GRObio has a distinguished scientific and business team – world-renowned pioneers with decades-long careers dedicated to genome engineering, computational biology, and therapeutic development
- Our science emerged from some of the most distinguished labs in the world. Our founders developed our platform technologies in the labs of George Church at Harvard Medical School and Andrew Ellington at University of Texas, Austin, pioneers of synthetic biology.
- We are supported by top-tier investors that have a proven track record of success in developing biotechnology platforms, commercializing novel therapies, and driving exponential growth in value. Our business team has closed over $2B in transactions.
- We have highly engaged, world-class advisors for specific disease indications that have led commercialization of blockbuster drugs, and have held top-level positions in academia and industry. Our Commercialization Advisory Board has decades of experience in drug discovery, clinical development and partnership transactions.
- We think broadly and creatively about how best to bring our technology to bear on the most pressing problems in healthcare—more freedom from treatment regimens, fewer side effects for patients, more living and less worry.
- We are passionate, innovative and fearless, and we believe we’re building something revolutionary with near limitless possibilities to improve health outcomes for patients.
Our technology addresses previously unsolvable problems in medicine, from immunogenicity to delivery and safety. Our potential to improve patients’ lives is limited only by our imaginations.
Daniel J. Mandell, PhD
Chief Executive Officer
GRObio is breaking barriers in protein engineering and therapeutic design. With our GRO platform we can deliver therapeutics with unprecedented capabilities in areas where others didn’t dare to go.
Christopher J. Gregg, PhD
Chief Science Officer
Leaps by Bayer is committed to advancing paradigm-shifting breakthroughs to permanently reverse autoimmune disease. Partnering with GRObio is an outstanding example of fulfilling this mandate. GRObio combines world-class science with pioneering approaches to protein engineering to create tomorrow’s therapies or even cures.
Jürgen Eckhardt, MD, MBA
Heads of Leaps by Bayer
Our Approach
We aim to identify and solve holy grail problems in medicine. We search for unmet clinical needs that our platform can uniquely address. From autoimmune conditions to metabolic diseases, we’re only scratching the surface of possibilities to improve the lives of patients.
We’re striving to fulfill the promise of protein-based therapies by reprogramming biology. Our GRO platform creates novel proteins with an expanded alphabet of non-standard amino acids (NSAAs), providing therapeutic modalities that were previously impossible. Our production process is scalable, stable, and sustainable.
GRObio’s mission is to leverage the unprecedented capabilities of NSAAs in our GRO platform to overcome longstanding limitations in protein therapeutics and bring better health outcomes to patients. Our biofoundry pairs computational protein design with sophisticated robotics, bringing sea-change acceleration to the development of NSAA therapeutics.
We’re applying our groundbreaking science to advance partnered and collaborative programs, as well as our own pipeline of unique NSAA therapeutics with the promise of unprecedented potency, stability, and immunotolerance.
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Our Team
The GRObio team has distinguished scientific credentials and a track record of commercial success. We are world-renowned pioneers with decades-long careers of innovation in protein engineering and pharmaceutical development.
Our executive leadership, directors and advisors bring together some of the best minds in synthetic biology, drug development and corporate strategy. We’ve built a team-based culture that values comradery and ownership of ideas to propel our vision to redefine protein-based therapies.
Learn more about us
- Executive Team
- Board of Directors
- Scientific Advisory Board
- Commercialization Advisors
- Clinical Translation Advisors
Dr. Mandell, a scientist and entrepreneur, is a leading expert in synthetic biology, protein engineering, artificial intelligence, and biological and medical informatics. Together with Dr. George Church, he leveraged GROs to produce the first proteins with stability and function dependent on non-standard amino acids. Dr. Mandell completed his research fellowship in genetics at Harvard Medical School where he was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow of the Life Sciences Research Foundation. Dr. Mandell completed his PhD at University of California, San Francisco, his MSc at University of Edinburgh, and his undergraduate degree in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University. Dr. Mandell currently serves as a member of BIO’s (Biotechnology Innovation Organization) Early-Stage Advisory Council. Prior to his role at GRObio, Dr. Mandell served as a consultant with WarpDrive Bio.
Dr. Gregg developed technologies for multiplexed genome engineering in microbial systems under Dr. George Church and brings leading expertise in genome design, microbial fermentation, and glycobiology of the immune system. Dr. Gregg completed his research fellowship at Harvard University, his PhD in Biomedical Sciences at University of California, San Diego, and his undergraduate work in Biomedical Engineering at The Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Gregg also led the strain engineering and synthetic biology efforts at GreenLight Biosciences prior to joining GRObio as Chief Science Officer.
