Visionary Investors and Advisors

We are grateful to partner with some of the most visionary investors in technology and life sciences on our ambitious mission to leverage advanced machine learning to discover and develop cancer immunotherapies.

Board of Directors

James Hardiman, MBA

Board Director

San Francisco, CA

James Hardiman, MBA

Board Director

San Francisco, CA

James Hardiman, MBA

Board Director

Bio:

James has been investing at DCVC since 2013, shortly after the firm raised its first insti­tu­tional fund. He is interested in tech­nolo­gies that better char­ac­terize, model, or manipulate biological systems; robotics and automation; and companies applying artificial intel­li­gence to vertical problems. James has also invested in frontier tech­nolo­gies such as quantum computing and maintains an open mind to hearing about trans­for­ma­tive tech­nolo­gies that may not cleanly fit into an investment thesis. Prior to investing, James worked on data-driven sales and marketing strategy for large life-science and healthcare companies. His profes­sional experience spans large-scale data analysis in healthcare, new materials R&D, and semi­con­ductor processing. James received a bachelor’s degree in engineering physics from the University of California, Berkeley, and an MBA from the University of Chicago Booth School of Business.

Amy Schulman, JD

Board Member

New York, NY

Amy Schulman, JD

Board Member

New York, NY

Amy Schulman, JD

Board Member

Bio:

Amy is a managing partner at Polaris Partners, focusing on healthcare investments and early-stage biotech start-ups. She serves as chair of the Board of Directors for Alnylam Pharmaceuticals and ByHeart, and represents Polaris on the boards of Kallyope, Thirty Madison, QurAlis, and Larkspur. Amy also contributes to several non-profit and advisory boards, including Mount Sinai Hospital and the California Institute of Technology. Before joining Polaris in 2014, Amy held leadership roles at Pfizer, including president of Pfizer Nutrition and Pfizer Consumer Healthcare, and was a partner at DLA Piper. She co-founded the Polaris Innovation Fund in 2017. Amy is a Yale Law School graduate and has been recognized by Fortune Magazine and Fierce Biotech for her leadership in the biotech industry.

Ron W. Alfa, MD, PhD

Co-Founder, CEO

Salt Lake City, UT

Ron W. Alfa, MD, PhD

Co-Founder, CEO

Salt Lake City, UT

Ron W. Alfa, MD, PhD

Co-Founder, CEO

Bio:

Ron has dedicated his career to tackling the most challenging areas of unmet need in medicine. Prior to Noetik, Ron was SVP, Head of Research (acting-CSO) at Recursion (RXRX) and an early founding employee where he led the company’s scientific and portfolio strategy from pre-Series A through IPO. He has led research programs across rare disease, neuroscience, oncology, and immunology, that have advanced molecules from discovery to clinical development. Ron holds an MD and PhD from Stanford University School of Medicine, where he completed his doctoral work in Neuroscience, and has a MA in History of Medicine from UCL.

Jacob Rinaldi, PhD

Co-Founder, CSO

San Francisco, CA

Jacob Rinaldi, PhD

Co-Founder, CSO

San Francisco, CA

Jacob Rinaldi, PhD

Co-Founder, CSO

Bio:

Jacob was the Head of Oncology at Recursion. Genentech comp bio (deep learning for cancer vaccines, target discovery for breast cancer, transfer learning for IO biomarkers, high-dimensional data visualization, next-gen SERDs), Stanford.

Dylan Reid

Board Observer

New York, NY

Dylan Reid

Board Observer

New York, NY

Dylan Reid

Board Observer

Bio:

Dylan Reid is an investor based in New York, focused on intelligent applications in healthcare and heavy industry. Prior to joining Zetta he was a principal at KEC Ventures, an early-stage venture firm. He built their in-house data platform and launched their pre-seed program, leading first check investments in companies across manufacturing, construction and energy. Prior to being an investor, Dylan was co-founder and CEO of Matter.io, a venture-backed advanced manufacturing startup, for which he was named to the Forbes 30 Under 30 list.

Manik Kuchroo, MD, PhD

Board Observer

Boston, MA

Manik Kuchroo, MD, PhD

Board Observer

Boston, MA

Manik Kuchroo, MD, PhD

Board Observer

Bio:

Manik joined Polaris in 2021 and serves as a Senior Associate in the Boston Office. He is primarily focused on early-stage biotech with a focus in immunology, oncology, neuroscience and machine learning therapeutic platforms. Prior to joining Polaris, Manik worked in clinical development at Biohaven Pharmaceuticals, helping develop their glutamate platform compounds in rare ataxias. Before Biohaven, Manik worked at Potenza Therapeutics in business development and at Merck & Co. in their Computational Genomics research group. Manik received his MD and PhD from Yale School of Medicine where he developed novel machine learning algorithms for different genomics applications in immunology, oncology and neuroscience. Manik completed his undergraduate studies at Harvard College. While working at Polaris, Manik is concurrently completing his residency in Internal Medicine at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Julia Moore

Board Observer

San Fransisco, CA

Julia Moore

Board Observer

San Fransisco, CA

Julia Moore

Board Observer

Bio:

Julia Moore is a Managing Partner and co-founder of Breakout Ventures. Julia has spent over two decades as an investor and operator of science-driven companies, helping founders navigate the translation of new life science technologies for customer adoption and scale. Having begun her career as a public investor and research analyst on Wall Street, Julia has worked with companies from founding through exit. Julia is a Kauffman Fellow and an active Board Member in companies across the broad range of the Breakout Ventures portfolio, including Immusoft, Checkerspot, and Vitra Labs.

Scientific Advisors

Ramy Ibrahim, MD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

San Fransisco, CA

Ramy Ibrahim, MD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

San Fransisco, CA

Ramy Ibrahim, MD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

Bio:

Ramy Ibrahim is the Chief Medical and Strategy Officer at Georgiamune Inc., and brings a wealth of experience from the forefront of cancer immunotherapy. His tenure on the Board of Directors and as the Chief Medical Officer at the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy highlights his capacity for strategic innovation in developing immune therapies. Ramy has also served on the boards of leading therapeutics companies, including Surface Oncology. This, coupled with his MD in Oncology from the National Cancer Institute of Cairo University, showcases his comprehensive expertise in the field.

Jason Hipp, MD, PhD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

Minneapolis, MN

Jason Hipp, MD, PhD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

Minneapolis, MN

Jason Hipp, MD, PhD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

Bio:

Jason Hipp is a board certified pathologist with training in pathology informatics and artificial language. Jason is the Chief Digital Innovation Officer at the Mayo Clinic with extensive computational and clinical pathology experience. Jason holds a MD Ph.D from Wake Forest University School of Medicine and has been gathering industry experience at companies such as BMS, Verily, Google, AstraZeneca, and the Mayo Clinic.

Brian Brown, PhD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

New York, NY

Brian Brown, PhD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

New York, NY

Brian Brown, PhD

Scientific Advisory Board Member

Bio:

Brian Brown is the Director of the Icahn Genomics Institute and the Associate Director of the Precision Immunology Institute at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City. He is an expert in tumor immunology and gene therapy, and holds several licensed biotechnology patents, including for vector and virus targeting, small RNA sequencing, and functional genomics. A major focus of his lab’s research is in applying spatial functional genomics to identify the genes controlling tumor immunity and resistance to immunotherapy drugs. His group is also working to develop therapies for tumor microenvironment re-programing. Dr. Brown brings his expertise in cancer immunotherapy, CRISPR screens, and spatial biology to the Noetik scientific advisory board.

Investors