Venue
Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP
1000 Marsh Road
Building 1100
Menlo Park, CA 94025-1015
Click here for Venue Directions»
Speakers Bios
Anton Gueth, Managing Director, Burrill & Company
Anton Gueth has over 20 years experience in the healthcare industry. Prior to joining
Burrill & Company, Mr. Gueth was President of Gueth Consulting, a firm specializing in
business development and alliance management in the life sciences industry. A
recognized expert in alliance management, he collaborates with Vantage Partners to
provide clients access to world class expertise in orchestrating strategic alliances for
pharmaceutical and biotech companies. As a business development consultant he
supported early-stage companies with an outsourced business development model and
also held the position of Chief Operating Officer for a startup software company,
Collaborative Drug Discovery (CDD).
Prior to establishing his own consulting firm in 2003, Mr. Gueth worked with Eli Lilly
and Company for 20 years holding a number of operational positions in corporate and
business development, general and financial management, sales and marketing. Most
notably, as Director of Alliance Management, he led Eli Lilly's efforts to become the
"pharmaceutical partner of choice."
Mr. Gueth is a member of the Board of Directors of Antares Pharma, a specialty
pharmaceutical company with an emphasis on delivery technology, and a member of the
Board of Directors of the American Liver Foundation, California Chapter.
Mike Powell, PhD, Managing General Partner, Sofinnova Ventures
Mike Powell, Ph.D., has more than 25 years of pharmaceutical development experience, and he has focused interest in clinical-stage product companies, particularly in the oncology, endocrine, and neurology areas. He joined Sofinnova Ventures as a General Partner in 1997. Prior to becoming a venture capitalist, Mike worked on 20 clinical products and authored almost 100 papers and books, including an 1,100–page treatise on vaccine design. Mike was an early investor in Actelion (SWX: ATLN), InterMune (Nasdaq: ITMN), Anesiva (Nasdaq: ANSV), Orexigen Therapeutics (Nasdaq: OREX), Seattle Genetics (Nasdaq: SGEN), and Threshold Pharmaceuticals (Nasdaq: THLD), as well as several private companies such as Ascenta and Trius Therapeutics. Mike is currently Board President of AVAC (AIDS Vaccine Advocacy Coalition), a past Advisor to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, a Strategic Advisor to One World Health, and a Founding Venture Advisory Board member of the IAVI Innovation Fund. He flies too much, but he loves it.
Mike was Group Leader of Drug Delivery at Genentech (1990–97) where his focus was developing new therapeutics. In 1987 he was part of the founding team of Cytel; as Director of Product Development, he was responsible for the company's early growth, which culminated in a successful IPO. Before this he was Scientist and Project Team Leader at Syntex Research. Mike had the honor of being the first scientist from the biotechnology industry to be elected a Fellow of the American Association of Pharmaceutical Scientists. He was also an Adjunct Professor at the University of Kansas, an Editorial Board member of J. Pharm. Sci., and a Scientific Advisor to the Controlled Release Society.
He received his Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry from the University of Toronto in 1981, and completed his post-doctorate work in Bioorganic Chemistry at the University of California, where he was subsequently a faculty member (1981–84).
Ken Song, MD, CEO, Tandem Diagnostics
Ken Song identified the core technology of Tandem Diagnostics back in 2009 while he was a venture capitalist at Venrock. Ken served as Acting CEO of Tandem in 2009 and assumed the CEO role earlier. Prior to Tandem, Ken was an investor at Venrock and led multiple investments in both public and private healthcare companies. Ken is a board certified physician, has extensive clinical and basic science research experience, and was previously a consultant at McKinsey & Company. Ken received his B.S. in Biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and his M.D. from the University of California, San Francisco.
Alex Barkas, Managing Director, Prospect Venture Partners
Alex is a Managing Director of all the Prospect Venture Partners Funds beginning in 1997. Previously, Alex was a Partner at Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (KPCB) from 1991 to 1997 where he focused on health care product company investments in the drug, device, and diagnostic sectors. Additionally, during his tenure at KPCB, Alex served as the founding CEO of two biotechnology companies, Geron, a NASDAQ listed company focused on stem cell derived product development and oncology drug development, and Connective Therapeutics, which became Connetics, a NASDAQ listed specialty pharmaceutical company.
Alex is currently Chairman of the Board of Geron (NASDAQ: GERN) and serves or has served on the Board of Directors of Amicus (NASDAQ: FOLD), Archemix, Connetics (now the Stiefel Laboratories division of GSK), Complete Genomics, Inc., NeoMend, Novacept (now NASDAQ: HOLX), SurgRx (now NYSE: JNJ), Tercica, (now Paris: IPN), Topica Pharmaceuticals, Transave, Zelos Therapeutics and several other privately held companies.
Alex received a Ph.D. in Biology from New York University and a B.A. in Biology from Brandeis University, where he currently is Chairman of the University Science Advisory Council and serves on the Board of Trustees.
Scott M. Iyama, Corporate Senior Associate, Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe LLP
Scott Iyama, a corporate managing associate in Orrick's Silicon Valley office, is a member of the Emerging Companies Group, which advises emerging companies and venture capital firms. Mr. Iyama's practice focuses on the representation of emerging growth life science and high tech companies, as well as public offerings, private venture financings and technology transactions.
Some of Mr. Iyama’s current and former clients include:
• AcroMetrix (funded by Telegraph Hill Partners).
• CELLective Dx (funded by Mohr Davidow Ventures and others).
• Facebook (funded by Accel Partners, Greylock, Meritech, Peter Thiel and others).
• Google (NASDAQ: GOOG).
• Greenplum (funded by Meritech, Sierra, Mission and others).
• Halcyon Molecular (funded by Founders' Fund).
• Laserscope (acquired by American Medical Systems Holdings).
• LS9 (funded by Flagship Ventures, Khosla Ventures and Lightspeed Venture Partners).
• Meebo (funded by Sequoia Capital).
• Medsphere (funded by Thomas Weisel Venture Partners, Azure Capital, and Wasatch Venture Fund).
• Micrus Endovascular (NASDAQ: MEND).
• PathoLase (funded by Nexus Medical Partners).
• Sharpcast (funded by Sigma, Selby and Draper Fisher Jurvetson).
• SquareOne (funded by Three Arch Partners, ONSET and others).
• Vendavo (funded by Sigma Partners, Doll Capital Management, InterWest Partners and others).
• VideoEgg (funded by August Capital and others).
Mr. Iyama has also represented Benchmark Capital, De Novo Ventures, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Maveron, Montreux Equity Partners, Telegraph Hill Partners and other venture funds in various investments.
Prior to receiving his juris doctor from Stanford Law School, Mr. Iyama performed extensive biochemical research at the University of California, San Diego and Genentech, Inc.
Mr. Iyama frequently lectures on topics related to emerging growth companies at various forums and has given guest lectures at Stanford Law School and Stanford University.
