Quadriga’s leadership, founders, scientific advisory board and principal investigators are world-renowned oncology experts well positioned to advance QBS72S in the clinic.
Leadership Team
Gordon Ringold, Ph.D., is CEO of Quadriga BioSciences, an oncology start-up focused on developing targeted anti-cancer drugs, and has held this role since 2015. He is currently on the board of directors of Sagimet, Apexigen, Rapafusyn and Okava Pharmaceuticals. From 1997 to 2015, he served in various capacities as Co-Founder and/or CEO of Maxygen, SurroMed, Alexza, and Alavita. From 1991 to 2000, Dr. Ringold was CEO and Scientific Director of Affymax Research Institute (acquired by Glaxo in 1995) where he managed the development of novel technologies to accelerate the pace of drug discovery; prior to that he was VP and Director of the Institute for Cancer and Developmental Biology at Syntex Corporation (1986-1991).
Dr. Ringold received his Ph.D. in the laboratory of Dr. Harold Varmus, before joining the Stanford University School of Medicine, Department of Pharmacology (1978-1987). While on the Stanford faculty he invented technologies for manufacturing of recombinant proteins in mammalian cells, now widely used for production of dozens of therapeutic products and received the John J. Abel Award as the best Pharmacologist in the US under the age of 35. Dr. Ringold is an alumnus of Crown College, University of California, Santa Cruz, 1972.
Ron Weitzman, M.D., Chief Medical Officer, is a U.S. trained, board-certified medical oncologist who has worked in the biopharmaceutical industry since 1999. Over his career, Dr. Weitzman has worked in all areas of clinical development including phase 1, 2 and 3 clinical trials. He has drug development experience in both solid and hematological malignancies and has interacted extensively with FDA, EMEA, Canadian and Japanese health authorities. As Vice President of Clinical Development at Exelixis, he oversaw cabozantinib’s (XL184) development in prostate cancer, spanning the period from its initial phase I study to subsequent approvals. Prior to Exelixis, he served as Group Director at Genentech overseeing Avastin’s development in NSCLC and GBM and has worked in several positions at Novartis and Eli Lilly.
Over the years, Dr. Weitzman has managed both large and small scientific and clinical development groups and very much enjoys mentoring colleagues. Dr. Weitzman received his M.D. from Western University and completed an internal medicine residency at The Mount Sinai Hospital in NYC and a medical oncology fellowship at Columbia Presbyterian Medical Center.
Founders
Bernd Jandeleit, Ph.D., is a Co-Founder of Quadriga BioSciences. His career spans more than 25 years in the biopharmaceutical and life sciences industries. Dr. Jandeleit currently serves as a Vice President of Chemistry at Kodiak Sciences, Inc., where he is responsible for advancing its polymeric platform technologies for sustained delivery of biologics and small molecules to the eye for the treatment of retinal diseases with high medical needs and underserved therapeutic options. In 2010, prior to joining Kodiak, he co-founded Quadriga BioSciences, Inc. As Vice President of Chemistry, Dr. Jandeleit was intimately involved in Quadriga’s R&D and CMC campaigns, corporate development, governance, financing, and IP protection. He co-invented QBS72S, a small molecule chemotherapeutic for the targeted treatment of primary and metastatic CNS cancers, and an advanced preclinical amino-acid transporter inhibitor candidate for T-cell mediated immune disorders. As a fellow of the German National Scholarship Foundation Studienstiftung des Deutschen Volkes, Dr. Jandeleit conducted postdoctoral research in the lab of K.C. Nicolaou at the Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla. He received his Ph.D. and MS degrees, both with summa cum laude, from the RWTH Aachen University in Germany under Professor Dieter Enders. He is an author and named inventor on over 70 scientific papers and patents.
Wolf-Nicolas Fischer, Ph.D., is a Co-Founder of Quadriga BioSciences and currently serves as Senior Director – Discovery Medicine at Kodiak Sciences, Inc., where he leads efforts aimed at designing novel medicines for the prevention or slowing of progression of retinal diseases in high-risk patients. Prior to Kodiak, Dr. Fischer was a co-founder of Quadriga BioSciences, Inc. and, as Vice President of Biology, led discovery efforts from its conception in 2010 through 2020. Dr. Fischer has held various positions at the Max-Planck Institute for Molecular Genetics, Berlin, Germany, the Eberhard-Karls University in Tübingen, Germany, and UCLA School of Medicine in Los Angeles, California. Dr. Fischer received his Ph.D. in biology from Eberhard Karls University and his MS in Chemistry from the Technical University Berlin (TU-Berlin), Germany.
