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ABOUT

Leadership Team

Frank Bedu Addo PDS

Frank Bedu-Addo, Ph.D.
Chief Executive Officer, Director

Dr. Bedu-Addo has served as a director, president and CEO of PDS Biotech since its inception in 2005. Dr. Bedu-Addo is a veteran biotech executive with experience successfully starting and growing biotechnology organizations. He has been responsible for the development and implementation of both operational and drug development strategies, supervising and managing both large organizations and emerging biotechnology companies. Dr. Bedu-Addo was a founding and senior executive at KBI BioPharma, Inc. As Vice President of Drug Development, he oversaw all business and drug development operations. Before his tenure at KBI, he successfully started and managed Cardinal Health’s East Coast biotechnology drug development operations. Prior to Cardinal Health, Dr. Bedu-Addo was an Associate Director at Akzo-Nobel, Senior Scientist at Elan (The Liposome Co.), and Principal Scientist at Schering-Plough. In these positions, he contributed to the development of numerous drugs, including antiviral and anticancer products. Dr. Bedu-Addo obtained his M.S. in Chemical Engineering and Ph.D. in Pharmaceutics from the University of Pittsburgh.
Gregory Conn

Gregory Conn, Ph.D.
Chief Scientific Officer

Dr. Conn has more than 35 years of drug-development expertise, including development of antiviral and anticancer drugs through to commercialization. He is a graduate of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine, where he obtained both his M.S. and Ph.D., discovering novel angiogenic molecules in the human brain. Dr. Conn started his pharmaceutical career at Merck, Sharpe, and Dohme, where he continued his work on novel angiogenic factors, discovering and characterizing the VEGF family of growth factors, work which led to the development and commercialization of the anti-cancer drug Avastin. He was later a leading scientist at Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, where he established and headed various groups in the Cell and Molecular Biology and Drug Discovery departments. Dr. Conn subsequently became a Director in the Process Development department at Covance Biotechnology Services Inc., a contract research and development and drug manufacturing organization, where he supervised the analytical development teams responsible for drug characterization, method development and drug stability studies, and program teams responsible for developing drug manufacturing processes. Dr. Conn has expertise across all phases of the drug development process, including FDA and regulatory requirements, is the co-inventor of eight drug patents, and was a founding member of the PDS team as CSO.
Matthew Hill

Matthew Hill
Chief Financial Officer

Mr. Hill joined PDS Biotech in 2021 as its Chief Financial Officer. Mr. Hill has decades of financial and operational experience across the full spectrum of corporate growth. Prior to joining PDS Biotech, he served as the Chief Financial Officer at Strata Skin Sciences (Nasdaq: SSKN), a medical device company focused on dermatology.He has spent more than 20 years in financial and operational leadership roles for life sciences companies, including as the CFO of Velcera (Nasdaq: VLCR) prior to its acquisition by the Perrigo Company and EP Medsystems (Nasdaq: EMPD) prior to its acquisition by St. Jude Medical where he also served as VP of Operations. Mr. Hill holds a B.S. in Accounting from Lehigh University and is a Certified Public Accountant.
Lauren V. Wood

Lauren V. Wood, M.D.
Chief Medical Officer

Dr. Wood joined PDS Biotech as Chief Medical Officer in February 2019.  She has overall responsibility for clinical development of the novel, immune activating Versamune® platform product pipeline targeting HPV-related pre-cancer and advanced cancers as well as a broad spectrum of solid tumors.  With 30 years of extensive clinical research experience at the National Institutes of Health, Dr. Wood most recently was the Clinical Director of the Vaccine Branch, Center for Cancer Research, National Cancer Institute.  While there she oversaw the translational development of immune-based therapies for both cancer and HIV infection and was a co-inventor of two patented therapeutic cancer vaccine platforms targeting the TARP and HER tumor antigens.Prior to joining the Vaccine Branch, Dr. Wood was a Senior Clinical Investigator from 1992-2009 in the NCI Pediatric Oncology and HIV and AIDS Malignancy Branches, overseeing teams investigating antiretroviral, anti-infective, and immunomodulatory therapies for HIV-infected children, adolescents and young adults.  Trained in both Internal Medicine and Pediatrics with subspecialty training in Allergy and Immunology from NIAID, Dr. Wood received her M.D. from Duke University School of Medicine and B.A. in Biology from Oberlin College.
Matthew Hill

