The promise of personalized healthcare has been evident for many years, however there are many barriers that prevent the field from realizing its true potential. The panelists will discuss how technology can impact personalized healthcare across the complete value chain on patient experience, including improving access to diagnostics and patient history, and examine challenges in scaling current technology to realize this promise.

Panelists

DR. ALEXANDRA GONCALVES

CMO Precision Diagnostics, Philips

Alexandra Goncalves is the Chief Medical Officer for Philips Precision Diagnosis Business, a position held since March 2021. Dr. Goncalves provides functional leadership for clinical innovation and clinical strategy, working closely and collaboratively with business, research and functional leaders across the organization, as well as exploring inorganic growth opportunities. Dr. Goncalves joined Philips in 2016 as Sr. Medical Director for the Ultrasound business and was instrumental in driving the success of that business by success by providing clinical insights and strategic direction, and by developing impactful partnerships through by fostering relationships with clinical, scientific, regulatory and marketing leaders worldwide. In 2019, she joined Philips Chief Medical Office where she led clinical strategy for Cardiology and served as Head of the Medical Office for Personal Health. Dr. Goncalves started her career as an academic cardiologist in Portugal and Spain and her experience includes research in epidemiology and clinical trials in the Cardiovascular Department at the Brigham and Women’s Hospital/ Harvard Medical School (HMS). She earned a master’s in medical sciences from HMS, and while working as a clinical cardiologist, she earned a doctorate degree (PhD). Her work drove the refinement of the use of echocardiography in transcatheter structural heart interventions. Dr. Goncalves is an internationally recognized thought leader, educator, author, and editor with a business acumen and an extensive record of multi-disciplinary medical collaborations. She serves as Affiliate Professor of Medicine in Portugal and has been awarded several prizes for her work and achievements, including the prestigious Senior Clinical Research and Career Development Award from HMS and Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology.

MATT RIORDAN

Chief Strategy Officer, Putnam Associates

Matt is Partner at Putnam Associates and leads Putnam’s Commercial Strategy practice area. As a member of the firm’s leadership team Matt has helped to drive the growth of Putnam’s practice area capabilities and human capital across the US and Europe. He has led or co-led numerous internal thought-leadership and capability building initiatives around emerging industry topics, including orphan and pediatric disease development strategies, patient engagement, and commercial planning for the emerging gene and cellular therapy landscape. In his nearly twenty years at Putnam Matt has advised clients ranging from venture backed biotech to Fortune 100 biopharma companies, covering nearly every major therapeutic area. His recent client advisory work has been primarily focused on new product development and commercialization in the Hematology/Oncology space.

JONATHAN BEER

Diagnostics Strategic Intelligence Lead, Worldwide Commercial & Portfolio Strategy, Oncology Business Unit, Novartis

Jonathan Beer is the Diagnostics Strategic Intelligence Lead in the Worldwide Precision Diagnostics Center of Excellence at Novartis. He has been with Novartis since 2011 and has supported multiple Phase III clinical trials of investigational new drugs which employed diagnostic assays across technology and sample types to select patients for enrollment. Through these development programs he has contributed to 7 Pre-Market Approval submissions to the US FDA for Companion Diagnostic Assays and was the Lead for the therascreen PIK3CA RGQ PCR Kit, the Companion Diagnostic Assay for the breast cancer precision medicine therapy alpelisib. In addition to clinical support, Jonathan has led a research lab identifying new and emerging technologies, performs feasibility testing of selected platforms or vendors, and makes recommendations on which assays will provide the highest impact exploratory biomarker data from precious clinical trial samples to Novartis drug development teams. As the Diagnostic Strategic Intelligence Lead, he develops relationships with key diagnostic development partners, leads summary reports of major Hematology and Oncology congresses from a Precision Medicine viewpoint, and oversees diagnostic competitive intelligence market landscape research to inform drug development programs at Novartis. Jonathan has over 20 years of experience in the medical device, diagnostics and pharmaceutical development field.

DANIEL ELBAUM, Ph.D.

Chief Scientific Officer, QurAlis

Daniel (Dan) Elbaum, PhD, is a drug discovery and development leader with more than 21 years of experience. He thrives on making new discoveries and connections and has made significant contributions in the fields of oncology, inflammation, and orphan diseases. He has worked in large organizations including Pfizer and Amgen, as well as several start-up companies including Kinetix Pharmacueticals and FoldRx Pharmaceuticals (acquired by Pfizer). He was senior director, chemistry and portfolio management, and co-head of the research and non-clinical development group at Retrophin. To keep abreast of cutting-edge research, he actively maintains close ties with the academic and start-up communities.

Dan earned his PhD and undergraduate degrees in chemistry from Harvard University, and conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Pennsylvania. An inventor on more than 25 patents and an author on more than 15 peer-reviewed publications, Dan is a mentor in the Kindle Mentors Program at Boston University and a longstanding member of the American Chemical Society and the Association for the Advancement of Science.

Moderator

PROFESSOR CHARLES COONEY

Professor Emeritus, Biomedical Engineering, MIT

Charles L. Cooney is the Robert T. Haslam (1911) Professor of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering, Emeritus in the Department of Chemical Engineering at MIT and founding Faculty Director, Emeritus of the Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation. His academic career has focused on biotech and pharma process design, operation, economics and control; continuous processing has been a reoccurring theme throughout his research. He has been involved as founder, advisor or board member of over 25 companies and currently sits on the Boards of Directors of Boyd Technologies, Codiak Bioscience, Innovent Biologics (1801.HK), Elektrofi, GreenLight Bioscience, Hovione, Iterative Scopes, LayerBio, and Levitronix Technologies. He was a member of the FDA Pharmaceutical Sciences Advisory Committee 2003-2006 and chair from 2005-2006. Prof. Cooney's research and teaching interests span a range of topics in biochemical engineering, pharmaceutical manufacturing and technological innovation. He has published over 250 research papers, over 25 patents and co-authored or edited 5 books including Development of Sustainable Bioprocesses: Modeling and Assessment, Wiley Press 2006. His teaching has focused on bioprocess development and manufacturing and technological innovation and is interested in the process of stimulating technological innovation and its translation from the university into new company creation. In addition, he is Trustee Emeritus of Boston Ballet, Advisor Emeritus of the Boston Symphony Orchestra and Trustee of the Leventhal Map and Education Center.