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Commercialization Advisory Board
Commercialization Advisory Board BiographiesKeith Kerman, MD, ChairmanManaging Director, Primus Venture Partners Dr. Kerman joined Primus Venture Partners in 2003 and has over 12 years of private equity and operating company experience. Prior to joining Primus, Dr. Kerman was a general partner with Morgenthaler Ventures for six years and a partner with Marquette Venture Partners for two years. He has been active in both early and later stage healthcare, medical technology and life science companies. Dr. Kerman was previously an operating executive at U.S. Healthcare, where he was president of that company's subsidiary providing outsourced services to self-funded health plans. Prior to joining U.S. Healthcare, Dr. Kerman was a Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Clinical Scholar at the University of Pennsylvania, where he served on the clinical faculty at the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania and was a Senior Fellow at the Leonard Davis Institute for Health Economics at The Wharton School. Dr. Kerman has an M.D. from Brown University and an MBA from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Kerman focuses on the firm's medical technology, healthcare services and life sciences investment activities. Dr. Kerman is responsible for the firm's investment in excelleRx, Inc. and serves on the Board of Directors of AxioMed, Inc. and Cardio-Optics, Inc. Mike Bunker Mike joined Early Stage Partners as Managing Director in 2008 to lead investments in the life science sector. Mike serves on the board of Juventas Therapeutics, an exciting regenerative medicine company focused on heart failure and also Cardiox, a diagnostic company aiming at stroke prevention. Prior to joining ESP, Mike held roles in sales management and corporate acquisitions for C.R. Bard (NYSE: BCR). As Director of Corporate Development, he created the process to evaluate medical technology investments for Bard's 6 decentralized divisions and successfully executed 14 acquisitions, licenses, and divestitures. Later, Mike managed a field sales force and negotiated multiple contracts with hospitals. Mike joined Medtronic (NYSE: MDT) in 1998 where he first led a $750 global product launch in cardiac rhythm management and served on product development, strategy and clinical committees. Mike then served in Medtronic's corporate development group where he closed over 10 minority investments and acquisitions in support of corporate strategy initiatives across the neurostimulation, cardiac rhythm management, orthopedic and vascular business units. Mike also served in sales and marketing management roles earlier in his career for Apogee Enterprises and Rand McNally. Mike is a graduate of Miami University in Ohio (B.S., 1989) and the Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University (M.B.A., 1998). Bob Easton For over 25 years, Bob Easton, Chairman of Scisive Consulting LLP, has been recognized as a leader in healthcare business consulting. He has built and led two top firms, beginning with the founding of The Wilkerson Group in 1985. He has led scores of market development and strategic advisory assignments for clients, including large and specialty pharmaceutical companies, early-stage through publicly traded biopharmaceutical companies, and diagnostics businesses. He has influenced the decision-making of numerous healthcare professionals and supported hundreds of client executives in Australia, Japan, Canada, U.S., Europe, and Israel. His interest in healthcare began when he managed a medical diagnostics business for Union Carbide. Mr. Easton has been highly visible in the industry, having written and spoken about multiple industry issues in scores of venues. He is a recently elected Director of the New York Biotechnology Association (NYBA). He has served on eight medical company Boards including Apex Bioventures, CollaGenex, and Cepheid. He also serves as Chairman of Gilda's Club of New York City, which provides social and emotional support to people living with cancer. Mr. Easton holds two degrees in Chemical Engineering from Rice University and an MBA from the Harvard Business School. Rich Ferrari Mr. Ferrari was the co-founder and CEO of CardioThoracic Systems, a company he led to an initial public offering in 1996. CTSI was ultimately acquired by Guidant Corporation in November 1999. In addition, he founded Saratoga Ventures, a venture capital partnership that has provided seed financing to startup medical technology companies. At Saratoga, Mr. Ferrari was Chairman of Oratec, which was sold in 2001 to Smith & Nephew PLC. Prior to that, Mr. Ferrari was the CEO of a publicly traded medical technology company, Cardiovascular Imaging Systems. CVIS was acquired by Boston Scientific Corporation in 1995. Mr. Ferrari also co-founded The Medical Technology Group, which spun out Integrated Vascular Systems, a company which was sold to Abbott. From 1986 to 1990, Mr. Ferrari held the positions of Executive Vice President and General Manager of ADAC Laboratories. Rich is the recipient of the Mallinckrodt Award for Excellence in Medicine and twice a finalist for the Entrepreneur of the Year Award. He holds a BS degree from Ashland University and an MBA from the University of South Florida. Peter Fitzgerald,