Spencer Brown
Senior Vice-President, General Counsel

Spencer D. Brown joined PDS Biotechnology as Senior Vice-President, General Counsel on June 1, 2022. Prior to joining PDS Biotech, Spencer worked most recently at Aclaris Therapeutics, Inc. in Wayne, Pennsylvania where he served as Senior Vice-President, Legal Affairs and Compliance Officer.Before that, he worked nearly eight years at GE Healthcare as Senior Commercial Counsel for the Life Sciences Core Imaging business in Princeton, New Jersey. Prior to that, Spencer spent almost ten years at AstraZeneca Pharmaceuticals in Wilmington, Delaware where he provided legal support for most of the company's therapeutic areas at some point during his tenure. Spencer has over two decades of in-house legal experience in the pharmaceutical industry. He began his legal career as an associate at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. Spencer earned his bachelor's degree at Princeton University and obtained his juris doctorate degree from the University of Pennsylvania School of Law.
Rory Cullinane

Rory Cullinane
Vice President of Quality

Rory Cullinane joined PDS Biotech as Vice President of Quality bringing more than 25 years of industry experience across multiple therapeutic areas. He has grown and matured Quality organizations in both large global pharmaceutical and small biotechnology companies. Rory started his career at the Schering-Plough (Merck & co., Inc.) in Ireland and the US where he held various positions of increasing responsibility. Mr. Cullinane subsequently joined Genzyme (a Sanofi Company) where he oversaw various aspects of Quality operations. More recently, he headed up the Quality organization at Advaxis Immunotherapies, Mitsubishi Tanabe Pharma America, and BioCentriq, a cell and gene-based Contract Development Manufacturing Organization. Mr. Cullinane received his degree in Applied Science (Chemistry and Physics) from Dublin Institute of Technology and a Masters Degree in Industrial Engineering from University College Dublin.
Joe Dervan

Joe Dervan, Ph.D.
Vice President of Research and Development

Dr. Dervan has more than 20 years of biopharmaceutical drug-development expertise, from bench to commercialization, including development of a broad range of immuno-oncology therapeutics. He is a graduate of Sheffield University Medical School, UK, where he obtained his Ph.D., in Molecular Medicine, researching protein-DNA interactions, and publishing his work in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA and Nature Structural and Molecular Biology. He went on to undertake postdoctoral work within the department of Molecular Biophysics & Biochemistry at Yale University and completed an MBA at Warwick University Business School, UK. Dr. Dervan started his pharmaceutical career at Pfizer, UK where he performed bioanalysis of a range of corticosteroids and related prodrugs. He also worked within the field of proteomics utilizing the world’s first genome sequences at F. Hoffmann-La Roche, Basel, Switzerland. Following his postdoc, he worked at Protalex, Inc, as Director of Protein Chemistry and Biopharmaceutical Manufacturing where he oversaw laboratory operations, drug substance and drug product development, and manufacturing operations. Following his time at Protalex, Inc, Dr. Dervan worked as a senior consultant for several biotech companies. Prior to joining PDS Biotech, he held leadership roles at GSK where he lead multiple analytical lifecycle management project teams, supporting global development of a broad range of mid-late phase biopharmaceutical assets.

