Board of Directors
Jean-Pierre Garnier, PhD, Chairman of the Board of Directors
Jean-Pierre Garnier assumed the CEO role at GlaxoSmithKline with the merger of SmithKline Beecham and Glaxo Welcome and served in that capacity from 2001 to his retirement from GSK in 2008. He joined SmithKline Beecham in 1990 and became CEO in 2000.
Prior to SmithKline Beecham, Dr. Garnier served as President of Schering-Plough's US business. Dr. Garnier currently serves as CEO of Pierre Fabre Labs, a pharmaceutical and cosmetic company located in France. He also serves on the boards of directors of the United Technologies Corporation and Renault S.A.
Dr. Garnier’s accomplishments have been recognized with many presitigous appointments and awards. He was appointed to Prime Minister Gordon Brown’s UK Business Advisory Council in 2007 and was also selected by President Chirac of France to receive the Chevalier de la Légion d'Honneur and subsequently was promoted by President Nicolas Sarkozy to Officier de Légion d’Honneur in 2008. Dr Garnier received the Oliver R Grace Award for Distinguished Service in Advancing Cancer Research from the Cancer Research Institute in 2007. He was named to the global list of top 20 CEOs by the Best Practice Institute in 2006 and was presented with the Global Business Leadership Award from Stanford Business School, and awarded the Global Corporate Citizenship Award from AMREF (African Medical and Research Foundation) in 2005. He received the Humanitarian Award from the Sabin Vaccine Institute in 2002 and was named one of 50 "Stars of Europe" by BusinessWeek magazine and presented with the Marco Polo Award for GlaxoSmithKline's commitment to China in 2001.
Dr. Garnier holds a PhD in pharmacology and an MS in pharmaceutical science from the University of Louis Pasteur in France. As a Fulbright Scholar, he earned an MBA at Stanford University and in 2002 he was honored with the Fulbright Association's Lifetime Achievement Medal.
Martin Tolar, MD, PhD, President and Chief Executive Officer
Martin Tolar, MD, PhD, joined NormOxys as the company’s President and CEO in June 2009. Previously, Dr. Tolar worked at CoMentis, Inc., where as the Chief Scientific Officer and later Executive Vice President & Chief Business Officer, he led the company’s scientific and business growth and negotiated a landmark collaboration agreement with Astellas Pharma for CoMentis’ beta secretase platform, a transaction valued at $760 million plus future commercial and next generation product milestones.
Prior to CoMentis, Dr. Tolar held a variety of leadership positions in Clinical Development, Strategic Partnerships and Business Development divisions at Pfizer, Inc. He directed programs through all stages of clinical development and NDA submissions, and led the Pfizer Neuroscience Licensing Team to complete numerous business transactions including a record-breaking acquisition of Rinat Neurosciences (valued at $500 million) and license of the RAGE modulator platform from TransTech Pharma (valued at $155 million upfront plus development and commercial milestones).
Dr. Tolar holds an MD degree and was trained in Neurology at the Boston Medical Center, where he served as a Teaching Fellow in Neurology at the Boston University School of Medicine and as a Research Fellow at the Massachusetts General Hospital. He received a PhD in Neuroscience for his work on the role of apolipoprotein E in Alzheimer’s disease. Dr. Tolar has published a number of scientific publications in the area of Neuroscience and served as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Neurology at Yale University School of Medicine.
Dr. Tolar serves on the Board of Directors for Suven Life Sciences Ltd, a public biopharmaceutical company based in Hyderabad, India, focused on contract research and manufacturing as well as innovative drug development of novel first-in-class or best-in-class therapies through the use of GPCR targets.
Claude Nicolau, PhD, Chief Scientific Officer, Founder
Claude Nicolau, Ph.D (Berlin, Humboldt University , 1961) has worked and published on the modulation of regulated oxygen delivery by red blood cells since 1979. After demonstrating the beneficial physiological effects of low O2- affinity red blood cells in cardiac ailments, he developed a series of physical methods for the introduction into the red blood cell of non-permeant allosteric effectors of hemoglobin. Recently, these studies have been extended using a new, permeant allosteric effector of hemoglobin leading to remarkable therapeutic effects in preclinical models in such areas as congestive heart failure and cancer.
