WuXi Global Forum 2020

Dr. Hui Cai joined WuXi AppTec in 2009 as Vice President of Business Development, and is currently Vice President and Head of Content Division.
Prior to WuXi, Dr. Cai spent 10 years at Johnson & Johnson Pharmaceutical Research and Development leading multiple drug discovery programs in the therapeutic areas of inflammation and autoimmune diseases. She is a co-author and co-inventor to over 50 scientific publications and issued or pending patents. Dr. Cai is a Councilor of the American Chemical Society (ACS), a member of BayHelix, and a member of the UCSD Alumni Board. In her past capacity, she served as a Commissioner at the City of San Diego Science and Technology Commission, Chair of SABPA, and President of SDCA. Dr. Cai received her BS and MS in Chemistry from Peking University, PhD from The Scripps Research Institute, and MBA from UCSD Rady School of Management as a DLA Piper – Athena Scholar.

As a scientist, entrepreneur and visionary leader, Dr. Ge Li has dedicated his career to enabling customers and partners in the development and delivery of innovative healthcare solutions for patients.
Dr. Li founded WuXi AppTec in 2000. With a vision for a future in which “every drug can be made, and every disease can be treated,” he pioneered an integrated, open-access R&D platform model with diligent capability and capacity building to enable innovators of any size to discover, develop and commercialize new medicines and healthcare products.
Under Dr. Li’s direction, WuXi AppTec has become an active contributor to the global healthcare community, a trusted partner to its many customers and an enabler of innovation. The company today has more than 21,000 employees in China, Germany, Israel, Japan, Singapore, South Korea, the United Kingdom and the United States, to support over 3,700 partners in more than 30 countries in their discovery and development of small molecule drugs, cell and gene therapies, and medical devices.
Dr. Li extended the open-access platform to establish WuXi Biologics, providing the biopharmaceutical industry with the first open-access, single-source biologics technology enabling platform.
Dr. Li is the co-author and co-inventor of more than 100 scientific publications and issued or pending patents, and has received numerous awards and honors. He earned his bachelor’s degree in chemistry from Peking University in 1989 and his doctoral degree in organic chemistry from Columbia University in 1994.

Eric Elenko, PhD, is the Chief Innovation Officer at PureTech where he has led the development of a number of programs, including Akili Interactive Labs, Gelesis, Karuna Therapeutics and Sonde Health. Prior to joining PureTech, Dr. Elenko was a consultant with McKinsey and Company where he advised senior executives of both Fortune 500 and specialty pharmaceutical companies on a range of issues such as product licensing, mergers and acquisitions, research and development strategy and marketing. Dr. Elenko received his BA in Biology from Swarthmore College and his PhD in Biomedical Sciences from University of California, San Diego.

Dr. David Schenkein is a general partner at GV, where he co-leads the life science investment team. Previously, Dr. Schenkein spent ten years as chief executive officer and a member of the board of directors at Agios Pharmaceuticals, where he remains executive chairman.

Dr. Schenkein has been a hematologist and medical oncologist for 30 years. He currently serves as an adjunct attending physician in hematology at Tufts Medical Center. Prior to joining Agios, Dr. Schenkein was the senior vice president, clinical hematology/oncology at Genentech, where he was responsible for numerous successful oncology drug approvals and leading the medical and scientific strategies for their BioOncology portfolio. While at Genentech, he served as an adjunct clinical professor of medical oncology at Stanford University School of Medicine.

Prior to joining Genentech, he served as the senior vice president of clinical research at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, overseeing the clinical development and worldwide approval of Velcade, a first-in-class cancer therapy now approved to treat multiple myeloma and non-Hodgkins lymphoma. He serves on the board of directors of bluebird bio and Denali Therapeutics.

Dr. Schenkein holds a B.A. in chemistry from Wesleyan University and an M.D. from the State University of New York Upstate Medical School.

