Biotech & Pharma

Jeff Galvin - Programming a HIV Functional Cure

Jeff Galvin is the CEO & Founder of American Gene Technologies (AGT), a clinical-stage biotech company with a proprietary gene-delivery platform for rapid development of cell and gene therapies to cure infectious diseases, cancers, and inherited disorders. He earned his BA degree in Economics from Harvard in 1981 and accumulated more than 30 years of business and entrepreneurial experience while founding and leading a variety of Silicon Valley startups. As a retired angel investor, Mr. Galvin funded and founded AGT after meeting with Dr. Roscoe Brady, a research scientist at NIH-NINDS who is best known for developing the first ever enzyme replacement therapy called Alglucerase that treats Gaucher disease and is marketed by Sanofi Genzyme. AGT’s lead candidate is a first-in-class, genetically modified T-cell therapy developed as a functional cure for HIV, which entered first-in-human Phase 1 clinical trials in November 2020 (AGT press release, Molecular Therapy paper).

Don Anderson & Caroline Vissers - Applying Hypoxia Biology

Dr. Don Anderson, PhD, MBA is Senior Scientist at Merck & Co., a multinational pharmaceutical company that develops and manufactures medicines in a broad range of therapeutic areas. Don previously worked at Peloton Therapeutics, which was acquired by Merck in May of 2019, primarily for its “novel small molecule therapeutic candidates targeting hypoxia-inducible factor-2α (HIF-2α) for the treatment of patients with cancer and other non-oncology diseases”.

Dr. Caroline Vissers, PhD is a Principal Investigator at UCSF, where she operates a lab that examines the role of RNA methylation in neural development and stem cell behavior.

Max Tejada - Biologics & Bioassays

Max Tejada, PhD is a Senior Director at Kite Pharma, an American biotech company and subsidiary of Gilead Sciences that develops cancer immunotherapies with a primary focus on genetically engineered adoptive T-cell therapies called CAR-T therapies. Dr. Tejada broke into the private sector by landing an industry postdoctoral fellowship at Genentech in the lab of Dr. Napoleone Ferrara, who is widely recognized for his role in developing the angiogenesis inhibitor Avastin (bevacizumab). He subsequently led teams that devised bioassays for development and high volume production of antibody-based drugs at Genentech, Gilead, and AstraZeneca as well as for cell therapies at Kite Pharma.

Evan Guggenheim - Emerging Cell & Gene Therapies

Evan Guggenheim, PhD is an Executive Director & Head of Research Operations at Sana Biotechnology, a startup dedicated to developing stem cell therapies and methods for in vivo delivery of gene therapy components to treat a variety of diseases. Prior to joining Sana, Evan worked as a Scientist at a sequencing company called Intelligent Bio-Systems (acquired by Qiagen in 2012) as well as at the large biotechnology company Biogen, where he rose through the ranks from the position of Scientist to ultimately become the Director of R&D Strategy and Portfolio Leadership.

Sam Hong - Running a Pharmaceutical Startup

Sam Hong, Ph.D is the Chief Operating Officer (COO) at Rapafusyn Pharmaceuticals, a pre-clinical stage startup developing macrocycle-based therapeutics for treatment of various disease indications.