Board of Directors

Georges Gemayel, Ph.D., Chairman

Dr. Georges Gemayel joined FoldRx as Executive Chairman of the Board of Directors in May of 2010.

Beyond his role as Executive Chairman on FoldRx’s Board, Dr. Gemayel also currently serves on the Boards of Adolor and Syndexa. He served as President, Chief Executive Officer and a Director of Altus Pharmaceuticals Inc. from June 2008 until November 2009. Prior to Altus, Dr. Gemayel served as Executive Vice President, Therapeutics and Biosurgery for Genzyme Corporation, where he was responsible for Genzyme's global therapeutics, transplant, renal and biosurgery businesses. Prior to joining Genzyme, Dr. Gemayel worked for Hoffmann-La Roche for 16 years. There he served as Vice President of the National Speciality Care business with responsibilities for oncology, transplantation, hepatitis, HIV and dermatology. He also was the General Manager of Hoffmann-La Roche Portugal.

Dr. Gemayel received his doctorate in pharmacy from St. Joseph University in Beirut, Lebanon and his Ph.D. in Pharmacology from Paris-SUD University.  

Ralph E. (Chris) Christoffersen, Ph.D., Director

Chris Christoffersen joined Morgenthaler Ventures in 2001, where he focuses on new biotechnology investments. Previously, he was the President and CEO of Ribozyme, a Morgenthaler portfolio company with a mission to commercialize the Nobel Prize-winning discovery of ribozymes for use as human therapeutics. He also served as the Senior Vice President of Research at SmithKline Beecham, Vice President of Discovery Research at Upjohn, and President of Colorado State University.

He received the "Outstanding Research of Year" Award from the International Society of Quantum Biology, the "W. E. Upjohn Award" for contributions in biotechnology, and a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Colorado Biosciences Association.

Dr. Christoffersen currently serves on several corporate boards, including Calithera Biosciences, Catalyst Biosciences, Elcelyx Therapeutics, FoldRx, Galleon Pharmaceuticals, GlobeImmune, OptiScan, Stemgent, and Tragara Pharmaceuticals, and achieved successful exits with Avidia, Morphotek, Orexigen, and Threshold.

He received a B.S. in Chemistry and Mathematics and an Honorary J.D. from Cornell College, and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Indiana University

N. Anthony Coles, M.D., M.P.H., Director

Tony Coles, M.D., joined Onyx in March 2008 as President, Chief Executive Officer, and member of its board of directors. Prior to joining Onyx, Dr. Coles was President, Chief Executive Officer, and a member of the board of directors of NPS Pharmaceuticals, Inc. Before joining NPS Pharmaceuticals in 2005, Dr. Coles was Senior Vice President of Commercial Operations at Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated, which he joined in 2002. His experience includes a variety of positions with Bristol-Myers Squibb, beginning in 1996, including Senior Vice president of Strategy and Policy, Senior Vice President, Marketing and Medical Affairs for the Neuroscience, Infectious Disease and Dermatology Division, Vice President, West Area Sales-Cardiovascular and Metabolic Business Unit for U.S. Primary Care, and Vice President, Cardiovascular Global Marketing. Prior to joining BMS, Dr. Coles was Vice President of the Hypertension and Heart Failure business Group at Merck. Dr. Coles holds an M.D. from Duke University, a Masters Degree in Public Health from Harvard University and a B.S. from Johns Hopkins University

Geoffrey Duyk, Ph.D., M.D., Director

Prior to joining Texas Pacific Group Ventures in 2004, Dr. Geoff Duyk served on the Board of Directors and was President of Research & Development at Exelixis where he led a 550+ person group focused on the discovery and development of small molecule therapeutics. Prior to Exelixis, he was one of the founding scientific staff at Millennium Pharmaceuticals. As Vice President of Genomics at Millennium, Dr. Duyk was responsible for building and leading the informatics, automation, DNA sequencing and genotyping groups as well as the mouse and human genetics group. Prior to his tenure at Millennium, Dr. Duyk was an Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School (HMS) in the Department of Genetics and Assistant Investigator of the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). While at HMS, Dr. Duyk was a Co-Principal Investigator in the National Institutes of Health (NIH) funded Cooperative Human Linkage Center. Dr. Duyk has been and continues to be a member of numerous NIH panels and oversight committees focused on the planning and execution of the human genome project.

