Ms. Helen Maslocka is co-founder and CEO of MedCool, Inc. She has worked in marketing, business development and CEO positions for twenty five years in the medical device, biotechnology, and healthcare information technology industries with specific focus on the development and introduction of new technologies and products. She has successfully implemented corporate partnering, launch and exit strategies, has raised over $80 million in private capital and has successfully positioned companies and been part of the teams for two initial public offerings resulting in several hundred million in capital.
Previously, she served as President and CEO of CardioFocus, Inc., a disposable photonics-based medical device company where she restructured, renamed, and refocused the company as a cardiovascular firm and completed a $12 million venture round of financing. Ms. Maslocka has held executive and consulting positions with LeukoSite, Seragen, Summit Technology, Whittaker General Medical, and Massachusetts General Hospital.
Ms. Maslocka holds a BA from Boston College in psychology with biology and a Graduate Degree in Management from Harvard/Radcliffe College.
David R. Walt is Robinson Professor of Chemistry at Tufts University. After postdoctoral studies at MIT, he joined the chemistry faculty at Tufts. Professor Walt served as Chemistry Department Chairman from 1989 to 1996. Walt serves on many government advisory panels and boards including service as a member of an NIH study section and he actively participates in government advisory meetings for biodefense. He serves on two National Academy of Sciences National Research Council Committees and previously chaired a National Research Council panel on New Measurement Technologies for the Oceans. In 1999, Walt was Professor Invitee' at Ecole Normale Superieure, Paris.
Walt is the Scientific Founder of Illumina, Inc., a publicly traded, San Diego-based biotechnology company with over 300 employees pursuing next generation genotyping instrumentation. Walt has published over 150 papers, holds over thirty patents, and has given hundreds of invited scientific presentations. Walt's research interests are in the field of sensors with particular focus in the area of fiber-optic chemical sensors. His pioneering research in the field of optical sensors has led to the elucidation of fundamental principles as well as important applications of sensors.
David Walt received a B.S. in Chemistry from the University of Michigan and a Ph.D. in Chemical Biology from SUNY at Stony Brook.
Richard S. Blumberg, M.D. is the co-founder of Syntonix. Dr. Blumberg is currently a Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Chief of the Gastroenterology Division at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.
In addition, Dr. Blumberg is Director of Gastroenterology Research, and Director of the Laboratory of Mucosal Immunology at Brigham and Women's Hospital. He serves as Chairman of the National Scientific Advisory Committee for Crohn's & Colitis Foundation of America, is Co-Director of the Harvard Digestive Diseases Center and a former member of the Immunological Sciences Study Section of the National Institutes of Health. Dr. Blumberg is an elected member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation and Association of American Physicians, and is Chair of the Immunology and Microbiology Section of the American Gastroenterological Association.
Dr. Blumberg received a B.S. in Biological Sciences from Carnegie-Mellon University, an M.D. from Jefferson Medical College, and an M.B.A from Northeastern University and holds board certifications in Internal Medicine, Infectious Diseases and Gastroenterology following fellowship training at Cornell University Medical College and Harvard Medical School.
Robert Creeden is Managing Director of the Center for Innovative Ventures (CIV) at Partners Healthcare, where he oversees the creation and launching of new ventures generated from Partners innovative research discoveries.
Bob has spent more than twenty-five years focusing on commercializing new technologies and promoting emerging businesses, including fifteen years early stage venture capital investing experience and culminating in his 2004 appointment by Partners to establish the CIV. Previously, he was a general partner at Egan-Managed Capital, a $150 million dollar Boston-based venture fund, after having served as vice president of the Massachusetts Technology Development Corporation, a 25-year-old early stage venture firm that funds technology-based companies in Massachusetts. Earlier in his career, he gained strategic operating expertise as a COO/CFO with start-up ventures and as a management consultant with Control Data Business Advisors.
Bob Creeden holds an AB in Economics from Holy Cross College and an MBA from Suffolk University.
Laurence J. Blumberg, M.D. is the co-founder of Syntonix. Dr. Blumberg has extensive experience in the management, financing and development of biotechnology and medical technology companies.
