Board of Directors & Observers

Lightstone Ventures

Caroline joined Lightstone Ventures in 2017 and evaluates new investment opportunities in the biopharmaceutical and medical device sectors out of the firm’s Dublin office. She has over 10 years’ operational experience in the pharmaceutical industry. Caroline spent 9 years at Bayer Healthcare, most recently serving on the board of senior management of Bayer Ltd. Ireland as head of market access, pricing and reimbursement. During her time in pharma she held a number of operational roles, predominantly focused on oncology, such as product management, strategic marketing, business development and regulatory affairs. Prior to Lightstone, and following completion of her BioInnovate fellowship in 2013, she co-led R&D on a device targeting Acute Pancreatitis and was subsequently involved in early pre-clinical, strategic clinical and commercial development at Vetex Medical. She currently serves as a director on the board of Catamaran Bio Ltd., Parvalis Therapeutics and ProVerum. She is an observer to the board of Carrick Therapeutics, Cerevance, and FIRE-1. She also previously served on the board of ALX Oncology. She is a member of the BioInnovate Ireland Board of advisors.

ARCH Venture Partners

Steven Gillis has been a managing director at ARCH Venture Partners since 2005. Dr. Gillis was a founder and director of Corixa Corporation and served as the company’s Chief Executive Officer since inception and as its chairman since January of 1999. GlaxoSmithKline acquired Corixa Corporation in July of 2005. Prior to starting Corixa, Dr. Gillis was a founder and director of Immunex Corporation. From 1981 until his departure in 1994, Dr. Gillis served as Immunex’s Director of Research and Development, Chief Scientific Officer and Chief Executive Officer of Immunex’s Research and Development subsidiary. Dr. Gillis was interim Chief Executive officer of Immunex Corporation following its majority purchase by American Cyanamid Company. Dr. Gillis remained on the Board of Directors of Immunex until 1997. Immunex was acquired by Amgen in 2002. Dr. Gillis is an immunologist by training with over 300 peer-reviewed publications in the areas of molecular and tumor immunology. He is credited as being a pioneer in the field of cytokines and cytokine receptors, directing the development of multiple marketed products including Leukine, (GM-CSF), Prokine (IL-2) and Enbrel (soluble TNF receptor-Fc fusion protein) as well as the regulatory approval of Bexxar (radiolabeled anti-CD20) and the novel vaccine adjuvant, MPL. Dr. Gillis received his B.A. from Williams College in 1975 and his Ph.D. from Dartmouth College in 1978. He currently serves as a director or Chairman of multiple private and public biotechnology companies in the United States.

Dr. George Golumbeski, Chairman of Carrick has more than 30 years of experience in the biotechnology industry. He is currently focused on new company creation and stewardship. He is a partner in DROIA Ventures Genetic Disease Fund and serves as an independent director on several Boards (Sage Therapeutics, Shattuck Labs, Chroma Medicine, and Peptone).

George is best known for his work at Celgene where he served as Executive Vice President of Business Development. During his tenure at Celgene, George developed new models for corporate collaborations, and led a business development effort that saw Celgene become “Partner of Choice” according to Boston Consulting Group Survey data.

George was previously Vice President of Business Development, Licensing and Strategy at Novartis. Prior to Novartis, he was Vice President of R&D Business Development at Elan and Vice President of Corporate Development at Schwarz Pharma, where he led CNS acquisitions worldwide. George holds a B.A. in Biology from the University of Virginia, a Ph.D. in Genetics from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and he conducted his post-doctoral research in molecular biology at the University of Colorado-Boulder.

Jon Hepple is a co-founder of Rosetta. He has more than 15 years’ investment experience in the life sciences industry. Previously, he was at Rothschild Asset Management and British Biotechnology Ltd. He was also a partner at Seroba Life Sciences, where he was on the Boards of Covagen and Opsona. Jon holds a PhD from Cambridge University.

