic lupus erythematosus and other autoimmune diseases.

After earning his Bachelor’s Degree from Menlo College, John received an MS from Stanford University and both a MS and PhD from MD Anderson Cancer Center where he discovered that IL-10 directly activates anti-tumor CD8+ T cells. John conducted post-doctoral work for a year at DNAX Research Institute and became a Scientist at Schering Plough where he developed PEGylated IL-10 (AM0010) as an immunoncology asset. He then founded Targenics, later merged with ARMO Biosciences (briefly a publicly traded company), to clinically develop AM0010 and other immune oncology assets. ARMO Biosciences was acquired by Eli Lilly in 2018 for a $1.6B up front deal. As a founder and Senior Director of Technical Operations at ARMO, John led the manufacturing and pre-clinical research teams.

John served as the Director of Immunoncology R&D at Medimmune LLC and is the author of 28 manuscripts and 52 granted or pending patents. After reviewing the immunoncology space for two years at MedImmune and developing such diverse projects as innate and T cell agonists, CART and other cell therapy projects as well as novel immunostimulatory antibody drug conjugates, John has most recently founded Deka Biosciences. Deka is the next generation cytokine development company created to solve the challenges associated with harnessing the massive potential of cytokine therapy. With the challenges in developing T cell agonists and cell therapy programs, it is likely that cytokine combinations coupled with targeting modalities administered in conjunction with precision patient selection will be clear value drivers for the pharmaceutical industry for years to come.

Dr Michael Murphy is the Chief Medical & Scientific Officer for Worldwide Clinical Trials, an international, multiservice , therapeutically focused clinical research organization providing research services for devices and pharmaceutical products across all phases of clinical development. During a career of 30 years, discovery and development activities emphasized the integration of medical and scientific acumen with operational excellence. Approximately 130 publications span diverse subjects from clinical trial methodology through commercialization. He is the sponsor of the Michael F. Murphy Clinical Research Methodology Fellowship Program at Worldwide Clinical Trials.

Prior to joining Worldwide, Dr Murphy was Chief Medical Officer, and Senior Vice President of Discovery and Development at TorreyPines Therapeutics Inc. Contributions emphasized translational research for small molecules in neurodegeneration and analgesia (GWAS, γ secretase modulator, AMPA/kainate receptor antagonists, selective M1 agonists). He served as President and Chief Medical and Scientific Officer of a Clinical Research Organization within UnitedHealth Group. During his tenure, this CRO was rated "number one" in the United States by CenterWatch.

Dr Murphy has participated in the preIND, IND/CTA application process for multiple small molecules ,biologics, and advanced therapy medicinal products. Product registration for which he is had direct responsibility exist in depression, Alzheimer’s disease, and narcolepsy [PROVIGIL® (modafinil)].

He is boarded in psychiatry and has a doctorate in pharmacology, with training at Tulane University, Stanford University, and the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine. He is a Founder, and Research & Development Editor for American Health & Drug Benefits™ a publication which focuses upon cost, quality, and access in the transition of novel diagnostics and therapeutics from discovery to commercialization. For 25 years, he has been a lecturer within the Clinical and Translational (C/T) Research Academy, Harvard Medical School, the Harvard Clinical and Translational Science Center and contributes to a curriculum focusing on innovative trial methodology within clinical development.

He is the recipient of the Clinical Research & Excellence (CARE) Lifetime Achievement Award in 2017. The award is presented annually to an extraordinary individual with exceptional contributions and a consistent history of service to the clinical research industry throughout their career. PharmaVoice selected him as one of 2017’s 100 Most Inspiring People in the life-sciences industry.

Swami Murugappan MD, Ph.D., is an executive biotech consultant and a hematologist oncologist with an established track record in developing Cell and Gene Therapies, Oncolytics, Monoclonal Antibodies, and T-cell engagers for solid and hematological cancers. He founded Trident Bio Consulting Inc. to help startups, biotech, and pharma organizations develop transformational therapies for cancer patients. In his consultant role as a chief medical officer, clinical consultant, or head of clinical development, Swami works closely with C-suite executive leaders, the R&D team, and Board members to help make strategic decisions and deliver on drug development milestones. Before establishing his consultancy firm, Swami held leadership roles at Kite Pharma, Amgen, and Nutcracker Therapeutics. In his prior positions, he has led and supported multiple global regulatory filings and approvals (Vectibix, ImLygic, and Tecartus). Swami also serves as an Industry advisor for startup companies through UCSF Catalyst Ventures, Berkeley SkyDeck, and California Life Sciences.

Natalia Mühlemann has over 18 years of experience in General Management, International Marketing, Business Development and Clinical Development in Life Sciences across several therapeutic areas, including intensive care, surgery, oncology, neurology, rehabilitation and diabetes. Dr Mühlemann combines medical and strategic expertise enhancing business value through clinical and real world evidence generation, medical & scientific interactions and stakeholders’ engagement.

In her recent positions of Global Business Manager, Medical Devices and Global Category Head, Acute Care – Oncology – Devices at Nestle Health Sciences (NHSc), Dr Mühlemann have been leading cross-functional team of marketing, business development, R&D, clinical, medical, regulatory, market Access and Operations.  Dr Mühlemann led due diligence and played a key role in deal negotiations as part of negotiation committees, resulting in several deal closures. She led financial evaluation, business plan development, technical and clinical development, regulatory plans and market access strategy for medical technologies licensed or acquired in early stage.

Dr Mühlemann has been invited to European MedTech meetings as panel speaker and expert jury member. Natalia also acts as an Expert Jury member for the European Commission’s European Innovation Council (EIC).

