Board of Directors
Elias Papatheodorou, Independent Chairman
Elias Papatheodorou has over 20 years of C-level experience in all aspects of pharmaceutical commercialization, including sales & marketing, business development, M&A, and operations. He has a proven track-record of managing clinical-stage organizations and preparing them for sale. He is currently the CEO of Genkyotex, which was sold to Calliditas Therapeutics, and was previously the CBO at Covagen, which was acquired by Janssen Pharmaceuticals.
Erik van den Berg, Board Member, CEO
Erik van den Berg is the CEO of Memo Therapeutics, bringing over 25 years of industry experience and a proven track record in leadership and company growth. He has orchestrated over 20 transactions and partnerships, notably a $600 million alliance with Pfizer, a $290 million partnership with Kyowa Kirin, and has secured $500 million in equity and debt financings for biotech firms from seed to IPO. Erik is the former CEO of AM-Pharma and holds chairmanships in Step Pharma and TargED Therapeutics. Erik holds a Master’s degree in chemistry and an MBA.
Dr. Hadrien Bouchez, Investor Representative
Dr. Hadrien Bouchez is a Partner at Kurma Partners who has participated in a dozen investments of the Kurma Biofund II and III funds. Hadrien has actively contributed to the creation of several portfolio companies such as Corlieve Therapeutics (sold to uniQure), Emergence Therapeutics (sold to Lilly) Imcheck Therapeutics, Flamingo Therapeutics as well as Ermium Therapeutics where he serves as Board member. Hadrien holds a PharmD from the Faculty of Pharmacy, Lille, and a Master in Entrepreneurship from the ESSEC Business School.
Dr. Philippe Dro, Investor Representative
Dr. Philippe Dro serves a Partner at Adjuvant Capital. He is trained in industrial pharmacy and finance. He has built a successful career in the European biotech and medtech sectors, serving on the boards of several startup and scaleups, initiating and executing notable strategic transactions. His experience includes CEO of GlycoVaxyn, leading it through to its acquisition by GSK. Before that, he led Endoart as CEO through a successful turnaround leading to its acquisition by Allergan.
Dr. Veronica Gambillara Fonck, Investor Representative
Veronica Gambillara Fonck serves as Partner at Pureos Bioventures. She has been a founder CEO of GlycoEra, a Zurich-based company with a glycoengineering platform for novel antibodies in autoimmune diseases, oncology and neurology. She was also a co-founder and the CEO of LimmaTech Biologics, a spin-off of GlycoVaxyn to service GSK. Before that, Veronica was in the executive team of GlycoVaxyn developing innovative vaccines for infectious diseases. She was instrumental in the acquisition of the company by GSK in 2015. Veronica is a bioengineer with a PhD in life science from the EPFL Lausanne.
Thomas Harth, Investor Representative
Thomas Harth serves as Principal at Ysios Capital and is responsible for executing and managing portfolio investments. He has been involved in several portfolio investment and is currently a board member at Tagworks pharmaceuticals. Prior to joining Ysios, Thomas was Senior Associate at Gimv focused on early-stage life sciences investments, where he was involved in the investments in Anjarium biosciences, Kinaset Therapeutics, Fire1, ONWARD (EBR:ONWD), Biotalys (EBR:BTLS), JenaValve, and Breath Therapeutics (sold to Zambon). He holds a master’s degree in Bioengineering and Applied Economics, both from the University of Ghent.
Dr. Robert Schier, Investor Representative
Robert Schier joined Swissanto Invest at Zürcher Kantonalbank in 2018 as Member of Senior Management, Investment Director PE/VC. He has many years' experience in the healthcare and life sciences sector with background in biotech and as investment director and/or partner in various venture capital firms, such as Inventages Venture Capital and Seventure Partners.Robert Schier holds a degree in pharmacy from the University of Vienna and a PhD in biotechnology from the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences, Vienna. He received the Keystone Award for Excellence in Research for his outstanding doctoral thesis, which he completed at the University of California, San Francisco. Dr Schier then completed an executive MBA programme at the European University Munich and is the author of several scientific publications and patents.
Dr. Christian Schneider, Investor Representative
Dr. Christian Schneider serves as Managing Partner at Vesalius Biocapital. He has extensive work and investment experience in the areas of diagnostics, medtech and therapeutics. Before transitioning to venture capital, he held various positions in R&D at Boehringer Mannheim and Centocor. Christian holds a PhD in immunology from the University of Munich and an MBA from Penn State University.
Scientific Advisory Board Members
Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. Stefan Kaufmann
Stefan Kaufmann is an immunologist and microbiologist with focus on infection biology. He received his PhD at the University of Mainz in 1977 and his habilitation in immunology and microbiology at the Free University Berlin in 1981.
Currently, he is director of the Department of Immunology at the Max Planck Institute for Infection Biology in Berlin, for which he served as founding director since 1993. Since 1998 he is also professor for immunology and microbiology at the Charité Berlin.
Prof. Dr. med. Bodo Plachter
Bodo Plachter is Professor of Medicine and Deputy Director of Virology at the University of Mainz.
Research topics include analysis of virus host interaction with particular emphasis on innate host defense mechanisms, intracellular transport of viral proteins and particle assembly, and development of subviral Dense Bodies as a vaccine candidate against HCMV infection.
Dr. med. Michael Hodges
Michael Hodges is an experienced and successful pharmaceutical industry veteran. He is currently supporting a number of biotechnology companies and VCs in the role of drug development consultant, scientific advisor and/or non-executive board director.
Michael Hodges was previously the CMO of Amplyx Pharmaceuticals, developing small molecule and monoclonal antibody drug treatments for life-threatening viral and fungal infections in immunocompromised patients. The company was acquired by Pfizer, Inc. Prior to Amplyx he was the CMO and head of drug development for Santaris A/S, developing RNA targeting drug treatments for chronic viral diseases, cancer, metabolic/lipid and eye diseases. The company was acquired by Hoffman-La Roche, AG.