Mr. Stewart, a veteran industry executive, has worked extensively in business and corporate development in the biotechnology and pharmaceutical space for more than 20 years. He has played an integral strategic role in scaling platform biotechnology companies from early stages through FDA-approval and product launch. Mr. Stewart served most recently as Chief Business Officer of Ribon Therapeutics. Prior to his role at Ribon he served as President and CEO of Commense, Inc., Chief Business Officer of Crescendo Biologics, and spent many years with Merrimack Pharmaceuticals in various roles, including SVP of Business Development and Head of Commercial. Mr. Stewart received his MBA from Cornell University.
Dror Berman, is a Founding Partner at Innovation Endeavors. Mr. Berman invests in early-stage startups that are driving exponential rates of change in their industries. Mr. Berman has invested in over 100 different companies from Seed through Series B. Mr. Berman earned an MBA from Stanford Graduate School of Business and a BS in Computer Science from Ben-Gurion University.
Dr. Beutel is an expert in novel therapeutics and platform research, business development, and company creation. He is focused on strategy, vision, team building and value creation at the interface of science and business, particularly for seed through Series A stage biotech. Dr. Beutel received his PhD in Molecular Biology from University of Wisconsin- Madison. In addition to leadership roles at Abbott and Merck, he has had several different C-level roles in multiple biotech companies including founding COO and Chief Business & Strategy Officer at Dewpoint Therapeutics. Dr. Beutel now serves as Venture Partner with Qiming Venture Partners USA.
Ms. Rakhshita Dhar is Senior Director of Venture Investments Health at Leaps by Bayer. Ms. Dhar received her Undergraduate degree in Biochemistry from Mumbai University and her Master’s in Molecular Biology from Georgetown University. Ms. Dhar’s past leadership experience include Director of Business Development at Roche Pharmaceuticals where she led collaborations with Dyno Therapeutics and Rheos Biosciences. She also spent several years at MassBio developing an accelerator program for life-science start-ups.
Dr. Gregg developed technologies for multiplexed genome engineering in microbial systems under Dr. George Church and brings leading expertise in genome design, microbial fermentation, and glycobiology of the immune system. Dr. Gregg completed his research fellowship at Harvard University, his PhD in Biomedical Sciences at University of California, San Diego, and his undergraduate work in Biomedical Engineering at The Johns Hopkins University. Dr. Gregg also led the strain engineering and synthetic biology efforts at GreenLight Biosciences prior to joining GRObio as Chief Science Officer.
Dr. Mandell, a scientist and entrepreneur, is a leading expert in synthetic biology, protein engineering, artificial intelligence, and biological and medical informatics. Together with Dr. George Church, he leveraged GROs to produce the first proteins with stability and function dependent on non-standard amino acids. Dr. Mandell completed his research fellowship in genetics at Harvard Medical School where he was a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Fellow of the Life Sciences Research Foundation. Dr. Mandell completed his PhD at University of California, San Francisco, his MSc at University of Edinburgh, and his undergraduate degree in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University. Dr. Mandell currently serves as a member of BIO’s (Biotechnology Innovation Organization) Early-Stage Advisory Council. Prior to his role at GRObio, Dr. Mandell served as a consultant with WarpDrive Bio.
Geoffrey W. Smith is the Founder and Managing Partner of Digitalis Ventures, a venture capital firm that partners with entrepreneurs, inventors, and scientists across all stages of venture investing to develop technology-driven solutions to complex problems in health. Geoff serves as a Trustee of The Jackson Laboratory where he is a member of the Executive Committee and Chair of the Finance Committee. He is also a member of the Scientific Advisory Board for Brigham & Women’s Hospital in Boston. Geoff also serves as the Chair of the Bard Early College Board of Governors. Previously, Geoff was the founding Director of the Mount Sinai Institute of Technology and a Professor in the Department of Population Health Science and Policy at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Geoff received a B.A. (with honors) from Williams College and a J.D. from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.
Dr. Church is a synthetic biologist with foundational contributions to genome sequencing, DNA synthesis, multiplex accurate genome editing (MAGE) and protein engineering. Dr. Church is Professor of Genetics at Harvard Medical School, Director of Wyss Inst. SynBio platform, and recipient of awards like Bower, Time100, NAS, NAE. Dr. Church led the development of genomically recoded organisms (GROs) at the core of the GRO Biosciences platform, and leads the company’s Scientific Advisory Board.