Dr Mühlemann holds MD and MBA and continues her professional development through medical conferences and Executive Education programs. Dr Mühlemann's specialization in medical cybernetics and instrumental methods of diagnostics enable her to effectively connect medical, engineering and data science specialties. Dr Mühlemann has Stanford certification in Medical Statistics, IBM Data Science Professional Certification and executive education in Machine Learning from MIT and Digital Transformation in Healthcare from Harvard Medical School.

Susan Nemetz is a proven leader and successful entrepreneur in the life science industry. In addition to founding and leading Corval, an innovative software technology company, she is the CEO and Founder of The NemetzGroup, a successful, strategic commercialization consultancy that has supported hundreds of biopharma companies and their development of numerous assets from targets to approved life-saving treatments. Previously, she held multiple commercial leadership roles in biopharma companies.

With more than 35 years of corporate strategy, commercial, medical affairs, business development, and operational experience, C-suite leadership teams rely on her thought partnership, inspiration, and mentoring to achieve goals across all stages of drug development. Ms Nemetz is on the Board of Advisors of Life Science Cares and the Board of Directors for Good Shepherd Community Care.

Judith Ng-Cashin, M.D., joined Novotech in 2023 as its Chief Medical Officer. With a rich background encompassing over two decades in the international pharmaceutical, biotech, and CRO sectors, Dr Ng-Cashin plays a pivotal role in shaping Novotech's global multi-regional later-phase strategy and ensuring the highest quality delivery of services to both sponsors and patients.

Before her role at Novotech, she held key senior executive positions, including CMO and CSO roles at organizations such as Eagle Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Syneos Health, AoBiome Therapeutics, and INC Research. Dr Ng-Cashin also serves as a valued member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Revibe Technologies, and most recently sat on the Board of Directors for DIA, and contributes as an Affiliate Mentor for Duke New Ventures within Duke University's Office for Translation and Commercialization.

Dr Ng-Cashin's commitment to advancing healthcare innovation is underscored by her impressive track record of successful clinical trials and her dedication to improving patient outcomes. Her educational background includes an MD from Rush Medical School, residency training at The University of Chicago Pritzker School of Medicine, and fellowships in infectious diseases and hematology/oncology from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She holds a dual BA/BS degree in Mathematics and Psychology, further enriching her multidisciplinary approach to healthcare leadership.

In April 2022, Mustafa Noor, MD, FACP joined Olatec’s Drug Development Team as Chief Medical Officer. At both large and small pharma companies, Dr Noor has contributed to numerous clinical drug development programs, leading and collaborating with teams in the development of novel therapeutics for inflammation, cardiometabolism, lipid and endocrine disorders as well as rare diseases. From 2001 to 2006, as medical director at Bristol-Myers Squibb, Dr Noor held positions of increasing responsibility in metabolic, cardiovascular, and antiviral programs. From 2006 to 2014 at GSK and at Pfizer he served as vice president and clinical head for GSK’s Center of Excellence in External Drug Discovery and for Pfizer’s Centers for Therapeutic Innovation focusing on open innovation, translational research and collaboration with biotech and academic partners on a portfolio of early-stage programs in indications for inflammatory diseases, including inflammatory bowel disease, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus and sarcoidosis. For the last several years Dr Noor has been a consultant CMO to emerging companies in the Boston/Cambridge area. Dr Noor completed his medical training at the University of Chicago and fellowship training in Endocrinology and Metabolism at the University of California, San Francisco. He holds a Master of Science in Clinical Investigation from Vanderbilt University and is a board-certified Internal Medicine specialist in Endocrinology and Metabolism.

TBD

Joseph M. Palumbo, MD, LFAPA, MACPsych, is Executive Vice President (EVP), Head of Research & Development (R&D) and Chief Medical Officer (CMO) of BioVie Inc., a clinical-stage company developing innovative drug therapies for the treatment of neurological and neurodegenerative disorders and advanced liver disease. In addition to his role at BioVie, Palumbo is a Life Fellow of the American Psychiatric Association (APA) and a Fellow of the American Society for Clinical Pharmacology. He is also involved in academia, serving as a member of the American College of Psychiatrists along with sitting on the Dean’s Council of Advisors at The George Washington University School of Medicine and Health Sciences. Prior to joining BioVie, Dr. Palumbo served as CMO for Zynerba, developing therapeutics for autism and other rare neuropsychiatric and neurodevelopmental conditions of adults and children. He previously held senior worldwide governance roles at Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma in both the United States (US) and Japan, where he led medical science and translational research across multiple therapeutic areas, and guided successful registrational programs for RADICAVA® (edaravone) for the treatment of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis in the US, Canada, Japan, Switzerland, South Korea, and other countries. Palumbo also served as Global Head and Franchise Medical Leader for Psychiatry, and the Interim Head of Global Neuroscience at Johnson & Johnson, where he led the medical teams who achieved successful global registrations in multiple neuropsychiatric conditions for RISPERDAL® (risperidone), CONCERTA® (methylphenidate HCL) and INVEGA® (paliperidone). He has also served on the executive teams of international pharmaceutical companies including Sanofi-Synthelabo and Cephalon, as well as senior leadership roles at prestigious academic institutions including Yale University, Cornell University, and the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Palumbo holds a BA from the University of Pennsylvania and a Doctor of Medicine from the George Washington University School of Medicine. He was a Biological Sciences Training Program Fellow of the National Institutes of Health, a research mentor of junior faculty at both the APA and the Society of Biological Psychiatry, and served as Chief Resident for the Abraham Ribicoff Clinical Neuroscience Research Unit at Yale University. Dr Palumbo has also received Board Certification in Psychiatry and Addiction Psychiatry.

