Mohan Purushothaman, Ph.D., President, Chariman, & CEO
Mohan is a thought leader in the Pharmaceutical Pricing, Reimbursement and Market Access space. He has several years of experience in the Pharma industry followed more than a decade of work as a strategic advisor to various pharmaceutical companies. After spending 5 years at Roche where he headed the pricing and contracting group, he built a successful practice at Net Margins and went on to lead a global practice at Alliance Life Sciences. In these challenging assignments, he guided the development of strategies for a number of products across multiple therapeutic areas and markets.
He has been an active entrepreneur and responsible for giving shape to multiple business concepts at the core of new business ventures over the last decade. As a co-founder and President of Progentec Diagnostics, he is actively involved in exploring and commercializing new technologies in the diagnostic and therapeutic areas.
He holds a Ph.D. from the Johns Hopkins University with a focus on Pharmaceutical Pricing. Prior to that, he was a Research Fellow at Harvard University.
Sanjiv Sharma
Pharmaceutical executive with a blend of successful experience in large, mid-size and startups in North America and Asia, with national and global responsibility for various business functions including General Management, Sales & Marketing, Market Access & Development.
Launched two companies in US and have led product launches as well as life cycle management of major brands in both primary care and specialty space. Served as member of Executive committee and have a successful track record of developing agile and inventive business cultures capable of achieving ambitious, “big-pharma” scale marketing initiatives on thrifty budgets.
His most recent success as a Chief Commercial Officer was the US launch of Diclegis for Duchesnay, one of the top-performing new product launches of 2013, achieved through a highly effective market access initiative and ground-breaking digital strategies. His professional history reflects the ability to drive paradigm change using cost-effective and scalable strategies that fully leverage marketing resources, including virtual organization structure, KOL network activation, and skilled application of customer research.
Previously, Sanjiv served as SVP WW Commercial & Country Head for US for NicOx, a French-based pharmaceutical platform technology company, and before that, oversaw strategic marketing for Biovail. The prior 15 years were spent with Sanofi-Aventis, where Sanjiv rose from sales rep in Canada to become the Director Global Marketing, New Products Commercialization, Metabolism & Cardiovascular. There, he successfully drove global marketing strategy for Sanofi Aventis’ GLP-1 and its diabetes portfolio.
Sanjiv received BSc (Hons) from Delhi University in India and his MBA with Distinction, from the Richard Ivey School of at the University of Western Ontario, Canada.
Eldon Jupe, Ph.D., Chief Research and Laboratory Officer, clinical laboratory director
Eldon brings over 30 years of experience in biochemistry, toxicology and human genetics. He co-founded InterGenetics Inc., and served as its VP, CSO and COO and raised more than $30M in financing and grants over time. He led a team that developed OncoVue® – a proprietary test for breast cancer . Eldon graduated magna cum laude from Texas A&M University with a BS in Biochemistry and an MS in Genetics. He holds a PhD in Biochemistry from Louisiana State University and completed Postdoctoral studies at the University of Cincinnati.
Melissa Munroe, M.D., PH.D., Principal Investigator & Scientist
Dr. Melissa Munroe is an expert in basic and clinical immunology whose research has led to the development of novel strategies for measuring autoimmune disease activity.
Her work at the Oklahoma Medical Research Foundation (OMRF) as both the Director of Serum Analyte and Biomarker Core team and as a Research Associate Member has identified biomarkers for inflammation and autoantibodies in human autoimmunity by using custom assays and mathematical modeling. This work was highlighted during the American College of Rheumatology ACR/ARP Annual Meeting during the ACR 19 Spotlight Slide Deck program.
Prior to her time at OMRF, Dr. Munroe completed her postdoctoral training in the lab of Gail Bishop, Ph.D., at the University of Iowa where she identified new functions of TNF Superfamily members, including CD40 protein and its Epstein-Barr viral mimic, LMP1, and identified links between environmental exposures and the immune response as it relates to autoimmunity.
She holds both a M.D. and Ph.D. from Northwestern University - The Feinberg School of Medicine where her focus was immunology.
