Event Already in Full Capacity

For Delegate Please Press Request to Join and one of our project manager will contact you!

08
November

08:00 AM EST

Medicinal Chemistry

Name: Medicinal Chemistry Strategy Meeting Boston
Start: 2023-11-16T08:00
End: 2023-11-16T17:50
Location: Le Méridien Boston Cambridge

Strategy Meeting East Coast USA 2023

Reinvigorating Productivity in Pharma Biotech Through Advanced Technologies and Innovative Techniques that Interrogate Activity and Mechanisms

Le Meridien Cambridge Boston

A MEETING EXPERIENCE UNLIKE ANY OTHER

Fresh Medicinal Chemistry Insights

Tired of the same conference experience? Real discussions and genuine networking are often promised, but not always delivered. Proventa International’s R&D Strategy Meetings are designed to avoid the pitfalls of a typical conference, by providing the right environment to make those important connections through interactive roundtable discussions, exclusive networking and keynote panel debates. Join Medicinal Chemistry professionals from across the East Coast, in Boston MA, to discover new insights and take your company’s mission to the next level.

What makes our strategy meetings unique?

Roundtable Discussions

Intimate discussions led by renowned industry experts. Have your voice heard and debate alongside like-minded life science executives.

Unrivalled Networking

With senior delegation from big pharma and innovative biotech from across the East Coast, you can network with peers from different locations, all in one place.

Personalised Agenda

Choose the topics that matter to you. Reserve your place at the roundtable discussions and ensure your whole day delivers the insights you need to hear.

Solutions to your Problems

We’ve partnered with the best solution providers to solve your biggest challenges. Engage in pre-arranged, private meetings to address your specific needs and find a tangible solution.

Industry Researched Topics

We guarantee our agenda is up-to-date and mission critical because its designed by you. We speak to our extended network of senior decision makers to ensure the most important topics are discussed.

Senior Decision Makers

The entire strategy meeting is specifically tailored to the needs and challenges of senior life science professionals. Discover how your peers are dealing with the same challenges as you.

Meet Our 2023 Facilitators

Our panel of facilitators play a key role in shaping the agenda for the day. See who will be bringing their expertise to the table at our Medicinal Chemistry strategy meeting.

Aaron Frank

Director and Head of Computational Chemistry Arrakis Therapeutics

Allen Hopper

Vice President, Drug Discovery Lucy Therapeutics

Andrew L. Roughton, Ph.D

WuXi AppTec Co., Ltd.

Blaise Lippa

Chief Scientific Officer Morphic Therapeutics

Byron DeLaBarre

Former Head of Protein Science & Structural Biology PsiThera

Carlos Pedraza

AVP Biology Sai Life Sciences

Ching Kim Tye

mRNA Director, LNP Platform Development Sanofi

Diane Joseph-McCarthy

Executive Director, Bioengineering Technology & Entrepreneurship Center Boston University

Dominic Reynolds

Senior Vice President, Head of Drug Discovery Remix Therapeutics

Dr. Tamsin Mansley

President and Global Head of Application Science Optibrium Inc.

Ed Olhava

Senior Vice President, Preclinical Development IFM Therapeutics

Over his nearly 20 year career in mid and early-stage biotech, Ed Olhava has invented and progressed multiple compounds through discovery and into clinical development. He has focused on discovering first-in-class small molecule modulators of new biological pathways, closely integrating medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, safety and CMC to enter clinical trials with these novel entities.
Before joining <a href="https://www.ifmthera.com/">IFM</a>, Ed was a strategic advisor at Third Rock Ventures, where he developed the strategic and operational plans for the drug discovery groups of two Third Rock seed companies, both of which were successfully funded and launched. Prior to Third Rock, he was a founding scientist at Epizyme, joining the company as the first medicinal chemist. He started the medicinal chemistry group and invented Epizyme’s first clinical compound and the first clinical histone methyltransferase inhibitor, EPZ-5676, leading activities from hit finding to filing the Investigational New Drug application. Before joining Epizyme, Ed began his medicinal chemistry career at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, where he co-invented NINLARO, approved in 2015 for the treatment of multiple myeloma, and MLN-4924.
Ed obtained his Ph.D. in synthetic organic chemistry from Harvard University and B.S. in chemistry from Stanford University. He is co-author/inventor on more than 40 papers and patents.

Horst Hemmerle

Chief Scientific Officer Kojin Therapeutics

Ivan Efremov

VP, Head of Medicinal Chemistry Nereid Therapeutics

Jacques Dumas

Chief Scientific Officer Arrakis Therapeutics

Jacques Dumas has 30-years experience in drug discovery and development. He is a co-inventor of two marketed drugs in Oncology, Nexavar® and Stivarga®.In January 2020, Jacques joined Arrakis, a biotech company dedicated to the discovery of small molecules targeting RNA. He is currently Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) and oversees all R&D functions. From 2015 to 2019, Jacques was CSO at Tetraphase, focusing on fully synthetic tetracyclines (acquired by La Jolla in 2020) and played a key role in regulatory approvals of eravacycline, a broad-spectrum antibiotic. Before joining Tetraphase, Jacques was CSO at Idenix (acquired by Merck in 2014) working on liver-targeted nucleosides and their applications in virology and oncology. From 2007 to 2014, Jacques worked at AstraZeneca, most recently as VP of Strategy, Infectious Diseases. Prior to that he spent 15 years at Bayer Healthcare. Jacques holds a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Paris VI University and completed a Post-doctoral Fellowship at Stanford University.