Uptal Patel is Chief Medical Officer at HI-Bio. Prior to HI-Bio, he was the Head of Clinical Renal and Executive Group Director in Early CVRM at AstraZeneca where he led early clinical strategy and development for a wide range of therapies that address several kidney diseases. He previously led the kidney diseases domain at Gilead Sciences. He currently also serves as Chair of the Board of Directors for the Kidney Health Initiative. As a faculty member at Duke University, he led clinical and translational research programs to improve detection and management of kidney disease in populations. He completed training at the University of Michigan in internal medicine, pediatrics, adult nephrology, pediatric nephrology, and health services research as a Robert Wood Johnson Clinical Scholar after attending medical school at UCSF.

Gary Pisano is the Harry E. Figgie, Jr. Professor of Business Administration at the Harvard Business School where he has been on the faculty since 1988. From 2018-2023, Pisano was Harvard Business School’s Senior Associate Dean for Faculty Promotion and Tenure. Pisano is an expert in competitive strategy, innovation, and operations. Over the course of his career, Pisano has explored fundamental questions about how organizations innovate, learn, compete, and grow. His research and consulting have spanned a broad range of industries including aerospace, automobiles, apparel, biotechnology and pharmaceuticals, entertainment, financial services, medical devices, semiconductors, software, specialty chemicals, and web services. Pisano has published over 100 scholarly articles and case studies and has written six books, including his latest, Creative Construction: The DNA of Sustained Innovation. Throughout his career, Pisano’s work has won numerous awards including, Strategic Management Society’s Best Paper (2003) and Strategy + Business best books (2006, 2019). He is a two-time winner of the McKinsey Award (2009, 2019) for the best article published in Harvard Business Review, and the inaugural winner of the Clayton M. Christensen Prize (2020) for his work on innovative cultures. In 2020, he received the Greenhill Distinguished Services Award from the Harvard Business School. At Harvard, Pisano has taught MBA, executive, and doctoral courses. In addition to his academic research and teaching, Pisano is an advisor to senior executives at leading companies around the world. He has served on the boards of both public and private companies. He currently serves on the board of Generate Biomedicines. Pisano is also an Academic Partner at Flagship Pioneering. Professor Pisano received his Ph.D. from the University of California, Berkeley and a B.A. in economics from Yale.

Ravi Rao is the Chief Medical Officer at Sitryx Therapeutics, a Venture Partner at SV Health Investors and an independent board director of DBV Technologies. He was previously Head of R&D and CMO at Swedish Orphan Biovitrum, where he led the development and approval of several medicines in rare diseases across immunology and haematology. Prior to that, he was Chief Medical Officer of Aeglea Biotherapeutics, a company specialising in rare metabolic diseases. Previously, he held several senior positions in R&D at GlaxoSmithKline in immunology and specialty medicines and was an immunology Group Medical Director at Roche Genentech. He has worked in discovery medicine, early and late-stage development as well as global medical affairs. Ravi was an academic rheumatologist and physician-scientist at Imperial College, London. He is a Member of the Royal College of Physicians, London and an Honorary Member of the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine. He received his medical degree from Cambridge University and his Ph.D. from Imperial College, completing a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard Medical School in the field of vascular biology and inflammation.

Dr Edwin Rock joined GlycoMimetics in 2022 as Chief Medical Officer after 16 years in biopharma roles of increasing responsibility. Most recently he was Chief Medical Officer at Partner Therapeutics. Previously, at MacroGenics he led the program culminating in FDA approval of MargenzaTM. Dr Rock has worked in biopharma on small molecules and biologics in all stages of development and marketing authorization. These agents include BusulfexTM, Dacogen®, Inqovi®, Jynarque®, Leukine®, MargenzaTM, Nucala, and Sprycel®, as well as investigational ASTX-660, GNX-8, guadecitabine, lorigerlimab, the MAGE-A3 cancer vaccine, OPB-31121, OPB-51602, OPB-111077, retifanlimab, tebotelimab, VEGF-dAB-Fc and others not disclosed. Prior to working in clinical drug development, he worked for 2 years as an FDA Medical Officer in oncology drug review, as well as for a year as a life sciences buy-side analyst at Leerink Swann and Company. Dr Rock holds a BA in Biology and Economics from Swarthmore College. He earned PhD then MD degrees at Stanford before completing Internal Medicine residency at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Medical Oncology fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania.

Rubi Rodriguez Nieto is a social anthropologist, activist, doula and mum. She works as a Community Services Manager at Birth Companions. She has experience working in the charity sector supporting pregnant women who experience multiple disadvantages, migrant women and girls, women and children survivors of domestic abuse, and overseas communities doing environmental conservation.

Marcie is currently the Chief Medical Officer at Tectonic Therapeutic, Watertown MA. She has over 18 years of experience in drug development across all stages of clinical drug development from translational/early development through post approval and across multiple modalities including small molecules, siRNA and biologics. She was named one of the 2023 Top Women in BioPharma by Endpoints News. Prior to joining Tectonic, she was VP and Head of Clinical Development for the Immunology/Inflammation Therapeutic Area at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals. In that role she led the clinical development of Dupixent® through over nine Phase 3 trial initiations and multiple regulatory approvals globally, including approvals for adult and pediatric asthma, pediatric AD, chronic rhinosinusitis with nasal polyps. She was instrumental in the pivotal study design and its execution supporting the recent approval in eosinophilic esophagitis and design of COPD studies. Over her career, which has included time at Merck and Alnylam and EMD Serono, she has built and led clinical development and cross functional groups across a range of therapeutic areas including respiratory, inflammation, bone, anemia and metabolic and rare diseases. Prior to entry into drug development, Marcie held a staff position in the Pulmonary Unit at Massachusetts General Hospital/Harvard Medical School where she founded and directed the Adult Cystic Fibrosis Program. She holds an AB from Princeton University and a MD/ MS from Washington University, St. Louis and completed her internal medicine and pulmonary fellowship training at Harvard Medical School affiliated hospitals.