Kerry J. Koller, Ph.D., is a Co-Founder of Quadriga BioSciences and the Vice President of Molecular Pharmacology. She has nearly 30 years of experience working in biotechnology, focusing primarily on transporter and receptor biology. Her discovery and development expertise includes target ID, assay development, candidate selection, and IND-enabling studies. Prior to Quadriga, Dr. Koller held positions of increasing responsibility at Genentech, Affymax, and XenoPort, where she was most recently Senior Director of Discovery Biology. She received her Ph.D. in Biochemistry/Neuropharmacology at the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and graduated with a B.S. in Chemistry, Honors, from Stanford University. She is an author and named inventor on over 40 scientific papers and patents.
Scientific & Industry Advisors
Mark M. Davis, Ph.D., is well known for identifying the first T-cell receptor genes, which are responsible for T lymphocytes ability to “see” foreign entities, solving a major mystery in immunology at that time. He and his research group have made many subsequent discoveries about this type of molecule, demonstrating that T cells are able to detect and respond to even a single molecule of their ligand-fragments of antigens bound to Major Histocompatibility Complex cell surface molecules. He also developed a novel way of labeling specific T lymphocytes according to the molecules that they recognize, and this procedure is now an important method in many clinical and basic studies of T cell activity, as are other technologies developed by his group.
Dr. Davis has authored over 350 publications and has received numerous awards and honors for his work, including memberships in the National Academy of Sciences, The National Academy of Medicine and the Royal Society. He is an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, and holds the Avery Family Chair of Immunology at the Stanford University School of Medicine. He has been vice chair and chair of the Department of Microbiology and Immunology at Stanford and, since 2004, The Director of the Institute for Immunity, Transplantation and Infection, which has become an international leader in the development of transformative technologies and approaches to better understanding the human immune system and its responses to infectious diseases and autoimmunity.
Dr. Ford is a medical oncologist and geneticist at Stanford, devoted to studying the genetic basis of breast and GI cancer development, treatment and prevention in families and populations. Dr. Ford graduated in 1984 from Yale University where he later received his M.D. degree, and he trained in internal medicine and oncology fellow at Stanford. He is currently Associate Professor of Medicine (Oncology) and Genetics, and Director of the Stanford Cancer Genetics Clinic and the Cancer Genomics Program at the Stanford University Medical Center.
Dr. Ford’s clinical interests include the diagnosis and treatment of patients with a hereditary pre-disposition to cancer. He runs the Stanford Cancer Genetics Clinic, which sees patients for genetic counseling and testing of hereditary cancer syndromes for prevention and early diagnosis of cancer in high-risk individuals and populations. He has recently been named the Director of Stanford’s new Cancer Genomics Program, performing next-generation tumor profiling to identify novel genetic targets for personalized targeted therapies.
Ron Levy, M.D., is the Robert K. Summy and Helen K. Summy Professor of Medicine and Director of the Lymphoma Program at Stanford University School of Medicine. He is also the Associate Director of Translational Science for the Stanford Cancer Institute. For more than 25 years Dr. Levy’s research has focused on monoclonal antibodies and the study of malignant lymphoma, currently using the tools of immunology and molecular biology to develop a better understanding of the initiation and progression of the malignant process. He was the first to successfully treat cancer with a monoclonal antibody, and went on to help develop rituximab (Rituxan®) for the treatment of patients’ lymphomas. Dr. Levy’s research concentrates on using lymphocyte receptors as targets for new therapies for lymphoma, and he is currently conducting clinical trials of lymphoma vaccines. Dr. Levy has published over 300 articles in the fields of oncology and immunology.
In 1982, Dr. Levy he shared the first Armand Hammer Award for Cancer Research, and was later awarded the Ciba-Geigy/Drew Award in Biomedical Research, the American Society of Clinical Oncology David A. Karnofsky Memorial Award, the General Motors Charles Kettering Prize, the Key to the Cure Award by the Cure for Lymphoma Foundation, the Medal of Honor by the American Cancer Society, the Evelyn Hoffman Memorial Award by the Lymphoma Research Foundation of America, the King Faisal International Prize in Medicine, the 2004 Damashek Prize from the American Society of Hematology and in 2009 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences.