Jon has held Board roles and is actively engaged in portfolio companies such as Catalyst Biosciences, GlycoMimetics, Novimmune, Procertus and Tranzyme, and also has worked closely with GeminX, Polyphor and Zealand. He currently serves on the Boards of Aprea and Clanotech.

Google Ventures

Tom is a general partner at GV. Prior to GV, Tom was a design director at IDEO Europe. He founded OpenIDEO, an open innovation platform where 100,000 users from more than 170 countries solve challenges for social good. Tom also launched OIEngine, a SaaS platform with clients including Harvard Business School and the Knight Foundation. Prior to IDEO, Tom was managing director of Marcos, a British sports car manufacturer and founded Magnom, a magnetic filter startup. Tom’s filter designs have been widely used in Formula One, superbikes, agricultural equipment, and central heating systems. Tom has also angel-invested in more than 20 companies, including as the founding investor in Mile IQ (sold to Microsoft). Tom has been recognized as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum, and has been featured in WIRED UK’s Top 100 Digital Power Brokers list every year since the list was established. He has also been included in the Evening Standard list of London’s 1000 Most Influential People. Tom earned a first class bachelor’s degree in physics from the University of Bristol, and an MBA from Harvard Business School, where he received the Baker Scholar Award of high distinction. He also received an honorary doctorate from University of the Arts London.

Lightstone Ventures

Jason Lettmann is a General Partner of Lightstone Ventures and focuses on investments in the biopharmaceutical and medical technology sectors. Jason brings 20 years of operating and venture experience in the life sciences and also is a General Partner at Morgenthaler Ventures. He currently serves on the Board of Directors of ALX Oncology (NASDAQ: ALXO), Atsena Therapeutics, Carrick Therapeutics, Cerevance, FIRE1, Relievant Medsystems, and Second Genome. Jason led the firm’s investments and served as a Director of Ra Pharmaceuticals (acquired by UCB) and Vapotherm (NASDAQ: VAPO). Jason also served as the interim CEO of Promedior and led the company through its sale to Roche in 2020. Before joining Morgenthaler in 2009, Jason was a Vice President at Split Rock Partners where he focused on early-stage venture investments in medical devices and the life sciences. During his time at Split Rock, Jason was a board observer at Ardian (acquired by Medtronic in 2011) and Cabochon Aesthetics (acquired by Ulthera in 2014) as well as actively involved with the firm’s investments in Atritech (acquired by Boston Scientific), Entellus Medical (NASDAQ: ENTL), and Evalve (acquired by Abbott Labs). Prior to Split Rock, Jason’s experience includes tenure with Guidant Corporation’s Compass Group which focused on corporate venture investing and business development, as well as a consultant with Accenture’s Health and Life Science practice, where he advised clients across the medical device, pharmaceutical, and healthcare payer sectors.

Google Ventures

Vidu Shanmugarajah is a London-based investing partner focusing on early-stage technology and life science companies. His investments include Deepset, an open-source NLP start-up based in Berlin, and Synthesia, a London-based star-tup applying AI to video creation. Vidu began his career in corporate law at Linklaters, where he led M&A, restructuring, and financing transactions across various sectors. He was previously at Grafton Capital, where he worked on enterprise software investments and spent time in private equity at HgCapital, working on technology buyouts and growth equity investments. He also founded an online platform that provided better access to legal services for start-ups and small businesses. Vidu holds a degree in law from the London School of Economics.

Cambridge Innovation Capital

Robert Tansley is a partner at the Cambridge (UK) based venture fund Cambridge Innovation Capital. Robert joined CIC in 2014 after spending 20 years in drug development, regulatory and commercialisation roles in both large pharma (Sanofi, Roche), a regulatory authority (the MHRA) and early stage biotech (including founder/CEO of Treague, founding CEO of Avilex Pharma and CMO at KalVista). Robert qualified in medicine from University College London, he is a member of the Royal College of Obstetricians & Gynaecologists and the Faculty of Pharmaceutical Medicine and has an MBA from London Business School and an M.Phil in Biostatistics from the University of Cambridge.