Advisory Board

Ken Kaitin, Ph.D. – Director, Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development

Dr. Kaitin joined the Tufts Center for the Study of Drug Development in 1986 and has served as its director since 1998. He is also a Professor of Medicine and Professor of Pharmacology & Experimental Therapeutics at Tufts University School of Medicine. Dr. Kaitin is an internationally recognized expert on the science of drug development. He publishes extensively on the factors that contribute to the slow pace and high cost of pharmaceutical R&D, and he has provided public testimony before the U.S. Congress on drug development, regulation, and policy issues. Dr. Kaitin is frequently quoted in the business and trade press on R&D trends in the research-based pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries. His work covers the entire value chain of pharmaceutical innovation, from discovery to manufacturing to sales and marketing. Dr. Kaitin is the former president of the Drug Information Association and the former editor-in-chief of the Drug Information Journal. He currently serves on the editorial boards of eight peer-reviewed and trade journals. He also serves on the Boards of Directors of two public companies and one private company, and the Scientific Advisory Boards of two companies. He received his B.S. from Cornell University and his M.S. and Ph.D. in pharmacology from the University of Rochester.

Paul Bleicher, M.D./Ph.D. – CMO, Humedica

Paul A. Bleicher, M.D., Ph.D., serves as a Chief Medical Officer and Director of Humedica, a next-generation clinical informatics company that provides novel software-as-a-service-based business intelligence solutions to the health care and life sciences industries. Prior to Humedica, he was a director of Phase Forward, which he co-founded and helped grow from initial concept to its position as a leading provider of clinical trial data management and drug safety software. From its founding in 1997 until November 2008, Dr. Bleicher served as Chairman and held various leadership and executive roles, most recently that of Chief Strategy Officer. In November 2008, Dr. Bleicher stepped down from his day-to-day executive role at Phase Forward to join the founding team of Humedica. Dr. Bleicher earned his B.S. from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and his M.D. and Ph.D., specializing in cellular immunology, from the University of Rochester School of Medicine and Dentistry. He previously worked at PAREXEL International, where he created and headed the Early Phase Services Department, assisting pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies with the initial development of novel therapies. Dr. Bleicher speaks and writes extensively about the role of technology, electronic data capture, and data visualization in the healthcare and pharmaceutical industry. In 1995, he chaired the first conference ever held in the pharmaceutical industry on the use of the Internet in drug development. Dr. Bleicher serves on the editorial boards of Applied Clinical Trials, Drug Information Journal, and Research Practitioner. In 2002, Dr. Bleicher won the Ernst and Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award in New England and was subsequently appointed to the Ernst and Young Entrepreneurs Hall of Fame. In 2005, he was recognized by PharmaVoice as one of the 100 most inspiring people in the life sciences industry, and in 2006 he was awarded Boston Business Journal‘s prestigious Champions in Health Care award. In 2007, he joined the Massachusetts Life Sciences Collaborative Leadership Council. Dr. Bleicher holds several issued patents in the U.S. and worldwide for a stem cell mobilizing biologic and for software design.

Roger Longman

Roger Longman is a Managing Director, Pharma at Elsevier Business Intelligence, a Reed Elsevier company. In 1983, Longman joined The Wilkerson Group as a writer covering the pharmaceutical and biotech industries for IN VIVO: The Business & Medicine Report. In 1989, along with David Cassak, he led a buyout of IN VIVO, and moved the newly created company, Windhover Information, to Connecticut. In addition to IN VIVO, Windhover now publishes Start-Up, The RPM Report, Medtech Insight, and The Strategic Transactions Database. He also produces a series of in-depth market reports on the device industry and organizes a number of conferences, including Pharmaceutical Strategic Alliances and The FDA/CMS Summit. In 2004, Windhover acquired Medtech Insight, an information company covering the medical device field through a market-leading newsletter, a series of in-depth market reports, and a number of conferences. In 2008, Windhover was acquired by Reed Elsevier and merged with its FDC Reports division (publishers of The Pink Sheet, The Tan Sheet and many other medical-industry newsletters), creating Elsevier Business Intelligence. Over the years, Mr. Longman has become recognized as one of the leading experts in biopharmaceutical strategy and dealmaking. He is often asked to speak at many key industry events organized by important trade organizations like the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO), investment banks, venture capital firms and leading pharma and biotech companies. He lectures regularly at several leading universities. Mr. Longman completed his BA at Cornell University and his MA in English literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Doug Redding, Executive-in-Residence, Cleveland Clinic