Antoine Papiernik is a Managing Partner at Sofinnova Partners, which he joined in 1997. Antoine has been an initial investor and active board member in public companies like Actelion, ProQR, Shockwave Medical, Novus Pharma (then sold to CTI), Movetis (then sold to Shire), Mainstay, Pixium Vision and Stentys, which went public respectively on the Zürich stock exchange, the NASDAQ, the Milan Nuovo Mercato, the Belgium Stock Exchange and the EuroNext Paris, in Cotherix (initially NASDAQ listed, then sold to Actelion), CoreValve (sold to Medtronic), Fovea (sold to Sanofi Aventis), Ethical Oncology Science (EOS, sold to Clovis Oncology) and Recor Medical (sold to Otsuka). He has also invested in and is a board member of private companies Reflexion Medical, Tissium, SafeHeal, Mnemo Therapeutics, Ablacare and Rgenix. Antoine has an MBA from the Wharton School of Business, University of Pennsylvania. In 2012 and 2011, Antoine was selected by Forbes for its “Midas List” of the world’s top venture capital investors. Antoine is one of the only Europeans on the list, and one of the few life science investors as well.

Kristiina Vuori, M.D., Ph.D., is President of Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute (La Jolla, CA). SBP is one of the largest non-profit research institutes in the U.S, with focus on cancer, neurodegeneration, inflammatory diseases, heart disease and rare children’s disorders. The Institute strives to accelerate the discovery of novel medicines by combining world-class biomedical research with drug discovery capabilities. SBP’s research portfolio today spans from basic biomedical research and early-stage drug discovery to four candidate therapeutics currently in clinical trials.

As a cancer researcher, Dr. Vuori is recognized for delineating molecular pathways that regulate cancer cell survival, metastasis and drug responsiveness. Dr. Vuori has published >100 research articles and received numerous research awards from NIH, NCI, DoD, Stand Up To Cancer Dream Team, and California Cancer Research Programs. Dr. Vuori was selected PEW Scholar in 1997 and elected to the National Academy of Inventors in 2014. She currently serves or has served on the governing boards for American Association for Cancer Research, California Institute for Regenerative Medicine, California Breast Cancer Research Program, and Sanford Consortium for Regenerative Medicine. She is on the corporate board of Bionano Genomics, Inc., and she was director of WebMD, Inc. until it was sold to KKR in 2017.

Dr. Vuori earned her M.D., Ph.D. degrees at University of Oulu, Finland, received postdoctoral training at SBP and was appointed to faculty in 1996. She served as Director of the Institute’s NCI-designated Cancer Center in 2005-2013, and she has been President of SBP since 2010.

Mr. Edward Hu is currently the Co-CEO at WuXi AppTec. With experiences in operations, financial management, capital markets, global business expansion, merger and acquisitions and venture investments, Mr. Hu has demonstrated his leadership in building and growing global businesses.

Since joined WuXi in 2007, Mr. Hu has served as the company’s Chief Operating Officer, and later Chief Financial Officer and Chief Investment Officer. Over the past decade, he has scored significant achievements in WuXi’s rapid development. Mr. Hu was elected to the Board of Directors in March 2016.

Prior to WuXi, Mr. Hu served as Senior Vice President and Chief Operating Officer at Tanox. His earlier career spanned at Biogen and Merck respectively. Mr. Hu has an MBA and Master’s degree in Chemistry from Carnegie Mellon University.

Dr. Fred Hausheer is a US-trained, board-certified medical oncologist with over 30 years of international experience in oncology drug development, pharmacology and in preclinical to IND/FIH clinical translational medicine. He has extensive experience in designing and managing multi-national Phase I-III clinical trials, in preparing and submitting commercial INDs/CTNs, in leading and managing multi-territorial regulatory interactions with the FDA, NMPA, EMA, Eastern Europe, and APAC. Fred’s career has focused on the integration of translational medicine, Phase I-III trial design, management and execution of commercial development strategies for international oncology Phase I-III development.

In his current role for WuXi Apptec, Dr. Hausheer provides extensive experience in translational science and medical knowledge of small molecule, targeted therapeutics and immuno-oncology development serves as a key advisor on numerous internal WuXi AppTec and external late-stage preclinical and clinical Phase I-III development programs. He has extensive due diligence, deal valuation, risk-management and structuring experience for potential acquisitions and investments. He is an inventor and co-inventor on more than 400 issued US and international patents.

Dr. Hausheer leads the new WuXi Oncology initiative which is positioned to be the first dedicated platform-to-platform translational and clinical Phase I-III oncology therapeutics development service operation. WuXi Oncology has the differentiated and focused aim to seamlessly integrate and firmly connect the preclinical science to the patients throughout clinical development efforts on a continuum for preclinical to IND and Phase I-III programs in China and the United States.