Dr. Duyk serves on the Board of Directors of Avidia, Macrogenics, Open Biosystems, Aerie, FoldRx, Amyris and Replidyne. He is a counsel member of the National Human Genome Research Institute at the National Institute of Health. He also serves on the Scientific Advisory Boards of the NHGRI DNA Sequencing Advisory Panel, Chair of the KOMP (Global Mouse TKO project), ESC (Expressed Sequenced Consortium), Co-Chair Advisory Panel Cancer Genome Project, Program in Genomics Applications (NHBLI); the Bioethics Advisory Group at Case Western Reserve University; the Spinal Muscular Atrophy Foundation; Jackson Laboratories - Bar Harbor Maine; Molecular Sciences Institute (UCB); WIL Laboratories; VLST; Avidia and FoldRx.

Dr. Duyk holds a Ph.D. and M.D. from Case Western Reserve University and completed his medical and fellowship training at University of California, San Francisco. While at UCSF, Dr. Duyk was a fellow of the Lucille P. Markey Foundation and was also awarded a post-doctoral fellowship from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute.

Ed Hurwitz, Director

Ed Hurwitz joined Alta Partners in 2002 and is a Director in Alta Partners BioPharma III fund. From 1997 to 2001, Ed served as Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer of Affymetrix, a publicly held life sciences company. From 1994 to 1997, Ed was a biotechnology research analyst for Robertson Stephens & Company, and from 1992 to 1994, was a biotechnology research analyst for Smith Barney Shearson. From 1990 to 1992, Ed practiced commercial law at Cooley Godward LLP. He is currently on the board of directors of MacroGenics, and led Alta's investments in ChemoCentryx, Threshold Pharmaceuticals and Sunesis.

Ed earned his Juris Doctor and Master of Business Administration degrees in 1990 from the University of California, Berkeley’s Boalt School of Law and Haas School of Business, respectively. Ed earned a Bachelor of Arts in Molecular Biology from Cornell University in 1985.

Stephen C. Knight, M.D., Director

Stephen Knight is president of Fidelity Biosciences, a unit of Fidelity Investments, overseeing Fidelity's private equity investing in biotechnology interests.

Dr. Knight has worked in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries for over sixteen years. Prior to joining Fidelity in 2003, Dr. Knight was president and chief operating officer for EPIX Pharmaceuticals in Cambridge, Massachusetts. For six years before joining EPIX, Dr. Knight worked at Arthur D. Little Inc., primarily as a senior consultant in Cambridge and Brussels, Belgium specializing in mergers and acquisitions in the pharmaceutical industry. Prior to 1990, Dr. Knight performed research at AT&T Bell Laboratories (now Lucent Technologies), the National Institutes of Health, and at Yale University.

Dr. Knight holds an MD from the Yale University School of Medicine and an MBA from the Yale School of Organization and Management. Dr. Knight received a BS in biology from Columbia University, graduating summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa.

Dr. Knight currently serves as Chairman of the Board of Directors for EnVivo Pharmaceuticals. He also serves on the Board of Directors of Ironwood Pharmaceuticals (formerly Microbia), CardioKine, Proteostasis Therapeutics, FoldRX, Bikam Pharmaceuticals, NextWave Pharmaceuticals, U.S. Genomics, and Respivert, Ltd.

Richard Labaudinière, Ph.D., President & CEO

Dr. Labaudinière is President and CEO of FoldRx Pharmaceuticals, Inc., bringing over 19 years of international experience in drug discovery and development, including 16 years in multinational pharmaceutical companies, such as Glaxo, RPR and Aventis. Prior to FoldRx, Dr. Labaudinière was Senior Vice-President of Research and Development at Genome Therapeutics, now Oscient Pharmaceuticals. At Genome Therapeutics, he was responsible for building and directing all drug discovery and development activities. He oversaw the development of Genome Therapeutics' lead product candidate, Ramoplanin, for the prevention, treatment and control of serious hospital-based infections and Genome Therapeutics' biopharmaceutical portfolio of discovery and development alliances with pharmaceutical companies including Amgen, AstraZeneca, bioMérieux, Schering-Plough and Wyeth, in the field of osteoporosis, asthma and infectious diseases.