MD, PhD Dr. Fitzgerald is co-director of the Center for Research in Cardiovascular Interventions and Director of the Cardiovascular Core Analysis Laboratory (CCAL) at Stanford University. Dr. Fitzgerald, with Dr. Paul Yock, has pioneered the efforts in catheter-based ultrasound for the past 12 years. Presently, Dr. Fitzgerald supervises 14 post doctoral research fellows and has served as the Principal Investigator for over 30 clinical trials involving intravascular ultrasound. Dr. Fitzgerald has joint appointments in the Stanford schools of Medicine and Engineering. His research is focused on signal and image processing of intravascular ultrasound for plaque characterization and advanced engineering developments in signal processing and catheter device development. Dr. Fitzgerald has advised dozens of medical device startups and multinational healthcare companies in the design and development of new devices, diagnostics and therapies in cardiology, orthopedics, and other areas. Peter holds an MD and PhD from Dartmouth, an RA from Stanford, an MS from Rensselaer and a BS from Santa Clara. Patrick Fortune,
PhD Dr. Fortune has over 30 years of experience in the healthcare, life sciences and information technology sectors. He was previously President and Chief Operating Officer of New Era of Networks; Vice President at Monsanto; Vice President, at Bristol Myers Squibb;, Group President at Baxter International; and VP R&D at Baxter International. Dr. Fortune currently serves on the boards of directors of Parexel International Corp, Combinatorx, Inc. and Epix Pharmaceuticals as well as several private life sciences companies. He has been responsible for nurturing start-up activities from idea to prototype to standalone business. He has also been involved in some 30 M&A transactions from sourcing the company to closing the deal and successfully integrating the result. Pat has served on the engineering and scientific advisory boards of The University of Wisconsin, the University of Illinois, and the University of Chicago. Pat holds a B.A. from the University of Wisconsin, an MBA from Northwestern University, and a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Wisconsin. Jan Garfinkle Jan Garfinkle specializes in medical technology investments, utilizing her educational background in biomedical engineering, extensive operating experience, and industry connections to select and nurture outstanding companies. Her investing activities primarily focus on FDA 510(k) and PMA medical device and diagnostics companies. Jan currently serves on the Board of Directors for HandyLab, VasoNova, and Mirabilis Medica and as an observer on Uptake Medical and BAROnova. Prior to founding Arboretum in 2002, Jan spent 20 years in senior management positions in entrepreneurial healthcare companies. Jan was Founder and President of Strategic Marketing Consultants, a consulting firm focused on the commercialization of healthcare technologies for start-ups and large medical device manufacturers. Earlier in her career, Jan worked for two successful medical device start-up companies, Advanced Cardiovascular Systems (ACS) and Devices for Vascular Intervention (DVI). Each of these companies was acquired by Eli Lily for more than $100 million and became the foundation for Guidant Corporation, which Eli Lily later spun out in 1994. She joined each company early in its development and held key management roles in marketing, clinical research and sales. She began her career as a manufacturing engineer and production line manager for Proctor and Gamble. Jan earned a BS in Bioengineering from the University of California at Berkeley and an MBA from the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania. Jeff Gold Jeff Gold is a Venture Partner of Longitude Capital. He focuses on investments in medical devices. Prior to Longitude, Mr. Gold was Chief Executive Officer of CryoVascular Systems, a medical device company developing treatments for peripheral vascular disease, from 2001 to 2005. CryoVascular was acquired by Boston Scientific Corporation in 2005. Between 1997 and 2000, Mr. Gold was COO and Executive Vice President of CardioThoracic Systems, a medical device company focused on developing products to enable off-pump open-heart surgery. CTSI completed an IPO in 1996 and was subsequently acquired by Guidant Corporation. Prior to CTSI, Mr. Gold