Dr. Howard Rutman is the CMO of Xalud Therapeutics where he oversees the development of plasmid-DNA based therapies for inflammation and neurodegenerative diseases. Since joining Xalud in April 2021, Howard has been responsible for the development program for XT-150, an IL-10 based transgene therapy, currently in clinical trials for osteoarthritis and neuropathic pain and in preclinical stage for ALS. Howard serves as the scientific face of Xalud in discussions with investors and potential partners. He has appeared on numerous biotech panels related to gene therapy development programs. Prior to joining Xalud, Howard was VP of Medical Affairs for Daiichi Sankyo US. In that role, he led the Medical Affairs group across all therapeutic areas to enhance the awareness of Daiichi Sankyo approved and clinical stage products through the generation, interpretation and exchange of high quality medical and scientific information for internal and external stakeholders. While at Daiichi Sankyo he had a leadership role in launches across multiple therapeutic areas including cardiovascular thrombosis, pain and oncology. Previously, Howard was at Pfizer as Global Medical Affairs lead for multiple monoclonal antibody biosimilars that were developed in oncology and immunology. Howard began his career as a New York-based academic cardiologist with a focus on managing patients with chronic congestive heart failure. He received a BA in Biochemical Sciences and Molecular Biology from Harvard, an MD from Johns Hopkins and an MBA from NYU-Stern. Howard completed his medical residency at New York-Presbyterian Hospital and his cardiology fellowship at Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He remains on the teaching faculty of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine.

Ajay Sadhwani is an Executive Life Science Professional with over 25 years of clinical research experience. He is a proven leader of cross functional teams and people management of large and small functional groups with a proven track record of successfully leading teams and motivating individuals to perform at their highest level.

Dr. Alison Schecter, MD, is a physician scientist and world-renowned immunologist/cardiologist. With over 20-year experience, Dr. Schecter is a strategic highly effective operational global executive in biotech and large pharma, and as of 2023, President of R&D of Axcella, a Flagship company. Recently Dr. Schecter founded Molecules to Medicine (MTM) Advisory Group, a boutique consulting service providing unique strategic/regulatory/ fund raising/ clinical development guidance for PEs/VCs/Biotechs. She completed internal medicine training from Johns Hopkins, fellowship training at MGH in Cardiology and continued basic science training at Mount Sinai School of Medicine (MSSM). As an academic physician tenured Associate Professor in Cardiology, and Immunology, Dr. Schecter built and co-directed the MSSM CV Research Center. Upon moving to Pharma, she led Translational Medicine in CV at Novartis, demonstrating the NLRP3 signaling pathway, via inhibition of IL-1β, with canakinumab, is a validated target for treating cardiovascular disease. This proof-of-concept trial led to the $1B ph3 CANTOS trial, and the 1 st demonstration that inhibition of inflammation, reduces CV morbidity and mortality. As being a seasoned CMO, Dr. Schecter has led multi-functional global teams to effect novel translational and BD approaches to expedite medicines to critical milestones and was instrumental in raising over $250M. As Head of Early Development for Rare Diseases at Sanofi/Genzyme, Dr. Schecter lead the Niemann-Pick Disease Team to garner the approval by the FDA, EMA, and PMDA and launch of Xempozyme, the 1 st treatment for Niemann-Pick Type B and A/B and was awarded the 2018 Cambridge Chamber of Commerce Visionary Award.

Donna Schwarz is an executive and communications coach specializing in leadership development, public speaking and Storytelling. She works closely with professionals to help them communicate with impact, drive organizational effectiveness, and win high-stakes opportunities.

One of her more popular programs, Storytelling for Business, is a powerful way to leverage the power of stories to inspire new thinking and make key points memorable. Donna works with individuals and teams to hone their communication and create powerful narratives that demonstrate value, overcome objections and influence decision making. Some of Donna’s clients include global pharmaceutical organizations, Biotech, Hedge Funds, Technology and Legal Services.

Prior to becoming an executive coach, Donna served fifteen years in progressive leadership roles as a financial and operations executive. She was employee number five at a dynamic, self-financed startup and played a pivotal role in driving growth for a successful $40M acquisition by a multibillion-dollar international media holding company.

Donna earned a graduate degree in Clinical Psychology and is a licensed psychotherapist. She is a sought-after speaker, quoted in the Wall Street Journal and Fortune Magazine. She is a member of NY Metro ATD and serves in a leadership role on the Board of Managers of her New York City condominium.

Jessica Scott, MD, JD, is a Patient Engagement leader who brings to Legacy Health Strategies a combined acumen of medicine and law, together with innovative thinking allows her to drive culture change in medical product development within organizations which results in mutually beneficial outcomes for patients and industry. She is also an experienced ambassador for medical policy issues and patient engagement to organizations and agencies on a global level.

Dr Scott is known as a credible and trusted thought-leader and collaborator, bringing novel solutions, digital strategies, and patient-centered approaches to biotech, med tech and pharmaceutical industries and across multi-stakeholder groups.

Dr Scott has deep knowledge of the pharmaceutical industry with senior leadership positions at both GlaxoSmithKline and Takeda where her focus has been on building patient perspectives into the process of R&D, enhancing trust and fostering a sense of true partnership with patients. She leads by inspiring others and engendering high levels of engagement with skillful, timely, and consistent delivery of initiatives and solutions that bring more medicines of value to patients, faster.

Dr Scott has received awards for innovative and impactful work in Patient Engagement including the Trail Blazer Award and PharmaVoice100 as one of the top 100 most inspiring leaders in the industry. She is actively involved as a strategic advisor to Bioethics International, Patient Focused Medicines Development, DIA Patient Advisory Council and remains actively licensed to practice law in North Carolina where she also practiced as a Family Physician for over a decade.