Howard A. “Skip” Burris III, MD, FASCO, FACP serves as president and chief medical officer of Sarah Cannon, as well as the executive director, drug development for the research institute. He is an associate of Tennessee Oncology, PLLC, where he practices medical oncology.

Dr. Burris’ clinical research career has focused on the development of new cancer agents with an emphasis on first in human therapies, having led the trials of many novel antibodies, small molecules, and chemotherapies now FDA approved, including ado-trastuzumab emtansine, everolimus, and gemcitabine. In 1997, he established in Nashville the first community based early phase drug development program, which grew into the Sarah Cannon Research Institute. He has authored over 400 publications and 700 abstracts. Sarah Cannon has now dosed over 350 first in human anticancer therapies and enrolls more than 3000 patients per year into clinical trials.

Dr. Burris was recently elected president of the American Society of Clinical Oncology (ASCO), a professional society representing over 40,000 cancer physicians and researchers globally. He also currently serves on the Board of ASCO’s Conquer Cancer Foundation. Additionally in 2014, Dr. Burris was selected by his peers as a Giant of Cancer Care for his achievements in drug development.

Karen is Co-Founder and Chairman of BioCentury Inc. and was Editor in Chief from October 1992 to August 2015.

She is a director at Ovid Therapeutics Inc., which is developing drugs for orphan diseases of the brain, and at Codiak Biosciences Inc., which is engineering exosomes to target new therapeutic spaces. Karen also serves on the board of trustees of the Keck Graduate Institute of the Applied Life Sciences and is a member of the board of advisors of KGI’s School of Pharmacy. She serves on the Board of Overseers of Scripps Research.

Karen holds a Ph.D. in Political Science from Stanford University and a B.A.in Politics and History from Brandeis University, where she served for many years as a member of the Brandeis University Science Advisory Council.

In 2005, the annual gathering of biotechnology chief executive officers at The Biotech Meeting in Laguna Niguel, Calif., inducted Karen into their Hall of Fame, citing her lifetime contribution to the biotech community. In 2007, Karen received a Special Recognition award at the American Liver Foundation’s Salute to Excellence, honoring individuals who have made an outstanding contribution to biotechnology and medical innovation. In 2013, she was named as one of the 100 Women of Influence in Silicon Valley by the Silicon Valley Business Journal. In 2015, Scientific American named Karen as one of The World VIEW 100 most influential people in biotech today. In 2016, she was named Commentator of the Year by the European Mediscience Awards.

Dr. Klausner is the founder and Chief Executive Officer of Lyell Immunopharma, Inc. He is also the Cofounder and Executive Chairman of Mindstrong, Cofounder of Lifemine Therapeutics and Director of Xtremity Prosthetics. He currently chairs Cancer Research UK’s Grand Challenge. He was the founder and Director of Juno Therapeutics and GRAIL, and the former Senior Vice President, Chief Medical Officer of Illumina Corporation. Previously, he has also served as the Executive Director for Global Health of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Appointed by Presidents Clinton and Bush as the Director of the U.S. National Cancer Institute between 1995 and 2001, he has served in senior advisory roles to several international governments. Well known for his work in cell and molecular biology, immunology and human genetics, he has authored more than 300 scientific articles and several books and is a member of the National Academy of Sciences, the Institute of Medicine and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Dr. Patrick Hwu is a tumor immunologist focused on vaccines, adoptive T-cell therapies, and immune resistance. His research and clinical efforts have led to insights and advances in understanding the interactions between tumors and the immune system, and the development of cellular therapies. He is the principal investigator on several NIH R01 translational immunotherapy grants, and other peer-reviewed grants.

Several novel, ongoing clinical trials have resulted based on his group’s work, including a trial of T-cells modified with chemokine receptor genes to enhance their migration to the tumor. His studies have focused on combinations of immune checkpoint blockade and T-cell therapy, and rational combinations of targeted therapies and immunotherapies, improving treatment outcomes.

Dr. Hwu earned his medical degree from the Medical College of Pennsylvania. Following his service in Internal Medicine at Johns Hopkins, he completed an oncology fellowship at the National Cancer Institute, where he continued for 10 years as a principal investigator leading tumor immunology studies.

He was recruited to MD Anderson as the first Chairman of Melanoma Medical Oncology in 2003. He has served as Associate Director of the Center for Cancer Immunology Research since 2004. He has been Chair of Sarcoma Medical Oncology since June 2012. In 2015, he became Head of the Division of Cancer Medicine.