spent 18 years with Cordis Corporation, the primary cardiovascular device subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson. He currently serves on the Boards of Access Closure, AngioDynamics, Niagara Gorge Medical Devices, Velomedix and Voyage Medical. He also is a member of the Executive Committee of the Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation at the University of Florida. Mr. Gold holds an MBA from the University of Florida and a BS in Engineering from Northeastern University, and is a graduate of GE's Manufacturing Management Program. Reggie Groves Reggie Groves joined Medtronic in June 2002 as the Vice President and General Manager, Patient Management. After successfully launching the new business, Reggie was asked to lead the Cardiac Rhythm Disease Management - Quality and Regulatory functions. Currently, she serves as the Vice President and General Manager of AF Solutions where she provides overall leadership and direction for AF Solutions which is focused on finding solutions to treat atrial fibrillation. Before coming to Medtronic, Reggie was the Global Managing Partner, Enterprise Services for Scient, Inc. an internet consulting group. Prior to Scient, Reggie was the CFO for Kaiser Permanente-SE Division, CFO for Egleston Children’s Hospital and SEM at McKinsey & Company. Reggie received her Master of Business Administration from Harvard Graduate School of Business. She has a Bachelor of Science in Pharmacy from the University of Florida. She is a registered Pharmacist in Florida and Tennessee. She currently sits on the board of MedMined, Inc. and the Health Advisory Group for the Medtronic Foundation. Reggie was honored with the “Women Changemaker” award by the Business Journal in 2003 and was awarded the “Wallin Award” for her leadership contributions in 2006. Steven Gullans,
PhD Dr. Gullans has been a founder to several early-stage businesses, including RxGen, where he served as CEO. Prior to running RxGen, Dr. Gullans served for two years as the Chief Scientific Officer at U.S. Genomics in Boston following an 18 year career as an academic research scientist at Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital. As a faculty member in the Departments of Neurology and Medicine, Dr. Gullans published more than 100 original scientific papers, and built a record of achievement in the field of functional genomics and advanced technologies. As Director of the BWH Biotechnology Center, he established the first large-scale public database of gene expression in human tissues. Dr. Gullans received his doctorate in physiology from Duke University and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Yale University in 1985. He has served as an Established Investigator of the American Heart Association, an Associate Editor of the American Journal of Physiology and Physiological Genomics and is a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Dr. Gullans currently serves on the Scientific Advisory Boards of U.S. Genomics, GenPat77, GeneOhm, Biomodels LLC, and GeneXP. He has also been an advisor to the venture capital community for many years, most notably working with CB Health Ventures. Kris Johnson Prior to joining Affinity Capital, Kris was most recently Senior Vice President and Chief Administrative Officer of Medtronic, Inc. During her seventeen years at Medtronic she was also President and General Manager of Medtronic's Vascular Business and its Tachyarrhythmia Management Business. Prior to Medtronic, she spent nine years in various executive positions at Cargill, Inc. Kris received her BA from St. Olaf College. She serves on the boards of directors of several portfolio companies as well as other for-profit and non-profit organizations. John Liddicoat, MD Dr. Liddicoat joined Medtronic in 2006 and is currently the Vice President and General Manager, Structural Heart Disease, Medtronic CardioVascular. Dr. Liddicoat is a cardiothoracic surgeon who was most recently in practice at the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston where he also held an appointment as Assistant Professor of Surgery at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Liddicoat earned an MBA from Boston University, a doctor of medicine from the University of Chicago, and a bachelor's degree from the University of Michigan. He completed his surgical training in general and cardiothoracic surgery at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. Prior to joining Medtronic, Dr. Liddicoat founded two medical device companies, and served as a consultant to several venture capital firms and medical device companies. Bob More Mr. More joined Frazier Healthcare Ventures in 2008 as a General Partner and is a member of the firm's biopharma and medical device investment teams. Prior to Frazier Healthcare, Mr. More was a Partner with Domain Associates, having joined the firm