Dr Jen Seda is a seasoned medical executive with over 20 years of experience specializing in rare diseases, medical devices, and innovative therapeutics, always prioritizing patient well-being. She excels in developing corporate portfolio strategies and guiding teams through medical and clinical execution.

At SSI Strategy, Dr Seda offers interim leadership from VP to CMO levels, advising medical executives and leading teams to develop solutions for clients at various developmental stages. With 5 years in gene therapy, 15 years in rare disease, and 2 years in digital diagnostics and therapeutics.

Prior to joining SSI, Dr Seda served as interim CMO/VP at biologics, gene therapy, and digital diagnostic firms, successfully navigating pivotal moments such as Series B rounds, IPOs, and acquisitions, ensuring milestone achievement and facilitating clinical trials and medical affairs activities. She also held the role of VP of Market Access, Government, and Medical Affairs at TerumoBCT, a global device company, overseeing various Therapeutic areas. She also led the Global Medical Affairs team at Baxter Healthcare’s Biologics division, overseeing launches in rare disease within pulmonology and neurology. She has helped build robust medical affairs and medical information teams, at Coviden’s Respiratory and Monitoring division, and led both medical affairs and marketing teams at Talecris Biotherapeutics to market leadership in rare disease.

Dr Seda holds a medical degree from the Mayo Clinic, with neuroimmunology training, and completed her undergraduate studies at U.C. Irvine. Her extensive experience, ranging from preclinical work at Amgen to strategic planning from bench to bedside, underscores her comprehensive expertise in the medical field.

Oscar Segurado is an executive veteran of the biopharmaceutical industry with extensive global leadership experience in translational science, clinical development and medical affairs. Dr Segurado is the Chief Medical Officer for ASC Therapeutics, and formerly held CMO positions for Symvivo, Myriad Genetics-Crescendo and CellMax Life, as well as roles such as Vice President for Becton Dickinson and Global Medical Head for Abbott/AbbVie. Dr Segurado is a senior medical leader experienced in matrixed, line management and consulting for biotechs, midsize and large pharma companies. He has extensive expertise in gene therapy (ASC, AveXis, UCLA Ventures, UniQure, Symvivo), immuno-oncology (Amgen, AstraZeneca, Bellicum, Jazz), immuno-therapy (Bristol-Myers Squibb, Macrogenics, TriSalus), genomics (Freenome, Myriad) and protein/cell diagnostics (Abbott, BD, Crescendo), predominantly focused on oncology, hematology and autoimmunity, including personalized medicine, molecular and cellular biomarkers. Dr Segurado holds a tenured Professorship of Immunology at the University of Leon, Spain, currently on leave. He received his PhD from the University of Wuerzburg, Germany and MD from the University of Salamanca, Spain. Prior to this, he was an associate professor at the Faculties of Medicine in the University of Munich, Germany, and University Complutense of Madrid, Spain. Dr Segurado has authored and co-authored over 100 peer-reviewed publications, including Nature, Lancet and Journal of Experimental Medicine, as well as books and medical articles and is a member of several scientific and medical societies, including ASCO, ASH, ESMO, AACR and SITC.

Born and raised in Torino (Italy) where in 1992 he obtained his medical degree and in 1997 completed his residency in Respiratory Medicine at the University of Torino. Attending physician and investigator in thoracic oncology in Torino till 2010 including several phase II-III clinical trials in NSCLC and SCLC and mesothelioma and author of papers on peer-reviewed journals and abstracts at main conferences (presenter at ASCO, ESMO, IASLC). Medical Director in Cancer Immunotherapy with GSK till 2012, then in Novartis Oncology till 2014 to develop ceritinib (ALK inhibitor) in NSCLC. VP of Clinical development in Oncolytics till January 2016 when he took the role of Lung cancer Program Lead at BMS till March 2019 leading to nivolumab approval in SCLC. Chief Medical officer at Xcovery since March 2019 to lead the company to first NDA submission of an ALK TKI for NSCLC.

Jalpa Shah has worked in the healthcare space for 18 years and at ZS for 9 years; she leads the ZS Emerging Pharma Medical & Evidence practice.

She focuses on bringing right-sized business and customer-oriented solutions to small and mid-sized pharma medical organizations, ensuring that medical leaders are connecting to create and deliver differentiated medical value. Her areas of expertise includes medical strategy, integrated evidence planning, organizational design and capability building, data strategy and analytics, and end-to-end scientific engagement. Ms Shah has worked extensively with pre-launch products, from phase 1 to phase 3 through to pre-launch, as well as with in-market products in the U.S. and partners with her colleagues across Europe and JAPAC across multiple disease states. Before joining ZS, she was a preclinical drug development scientist at organizations like GlaxoSmithKline, National Cancer Institute and a startup biotech, OncoMed Pharmaceuticals.

Ms Shah holds an M.S. in Biotechnology from Johns Hopkin University and a B.S. with honors in Biomedical Science from the National University of Singapore.

Yaping Shou, M.D., Ph.D., is the Founder and CEO of Wells Therapeutics, Inc. and a Venture Partner at Lilly Asia Ventures (LAV). Yaping has over 20 years of global clinical development experience in both pharma (GlaxoSmithKline, Novartis, and Takeda) and biotech (Trillium) companies. Yaping was the chief medical officer of Trillium Therapeutics, and prior to that, the executive medical director with Takeda Pharmaceuticals. She has made critical contributions to the development and approval of multiple oncology drugs including lapatinib, pazopanib, nilotinib, sonidegib, and ixazomib. She also led significant clinical progress at Trillium in recent years which formed the strong basis for Pfizer's $2.3b acquisition of Trillium in 2021. In her current role at LAV, Yaping leverages her development expertise to support investment decisions. She also provides strategic guidance to help businesses achieve clinical development success, financial growth, and optimal organizational performance. She founded Wells Therapeutics Inc. in June 2022 with the goal to accelerate globalization of regionally sourced therapeutics for the benefit of patients worldwide. Yaping holds a MD degree from Zhejiang University School of Medicine and a PhD degree in cellular and molecular biology from Drexel University. She also received post-doctoral fellowship training at the Genetic Branch of NCI. As a female executive, Yaping graduated from a 12-month woman leadership program for high-potential women led by WOMAN Unlimited, Inc., and received leadership training at SAID Business School of Oxford and MIT Sloan School of Management.

