Washington State Life Science Summit

Dr. Alexandre is President and CEO of Life Science Washington (LSW) and Executive Director of LSW Institute. LSW connects its hundreds of members to each other and to talent, funding, partners and essential business services. The association promotes policies that strengthen the environment for ground-breaking research and product development that improves and saves lives. A 30-year veteran of the health care and life science industries, Dr. Alexandre received her Doctor of Public Health from UCLA. Her career includes leadership roles in companies ranging in size from startup to Fortune 500, prominent research institutions and non-profit organizations, and as senior staff for two U.S. senators.

Albert is a Managing Partner of Frazier’s Life Sciences team. He joined the firm in 2021 and has over 20 years of experience investing in public and private biopharmaceutical and medical device companies.

Albert was previously a Managing Partner at Vivo Capital. He currently serves on the boards of Ascendis Pharma A/S (NASDAQ: ASND) and KalVista Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: KALV), and has previously served on the boards of Aclaris Therapeutics (NASDAQ; ACRS), Biohaven Pharmaceuticals (NYSE: BHVN), and many other private and public biopharmaceutical companies.
Albert is a co-founder of the annual Dermatology Summit and Dermatology Innovation Forum. He also worked at Oracle Corporation in pharmaceutical consulting and at the Palo Alto VA Hospital as a biomedical engineer.

Mitch Horowitz has a strong record of accomplishment in technology-based economic development where he has worked as a principal economic development consultant, high ranking state development official and as an executive in a fast-growing clinical trials informatics company and mezzanine finance group.

Mitch served until December 2015 as Vice President & Managing Director of the Technology Partnership Practice (TPP) at Battelle, the world’s largest independent, non-profit R&D organization. He now is a Principal and Managing Director of TEConomy Partners, LLC., which transitioned the full capabilities of Battelle TPP into a new independent organization.

Mitch has been a national leader in developing bioscience cluster strategies dating back to his work as the consultant who developed Maryland’s widely acclaimed biotechnology strategy in the early 1990’s. Mr. Horowitz then joined the State of Maryland with the responsibility for implementing that strategy as Technology Advisor to the Secretary of Economic and Employment Development.

Mitch has developed a strong track record in advancing numerous biosciences development strategies and specialized assessments at the state and regional level, including in Arizona, Georgia, Indiana, Los Angeles, Massachusetts, Maryland, Memphis, North Carolina, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Utah, and Washington State. He also has authored national studies with the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA) on best practices and international competitive issues, as well as with the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) on state biosciences development trends, STEM education and industry-university partnerships in translational research.

Additional development experience includes positions for the Governor’s Office in New York, the City of New York, and the Corporation for Enterprise Development (recently rebranded as Prosperity Now). Mitch is a frequent speaker on technology-based economic development.

Mitch holds a Master’s in Public Policy from the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a B.S. from Cornell University.

Kelly is a Managing Director in the Healthcare Investment Banking Group at Wedbush PacGrow and Head of the Biopharma practice. Kelly joined Pacific Growth Equities in 2004 and has completed over 350 transactions with the firm raising over $38 billion. Prior to Wedbush, Kelly worked at ICOS (now part of Eli Lilly) on Cialis and the PDE4 program. She is a member of the Intellectual Property Committee at the Benaroya Research Institute as well as the Board of Directors for the Retinal Degeneration Fund, a not-for-profit focused on making venture philanthropy investments on behalf of the Foundation Fighting Blindness. Kelly holds an AB in Molecular Biology from Princeton University where she completed her thesis under the direction of Dr. Thomas Shenk, the Elkins Professor in the Life Sciences and former board member of Merck & Co.

Agustin Mohedas, Ph.D. is a Research Analyst at Janus Henderson Investors focused primarily on stocks in the biotechnology sector, a position he has held since 2019. Before joining the firm, Dr. Mohedas was a senior analyst at Eventide Asset Management, working on the Healthcare and Life Sciences Fund from 2017. Prior to this, he was an analyst with RA Capital Management, a long/short hedge fund focused on biotechnology, from 2014.

