Dr. Jorge Garcia Fortanet is the Vice President of Drug Discovery at DEM BioPharma and joined the Company in November 2022. He brings 15 years of industry experience spanning big pharma and biotech. Prior to joining DEM BioPharma, he was Head of Chemistry at New Equilibrium, focusing on oncology therapeutics targeting intrinsically disordered proteins.

Previously, Dr. Garcia Fortanet served as Senior Director of Medicinal Chemistry at Casma Therapeutics, leading autophagy activation efforts across neuromuscular, metabolic, and infectious diseases. As an early employee, he played a key role in building Casma to ~70 employees and contributed beyond medicinal chemistry, overseeing compound management, lab operations, and co-leading the Target ID and Hit-to-Lead group.

Prior to Casma, he worked at GSK/Tempero Pharmaceuticals, leading immuno-inflammation projects across global sites. At Novartis, he contributed to oncology and immuno-oncology programs across target types, including kinases, epigenetic regulators, and phosphatases. He was instrumental in developing the first SHP2 clinical candidate (TNO155).

Dr. Garcia Fortanet conducted postdoctoral research at MIT after earning his International Ph.D. from Universitat Jaume I in Spain. His graduate research included work at the University of Cambridge (UK) and UT Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas (US). He holds over 15 patents, has authored 29 research publications, and is a member of the American Chemical Society and the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry.

Dr. Ingmar Bruns brings more than 20 years of experience in hematology and oncology as a physician and scientist. Most recently, Ingmar served as the Head of the Hematologic Malignancies Franchise at Pfizer. Prior to that he was the Chief Medical Officer of Trillium Therapeutics until the acquisition of Trillium by Pfizer. Before that he was at Pieris Pharmaceuticals, a clinical stage biotechnology company, where he built and led the clinical development organization across therapeutic areas including oncology, hematology and respiratory medicine. From 2013 through 2017, Dr. Bruns led clinical development of several high priority oncology assets at Bayer Pharmaceuticals. Before his industry tenure, Dr. Bruns served as an attending hematologist and oncologist as well as a physician-scientist at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York and the University Hospital of Dusseldorf in Germany. Dr. Bruns has authored over 50 publications in the field of hematology and oncology, including several lead authorships in high impact journals such as Nature Medicine, Blood and Leukemia. He received his M.D. and Ph.D. from the University of Lubeck in Germany.

Dr. Thommes has more than 30 years of experience in biomanufacturing in academia, industry, and the not-for-profit sector. He is a principal consultant and manager at JT Consulting, a CMC consultancy specializing in Drug Substance and Drug Product process & analytical development, manufacturing, and supply of traditional and advanced biologics, ranging from monoclonal antibodies to cell therapy products. In previous positions he served as the Senior Vice President Engineering & Technology at Biogen, Head of CMC at the Bill & Melinda Gates Medical Research Institute, and Executive Vice President Pharmaceutical Sciences and Operations at Repertoire Immune Medicines. Core competencies are in Chemistry, Manufacturing and Controls (CMC) for antibodies, recombinant proteins, vaccines, and advanced biologics (including cell therapy). Deep expertise in Drug Substance and Drug Product process and analytical development, formulation and stability, clinical and commercial manufacturing including CMO selection and oversight, scale-up, and writing of CMC sections of regulatory filings. Additional experience in manufacturing facility design and project execution ranging from small single use manufacturing facilities to very large commercial scale factories. Extended experience in pharmaceutical development and program leadership. Dr. Thommes holds a doctorate of natural sciences from University of Bonn, Germany and an advanced research and teaching degree (Habilitation) in Industrial Biochemistry from University of Dusseldorf, Germany.

Jan is a member of the Board of Directors at Zentalis Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq:ZNTL), and Monte Rosa Therapeutics (Nasdaq:GLUE). Previously, he was the CEO of Trillium Therapeutics (Nasdaq:TRIL), a clinical stage immuno-oncology company, where he led a highly successful, 360-degree turn-around that produced a leading CD47 drug candidate, while taking the company from a $16M valuation to a $2.3B buy-out by Pfizer in two years.

Prior to that, Jan was the CEO of Tal Medical, a private, clinical stage neuroscience company; a partner in the life sciences practice at Bain & Company, Boston; and a manager at Price Waterhouse Corporate Finance in London, UK and Vienna, Austria. He holds a PhD in economics from the University of Economics in Slovakia, and an MBA from Harvard Business School.