Amy Simon, MD, is Chief Medical Officer of Beam. Dr Simon brings more than 20 years of clinical experience to Beam, serving in roles as a physician-scientist in academia and the biotechnology industry. Dr Simon joins Beam from Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, where she spent over a decade in various roles with increasing responsibility for the clinical development of RNAi-based medicines, most recently serving as Vice President, Clinical Development. During her tenure at Alnylam, she led the successful execution of clinical programs from natural history studies to Phase 1 through Phase 4 studies, regulatory interactions with both U.S. and ex-U.S. authorities, and drug approvals in the US and EU. Dr Simon was the lead clinician developing GIVLAARI® (givosiran) for patients with acute hepatic porphyria, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration in 2019. Prior to entering the biotech industry, Dr Simon worked in academia at Tufts University, serving as a professor and a director of the Asthma Center in the Pulmonary and Critical Care Division at Tufts University School of Medicine and as a professor at Tufts Graduate School of Biomedical Science where her laboratory conducted basic science research on asthma. She began her career in clinical practice, training as a resident in internal medicine and as a fellow in pulmonary and critical care medicine at Tufts Medical Center. Dr Simon holds a BA in History and Science from Harvard University, and an MD from Tufts University School of Medicine.

Hunter Smith is the Head of Clinical Recruitment at Govig Biopharma and sits alongside a team of 18 tenured recruiters. His education in genetic biology and cellular development coupled with a passion for emerging and revolutionary therapies drive his consultative approach to partnering with the industry's leading organizations. With over 22 years of experience recruiting in the life sciences, the Govig team specializes in establishing and scaling up teams across preclinical, clinical development, clinical operations, medical affairs, pharmacovigilance, and regulatory affairs. Smith's expertise lies largely in VP through C-Suite level searches. Govig deploys organization-specific strategies through a comprehensive approach to recruitment to ensure optimal individual and organizational success.

Alex Snyder, MD, is the Head of Research and Development at Generate Biomedicines, a therapeutics company that exists at the intersection of machine learning, biological engineering and medicine to create breakthrough medicines across a wide range of biologic modalities. Prior to joining Generate in 2022, Dr Snyder was a Principal at the biotech incubator Two River, following her role as Associate Vice President and Head of Translational Oncology at Merck. She previously was Translational Medicine Lead at Adaptive Biotechnologies, and started her career as faculty and federally-funded Principal Investigator at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center. She is a Clinical Assistant Professor of Medicine at NYU and Bellevue Hospitals, Section Editor for the Journal for the Immunotherapy of Cancer and a member of the board of Navigating Cancer.

Dr Snyder received her medical degree and internal medicine training at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai and Mount Sinai Hospital, followed by a medical oncology fellowship at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSKCC).

TBA

Kalliopi “Kali” Stasi, M.D., Ph.D. is a renowned expert with over 20 years of experience in ophthalmology specializing in clinical development for gene and cell therapy. She is currently Adverum’s Senior Vice President of Clinical Development and acting CMO responsible for global strategic planning and execution of the clinical development programs of gene therapy for age related macular degeneration. Most recently, Dr. Stasi served as the senior vice president, clinical development and acting CMO at Tenpoint Therapeutics, leading clinical development for cell therapy for age-related macular degeneration and other ophthalmology indications. Prior to Tenpoint, Dr. Stasi served as an early clinical development leader at Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research for more than 8 years, leading the gene and cell therapy ophthalmology pipeline including the first AAV internally generated, gene therapy program, plus low molecular weight compounds for various indications. Previously, she was associate professor of Ophthalmology at University of Pennsylvania for 4 years, combining a busy medical and surgical anterior segment ophthalmology practice with cutting edge translational research on stem cell therapies.

Dr. Stasi earned her M.D. and Ph.D. in Neurodegenerative Diseases from the University of Patra, Greece. She completed ophthalmology residency at the University of Rochester NY, and a Cornea and Refractive Surgery Clinical fellowship at Johns Hopkins Wilmer Eye Institute. She also completed a post-doc glaucoma research fellowship at Mount Sinai (including work on complement that led to the Lewis Rudin Award from the NY Academy of Medicine) and completed a business post-baccalaureate degree at Wharton Business School.

Mark Sumeray has 25 years of experience across the pharmaceutical, medical devices and biotech industries, both in the US and EU. Prior to his current role as CMO at Amolyt, he spent six years as chief medical officer at Amryt Pharmaceuticals, where he was responsible for development, regulatory and safety areas of the company. He was closely involved in support for the approval and launch of new treatments for patients with acromegaly, lipodystrophy, epidermolysis bullosa and homozygous familial hypercholesterolemia and led the clinical and scientific interactions with global health authorities. Prior to Amryt, he spent five years as chief medical officer at Aegerion Pharmaceuticals. Earlier in his career, he worked at Bristol-Myers Squibb, where he led a large US medical affairs team within the cardiovascular and metabolics area. He also previously worked at Ethicon, a Johnson & Johnson medical device company, where he was responsible for the clinical group. He spent nine years in clinical practice in the NHS, specializing in cardiovascular surgery and physiology. Mark received his bachelor’s and M.D. from University College London and FRCS qualification from Royal College of Surgeons.