In recognition of his contributions to cancer research, Dr. Hwu has held endowed positions since joining the institution. He currently holds the Sheikh Mohammed Bin Zayed Al-Nahyan Distinguished University Chair at MD Anderson Cancer Center.

John D. Carroll is a biotech analyst and writer with decades of prize-winning experience in journalism. A co-founder of Endpoints News, he has covered biopharma for the past 17 years. Aside from his daily industry coverage for FierceBiotech, where he was named editor in 2003, leaving in 2016, Carroll has been a regular speaker at biotech events around the globe. He’s been quoted by The New York Times, The New Yorker, Financial Times, The Times of London and more. He’s also keynoted at biotech gatherings around the world and addressed student audiences at MIT and Harvard. Carroll has contributed stories from Central America and Ireland to the Dallas Morning News and Time and wrote for the Houston Press. He spent 6 years as editor and publisher of the Dallas Business Journal, was publisher of Texas Business and early in his career was part of a Pulitzer Prize-winning team of reporters and editors at the Kansas City Star & Times.

James M. Wilson, MD, PhD, is a Professor in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania where he has led an effort to develop the field of gene therapy. His research career spanning over 40 years has focused on rare diseases and ways to treat them by gene therapy. The Wilson lab identified a new type of vector based on novel isolates of adeno-associated viruses which have become best in class for gene therapy being used by over 29 companies. More recently Dr. Wilson’s laboratory has focused on improved vectors for gene therapy and clinical applications of genome editing and mRNA therapy.

Dr. Tadataka (Tachi) Yamada is a Venture Partner with Frazier Healthcare Partners. As a member of the Frazier Life Sciences team he focuses on creating companies as well as providing strategic guidance to existing portfolio companies. He chairs the board of Phathom Pharmaceuticals and serves as a Director of Agilent Technologies and number of private life science companies. Prior to joining Frazier Dr. Yamada was Executive Vice-President, Chief Medical & Scientific Officer and a Board Member of Takeda Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Yamada has also served as President of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation Global Health Program. He was formerly Chairman, Research and Development and a Member of the Board of Directors of GlaxoSmithKline and before that he was Chair of the Department of Internal Medicine and Physician-in-Chief at the University of Michigan Medical Center.

Dr. Yamada holds a bachelor’s degree in history from Stanford University and obtained his M.D. from New York University School of Medicine. In recognition of his contributions to medicine and science he has been elected to membership in the National Academy of Medicine (US), the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Academy of Medical Sciences (UK) and the National Academy of Medicine (Mexico). He has been conferred an honorary appointment as Knight Commander of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (KBE), the Honorary Citizen Award from the Government of Singapore and the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Stars from the Japanese Government. Dr. Yamada has served on the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

Dr. Chris Chen is currently Chief Executive Officer at WuXi Biologics, a Hong Kong listed company with market cap surpassing $10 billion. At WuXi Biologics, he has built a world-class open-access integrated biologics discovery, development and manufacturing platform enabling full spectrum of companies ranging from 2-employee virtual companies to Top 20 global large pharmaceutical companies. WuXi Biologics has transformed the global biotech industry by enabling entrepreneurs to build successful biotech companies with no need of investing in infrastructure for people, labs or manufacturing. Under his leadership, WuXi Biologics has assembled one of the largest biologics teams with over 4000 employees enabling 60 IND programs and 3 BLA programs per year. WuXi Biologics has also pioneered disposable-bioreactor based state-of-the-art commercial manufacturing facility and built the first 30,000L bioreactor capacity in the world using disposables. The leading globally platform providing end-to-end solutions for biologics developed by WuXi Biologics is now serving more than 200 companies in China, US, Europe, Japan, South Korea, and Singapore. As the first Chinese company producing biologics for clinical trials in the US and Europe, WuXi Biologics is also the first biologics company in China to pass both the U.S. FDA and EMA inspection, and have cGMP biologics manufacturing facility in China approved by the U.S. FDA for commercial biologics products.