Kaicheng Zhu

Head of Operations, Boston Bellen

Kevin Kreutter

Vice President, Drug Discovery Empress Therapeutics

Liang Mao

Senior Director, Head of Developability and Formulation Research WuXi AppTec

Matthew Lucas

VP of Medical Chemistry Third Harmonic Bio

Norman Azoulay

Director – Scientific Products Excelra

Onur Atasoylu

Director, Head of Computational Chemistry Incyte

Richard Heidebrecht

Vice President of Research and Development Glycologix

Robert Goodnow

Head Drug Discovery Sciences Takeda

Sam Baskaran

Director, Medicinal Chemistry WuXi AppTec

Sejal Patel

Vice President Chemistry Scorpion Therapeutics

Sejal is an entrepreneurial and data driven scientific leader who has two decades of drug discovery experience from concept to clinic. She is currently a Vice President of Chemistry at Scorpion Therapeutics, where she has been co-leading the early drug discovery portfolio, prioritizing and enabling novel targets using the company’s chemoproteomics, and covalent library platform towards lead optimization via integration of advanced technologies and scientific rigor. Prior to joining Scorpion, Sejal worked at Novartis Institute for Biomedical Research (NIBR) in global discovery chemistry where she led integrated drug discovery teams from early target validation to identification of clinical leads across multiple therapeutic areas, as well as supporting IND-enabling studies and filings. Sejal also has experience in portfolio strategy, delivery technologies, digital therapeutics, academic/biotech collaborations, and strategic partnerships. Sejal has been a long-standing advocate of mentorship programs to share experiences, and to level up inclusivity in the sciences. Sejal received her dual B.S. degrees in chemistry and biology from UC Irvine and her Ph.D. degree in organic chemistry from MIT under the supervision of Tim Jamison.

Shankar Venkatraman

Executive Director, Chemistry IFM Therapeutics

Over his 20+ year industrial career Shankar Venkatraman has invented and progressed multiple compounds through discovery and into clinical development. He has focused on discovering first-in-class small molecule modulators of new biological pathways, closely integrating medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, and safety to enter clinical trials with these novel entities. Before joining IFM Therapeutics, LLC, Shankar was a Director of Chemistry at Vitae Pharmaceuticals. There he led number of programs including Menin-MLL, resulting in Revumenib (SNDX-5613), currently undergoing multiple clinical trials for ALL/AML with an anticipated NDA filing by the end of 2023. Prior to Vitae, he was a Senior Research Fellow at Merck, where he worked on number of modalities including HIV, neuropathic pain and schizophrenia, and delivered number of clinical candidates. Before joining Merck, Shankar began his medicinal chemistry career at Axys Pharmaceuticals, and worked on cathepsin K, with efforts leading to the identification of Odanacatib. Shankar obtained his Ph.D. in synthetic organic chemistry from University of Minnesota and B.S. in chemistry from University of Bombay. He is co-author/inventor on more than 60 papers and patents.

