Hanne Callewaert has 20+ years of expertise in the life science industry exhibiting a unique capability to merge strategy and operational execution. Global industry experience in large pharmaceutical industry and smaller biotech environment. Co-founder and CEO of AstriVax, being responsible for incubation, start-up and scale-up, financing (VC and non-dilutive), operational and strategic set- up. Strong experience in development of commercial, late or early stage vaccines, monoclonal antibodies, peptides and small molecules. Proven track record to build and lead diverse teams. Innovative mindset, demonstrated ability to think beyond commonly accepted boundaries, understanding well different personalities, able to perform complex tasks and capable to distil the essence from the noise.

Ying Kai Chan, PhD is Co-Founder and CEO of Cirrus Therapeutics, whose mission is to tame the ocular immune system to treat chronic blinding diseases. He is passionate about translating cutting edge scientific discoveries to transformative therapies for patients. Previously, he served as CSO of Ally Therapeutics, a VC-backed startup.

Dr. Chan is a translational scientist and immunologist by training. He performed his postdoctoral research under the tutelage of Dr. George Church at Harvard Medical School (HMS) and the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering, where he became Principal Investigator and led projects on various genetic medicine technologies. Kai earned a BA summa cum laude in Neuroscience from Washington University in St. Louis, an MS in Biological Sciences from Stanford University, a PhD in Microbiology and Immunobiology and a Certificate in Human Biology and Translational Medicine from HMS.

Kai holds multiple patents on platform technologies and therapeutic approaches. He serves as an appointed member of the Immune Responses to Gene & Cell Therapy Committee of ASGCT. He was a recipient of the inaugural STAT Wunderkind award in 2017 and was named a Blavatnik Fellow in Life Science Entrepreneurship at Harvard Business School in 2021.

Dr. Tinashe Chandauka is Co-Founder and CEO of Nandi Life Sciences which is a rare disease, oncology and auto-immune biotechnology company. Nandi is currently developing two assets: an asset targeting adaptive resistance to anti-angiogenic drugs in solid tumors and another targeting an autoimmune endocrine disorder. He is an Entrepreneur-in-Residence at Texas Medical Center Innovation’s Accelerating Cancer Therapeutics (ACT), an initiative funded by the Texas government’s US$6B Cancer Prevention & Research Institute of Texas.

Prior to this, he was the Director of Early Pipeline Development at NASDAQ listed Tarsus Pharmaceuticals. Before this, he was at Oxford Science Enterprises (OSE) where he participated in over $350M of early-stage venture capital investments, supported the growth and financing 55 early stage companies and supported the $160M Series B fundraise and preparations for the NASDAQ IPO of Vaccitech, inventor of the Oxford COVID-19 vaccine as a founding member of the OSE portfolio management team.

He holds a PhD from Oxford University where he was a Rhodes Scholar and a medical degree from the University of Cape Town, with distinction and honours. He holds medical practice licences in the United Kingdom and South Africa. He is a member of the board of directors of AMREF, a global Africa focused healthcare charity.

Aaron Edwards is the CEO and co-founder of KiraGen Bio, a pioneering startup leveraging ML-driven multiplex gene editing to develop CAR-T cells resistant to the immunosuppressive solid tumor microenvironment. Under Aaron’s leadership, KiraGen is working towards offering new hope to patients with aggressive solid tumors worldwide.

Aaron is a soon-to-be graduate with a dual MS/MBA in Biotechnology from Harvard Business School and Harvard Medical School. He also holds an MS in Medical Sciences from Boston University School of Medicine and a BS in Biology from Centre College. During his 4 year tenure at Beam Therapeutics, Aaron served as the in vitro biology lead for BEAM-201, the company’s now-clinical multiplex base edited CAR-T program for pediatric T-ALL. His time at both Beam Therapeutics and bluebird bio before that, coupled with internships at 1910 Genetics, Eli Lilly, Rejuvenate Bio, and BioMarin have deeply enriched his expertise in biotech innovation and business development.

A committed advocate for inclusivity and diversity in the biotech sector, Aaron’s influence extends beyond KiraGen. Outside of work and school, Aaron actively engages with the ‘bioTwitter’ community and is busy raising his goldendoodle puppy named Finn.

Floris Engelhardt is Co-Founder and CEO of Kano Therapeutics, a biotech startup based in Cambridge, MA. She holds a PhD in Physics from the Technical University of Munich, with a focus on DNA nanotechnology. Most recently, she was a postdoctoral researcher in Mark Bathe’s BatheBioNano Lab at MIT.  Floris was awarded with a founder stipend from Activate Global as part of Cohort 2, Pillar VCs Founder to watch in Biotech Award 2021, The Wave Summit 21 Emerging Woman Founders Award, and MIT’s 2020 Innovative Woman in Entrepreneurship Award.