Doug has more than 30 years experience in finance and operations, most recently as Chief Operating Officer of VIMAC Ventures, an early-stage venture capital firm with investments in information technology and life sciences. In addition to managing firm operations, Doug spent a substantial portion of his time supporting portfolio company management on planning, budgeting, infrastructure and financing. Prior to VIMAC, Doug spent 20 years as a founder and senior level executive at several early-stage technology firms, including Software Developers’ Company, Cortex Corporation, CenterLine Software and edu.com. He spent the first seven years of his career at Price Waterhouse and is a certified public accountant. Doug holds a BA from Stanford University and attended Cornell and UCLA Graduate Schools of Business.

Sean Power

Sean Power is a technologist and entrepreneur with over 15 years of experience creating products and services for his clients. Most recently, Sean co-founded Infinata, a leading provider of information services to the pharmaceutical and financial services industries. From its inception in 2000 until his departure in 2010, Sean was responsible for all areas of the company’s growth, including product creation, technology development, sales and marketing, client services and operations. Under Sean’s leadership, Infinata grew from a 2 person start-up to one of the fastest growing information companies in the market, with over 500 corporate clients and tens of thousands of users. The Financial Times acquired Infinata in September of 2007 as a key part of the FT strategy to diversify into subscription-based online revenue streams. While at Infinata, Sean created BioPharm Insight, a premium information service for the pharmaceutical industry. BioPharm Insight is used by clinical research organizations to support their business development efforts, by pharmaceutical and biotech firms to support their licensing and corporate development information needs, and by financial services firms to fuel key investing decisions. Sean was also responsible for the creation of several other online information services, including BioPharm Clinical, HNW Insight, and WealthTracker. In many of these efforts, Sean was able to develop strong partnerships with other technology providers (Financial Information Group, i3 Informatics, among many others) to the mutual benefit of Infinata, the partner, and the shared client base. The key theme running through all these activities is a willingness and ability to bring resources together to create something new, exciting, and valuable for clients.

Prior to founding Infinata, Sean was an analyst at Putnam Investments in their corporate development group, working on mergers and acquisitions, international expansion, and alternative investment products. Prior to that, Sean was a senior consultant at Ernst and Young, advising biotechnology and start up technology clients. Sean graduated magna cum laude from Boston College, and lives in Marshfield ,MA with his wife, Johanna, and two children, Joshua and Elizabeth.

Orian Shirihai, M.D./Ph.D.  - Associate Professor, Boston University School of Medicine

Shirihai joined the Department of Medicine at Boston University Medical Center (BUMC) and Boston University School of Medicine in June 2008. He came to BUMC from the Department of Pharmacology at Tufts University, Boston where he is currently an Adjunct Associate professor. Shirihai did postdoctoral work with Prof. Stuart Orkin at Harvard University. He earned his MD and PhD degrees from the Faculty of Medicine at the Technion – Israel Institute of Technology. At BUMC, Dr. Shirihai is a member and founder of the Mitochondria ARC (Advancing Research through Collaborations), which is part of the ARC system of BUMC department of medicine. Dr. Shirihai is the Director of the Cellular Imaging Core at BUMC.

Mark Sprague

Mark Sprague, previously the VP of Product Development at Spinnaker Software and Founder of Northern Light Technology, brings over 20 years of software development expertise to Relay, including a track record for building successful startup companies.