Board of Directors
Kenneth M. Bate - NitroMed, Inc.
Douglas G. Cole, M.D. - Flagship Ventures
Ronald A. DePinho, M.D. – Co-founder of AVEO, Dana Farber Cancer Institute
Anthony B. Evnin, Ph.D. – Venrock Associates
Nicholas Galakatos, Ph.D. – Clarus Ventures
Tuan Ha-Ngoc – President and CEO of AVEO Pharmaceuticals
Robert Higgins – Highland Capital Partners
Russell Hirsch, Ph.D., M.D. – Prospect Venture Partners
Raju Kucherlapati, Ph.D. – Harvard Center for Genetics and Genomics
Kenneth E. Weg – Clearview Projects
Kenneth M. Bate
Ken Bate was appointed to AVEO Pharmaceuticals’ Board of Directors in January 2008. He is currently the President and Chief Executive Officer of NitroMed, Inc., a position he has held since January 2007. Previously he served as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Financial Officer of NitroMed. From 2002 to January 2005, Mr. Bate served as Head of Commercial Operations and Chief Financial Officer at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. His executive management experience also includes six years with Biogen (now Biogen Idec), where he held the positions of Chief Financial Officer and Vice President, Sales and Marketing. Mr. Bate co-founded JSB Partners and served as a partner with this investment banking and transaction advisory firm focused on the biopharmaceutical industry. He also served as senior managing director and chief executive officer of MPM Capital, LP, a venture capital company, and as an advisor to BB Bioventures, a venture capital fund. Currently, in addition to his AVEO board membership, Mr. Bate serves on the boards of NitroMed, Inc., Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and Coley Pharmaceutical Group. He received his B.A. degree in Chemistry from Williams College, and an MBA from The Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.
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Douglas G. Cole, M.D.
Doug is a general partner of Flagship Ventures where he focuses on Life Science investments. He came to Flagship in 2001 with significant industrial experience and a strong academic background. He obtained post-graduate medical training at the Johns Hopkins Hospital and neurological training at the Massachusetts General Hospital. In 1992, Doug was appointed Instructor in Neurology at Harvard Medical School and an Assistant in Neurology at the Massachusetts General Hospital. He established a research program investigating neurotransmitter signaling events in neuro-psychiatric disorders with the support of the NIH and several non-profit research foundations. Doug holds an AB magna cum laude in English from Dartmouth College and an MD from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
In 1996, Doug joined Cytotherapeutics as Associate Medical Director overseeing various research and clinical activities related to the company’s cell-based therapeutic technologies. In 1997, he was appointed Program Executive at Vertex Pharmaceuticals, Inc., leading a multidisciplinary program that conducted preclinical development through Phase II studies in neuronal protection and repair. Additionally at Vertex, he oversaw a major research collaboration and was responsible for identifying strategic market opportunities in multiple arenas.
At Flagship, Doug has led Flagship’s investments in CombinatoRx and Alinea Pharmaceuticals. He co-founded Ensemble Discovery with Noubar Afeyan and Professor David Liu of Harvard University, and he served as Acting CEO of the company in its initial stages. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of CombinatoRx, Ensemble Discovery, and CGI Pharmaceuticals, and is an Observer on the Board of Directors of Alinea. He has also been actively involved with Renovis (NASDAQ: RNVS), Hypnion, and Genstruct.
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Ronald A. DePinho, M.D.
Co-Founder
Dr. DePinho is a co-founder of AVEO and holds the coveted American Cancer Society Research Professorship and is Professor of Medicine and Genetics at the Harvard Medical School. He is the director of the Center for Applied Cancer Science at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute. His research program has made major discoveries of fundamental importance to cancer medicine, aging and degenerative disorders. He has been a leader in the field of molecular genetics and in the development of mouse models of human cancer. His independent scientific career began at the Albert Einstein College of Medicine where he was the Senior Scholar in Cancer Research and launched the first mouse genome engineering program to model and study the genetic basis of cancer. He is now a member of the Department of Medical Oncology at the Dana Farber Cancer Institute and Department of Medicine and Genetics at the Harvard Medical School. Dr. DePinho is a former member the Board of Directors of the American Association for Cancer Research, chairs advisory boards for the NCI Mouse Models of Human Cancer Consortium and the NIH Human Cancer Genome Altas Project, and serves on numerous advisory boards for the public and private sectors. Dr. DePinho studied Biology at Fordham University where he graduated Class Salutatorian and received his M.D. degree with distinction in Microbiology and Immunology from the Albert Einstein College of Medicine. His honors and awards include the March of Dimes Basil O'Connor Award, James S. McDonnell Scholar Award, the Cancer Research Institute Scholar Award, the Melini Award for Biomedical Excellence, the Irma T. Hirshcl Award, Kirsch Foundation Investigator Award, and the Richard and Claire Morse Scholar Award. He is the 2002 recipient of the American Society for Clinical Investigation Award and the 2003 AACR Clowes Award. He is a member of the National Academy of Science Institute of Medicine.
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Anthony B. Evnin, Ph.D.