Dr. Westphal is co-founder and General Partner of Longwood Fund and has spent over 20 years as a biotech CEO, entrepreneur, and investor. Dr. Westphal has been the co-founder, CEO, and lead investor of seven biotechnology companies that have completed initial public offerings (IPOs) and created sustained market value of over $45 billion and have developed and received FDA approval for over 10 important drugs. These include: Momenta Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: MNTA, acquired by J&J in 2020), Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: ALNY), Acceleron Pharma, Inc. (NASDAQ: XLRN, acquired by Merck in 2021), Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: SIRT, acquired by GSK in 2008), Verastem (NASDAQ: VSTM), and TScan Therapeutics (NASDAQ: TCRX).

Dr. Westphal was also co-founder of Alnara Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Eli Lilly in 2010); co-founder/CEO of DEM Bio Pharma; co-founder/CEO of Immunitas Therapeutics; co-founder/Chair of Solu Therapeutics; co-founder of Tome Biosciences; co-founder of Pyxis Oncology (NASDAQ: PYXS); and co-founder of Concert Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: CNCE, acquired by Sun Pharma in 2023).

Companies founded by Dr. Westphal have created thousands of jobs in the Boston area.

Dr. Westphal and Longwood partners have founded over 20 biotech companies, received FDA approval for over 20 important drugs, including the first RNAi therapy; for currently incurable cancers; the largest-selling heparin in the United States; a therapy for MS; for Beta Thalassemia and Myelodysplastic Syndrome; and several experimental medicines: for cystic fibrosis (phase 3); for serious inflammatory disorders (phase 2), and created sustained market caps of over $100 billion.

Dr. Westphal earned his M.D. from Harvard Medical School and Ph.D. in genetics from Harvard University; and he graduated with a B.A. summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia University. Dr. Westphal has served or currently serves as a member or director of: the Boston Commercial Club, the Biotechnology Industry Organization’s (BIO) Emerging Companies Section Governing Board, the Board of Fellows of Harvard Medical School, and the Board of Trustees of the Boston Symphony Orchestra; he is also a member of the ownership group of the Boston Celtics. Dr. Westphal has been the lead or senior author on several patent applications and scientific papers in journals such as Cell, Nature, and Nature Genetics. Dr. Westphal has been featured on 60 Minutes with Morley Safer, CNN’s Vital Signs with Dr. Sanjay Gupta, an ABC News Special hosted by Barbara Walters, and as the subject of Fortune, New York Times, and Wall Street Journal cover articles. Dr. Westphal has generally avoided media interviews since 2010.

Mr. Janney is the Managing Partner of Alta Partners. Mr. Janney joined Alta Partners at its founding in 1996. He has nearly 25 years of successful early-stage investing experience in life sciences. Mr. Janney's focus on working with talented entrepreneurs to create companies around novel insights in biology and new approaches to drug discovery has led to the funding and development of 35 companies. Prior to Alta, Mr. Janney was a senior investment banker at Montgomery Securities.

Mr. Janney is currently on the board of directors of several public and private companies, including Allakos (NASDAQ: ALLK), Be Biopharma, Curasen Therapeutics, ImmuneID, Krystal Biotech (NASDAQ: KYRS), Lassen Therapeutics, Novome Biotechnologies, and Prolacta Bioscience. In addition, he led Alta's investments in Astex Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Supergen), Cellective (acquired by Medimmune), ChemGenex (ASX: CXS acquired by Cephalon), CoTherix (NASDAQ: CTRX acquired by Actellion), Definity Health (acquired by United Health), Dynavax (NASDAQ: DVAX), Endonetics (acquired by Medtronic), Esperion Therapeutics (NASDAQ: ESPR), Ilex Oncology (NASDAQ: ILXO acquired by Millennium Pharmaceuticals), InterMune (NASDAQ: ITMN acquired by Roche), LJL Biosystems (NASDAQ: LJLB acquired by Molecular Devices), Mako Surgical (NASDAQ: MAKO acquired by Stryker) and Triangle Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: VIRS acquired by Gilead).

Mr. Janney is a member of The President's Council of the J. David Gladstone Institutes and the chair of the Board of Directors of the California Academy of Sciences. He also serves on the Board of Regents of Georgetown University. He holds a BA from Georgetown University and a MBA from the Anderson School at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Dr. Morris is a Managing Director at Insight. He joined the firm in 2021 to focus on investments in computational biology. Dr. Morris was previously a general partner at CRV, where he built the bioengineering practice, leading the firm's investments in Dyno Therapeutics, Recursion Pharmaceuticals, and Plexium, among others. Prior to CRV, Dr. Morris invested at Innovation Endeavors, Eric Schmidt's early stage venture capital firm, where he drove investments in companies operating at the intersection of data science and life science.