Norman L. Sussman, M.D., FAASLD, joined DURECT as Chief Medical Officer in November 2020. He has extensive clinical experience and expertise in the field of liver disease and brings over 30 years of clinical research and development experience in academia and industry. Prior to joining DURECT, he was an Associate Professor of Medicine and Surgery at Baylor College of Medicine and a faculty member of Baylor College of Medicine from 1985 to 1990 and again from 2003 to 2020 with some time also spent as the Chief of Hepatology at the University of Utah School of Medicine. During his academic career, he served as a principal investigator for research focused on the assessment and management of acute liver failure and artificial liver support. Dr. Sussman gained leadership experience in industry as the Founder and Vice President of both Amphioxus Cell Technologies from 1995 to 2003 and Hepatix, Inc. from 1993 to 1995. Most recently, he has also served in senior leadership roles as a member of the Baylor Faculty Senate and as director of the telehealth program, Project ECHO®, at Baylor St. Luke’s Medical Center. Dr. Sussman received his Bachelor of Medicine and Surgery from the University of the Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. He then completed his residency at St. Louis University Hospital and his postdoctoral fellowship at Washington University. He is board certified in internal medicine, gastroenterology, and transplant hepatology. Dr. Sussman is also a fellow of the American Association for the Study of Liver Diseases, which is a designation that recognizes his superior level of professional achievement in the field of hepatology.

As Chief Medical Officer and Head of the Medical and Development organization, Dr Tadaaki Taniguchi is responsible for overseeing a global team striving to identify, discover and develop treatments with the potential to reshape expectations of medical care. This includes multiple divisions focused on developing innovative and patient-centric treatments and ensuring their appropriate and safe use throughout the product’s life cycle, including Data Science, Development in key Primary Focus areas (BioPharma, Cell & Gene Therapy, Oncology, Immuno-Oncology)​, Clinical Operations, Medical Affairs, Regulatory Affairs, Pharmacovigilance and Strategy and Operations. Dr Taniguchi has over 20 years of industry experience spanning research, development and medical affairs. He has worked across a range of therapy areas including diabetes and oncology to deliver life-changing medicines to patients. Prior to joining Astellas, Dr Taniguchi held senior roles in major multinational pharmaceutical companies in the US, Japan and China operating at global and regional levels and most recently served as Senior Vice President, Head of Global Medical Affairs, Oncology Business Unit at AstraZeneca. Dr Taniguchi earned his Doctor of Medicine from Tottori University, Japan and completed a PhD in Medicine at Imperial College, London. As a surgical oncologist, he spent 10 years working in clinics and research laboratories, contributing to his unique perspective on how global pharma can create and deliver breakthrough science that can change the way diseases are treated.

Dr. Edwin J. Tucker MD is a highly accomplished and respected medical professional with a diverse background in medicine, business, and leadership. He is Chief Medical Officer for Jasper Therapeutics, a biotech focused on the development of briquilimab, a novel antibody therapy targeting c-Kit (CD117) to address mast cell driven diseases such as chronic spontaneous urticaria (CSU) and chronic inducible urticaria (CIndU), His career spans over 30 years beginning with medical practice in the UK. He acquired increasingly senior leadership roles in large Pharma with Bayer, JNJ and Genentech/Roche before moving to start-up biotech with Acerta (COO, final role), then CMO at Mirum, CMO at Goldfinch before joining Jasper. He has served as a clinical advisor and a consultant to several biotech and investment companies. He earned his MD from Leeds University medical school; an MBA from UConn; and is Member of the Royal College of Physicians (UK). His passion is creating high performance teams and companies to improve healthcare outcomes for patients globally.

Christopher Turner, M.D. is the CMO for Nuvalent and is an experienced oncology drug developer and executive with over 22 years of clinical and pharmaceutical experience in early and late-stage oncology drug development. Nuvalent is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company focused on creating precisely targeted therapies for patients with cancer and is advancing a robust pipeline with parallel lead programs in ROS1-positive and ALK-positive non-small cell lung cancer, a program in HER2 Exon 20 insertion-positive cancers, and multiple discovery-stage research programs.

Prior to joining Nuvalent, Dr. Turner was Vice President of Clinical Development at Blueprint Medicines where he led the clinical development of GAVRETO (pralsetinib) in RET altered lung and thyroid cancers.

Dr. Turner has also held oncology clinical development leadership positions at Celldex Therapeutics and ARIAD Pharmaceuticals and was involved with the clinical development of the oncology drugs ICLUSIG(ponatinib) and ALUNBRIG (brigatinib).  Prior to that, Dr. Turner was Director of the Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Outcomes Clinic at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute/Children’s Hospital Boston and an Instructor of Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Turner is board certified in both Pediatrics and Pediatric Hematology and Oncology and is a Fellow of the American Academy of Pediatrics. He received his M.D. from the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry in Rochester, New York. He completed fellowships in both Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and Pediatric Neuro-Oncology at Duke University Medical Center in Durham, North Carolina. 

Kari is an experienced pharma, biotech and healthcare professional and he has played multiple roles ranging from an advisor to a CEO in various pharma and healthcare related industries. Kari has MD and PhD degrees from the University of Helsinki and board qualification in clinical microbiology and an MBA from IMD, Switzerland. He spent his early career in basic immunological research but in the mid 90’s he was invited to join pharma industry at the time when first products of biotech origin came to clinical use. Between 1995 and 2019 his CV includes many roles in pharma, healthcare, consulting and insurance industries and titles ranging from a senior adviser to VP, SVP, CMO and CEO. His responsibilities have covered clinical development, regulatory affairs, pharmacovigilance, medical affairs, investor relations, medical marketing and health technology as well as strategy development and execution and business development. Companies where Kari has served range from start-ups to global big five companies. Since his retirement in 2019 Kari has been a part-time CMO for TILT Biotherapeutics, which is a clinical phase biotech company focusing in development of oncolytic viruses for treatment of solid tumors. in 2023 Kari started as a CMO also in Linio Biotech, which develops biologically active tissue products for dermatology. In addition to his two CMO roles Kari acts as an angel investor and a board member in several biotech and healthtech companies as well as in some not-for-profit foundations. In his spare time Kari is a keen nature photographer and qualified mindfulness coach.