Tony Evnin is a Managing General Partner at Venrock Associates. He was awarded his Ph.D. in Chemistry from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and also has an A.B. in Chemistry from Princeton University. Dr. Evnin's previous experience was as a research scientist and business development manager at Story Chemical and Union Carbide. His focus today is largely on biotechnology and related life sciences. He has led financings of several major biotechnology companies over the last 30 years. Dr. Evnin presently serves on the boards of Coley Pharmaceutical Group, Icagen, Memory Pharmaceuticals, Renovis, Sunesis Pharmaceuticals and several private companies. He led Venrock's investment in Athena Neurosciences, Centocor, Genetics Institute, IDEC Pharmaceuticals, IDEXX Laboratories, and Sepracor.
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Nicholas Galakatos, Ph.D.
Dr. Galakatos is a co-founder and Managing Director of Clarus Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on lifescience investments. He has been a venture capital investor since 1992, most recently at MPM Capital where he was General Partner specializing in the formation and growth of biopharmaceutical companies. Prior to MPM, Dr. Galakatos was Vice President, New Business and a member of the Management Team at Millennium Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: MLNM). In that capacity Dr. Galakatos co-founded Millennium Predictive Medicine (acquired by Millennium) and TransForm (acquired by Johnson & Johnson), where he also was Chairman and founding CEO. Prior to Millennium he was an Associate at Venrock Associates and led the firm’s founding investments in Caliper (NASDAQ: CALP), Symyx (NASDAQ: SMMX), and Idun (acquired by Pfizer). Before joining Venrock he was Head of Molecular Biology Research at Novartis (formerly Ciba). He holds a B.A degree in Chemistry from Reed College, a Ph.D. degree in Organic Chemistry from MIT, and performed postdoctoral studies at Harvard Medical School.
Dr. Galakatos is the Chairman of Hypnion, and a member of the Board of Directors of Affymax, Alinea, AVEO, Critical Therapeutics (NASDAQ: CRTX), and Portola. Past Directorships include Millennium Biotherapeutics (acquired by Millennium), Syrrx (acquired by Takeda) and TransForm.
Dr. Galakatos is a member of several Advisory Councils at Harvard Medical School, serves on the Visiting Committee for the Chemistry Department at MIT, and is a Trustee of Anatolia College.
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Tuan Ha-Ngoc
Tuan Ha-Ngoc is a leader with more than 30 years’ experience in senior management positions in pharmaceuticals and healthcare.
Since the start of the Company more than five years ago, Mr. Ha-Ngoc has served as President and CEO of AVEO Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a biotechnology company leveraging breakthrough discoveries in cancer biology to discover, develop and commercialize targeted oncology therapies.
Before starting AVEO in 2002, Mr. Ha-Ngoc co-founded deNovis, Inc., an enterprise-scale software development company focused on automating administrative functions in healthcare. Mr. Ha-Ngoc led deNovis as President and CEO from 1999 until 2002.
From 1998 to 1999, Mr. Ha-Ngoc was Wyeth’s Corporate Vice President of Strategic Development. His tenure there followed Wyeth’s acquisition of Genetics Institute, where Mr. Ha-Ngoc was Executive Vice President with responsibility for Corporate Development, Commercial Operations, as well as European and Japanese Operations and in addition at various times Legal Affairs, Regulatory, a major R&D program and Program Management. Prior to joining Genetics Institute in 1984, he held various marketing and business positions at Baxter Healthcare, Inc.
Mr. Ha-Ngoc earned an MBA from INSEAD and a Master's in Pharmacy from the University of Paris, France. He serves on the Board of Directors of Human Genome Sciences, Inc. and on the boards of a number of academic and nonprofit organizations, including the Harvard School of Dental Medicine, the Tufts School of Medicine, the Belmont Hill School, the Boston Philharmonic Orchestra, and the International Institute of Boston.
Mr. Ha-Ngoc is the recipient of the 2007 Ernst & Young New England Entrepreneur of the Year.
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Robert Higgins
Bob has more than twenty years of experience in venture capital and has served as a director of many public and private companies. He is a former director of the National Venture Capital Association and President of the New England Venture Capital Association. In addition, Bob has been recognized by the prestigious Forbes Midas List as one of the top venture capitalists in the industry.
Bob has been an investor in many successful healthcare service, medical device and biotechnology companies. Some of the services companies he has backed are Community Health Systems (NYSE: CYH), Mariner Health Group (IPO/acquired), New England Critical Care (IPO/acquired), Renal Treatment Centers (IPO/acquired) and U.S. Labs (acquired). Bob's medical technology investments include AVEO Pharmaceuticals, Conor Medsystems (Nasdaq: CONR), Helicos BioSciences, Magen BioSciences, Mitotix (Neuer Market: GPC Biotech AG), Origin Medsystems (acquired), PerSeptive Biosystems (IPO/acquired), Pervasis Therapeutics and PRAECIS PHARMACEUTICALS (Nasdaq: PRCS). In addition, Bob has also served on the boards of SmartBargains, Staples.com and WordWave (acquired by Merrill Corporation).