Before becoming an investor, Dr. Morris cofounded Integrated Plasmonics, a venture-backed point-of-care diagnostics startup. Prior to that, he conducted graduate research in biochemistry and molecular biophysics at Caltech, where he co-authored multiple peer-reviewed publications. Dr. Morris received his AB in Computer Science from Harvard University.

Dr. Peakman is a Partner at Pfizer Ventures and an Executive Director in Emerging Science & Innovation at Pfizer. In her current role she has responsibility for investing in early-stage biotech companies and supporting them in advancing emerging science to deliver new medicines to patients. Dr. Peakman holds a B.Pharm.Hons. degree in Pharmacy and a PhD in Physiology & Pharmacology from the University of Nottingham U.K. She conducted postdoctoral work at Yale University in the department of Molecular Biophysics & Biochemistry and the department of Molecular Psychiatry. Dr. Peakman has been at Pfizer for 24 years holding various leadership positions supporting small molecule lead discovery.

As part of her former responsibilities, Dr. Peakman founded and led the Primary Pharmacology Group for 13 years during which time they were responsible for the identification of nirmatrelvir (Paxlovid), abrocitinib (Cibinqo), danuglipron, ervogastat, clesacostat, ritlecitinib and additional small molecule therapeutics that are currently in the clinic. She was recognized as a PhRMA ‘We Work For Health’ Champion in 2018 and was a 2019 finalist for the CT Women of Innovation Award. She is a member of The Royal Pharmaceutical Society, Chair of the Board of Directors for United Way of Southeastern CT, on the Board of Trustees for Lawrence and Memorial Hospital and Treasurer on the Board of Directors for the Thames River Innovation Place. She is also currently the Executive Sponsor for the Pfizer Women’s Resource Group in CT.

Mr. Konagai joined AVM in 2020. Before joining AVM, he worked at the Strategic department at Astellas Pharma Inc. based in Tokyo HQ since 2015. He has led various internal projects and evaluation of external later stage opportunities across multiple therapeutic areas and modalities including Oncology, Ophthalmology and regenerative medicine. In parallel, he served as a member who develops corporate global R&D strategy and business strategy for regenerative medicine using his scientific and business intelligence. From 2004 to 2015, he was engaged in Oncology research programs including kinase inhibitors, Immuno-Oncology and biologics from target discovery to clinical stage as a pharmacology research scientist in Drug Discovery Research Center at Astellas Pharma Inc. Mr. Konagai has received his Master of Life Science degree in the field of Integrated Life Science from Kyoto University and Master of Business Administration, Entrepreneurship and Innovation from University of Massachusetts Lowell.

Nenad Grmusa is the Chief Executive Officer of DEM BioPharma and joined the Company in September 2022. Prior to joining DEM Bio, Mr. Grmusa led the R&D Strategy and External Innovation group at Takeda. In this role, he oversaw all external research and development activities including strategic venture investments, academic alliances, R&D collaborations, and spinouts. He was also responsible for R&D Finance and Portfolio Strategy, innovative R&D business and venture investment models, and divestiture strategies for non-core assets.

Previously, Mr. Grmusa served as Head, Center for External Innovation and R&D Portfolio & Investment Strategy at Takeda, where he supported the Head of R&D in managing Takeda’s diverse pipeline from early discovery to commercial life cycle management. Mr. Grmusa has 20 years of experience in R&D finance, financial planning and analysis, and pharmaceutical portfolio management.

Prior to joining Takeda, Mr. Grmusa spent 10 years with Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. in various financial planning and analytical roles with increasing responsibilities. While at Millennium, Mr. Grmusa directly engaged with R&D leaders and the Millennium management team on pipeline investment management and strategic corporate planning. Prior to Millennium, he spent 3 years in consulting with Boston Biomedical Consultants.

Mr. Grmusa holds an MA in International Economics and Finance from Brandeis University and a BS in Finance from West Virginia University.

Dr. Weissman is a Professor of Biology at MIT, an investigator at the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Landon T. Clay Professor of Biology at the Whitehead Institute, and a member of the National Academy of Sciences. His research is focused on how cells ensure that proteins fold into their correct shape, as well as the role of protein misfolding in disease and normal physiology and building innovative tools for broadly exploring organizational principles of biological systems. These include ribosome profiling, which globally monitors protein translation, CRIPSRi/a for controlling the expression of human genes and rewiring the epigenome and lineage tracing tools, to record the history of cells.

