Meet the Mentors

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Tables 1 - 6

Becca Levin, Head of Business Development and Strategy, Leash Bio

Becca is a scientist turned strategist who takes a hands on approach to business development, corporate strategy and capital formation. Becca trained at the intersection of chemistry, biology & pharmacology, earning a PhD from UCSF. From there she transitioned to the business side of life sciences, with a fellowship at VC firm Apple Tree Partners and as a consultant at Boston Consulting Group. She then focused on corporate & pipeline strategy for AI/ML enabled biotechs. She spent 4 years at Recursion defining pipeline strategy, supporting the 2021 IPO and subsequent public reporting. At Eikon Therapeutics she supported the recent $100M series C, clinical strategy & helped launch a commercialization effort for their proprietary microscopy technology. She is now Head of Business Development and Strategy at Leash Bio, a seed-stage biotech harnessing ML for medicinal chemistry.

Chad Testa, CEO, Curza

Chad joined Curza after 12+ years at Echelon Biosciences where his industrial career began. Most recently, Dr. Testa served as Senior Vice President of Research & Development after assuming positions of increasing responsibility from an initial role as Research Scientist. He has developed a diverse, multi-disciplinary chemical biology skill set, with particular emphasis on biological assay development for targeted biomarkers in antibacterial discovery, oncology and inflammatory disease pathways. Leading teams of scientists including external collaborators, Chad was responsible for administering multi-institutional, multi-disciplinary collaborations. Of particular importance was establishment of a proprietary antibacterial discovery platform targeting the methylerythritol phosphate (MEP) pathway for isoprenoid biosynthesis that included development and implementation of a cascade of assays, including a whole-cell phenotypic screening platform to identify pathway-specific leads, biochemical and MIC assays that were used to identify two series exhibiting MEP pathway selectivity. Additional efforts include development of a non-invasive imaging agent to visualize tumors, numerous product launches, leading efforts that resulted in awarding of federal grants exceeding $8M and creation of synergistic relationships. Dr. Testa has served as PI or co-PI on grants awarded by NIAID, DTRA, NCI, FDA and NSF and participates as a reviewer for NIAID study sections focused on antibacterial discovery/development, the NSF SBIR program and the state of Utah. Chad received a Bachelor’s degree from Ithaca College and a Master’s degree in Chemistry studying a member of the lipoxygenase family of enzymes. His PhD in Chemistry was obtained from the University of Utah working with Prof. C. Dale Poulter studying isoprenoid pathways, including the MEP pathway.

Faith Chamas, Program Manager, R&D, Stryker

Faith Chamas is a seasoned professional with over a decade of experience in the medical device industry. She has over a decade of experience in designing, commercializing, and manufacturing class II and III medical devices. Faith is known for her strong leadership skills, guiding teams to success and setting high standards for performance. She has a solid technical background and a strategic mindset, which have been instrumental in driving successful product launches and managing complex operational challenges. Faith holds design patents in atherectomy systems and fracture prevention in implantable devices, highlighting her dedication to advancing medical technology.

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Terry Hudson, Executive Director, MSAT and Manufacturing Operations, Denali Therapeutics

Terry lead the the Manufacturing Science and Technology organization in Genentech's South San Francisco biologics production facility, in which clinical and commercial drug substance and drug product were produced. Most recently, he joined Denali Therapeutics as their Executive Director, MSAT and Manufacturing Operations. He has a Ph.D. in chemical engineers from the University of Texas.

Marissa Saunders, Senior Director of Data Science, Recursion

With over 15 years in the field of data science, statistics, analytics, and technology, Marissa Saunders excels in developing and applying machine learning products to complement how we discover and learn new things. In her tenure as a data scientist and data science leader at Recursion Pharmaceuticals, she has applied data science tools and methods to revolutionize pharmaceutical discoveries. She leads teams that work cross-functionally to find new ways to industrialize the drug discovery process.  Over the last 3 years, Marissa has worked on teams that focus on applying a range of data science tools, ranging from relatively simple statistical models to more cutting-edge deep learning and foundation models, in a pragmatic and applied way to accelerate insights around discovering medicines. Marissa also has experience in natural language processing and inferring semantic relationships, having worked extensively with both neural network-based and statistical language models. Her capabilities stretch far beyond the technical. She has a proven record of effective collaboration with diverse teams, including product managers, biologists, chemists, biochemists, software engineers, C-suite executives, and L&D professionals. An alumnus of the University of Chicago, Marissa earned her Ph.D. degree in Chemistry, focusing on protein biophysics and computational simulation. She continued her studies at the University of Utah with a post-doctoral focus on computational models and CryoEM images for membrane folding proteins before abandoning academia for the then-burgeoning field of data science.