Dr. Ellington is the Fraser Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Texas at Austin and is a respected expert in using evolutionary techniques to engineer biopolymers and cells. Dr. Ellington led the development of key protein translational machinery to incorporate non-standard amino acids into proteins using GROs. Dr. Ellington is a GRObio co-founder and serves on the company’s Scientific Advisory Board.
Ms. Howson is a highly experienced business development executive and consultant with more than 30 years of service in the pharmaceutical and biotechnology industries. Ms. Howson currently serves on the board of directors of MEI Pharma, Inc. and Immunic, Inc. Between 2009 and 2019 she has also served on the boards of various life sciences companies. Ms. Howson also served as executive vice president, corporate business development at Lexicon Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a public biotech company. Prior to joining Lexicon, Ms. Howson served as senior vice president, corporate and business development at Bristol-Myers Squibb and SmithKline Beecham PLC. Ms. Howson holds an MBA from Columbia University, an M.S. from City University of New York and a B.S. in chemical engineering from the Technion, Israel.
Arthur Hiller is a Boston-based biopharma executive. Over the last decade, he has been CEO of two early stage companies in the areas of drug discovery and cardiovascular medical devices. He currently provides consulting and business advisory support, and serves in part-time senior executive operating and mentoring roles for a wide range of start-up and early stage companies in the Boston area. His career spans more than 35 years of experience across a wide range of functional areas and sectors of the life sciences and healthcare technology industry, where he has held executive positions in general management, marketing, sales, sales management, and business development at Millennium Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Merck and Co, and two other large, multinational pharmaceutical companies.
Dr. Peattie is veteran life science entrepreneur who currently serves as Managing Partner at SV Bio Ventures. Dr. Peattie has served in senior leadership roles at Valo Health, GlaxoSmithKline, and she served as Director of Business Development in the Office of Technology Development at Harvard University. Previously, Dr. Peattie maintained her own biotechnology consulting firm, Pleiades Advisors, and she also held executive scientific, strategy and planning positions at Cubist Pharmaceuticals, Inc. and at Valeo Medical, Inc., of which she was a co-founder. Dr. Peattie holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a PhD in Biochemistry & Molecular Biology from Harvard University. She was also a post-doctoral fellow at Stanford University and received her BA in Chemistry from Hollins University.
Dr. Roberts currently serves as CEO of Civetta Therapeutics. He is an accomplished R&D executive with expertise in building companies focused on the discovery and clinical development of innovative new therapeutics. Dr. Roberts has a track record of advancing highly novel targets, biology and pharmacological approaches through to development candidates, into first in human clinical studies and successful clinical proof of concept. Dr. Roberts has experience in startups, small biotech and Big Pharma and he has a proven track record in corporate and business development in/out licensing, mergers and acquisitions, and public financings. Dr. Roberts holds a PhD in Organic Chemistry from University of California, Riverside, and completed his post-doctoral work at University of Bern in Organic Chemistry and Chemical Biology.
Dr. Kaarsholm has 21 years of experience at Novo Nordisk leading development and commercialization of metabolic therapeutics. He has delivered several key metabolic disease therapeutics serving in senior leadership roles in protein engineering. Dr. Kaarsholm provides scientific and commercialization expertise for GRObio’s DuraLogic technology.
Dr. Lodie now serves as Chief Scientific Officer at Quell Therapeutics, and was previously Chief Scientific Officer at Gamida Cell, Ltd. Prior she held senior leadership roles at Blue Rock Therapeutics, Syros Pharma, and Sanofi/Genzyme where she led immunology efforts from discovery through early clinical development. Dr. Lodie provides scientific, early clinical translation, and commercialization expertise for GRObio’s ProGly technology.
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Partnerships
We pursue partnerships to keep core value in the company while advancing our internal and external programs. We welcome partnering opportunities to extend our platform and to access novel application spaces.
- We focus on partnering to develop NSAA therapeutics that address currently unsolvable problems in healthcare
- We also engage in platform-level collaborations that leverage our biofoundry, GRO platform, and NSAA engineering technologies to advance partners’ programs
- Our strategic partnerships build alliances, bolster the company’s financial position, and advance patient care while increasing our capacity to focus on additional areas of great clinical need