Sonela Cavicke

Vice President of Discovery Business Development Sai Life Sciences Ltd

Xiaoqi (Charles) Chen

VP of Business Development Bellen Chemistry

First name	Last name	Job title	Company name	Photo URL	Bio Position
Aaron	Frank	Director and Head of Computational Chemistry	Arrakis Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Aaron-Frank.jpg	Aaron is a Director and Head of Computational Chemistry at Arrakis Therapeutics. Aaron did his Ph.D. at the University of Michigan and then the University of California, Irvine, and developed techniques to integrate NMR and molecular dynamics simulations. After that, he spent two years at Nymirum Inc. (now base4) and another three years as a postdoc at the University of Michigan with Professor Charles Brooks. Before joining Arrakis, Aaron was an Assistant Professor at the University of Michigan, where he led a computational biophysics group focused on modeling the structure and dynamics of RNA.
Allen	Hopper	Vice President, Drug Discovery	Lucy Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Allen-Hopper.jpg	Allen Hopper received his Ph.D. in Medicinal Chemistry from the Ohio State University in 1993 under the mentorship of Professor D. T. Witiak, followed by a post-doc at the University of Wisconsin. Prior to joining Lucy Therapeutics in 2022, Allen held positions for a variety of Biotech companies including Allelix, Memory, Lundbeck and Sage Therapeutics. Most of his career has been in the area of small molecule CNS drug discovery focused on compound design and building mechanistic links from target engagement to disease relevant biological consequences. Allen authored or co-author approximately 75 patent applications and publications.
Andrew	L. Roughton,	WuXi AppTec Co., Ltd.		https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Andrew-Roughton.jpg	Andrew Roughton trained in organic chemistry with P. Deslongchamps (Sherbrooke), M. Demuth / K. Schaffner (Max Planck, Mülheim) and S. A. Benner (ETH Zürich). He worked with Pharmacopeia, Inc. (Princeton, NJ) as a medicinal chemist across early Discovery to candidate selection for modulators of several traditional target classes, investigated riboswitch and ubiquitin-proteasome system modulators with Dalton Medicinal Chemistry and then joined Encycle Therapeutics (Toronto, ON) as VP, Discovery & Operations, where he led efforts in proprietary macrocyclization and protein-protein interaction modulators. In August 2019, he joined WuXi AppTec in Boston and is currently Executive Director, Medicinal Chemistry with the Research Chemistry Services/Integrated Program Management team (North America and Europe).
Blaise	Lippa	Chief Scientific Officer	Morphic Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Blaise-Lippa-3.jpg	Blaise Lippa is the SVP of Molecular Discovery at Morphic Therapeutic, joining the company at its inception and helping to build it through IPO, while advancing integrin small molecule projects towards the clinic. Prior to this, Blaise was a Sr. Director of medicinal chemistry at Cubist Pharmaceuticals, where he led teams that advanced multiple acute care compounds to the clinic, and served on a development team that achieved an NDA. Blaise began his industrial career at Pfizer, working in multiple therapeutic areas, including oncology, antibacterials, and metabolic diseases. A project he initiated and first led was approved in 2019(Daurismo/ Glasdegib) for leukemia. Blaise obtained his B.Sc. degree from the University of Michigan, and his Ph.D. from Stanford. Blaise is an author of over 70 publications and patents.
Byron	DeLaBarre	Former Head of Protein Science & Structural Biology	PsiThera	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/Byron-DeLaBarre-1.jpg
Carlos	Pedraza	AVP Biology	Sai Life Sciences	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Carlos-Pedraza.jpg	Carlos Pedraza, PhD. is an expert discovery biologist with over 16 years of experience in small molecule drug discovery in the fields of neuroscience, neurodegeneration, neuropsychiatry and neuroimmunology. Carlos’ work in the pharmaceutical industry has been focused in early target identification, scientific evaluation, feasibility assessment and experimental validation of novel, viable targets from concept to portfolio entry, IND and early clinical development. Carlos has extensive experience in collaborative interactions with CROs, academics, scientific groups and other institutions with continuous project management in company-sponsored research.
Ching	Kim Tye	mRNA Director, LNP Platform Development	Sanofi	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Ching-Kim-Tye.jpg	Kim is a seasoned pharmaceutical professional with two decades of expertise in drug delivery. She has successfully led technical teams in Research and in Development organizations across the pharmaceutical industry, spanning from early discovery to late-stage development. Kim has served in big and mid-size pharma like Pfizer, Bristol-Myers Squibb, Eli Lilly/Elanco, and CSL, where she honed her skills. Presently, she serves as the mRNA Director for LNP Platform Development at Sanofi’s mRNA Center of Excellence. In this role, she remains dedicated to advancing LNP platforms as a delivery system for vaccines and beyond, contributing to the broader realization of the full potential of mRNA medicines.
Diane	Joseph-McCarthy	Executive Director, Bioengineering Technology & Entrepreneurship Center	Boston University	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Diane-Joseph-McCarthy.jpg	Diane Joseph-McCarthy is the Executive Director of the Bioengineering Technology & Entrepreneurship Center and Professor of the Practice in Biomedical Engineering at Boston University. Prior to that, she was a senior life science executive with over 20 years of drug discovery, development, and leadership experience. She was SVP of Discovery & Early Development at EnBiotix, a bioengineering company focused on respiratory and rare disease. She was an Associate Director at AstraZeneca, where she led a global team and task forces to transform Infection’s early portfolio. At Wyeth, she held positions of increasing responsibility. Diane received her PhD from MIT and was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University/Harvard Medical School.
Dominic	Reynolds	Senior Vice President, Head of Drug Discovery	Remix Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Dominic-Reynolds.jpg	Dominic has extensive experience in the biotech space and building successful biotech companies. Prior to his current role at Remix therapeutics, recent positions include drug discovery consultancy to two seed-stage companies at Third Rock Ventures and VP, Head of Chemistry at H3 Biomedicine, a company he joined on day one. Prior to that Dominic worked at Forma Therapeutics, where he also joined on the first day, and he started his career at Millennium Pharmaceuticals. He received his PhD in synthetic chemistry from the University of Cambridge and conducted postdoctoral training at Harvard University where he focused on natural product synthesis.
Dr.	Tamsin Mansley	President and Global Head of Application Science	Optibrium Inc.	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Dr.-Tamsin-Mansley.jpg	Tamsin holds a PhD in Organic Chemistry from the University of East Anglia in the UK and pursued Postdoctoral studies in the labs of Prof. Philip Magnus at University of Texas, Austin. She is an experienced drug discovery scientist, having worked as a medicinal chemist at Eli Lilly and UCB Research. Her interests lie in coupling machine learning and artificial intelligence techniques with generative chemistry approaches to explore chemistry space and guide compound design.
