Board of Directors
Larry McCarthy PhD
Martin Verhoef
Robert Rosenthal PhD
Michael Bigham
Vin Miles PhD
Azlin Bin Alias
Nina Kjellson
Larry McCarthy PhD., Executive Chairman of the Board
Dr. McCarthy serves as the Executive Chairman of Primera Diagnostics. He currently is a Venture Partner with Ampersand Ventures and is also a member of the Boards of Directors of IBT Laboratories, Genoptix , Magellan Biosciences, and Marligen Biosciences. Previously, he served as Chairman, CEO and CTO of Focus Diagnostics; as President of Boehringer Mannheim Diagnostics; and as VP of R&D and VP and General Manager at Becton Dickinson & Company. Dr. McCarthy has also served on the faculties of the Cornell University School of Medicine, the University of North Carolina School of Medicine, and the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. He has directed clinical laboratories at the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and at the North Carolina Memorial Hospital.
Martin Verhoef, President & CEO
Martin Verhoef joined PrimeraDx with over 20 years of experience in the Life Sciences industry working for both Fortune 500 companies and Start ups. Martin has held various senior management positions at Hewlett-Packard/Agilent in Germany and US and was with Ciphergen Biosystems, first as Vice President of Sales and Marketing and later President of the Ciphergen Biosystems Division. Martin began his career at the Dijkzigt Academic Hospital and Erasmus University in Rotterdam, The Netherlands followed by Pharmacia Biotechnologies in Uppsala, Sweden. He received a BS in Medical Chemistry and a BS in Chemistry from the van ‘t Hoff Institute in Rotterdam, The Netherlands
Robert J. Rosenthal PhD, President & CEO, Magellan Biosciences
Mr. Rosenthal is Magellan's founding president and chief executive officer. A proven executive, Dr. Rosenthal has 20 years of experience building value for customers, shareholders, and employees in companies serving the biomedical research and diagnostics industries. Most recently, Dr. Rosenthal was president and CEO of Boston Life Sciences, an R&D development-stage biopharmaceutical company. Previously, he was president of PerkinElmer's Instruments division, where he managed the acquisition and integration of the Analytical Instruments group from PE Corporation. As president and CEO of Thermo Optek, Dr. Rosenthal built a market-leading instrument company, which went public in 1996. Prior to Thermo Optek, Dr. Rosenthal served as president of Nicolet Instrument Corporation, a subsidiary of Thermo Instruments, which supplies analytical tools for research and development to several industries, including biotechnology. In addition to the Magellan and subsidiary boards, Dr. Rosenthal serves on several others, including the boards of Matritech (AMEX:MZT), Safeguard Scientifics, Inc. (NYSE:SFE), and the University of Maryland Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry Board of Advisors. He is also a member of the University of Maryland, College of Chemical and Life Sciences Board of Visitors.
Dr. Rosenthal holds a BS in chemistry from the University of Maryland, an MS in chemistry from State University of New York (Buffalo), and a PhD in physical chemistry from Emory University. He spent a year in Germany completing a post-doctoral fellowship and as a guest scientist of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation. This was followed by an additional post-doctoral fellowship at UCLA. Dr. Rosenthal also holds an AEA Executive MBA from Stanford University.
Michael F. Bigham, Partner, Abingworth
Mr. Bigham has 14 years of operational experience and six years investment banking experience in life science companies and has been with Abingworth since 2002. He was formerly Vice Chairman of Corixa and was President and Chief Executive of Coulter Pharmaceuticals from July 1996 until it merged into Corixa in December 2000. Previously, he was an early employee at Gilead Sciences where he spent eight years serving in various capacities, including Executive Vice President of Operations and CFO. Before joining Gilead, Michael was a partner at Hambrecht & Quist where he became Co-Head of Healthcare Investment Banking. He has a BS Degree in Commerce from the University of Virginia and qualified as a CPA before completing his MBA at Stanford University. Michael is responsible for Abingworth’s Boston office and focuses on East Coast deals
Vincent Miles PhD, Venture Partner, Abingworth
Mr. Miles has more than 25 years of management experience in the biotechnology industry. He was most recently Senior Vice President, Business Development, of the Abingworth portfolio company, Alnylam Pharmaceuticals. Before joining Alnylam, Vincent was at Millennium Pharmaceuticals where he held a number of senior management positions in business development, strategic planning and corporate communications. Formerly he was Director of the technology transfer office at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and held senior management positions in business development and research at RiboGene and Pharmacia, having begun his career at Amersham International in R&D. He has a BSc in biochemistry and a PhD in molecular biology from University College London. He is based in the Boston office.
Azlin has over 15 years of equity investment and corporate management experience. Prior to his current position with the MTDC, he was a member of the board of directors, executive committee and Equity Capital Market (ECM) committee for Avenue Securities, where he was responsible for overseeing equity placements and development of the equity research team. He also served as a senior equity analyst at Nomura Advisory, Caspian Research and Phileo Allied Securities. He holds a Bachelor of Commerce from University of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. He is also a qualified Certified Public Accountant (CPA) in Australia and (CA) in Malayasia.
Prior to joining Interwest, Nina was an investment manager at Bay City Capital, a life sciences merchant bank, and a research associate at Oracle Partners, a healthcare-focused fund. She began her career conducting health policy and survey research with the Kaiser Family Foundation. Nina is a board member of Alyine Pharmaceuticals, she is an observer on the boards of AkaRx Inc., Devax Inc., Kanisa Pharmaceuticals and MacuSight Inc., Nina also played a primary role in Interwest’s investment in Aspreva Pharmaceuticals. She holds a B.S. in human biology from Stanford University.