Neil was previously Vice President of Business Development at Notable Labs, an oncology focused startup and Bioverge portfolio company, where he led the development of global corporate partnerships and contributed to the strategic vision. Neil oversaw business development at Notable through the successful completion of the company’s $40 million Series B and was instrumental in negotiating multiple terms sheets to in-license clinical stage oncology assets.
Prior to Notable, Neil was a member of the Executive Leadership Team and Director of Business Development at the California Institute for Regenerative Medicine (CIRM). As part of CIRM’s leadership team, Neil helped develop the five-year strategic plan for managing and deploying CIRM’s $3 billion across the organization’s discovery, translational, and clinical stage stem cell and regenerative medicines programs. At CIRM, Neil was Head of the Therapeutics Group and oversaw a team responsible for managing over 40 clinical stage therapies totaling over $500 million of CIRM investment, including Forty Seven, Inc. (acquired by Gilead for $4.9B), Orchard Therapeutics (Nasdaq: ORTX), Cellular Dynamics International (acquired by Fujifilm for $307M), Sangamo Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: SGMO), Poseida Therapeutics, Inc. (Nasdaq: PSTX), and others.
Prior to managing the Therapeutics Group, Neil oversaw the Strategic Infrastructure Group at CIRM, managing a portfolio of $125 million supporting infrastructure programs including: $30 million Stem Cell Center (partnership with IQVIA); $24 million Alpha Stem Cell Clinical Network (partnership with UCLA, UCSD, City of Hope, UC Irvine); $32 million iPSC Bank (partnership with Fujifilm); $40 million Genomics Center of Excellence (partnership with Stanford).
Prior to CIRM, Neil was a healthcare investment banker at Thomas Weisel Partners and Deutsche Bank, working on transactions totaling over $1 billion. His primary focus was on strategic advisory and public and private financings.
Neil received a Master of Science in Biotechnology from The Johns Hopkins University, and a Bachelor of Arts in Molecular, Cellular and Development Biology from the University of Colorado, Boulder.
Rick previously worked at Stanford University’s Office of the CFO as a Senior Venture Fund Analyst where he was involved in the management and oversight of the President’s Venture Fund and Stanford-StartX Fund. Across both of these funds, Rick was primarily involved with investment sourcing, due diligence, and portfolio management, investing $450M in aggregate across more than 400 companies. This further included providing ongoing support by connecting them to elite talent, fundraising opportunities and strategic partnerships, as well as stewarding long-term strategic plans and operating roadmaps to achieve commercialization, a stronger innovation pipeline, and enhanced product-market fit.
Notable highlights include leading seed-stage investments into Personalis (precision medicine and cancer genomics company; co-investors:Lightspeed; NASDAQ: PSNL), Kodiak Sciences (antibody therapies to treat and prevent blindness; NASDAQ: KOD), Oculeve (ocular stimulation to treat dry eye disease; acquired by Medtronic), Genapsys(desktop DNA sequencing), HeartFlow (real-time digital modeling of coronary arteries; co-investors: Medtronic, USVP, GE Ventures; $1.5B+ valuation), and Orca Bio (cellular therapies to treat cancer and autoimmune disorders; co-investors: Lightspeed, Data Collective, 8VC).
Prior to this, Rick was a part of the Licensing team at Stanford University’s Office of Technology Licensing (OTL). The OTL receives and evaluates over 500 invention disclosures each year to assess their commercial feasibility and potential. Royalties from successful licensing are collected and distributed to the inventors, their departments and schools. At the OTL, he managed a portfolio of 300+ technologies across their full lifecycle to support them with critical expertise in IP strategy, marketing, business development, licensing, fundraising and commercialization.
Rick holds a Master’s Degree in Biotechnology from The Johns Hopkins University, and graduated from Rice University with a B.S. in Bioengineering and Biomedical Engineering.
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