Matthew Hobson, PhD is a Principal at Catalio Capital Management. Matthew joined Catalio at its founding in 2020 and primarily covers investments in therapeutics and diagnostics for their venture and private credit strategies. He currently represents Catalio as a board observer of multiple companies including Anagenex, Iambic Therapeutics, Octant, and Pink Dx. Prior to joining Catalio, Matthew was a Postdoctoral Fellow at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine where he also earned a PhD in biophysics and biophysical chemistry, studying proteins involved in DNA replication and repair. Matthew holds a B.S. in chemistry and physics from Emory University.
Team Category: Board of Directors
Brian Liu, MD, is a Managing Director at Longitude Capital. Dr. Liu serves on the board of directors at CG Oncology and is a board observer at Quanta Therapeutics, Rivus Pharmaceuticals, and Zenas BioPharma. He previously served as a board observer at Endeavor Biomedicines, Inflazome (acquired by Roche), Talaris Therapeutics (TALS), and Vera Therapeutics (VERA). Dr. Liu holds an MD from Stanford School of Medicine and a BS in Biomedical Engineering from The Johns Hopkins University.
Maria Fardis, PhD, is a Venture Partner at Frazier Life Sciences and is the Chair of Board of Directors at Obsidian Therapeutics. She is a member of the Board of Directors at CRISPR Therapeutics as well as Quanta Therapeutics. She has over 20 years of scientific and management experience in public and private companies. Dr. Fardis previously served as President and Chief Executive Officer at Iovance Biotherapeutics, a publicly traded Biotechnology company. As CEO at Iovance, she led the transformation from an early-stage development company to a company with late-stage cell therapy programs for the treatment of solid tumors. Prior to Iovance, Dr. Fardis served as the Chief Operating Officer of Acerta Pharma B.V., where she worked on the development of Calquence® until the company’s acquisition by AstraZeneca. Prior to that, she worked at Pharmacyclics, Inc. She was a key contributor in the creation of a broad clinical program leading to global approvals for Imbruvica® in multiple hematologic malignancies. She served as Chief of Oncology Operations and Alliances at Pharmacyclics. Before Pharmacyclics, Dr. Fardis held increasing senior positions in medicinal chemistry and the project and portfolio management at Gilead Sciences, Inc., during which time she was involved with different therapeutic areas including antivirals, oncology, and cardiovascular therapeutics and worked on the development and life cycle management of Letairis®.
Maria received her PhD in Organic Chemistry from the University of California, Berkeley and her B.S. summa cum laude, in chemistry from the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. She also holds an M.B.A., received with the highest honors, from Golden Gate University.
Lisa Olson, PhD served as Chief Scientific Officer and Head of Research of Magenta Therapeutics providing strategic direction, oversight and execution for the company’s research and discovery efforts. Dr. Olson is an experienced senior-level pharmaceutical executive, with more than 20 years of experience in research and drug discovery. She joined Magenta following 15 years in leadership positions at the AbbVie Bioresearch Center, most recently as Vice President, Immunology Discovery and Site Head, where she was responsible for all immunology discovery scientific and portfolio decisions, including new target approval, project advancement and licensing opportunities. Under her leadership, 15 molecules advanced into clinical development, including Upadacitinib that launched last year as Rinvoq™. Prior to AbbVie, she served as a Research Fellow and Group Leader in Inflammation & Immunology at Pfizer, Inc. She began her career as an Assistant Professor at Washington University School of Medicine, following a post-doctoral cardiovascular fellowship at the University of Chicago. Dr. Olson holds a Ph.D. from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and a Bachelor of Science from Iowa State University
David is a General Partner at Longwood Fund. Previously, David was co-founder and Chief Innovation Officer at PureTech Health, (LSE: PRTC), where he focused on biotech venture creation and investing. David has served as founding CEO of multiple biotech companies, including Vor Biopharma (NASDAQ:VOR), Pyxis Oncology, Be Biopharma, Vedanta Biosciences, Endra Life Sciences Inc. (NASDAQ: NDRA), and Entrega Biosciences, and co-founded ResTORbio (NASDAQ: TORC). Prior to that David worked in biopharma strategy consulting at Boston Consulting Group and Vertex Partners, and in R&D at P&G Pharmaceuticals. He received his M.B.A. from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business and holds a B.A. in biology from Cornell University.
Christoph Westphal, MD, PhD, is co-founder and General Partner of Longwood Fund and has spent 20 years as a life sciences CEO, entrepreneur, and investor. Companies founded by Christoph have developed and received FDA approval for important drugs, including the first RNAi therapy; for currently incurable cancers; the largest-selling heparin in the United States; a therapy for MS; and several experimental medicines: for cystic fibrosis, for anemia, for serious inflammatory disorders, and for serious neurological illnesses such as MS.