Before joining GenomeTherapeutics, Dr. Labaudinière held numerous senior management positions at Glaxo, RPR and Aventis, having full oversight for discovery and development programs, in many different therapeutic areas, from target selection to drug candidate selection and clinical development programs. His R&D efforts have resulted in several therapeutics reaching clinical development and the market.

Dr. Labaudinière is a graduate of Ecole Nationale Supérieure De Chimie in Montpellier, France and is author of over 70 publications and patents.

Augustine Lawlor, Director

Augustine Lawlor has been a Managing Director of HealthCare Ventures since 2000. He was previously chief operating officer of LeukoSite, Inc., a HealthCare Ventures III, IV, and V company. Before joining LeukoSite, Mr. Lawlor was chief financial officer and vice president of corporate development for Alpha-Beta Technology. He held similar positions at BioSurface Technology and Armstrong Pharmaceuticals. Mr. Lawlor has also served as a management consultant with KPMG Peat Marwick.Mr. Lawlor is currently a member of the board of directors of Catalyst Biosciences, Dynogen Pharmaceuticals, GlobeImmune, Human Genome Sciences, Medior, Replidyne, Synovex, U. S. Genomics, VaxInnate and the Slater Center in Providence, Rhode Island.Mr. Lawlor received his Master's degree in public and private management from Yale University.

Heath  Lukatch, Ph.D., Director

Heath Lukatch is a Partner in Novo Ventures, Novo A/S. Heath Lukatch joined Novo A/S in 2006 working out of the San Francisco, California office. He is chairman of the board of directors of Inogen, Inc. and NeuroTherapeutics Pharma, Inc., and a member of the board of directors of Amira Pharmaceuticals, Inc. AnaptysBio, Inc., FoldRx Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Synosia Therapeutics.

Prior to joining Novo A/S, Heath was a Managing Director for Piper Jaffray Ventures and SightLine Partners, and a bench scientist at Cetus, Chiron and Roche Bioscience. While at Piper Jaffray and Sightline he was responsible for biotech venture investments and served on the boards of several biotech and medical device companies. Previously, he was at McKinsey & Co. where his primary focus was on strategy consulting for biopharmaceutical companies.

Heath also brings entrepreneurial experience from his role as founder and CEO of AutoMate Scientific, Inc. a biotechnology instrumentation company.

Heath holds a PhD in neuroscience from Stanford University and a BA in biochemistry from the University of California at Berkley.

Observers

Markus Goebel, M.D., Observer

Markus Goebel joined Novartis Venture Fund as Managing Director in September 2004. Previously he worked as head Pharma Corporate M&A and head Nervous System BD&L Pharma. An M.D. by training and certified, amongst others, in Haematology/Oncology he worked for Farmitalia Germany and later held several positions in R&D, Marketing and Strategy at Roche headquarters before joining Novartis. Markus Goebel received an M.D. and a Ph.D. from the Ludwig Maximilian’s University in Munich and an MBA from Henley.

Eran Nadav, Ph.D., Observer

Prior to joining TPG Biotech in 2007, Dr. Nadav served as Business Development Director at Eisai Pharmaceuticals in New Jersey for four years, where he evaluated and negotiated licensing deals in oncology, CNS and GI therapeutics. Prior to Eisai, Dr. Nadav worked for the Israeli office of JJDC, the venture capital subsidiary of Johnson & Johnson, where he analyzed and supported investments in innovative technologies and therapies. Before his professional career and academic studies, he served as a Tank Commander in the IDF for three years.

Dr. Nadav holds a B.Sc. (magna cum laude), M.Sc. (magna cum laude) and Ph.D. in biochemistry from Tel Aviv University in Israel. His doctorate supervisor was 2004 Nobel Laureate Professor Aaron Ciechanover. He also holds an M.B.A. from Tel Aviv University, were he was a team leader in the Wharton Global Consulting Practicum, a multinational marketing partnership with the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.