Ed	Olhava	Senior Vice President, Preclinical Development	IFM Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Ed-Olhava.jpg	Over his nearly 20 year career in mid and early-stage biotech, Ed Olhava has invented and progressed multiple compounds through discovery and into clinical development. He has focused on discovering first-in-class small molecule modulators of new biological pathways, closely integrating medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, safety and CMC to enter clinical trials with these novel entities. Before joining IFM, Ed was a strategic advisor at Third Rock Ventures, where he developed the strategic and operational plans for the drug discovery groups of two Third Rock seed companies, both of which were successfully funded and launched. Prior to Third Rock, he was a founding scientist at Epizyme, joining the company as the first medicinal chemist. He started the medicinal chemistry group and invented Epizyme’s first clinical compound and the first clinical histone methyltransferase inhibitor, EPZ-5676, leading activities from hit finding to filing the Investigational New Drug application. Before joining Epizyme, Ed began his medicinal chemistry career at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, where he co-invented NINLARO, approved in 2015 for the treatment of multiple myeloma, and MLN-4924. Ed obtained his Ph.D. in synthetic organic chemistry from Harvard University and B.S. in chemistry from Stanford University. He is co-author/inventor on more than 40 papers and patents.
Horst	Hemmerle	Chief Scientific Officer	Kojin Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Horst-Hemmerle.jpg	Horst Hemmerle is an experienced drug discovery leader in the pharmaceutical industry. Horst’s illustrious career spans across prominent organizations such as Eli Lilly and Aventis, where he led numerous teams in both biology and chemistry divisions. On his professional journey he joined Novartis in Cambridge as Executive director in 2013. Since that time, he established a global hit-and lead generation organization within Global Discovery Chemistry. Most recently he took on the new role Head of Frontier Chemistry and explores “frontier” areas like AI/ML enabled medicinal chemistry, induced proximity, molecular targeting, drug delivery and bioreactions. Through his visionary guidance, Horst fostered a culture of innovation and achievement within these teams, driving them towards remarkable drug discoveries.
Ivan	Efremov	VP, Head of Medicinal Chemistry	Nereid Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Ivan-Efremov.jpg	Ivan Efremov is a Senior Director, Head of Medicinal Chemistry at Fulcrum Therapeutics. He started his medicinal chemistry career in 2001 when he joined Pfizer after obtaining his PhD with Professor Leo Paquette at The Ohio State University. While at Pfizer, he significantly contributed to multiple projects including delivery of development candidates for CNS, immunology and rare disease indications. He joined Fulcrum Therapeutics in 2017 where he led a chemistry effort culminating in nomination of a development candidate for sickle cell disease. His research interests include structure-based design, fragment-based lead generation, and chemogenomics. He is an author on more than 50 publications and patents.
Jacques	Dumas	Chief Scientific Officer	Arrakis Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Jacques-Dumas.jpg	Jacques Dumas has 30-years experience in drug discovery and development. He is a co-inventor of two marketed drugs in Oncology, Nexavar® and Stivarga®.In January 2020, Jacques joined Arrakis, a biotech company dedicated to the discovery of small molecules targeting RNA. He is currently Chief Scientific Officer (CSO) and oversees all R&D functions. From 2015 to 2019, Jacques was CSO at Tetraphase, focusing on fully synthetic tetracyclines (acquired by La Jolla in 2020) and played a key role in regulatory approvals of eravacycline, a broad-spectrum antibiotic. Before joining Tetraphase, Jacques was CSO at Idenix (acquired by Merck in 2014) working on liver-targeted nucleosides and their applications in virology and oncology. From 2007 to 2014, Jacques worked at AstraZeneca, most recently as VP of Strategy, Infectious Diseases. Prior to that he spent 15 years at Bayer Healthcare. Jacques holds a Ph.D. in Organic Chemistry from Paris VI University and completed a Post-doctoral Fellowship at Stanford University.
Kaicheng	Zhu	Head of Operations, Boston	Bellen	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Kaicheng-Zhu.jpg	Kaicheng Zhu is the Director of Boston Operation at Bellen Chemistry. He is in charge of Business Development and Project Management of contract research and manufacturing. Kaicheng received his Ph.D. degree in organic chemistry at Boston University and did his postdoctoral research at the Scripps Research Institute (CA). Prior to joining Bellen, Kaicheng worked as a medicinal chemist at Pfizer Inc (Groton, CT) and process chemist at Enanta Pharmaceuticals (Watertown, MA).
Kevin	Kreutter	Vice President, Drug Discovery	Empress Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/06/Kevin-Kreutter.jpg	Kevin began his Drug Discovery career at 3DP, then Janssen, before moving to the Boston area. Formerly at Nimbus and now at a Flagship NewCo, he’s worked across therapeutic areas and is co-inventor of three clinical candidates, including the gut tissue-restricted pan-JAK inhibitor lorpucitinib. He’s currently VP of Drug Discovery at VL54 Toran + VL55 Empress and his team uses med chem, chemoproteomics, and synthetic biology to help develop novel therapeutics based on co-evolved, human-experienced molecules that play a privileged role in human health.
Liang	Mao	Senior Director, Head of Developability and Formulation Research	WuXi AppTec	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Liang-Mao.jpg	Liang Mao is currently a Senior Director at STA WuXi AppTec in Shanghai; he joined STA more than 6 years ago and now manages the developability and formulation research team. Prior to STA, Liang worked for around 6 years in Novartis’s pre-formulation team supporting compound developability assessment, physical form screening and selection, preclinical formulation development. He has another four years work experience in research institute and biopharmaceutical company supporting early drug development. He has expertise in drug developability assessment, physical form screening, and bioavailability enhancement technologies. Liang holds a master’s degree in bio-chemical engineering from Nanjing University of Technology.
Matthew	Lucas	VP of Medical Chemistry	Third Harmonic Bio	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/08/Matthew-Lucas.jpg	Matt Lucas, with more than 20 years of drug discovery experience, is currently VP Chemistry at Third Harmonic Bio, a biopharmaceutical company focused on dermal, respiratory, and gastrointestinal inflammatory diseases. Recent roles also included serving as Chief Science Officer at Gandeeva Therapeutics, and SVP Drug Discovery at Black Diamond Therapeutics where he led the CNS-penetrant EGFR mutant inhibitor program that delivered BDTX-1535 to the clinic for the treatment of glioblastoma and NSCLC. Matt has also served in leadership roles at Yumanity Therapeutics, Cubist Pharmaceuticals and at Roche Pharmaceuticals, leading multiple projects across therapeutic areas including oncology, immunology and neuroscience.
