John Swart

John R. Swart, Ph.D., is the CEO of Cytotheryx and previously served as President and CEO of Exemplar Genetics. Dr. Swart has over 20 years of experience in the biomedical research industry, focusing on business development and operations management.

Susan Slocum

Susan Slocum currently manages $2.1 billion in assets for Children’s Minnesota and an additional $2.6 billion in related ERISA funds.  As an active allocator, Ms. Slocum’s approach for Children’s Minnesota is to optimize returns commensurate with the organization’s risk tolerance.   

Within the private market allocation of the portfolio, Ms. Slocum has segregated and developed a Strategic Healthcare Impact Portfolio that is composed of select fund managers and direct investments that target or can pivot to improving child health.  Collaborating with Children’s internal researchers and subject matter experts, she seeks to improve both Children’s view of innovative science and fund managers’ view of practical use.

Currently, Ms. Slocum is working on how Children’s portfolio is advocating across the diversity, equity, and inclusion landscape.  She has actively rebalanced the public equity exposure across sectors to move the public market funds managed by firms that advocate for women and people of color up from the previous 31% to over 60% while improving the risk/return profile of the portfolio

Tim Argo

Tim Argo is a Senior Director of Licensing at Mayo Clinic. He manages an IP Portfolio and evaluates/advances the commercial potential of a variety of medical inventions and discoveries coming from Mayo’s clinical and research activities. Develops and implements technology sales and marketing plans; manages the patent process; identifies potential commercial partners; facilitates start-up company formation and funding; negotiates license agreements and other commercialization arrangements; manages relationships with industry; advises Mayo physicians and scientists regarding the protection of intellectual property and technology-based business matters.

Cassie Edgar

Cassie J. Edgar is a scientist and an attorney with over 20 years of corporate experience, in addition to her more recent time in private practice. Throughout her career, she’s held positions in R&D, legal, and management roles to working to translate innovation into revenue for technologies that feed the world and keep it healthy. Cassie’s experience and professional network in the biotechnology sector spans plant, animal, and human health. Before moving to private practice, she served as Chief IP & Regulatory Officer for Genus plc where she created global IP and regulatory strategies for gene editing, and was accountable for patent protection as well as negotiating and drafting research and licensing agreements. Previously at Pioneer DuPont (now Corteva), she held roles in research, legal and management including IP Counsel, Sr. Regulatory Counsel, and R&D Director. Cassie has a B.S. in Molecular Genetics from The Ohio State University, an M.S. with an emphasis on Biomathematics from North Carolina State University, a J.D. from Drake University, and is also an alumna of Harvard Business School after completing the General Management Program in 2013.

Don Lehr

Donald Lehr serves as Chief Legal Officer for Precigen. Mr. Lehr has broad experience in the areas of corporate, securities, and general business law. Prior to joining Precigen, he practiced law with the law firm of Hogan Lovells LLP (formerly Hogan & Hartson, LLP) in Baltimore, Maryland. While at Hogan Lovells, his practice included the representation of privately and publicly held corporations across many industries, including biotechnology, pharmaceuticals, healthcare, software, technology, and manufacturing. Prior to Hogan Lovells, Mr. Lehr served as a judicial clerk for the Honorable Irma S. Raker of the Court of Appeals of Maryland. Mr. Lehr received a BA degree from Swarthmore College and JD from the University of Maryland School of Law.

Stuart Winter
Observer

Since joining Children’s Minnesota as its Chief Research Officer in 2017, my focus has been to promote and support the institution’s 12 research departments.  Beyond the traditional goal of utilizing research to advance discovery and innovation, Children’s Minnesota has aligned its research efforts to advance value-based care, quality/safety, and equity/inclusion to the benefit of all Minnesota children and their families. I manage the creation and implementation of basic and applied research projects, the evaluation and development of new processes, technologies or products, and partnerships with surrounding academic institutions. As an affiliate Professor of Pediatrics at the University of Minnesota, I co-chair the Child Health Advisory Committee with Dr. Mark Schleiss. The charter of this effort is to understand and mitigate social determinants of child health.

With certification by the American Board of Pediatrics in Hematology/Oncology from 1994 onward, I have three decades of experience as a practicing clinician-scientist. My translational focus is primarily directed towards the biology and classification of acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL) and the conduct of pediatric clinical trials. I have experience in managing pre-clinical trials, including those that involve testing new agents (biologics) in animal models.  As a former IRB chair and treating physician, I have experience in all phases of clinical trial design and implementation, including the steps that involve regulatory agencies (e.g. the FDA, CTEP, NIH, PedCIRB) as well as pharmaceutical companies.