David R. Liu is Director of the Merkin Institute and Vice-Chair of the Faculty at the Broad Institute; Professor of Chemistry and Chemical Biology at Harvard University; and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. Liu graduated first in his class at Harvard in 1994. He performed research on sterol biosynthesis under Professor E. J. Corey’s guidance as an undergraduate. During his Ph.D. research with Professor Peter Schultz at U. C. Berkeley, Liu initiated the first general effort to expand the genetic code in living cells. He earned his Ph.D. in 1999 and became Assistant Professor at Harvard in the same year. Liu was promoted to Full Professor and became a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator in 2005. Liu has published >180 papers and is the inventor of >70 issued U.S. patents. His research and teaching accomplishments have earned distinctions including the Ronald Breslow Award for Biomimetic Chemistry, the American Chemical Society Pure Chemistry Award, the Arthur Cope Young Scholar Award, and awards from the Sloan Foundation, Beckman Foundation, NSF CAREER Program, and Searle Scholars Program. In 2016 he was named one of the Top 20 Translational Researchers in the world by Nature Biotechnology, and in 2017 was named to the Nature’s 10 researchers in world. Professor Liu’s research integrates chemistry and evolution to illuminate biology and enable next-generation therapeutics. Prime editing, base editing, PACE, and DNA-templated synthesis are four examples of technologies pioneered in his laboratory. He is the scientific founder or co-founder of seven biotechnology and therapeutics companies, including Editas Medicine, Pairwise Plants, Exo Therapeutics, Beam Therapeutics, and Prime Medicine.

Dr. Steve Yang is Executive Vice President and Chief Business Officer of WuXi AppTec. He is also WuXi AppTec’s Head of Research Service Division and Head of Lab Testing Division. His responsibilities include management of multiple business units and commercial operation. WuXi AppTec provides a broad portfolio of R&D and manufacturing services that enable companies in the pharmaceutical, biotech and medical device industries worldwide to advance discoveries and deliver groundbreaking treatments to patients.

Dr. Yang is a pharmaceutical industry leader recognized for building R&D and service capabilities, delivering research and early development portfolios of drug candidates, and establishing R&D partnerships in US, Europe, China and other Asian and emerging markets. Before joining WuXi AppTec, Dr. Yang was Vice President and Head of Asia and Emerging Markets iMed at AstraZeneca, based in Shanghai. Previously, Dr. Yang served as Vice President and Head of Asia R&D at Pfizer based in Shanghai, and as Executive Director and head of Pfizer’s global R&D strategic management group based in the United States.

Dr. Yang received his PhD in Pharmaceutical Chemistry from the University of California, San Francisco. He started his undergraduate study in Fudan University, China and completed his BS Summa Cum Laude from Michigan Technological University. He co-founded the BayHelix Group, a non-profit global professional organization of Chinese life science business leaders, and served as the chairman of the board for two terms.

Paul-Peter Tak is President, Chief Executive Officer and Board Member of Kintai Therapeutics and Venture Partner at Flagship Pioneering.

He received his medical degree cum laude from the Free University in Amsterdam and was trained as an internist, rheumatologist and immunologist at Leiden University Medical Center, where he also received his PhD. He has worked as a scientist at UCSD and served as Professor of Medicine and founding Chair of the Department of Clinical Immunology and Rheumatology at the Academic Medical Centre/University of Amsterdam (AMC) for 12 years. He has published extensively in peer-reviewed journals and has been awarded numerous awards and named lectures. He has been elected Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences (UK).

At Glaxo SmithKline he served as Senior Vice President, Chief Immunology Officer, and Global Development Leader. He oversaw the creation of a large portfolio of drug candidates for immune-mediated inflammatory diseases and pain. Later, he also led the Oncology and Infectious Disease Therapy Area Units. He is the founder of GSK’s Immunology Network, a collaboration between GSK and leading academics, which provides the latter with privileged access to the latest research and facilities GSK has to offer. He has been a board member of Galvani Bioelectronics and ViiV Healthcare.

In addition to his work in academia and big pharma, he has been CEO of Tempero Pharmaceuticals (Cambridge, MA), is one of the founders and board directors of Sitryx Therapeutics (Oxford) and serves on the board of directors of Levicept (London) and Omega Therapeutics (Cambridge MA).