James Wilcox, ESq., Chief Counsel and Corporate Secretary
Jim has practiced for more than three decades in the fields of corporate, business, intellectual property, licensing, M&A and transactional law. He has represented clients ranging from startups to Fortune 100 companies, and currently focuses primarily on startup, early-stage and emerging companies in the medical diagnostics, biopharmaceutical, biotechnology and medical device fields. He regularly serves as clients’ outside general counsel, as general/intellectual property counsel to executive management and boards of directors, and as a corporate board member.
Previously, Jim was in-house general counsel/chief legal officer for two public, multi-national health care companies, and led their legal teams in successful IPO and subsequent public stock offerings and private placement financings. Earlier in his career, as the managing licensing and intellectual property counsel for one of the world’s largest bio-pharmaceutical and diagnostics companies, he and his team successfully obtained many significant patents and completed numerous major in-licensing and acquisition transactions, creating an intellectual property portfolio which was instrumental in helping the company maintain its premier position in the industry.
Mr. Wilcox has a doctorate in law and is also a registered patent attorney, holding undergraduate degrees in chemistry and physics.
Sneha Nair, Senior Manager, Operations
Sneha brings with her strong experience in HR, operations, and project management. Having led a team of business analysts in executing projects in the healthcare domain, over the years she has also worked as a research consultant with various clients in finance and healthcare. Sneha holds an MBA in Human Resource Management.
Michael F. Petruny, M.S. , Vice President, Sales & Marketing
Michael has more than 25 years of combined experience in leading company sales and marketing organizations. Additionally he has provided consulting services to a variety of life science companies. A majority of Michael’s life sciences tenure has been working with clinicians and researchers with products and services that addressed various aspects of the immune system.
Previous leadership positions include: Vice President for a major consulting firm that conducted market research and conducted marketing communications programs; National Sales Director where he had oversight of over 45 sales professionals and managers, for a best in class immunosuppressive product; Vice President of Sales and Marketing where he launched a novel diagnostics test for the autoimmune disease marketplace; Vice President of Sales where he significantly grew the sales and marketing organization, and revenues for FDA cleared transplant diagnostics tests, at two different companies.
He earned his Bachelor of Arts Degree in Economics and a Masters Degree in Marketing from Louisiana State University, where he authored numerous peer reviewed research papers in the marketing and sales discipline. Michael has also developed and successfully conducted sales and management training programs for numerous life sciences sales teams.
Arif Sorathia, Director of Digital Products
Arif, a co-founder of LupusCorner, has spent his career in data science and product development. He is a Product Strategist with a developer and solution architecture skillset with deep experience in analytics and software development. He has built predictive models and lead data science and product teams. Being the son of a physician and getting his degree in Biomedical Engineering instilled a deep passion for building tech that helps patients. Arif led the analytics and innovation practice at IBB prior to founding Karate Health. He currently co-leads Social Media initiatives relating to LupusCorner at Progentec where he is leading business and technical development efforts.
Brett Adelman, Director of Patient & Physician Engagement
Brett, a co-founder of LupusCorner, is dedicated to using technology to improve the delivery of healthcare for clinicians and patients. Both at Epic, a leading electronic medical health records company, and Nordic Consulting Partners, he re-designed and implemented workflows for specialty ambulatory clinics including rheumatology and oncology practices. He has also supported health policy efforts in Washington, D.C., lobbying on behalf of the Association of Contract Research Organizations (ACRO). Before joining Progentec, he founded Karate Health, a healthcare startup that provided custom digital tools for people living with chronic health conditions. Brett leads product development and customer acquisition.
Ryan Newhardt, Clinical Study Coordinator
Ryan began his research career as an undergraduate researcher developing nanotechnology for the delivery of chemotherapy agents. He also gained clinical experience working as a Medical Assistant. Prior to joining the Progentec TM team, Ryan spent three years focused on patient recruitment and clinical trial reporting at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center including managing the hospital’s participation in ‘Project: Every Child,’ the largest study of its kind aimed at enrolling all newly-diagnosed or relapsed pediatric oncology patients into an international registry. Ryan has a BS in Zoology from Oklahoma State University.