Kelly Hoon, Director Global Segment Marketing - Infectious Disease & Microbiology, Illumina

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Tables 7 - 11

Leah Frautschy, Vice President, Clinical Manufacturing, Denali Therapeutics

Leah Frautschy is the Vice President, Clinical Manufacturing for Denali.  She is responsible for building and leading Denali’s clinical manufacturing capability in Salt Lake City.Leah has over 25 years of experience in process development, manufacturing, facility engineering and senior leadership roles in the biotech industry.  Her broad background includes initiatives in quality improvement and extensive health authority interactions.  Her most recent role before joining Denali was the Senior Director of Engineering for Genentech’s Clinical Supply Center facility recently completed in South San Francisco, CA. Leah holds a Master of Engineering in Professional Practice degree from University of Wisconsin, Madison and a Bachelor of Chemical Engineering degree from the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities.

Michaela Hatch, Senior Scientist, Recursion

Michaela is a biologist passionate about helping patients through improving drug discovery. After graduating from Boston University with a B.A. in Biochemistry and Molecular Biology, she worked as a lab manager and researcher in Dr. Christopher Hughes' lab at UC Irvine, developing Vascularized, Organ-on-a-Chip technology as well as running preclinical, oncology in vivo studies for a local pharmaceutical company. She has over 10 years of experience in laboratory settings studying vascular, fibrotic and oncology diseases. In 2019, Michaela joined Recursion as a research associate developing in vitro disease models for preclinical studies. Today, Michaela has transitioned out of the lab, now reviewing and nominating potential programs, as well as enhancing Recursion's industrialized drug discovery pipeline. During her time at Recursion, she has navigated career development from research associate to scientist and now senior scientist in managerial, mentor and individual contributor roles.  She is the co-founder of Women at Recursion, an employee resource group advocating and supporting women in STEM inside and outside of Recursion, including initiating a Returnship program that is currently underway, and represents Recursion as a member of the Biohive WITS leadership committee. In her free time, Michaela is a working parent of two amazing boys, and coaches volleyball through Cottonwood High School and her own volleyball club for women and youth.

Josh Jones, Medical Affairs and Education Associate, Boston Scientific

Josh Jones is a Medical Affairs and Education Associate at Boston Scientific in Interventional Oncology and Embolization. Prior to his current role, Josh was Principal Scientist and Lead Biomedical Engineer at Fluidx Medical Technology, a Utah-based medical device start-up. In these roles, he has been involved in the design, execution, and dissemination of results from both clinical and preclinical studies. He received a PhD in 2017 from the University of Utah in Bioengineering. His graduate work focused on biomimetic novel materials for embolization. He lives in Sandy, UT with his family and enjoys skiing, running, and exploring the great outdoors in his free time.

Kim Dobaj, Senior R&D Engineering, Stryker

Kim Dobaj has 25+ Years in the Medical Device industry with various leadership roles in R&D, Operations, Manufacturing Engineering, Project Management and Supply Chain. She has enjoyed learning and contributing to a variety of medical device industries and companies including Stryker, CONMED, DePuy Synthes, IDEXX Labs and DJ Orthopedics and currently, works at Stryker Neurovascular.  Kim is a practitioner of Lean and Six Sigma methodologies and has been instrumental in transforming several manufacturing sites.  She is passionate about learning, developing people and delivering results and is an active leader in Stryker Women’s Network.  Kim developed and taught a practical course on New Product Development at University of Colorado, Denver, earned a M.S. in Material Science and Engineering from the University of Utah and a B.S. in Pre-medicine from the University of Nevada, Reno. She and her family love to be outdoors and are happy to be in Utah.