Before co-founding Highland Capital, Bob was a general partner at a Boston-based venture capital partnership. Immediately prior to entering venture capital, he spent four years as the Executive Director of the John A. Hartford Foundation. He also was the Chief Executive of the Clark Foundation and the Burden Foundation. Bob is a former Assistant to the U.S. Secretary of Commerce and an Assistant to the head of the international division of the U.S. Treasury.
Bob is involved in many activities related to venture capital and healthcare. Bob has served as Chairman of the Finance Committee of the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center. Currently, he is a member of the Advisory Board of the Department of Health Care Policy at Harvard Medical School and the Advisory Board of the Harvard - MIT Division of Health Sciences & Technology. Also, Bob has been a faculty member at the Harvard Business School since 2001. At HBS, he currently teaches a second year course called Entrepreneurship and Venture Capital in Healthcare.
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Russell Hirsch, Ph.D., M.D.
Russell is a Managing Director of Prospect Venture Partners. Prior to establishing Prospect Venture Partners II and III, Russell was a member of the Health Care Technology Group at Mayfield. He joined Mayfield in 1992, served as a Venture Partner from 1993 to 1994 and as a General Partner from 1995-2000. Russell played a key role in Mayfield's investment activities in the biotechnology and medical device sectors. As an Associate, he participated actively in the incubation of Millennium Pharmaceuticals and as a General Partner he was responsible for the incubation of Intuitive Surgical Devices both of which are now publicly traded. (NASDAQ: MLNM), (NASDAQ:ISRG).
Prior to Mayfield, Russell was at the University of California San Francisco from 1984-1992 where he was engaged in biomedical research. His work, published in a variety of respected journals, focused on important aspects of hepatitis B viral replication. His descriptions of the reverse transcription and packaging functions of polymerase gene products merited publication in Nature.
Russell serves or has served on the Board of Directors of Intuitive Surgical (NASDAQ: ISRG), Sunesis (NASDAQ: SNSS), Valentis (NASDAQ: VLTS), Opus Medical (NASDAQ: ARTC), Orquest (NASDAQ: JNJ), Visiogen, Baxano, Inc., Hansen Medical, Portola Pharmaceuticals and several other privately-held companies. Russell serves on the Board of Interplast and on the Genetics Advisory Council of the Harvard Medical School-Partners Healthcare Center for Genetics and Genomics.
Russell holds an M.D. and Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the University of California, San Francisco and a B.A. in Chemistry from the University of Chicago.
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Raju Kucherlapati, Ph.D.
Raju Kucherlapati is a Professor of Medicine and the Paul C. Cabot Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School and the first Scientific Director of the Harvard-Partners Center for Genetics and Genomics. Dr. Kucherlapati came to the United States in 1967 after completing undergraduate and graduate degrees in India. He received his Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana and did his post-doctoral work in the lab of Frank Ruddle at Yale University. He was assistant professor in the Department of Biochemical Sciences at Princeton University, and then became professor in the Department of Genetics at the University of Illinois College of Medicine. In 1989 Dr. Kucherlapati went to the Albert Einstein College of Medicine where he was the Lola and Saul Kramer Professor of Molecular Genetics and Chairman of the Department of Molecular Genetics, a position he held for eleven years.
Dr. Kucherlapati’s research interests include cloning of human disease genes and the generation and characterization of mouse models for human disease. The Kucherlapati laboratory at Harvard Medical School has four major areas of focus: mammalian genetics, where his laboratory participated in the mapping and sequencing of the mouse and human genomes; the etiology of Velo-Cardio-Facial syndrome; generation of mouse models for human cancer; and the etiology of Noonan Syndrome. To date he holds 12 patents. He was a member of the National Advisory Council for Human Genome Research at the National Human Genomics Research Institute, and currently serves as co-chair of the steering committee for the National Cancer Institute’s Mouse Models for Human Cancer Consortium. He serves on the editorial board of the New England Journal of Medicine and was editor in chief of the journal Genomics.
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Kenneth E. Weg
Mr. Weg is a founder and the chairman of Clearview Projects, a company dedicated to representing biopharmaceutical clients on strategic transactions to maximize the value of the technologies and products in their portfolios. He has over 33 years of experience in the pharmaceutical industry with Merck, Sharp & Dohme and Bristol-Myers Squibb. Since 1993, he was president, Worldwide Medicines Group, Bristol-Myers Squibb Company, responsible for all ethical pharmaceuticals and over-the-counter medicines on a global basis. Mr. Weg was elected to the board of directors and named as an executive vice president of Bristol-Myers Squibb Company in May 1995. In May 1999, he was elected vice chairman of the board. He retired in February 2001. Currently, Mr. Weg serves as Vice Chairman of the Board at Fox Chase Cancer Center, and non-executive Chairman of the Board at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc. He is a member of the Genetics Council of the Harvard-Partners Center for Genetics and Genomics. He holds a B.A. in English Literature from Dartmouth, an M.B.A. from Columbia University, and an honorary Doctor of Philosophy from the Medical University of Southern Africa.
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