In the past Dr. Nicolau reported the first gene- transfer and expression in live animals and invented and developed the technique of protein electroinsertion in the plasma membrane of red blood cells.
Claude Nicolau has extensively published on the use of liposomes in many areas including gene transfer, targeted drug delivery and vaccines. He developed an anti-β amyloid vaccine and a monoclonal antibody against β-amyloid, which is in clinical trials.
Dr. Nicolau was a visiting Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School between 1991 and 2002 and is currently a visiting Professor at Tufts University. He has authored over 220 papers in peer-reviewed , scientific journals and was awarded over 50 patents. Claude Nicolau is the co- founder of Alantos, Inc., recently sold to Amgen, and of AC Immune (Lausanne, Switzerland) based upon his Alzheimer work.
Francesco De Rubertis, PhD, Index Ventures
Dr. DeRubertis is a Partner in the life sciences practice of Index Ventures, headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland. He joined Index in 1998 and has served on the board of numerous companies including 7TM, Addex, Bioxell, Genmab, Molecular Partners, Pangenetics and Parallele. Prior to joining Index, Francesco was involved in post-doctoral research in genetics at the Whitehead Institute, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He is also the author of several publications in international scientific journals.
Dr. DeRubertis has a BA in Genetics and Microbiology from the University of Pavia and a PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Geneva. He is also a CFA charter holder.
Michele Ollier, MD, Index Ventures
Dr. Ollier joined the Index Ventures Life Sciences team as a Partner in 2006.
From 2003, she was Director of Investment in Life Sciences at Edmond de Rothschild Investment Partners in Paris. During the previous 15 years she has acquired extensive pharmaceutical and biotechnology experience with companies such as Sanofi Pharma International, Bristol Myers Squibb France, Rhone Poulenc Rorer International/RPR Gencell in the capacities of strategy, development and commercialization of pharmaceutical products as well as at Serono International.
Dr. Ollier's knowledge base spans numerous therapeutic areas including neurology, cardiology, oncology and reproductive medicine.
Argeris “Jerry” Karabelas, PhD, Partner, Care Capital
Dr. Argeris ("Jerry") Karabelas is a Partner at Care Capital, a life sciences venture capital firm. Prior to Care Capital, Jerry was the Founder and Chairman of the Novartis BioVenture Fund. In this role he invested approximately $40 million in 14 portfolio companies including Eyetech, Indenix and Theravance. From 1998 to 2000, Jerry was Head of Healthcare and CEO of Worldwide Pharmaceuticals for Novartis AG. He had full responsibility for Novartis Pharma, Ciba Vision and Generics representing $12 billion in annual sales. Included in these responsibilities was strategic and operational leadership of R&D with a budget in excess of $2 billion. Prior to joining Novartis, Jerry was Executive Vice President of SmithKline Beecham responsible for US operations, European operations, Regulatory, and Strategic Marketing. He has been responsible for numerous pharmaceutical product approvals and new product launches, including the launch of four $1 billion products.
Jerry currently serves as Chairman of the Board for several of Care Capital's portfolio companies, including Vanda Pharmaceuticals and Cyreniac Pharmaceuticals. Jerry also serves as a Director for Inotek Pharmaceuticals. In addition to these board positions, Jerry also serves as Chairman of Human Genome Sciences.
Jerry holds a Ph.D. in Pharmacokinetics from the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy.
Conrad Bletzer, Jr., Esq., Board Observer and Founder
Conrad J. Bletzer Jr. received his Bachelor of Arts degree from Boston College in 1977. He graduated from Boston College Law School in 1980 and later that year was admitted to the Massachusetts and Federal Bar. He is a practicing attorney.
Mr. Bletzer has been general counsel for several companies, the largest of which had sales in excess of $70 million last year and has provided corporate, contract, litigation and litigation assessment services to several others. His background in contracts, Intellectual property, litigation, finance and real estate allows him to give a broad perspective in providing corporate services. He has extensive experience in forming corporations, LLC's, limited and general partnerships, and trusts, and advising them with respect to their needs thereafter. He has extensive experience in finance, negotiating contracts, employment matters, and assessing litigation risk for companies. Mr. Bletzer has represented several venture capital entities and investors.