Deanne Randolph

Deanne Randolph
Vice President of Commercial Development

Ms. Randolph is an accomplished pharmaceutical/biotech commercial leader with more than 20-years of high-impact contributions to large multinational corporations as well as clinical stage biotech companies. From early development through commercialization, Ms. Randolph has led multiple US, European, and global pharmaceutical and biotechnology product launches. She has experience in both primary and secondary care across a broad range of therapeutic areas including immunology, oncology, and rare disease. Prior to joining PDS Biotech, she led Sante Group, a consultancy she founded to provide expertise in strategic pre-launch planning, positioning, life cycle management and clinical development strategy to pharmaceutical and biotech clients preparing for commercialization. Prior to consulting, Ms. Randolph held commercial leadership roles in both the US and Europe at Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson, and at Bayer. She holds both an MBA and a BA from Wake Forest University.
Deanne Randolph

Gregory Reid
Vice President of Program Development

Mr. Reid has amassed 30+ years’ experience in the pharmaceutical industry, chiefly in drug development. He brings this breadth of experience to PDS Biotech to support the advancement of the company’s innovative pipeline.While Mr. Reid has obtained substantial operational experience in large pharma and large clinical research organizations (CROs), the majority of his experience has been acquired working with biotech firms where he has skillfully guided teams to successfully bring several novel molecules targeting oncology and antifungal therapies from the bench through development. Mr. Reid has led development programs in North America, Europe and Asia. He holds a M.Sc. in immunology from McGill University and an MBA from the John Molson School of Business at Concordia University and has authored more than 20 peer-reviewed manuscripts and abstracts.
Nathalie Riebel

Nathalie Riebel
Senior Vice President of Clinical Operations

Ms. Riebel joined PDS Biotech in June 2019 as the Vice President of Clinical Operations. She is responsible for the operational execution of the PDS Biotech pipeline. She brings 30 years of clinical research experience across the industry. Before joining PDS Biotech, Mrs. Riebel held a leadership role at Delcath Systems for oncology devices and Eli Lilly and Co. as Director of Global Quality/Inspection readiness. As Director of Clinical Operations at GSK, Imclone Systems, and ICON Clinical Research, she skillfully guided cross-functional global teams to achieve clinical deliverables and submissions.
David Schaaf

David Schaaf, M.D.
Vice President of Medical Affairs

Dr. Schaaf joined PDS Biotech as Vice President of Medical Affairs in September 2022. Dr. Schaaf has over 20 years of industry experience at large global pharmaceutical and small biotechnology companies across multiple therapeutic areas. His focus is on establishing medical strategies to enhance product value with core expertise in clinical development, regulatory submissions, product launch, medical communications, and KOL development. Most recently, Dr. Schaaf was Vice President, Medical Affairs at Zogenix where he oversaw the US launch of fenfluramine for Dravet Syndrome and Lennox-Gastaut Syndrome. Prior to Zogenix, he built and lead the Medical Affairs functions at two small biotech companies. Dr. Schaaf started his industry career at Pfizer where he spent 12 years across multiple medical affairs groups including the managed markets and pain teams.
Dr. Schaaf completed an internship in internal medicine at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital in New York City. He received his M.D. from Columbia University and received his undergraduate degree in Chemistry from Stanford University.
 
SanjaySavari

Sanjay Zaveri
Senior Vice-President of Business Development

Sanjay joined in May 2022 as the Senior Vice President of Business Development. Mr. Zaveri is responsible for partnering strategy, business development and alliance management. He brings over 25 years of commercial strategy and business development experience across the pharmaceutical industry. Previously, Mr. Zaveri was VP and Head of Business Development & Corporate Strategy at Strongbridge BioPharma, where he spearheaded business development strategy and led evaluation of business opportunities. He facilitated cross-functional due diligence teams on partnering, acquisition, and licensing strategy and played a key leadership role in the corporate development function, focusing on organization and deployment of team resources. Prior to Strongbridge, Mr. Zaveri was a Director at Guidehouse (FKA Navigant Consulting), where he advised pharmaceutical clients on issues in commercial and strategy development. Mr. Zaveri received an MBA from the University of Minnesota, Carslon School of Management, and a BS in Pharmacy from the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences.

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