Frank McCormick, Ph.D., FRS, D.Sc., is Professor Emeritus of the UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center. Prior to joining the UCSF faculty, Dr. McCormick pursued cancer-related work with several Bay Area biotechnology firms and held positions with Cetus Corporation (Director of Molecular Biology, 1981-1990; Vice President of Research, 1990-1991) and Chiron Corporation, where he was Vice President of Research from 1991 to 1992. In 1992 he founded Onyx Pharmaceuticals, a company dedicated to developing new cancer therapies, and served as its Chief Scientific Officer until 1996. At Onyx Pharmaceuticals, he initiated and led drug discovery efforts that led to the approval of Sorafenib for treatment of renal cell cancer in 2005, for liver cancer in 2007, and for nasopharyngeal cancer in China. Sorafenib is being tested in multiple indications worldwide. In addition, Dr. McCormick’s group led to the identification of a CDK4 kinase inhibitor. Dr. McCormick’s current research interests center on the fundamental differences between normal and cancer cells that can allow the discovery of novel therapeutic strategies.
Dr. McCormick holds the David A. Wood Chair of Tumor Biology and Cancer Research at UCSF. He is the author of over 285 scientific publications and holds 20 issued patents. He also served as President, 2012-2013 for the American Association for Cancer Research (AACR). More recently, Dr. McCormick has taken a leadership role at the Frederick National Lab for Cancer Research, overseeing an NCI supported national effort to develop therapies against Ras-driven cancers. These cancers include most pancreatic cancers, and many colorectal and lung cancers, and are amongst the most difficult cancers to treat.
Michael Prados, M.D., began his career in Neuro-Oncology as a Fellow at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) in 1985. Following a two year training program, he was recruited to the Faculty in 1988 and has remained at UCSF since that time, and is now Professor-in-Residence and the Charles B Wilson Chair of Neurosurgery. His career interests center around patient care, and clinical and translational research. He became the Project Leader of the North America Brain Tumor Consortium (NABTC) and led that group for 15 years. When the NABTC merged with the NABTT (and became the Adult Brain Tumor Consortium) he was named Co-Project Leader until stepping down from this multi-institutional early phase clinical trials group in early 2014. In 2009, he was awarded the Project Leadership of the Ivy Foundation Early Phase Clinical Trials Consortium, a group of now seven major academic centers that conduct clinical and translation research in adults with brain cancer. In 2014 he was awarded the Victor Levin Award for lifetime clinical research excellence from the Society of Neuro-Oncology.
Dr. Prados was the Institutional Site Principal Investigator for the Pediatric Brain Tumor Consortium (PBTC) for over 10 years, ending that role in 2012. At that time he formed the Pacific Pediatric Neuro-Oncology Consortium (PNOC), a multi-institutional consortium of now 15 major academic centers across the United States, conducing early phase, precision-focused, clinical trials in young children and adolescents.
His major interests are early phase clinical trials research, and the translational studies that precede and inform those trials in both adults and children. Since 1985, he has published over 300 articles and is part of the Editorial Board of Neuro-Oncology, Journal of Neuro-Oncology and Journal of Clinical Oncology.
W. K. Alfred Yung, M.D., is professor of Neuro-Oncology at The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, where he holds the Margaret and Ben Love Chair of Clinical Cancer Care.
He was Chair of the Department of Neuro-Oncology (1999-2015) and Co-director (1999-2015) of the MDACC Brain Tumor Center. During his tenure, the department has achieved much, including approval of temozolomide and bevacizumab by the FDA for GBM, development of the National Cancer Institute (NCI)-funded Brain Tumor SPORE, building of the D24 smart oncolytic virus program, leadership in the NCI- funded CNS tumor clinical trial consortia and creation of the GBM Agile a global adaptive clinical trial platform.
Dr. Yung has served as Editor-in-Chief of Neuro-Oncology (2007-2014), and co-chair of the NCI Brain Malignancy Steering Committee (2011-2017). He was appointed to Vice President Biden’s Cancer Moonshot Blue Ribbon Panel in 2016. He is Special Scientific Advisor of NBTS and a member of the MDACC Moonshot executive committee. Dr. Yung also serves on the Scientific Advisory Committee of the Ludwig Institute of Cancer Research and the Scientific Advisory boards of several foundations and biotech companies including AFCR, NFCR, DNAtrix, Quadriga and ILCT.
Board of Directors
Ronald W. Barrett, Ph.D. is a scientist entrepreneur with more than 30 years’ experience in the biopharmaceutical industry. He is the former CEO and a Director of XenoPort, Inc, a biopharmaceutical-focused company he co-founded in 1999, which was acquired by Arbor Pharmaceutical in 2016. Under Barrett’s guidance, XenoPort advanced five in-house discovered compounds into human trials. Dr. Barrett led the company’s efforts that resulted in the FDA approval of HORIZANT (gabapentin enacarbil), the first and only non-dopaminergic drug approved for moderate to severe RLS.