Norman	Azoulay	Director – Scientific Products	Excelra	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/norman.jpg	Norman, a seasoned product leader with degrees in Neuroscience and Biology from Wesleyan University and Harvard University, respectively, leads Excelra’s scientific products team. He focuses on Excelra’s flagship platforms like GOSTAR and GOBIOM, aligning innovation with a user-centric approach. With diverse experience, including key roles at Elsevier and ADP, he has become a vital asset at Excelra. His expertise in data management plays a central role in drug discovery lead generation and optimization, ensuring that scientists across various fields consistently benefit from Excelra’s adaptive product offerings.
Onur	Atasoylu	Director, Head of Computational Chemistry	Incyte	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/08/Onur-Atasoylu-1.jpg	Onur Atasoylu obtained his Ph.D. from University of Pennsylvania in organic chemistry and undertook postdoctoral research at the University of Oxford, UK. He held various academic and industry positions in medicinal chemistry before joining Incyte Corporation in 2015. As the Head of Computational Chemistry at Incyte his research focuses on the design of small molecule inhibitors of targets in oncology and immunology.
Richard	Heidebrecht	Vice President of Research and Development	Glycologix	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Richard-Heidebrecht-scaled.jpg	Rich Heidebrecht is currently the Vice President of Research and Development at Glycologix. He started his career at Pfizer and Merck before making a transition to Biotech via the Broad Institute. Rich has gained expertise in medicinal, process and analytical chemistry and has worked on diverse therapeutic modalities such as small molecules, cell therapies, medical devices, and polymers including oligonucleotides. Over the course of his career, Rich has contributed to 35 patent/patent applications, 16 papers, two clinical programs and one marketed drug. Doctor Heidebrecht completed his undergraduate work at Worcester Polytechnic Institute and his graduate work at Indiana University with David R. Williams. His postdoc with Stephen Martin at the University of Texas at Austin rounded out two natural product synthesis projects – one total, one formal.
Robert	Goodnow	Head Drug Discovery Sciences	Takeda	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Robert-Goodnow.jpg	Robert Goodnow (Rob) is Head Drug Discovery Sciences at Takeda Pharmaceutical Company since August 2022; this group enables multiple therapeutic modalities. Rob began his industrial career at Roche, where his research focused on the implementation of multiple chemistry platform technologies. These include small molecule-targeted delivery of oligonucleotides for therapeutic application, analytical and computational chemistry as well as DNA-encoded chemistry. Rob’s efforts in medicinal chemistry have been focused on projects in oncology, inflammation, neurosciences, and metabolic diseases. He has authored or co-authored more than 90 scientific papers, book chapters and patent applications. In 2014, he published a book entitled “A Handbook of DNAEncoded Chemistry” (Wiley)
Sam	Baskaran	Director, Medicinal Chemistry	WuXi AppTec	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/10/Sam-Baskaran.jpg	Dr. Sam Baskaran is Director, Medicinal Chemistry with the Research Chemistry Services/Integrated Program Management team at WuXi AppTec in Boston. He has over 20 years of drug discovery experience in the biotech and pharma industries (Novartis, Sunesis, GSK). He was trained as an organic chemist with a Ph.D. and PostDoc. Sam has an excellent track record of international publications, co-authored >50 publications, and >20 patents, and is one of the inventors of 5 clinical candidates.
Sejal	Patel	Vice President Chemistry	Scorpion Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/07/Sejal-Patel.jpg	Sejal is an entrepreneurial and data driven scientific leader who has two decades of drug discovery experience from concept to clinic. She is currently a Vice President of Chemistry at Scorpion Therapeutics, where she has been co-leading the early drug discovery portfolio, prioritizing and enabling novel targets using the company’s chemoproteomics, and covalent library platform towards lead optimization via integration of advanced technologies and scientific rigor. Prior to joining Scorpion, Sejal worked at Novartis Institute for Biomedical Research (NIBR) in global discovery chemistry where she led integrated drug discovery teams from early target validation to identification of clinical leads across multiple therapeutic areas, as well as supporting IND-enabling studies and filings. Sejal also has experience in portfolio strategy, delivery technologies, digital therapeutics, academic/biotech collaborations, and strategic partnerships. Sejal has been a long-standing advocate of mentorship programs to share experiences, and to level up inclusivity in the sciences. Sejal received her dual B.S. degrees in chemistry and biology from UC Irvine and her Ph.D. degree in organic chemistry from MIT under the supervision of Tim Jamison.
Shankar	Venkatraman	Executive Director, Chemistry	IFM Therapeutics	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/06/Shankar-Venkatraman-2.jpg	Over his 20+ year industrial career Shankar Venkatraman has invented and progressed multiple compounds through discovery and into clinical development. He has focused on discovering first-in-class small molecule modulators of new biological pathways, closely integrating medicinal chemistry, pharmacology, and safety to enter clinical trials with these novel entities. Before joining IFM Therapeutics, LLC, Shankar was a Director of Chemistry at Vitae Pharmaceuticals. There he led number of programs including Menin-MLL, resulting in Revumenib (SNDX-5613), currently undergoing multiple clinical trials for ALL/AML with an anticipated NDA filing by the end of 2023. Prior to Vitae, he was a Senior Research Fellow at Merck, where he worked on number of modalities including HIV, neuropathic pain and schizophrenia, and delivered number of clinical candidates. Before joining Merck, Shankar began his medicinal chemistry career at Axys Pharmaceuticals, and worked on cathepsin K, with efforts leading to the identification of Odanacatib. Shankar obtained his Ph.D. in synthetic organic chemistry from University of Minnesota and B.S. in chemistry from University of Bombay. He is co-author/inventor on more than 60 papers and patents.
Sonela	Cavicke	Vice President of Discovery Business Development	Sai Life Sciences Ltd	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Sonela-Cavicke-1.jpg	Since 2020, Sonela Cavicke is the West Coast VP of Business Development for Discovery Services at Sai Life Sciences. Sonela’s research background is in Immunology, particularly immunoassay development for vaccines, biologicals, and biomarkers. She completed her Bachelor’s and Master’s Degrees in Immunology and Microbiology at the University of Texas in Austin. She is a co-founder of a life sciences and diagnostic instrument company, Charted Scientific. She has held R&D positions at Luminex, Life Technologies, Merck Research Laboratories and Amgen and has worked in business development roles at MilliporeSigma, DiscoverX, and Eurofins Discovery prior to joining Sai.
Xiaoqi	(Charles) Chen	VP of Business Development	Bellen Chemistry	https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/Xiaoqi-Chen.jpg	Xiaoqi (Charles) Chen is VP of Business Development of Bellen Chemistry. He is working in business development and project management at Bellen. He helped Bellen establish the process optimization center in Shanghai. Before joining Bellen Chemistry, He worked at Amgen, Tularik, and Abbott Labs as a Principal Scientist engaging medicinal chemistry drug discovery. He obtained his PhD in organic chemistry at Rice University.