in 1996 as a Kauffman Fellow and becoming a Partner in 2000. From 1997-1998, Mr. More served as the Chief Operating Officer of Small Molecule Therapeutics, a Domain portfolio company subsequently purchased by Morphochem AG. And from 1992 to 1995, Mr. More was with Pharmacia Biotech in sales. Prior to joining Pharmacia, Mr. More held a research position at Somatogen, a company developing a recombinant blood substitute that was subsequently bought by Baxter. While attending business school, Mr. More worked with MedVest, an early-stage venture group in Washington, D.C. Mr. More managed successful investments in and served on the boards of ESP Pharma (acquired by Protein Design Labs, Inc.), Proxima Therapeutics (acquired by Cytyc Corporation), Onux Medical (acquired by C.R. Bard), NovaCardia (acquired by Merck), Esprit Pharma (acquired by Allergan) and IntraLase (acquired by Advanced Medical Optics, Inc.). Mr. More serves as an advisory board member for Montagu Newhall Associates, Okapi Ventures, The Medical Industry Group of the NVCA and The Sulpizio Family Cardiovascular Center. He is also a past founding board member of the Kauffman Fellows Program. Mr. More received his MBA from the Darden School of Business Administration at the University of Virginia and a BA from Middlebury College. Howard Palefsky Mr. Palefsky has 35 years of experience as an entrepreneur, manager and investor in the medical device and pharmaceutical industries. Mr. Palefsky has been a General Partner/Managing Member of Montreux since 2002 and was a Venture Partner of Montreux from 1999 to 2002. Immediately prior to joining Montreux as a General Partner, Mr. Palefsky was the Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of a Montreux portfolio company, NeurogesX. Mr. Palefsky was the Chairman, President, Chief Executive Officer, and/or Director of Collagen, a tissue engineering device company, from 1978 to 1997. Collagen and its affiliated companies made a number of venture capital investments during Mr. Palefsky's tenure. In addition to his responsibilities as CEO, Mr. Palefsky was directly responsible for these investments and, in each case, served as Collagen's representative on the board of directors. Mr. Palefsky currently serves as Chairman of the board of directors of Windy Hill and sits on the board of directors of two other Montreux portfolio companies Pulmonx and NovoStent. He is also actively involved in Montreux’s investment decisions in Asthmatx. Mr. Palefsky received his MBA from the Stanford University Graduate School of Business and his BS from the City College of the City University of New York. Matt Pollman, MD Matthew Pollman, consultant, has held a number of leadership positions in the development of cardiovascular therapeutics and diagnostics. He has most recently served as Medical Director, R&D, for Abbott Vascular. In this role, Dr. Pollman was the principal medical and scientific advisor for the R&D and Business Development organizations. Prior to this role, Dr. Pollman was the Director of New Ventures, Guidant Corporation where he led a multi-disciplinary in-house start-up incubator tasked with identifying, exploring and incubating through PhI/PhII clinical trials, novel therapeutic opportunities utilizing emerging device or combination product technologies. Dr. Pollman has also directed therapeutic/diagnostic target discovery and development efforts as Director of Cardiovascular Biology and Molecular Medicine for Millennium Pharmaceuticals. Dr. Pollman is a cardiologist and cardiovascular molecular biologist and has authored numerous peer-reviewed journal articles. He has served on the faculties of Harvard Medical School and Morehouse School of Medicine. John Rice,
PhD John is founder and Managing Partner of Triathlon Medical Ventures in Cincinnati and brings 13 years of venture investing and 13 years of research and R&D management experience in biotechnology, devices, and diagnostics. John was a Managing Director of Senmed Medical Ventures from 1989 until 2003 and served as a member of the investment committee. He also led the emerging medical technology investment efforts. He represented Senmed on the board or as board observer to several Senmed portfolio companies, including Allergenics, Athersys, Merix BioScience, Transplant Therapeutics, and Optosonics and currently represents Triathlon on the board of Kereos and is an observer to the board of Endocyte. Prior to joining Senmed Medical Ventures, John spent 13 years with Battelle Memorial Institute serving in various research, research management, and business development capacities at Battelle Memorial Institute most recently overseeing Battelle's international biotechnology activities. John was among the early organizers of Bio/Start, Cincinnati's biomedical business incubator and currently serves on its Board of Trustees. He is also a trustee of