Steve Paul, M.D. is President, CEO and Chairman of Karuna Therapeutics, a biotechnology company developing medicines for schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s disease and pain. Dr. Paul is also a co-founder and former President and CEO of Voyager Therapeutics, as well as a member of its board of directors. Dr. Paul is also a co-founder and board member of Sage Therapeutics. Dr. Paul is also a venture partner at Third Rock Ventures. Dr. Paul was the Founding Director of the Appel Alzheimer’s Disease Research Institute at Weill Cornell Medical College, as well as professor of neuroscience, psychiatry and pharmacology. He is currently a professor of neurology and psychiatry at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. Dr. Paul spent 17 years at Eli Lilly and Company, during which time he served in several key leadership roles, including Executive Vice President of Science and Technology and President of the Lilly Research Laboratories. As President of the Lilly Research Laboratories, he was responsible for the company’s overall R&D strategy, expanding its efforts in neuroscience, diabetes, oncology, inflammation and biotechnology. Prior to Lilly, Dr. Paul served as a Laboratory/Branch Chief and the Scientific Director of the National Institute of Mental Health. He has also served as Medical Director in the Commissioned Corps of the United States Public Health Service. Dr. Paul has authored or co-authored more than 550 papers and book chapters. He is an elected fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and a member of the National Academy of Medicine. Dr. Paul currently serves on the board of Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and is the chairman of the board of the Foundation for the National Institutes of Health.

Samantha Du is the founder and CEO of Zai Lab (Nasdaq: ZLAB), an innovative biopharma based in China and US with a focus on bringing transformative medicines in cancer, autoimmune and infectious diseases to patients. She is also a Founding Managing Director of a life sciences venture firm Quan Capital.

In 2001, Dr. Du founded Hutchison MediPharma and remained its CEO till 2012. She is also the co-founder and CSO of Chi-Med (Nasdaq: HCM) till 2012.

Prior to her entrepreneurial roles, she spent her R&D career at Pfizer, Groton after receiving a Ph.D. in Biochemistry study. Where she involved with multiple products’ development, of which two were blockbusters. In her last role at Pfizer, she was responsible for global metabolic drug licensing on the scientific side.

In between her entrepreneurial roles, she spent two years at Sequoia Capital leading its life sciences investments and led four landmark deals in China, Betta Pharma, BCG, JHL and Angel Hospital.

Dr. Du serves and chairs numerous government and regulatory committees and received many awards and recognitions including 2015 FierceBiotech’s Top 12 Women in Biopharma, 2017 BayHelix Lifetime Achievement Award, China Central Government highest honor for Innovator of the Year Award in 2016 and is also the recipient of Shanghai Magnolia Gold Award, an award for honorary citizens.

Dr. Du was featured by many magazines and newspapers around the world as the pioneer of China biotech including WSJ, Bloomberg, Forbes and Nature Reviews.

Osvaldo (Lalo) Flores is the Chief Executive Officer of Century Therapeutics. He was previously the Vice President of R&D and Entrepreneur-in-Residence with Janssen (Johnson & Johnson). He assumed those roles after completing the acquisition and integration of Novira Therapeutics, where he was a co-founder, the President and Chief Scientific Officer. Prior to Novira, Lalo was a department head at Merck & Co., where he led drug discovery and development programs across diverse therapeutic areas including antiviral, oncology and metabolic. He started his R&D career at Tularik Inc., establishing key elements of the antiviral drug discovery platform. Lalo received his PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology from Rutgers University and was a postdoctoral Fellow at the Salk Institute.

As Global Head of Johnson & Johnson Innovation – JLABS (JLABS), Melinda Richter fosters the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies external R&D engine and supports the innovation community by creating capital-efficient commercialization models that give early stage companies a big company advantage. By providing infrastructure, services, educational programs and networks in global hotspots, JLABS is the best place to start a healthcare company, with a specific emphasis on consumer and health tech, medical device and pharmaceuticals. Prior to JLABS, Melinda was Founder and CEO of Prescience International and held posts across the globe with Nortel Networks. She holds a Bachelor of Commerce from the University of Saskatchewan in Canada and an MBA from INSEAD in France.

Melinda is Chair of the California Life Sciences Association (CLSA), and a board member of BIO’s Technology Transfer Committee, the Texas Health Catalyst Advisory Panel (The Dell Medical School and the Provost office of the University of Texas at Austin), the University of Toronto & Janssen Neuroscience Catalyst, A*STAR ETPL’s Strategic Advisory Panel.