Aaron Frank, Allen Hopper, Andrew L. Roughton, Ph.D, Blaise Lippa, Byron DeLaBarre, Carlos Pedraza, Ching Kim Tye, Diane Joseph-McCarthy, Dominic Reynolds, Dr. Tamsin Mansley, Ed Olhava, Horst Hemmerle, Ivan Efremov, Jacques Dumas, Kaicheng Zhu, Kevin Kreutter, Liang Mao, Matthew Lucas, Norman Azoulay, Onur Atasoylu, Richard Heidebrecht, Robert Goodnow, Sam Baskaran, Sejal Patel, Shankar Venkatraman, Sonela Cavicke, Xiaoqi (Charles) Chen

See the full agenda and facilitator line-up Download the strategy meeting brochure for full details

DOWNLOAD THE BROCHURE

Who Should Attend the Event?

Chief Executive Officers

Executive Vice Presidents

Vice Presidents

Executive Directors

Directors

Global Heads

Responsible For:

Medicinal Chemist

Computational Chemist

Translational

Chemist/Biology

In-Silico/In-vivo/In-vitro Chemist/Biologist

Chemical Biology

Molecular Chemist/Biologist

Hit and Lead Chemist

Small/Large Molecules Chemist

Drug Discovery or Drug Development

See Which Topics Are Discussed at the Strategy Meeting

09:00 – 10:00

Roundtable Tracks

AI/ML
Evaluating the Effectiveness of Computer-Aided Drug Design, Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning Tools In Fragment-Based Lead Discovery

-Diane Joseph-McCarthy
Executive Director, Bioengineering Technology & Entrepreneurship Center
Boston University