Dr. Weissman has received several distinctions for his work including the Ira Herskowitz Award from the Genetic Society of America, the National Academy of Sciences Award for Scientific Discovery and the Raymond and Beverly Sackler International Prize in Biophysics. He received his PhD from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Dr. Bassik is an Associate Professor in the Department of Genetics at Stanford University. His laboratory at Stanford focuses on development of CRISPR/Cas9 based systems for high-throughput screening by mutagenesis, single and pairwise gene perturbation, and application of these technologies to two major areas: (1) understanding mechanisms of cancer growth and drug resistance in order to find new therapeutic targets, and (2) mechanisms by which macrophages and other cells take up diverse materials by endocytosis and phagocytosis; these substrates range from bacteria, viruses, and cancer cells to drugs and protein toxins.

Dr. Weiskopf, M.D., Ph.D. is a Valhalla Fellow at Whitehead Institute for Biomedical Research in Cambridge, MA. He is a pioneer of macrophage-directed therapies and leads a research laboratory that studies novel macrophage and myeloid immune checkpoints for the treatment of cancer. As a physician-scientist, Dr. Weiskopf also maintains a clinical appointment at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute as a Hematology and Oncology fellow.

Dr. Weiskopf earned his medical and graduate degrees at Stanford University. As a member of Dr. Irving Weissman's laboratory, he characterized the CD47/SIRPa interaction as an immune checkpoint that regulates macrophages in cancer. He engineered therapies that stimulate macrophages to attack tumors and showed these could be effective for many types of cancer. Dr. Weiskopf is an inventor on over 15 issued U.S. patents pertaining to macrophage-directed therapies. He co-founded ALX Oncology, a biotech company that is investigating macrophage-directed therapies in multiple Phase 1 and 2 trials for cancer, and serves on the company's scientific advisory board. Other technology that Dr. Weiskopf invented has been licensed to Forty Seven, Inc. (acquired by Gilead).

Dr. Weiskopf completed his medical training in the Internal Medicine Residency Program at Brigham and Women's Hospital and is board certified in Internal Medicine. He has previously been awarded a Winston Churchill Scholarship, the Harold M. Weintraub Graduate Student Award, first place in the Collegiate Inventors Competition, and the AACR-AstraZeneca Career Development Award for Physician-Scientists, in Honor of José Baselga. Dr. Weiskopf previously earned a B.A. from Amherst College and an M.Phil. in genetics from University of Cambridge.

Dr. Kamber is a postdoctoral fellow in Michael Bassik’s laboratory in the Department of Genetics at Stanford University. He is the recipient of an NIH/NCI K99/R00 Pathway to Independence Award and a postdoctoral fellowship from the Jane Coffin Childs Memorial Fund for Medical Research. He conducted his PhD work as an NSF Graduate Research Fellow in the laboratory of Vladimir Denic at Harvard, investigating the regulation of damaged organelle elimination by autophagy, and received a BS with Honors in Biology from Stanford University.

As a postdoc, he developed a CRISPR screening platform that uncovered several novel inter-cellular signaling axes that impede cancer cell clearance by macrophages. He has additionally co-developed methods for the unbiased prediction of uncharacterized gene functions. His work has been published in several peer-reviewed journals including Nature, Nature Genetics, eLife, and Molecular Cell.

Dr. Yang did his PhD with Drs. Monte Winslow and Julien Sage at Stanford, where he studied the epigenetic and genetic mechanisms of cancer metastasis. His PhD work was awarded the Denise A. Chan Outstanding Thesis Award in 2017.

Dr. Yang is currently a Damon Runyon Postdoctoral Fellow in Dr. Jonathan Weissman's lab. His work on developing innovative approaches has brought new insights into tumor evolution and tumor-immune cell interaction. He has won several awards, including a Damon Runyon Jake Wetchler Award, and more recently, a Dale F. Frey Award for Breakthrough Scientists.

Dr. Wucherpfennig is Professor and Chair of the Department of Cancer Immunology and Virology at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical School. His research focuses on the discovery of genes that control the activity of cytotoxic T cells in the tumor microenvironment drawing insights for the development of next-generation cancer immunotherapies.

He has received a number of honors and awards, including his election as a Fellow in the American Society for the Advancement of Science, his election as a member of the Henry Kunkel Society at Rockefeller University, and his election as a member of the American Society for Clinical Investigation. Dr. Wucherpfennig serves as an advisor to a number of immuno-oncology companies and venture funds.

Dr. Wittrup is the Carbon P. Dubbs Professor of Chemical Engineering and Biological Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the Associate Director of the Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research. From 1989-1999 he was Assistant Professor, Associate Professor, and then J. W. Westwater Professor of Chemical Engineering, Bioengineering, and Biophysics at the University of Illinois in Champaign/Urbana. Prof. Wittrup received a B.S. in Chemical Engineering Summa cum Laude in 1984 from the University of New Mexico, and a Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the California Institute of Technology in 1988 under the thesis direction of Prof. James Bailey.