Hans Bishop is the Chief Executive Officer of GRAIL. Hans has more than 30 years of experience in the biotechnology industry. Hans co-founded Juno Therapeutics in 2013 and served as its President and Chief Executive Officer until the company was acquired by Celgene in March of 2018. Prior to this, he served as an Executive in Residence at Warburg Pincus. Earlier in his career, Hans was the Executive Vice President and Chief Operating Officer for Dendreon, Inc. He also previously served as President of Specialty Medicine at Bayer Healthcare, Senior Vice President of Global Commercial Operations at Chiron Corporation, and Vice President and General Manager of European Biopharmaceuticals. He currently serves as the Executive Chair of the Sana Board of Directors and as a Director of Celgene, Agilent Technologies, and Lyell Immunopharma. Hans holds a BA in chemistry from Brunel University in London.

Kenneth Kaitin is the Director of the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development and a Professor of Medicine and of Public Health at Tufts University School of Medicine. He is also an Advisory Professor at Shanghai Medical College at Fudan University, and he serves on the faculty of the European Center for Pharmaceutical Medicine at the University of Basel. Dr. Kaitin is an internationally recognized expert in drug development science and policy. He writes, speaks, and teaches on global trends in pharmaceutical development and regulation, and he has provided public testimony before the U.S. Congress. A former President of the Drug Information Association, Dr. Kaitin is currently Editor-in-Chief of Expert Review of Clinical Pharmacology, and he is a consultant to the U.S. Department of Defense on bioterror countermeasures. In 2011, he received the Dr. Louis M. Sherwood Award, granted by the Academy of Pharmaceutical Physicians and Investigators. Dr. Kaitin serves on several public and private life science company boards of directors. He received his BS from Cornell University and MS and PhD in pharmacology from the University of Rochester.

Dr. Jason Coloma is the CEO of Maze Therapeutics. Prior to his appointment to CEO, he was Maze’s interim chief operating officer and a venture partner at Third Rock Ventures, where he was instrumental in the founding and launch of the company. As a venture partner at Third Rock, Jason focused on new company creation, and held interim chief business officer roles at portfolio companies insitro and Celsius Therapeutics.

Prior to Third Rock, Jason was senior vice president and chief business officer at Corvus Pharmaceuticals. Previously, he held a number of roles at Roche, including vice president & global therapeutic area head of oncology and cancer immunotherapy partnering. Before joining Roche, Jason was a consultant in the life sciences practice at L.E.K. Consulting. He also worked in finance at Amgen and in research at the University of California, San Francisco and Cytokinetics.

Jason holds a Ph.D. and M.P.H. at the University of California, Berkeley, an MBA from the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth and a B.S. in biology from the University of San Francisco.

Zavain is driven by smart software, leveraging data and machine intelligence to scale, augment, and balance human intelligence. He invests in companies that are using machine learning and AI to augment or replace physical-world functions including biology, language, manufacturing and analysis.

Zavain has led Lux’s investments in Primer, a machine intelligence startup; Clarifai, which democratizes cutting edge deep neural networks; Auransa, which is developing novel medicines based on computational insight applied to genomic data; Recursion which uses automation and deep learning to develop drugs for rare diseases; Tempo Automation, which applies software and automation to electronics manufacturing; Rigetti Computing, which is fabricating some of the fastest quantum chips in the world; Visla, which is bringing AI to medical diagnostics; Visor, which aims to simplify tax preparation; Computable Labs, which is building a decentralized data marketplace; Blockstack, which builds architectures to decentralize current winner-take-all centralized web components; and Runway, which is putting machine learning tools into the hands of creators.

Zavain holds a BS in symbolic systems and an MS in computer science from Stanford where he was a researcher in Stanford’s AI Lab. He is currently a Lecturer at Stanford and has taught quarter long seminars in Cryptocurrencies, Artificial Intelligence and Philosophy, and Venture Capital.

Carolyn is the CEO of Aetion, a technology company delivering the real-world analytics and evidence needed to inform health care’s most critical decisions: which treatments work best, for whom, and when.

Carolyn brings decades of experience in executive positions with top payer, population health and digital health companies. Over a period of 8 years at UnitedHealth Group (UHG), Carolyn served in multiple executive roles, including the national Vice President for Medicare Special Needs for individuals with chronic illnesses and for Dual Eligibles. She was also the COO of New Jersey’s Medicaid and Medicare plan, covering over 400,000 lives. Subsequently, Carolyn served as EVP of Payer Strategy and Operations at Evolent Health. In this role, Carolyn led the team operationalizing value based payer contracts and health plans on behalf of health system clients. Most recently before joining Aetion, Carolyn served as CEO of Remedy Partners, a bundled payment company serving payers and providers.

