Senior Management and Board of Directors

Malcolm Thomas, President and Chief Executive Officer
Mr. Thomas is an accomplished senior business executive with over 20 years experience in the biotechnology and biological markets. He has Multinational Corporation and early stage company experience at increasing levels of responsibility. He was previously Vice President of Operations for StemCo Biomedical. Prior to joining StemCo, he was Director of International Marketing for Bayer Biologicals and Vice President of Pacific Rim Operations for Becton Dickinson Biosciences. He has had over 10 years of full P&L responsibility for multiple business units with total revenues of $50 million. During his tenure with Becton Dickinson he was General Manager for Asia Pacific and lived in Singapore for 5 years. He holds a BSc.in Biochemistry (Hons.) from the University of East Anglia in the UK.

Chris English, Chairman of the Board
Chris English served as President of Biometric Imaging, a biotechnology company focusing on medical diagnostics, raising over US $15 million and successfully negotiating the sale of the company to Becton Dickinson for US $85 million in 1999. Prior to joining Biometric Imaging, as Chief Executive Officer of BioLumin, he managed the progress of this start-up development company in the fluorescence/absorbance life science research market from infancy to successful market entrance and acquisition by Molecular Dynamics. At Becton Dickinson, he was Director of Clinical Cytometry Systems, Vice-President Operations and Executive Vice-President, General Manager over a nine year career which saw the division grow under his leadership from US $6 million to US $160 million. He also served as a member of the BD corporate diagnostic strategy team. He also managed several health care companies throughout Europe and Africa. Since retiring to the Caribbean, Chris has managed cricket operations for the third largest sporting event in the world, the ICC Cricket World Cup (2007) and currently serves on the boards of Pacific BioMed LLC., US Junior Cricket, the Rotary Club of Liamuiga, Dieppe Bay Cultural Centre and was recently an Assistant Governor for Rotary District 7030. He received his B.A. (Hons.) from the University of Durham, England and is a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing (FCIM).  

Leslie M. Alexandre, Dr.P.H., Director
Dr. Leslie Alexandre advises industry, government and non-profit clients in health care and the life sciences on strategic planning, corporate positioning, business development, innovation, entrepreneurship and technology commercialization. She is also Adjunct Professor in the Department of Management, Innovation and Entrepreneurship in the Poole College of Management at North Carolina State University. From August 2002-April 2007, Dr. Alexandre was President and CEO of the North Carolina Biotechnology Center. She previously served in leadership positions for the National Cancer Institute, Oncormed, EDS and two United States Senators. Dr. Alexandre has served on more than 20 corporate, philanthropic, government and academic boards and currently is a member of the Advisory Board of The Axial Exchange, the Advisory Commission of the NC Museum of Natural Sciences, the NCSU Technology Transfer Advisory Board and the Advisory Board of the Edward P. Fitts Department of Industrial and Systems Engineering at NCSU.

Troy Knauss, Director Troy is a partner with Guardant Partners, an administrative company that organizes and manages private angel investor funds, and a member and former fund executive for the Piedmont Angel Network ("PAN"), a series of committed capital angel funds with over $15 million under management located in Greensboro, North Carolina. Troy has over 19 years of experience in family and start-up businesses. Troy's current direction with Guardant focuses on private investments in high-growth, high-technology firms. Since 2007, Troy has successfully led and completed a number of life science, medical device, and technology syndication deals, with multiple funds across the Southeast United States and with multiple funding rounds. In addition to the fund activities, In 2007, Troy was named one of the Triad's Impact Entrepreneurs by Business Leader magazine. He speaks frequently to entrepreneurs and investors on private investing, is an adjunct professor of Entrepreneurship at Wake Forest University, a faculty member for the North Carolina SBTDC's Investor-Ready Entrepreneur seminar series, and serves on a number of boards. In 2010, Troy was elected to the national Angel Capital Association board and co-Chairs the Syndication & Collaboration Committee responsible for co-investment activities throughout North America. He holds an undergraduate degree from Susquehanna University and a Masters of Business Administration degree from Wake Forest University.

Jonathan Lawrie, Ph.D., Director
Dr. Lawrie was previously Founding President and CEO of StemCo Biomedical where he successfully raised $16 million in 2 rounds of venture capital financing. Before that, he was Director of Business Development at Becton Dickinson (BD) Technologies and was head of BD's Global Biotechnology Incubation Program. Prior to BD Technologies, Dr. Lawrie was President of Cardiovascular Diagnostics, Inc. from Raleigh, NC. CVDI had a $23 million IPO in December 1995. Prior to CVDI, he was with Roche Diagnostic Systems, Gene-Trak Systems, and co-founded Codon, a successful biotechnology company that developed human diagnostic and therapeutic products. Dr. Lawrie holds a B.A. in Biology from the University of California, Irvine and a Masters and PhD in Microbiology and Immunology from the University of Washington. 

Jeremy K. Mario, Director Jeremy has served as Principal, Private Equity Investments for Mario Family Partners since 2001 and has more than 20 years of experience in the pharmaceutical and health care fields, ranging from clinical development services to marketing and research. He manages the private equity portfolio of Mario Family Partners, a diversified asset management company that specializes in early-stage biotech ventures. Jeremy has wide-ranging expertise assisting early-stage companies refine business plans and capitalization goals.

Charlton Owensby MD JD MBA, Director
Dr. Charlton Owensby is a practicing physician, attorney, and investor with a keen interest in early stage companies, especially those related to healthcare, life-science, and biotechnology. He actively promotes the need for capital for these small companies and enjoys the discovery, learning, and association with these entrepreneurs as they create real value from simple ideas.


SCIENTIFIC FOUNDERS

Dennis Brown, Ph.D., Founder & Chairman of Scientific Advisory Board
Dr. Brown received a PhD in Molecular Biology from the University of Pennsylvania in 1967. He has served as Assistant Professor of Biology at Dartmouth College, Associate Professor of Medical Pharmacology at the University of Maryland, Professor of Genetics at the University of Cologne (Germany), Professor of Microbiology, Director of the Cell Research Institute and Chair of the Division of Biological Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin. He has served as Professor and Department Head of Molecular & Structural Biochemistry at North Carolina State University since 1997. Dr. Brown is an expert in the field of virus structure assembly and function. He is author or co-author of over 100 peer reviewed research publications.

Raquel Hernandez, Ph.D. Co-founder
Dr. Hernandez received a Ph.D. in Microbiology from the University of Texas at Austin. She is Research Associate Professor of Molecular and Structural Biochemistry at North Carolina State University. Dr. Hernandez is author or co-author of 14 scientific publications. She is an expert in the field of virus assembly and function. She is co-inventor, with Dennis Brown, of the technology that is being developed by Arbovax.