Omeris, Ohio's life science economic development organization. John also holds an adjunct appointment in the department of Molecular Virology, Immunology and Medical Genetics in the School of Medicine and Public Health at Ohio State University. He has authored numerous scientific publications and holds four patents in the fields of virology and immunology. John earned a BS in Microbiology as well as MS and PhD degrees in Microbiology and Virology from The Ohio State University. Immanuel Thangaraj Managing Director Immanuel Thangaraj has 15 years of experience in operations and venture capital. Mr. Thangaraj began his venture career at ARCH Venture Partners, a leading venture capital firm with over $1 billion under management, which makes early stage technology and healthcare investments. In his initial tenure at AVP, he managed one of its portfolio companies, a medical information company, until its sale to a large hospital supplies company. Mr. Thangaraj joined Essex Woodlands in 1997. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of CBR Systems, Acura Pharmaceuticals (formerly Halsey Pharmaceuticals), Clear Vascular, Proteus, Medlogics, and Sound ID. He is also responsible for Essex Woodland’s investments in Accumetrics and Novacept. Mr. Thangaraj holds a Bachelor of Arts and a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Chicago. Dennis Wahr, MD Dennis W. Wahr, MD, is the co-founder, President, and CEO of Lutonix. He has over 25 years of experience in medical device development, management, and operations, as well as in clinical practice as a board certified interventional cardiologist. Lutonix represents Wahr's second entrepreneurial effort having also been the co-founder, President, and CEO of Velocimed LLC. At Velocimed Wahr led the invention, development, clinical evaluation, and commercialization of three innovative, minimally invasive cardiovascular and neurovascular devices. He led Velocimed through four financing events which funded the development of new products and the sponsorship of clinical trials in the United States and internationally. Ultimately the businesses of Velocimed were acquired by St. Jude Medical in April 2005. Following the sale of Velocimed, Wahr spent approximately 2 years working with RiverVest Ventures where he served as a Managing Director. He actively led several investments on behalf of RiverVest and served on the board of several portfolio companies. Before founding Velocimed, Wahr spent approximately 15 years as a practicing interventional cardiologist. During his time in practice he served as the Director of Interventional Cardiology and Chief of Cardiology at St. Joseph Mercy Hospital (Ann Arbor, MI). During his years in clinical practice he was actively involved in clinical research projects as both a principal investigator and as a member of the medical advisory boards of Scimed, Percusurge Inc., Pharmacyclics Inc., and Boston Scientific among others. He has published research in many peer-reviewed scientific journals. Wahr also has extensive experience with the FDA and CMS having made multiple presentations to these agencies related not only to his products, but also on behalf of other companies and the National Venture Capital Association where he was a member of their Medical Industry Group. Wahr currently serves on the board of directors of Lutonix and Accumetrics. Recent past board membership includes Velocimed and IDev Inc. among others. Wahr performed his fellowship in cardiovascular medicine at the University of California, San Francisco, and his residency in internal medicine at the University of Michigan. Wahr received his MD from Wayne State University School of Medicine. Lee Wrubel, MD Dr. Wrubel has ten years of experience in venture capital and has been associated with a large number of private companies, including such now publicly traded companies as Pozen Pharmaceuticals, OraPharma, and GenVec. Prior to starting Foundation Medical Partners, Dr. Wrubel was an investment professional with Canaan Partners and more recently Highland Capital Partners, where he specialized in biotechnology and medical device investments. Dr. Wrubel serves on the board of directors of EndoGastric Solutions, Inc., CardioMEMS, Inc., IlluminOss and Circulite, Inc. Dr. Wrubel began his business career as a consultant at The Wilkerson Group, a health care-focused management consulting company. Dr. Wrubel completed a pediatric internship at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York. He holds an A.B. from Lafayette College, an M.D. and Masters in Public Health from Tufts University, and an M.B.A. from Columbia University. Dr. Wrubel serves on the Translational Research Advisory Committee of the Muscular Dystrophy Association, and is a member of the Health Leadership Council of Save the Children. |
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