Carolyn earned her BA at Harvard University and MBA in Health Care Management from Wharton. She is on the Board of Directors of Parity.org, which advocates for gender parity in the c-suite and board rooms, and of the Center for Health Policy Development, which oversees the National Academy for State Health Policy. Carolyn has been recognized by Goldman Sachs, MM&M, and Crain’s New York for her leadership in health care.

John D. Halamka, MD, MS, president of the Mayo Clinic Platform, leads a portfolio of new digital platform businesses focused on transforming health by leveraging artificial intelligence, the internet of things, and an ecosystem of partners for Mayo Clinic.

Previously, Dr. Halamka was executive director of the Health Technology Exploration Center for Beth Israel Lahey Health in Massachusetts. Previously, he was chief information officer at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center for more than 20 years. He is chairman of New England Healthcare Exchange Network Inc. and a practicing emergency medicine physician. He also was the International Healthcare Innovation Professor at Harvard Medical School.

As the leader for innovation at the $7 billion Beth Israel Lahey Health, he oversaw digital health relationships with industry, academia and government worldwide. As a Harvard Medical School professor, he served the George W. Bush administration, the Obama administration and governments around the world planning their health care information (IT) strategies. In his role at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, Dr. Halamka was responsible for all clinical, financial, administrative and academic IT.

Dr. Halamka has written a dozen books about technology-related issues, hundreds of articles, and thousands of posts on the Geekdoctor blog.

Dr. Halamka completed his undergraduate studies at Stanford University, where he received a degree in medical microbiology and a degree in public policy with a focus on technology issues. He received his medical degree at the University of California, San Francisco, and simultaneously pursued graduate work in bioengineering at the University of California, Berkeley, focusing on technology issues in medicine. He completed his residency at Harbor — UCLA Medical Center in the Department of Emergency Medicine.

He runs Unity Farm in Sherborn, Massachusetts, and is the caretaker for 250 animals, 30 acres of agricultural production, and a cidery and winery.

Leon Wang is Executive Vice President, International and China President at AstraZeneca. He is responsible for the overall strategy for the region and for driving sustainable growth across our activities in China, Asia Area, Australia, New Zealand, as well as Latin America, Brazil, Russia, Eurasia, the Middle East and Africa.

Leon joined AstraZeneca China in March 2013 as Vice President for GI, Respiratory, Anaesthesia and Anti-infection (GRA), and was promoted to President of AstraZeneca China in 2014. Under Leon’s leadership, China has become AstraZeneca’s second-largest market worldwide, and AstraZeneca has become one of the fastest-growing multinational pharmaceutical companies in China. In January 2017, Leon was promoted to Executive Vice President, Asia Pacific Region at AstraZeneca, with responsibility for the strategy and sustainable growth of businesses in China, Asia Area, Australia and New Zealand. In May 2017, Leon further expanded his role to cover the whole international region as Executive Vice President till now.

Leon holds an EMBA from China Europe International Business School, and a Bachelor of Arts from Shanghai International Studies University.

Since his appointment as Chief Executive of the BioIndustry Association in 2012, Steve has led major BIA campaigns for, amongst other things, improved access to finance, the refilling of the Biomedical Catalyst, anti-microbial resistance and the opportunity the sector presents to generalist long term investors. Steve champions the adaptive pathway approach to the licensing of new drugs, the need for Early Access and is particularly proud of the working relationship the BIA has established with the UK’s leading medical research charities.

A founder member of United Life Sciences, a strategic partnership representing over 1000 life science and healthcare member companies across the UK and internationally, Steve attends the UK’s Ministerial Industry Strategy Group, and sits on The Royal Society’s Science, Industry and Translation Committee.

Beyond the UK Steve is a member of EuropaBio’s Board and its National Association Council and is a founder member of the International Confederation of Biotech Associations. An expert and regular commentator on the sector in the media and at industry-leading conferences Steve has worked both in biotech (as Senior Director at Genzyme UK and Ireland) and at the highest levels of UK government (as Special Advisor to John Reid, MP, during his time in Tony Blair’s government) for over 15 years. Steve was awarded the OBE in January 2017.