Venture Investment and Partnership (VIP) Forum with Daiichi Sankyo

Takahiro "Taka" Nagayama, Ph.D., is the Head of Daiichi Sankyo's Research Institute San Diego. He joined Daiichi Sankyo in 2000 and built his career in the company's Research organization. Following his time at Johns Hopkins University, he progressed to Senior Director roles in Cardiovascular & Metabolics in 2013 and Cell Therapy in 2016, before transitioning to the Business Development team in 2021. Since returning to Daiichi Sankyo's Research organization, he supported the launch of the Research Institute Boston in 2024 and the Research Institute San Diego in 2025. He currently oversees open innovation activities on the U.S. West Coast.

Regina Leung is CEO of SylamoreBio, a biotechnology company developing a CNS delivery platform technology with a pipeline of rare disease programs. She is a healthcare executive based in the San Francisco Bay Area with over 25 years of leadership and business management experience in the life sciences industry, having held commercial roles at Bristol-Myers Squibb, Gilead Sciences, and McKesson.

Prior to joining SylamoreBio, she consulted for biopharmaceutical, private equity, and early-stage companies on projects spanning market access, commercial launches, due diligence, corporate valuation, capital raising, and strategic and licensing partnerships.

Jason Fontana is the co-founder and CEO of Wayfinder Biosciences, a biotechnology company developing a new class of orally available RNA-targeting medicines. He holds a PhD in Molecular Engineering from the University of Washington, where he worked on developing tools to modulate transcriptional systems using rationally designed guide RNAs in the laboratories of James Carothers and Jesse Zalatan. Previously, Jason obtained a Master's degree in Cellular and Molecular Biotechnology from the University of Trento, where he worked in Sheref Mansy’s lab on engineering communication between artificial and natural cells.

Shiv Krishnan joined Daiichi Sankyo in August 2022. He leads the Early-stage Search & Evaluation function within Global Business Development and is a member of the Global Business Development Leadership Team. With its focus on enabling technologies, the Early-stage Search & Evaluation team works closely with Daiichi-Sankyo’s Research, Development and Manufacturing functions.

Prior to joining Daiichi Sankyo, Dr. Krishnan led External Innovation at Lonza BioR&D. In this capacity he led a global team of scouts identifying and evaluating manufacturing technologies for a spectrum of biological modalities from protein-based therapeutics to cell-based therapies, with a particular focus on future disruptive approaches.

Prior to working at Lonza, Dr. Krishnan spent all his professional life at Sanofi and its legacy companies. He began his career in R&D in France, first as a scientist and then in research management, with experience spanning different modalities such as protein-based therapeutics, nucleic acid vaccines, gene therapy and drug discovery. He spent nearly two decades in partnering, first in alliance management and then in Sanofi’s business development and licensing organization, where he was particularly dedicated to innovative technologies for the discovery, development and manufacturing of medications from small molecules to cellular therapies.

Dr. Krishnan received his BSc in Zoology from American College, Madurai, India and his Ph.D. in Biochemistry from the Université de Technologie de Compiegne, France.

Wataru Tomisato, Ph.D., is Head of Open Innovation Group at Daiichi Sankyo, leading global scouting and partnerships for research-stage open innovation, with a particular focus on expanding the company's network across Asia and Oceania. He also leads the Research Institutes Planning Office, coordinating and integrating Daiichi Sankyo's globally deployed Research Institutes. He assumed his current role in 2024, following three years with the Global Business Development team in New Jersey, where he was instrumental in Search and Evaluation in oncology. With over 20 years at Daiichi Sankyo, he brings deep expertise in drug discovery across oncology, autoimmune diseases, and cell therapy.

Elizabeth Cross Nichol, MBA, PT, is the Program and Grants Manager for the Life Sciences Washington Entrepreneurship & Venture Services. She supports the team by being a conduit from the funding agency to underserved entrepreneurs across the state. Elizabeth is responsible for the set up and implementation of two new grant programs, the SBIR/STTR Matching Grant and the Washington Competes Grant. A prime focus will be on the support of early-stage, life science, Washington-based entrepreneurs via awareness, recruitment, education, grant awards, and outcomes tracking. These grants are intended to accelerate Life Sciences Research Commercialization in Washington with a prime focus on addressing the different needs of varied applicant types.

Having worked as a clinician and a hospital administrator, Elizabeth is well aware of the need to bring safe and effective products and solutions to deliver great patient care.  She has conducted health technology and services assessment as both a purchaser and an investor. Working with several early-stage medical device concepts from ideation to commercial implementation, Elizabeth understands the challenges of moving through product lifecycle. As the past president of ORCANW, Elizabeth enjoys the opportunity to engage with regulatory colleagues on determining appropriate regulatory routes, while pursuing a lean business model for early monetization. Elizabeth has an MBA in Health and Business from Boston University and a Bachelors in Science from McMaster University.