Christoph has been the co-founder, CEO, and lead investor of six biotechnology companies that have completed initial public offerings including Momenta Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: MNTA), Alnylam Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: ALNY), Acceleron Pharma, Inc. (NASDAQ: XLRN), Sirtris Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (NASDAQ: SIRT, acquired by GSK in 2008), Verastem (NASDAQ: VSTM), and TScan Therapeutics. Dr. Westphal is also co-founder of Longwood portfolio companies Alnara Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Eli Lilly) and Axial Biotherapeutics; and co-founded Concert Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: CNCE).
Christoph earned his MD from Harvard Medical School and Ph.D. in genetics from Harvard University; and he graduated with a B.A. summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa from Columbia University. Dr. Westphal has served or currently serves as a member or director of the Boston Commercial Club, the Biotechnology Industry Organization’s (BIO) Emerging Companies Section Governing Board, the Board of Fellows of Harvard Medical School, and the Board of Trustees of the Boston Symphony Orchestra.
Dan Janney is the Managing Partner of Alta Partners. Dan Janney joined Alta Partners at its founding in 1996. He has nearly 25 years of successful early-stage investing experience in life sciences. Dan’s focus on working with talented entrepreneurs to create companies around novel insights in biology and new approaches to drug discovery has led to the funding and development of 35 companies. Prior to Alta, Dan was a senior investment banker at Montgomery Securities.
Dan is currently on the board of directors of several public and private companies, including Allakos (NASDAQ:ALLK), Be Biopharma, Curasen Therapeutics, ImmuneID, Krystal Biotech (NASDAQ:KYRS), Lassen Therapeutics, Novome Biotechnologies, and Prolacta Bioscience. In addition, he led Alta’s investments in Astex Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Supergen), Cellective (acquired by Medimmune), ChemGenex (ASX:CXS acquired by Cephalon), CoTherix (NASDAQ:CTRX acquired by Actellion), Definity Health (acquired by United Health), Dynavax (NASDAQ:DVAX), Endonetics (acquired by Medtronic), Esperion Therapeutics (NASDAQ:ESPR), Ilex Oncology (NASDAQ:ILXO acquired by Millennium Pharmaceuticals), InterMune (NASDAQ:ITMN acquired by Roche), LJL Biosystems (NASDAQ:LJLB acquired by Molecular Devices), Mako Surgical (NASDAQ:MAKO acquired by Stryker) and Triangle Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ:VIRS acquired by Gilead).
Dan is a member of The President’s Council of the J. David Gladstone Institutes and the chair of the Board of Directors of the California Academy of Sciences. He also serves on the Board of Regents of Georgetown University. He holds a B.A. from Georgetown University and a Master of Business Administration from the Anderson School at the University of California, Los Angeles.
Jamie Topper, M.D., Ph.D., has more than 25 years of experience working with entrepreneurs to found and build successful therapeutics-focused companies. He is a Managing General Partner of Frazier Healthcare Partners’ Life Sciences team. Throughout his 14 years as a General Partner, Jamie has invested across over 35 companies encompassing a broad spectrum of life science and biopharmaceutical companies.
Jamie has led and served as a board member for many of Frazier’s successful life sciences investments, including Acerta Pharma BV (sold to AstraZeneca), Calistoga Pharmaceuticals (co-founder, sold to Gilead Sciences), Mavupharma (sold to AbbVie), Rempex (sold to The Medicines Company), Incline (co-founder, sold to The Medicines Company), Alnara (sold to Lilly), Portola (co-founder, NASDAQ: PTLA), CoTherix (sold to Actelion), and Threshold (NASDAQ: THLD). He currently represents Frazier on the boards of Allena Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: ALNA), Alpine Immune Sciences (NASDAQ: ALPN), Amunix Pharmaceuticals, AnaptysBio (NASDAQ: ANAB), Aptinyx (NASDAQ: APTX), and Phathom Pharmaceuticals. He is also a board observer for Alcresta Therapeutics and Sojournix.
Prior to joining Frazier, Jamie was the head of cardiovascular R&D at Millennium Pharmaceuticals and ran Millennium San Francisco (formerly COR Therapeutics). Before the merger of COR and Millennium, he served as the Vice President of Biology at COR and was responsible for all research activities. He served on the medical school faculties at Stanford and Harvard Medical School prior to joining COR.
Jamie received his M.D. and Ph.D. in Biophysics from Stanford and holds a B.S. from the University of Michigan.