In 1999, he formed Blumberg Capital Management LLC that is focused on investments in the life sciences field. Prior to that, he spent five years as Vice President, Equity Research at Alliance Capital Management, L.P. specializing in biotechnology and medical products and before that was an independent healthcare consultant to S Squared Technology, a technology hedge fund. He is also a co-founder of Cambridge Heart, Inc., a medical device firm, serves on the board of the Heart Research Institute of St. Michael's Medical Center, and is a member of the Board of Overseers of the School of Science, Brandeis University.
Dr. Blumberg received a B.A. in Physics from Brandeis University, an M.D. from Temple University School of Medicine, and an M.B.A. from Columbia University School of Business.
As head of Comerica's Technology and Life Sciences Division in the Northeast, Dianne Russell oversees all lending to Life Sciences companies - including biotech, medical devices, bioinformatics and health-related companies. She has been responsible for the establishment of Comerica's national Life Sciences practice including the hiring of professionals with advanced degrees in molecular biology and medicine to build that practice.
Russell has extensive experience in the origination, negotiation and structuring of debt financings for companies at every stage of development from early stage pre-revenue companies to mature, profitable public corporations. She has managed specialized lending groups including those dedicated to M&A, leveraged buyouts and recapitalization. Formerly a Senior Vice President and Department Executive at Bank of Boston, Russell headed that bank's leveraged buyout operations while Division Executive of Acquisition Finance. Subsequently, she ran Large Corporate Banking which encompassed the five geographical lending regions covering the United States, plus two specialty groups, Acquisition Finance and Environmental Services.
Currently a member of the Board of Directors of Morton's Restaurant Group, Inc, she has also served on the board of directors for the Boys and Girls Clubs of Boston and for the Center for the Advancement of Ethics and Character at Boston University. Russell was appointed by Massachusetts Governor William F. Weld to the Board of Directors of the Massachusetts Development Finance Agency (MDFA), the state's development bank where she was named Treasurer and served as head of the agency's credit committee. She is currently Chairman of the Financial Advisory Board of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
David Sinclair, Ph.D. is a co-founder of Sirtris Pharmaceuticals and Associate Professor of Pathology at Harvard Medical School. He has made key contributions to the scientific understanding of aging. In 1997, David identified the cause of aging in yeast, a first for any species, and in 2003 reported the discovery of a conserved master regulatory gene controlling this process. David has authored more than 20 peer-reviewed scientific publications, including several seminal papers in Nature and Science, and has received numerous awards and honors for his research.
David Sinclair performed his post-doctoral work with Dr. Leonard Guarente at MIT and holds a PhD in Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics from the University of New South Wales.
David Gottlieb is the Managing Partner of Noble Bridge Group LLC, a financial consulting company he established in early 2004. Also since 2004, Mr. Gottlieb has served as a Director of ABIOMED, a leading developer, manufacturer and marketer of medical products designed to assist or replace the pumping function of the failing heart. From 1990 to 2003, Mr. Gottlieb held various investment banking positions most recently as Global Head of the Medical Technology Corporate and Investment Banking Group of Banc of America Securities. In this role, he was responsible for the sector team covering nearly 300 companies globally in the medical device and hospital supply industry as well as the life science tools, in-vitro diagnostics and diagnostic imaging industries.
Previously, he held a number of positions overseeing investment banking for life science companies, including at UBS Investment Bank and Kidder, Peabody & Co. Incorporated. Mr. Gottlieb has completed more than $45 billion in corporate banking, investment banking and strategic advisory transactions such as mergers and acquisitions in the medical technology, biotechnology and health care services fields.
David Gottlieb's degrees include a Bachelor's degree in Economics from Connecticut College and a Master's in Business Administration from the Columbia Business School.
John Dyson is Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Millbrook Capital Management which owns Pebble Ridge Vineyards & Wine Estates, which in turn, operates wineries and commercial vineyards in New York, California and Italy.
Much of Dyson's career has been spent in public service. He created the New York tourism campaign in the 1970s when he was Commissioner of Commerce for New York state. In 1994, Mayor Rudolph Giuliani appointed him New York City Deputy Mayor for Finance and Economic Development, in which position he worked to rebuild the downtown area in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center. He served as chairman of the New York State Power Authority and of the Urban Development Corporation and state commissioner of agriculture, where he was responsible for developing the "Grown in New York" program.
John Dyson earned a bachelor of science degree from Cornell University.