INNOVATIVE AND EMERGING MODALITIES
Building Successful Collaborations in Drug Discovery: Strategies for Effective Partnerships

-Richard Heidebrecht
Vice President of Research and Development
Glycologix

CHEMICAL BIOLOGY, TARGETED PROTEIN DEGRADATION & UNDRUGGABLES
Next-Generation PROTACs: Beyond Traditional Ubiquitin Ligases

-Byron DeLaBarre
Former Head of Protein Science & Structural Biology
PsiThera

HIT IDENTIFICATION / LEAD OPTIMIZATION
Leveraging Predictive Model Techniques To Accelerate Hit-To Lead Optimization

-Onur Atasoylu
Director, Head of Computational Chemistry
Incyte

INTEGRATED DRUG DISCOVERY
Challenges of the CNS Drug Discovery and Development

-Alex Nivorozhkin
Chief Scientific Officer
Cybin

DESIGN & SYNTHESIS
Emerging Trends in Medicinal Chemistry: Small Molecule Analog Synthesis and Structure-Activity Relationship (SAR) Strategies

-Matthew Lucas
VP of Medical Chemistry
Third Harmonic Bio

11:10 – 12:10

Roundtable Tracks

AI/ML
Overcoming Challenges And Achieving Resilience: The Future of Biotech and Biopharma – AI-Guided In Drug Discovery and Development (Topic TBC)

INNOVATIVE AND EMERGING MODALITIES
Novel Chemical Modalities

-Sonela Cavicke
Vice President of Discovery Business Development
Sai Life Sciences Ltd

CHEMICAL BIOLOGY, TARGETED PROTEIN DEGRADATION & UNDRUGGABLES
Approaches to ‘Undruggable’ Targets – Targeted Protein Degradation, Chemical Biology and beyond

-Andrew L. Roughton, Ph.D
WuXi AppTec Co., Ltd.

HIT IDENTIFICATION / LEAD OPTIMIZATION
RNA Therapeutics Beyond Antivirals

-Carlos Pedraza
AVP Biology
Sai Life Sciences

INTEGRATED DRUG DISCOVERY
Strategies for implementation of modern and innovative integrated drug discovery towards emerging drug modalities

-Sam Baskaran
Director, Medicinal Chemistry
WuXi AppTec

DESIGN & SYNTHESIS
Efficient Hit-to-Lead Design, Synthesis, and Screening Strategies for Drug Discovery

12:15 – 13:15

Roundtable Tracks

AI/ML
Strategic Partnerships in the Age of AI/ML: Maximizing Value through Collaboration

-Robert Goodnow
Head Drug Discovery Sciences
Takeda

INNOVATIVE AND EMERGING MODALITIES
Advancing Drug Discovery: Exploring Innovative Modalities with Small Molecules in Pre-clinical Development

-Ed Olhava
Senior Vice President, Preclinical Development
IFM Therapeutics

CHEMICAL BIOLOGY, TARGETED PROTEIN DEGRADATION & UNDRUGGABLES
Tackling Drug Resistance and Undruggable Targets

-Sejal Patel
Vice President Chemistry
Scorpion Therapeutics

HIT IDENTIFICATION / LEAD OPTIMIZATION
Investigating Best Strategies To Accelerate The Progress of Compounds From Hit Identification Into Lead Optimization

-Ivan Efremov
VP, Head of Medicinal Chemistry
Nereid Therapeutics

INTEGRATED DRUG DISCOVERY
Translation Gap: Challenges in Translating Promising Drug Candidates to Clinical Success

-Blaise Lippa
Chief Scientific Officer
Morphic Therapeutics

DESIGN & SYNTHESIS
SAR Considerations for CNS-Active Small Molecules: Strategies and Challenges

-Allen Hopper
Vice President, Drug Discovery
Lucy Therapeutics

15:15 – 16:15

Roundtable Tracks

AI/ML
The Practical Application Of AI To Drug Discovery: What’s Required For Success

-Dr. Tamsin Mansley
President and Global Head of Application Science
Optibrium Inc.

INNOVATIVE AND EMERGING MODALITIES
The Most Recent Advancements in Small Molecule Drug Design, Development, and Synthesis In Drug Bioavailability

CHEMICAL BIOLOGY AND UNDRUGGABLES
Moving Towards the Clinic: Preclinical PK and Safety Studies of PROTACs in Targeted Protein Degradation

HIT IDENTIFICATION / LEAD OPTIMIZATION
Rethinking Drug Design & Discovery in the Era of Generative AI

-Norman Azoulay
Director – Scientific Products
Excelra

INTEGRATED DRUG DISCOVERY
Collaborative Platforms for Drug Discovery: Enabling Data Sharing and Collaboration

DESIGN & SYNTHESIS
Using An Integrated CRO/CDMO Service To Accelerate Drug Discovery And Development

-Kaicheng Zhu
Head of Operations, Boston
Bellen

16:30 – 17:30

Roundtable Tracks

AI/ML
Harnessing AI/ML in RNA Modeling and Cheminformatics: From Sequence Analysis to Drug Design