Roger is a Board-certified Medical Oncologist with over 25 years’ experience supervising the delivery of complex oncology patient care and palliative medicine in teaching hospitals and developing new drugs in oncology and in malaria at large pharma. Roger is currently the Chief Medical Officer of Indaptus, a clinical-stage biotechnology company developing a novel broad agonist of both innate and adaptive immune systems. Prior to Indaptus, Roger served as CMO from 2019-2023 for Molecular Templates, a clinical-stage biotechnology company developing several novel, targeted immunotoxins. Prior to Molecular Templates, Roger was the CMO from 2017-2019 at Rgenix/Inspirna developing a novel immune- oncology compound and a metabolic inhibitor. Previously, he was CMO/CSO for Jaguar Health from 2016-2017, developing first-in-class, FDA-approved botanicals as novel antidiarrheals. Roger spent over nine years at Novartis, lastly as Global Program Head responsible for all early and late-stage development activities of antimalarials, including Coartem and two compounds in Phase 2 development, including generating a collaboration agreement with Medicines for Malaria Venture and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Previously, Roger was responsible for Global Clinical Development activities for several oncology compounds including the successful NDA filing of Jakavi, and successful sNDA applications for Glivec and Tasigna. For nearly 12 years, Roger worked as a clinical medical oncologist and clinical researcher at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, Mount Sinai Hospital, and Saint Vincents Cancer Center, all in New York. He held academic positions as Assistant Professor in the Department of Medicine at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and New York Medical College. Roger received his undergraduate degree magna cum laude from Brown University in Providence, RI with honors in American Literature. He also received his medical degree from Brown University School of Medicine and completed his internship and residency at Harvard’s Beth Israel Hospital in Boston, MA. He completed his fellowship at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in hematology and oncology. He graduated with an MBA from Columbia University in New York.

TBA

Dr Barbara Wirostko is the Chief Medical Officer and Co-Founder of Qlaris Bio. Dr Wirostko is a practicing glaucoma specialist and is also a Clinical Adjunct Professor at the University of Utah, Moran Eye Center. She was previously the Chief Medical Officer of EyeGate Pharmaceuticals following its acquisition of Jade Therapeutics where Dr Wirostko was Co-Founder and Chief Scientific Officer spearheading the development of the Ocular Bandage Gel for human use. Prior to Jade, she served as the Chief Medical Officer of Altheos, a glaucoma company, and held leadership positions in medical and clinical development at Pfizer in Ophthalmology.

Dr Wirostko received her MD from and completed her residency at Columbia University and holds a BA in Microbiology from Cornell University.

Arvin is the Chief Medical Officer at Pheon. He was previously the CMO at Mersana in addition to spending over a decade at Bristol Myers Squibb in a variety of leadership roles focused on early and late-stage clinical development of oncology, hematology, and immuno-oncology therapies. Arvin received a B.A. from Rutgers College and M.D. and Ph.D. degrees from Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and completed training in internal medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess, Harvard Medical School and in oncology at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.

John Yee MD, MPH, currently serves as Senior Vice President, Medical Affairs, at Apnimed, Inc., a company developing oral drugs for the treatment of obstructive sleep apnea. He has more than 25 years of leadership experience at leading biotechnology, pharmaceutical, and health care technology companies, and at a major academic medical center. Dr. Yee has expertise in all aspects of drug development and commercialization, including clinical development, medical affairs, pharmacovigilance, regulatory affairs, and patient advocacy. He has provided medical leadership for more than 10 new product launches and label expansions. Dr. Yee has served in senior medical leadership roles at Genzyme Corporation, AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals, Intarcia Therapeutics, Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Flexion Therapeutics, and Sobi North America. Dr. Yee serves on the scientific advisory board for Comera Life Sciences, and previously served as a non-executive director on the board of directors. Dr. Yee earned an M.D. from Harvard Medical School, an M.P.H. in Health Care Management from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health, and an A.B. in History and Science from Harvard College. He completed his pediatric residency and fellowship training in rheumatology, immunology and health services research at Boston Children’s Hospital. Prior to joining the industry, Dr. Yee held leadership roles at Boston Children’s Hospital and served as a faculty member at Harvard Medical School.

Steven Zelenkofske DO currently is principal consultant for SLZ consulting LLC, board director for Dinaqor AG and Cadrenal Therapeutics and chief strategy officer for Dinaqor AG. Dr Zelenkofske brings more than 20 years of industry development experience, most recently as Chief Medical Officer of SwanBio therapeutics, a gene therapy company specializing in neurodegenerative diseases. Previously he served as Chief Medical Officer of Achillion Pharmaceuticals and Regado Biosciences. He has also held leadership positions at Astra-Zeneca, Sanofi-Aventis, Boston Scientific and Novartis. Dr Zelenkofske has been responsible for multiple NDA filings and has worked across multiple therapeutic areas including cardiovascular, metabolic diseases, diabetes, nephrology, hematology, immunology and neurology. Dr Zelenkofske completed his residency training at Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, followed by fellowships in cardiology and electrophysiology at The Graduate Hospital, Philadelphia, and St Luke’s Hospital, New York, respectively. He is a graduate of Emory University, where he also earned a Master of Science degree in immunopharmacology. He earned his Doctor of Osteopathy from Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine. He is a fellow of the American College of Cardiology, the American College of Chest Physicians, and the American College of Osteopathic Internists.