Mike Graczyk, Director of Operations, Molecular Division, ARUP Labs

Mike Graczyk has been an Operations Director in the field of medical laboratory testing for the past 19 years. His area of focus is in molecular diagnostics in the disciplines of Infectious Disease, Hematopathology, Anatomical Pathology, Inherited and Cancer Genetics. He has over 10 years in progressive management roles and responsibilities, and currently oversee the Molecular Division at ARUP Laboratories. He holds an MBA from the University of Utah.

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Tables 12 - 17

Lisa Carricaburu, VP of Marketing, ARUP Labs

Lisa Carricaburu is vice president of marketing at ARUP Laboratories, a position in which she has leadership responsibility for market research, clinical product management, test and corporate marketing, internal communications, and public relations in addition to medical writing and editing. Lisa joined ARUP in 2015 as managing editor of the Decision Support Team made up of the medical writers and editors responsible for ARUP Consult, Test Fact Sheets, ordering recommendations, and other medical/educational content. She led that team for nearly five years before becoming director of marketing in 2020 and VP of marketing in 2024.  Before joining ARUP, Lisa oversaw marketing and technical publications for the Utah Educational Savings Plan (now my529). Prior to that role, she was managing editor and held numerous other newsroom leadership positions at The Salt Lake Tribune and other newspapers for more than 25 years.

Clark Cahoon, VP Industry Development, 47G

Before joining the team at 47G, Clark worked at Salt Lake City's Department of Economic Development where he focused on Mayor Mendenhall's Tech Lake City initiative. He helped promote the industry through partnerships and workforce development policy and programs that elevated the life science industry. Prior to his work at Salt Lake City, Clark worked at Utah’s Governor’s Office of Economic Development where he managed the Technology Commercialization and Innovation Program (TCIP) and as the Life Science Industry Director. TCIP provided competitive grants to early stage companies across a variety of industries to accelerate commercialization and create durable jobs. Clark also worked as an International Trade Specialist at World Trade Center Utah where he guided small and medium-sized businesses in entering global markets by helping them navigate complex international rules and providing advice on logistics, marketing, legal matters and finance. In his free time Clark enjoys reading, camping and doing home renovation projects.

Craig Mosman, Chief Business Development Officer, Seek Labs

Craig Mosman is currently the Chief Business Development Officer at Seek Labs. Craig earned his J.D. from the University of Idaho and a B.A. in Education from Utah State University. He began his career in the biotech business as the President and CEO of CancEr2, Inc, a company that developed a novel treatment for prostate cancer. He also served as President and CEO of ClonE2, which was a spinoff from that company. Later, as President of Kirkland Biosciences for more than a decade, Mosman led a company which focused on early investment in, or acquisition of early stage technologies, funding the development of technologies, and licensing and sale of the technologies. In that capacity he has served as CEO of 8 different medical device or biotechnology companies in the past 20 years, leading each one to a strategic acquisition, IPO, or sale. He has been personally involved in conducting significant international business in China, Asia, Europe, and Africa. He has raised over $100M in funding for different companies. He is committed to improving global health.

Cindy Dunkle, Chief People Officer, Denali Therapeutics

Cindy Dunkle serves as Chief People Officer at Denali.  In this position, she oversees all aspects of Human Resources, Facilities and Environmental Health and Safety. Cindy has been instrumental in the successful growth of the company from inception, positioning science and leadership as a focus in attracting and developing top talent.  She drives HR strategy, has created and fosters a culture of learning and innovation to enable each individual to achieve their unique potential. Cindy has 30 years of experience with an emphasis in compensation, organizational growth and development and talent acquisition. Prior to Denali, Cindy has held leadership roles across human resources and organizational development functions at Genentech/Roche, Avalanche Biotechnologies, and other BioPharma’s. Cindy obtained a B.S. in psychology from Metropolitan State University.

Teresa Anderson Myers, Director of Engineering, Recursion

Aimee Edwards, Executive Director, BioHive

Aimee Edwards is the Executive Director of BioHive leading the organization’s mission to brand, build and bring together the life science and healthcare innovation ecosystem. She has a broad range of leadership experience building community, branding and policy. Prior to joining BioHive, she served as the External Affairs Director at Western Governors University. In this role, she launched the university’s first community affairs department which was vital in securing national partnerships, expanding social impact and advancing education and workforce development programs. She previously held multiple positions of increasing responsibility at the Utah Governor’s Office and Utah Governor’s Office of Economic Opportunity including leading strategic outreach, communications and marketing, and legislative strategy.

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