Prior to founding XenoPort, Dr. Barrett was Senior Vice President of Research at Affymax Research Institute, where he pioneered the development and use of new drug discovery technology – work that led to 2 FDA-approved medicines. Barrett began his professional career in the neuroscience drug discovery group at Abbott Laboratories. He is currently Executive Chairman of Medikine Inc, and a Director of Concert Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (Nasdaq:CNCE). He is currently Director of the RLS Foundation, a non-profit patient advocacy group and previously served as a Director of the Youth Science Institute, a non-profit focused on K-8 science education. Dr. Barrett has co-authored more than 50 manuscripts from peer-reviewed journals and is an inventor of over 50 issued patents in the U.S. He received a B.S. degree in biology from Bucknell University and a Ph.D. degree in pharmacology from Rutgers University.
Karen Liu, Ph.D., is a founding partner of 3E Bioventures Capital, a fund that focuses on venture investments in healthcare related sectors, such as drug, device, diagnostics, increasingly, interdisciplinary innovations at the frontier of BT (Biotech) and IT (information technology). While 3E primarily invests in China, it is also actively exploring cross-border investment opportunities.
Dr. Liu has been active in China healthcare venture investment since 2006. Her past investments include device and diagnostic companies, drug related companies, and mobile health companies. Prior to 3E Bioventures, Dr. Liu held various positions in healthcare investments as a partner at Kaiwu Capital and Managing Director at CRCI Capital.
In 2006, Dr. Liu co-founded Shenogen Pharma, a company developing innovative liver cancer therapeutics, and was its first angle investor. From 2000-2004, she was an entrepreneur and senior team member of 3721, an Internet search company founded by Internet veteran Hongyi Zhou. She helped build up the small internet company and achieved profitability and eventually sold it to Yahoo in early 2004. Dr. Liu also worked as a consultant at McKinsey & Company from 1998-2000.
Dr. Liu received her Ph.D. degree in immunology from Harvard University and Master of Medical Sciences degree from Harvard Medical School. She also received her Bachelor of Sciences degree from Cornell University and her EMBA degree from the Chungkong Graduate School of Business (CKGSB) in China.
Gordon Ringold, Ph.D., is CEO of Quadriga BioSciences, an oncology start-up focused on developing targeted anti-cancer drugs, and has held this role since 2015. He is currently on the board of directors of Sagimet, Apexigen, Rapafusyn and Okava Pharmaceuticals. From 1997 to 2015, he served in various capacities as Co-Founder and/or CEO of Maxygen, SurroMed, Alexza, and Alavita. From 1991 to 2000, Dr. Ringold was CEO and Scientific Director of Affymax Research Institute (acquired by Glaxo in 1995) where he managed the development of novel technologies to accelerate the pace of drug discovery; prior to that he was VP and Director of the Institute for Cancer and Developmental Biology at Syntex Corporation (1986-1991).
Dr. Ringold received his Ph.D. in the laboratory of Dr. Harold Varmus, before joining the Stanford University School of Medicine, Department of Pharmacology (1978-1987). While on the Stanford faculty he invented technologies for manufacturing of recombinant proteins in mammalian cells, now widely used for production of dozens of therapeutic products and received the John J. Abel Award as the best Pharmacologist in the US under the age of 35. Dr. Ringold is an alumnus of Crown College, University of California, Santa Cruz, 1972.
Peter Tam, MBA, is a pharmaceutical executive with over 25 years of drug development experience. He served as President and COO of Quadriga Biosciences where he managed the Company’s operations and led the development of Company’s lead compound from IND-enabling studies, CMC manufacturing, IND filing with FDA, and initiation of first-in-human study. He is currently a strategic advisor to the Company. Prior to joining Quadriga, Peter served as President and a member of the Board of Directors of VIVUS Inc, a biopharmaceutical company that develops therapies for the treatment of obesity, diabetes, and genitourinary diseases. Under his leadership, VIVUS obtained four consecutive drug approvals from product inception. Mr. Tam built the company’s R&D pipeline through licensing and acquisition. He built and led R&D teams (regulatory, clinical and CMC), created and developed patent portfolio and collaborated with FDA, corporate partners and stakeholders to ensure regulatory approvals for company’s pipeline products. He also helped raise over $500M in corporate financing during his 20-year tenure at VIVUS (1993-2012). He has extensive management experience in drug development , corporate/business development, senior executive leadership and board experience in the biopharmaceutical industry. Prior to VIVUS, Mr. Tam also held various research and clinical development positions at Genentech and XOMA Corporation.
Mr. Tam holds a B.S. in Chemistry from University of California Berkeley and an MBA from Santa Clara University. He has a number of patents approved and pending to his name.