Dr. Manuel Marina Breysse is a cardiologist, CEO and co-founder of Idoven, a health technology company advancing early detection and precision medicine for cardiovascular diseases. Manuel and his co-founders started Idoven in 2018 after conducting basic and translational research at the National Center for Cardiovascular Research (CNIC) in Spain focused on machine learning applied to cardiology.

As a cardiologist, Manuel is specialized in arrhythmias and high-performance sports cardiology and has been a doctor at the Spanish Agency for Health Protection in Sports (AEPSAD). He is also a member of the European Society of Cardiology, an Associate Partner of the Spanish Society of Cardiology, and scientist at the Cardiovascular Disease Network Biomedical Research Center (CIBERCV). Manuel has published over 20 scientific papers, received a MS in Statistics from the University of Cordoba and MD from the University of Alcalá in Spain.

Natalie Nairn is the Cofounder, CEO, and CSO of Cyclera Therapeutics, a company creating revolutionary extracellular protein degraders to do what other drugs cannot. She has more than 20 years of experience in the biotechnology industry developing protein therapeutics from discovery through late-stage clinical development. Prior to Cyclera, Dr. Nairn was Vice President, CDP Therapeutics at Blaze Bioscience. Many programs were developed in this role, including the CYpHER technology that Dr. Nairn licensed into Cyclera. She was one of the initial 5 employees at Allozyne, a company developing next-generation ADCs, PEGylated proteins, and bispecifics. Dr. Nairn had growing responsibilities overseeing design, chemistry, formulation, and protein biochemistry. Her therapeutic career began at Corixa, developing cancer vaccine approaches. 

Dr. Nairn earned her Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from California Institute of Technology, where she was an NSF Graduate Research Fellow. Prior, she earned an M.S. from Caltech and a B.S.ChE from University of Washington in chemical engineering. Dr. Nairn is an inventor on 13 US patents. 

Nabanita Nawar is the CEO and co-founder of HDAX Therapeutics. Dr. Nawar played a lead role in building the foundational science behind HDAX during her PhD in Medicinal Chemistry at the University of Toronto. Her expertise in drug discovery, leadership, governance and science policy, fuels HDAX’s growth through her forward-thinking vision. Recognized as a Forbes 30 Under 30 honoree for Toronto in 2023, and Canada’s most prestigious BIOTECanada Next Generation Leadership Awardee 2023 for her leadership and innovation, Nabanita boasts an impressive portfolio that includes 10 high-impact publications, 2 patent applications, and over 20 awards and recognitions. These accolades include the Canadian Silver Medal from the Chemical Institute of Canada, The Society of Chemical Industry Merit Award, and the Top Scholar distinction at the University of Toronto. Under her leadership, HDAX has successfully raised >$1M USD to bring forth breakthrough therapies for unmet clinical needs. Nabanita is also a lecturer at the Temerty Faculty of Medicine of University of Toronto, for the Health Science Professional Master’s program. 

Richard Novak, Ph.D. is a bioengineer and entrepreneur dedicated to solving unanswerable questions through technology innovation. He co-founded Unravel Biosciences and serves as its CEO. Prior to Unravel Bio, he was a Lead Engineer at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University where he managed fast-paced programs in drug discovery, advanced disease models, human Organ Chips, and integrated automation and sensor systems. He has over 15 years of experience in drug discovery system development and applications in the therapeutic space. He is a founder and president of the nonprofit Future Scientist and a founder of the sample collection automation company, Rhinostics Inc.

Catherine Sabatos-Peyton, Ph.D., is Larkspur Biosciences’ Chief Executive Officer and member of the board of directors. Prior to joining Larkspur in 2021, Catherine was Executive Director and Head of Immune Modulation at Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research (NIBR), overseeing strategy and development of immunotherapy programs (small molecule and biologics) from preclinical validation and translational research, through development into Ph1-3 clinical trials for molecules including the Novartis checkpoint antibodies and multiple novel tumor microenvironment modulating therapies. Catherine joined Novartis in 2014 from the acquisition of CoStim Pharmaceuticals where she was Director of Immunology, developing the cancer checkpoint antibodies that became part of the Novartis pipeline.