Following a year of postdoctoral research at Amgen (Thousand Oaks, CA), Dr. Wittrup joined the faculty at the University of Illinois. Wittrup’s research program is focused on protein engineering of biopharmaceutical proteins by directed evolution. Areas of interest include: pre-targeted radio-immunotherapy; biological response modification of EGFR; and immunotherapy of cancer via engineered cytokines and vaccines. Dr. Wittrup has received the following awards and honors recognizing his scholarship: the A. McLaren White Award, for First Prize in the National American Institute of Chemical Engineers Student Design Contest (1984); the Presidential Young Investigator Award of the National Science Foundation (1990-1995); the Allan P. Colburn Award of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers, for excellence in publications for an individual under the age of 35 (1998); the University of New Mexico College of Engineering Distinguished Young Alumnus Award (2000); the Dow Chemical Company Teaching Award(1989); the UIUC School of Chemical Sciences Award for Excellence in Teaching (1993); the UIUC College of Engineering Anderson Award for Undergraduate Advising (1991, 1994); the J.R. Mares Professorship (1999-2007); the C.P. Dubbs Professorship (2007-); induction as a Fellow of the American Institute of Medical and Biological Engineers (1999); induction as Fellow, American Association for the Advancement of Science (2011); and Member, National Academy of Engineering (2012).

In 2007, Prof. Wittrup co-founded Adimab, Inc. and serves as CSO. In 2009, he co-founded Eleven Biotherapeutics, and serves on the Scientific Advisory Board. He also serves as an advisor to many additional biotech companies.

Dr. John Lambert, Ph.D., is one of the leading experts in the field of antibody-drug conjugate ADC) discovery and development. He joined ImmunoGen's research programs to develop ADCs as anti-cancer therapeutics in 1982 and served as its Chief Scientific Officer from 2008 until 2015, and was subsequently Distinguished Research Fellow at ImmunoGen until retirement in 2018. During John’s tenure in leadership roles, ImmunoGen invented the ADC technology that resulted in Kadcyla® (Genentech/Roche) and Elahere® (ImmunoGen/AbbVie), for treatment of HER2+ breast cancer and folate receptor alpha-positive platinum-resistant ovarian cancer, respectively, and the Company also discovered the anti-CD38 antibody that became the Sanofi drug Sarclisa®. Dr Lambert has a PH.D. from the University of Cambridge, UK, and is the author/co-author of over 125 peer-reviewed scientific publications. He is a fellow of the American Institute for Medical and Biological Engineering (AIMB) and an Honorary Professor of Queen’s University, Belfast, Northern Ireland, UK.

Dr. Young currently serves as an Advisor to Google Ventures, Board Director and Scientific Advisory Board Member of several biotech companies. Prior to her current roles, Dr. Young held the title of SVP of the Small Molecule Drug Discovery division at Genentech. Under her leadership, more than 25 clinical candidates in the areas of oncology, immunology, neurology and anti-infectives, progressed into clinical development.

Dr. Young led the BTK program and is co-inventor of fenebrutinib which is currently in Phase 3 trials for multiple sclerosis. Prior to joining Genentech, she held medicinal chemistry leadership roles at both Celera Genomics and Johnson & Johnson. Dr. Young is named as an inventor or author on more than 70 published patents and manuscripts. In 2018 she was inducted as an ACS Fellow for her lifelong service to chemistry, society and medicine, in 2019 she was highlighted as “One of the Top 20 Women in Biopharma” by Endpoints News and in 2020 she was awarded the prestigious Earle B. Barnes Award for Leadership for outstanding achievements in Chemical Research Management.

Dr. Young received a Ph.D. in chemistry from Princeton University and was an American Cancer Society Postdoctoral Fellow at Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center.

Dr. Uger has spent 20+ years developing novel agents targeting the immune system. He began his industry career in cancer vaccine research with Aventis Pasteur, and then joined start-up Trillium Therapeutics as Director, Research & Development, later serving as Vice President, Research & Development, and then Chief Scientific Officer until the company was acquired by Pfizer in 2021 for $2.2B. At Trillium, Dr. Uger was responsible for the company's scientific strategy and guided several compounds from concept to clinic. His expertise spans both innate and adaptive immunology, and he has overseen programs in the fields of immuno-oncology, autoimmunity and transplantation. He received his PhD in immunology from the University of Toronto..