James W. Young, PhD
Chairman of the Board, Venture Partner, 5AM Ventures

Perry A. Karsen
Chief Operations Officer, Celgene Corporation

Kathleen LaPorte
Managing Director, New Leaf Ventures

Howard B. Rosen
Interim President and CEO

Nicholas Simon
Managing Director, Clarus Ventures

James W. Young, PhD

Chairman of the Board, Venture Partner, 5AM Ventures

James W. Young has over 20 years of experience in the biopharmaceutical industry. He has been a Venture Partner at 5AM Ventures since 2006. He also is Chairman of the Board at Sunesis Pharmaceuticals, where he earlier was Chief Executive Officer and more recently Executive Chairman. Prior to Sunesis, he served as Senior Vice President, Research and Development, and as Group Vice President at ALZA Corporation. Before joining ALZA, Dr. Young was President of the Pharmaceuticals Division of Affymax, N.V., and Senior Vice President and General Manager of the Pharmaceuticals Division at Sepracor Corp. Earlier, Dr. Young was Vice President for Research at Zoecon Corporation/Sandoz Crop Protection Corporation. He earned a BS in Chemistry from Fordham University and a PhD in Organic Chemistry from Cornell University.

Perry A. Karsen

Chief Operations Officer, Celgene Corporation

Perry A. Karsen currently serves as Chief Operations Officer at Celgene Corporation. Most recently, Mr. Karsen served as President and Chief Executive Officer at Pearl Therapeutics. From 2004-2009, Mr. Karsen was Senior Vice President and Head of Worldwide Business Development at Celgene and was also responsible for emerging businesses as President, Asia/Pacific Region. Previously, he was Senior Vice President, Business Development at Human Genome Sciences. Earlier in his career, he held positions including Vice President, Strategic Business Analysis and Development, Bristol-Myers Squibb; Senior Vice President Marketing and Sales, Zimmer, Inc.; Director, Business Development and Representative Director, Japan, at Genentech and various domestic and international roles with Abbott Laboratories. Additionally, Mr. Karsen was a General Partner at Pequot Ventures responsible for early and late stage investments in biotechnology and medical devices.

Mr. Karsen serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the Biotechnology Industry Organization (BIO) and as a member of the Board of Directors of BayBio. Perry has a Masters of Management degree from Northwestern University’s Kellogg Graduate School of Management, a Masters in Teaching of Biology from Duke University, and a B.S. in Biological Sciences from the University of Illinois, Urbana.

Kathleen LaPorte

Managing Director, New Leaf Ventures

Kathy LaPorte is one of the founders of New Leaf Ventures, specializing in biopharmaceutical and diagnostic investments. From 1993 she was with the Sprout Group, one of the early venture capital groups with a life science focus, and became a General Partner there in 1994. Previously she was a principal at Asset Management Company, a venture capital firm focused on early stage investments. Ms. LaPorte began her career as a financial analyst with The First Boston Corporation. She is the Past President, and a former member of the Board of the Western Association of Venture Capitalists. She received an MBA from Stanford University Graduate School of Business (Arjay Miller Scholar), and a BS, summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa from Yale University.

Howard B. Rosen

Interim President and CEO

Howard B. Rosen is currently interim President and CEO for Pearl Therapeutics and a consultant to several companies in the industry and a lecturer in the Department of Chemical Engineering at Stanford University. He previously served as Vice President, Commercial Strategy, at Gilead Sciences, Inc., where he was responsible for strategic marketing, global brand management, health economics, competitive intelligence, market research and Gilead's overall portfolio and business planning. Prior to Gilead, Mr. Rosen spent more than 10 years in various roles at ALZA Corporation, an operating company within the Johnson & Johnson Family of Companies, most recently as President of the ALZA division of Johnson & Johnson. During his tenure at ALZA, he was responsible for product development activities, portfolio management, corporate and new product planning, mergers and acquisitions, R&D planning and technology ventures.

Prior to ALZA, Mr. Rosen managed the west coast practice of Integral, Inc., served as Director of Corporate Development at GenPharm International, Inc., and was a consultant in the San Francisco office of McKinsey & Co. Mr. Rosen also serves on the Boards of Directors of AcelRx Pharmaceuticals, Inc., PaxVax, Inc. and CNS Therapeutics, Inc.

Mr. Rosen holds an M.B.A. from the Stanford Graduate School of Business, an M.S. in chemical engineering from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and a B.S. in chemical engineering from Stanford University. He is a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

Nicholas Simon

Managing Director, Clarus Ventures

Nicholas Simon is a Managing Director at Clarus Ventures, LLC, a venture capital company he co-founded in February, 2005, which is focused on investing in life sciences companies. Since October 2001, Mr. Simon has been a General Partner at MPM BioVentures III. From April 2000 to July 2001, Mr. Simon was Chief Executive Officer, Founder, and Director of Collabra Pharma, Inc., a pharmaceutical development company. From 1989 to 2000, Mr. Simon served in various management positions at Genentech, Inc., a biotechnology company, including Vice President of Business and Corporate Development. Mr. Simon represents Clarus on the Board of Directors of Achillion Pharmaceuticals, Inc. (ACHN), ARYx Therapeutics (ARYX), Avanir Pharmaceuticals (AVNR), Pearl Therapeutics Inc., and Sientra Inc. In addition he is also a member of the board of directors for Poniard, Inc. (PARD) and QuatRx Pharmaceuticals. Previous directorships include Barrier (acquired by Stiefel Laboratories, Inc.) CoTherix (NASDAQ:CTRX), Neosil, and Rigel (NASDAQ:RIGL).

He is also on the Advisory Council at the Gladstone Institute, a private not-for-profit research institute affiliated with the University of California San Francisco (UCSF). Mr. Simon received a B.S. in Microbiology from the University of Maryland and an M.B.A. in Marketing from Loyola College.