Catherine was a Fulbright Fellow at the University of Oxford. She earned her Ph.D. from the Division of Medical Sciences at Harvard University where she was part of the team that first discovered TIM-3, now understood as a critical immune and leukemic stem cell modulator in AML and MDS. Catherine went on to a postdoctoral fellowship at UCSF, followed by a fellowship at the University of Bristol (funded by the UK Multiple Sclerosis Society).

Dr. Shardule Shah is the CEO and co-founder of Lime Therapeutics. In 2022, he was awarded the prestigious Harvard Blavatnik Fellowship for Life Sciences Entrepreneurship and currently holds an Executive Fellow position at Harvard Business School. Prior to co-founding Lime in 2021, Dr. Shah worked in the Bay Area at Lucira Health and Roche Molecular Diagnostics, where he managed cross-functional global clinical operations and regulatory affairs teams for point-of-care diagnostic devices including COVID-19 and influenza testing. Dr. Shah earned his PhD from Emory University in immunology, MBA from Harvard Business School, MS from the University of Pennsylvania in cell biology, and BS from Case Western Reserve University in biochemistry.

Carla Spina, Ph.D. is a scientific innovator and entrepreneur dedicated to improving the lives of patients living with complicated diseases. Carla graduated with a B.Sc. from the University of Calgary then began her Ph.D. in 2003 in Bioinorganic Chemistry at McGill University under Dr. D.S. Bohle, the Canadian Chair in Bioinorganic chemistry. Under the guidance of Dr. Bohle, Carla set about integrating the principles of chemistry, biology, and infectious disease to increase understanding of human disease. Building upon her expertise at the intersection of chemistry and biology she trained in applied formulations at BASF in Germany then went on to lead the research team at a MedTech start-up developing Class II/III drug-devices for infectious disease prevention. During this time, she guided research from concept through to commercialization, resulting in global licenses through 3M. Following this role, she co-founded a biotech start-up focused on novel therapeutics for complicated skin and skin structure infection. Within this role, Carla drove the company from drug discovery through to Phase Ib/IIa clinical study, establishing a network of KOLs, consultants, advisors, and research foundations to tackle diseases considered a complication of diabetes. Leveraging her experience from drug discovery through to clinical phase studies, Carla is now leading the team at Noa Therapeutics, a preclinical Canadian biotech company aiming to defy the convention of traditional drug development to revolutionize treatment options for those living with complex inflammatory skin diseases.

Theresa Tribble has spent much of the past 20 years building early-stage life science companies, particularly in medical diagnostics. Prior to Droplet, she was an operating partner at The Engine. She served as Chief Business Officer of Everlywell (now Everly Health), the leading at-home testing company. She is the founding advisor at BigHat Biosciences, which is applying artificial intelligence to the challenges of antibody drug development, and Landsdowne Labs, a material sciences company. Theresa earned her undergraduate degree at Wellesley College and her MBA at Harvard Business School.

Fernando Vieira is the CEO and Chief Scientific Officer at the ALS Therapy Development Institute (ALS TDI); a non-profit research institute dedicated to discovering and advancing effective treatments to slow, stop, or reverse amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).  At ALS TDI, he leads a multidisciplinary team of scientists and researchers in their efforts to discover and develop effective treatments and biomarkers for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). He has been focused on ALS research since 2001. His research findings – spanning basic discovery, preclinical drug discovery and optimization, clinical development, and translational ALS research have been widely cited. Specifically, his efforts have ranged from optimizing animal models for ALS preclinical pharmacology and drug screening to identifying and preclinically validating four drugs that have been advanced into human clinical assessment, and he has been awarded multiple patents for those drugs. His teams have contributed fundamental research findings to the study of genetic ALS, focusing on SOD1 mutation biology and C9orf72 mutation biology. His work has been published in prestigious journals including Nature Communications, Nature Genetics, Digital Medicine, and Science Translational Medicine. He leads the ALS Research Collaborative (ARC) Study, a groundbreaking distributed ALS natural history/omics study enrolling more than 1000 people with ALS. Through the ARC Study, he has led biomarker discovery efforts employing digital outcome measures and machine learning to assess ALS symptom severity. Dr. Vieira received his medical degree from Harvard Medical School and a bachelor’s degree in Biological Engineering from the University of Florida.

Dan Jing is the CEO and co-founder of VivArt-X. She has a PhD degree in biomedical engineering from the TU/e in the Biomedical Materials and Chemistry group. She was nominated as one of the FD50 talents under 35 in the Netherlands and received the PAC Innovasion Award in 2023. Moreover, she is the co-founder of the Dutch fashion label NOYA NOIR.