-Aaron Frank
Director and Head of Computational Chemistry
Arrakis Therapeutics

INNOVATIVE AND EMERGING MODALITIES
The Most Recent Advancements in Small Molecule Drug Design, Development, and Synthesis in Drug Bioavailability

-Kevin Kreutter
Vice President, Drug Discovery
Empress Therapeutics

CHEMICAL BIOLOGY AND UNDRUGGABLES
Utilizing The New Warheads: Strategic Ways Of Developing Targeted Covalent Drugs

-Shankar Venkatraman
Executive Director, Chemistry
IFM Therapeutics

HIT IDENTIFICATION / LEAD OPTIMIZATION
Supercharging Drug Discovery: Accelerating Hit Identification and Lead Optimization for Rapid Development

-Horst Hemmerle
Chief Scientific Officer
Kojin Therapeutics

INTEGRATED DRUG DISCOVERY
RNA-Targeted Drug Discovery: Advances in Hit Identification and Lead Optimization Strategies

-Dominic Reynolds
Senior Vice President, Head of Drug Discovery
Remix Therapeutics

DESIGN & SYNTHESIS
Lipid Nanoparticles (LNPs) in Medicinal Chemistry: Synthesis, Formulation, and Delivery Optimization

-Ching Kim Tye
mRNA Director, LNP Platform Development
Sanofi

Reasons To Attend the Strategy Meeting

Discussions on the advancements in targeted protein degradation andrnpushing past its boundaries.

Leveraging Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning in accelerating therndevelopment of new drugs

Discuss approaches to further understand the interactions of undruggablerntargets and different Protein Degraders such as PROTACs, Molecular Glues,rnetc

Focusing on advancing interrogative techniques to improve the Drug Delivery System/Discovery: Modified mRNA, Nanoparticle-Mediated siRNA, Antibody-Drug Conjugates, and more

Become an official strategy meeting partner Whatever your business needs, we can help. Get in touch for partnering opportunities

I’D LIKE TO PARTNER

Press play to hear what your colleagues had to say…

Hotel & Venue

Le Méridien Boston Cambridge

Le Méridien Cambridge-MIT’s elegant guest rooms and suites offer a place of luxurious sanctuary and unmatched comfort. Explore unique programs inspired by the brand’s European heritage. Born in a glamorous era of travel, Le Méridien believes everyone should explore the world in style.

Hotel Details Maps & Direction Parking

Quick Links

Want to find out more?

Find out more details about our Strategy Meetings and other news and events.

Here To Help

Want to know more? Interested in sponsoring the event? Need help registering your team? Just get in touch and a member of the team will be happy to help.

Event Already in Full Capacity

Europe

USA East

USA West

Webinars

Dinners & Spotlights

R&D

R&D Boston

Medicinal Chemistry Strategy Meeting East Coast – Boston 2024

Medicinal Chemistry

Strategy Meeting East Coast USA 2023

<img class="lazy" decoding="async" src="data:image/svg+xml,%3Csvg%20xmlns='http://www.w3.org/2000/svg'%20viewBox='0%200%201%201'%3E%3C/svg%3E" data-src="https://proventainternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/12/location.png" >Le Meridien Cambridge Boston

Fresh Medicinal Chemistry Insights

What makes our strategy meetings unique?

Roundtable Discussions

Unrivalled Networking

Personalised Agenda

Solutions to your Problems

Industry Researched Topics

Senior Decision Makers

Meet Our 2023 Facilitators

Aaron Frank

Allen Hopper

Andrew L. Roughton, Ph.D

Blaise Lippa

Byron DeLaBarre

Carlos Pedraza

Ching Kim Tye

Diane Joseph-McCarthy

Dominic Reynolds

Dr. Tamsin Mansley

Ed Olhava

Horst Hemmerle

Ivan Efremov

Jacques Dumas

Kaicheng Zhu

Kevin Kreutter

Liang Mao

Matthew Lucas

Norman Azoulay

Onur Atasoylu

Richard Heidebrecht

Robert Goodnow

Sam Baskaran

Sejal Patel

Shankar Venkatraman

Sonela Cavicke

Xiaoqi (Charles) Chen

Who Should Attend the Event?

Chief Executive Officers

Executive Vice Presidents

Vice Presidents

Executive Directors

Directors

Global Heads

Responsible For:

Medicinal Chemist

Computational Chemist

Translational

Chemist/Biology

In-Silico/In-vivo/In-vitro Chemist/Biologist

Chemical Biology

Molecular Chemist/Biologist

Hit and Lead Chemist

Small/Large Molecules Chemist

Drug Discovery or Drug Development

See Which Topics Are Discussed at the Strategy Meeting

REGISTRATION AND WELCOME

OPENING KEYNOTE PRESENTATION

Roundtable

Roundtable Tracks

NETWORKING / 1-1 MEETINGS

NETWORKING / 1-1 MEETINGS

NETWORKING / 1-1 MEETINGS

Roundtable

Roundtable Tracks

Roundtable

Roundtable Tracks

NETWORKING LUNCH

AFTERNOON KEYNOTE PRESENTATION

Le Meridien Cambridge Boston