Manus Rogan

Chair

Dr Manus Rogan is a Managing Partner and co-founder of Fountain Healthcare Partners. He has over 27 years of investment and operating experience in the life science sector in both the US and Europe. Manus earned a PhD in chemistry from the University of York (sponsored by GlaxoSmithKline) and an MBA from Trinity College Dublin.

Manus began his career in product development at GlaxoSmithkline in the UK and in 1996 joined Elan Corporation’s business development group. For four years he was responsible for licensing products and drug delivery technologies in Europe and Japan. In 2001, Manus joined Elan’s Corporate Venture Capital group in New York where he invested in private and public biotechnology companies. Investments included Sirna (acquired by Merck, 2006) and Beyond Genomics (IPO, 2011). In his 7 years at Elan, Manus concluded over twenty five investment and technology licensing transactions involving companies in the US, Europe and Japan.

Manus led Fountain’s investment in Innocoll Inc. and currently serves on the board of Neuromod Devices and PrioThera Ltd. He previously represented Fountain on the boards of Inflazome (acquired by Roche), Amarin Corporation, Opsona Therapeutics and Mainstay Medical (IPO, 2014). He was formerly Chairman of the Irish Venture Capital Association (‘IVCA’).

Dhaval Patel

Director

Dhaval is an EVP and CSO of Sana Biotechnology. He received an MD and PhD (Microbiology and Immunology) from and further clinical training in Internal Medicine, Rheumatology, Allergy, and Clinical Immunology at Duke University. Prior to joining the industry in 2006, he was an Eminent Professor of Medicine, Chief of Rheumatology, Allergy and Clinical Immunology, and Director of the Thurston Arthritis Research Center at the University of North Carolina in Chapel Hill. During a 10 year career at Novartis, he led Research in Europe and Autoimmunity, Transplantation and Inflammation Disease Area which developed the S1PR modulators fingolimid and siponimod as well as several other medicines. He was also an Entrepreneur in Residence at the Novartis Venture Fund, and serves on several biotechnology boards. Prior to joining Sana in 2024, Dhaval served as EVP and CSO of UCB.

Marten Steen

Director

Dr. Mårten Steen. Partner of HealthCap. Previously, he has worked with business development at Merck Serono focusing on both product and technology licensing. Mårten is a Medical Doctor trained at Lund University. He has pursued research in the field of protein chemistry and coagulation at Lund University and Novo Nordisk, rendering him a PhD in Clinical Chemistry. He is the author of numerous scientific papers and published in peer-reviewed journals. He has also a B.Sc. degree in Business Administration from the Lund University School of Economics and Management.

Henry Skinner

Director

Dr. Skinner is Senior Vice President, Venture at Tekla Capital Management. Prior to joining Tekla, Dr. Skinner Served as Deputy Head and Managing Director of Novartis Venture Fund. In addition, Dr. Skinner has been CEO of SelectX Pharmaceuticals and NeoGenesis Pharmaceuticals and has held positions in Business Development for Novartis Institutes for Biomedical Research, Pfizer, Pharmacia, Pharmacia & Upjohn and Lexicon Genetics. Dr. Skinner was a postdoctoral fellow at Baylor College of Medicine in the department of Human and Molecular Genetics, earned his Ph.D. in Microbiology and M.S. in Biochemistry from the University of Illinois and M.S. and B.S. in Biology/Biotechnology from Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

Lionel Carnot

Director

Lionel Carnot is a Partner at Earlybird. Before joining Earlybird in 2016, Lionel was a Managing Director at Bay City Capital after having been extensively involved in the firm’s activities as part of The Pritzker Organization. Prior to The Pritzker Organization, Lionel was a Principal at Oracle Partners, a healthcare hedge fund. He also held several positions in the pharmaceutical industry, including Product Manager for Prozac at Eli Lilly and several sales and marketing positions at Sanofi-Aventis. He was also a strategy and management consultant to the biopharmaceutical industry at Booz Allen & Hamilton, and Accenture Strategic Services. Lionel holds an MBA with Distinction from INSEAD and an M.Sc. in Molecular Biology from the University of Geneva.