Dr. Mohedas received his bachelor of science degree in biomedical engineering from Texas A&M University, graduating summa cum laude. He also earned a Ph.D. in medical engineering and medical physics from the Harvard-MIT Program in Health Sciences and Technology. His Ph.D. research focused on drug development for a rare genetic disease, resulting in multiple patents and publications. He has 7 years of financial industry experience.

Russ Read has worked in the bioscience industry for over thirty - five years. He was formerly an executive with the Burroughs Wellcome and Glaxo Wellcome companies, heavily involved with the commercial development of antivirals for HIV illness like AZT and 3TC and was CEO of the Kucera Pharmaceutical Company- a bio-pharmaceutical company. He has led a national biotechnology workforce effort for sixteen years called the National Center for the Biotechnology Workforce (NCBW), based in Winston-Salem is a part of North Carolina’s Community College System and Forsyth Technical Community College which focuses on achieving best practices for bioscience workforce training. Forsyth Tech, won a $15 million US DOL Trade Adjustment Assistance grant looking at building biosciences workforce skill standards and credentials. Russ was the consortium’s Project Director from start to finish in October 2016. He was the Principal Investigator for the NSF ATE Project grant named the Biosciences Industry Fellowship Program and is the Principal Investigator for another NSF ATE Project grant called Biomedical Emerging Technology Applications or BETA Skills, at the interface between biomedical devices and tissue engineering, and most recently became a CO-PI of InnovATEBIO, an NSF ATE Biotech Education Center based out of Austin. He currently serves as a Past-Chair of the Advisory Committee for the NC Biotech Center’s Piedmont Triad regional office and is a Director of NCBIO. He also served on the National Visitor’s Committee of Bio-Link and AC2 Bio-Link Regional Center, Austin TX, an advisor to the NSF ATE NBC2 Bio-manufacturing program and a member of the workforce committee for the National Institute for Innovation in Manufacturing Biopharmaceuticals or NIIMBL. Russ has been twice recognized for his work by the North Carolina Biotechnology Center’s TRIAD BIONIGHT for community support and service and for academic excellence.

Michael Schutzler is an entrepreneur, engineer, science buff, and first generation immigrant. He is the CEO of the Washington Technology Industry Association (WTIA) serving more than 1200 member companies.

Before joining WTIA, Michael led the merger of Livemocha – a community of 17 million language learners – with the popular education software company Rosetta Stone. He also co-founded Freeshop which had its IPO during the internet bubble, built Classmates.com into the first profitable social media application, led online marketing at Monster.com, and built the online gaming division at RealNetworks into a global leader.

As a successful Internet entrepreneur, investor, and executive coach, Michael has personally invested in more than thirty startups, served as coach and advisor to more than 100 executives, and has raised over $100M in private and public financing.

He serves on several boards including PBS affiliate KCTS9/Crosscut, serves as a Dharma Teacher in the Kwan Um School of Zen, and is an endurance athlete.

Michal Silverberg is a Managing Director at the Novartis Venture Fund in Cambridge, MA, USA. Prior to joining NVF, she was a Senior Partner at Takeda Ventures and, before that, worked at Novo Nordisk in roles of increasing responsibility including as Senior Director Business Development and New Product Commercialization, serving as a member of the BioPharm leadership team. Since 1998, Michal has held positions in various sectors of the life science industry including in the Office of the Chief Scientist of Israel (The Incubator program), venture capital (Ofer Brothers Hi Tech) and global pharmaceutical and biotech companies, including various positions at MGVS, an Israeli biotech company and at OSI Pharmaceuticals in a business development role. She received her B.A. in Economics and Business Management from Haifa University, her M.B.A from Tel-Aviv University in Israel and her Master's degree in Biotechnology from Columbia University in New York.

Peter Thompson, M.D., is a Partner on the private equity team at OrbiMed, with over 25 years of industry experience. He held executive positions at Becton-Dickinson and Chiron, co-founded and was CEO of Trubion Pharmaceuticals, co-founded Corvus Pharmaceuticals, Cleave Biosciences, Silverback Therapeutics and serves as a Director on several company boards. Dr. Thompson is an Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year awardee, an Affiliate Professor of Neurosurgery at the University of Washington, an inventor on numerous patents and a board-certified internist and oncologist. He was on staff at the National Cancer Institute following his internal medicine training at Yale University.